jawbreaker.io

Welcome to today’s podcast. “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it rhymes.” Now President Trump faces a stark choice: should he dispatch American B-2 bombers armed with 30,000-pound bunker busters against Fordo, Iran’s mountain-hidden uranium enrichment site? Since 1979, Iran’s theocracy has repressed its own people and poured resources into a nuclear program that Karim Sadjadpour calls a strategic “albatross.” It sustains just one percent of Iran’s energy demand at a cost approaching half a trillion dollars. After October 7th, Israel struck Iranian military and nuclear scientists, and Prime Minister Netanyahu declared, “We are doing what we need to do.” Now...

Welcome to Uncanny Valley. Today we’re asking the question on everyone’s mind: “What is superintelligence?” Meta has just announced a major move in its AI efforts—“investing in Scale AI and building a superintelligence AI research lab.” After trailing big names like OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google, Meta is dropping serious cash to acquire talent and accelerate research. But what exactly is superhuman intelligence? Is it an AI that outthinks us in every domain, from science to creativity? Or a system that learns and adapts faster than any human could imagine? We’ll break down the deal between Meta and Scale A...

Welcome to today’s Middle East Minute. A week of Israeli airstrikes inside Iran has upended daily life, hitting fuel depots, airports and public buildings from Tabriz to Tehran. Ordinary Iranians say the attacks shattered any sense of safety. “They want to scare us,” a shopkeeper told reporters. At the same time, crippling sanctions have drained cash reserves, leaving long ATM lines and families scrambling for banknotes. Rolling power cuts and intermittent internet blackouts only add to the anxiety. “We never imagined war would reach us here,” said a university student in northern Iran. As Tehran’s leaders issue stern warnin...

Welcome to Productivity Power. I’m your host. Ever feel mentally drained before lunch? That’s decision fatigue, and it’s real.

As Fast Company puts it, “Routine isn’t boring. It’s strategic.” Automate your first 60 minutes: pick your breakfast, outfit, and workout ahead of time, then follow a fixed morning ritual to reserve brainpower.

The article advises making your to-do list the night before because “a prepared mind is a focused mind.” Jot down your top three priorities and one quick win to seize the morning.

Fuel up with a protein-rich breakfast—eggs, Gr...

Welcome back to Newel of Knowledge. Today we’re tackling how to make new friends—no cold-calling strangers required. First, lean into your existing circles. Tap into coworkers, classmates or neighbors. “Shared routines breed shared trust,” and a simple coffee break or study session can spark a genuine connection. Next, join interest-based groups—book clubs, cooking classes or weekend sports leagues. Here you’re walking into a community that already shares your passion. As one expert puts it, “Friendship blossoms when experiences are shared, not forced.” Third, volunteer. Giving your time alongside others creates natural teamwork and conversation. Finally, nurture casual a...

Welcome to Longevity Lowdown. Today we ask: Do longevity drugs work?

“As elixirs of life go, long-term fasting is a surprising candidate. Yet it seems to work.” Experiments on species from nematode worms to rhesus monkeys show that near-starvation prolongs lifespan, and “short-term ones suggest similar physiological changes happen” in humans.

Drugs promise an easier route. Rapamycin, an immune suppressant, blocks a key growth pathway and has extended mouse lifespans by up to 25 percent. Metformin, a decades-old diabetes pill, is now in a major trial to see if it can delay ageing in people.

Then t...

Welcome back to Quick Career Tips. Today, we’re unpacking advice from a Principal Engineer at Amazon on how to stand out without breaking a sweat.

First, he says, “Focus on delivering high-impact solutions that others will notice.” In practice, this means picking projects that align with big business goals and seeing them through end to end.

Next, he urges you to “think bigger than your role.” That means proactively spotting problems outside your immediate tasks and offering to solve them.

Collaboration is key. He reminds us, “Helping your peers—through code reviews, mentoring, or...

Welcome to today’s show. David and Jake are joined by Dominic Preston to unpack Trump Mobile. They warn that while launching a carrier is “easy” and can be lucrative, Trump Mobile is “a pretty bad deal.” The promised $500, “made-in-America,” “coming-soon device” may not even exist. We dive into the rise of MVNOs, debate what “made in the USA” really means, and ask if there’s any redeeming quality behind this obvious grift.

