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Tech News
OpenAI is developing a new 'Persistent mode' for its Codex AI coding agent, spotted in code changes to the command-line tool's public repository. Unlike current settings that stop after minutes or hours, this mode would let Codex keep working on a task until manually stopped, or 'put to sleep.' An OpenAI spokesperson confirmed the feature is being tested but said there are no immediate plans for a public launch.
A community developer has released an unofficial build that repackages Cursor's Electron-based Grok Bot app, officially available only for macOS and Windows, so it runs natively on Ubuntu and other Linux distributions. The project swaps out Windows-only native components and packages the app as a .deb, tarball, or AppImage, currently targeting Grok Bot version 0.29.0 on Electron 42.1.0.
Chris Malone, OpenAI's head of data centers, has reportedly left the company, becoming the 13th senior executive to depart this year. His exit follows a string of high-level resignations amid the company's rapid infrastructure expansion.
Opslane is a new open-source platform that records user sessions to catch bugs beyond crash reports, including silent UX failures like unresponsive buttons or abandoned forms. It ranks issues by how many users are affected, investigates the highest-impact ones, and automatically opens verified pull requests when it can confirm a fix works in a sandbox environment. The system integrates with coding agents via an MCP server and delivers a daily Slack digest summarizing what broke and what's ready to merge.
A new Entrepreneur commentary argues that most companies underinvest in training as a strategic tool, focusing instead on sales, tech and operations while overlooking the staff who directly shape customer experience. The author says businesses that link training to standards, coaching and culture—not just task completion—build stronger consistency and retention over time.
Peter Cullen, the Canadian voice actor who gave life to Optimus Prime across Transformers films, TV shows and games, has died at his Los Angeles home. He was also known for voicing Eeyore in Winnie the Pooh productions, King Kong in the 1976 remake, and the villainous K.A.R.R. on Knight Rider. His family confirmed he passed peacefully, surrounded by loved ones.
Hugging Face and Pollen Robotics released Microduck, a 25-centimeter open-source robot shaped like a duck that costs $399 and can walk, grip objects up to 800 grams, right itself after falling, and even roller skate. The robot uses a camera, lidar, and dual IMUs to sense its surroundings, and its behaviors are trained in simulation before being deployed and fine-tuned on the physical device.
A startup called Operation Bluebird, founded partly by former Twitter trademark counsel Stephen Coates, has launched a new social network named Twitter.now. The move follows a lawsuit from X last year, which tried to block the company from using the Twitter name, though Operation Bluebird argued X had abandoned trademarks like 'Twitter' and 'Tweet.' The platform is currently in paid testing at $20 for early access and features an AI trust-scoring system called VERA.
Nvidia announced hardware optimizations for popular Chinese open-source AI models, including DeepSeek's V4 Flash and Alibaba's Qwen 3.8, as part of a broader push to support open-weight systems. Alongside the announcement, an SEC filing tied to its quarterly earnings warned that potential White House restrictions on Chinese-origin AI could hurt its business by limiting its ability to support apps built on those models.
Australian authorities have arrested two men in Perth accused of belonging to TeamPCP, a hacking group linked to widespread supply-chain attacks on open-source software. The pair face over a dozen charges including hacking, money laundering, and cybercrime offenses, with a court appearance scheduled for Thursday. The FBI says the group compromised more than a thousand organizations and stole over half a million credentials.
Google announced two new Android app quality requirements in response to memory chip shortages fueled by AI data center demand. One mandates stricter thresholds on dynamic memory and bitmap usage along with code optimization to prevent crashes and slowdowns, while the other requires apps to automatically restore sign-in status when users switch devices, via the Zero Tap Sign-In standard. Developers have until February 2027 for the memory rules and April 2027 for sign-in compliance.
Pollen Robotics, owned by Hugging Face, has opened pre-orders for Microduck, a 25cm, sub-800g bipedal robot priced at $399. Unlike the stationary Reachy Mini, Microduck is built for mobility, packing 15 motors, a camera, LiDAR, two IMUs and an articulated beak so it can walk, sit, crouch, recover from falls and even roller-skate.