Morning Digest
35 stories from 9 sources, 207 more held back.
Armenia’s pro-EU prime minister targets former rival. Former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan, now a major opposition figurehead, has been detained in a corruption probe, the head of his office has said. Kocharyan and his eldest son Sedrak are reportedly being held amid a series of searches on their properties.
Gaza rescue crews have been searching the enclave’s ruins for thousands of Palestinians believed to remain buried beneath buildings destroyed in Israeli strikes, some dating back to the first months of the war.
Norway warns EU against pushing green agenda. Norway will continue developing oil and gas fields in the Arctic, Energy Minister Terje Aasland has said, despite EU calls for a moratorium on drilling in the region. The bloc should no longer see his country as Europe’s “green battery,” he added.
These are the lessons Russia learned from Asia. Fifteen years ago, it appeared that Russia-Japan relations were improving to the extent that Japan could become, for Russia, an eastern version of Germany as a former enemy turning into a major economic partner in a relationship where Russian resources were traded for the other partner’s investment and advanced technologies.
Germany’s Porsche has signed a $1.5 billion deal with India’s largest IT services company as the luxury carmaker looks to leverage AI to make itself more competitive in a fast-changing industry.
This article is brought to you by Ollobot. From about 2017, individuals began to truly connect with the initial wave of companion robots. These devices had personality, moved around, joked, and answered when you spoke to them.
Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us your events for inclusion.
ATLANTA -- The PGA Tour's future postseason will include a Championship Series finale -- a 72-hole, stroke-play tournament that will finalize the points list and determine the seasonlong champion -- followed by the top golfers competing in match play over two weeks in a reimagined Tour Championship.
The LeBron James Family Foundation Invitational, which will be played July 6-7 at the South Course at Firestone Country Club, will feature amateurs and pros from the tour's Pathway to Progression Pro-Bound Five program.
Duke has named San Jose State transfer Walker Eget its starting quarterback ahead of the Blue Devils' season opener against Tulane on Sept. 5, sources told ESPN's Pete Thamel. After a four-year career at San Jose State, Eget applied for and was granted an NCAA waiver in February to be eligible for the 2026 season. Duke added him via the transfer portal following Darian Mensah's departure for…
Golden State Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase didn't want to say definitively that Monday's 80-66 victory over the Minnesota Lynx was her team's top defensive performance of the season. But it was easily among the best, and exactly what the Valkyries needed after consecutive losses.
PHOENIX – For the better part of the past four and a half years, Kevin Gausman pitched like a bona fide ace for the Blue Jays. A World Series-tested veteran, the 35-year-old brings both moxie and a nasty fastball/splitter mix to the top of the Cubs’ rotation – both of which he displayed in a dominant outing Monday.
Think back to March, preparing for Opening Day of the 2026 season, and imagine someone told you, “Neither Aaron Judge nor Shohei Ohtani will win MVP this season. That’d be hard to believe, no? Yordan Alvarez still has a stranglehold on AL honors in our latest MVP poll, but for the first time this season, we’ve seen a seismic shakeup in the NL.
The Top 100 Prospects list isn't formulated to pick the players who will perform best in the Minor Leagues. It's a ranking that looks at which players project to have the most success in the Majors. Of course, when tooled-up prospects also happen to put up big numbers, that's worthy of celebration.
Congratulations, at last, to the Brewers who, for the first time all season, are atop these Power Rankings. They’re actually the fourth team to hold the No. 1 spot this year, and the others are, like them, from the National League: The Dodgers (who had been No. 1 for the past two months before this week), the Braves and, for one week back in May, the Cubs.
Humanoid robots and AI are chasing a powerful promise: replacing repetitive manufacturing tasks for lower cost, easing caregiver shortages, taking people out of dangerous work, and helping more of us live better, fuller lives in environments built for humans. That’s important, and it’s coming. On rural farms or urban construction sites, the problem looks different.
Like other global automakers, XPeng Motors is branching into humanoid robots. The electric vehicle manufacturer today said that its Dogotix robotics unit has raised more than $900 million in its initial funding round, bringing its pre-money valuation to $5 billion and post-transaction valuation to more than $6.3 billion.
While a digital twin does not necessarily replace a systems integrator, it can help manufacturers evaluate robots and plan applications, says RoboDK.
The addition of physical AI to the workforce requires more key performance indicators than throughput, according to the president of HireArt.
Donald Trump’s investment portfolio raked in millions in oil and gas stocks while Americans all got gouged at the pump. Trump’s fiercely devoted blonde 35 year-old aide Natalie Harp’s deleted social media posts have come to light, revealing years of over-the-top devotion to the president. In Texas, conservatives are pledging to break with the Republican Party over their support for AI data…
Today, Raw America managing editor Carl Gibson sat down with Ellie Leonard of The Panicked Writer Substack and Kait Justice of the Downwind of Truth Substack. Ellie and Kait are two leading independent researchers covering the Jeffrey Epstein saga who have been digging deep into evidence most legacy outlets still haven’t touched.
Former federal officials are revealing that the White House already has a secure nuclear bunker, which undermines Donald Trump’s main argument for his $600 million ballroom. A Pentagon spokesperson just admitted that it keeps a secret blacklist of journalists who ask questions it doesn’t like.