Next, TV is dying faster than anyone expected. We explore the unstoppable growth of Netflix and YouTube, the surprising success of FAST networks, and what this shift means fo...

Welcome to today’s episode. Have you ever noticed how your vocabulary seems to shift when you jump on a Zoom call or watch a lecture online? Researchers at the Max Planck Institute have found that since ChatGPT launched, words like “meticulous,” “delve,” “realm,” and “adept” are up to 51 percent more common in academic videos. One lead author even warns, “Delve is only the tip of the iceberg.”

But it’s not just word choice. AI is shaping tone, favoring longer, more structured speech with muted emotion. Cornell studies show smart replies boost cooperation—but if your chat partner might be usin...

Welcome to “Future Focus,” where we explore the tech shaping tomorrow. I’m your host. Today: how AI is helping students find the right college.

After graduating in 2014, Julia Dixon found herself bombarded with questions from friends and family about college applications. She realized too many students lacked affordable, expert support. So she co-founded CollegeVine, an AI-powered platform that offers personalized guidance—from essay feedback to admissions probability.

“Every student deserves access to high-quality guidance,” Dixon says. The system analyzes a student’s grades, test scores, interests, and extracurriculars, then suggests safety, match, and reach schools. It ev...

Welcome back to One Minute Tech, where today we’re looking at seven under-$50 tools that make your life easier. First up, the Rosewill NVMe SSD Cloner—just “plug in the USB-C power adapter, slot your source on the left and destination on the right, press the clone button,” and you’re done. Next, the Sangabery digital caliper delivers precise millimeter or inch readings, ideal for checking laptop thickness or fitting 3D prints. The HOTO NEX O1 Pro cordless screwdriver “charges over USB-C” and offers variable torque for PC builds or furniture assembly. Smooth out plastic, wood, or metal edges with the...

Looking to climb hills with minimal pedal power? One option is to buy a new ebike. But with reliable models starting at $1,200, it’s tempting to convert your own ride. As WIRED explains, you can “slap an aftermarket unit on your traditional bike,” turning it into an ebike with pedal-assist, throttle, or both. Pedal-assist uses cadence or torque sensors to “kick on” as you pedal, while throttle kits, like motorcycle grips, deliver instant power without pedaling. Easy “treadmill” style converters—think Rubbee X or Livall PikaBoost—attach to your fork or seatpost, “contacting your tire” to roll you forward. Want something more pe...

Welcome back to Lore Party Media. Today we’re diving into Funcom’s ambitious open-world MMO, Dune: Awakening. Set on the unforgiving planet Arrakis, this game blends base building, resource management, and epic faction warfare. You’ll harvest spice amid deadly sandstorms, forge alliances with Atreides, Harkonnen, or Fremen, and even face off against colossal sandworms. As one reviewer puts it, “the world of Arrakis has never felt more alive,” from the harsh desert vistas to the tense PvP encounters. Crafting plays a central role—players construct sietches, secure water supplies, and research advanced technologies to tip the balance of power. Co...

Welcome to Reality Check, I’m your host. Today we’re diving into Bored Panda’s dazzling roundup of 94 mind-blowing photographs that prove “reality is far stranger than fiction will ever be.” From a backyard amateur telescope capture of the rare 2024 supermoon to wind turbines that look like they’re floating in the sky, each image forces you to pause and stare. These pictures “stand out among the flood of other content out there,” showcasing everything from chimeric cats with half-and-half eyes to flowering meadows on horseback in Italy.

The article doesn’t stop at eye candy. It shares advice f...

Hello and welcome to this week’s snapshot from the natural world. In Michigan, wildlife experts finally trapped a black bear with a large lid stuck around its neck—“we don’t know how it fed itself for two years,” they admit—but he’s now safe and recovering. In Brazil, a jaguar growls at rescuers in Jundiaí, pushed from its home by São Paulo’s expanding “stone jungle.” Off the Isle of Man, dolphins dazzle us with their acrobatic leaps. In Corsica, spongy moth caterpillars are defoliating oak woods, while here in the UK two baby roe deer bask and play und...

Hello and welcome to Tech Tidbits. I’m your host, and today we’ve got our first look at the upcoming Nothing Headphone 1, thanks to a fresh round of leaks.

