Publish posts and daily digests
Daily digests, topic reading and writing about Micro.
A growing sense of unease is settling over the companies that were supposed to power the AI revolution. This week brought a flurry of warning signs: the chipmaker Solidigm pulled its IPO, smaller “neocloud” providers specialising in AI compute are coming under severe financial p…
Robinhood’s announcement that bitcoin, gold and oil contracts are now its fastest-growing prediction markets signals a quiet but significant evolution in how financial speculation works. Until recently, prediction markets were largely the domain of sports betting and election fo…
The Chancellor will use Wednesday’s Budget to announce a £100 million investment in what is being described as a “world first” AI Biosecurity Lab. The facility aims to use artificial intelligence to detect, track, and respond to biological threats — from novel pathogens to engin…
Friday’s trading session was dominated by a sharp risk-off move as Brent crude surged above $116 per barrel, a six-month high, pushing the Dow down more than 600 points and tech stocks to a two-and-a-half-month low (CNBC). The oil spike reflects the ongoing Iran war’s reshaping…
In an age of relentless online scrutiny, Muslims often find themselves judged — by outsiders who dismiss Islam as backward, and sometimes even by fellow believers eager to police orthodoxy. The Quran offers a striking scene in Surah Al-Mutaffifin: when the disbelievers saw the f…
Bitcoin Core — the software that powers the vast majority of bitcoin nodes — quietly adopted a new security policy this week that reflects a fundamental shift in how open-source projects must think about vulnerability disclosure when artificial intelligence can find flaws in min…
The European Commission has floated the idea of Canada becoming the EU’s first “associate member” — a phrase with no definition in the treaties, and for that reason more revealing than a formal proposal would be. The framing matters: it lands as the Trump administration’s tariff…
A week of relentless cyber incidents — ransomware attacks on critical infrastructure, data breaches at major firms, and disruptions to everyday services — has led security professionals to ask a sobering question: is this the new baseline? Drew Silcock’s reflection on the patter…
A new CNBC survey has found that 36% of registered US voters now rank government corruption as the most important issue facing the country, edging out the cost of food and groceries. The finding cuts across party lines and reflects a deep disillusionment with the integrity of po…
The news that Polymarket has fired its chief marketing officer, Matthew Modabber, after an internal investigation into alleged misconduct including a scheme involving fake trades, raises questions that extend beyond one company. Modabber was not just an executive — he was a clos…
Ethereum developers made an unusual decision this week: they voluntarily delayed the Glamsterdam upgrade on the Hoodi test network after security researchers at ChainSecurity warned that proposed gas-accounting changes could alter how existing smart contracts handle failed trans…
Andy Burnham has written in The Guardian that his determination to reach net zero is “unwavering”, even as his government approved Shell’s Jackdaw gasfield in the North Sea. The decision, which environmental groups say could produce emissions equivalent to millions of cars, puts…
Markets took a sharp risk-off turn on Thursday as fresh AI doubts sent tech stocks tumbling, with the Nasdaq posting its worst session since June. Meta’s slide of nearly 7% — after earnings showed negative free cash flow from heavy AI spending — amplified the rout, while crypto …
The collapse of a war-damaged building in Gaza that killed at least 20 people, and a drone reportedly targeting Mecca, are the kind of events that test the soul. For Muslims watching from afar, these stories stir grief, anger, and a longing for justice. Yet the Quran offers a qu…
The Central Bank of Ireland’s decision to fine Coinbase Ireland €3.25 million — roughly $3.6 million — for failures in safeguarding customer funds is a reminder of something the crypto industry has struggled with since its early days: the gap between technology’s potential and …
For years, stablecoins were seen within crypto markets as a convenient on-ramp and off-ramp — a way to park funds without exiting into traditional finance. That narrative is shifting. As a CoinDesk analysis notes, stablecoins are now being adopted as B2B cross-border payment and…
Two stories from the UK today capture something important about the gap between technological change and institutional response. Barclays is cutting 5,000 jobs — roughly 5% of its workforce — citing increased reliance on artificial intelligence. Meanwhile, Downing Street is adve…
When Elon Musk poured $158 million into a Super PAC backing Republican Ken Paxton for the Texas Senate, he wrote on X that Democratic nominee James Talarico had “something deeply wrong” with him. Talarico’s response cuts to a deeper truth: “There is something deeply wrong with …
India has become the hottest data center market in Asia, with tech giants and investors piling capital into a sector that promises to host the world’s digital future. Yet as reported by CNBC, this rapid expansion is colliding with growing public anger over the enormous water and…
The internet faced one of its most severe security crises in years after critical vulnerabilities were discovered in the PHP programming language, forcing governments in France and Finland to shut down web services and prompting the US National Security Agency to warn organisati…