GoKawiil
Tech News
The Department of Defense has launched Project Meridian, an initiative described by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth as a study of future battlefields meant to identify weapons and technologies the military will need and propose ways to develop and field them. The effort will be led by Elon Musk, Palmer Luckey and Newt Gingrich, none of whom have served in the US military.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Project Meridian, a 120-day Pentagon initiative to identify future warfare capabilities and technologies. Elon Musk, Palmer Luckey and Newt Gingrich will serve as co-leads under Pentagon technology chief Emil Michael, drawing on experts from government, industry, academia and policy circles. Hegseth said the project aims to determine which military domains and capabilities the U.S. must master, not to set new strategy or policy.
The U.S. Department of Defense is reportedly negotiating a $5 billion loan to Fluidstack, a company that builds AI computing infrastructure. The deal is being advised by a bank founded by Palmer Luckey, a prominent early backer of Donald Trump.
Tech entrepreneur Paul Graham argued publicly that companies should always hire the most qualified candidate regardless of nationality, prompting Palmer Luckey to challenge him for suggesting that hiring any foreign worker undermines an 'American firms should hire Americans' stance. The dispute unfolded as a lengthy public exchange over how immigration and merit intersect in tech hiring decisions. The author uses a personal family story about an Army-drafted tool engineer who ended up working on early heat-shield research under Wernher von Braun to question what 'qualified' really means.