Renders posted by Equal Leaks reveal what the company is calling a “two-step design,” with a “rectangular-shaped base with rounded corners” and, perched on top, “a transparent oval island” that connects to the headband. If you’re picturing an 80s cassette tape, you’re not far off—Nothing’s design team seems to be going full retro-futuristic.

Meanwhile, real-world photos from the Nothing Fan Club Instagram account show t...

Welcome back to Tech Brief. Today, Cloudflare’s CEO Matthew Prince sounds the alarm on the widening gap between Google’s crawling and real traffic to publishers’ sites. Ten years ago, Google crawled two pages for every visitor it sent along. Six months ago it was six to one. Now it’s eighteen to one. That means search bots are pulling down more content than ever, while human readers aren’t clicking through. As Christine Wang at Axios puts it, “publishers face an existential threat in the AI era and need to take action to make sure they are fairly compe...

Welcome back to another Friday edition of On Call from The Register. Today’s tale comes from “Ray,” who built a sales validation tool for a point-of-sale team using rapid application development. It was “quick and cheap,” he told us—a simple front-end alternative to mainframes that the team embraced instantly.

Months later, Ray’s phone rang: the program had stopped working. He tried to triage over the phone, but got “no coherent feedback at all,” so he set off on a four-hour drive in the pouring rain.

On arrival, the supposed “problem” turned out to be a feature the te...

Welcome to Tech on a Budget. I'm your host. Today, we’re exploring five sub-$15 gadgets from AliExpress. Top of the list is the Tuya Zigbee Smart USB Adaptor Switch, a $5 device with three USB-A ports that links to SmartThings. It earns “an A for value and functionality.” Next up, a $14 USB-powered ceiling fan that's “surprisingly quiet” with three power settings but only “produces a light breeze”—I give it a B+. The $4.59 Tuya Zigbee water sensor didn't connect out of the box, but after driver tweaks I had a responsive leak detector—C+ grade. Then there's a $14 smart Wi-Fi clock moveme...

Your new book is titled On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything. How do you define “risk” in contexts as diverse as financial markets, political forecasting, and personal decision-making? In your experience, what common cognitive biases most often derail our ability to assess and embrace calculated risks? Can you walk us through a prediction you made that seemed almost too risky at the time—but ultimately paid off? What did that teach you? During the COVID-19 pandemic, you applied forecasting models in public health. Which lessons from that period do you think are most under-appreciated today? How do you balanc...

Welcome back to Retro Tech Minute. Today we’ve got a real surprise for vintage Mac fans. Imagine finding a 1987 Macintosh SE case at a garage sale—only to discover it had been gutted and painted to become an aquarium. That’s exactly what happened to Duncan Hall, but instead of fish, he filled it with a Dell XPS Core i7 laptop motherboard and called the result the “PhoeNIX SE.”

Duncan swapped the old monochrome CRT for a 9.7-inch LCD mounted on custom 3D-printed brackets. He even kept two floppy bays—one now houses a webcam for Zoom calls...

The Nultys, from Bolton, flew to Cancun for a luxury stay at Riu Palace Costa Mujeres. On April 3rd, Colin Nulty was lying by the pool when he heard gunshots mere metres away. “Chaos broke out, with lots of screaming and people running in every direction,” he said. He, his wife and their 14-year-old daughter scrambled for cover behind sun loungers. Colin, a former fire service veteran, tried to help a man shot in the head but found he was already dead. Authorities locked down the resort and later revealed it was a shootout between a cartel and undercover poli...

Hello and welcome to Today’s Tech Tidbits. In a recent Astral Codex Ten post titled “Make a Personalized AI Kids’ Book,” we learn how easy it is to craft a one-of-a-kind story for your child using AI. First, you pick a few key details—your child’s name, favorite animal, maybe a dream destination—and feed them into a text generation model. Next, the AI spins up a custom adventure, complete with charming characters, playful dialogue, and a moral lesson tailored just for your kid. Then you add illustrations, also AI-generated, to bring the pages to life. As the author wry...

Hello everyone, and welcome to this week’s tech update. I’m your host, Sarah Lee. Today we’re talking about Samsung’s upcoming earthquake warning system, which promises far more control than Google’s current Android alerts.

