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Stripe developed an internal tool called Harbor that lets its teams prototype software using an AI agent. According to Stripe, the tool compiles prototypes directly in the browser as the agent works.
Unreal Labs introduced Unreal Agent, a harness for running AI agents that it says delivers up to 40% cost savings compared to OpenAI's Codex and up to 20% savings compared to Pi, without hurting performance on production workloads and coding/science benchmarks. The company says the harness manages tool calls asynchronously, removing the need for the underlying model to handle waits, polls, and heartbeats itself.
X announced it will now notify users when their posts or accounts have had visibility limited because the company complied with a government's legal demand. This builds on the 'Under the Hood' transparency feature launched in August, letting users with at least 10 monthly posts download a data file showing labels, downranking, and which country requested the restriction.
New workplace research identifies a growing performance split between employees who actively use AI tools and those who avoid them. High performers reportedly rely on specific strategies to weave AI into daily tasks—covering automation, tool choice, and quality checks—without sacrificing accuracy or independent judgment.
Cactus launched Needle 3, a foundation model small enough to run as a single 8-29MB binary on phones, wearables, robots, smart home hubs and cars. Built on what the company calls a Simple Attention Network, it sacrifices general chat ability to specialize in three tasks: text embedding for local search, structured data extraction from messy text, and tool calling that maps spoken requests to app functions. The company claims it outperforms models ten times larger on mobile tool calls and matches models two to three times bigger on extraction.
Researchers publishing in Frontiers in Psychology observed that adult chimpanzees, mostly mothers, model tool-use behaviors like extracting hard-to-reach food, then pass their tools directly to young chimps so they can imitate the motions. The team calls this deliberate handoff a form of teaching, distinct from mere observation, that helps juveniles master foraging technology.
Microsoft offers a downloadable Media Creation Tool that lets users create a bootable Windows 11 installation USB drive. The process involves running the tool as administrator, selecting a USB drive, and letting it download and write Windows 11 files, after which the drive can boot and install Windows 11 on another PC.
A developer launched a Show HN project that lets users upload an exported .xlsx Google Sheets workbook and extracts every comment thread from it in one list, showing the tab, cell reference, reply chains, and resolution status for each. The tool currently works only with spreadsheet files, not Google Docs or Slides. A companion add-on also lets users pull comments directly inside Google Sheets into a new tab without needing to export or upload a file.
A free application designed to identify and flag suspicious phone calls and messages is being highlighted as a defense against increasingly sophisticated scams. The tool works across both major mobile platforms, giving users a way to screen for fraud attempts before falling victim to them.
Minded is a new free app designed to interrupt habitual doomscrolling by prompting users to pause before opening time-wasting apps or sites. Rather than blocking access outright, it nudges users toward intentional decisions about how they spend their attention.
Newly released emails obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request show DOGE affiliate Christopher Sweet, an undergraduate at the University of Chicago, worked with colleague Scott Langmack to seek academic credit for his work at HUD. The pair drafted a framework describing his time building an AI tool called SweetRex — designed to flag agency rules for rescission — as graduate-level research spanning AI, data science, and regulatory law, rather than a standard internship.
WIRED obtained and analyzed Flock Safety's police surveillance software, revealing tools that let officers set up automated, ongoing searches across camera networks for people matching a written description, not just vehicle plates. The company added safeguards in August—shorter data retention, mandatory case codes, and automated audits—after facing canceled contracts, congressional scrutiny, and a finding that Illinois camera data reached federal immigration agents in violation of state law.