GoKawiil
Tech News
As AI data centers rise across the country, the trucking industry is quietly benefiting from hauling the materials needed to build them—HVAC systems, wiring, tubing and semiconductors. Industry executives say this equipment-heavy freight, especially flatbed and heavy-haul segments, has seen multiyear-high spot rates and tighter capacity even as broader freight demand remains uneven amid tariffs and record diesel prices.
Meta is testing robot arms from suppliers including ABB, Kinova, and Watney Robotics to handle physical data center tasks like swapping network cables and power-cycling server racks. The effort is still in early trial stages, but an anonymous Meta employee said a Kinova robotic arm could eventually take over up to 80 percent of workers' current duties. Meta declined to comment when asked about the testing.
The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, representing major automakers, has formally asked Congress to permanently ban the sale, import and manufacture of Chinese-made cars, parts and software. CEO John Bozzella cited concerns over unfair trade practices, subsidies, IP theft and surveillance, urging lawmakers to act before the current session ends. The request aligns with existing bipartisan legislation, the Connected Vehicle Security Act of 2026, targeting vehicle tech tied to China, Russia, Iran and North Korea.
A technical essay argues that describing large language models as mere next-token predictors is outdated once reinforcement learning with verifiable rewards (RLVR) enters the picture. Unlike pre-training, which only reinforces sequences already present in training data, RLVR lets models generate novel token sequences and learn from evaluating their outcomes. The piece walks through pseudocode contrasting the two training loops to show how post-training changes what the model is actually optimizing for.
An Entrepreneur contributor argues that while AI coding agents have been rapidly embraced by software teams, autonomous agents for go-to-market functions like sales and marketing remain underused. The piece attributes this gap not to AI capability limits but to fragmented, duplicated sales data that lacks connection to reliable external signals needed for commercial decisions.
A newly launched smart toothbrush priced at $499 uses AI-driven sensors to guide brushing technique and claims it can reduce the need for manual flossing. The product enters a growing category of connected oral-care devices aimed at improving dental hygiene compliance through real-time feedback.
Candidates across parties are campaigning against Flock Safety's AI-powered license-plate camera network, which operates in thousands of U.S. communities and lets police search shared vehicle data. Politicians in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Florida have called for bans, funding cuts, warrant requirements, or campaigned directly against the surveillance system. Flock defends the technology, citing its role in solving roughly a million crimes and reuniting thousands of missing people with families.
Jacob Stokes, a former Obama national security official now at the Center for a New American Security, published a report titled 'Superpowers and AGI' urging the US to prepare drastic responses if China reaches artificial general intelligence first. His proposed options range from cyberattacks to sabotage AI systems up to kinetic military strikes on physical data centers, which he acknowledges carries the highest risk of escalation.
US military branches confirmed to Senator Ron Wyden and Reuters that they have turned off advertising identifiers on service members' phones and computers. The Air Force disabled them two months ago, Special Operations Command did so recently, and the Army says mobile ad IDs have been off since earlier this year, with Windows devices blocked since before 2021.
A Denver resident filmed a newly built AI data center running its lawn sprinklers heavily enough to create standing puddles, even as Denver Water's Stage 1 drought restrictions limit residential and commercial lawn watering to twice a week through September, with a full ban starting October 1. The footage went viral and fueled anger, though it remains unclear whether the facility violated the rules, since the timing of the video, use of recycled non-potable water, or a special variance could all justify the watering.
The Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps and Special Operations Command have all turned off advertising tracking on government-issued phones and computers, according to a letter Senator Ron Wyden shared. The change, rolled out earlier this year with the Air Force following in July, blocks the advertising identifiers apps use to generate location data that gets sold to data brokers.
Ukraine is releasing millions of data points from tens of thousands of drone missions to defense contractors and commercial companies, turning frontline combat into a unique training ground for AI systems. This data offers realistic, chaotic conditions that AI developers normally cannot replicate, making it highly valuable to the defense and tech industries. The move raises calls for new oversight since this wartime data differs fundamentally from typical commercial datasets.