Right now on Android, there’s a simple toggle for earthquakes above magnitude 4.5. Samsung’s version, spotted by Galaxy Techie, lets you customize that threshold anywhere from a barely noticeable magnitude 1.0 up to a more significant 4.0. You can even “preview earthquake warnings and set different thresholds for day and night,” giving you complete control over when you’re notified.

But Samsung do...

Welcome to today’s episode. We’re examining why President Trump’s decision to kill Iran’s top general, Qasem Soleimani, is causing a rare rift in the Republican Party. On January 3rd, Mr. Trump hailed the strike as decisive, calling Soleimani “the number one terrorist in the world.” Hawkish senators like Lindsey Graham praised the move as “the right call at the right time,” while Marco Rubio insisted it showed the president “will defend American lives.” Yet others in the party are urging caution. Senator Mitt Romney warned that “we can’t drift into open-ended war without congressional debate,” and Rand Paul c...

Welcome to the WunderTech podcast. Today, I’m showing you “How I Monitor My Entire Home Lab.” Imagine having real-time visibility into every server, uptime alert and log entry—all at your fingertips. “With just a few lines of configuration,” you can scrape detailed CPU, memory, disk and network stats using Prometheus and Node Exporter. Those metrics flow straight into Grafana, where you get beautiful dashboards for every host.

For uptime checks I turn to Uptime Kuma. As I say in the video, “it’s dead-simple to set up and you get instant alerts when something goes down.” I pair th...

Today we’re talking about why you don’t need to accomplish things to matter…

A conversation with Maya, a high-achieving mom, shows how our worth can get tied to our task list. As she said, “If I’m not accomplishing something, I feel like I don’t matter.”

We live in a world that prizes busyness, making rest feel like failure and worth tied only to output.

How do we break free? First, notice the voice telling you “I should be doing more.” Then redefine success: maybe it’s holding a boundary or being present for...

Welcome to the Saddleback Leather podcast. Today we’re thrilled to introduce the 2025 Saddleback Club Membership Bundle. Saddleback Leather says this year’s Third Edition gear is “built tougher, smarter, and more rugged than ever,” and after taking Dave out into the dunes, it’s clear why. First, the new Hiker’s Backpack offers full-grain leather panels, a weather-sealed canvas body, and heavy-duty zippers that stand up to dust, sand, and whatever your journey throws at you. Next, the Set of Three Gear Bags—each in small, medium, and large—keeps your essentials organized in thick leather that only gets better with...

Hello and welcome to today’s Tech Brief. New research shows U.S. software developers lead the world in AI-assisted coding. A team of researchers analyzed 80 million GitHub submissions from 2018 to 2024 and found that in 2024, an estimated 30.1 percent of U.S.-sourced Python functions were AI-generated—more than Germany’s 24.3 percent, France’s 23.2 percent, India’s 21.6 percent, Russia’s 15.4 percent, and China’s 11.7 percent.

The study argues that “once developers use AI for 30 percent of their code, quarterly commits rise by 2.4 percent.” They estimate the annual value of AI-assisted coding in the U.S. at nine to fourteen billion d...

Welcome to your Wake County update. Today, Wake County Commissioners unanimously approved a landmark zoning change for Research Triangle Park, or RTP. For the first time in 65 years, this 7,000-acre research hub can open its doors to homes, shops and recreation. “I can’t think of another urban area in North America that has 7,000 acres of non-optimized land in the center,” says Scott Levitan, president of the Research Triangle Foundation. Right now, 55,000 people clock in each day—and then head home to a park that feels like a ghost town. Under the new rules, up to 500 acres in Wake County c...

Hey there, and welcome to “One Minute Wired.” Today: 7 ways to limit your endless doomscrolling. As WIRED points out, “If you actually measure the amount of time you spend scrolling through algorithm-led social media feeds each day, it will probably add up to more hours and minutes than you’d guess.” Worse yet, “Time can quickly slip away while you’re checking up on friends, celebrities, the news, and the viral memes of the day.”

Here’s how to hit pause:

Hello and welcome to today’s tech podcast. Apple is exploring using generative AI to design its custom chips, Senior Vice President Johny Srouji revealed. Speaking at Belgium’s Imec research hub, he told Reuters, “Generative AI techniques have a high potential in getting more design work in less time, and it can be a huge productivity boost.” Apple plans to integrate AI into electronic design automation tools, joining industry leaders Cadence and Synopsys in this race. This effort builds on Apple’s chip legacy, from the A4 system-on-a-chip to the M-series processors that power its Mac lineup. Reflecting on that sh...

