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Tech News
Meta has agreed to an $18 billion settlement with 52 attorneys general representing 29 U.S. states over allegations it designed Instagram and Facebook to hook young users. The company admits no wrongdoing but commits to detailed platform changes for minors, with the payout spread across a decade, softening its financial impact given Meta's $200 billion-plus annual revenue.
Reuters reports that Meta developed an internal restructuring effort, codenamed Project OT, that explored replacing much of the daily work of thousands of employees with AI systems overseen by small human teams. The plan, reportedly set in motion by CEO Mark Zuckerberg, called for two rounds of layoffs; the first occurred in May, but Meta scrapped the second round. Meta confirmed the scenario-planning exercise took place but said not every scenario was implemented, noting thousands of employees were instead redeployed to new priority teams.
A new analysis pushes back on fears of AI-driven obsolescence, arguing that structural bottlenecks will keep humans central to research and development. It frames AI primarily as an augmentation tool rather than a replacement, predicting that human effort will move away from routine technical execution toward tasks that resist easy verification.
A retrospective traces how Dolly Parton's 1980 film and song '9 to 5' grew out of real grievances shared by working women, originating from a Boston group formed in the mid-1970s to discuss office experiences during the feminist movement. The piece argues the cultural touchstone remains relevant because many of the frustrations it captured persist today.
Security firm Huntress published findings from investigations conducted throughout 2026 in which it helped organizations confirm they had unknowingly hired North Korean operatives posing as IT staff. Cases included an Australian healthcare firm that flagged three employees suspected of impersonating Chinese nationals, plus two separate incidents in the financial services sector uncovered in August. Huntress noted these DPRK-linked workers have grown more skilled and active, blending into IT teams while funneling wages back to the regime and potentially planting malware or stealing data.
Flipboard has acquired Graze, a Portland startup that lets creators build and monetize custom Bluesky feeds using contextual, non-tracking ads. Graze has delivered over 41 billion posts to roughly 12 million people across more than 7,000 feeds since launching 21 months ago, splitting ad revenue 70/30 with creators.
Jeff Arcuri, known for his viral crowd-interaction bits, discussed his comedic method on the How Success Happens podcast tied to his Netflix special 'Nice To Meet You.' He revealed that his seemingly spontaneous audience banter is actually built on careful preparation, financial sacrifice early in his career, and a deliberate habit of testing one risky new joke per show.
Reuters reports Meta spent 2024 developing 'Project OT,' an internal restructuring effort meant to reorganize the company around AI agents overseen by small human 'pods,' with some teams facing headcount cuts of up to 60%. Mark Zuckerberg reportedly shelved or paused a planned second wave of layoffs under the plan, which would have followed the company's earlier 10% workforce reduction this year. Meta confirmed a second plan existed but described the harsher cuts as scenarios under consideration rather than finalized decisions.
An Entrepreneur opinion piece argues that choosing an HR and payroll provider is no longer just about comparing software features and price, since AI has become nearly universal across human capital management platforms. Instead, small and growing businesses—especially those with fewer than 75 employees lacking dedicated HR staff—are now weighing providers based on how well they support scaling, evolving regulations and long-term needs.
A new open-source project called TexLite provides a browser-based, self-hosted environment for teams to write and compile LaTeX documents together. It runs as a single Node.js process with SQLite and local file storage, reusing the host machine's existing TeX installation, and adds real-time editing plus source-level commenting.
Researchers have devised a method to operate two separate genetic codes at once without needing to re-engineer an organism's entire genome to accommodate the change. The approach was tested outside living cells, so it avoids the laborious process of altering every gene, as previous efforts required when adding new amino acids to bacterial proteins.
A workplace analysis outlines seven common leadership behaviors that gradually erode employee morale and push skilled workers to leave their jobs. Rather than a single bad incident, the piece argues these are repeated patterns—like poor communication, favoritism, or lack of recognition—that accumulate over time until employees decide to walk away.