Hello and welcome. Today we’re talking about Dosa Divas, a bold new game from Outerloop Games that literally serves up resistance. As protestors clashed with ICE agents in Los Angeles this June, the brown and Black team behind Dosa Divas stayed close at Summer Game Fest. “In case of an ICE raid, we’re gonna stay together,” game director Chandana Ekanayake explained, highlighting the stakes they navigate every day.

In Dosa Divas you’re not just flipping pancakes—you’re fighting capitalism with every sizzling dosa. This time-bending roguelike sends you from modern streets back to 1965 India, where y...

Hello and welcome to Lottery Lens. On April 19, 2023, the Lotto Texas jackpot stood at $73 million, skyrocketing to $95 million by Saturday after 92 rollovers. Dawn Nettles, founder of the Lotto Report, recalled, “I knew right then. Somebody was buying all the combinations.” With 26 million possible picks, a syndicate guaranteed their win—and Texas paid out nearly $58 million after taxes. Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick blasted it as “the biggest theft from the people of Texas in the history of Texas.” The scandal triggered a Texas Rangers probe, the retirement of executive director Gary Grief, and a ban on ticket consignment apps like Jackpocket...

Welcome to Tech Minute. Today we’re asking: How much energy does AI really use? It turns out nobody’s quite sure. In a recent WIRED deep dive, reporters reveal that companies guard the numbers on data-center power like trade secrets. We know a single ChatGPT query uses about 0.34 watt-hours of energy—“about what an oven would use in a little over one second, or a high-efficiency lightbulb would use in a couple of minutes,” as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman explained. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Training massive models can consume hundreds of megawatt-hours and require rack...

Hello and welcome to the Continuous Delivery Podcast. Today we’re diving into Dave Farley’s take on a question every team grapples with: what’s the real difference between a coder, a developer, and a software engineer?

Farley starts by unpacking the coder. “A coder writes code,” he says, and that’s it. They take a specification, translate it into syntax, and move on. The developer steps up a notch: they not only write code, they own features, collaborate with teammates, and consider user needs along the way. As Dave puts it, “A developer builds a solution, not...

Welcome to Linux Insights. Today we’re diving into how to use systemd for auto-mounting storage volumes on your workstation or server. As Jay LaCroix explains, “mounting volumes with systemd is very effective and is the recommended method going forward.”

First, identify your block device—say /dev/sdb1—and create a matching .mount unit in /etc/systemd/system. Name it after the mount path, for example, media-data.mount, and set the correct [Mount] options: What device, what directory, and your filesystem type. Then create a media-data.automount unit with [Automount], pointing to the same mount file, and set IdleTi...

Welcome to Wired’s one-minute podcast. Today we’re talking about a new breed of AI that, as the article puts it, “never stops learning.”

Modern large language models might write beautiful sonnets and elegant code, but they lack even a rudimentary ability to learn from experience. This new model flips that script. It’s built to update its own knowledge on the fly, drawing on fresh data streams and real-time feedback to refine its understanding.

Rather than freezing its world view at the end of training, it continuously adjusts its internal map. If you correct it...

Hello and welcome to Tales from the Tar Heel Traveler. Today we head to North Carolina to meet a man who has been collecting baseball cards for decades. What started as a childhood hobby has grown into a treasure trove of sports history.

“I remember buying my first card for a penny,” he says, recalling that dog-eared 1950s card that sparked his passion. Over the years, he’s tracked down rare gems like a 1914 Babe Ruth rookie card and a pristine 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle, calling each one “a time capsule of America’s pastime.”

He travels swap...

Welcome back to The Global Minute. Today, we’re zeroing in on a growing missile imbalance in the Middle East. According to a U.S. official and an analyst familiar with the numbers, “Iran has more offensive missiles than Israel has interceptors.” That alarming gap threatens to upend Israel’s missile defense strategy, which relies heavily on the Arrow 3 system. The Arrow 3 interceptors have been critical in countering long-range ballistic missile threats from Iran and Yemen, but today they “are now in short supply.”

With fewer Arrow 3 batteries available, Israel may face tougher choices if missile volleys increase. Op...