Mary Peltola launches her campaign as a Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Anchorage, Alaska, U.S., January 17, 2026. John here, and this is the Sunday Wrapup. This week, Democrats saw their chances of retaking the Senate — which seemed like a pipe dream just a year ago — significantly improve, all thanks to a handful of Senate races in red states.
PHOENIX – A season ago, Michael Busch was the Cubs’ home-run leader. But after smacking 34 bombs in 2025, the first baseman came into Monday sixth on the roster with just 16 this year. It’s not that he hasn’t been effective – his .352 on-base percentage was the highest of his young major league career – but he hasn’t been the same lineup-carrying presence he was at times last season.
PHOENIX — You might have heard that the Cubs are in a playoff race. While there’s still more than a month of baseball before the postseason begins and the Cubs play their most important games of the year, the games are pretty important already, with the Brewers threatening to pull away in the NL Central and teams like the Phillies and Padres hot on the Cubs’ heels in the wild-card standings.
SEATTLE — Cubs left fielder Ian Happ had a chance to join a mighty exclusive baseball fraternity. Only 13 players in major-league history have hit two grand slams in the same game, and after Happ banged his first off the foul pole in the third inning Sunday, he strolled to the plate with the bases loaded again in the eighth. He drew a walk instead of becoming the newest member of the club.
SEATTLE — The Cubs can be happy they didn’t get swept out of the Pacific Northwest by a sub-.500 Mariners team after winning with a 19-2 rout Sunday.
This release of the Anthropic plugin for LLM mainly provides compatibility with the recently released anthropic v1.0.0 Python library, which switches from httpx to httpx2. OpenAI made the same change in their v3.0.0 release two weeks ago. Anthropic provide this migration guide for upgrading to 1.0, so I prompted Fable 5 in Claude Code with:.
Your executable is a SQLite database (via) Farid Zakaria describes a neat Linux pattern for creating a SQLite database file that can be directly used as an executable binary. The trick sets the SQLite file format's 4-byte application ID (68 bytes into the file) to SELF, standing for Structured Executable & Linkable Format.
Anthropic’s best AI model struggles to attract users as cheaper tools thrive (via) A few interesting numbers in this FT story gathered from "people with knowledge of the matter":. This article also introduced me to the Ramp AI index, which uses billing data from 70,000 Ramp credit card using companies to estimate model adoption.
Prior to Fable, it felt silly to waste too much time improving your coding harness or context strategies. A new model would arrive at the same price (or cheaper!) and paper over most of your problems. It was (and still is!) incredible.
The Middletown Works facility is considered to be Cleveland-Cliffs’ flagship plant for producing automotive steel, with the capacity to produce 3 million tons of raw steel per year. The project would maintain current production levels while “improving operational reliability, productivity, energy efficiency, and cost competitiveness,” the company said in a news release.
The United States and Canada failed to reach a deal Friday that would have averted 50% levies President Donald Trump promised last month, further souring the trade relationship between two of North America’s largest economies.
Manufacturers are increasingly prioritizing energy procurement — including efficiency, fuel diversity, or other investments — amid an ongoing rise in prices. Few industries have been untouched by this year’s convergence of geopolitical turmoil, an artificial intelligence infrastructure boom and federal policies that have contributed to energy cost increases.
Brad Howell had hit a ceiling he couldn't hire his way past. His company, R&D Specialties, is a UL-certified panel builder that's served the oil and gas industry in Odessa, Texas, since 1983. To grow, he needed more skilled labor.
Armenia’s pro-EU prime minister targets former rival. Former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan, now a major opposition figurehead, has been detained in a corruption probe, the head of his office has said. Kocharyan and his eldest son Sedrak are reportedly being held amid a series of searches on their properties.
Gaza rescue crews have been searching the enclave’s ruins for thousands of Palestinians believed to remain buried beneath buildings destroyed in Israeli strikes, some dating back to the first months of the war.
Norway warns EU against pushing green agenda. Norway will continue developing oil and gas fields in the Arctic, Energy Minister Terje Aasland has said, despite EU calls for a moratorium on drilling in the region. The bloc should no longer see his country as Europe’s “green battery,” he added.
These are the lessons Russia learned from Asia. Fifteen years ago, it appeared that Russia-Japan relations were improving to the extent that Japan could become, for Russia, an eastern version of Germany as a former enemy turning into a major economic partner in a relationship where Russian resources were traded for the other partner’s investment and advanced technologies.
Germany’s Porsche has signed a $1.5 billion deal with India’s largest IT services company as the luxury carmaker looks to leverage AI to make itself more competitive in a fast-changing industry.
ATLANTA -- The PGA Tour's future postseason will include a Championship Series finale -- a 72-hole, stroke-play tournament that will finalize the points list and determine the seasonlong champion -- followed by the top golfers competing in match play over two weeks in a reimagined Tour Championship.
The LeBron James Family Foundation Invitational, which will be played July 6-7 at the South Course at Firestone Country Club, will feature amateurs and pros from the tour's Pathway to Progression Pro-Bound Five program.
Duke has named San Jose State transfer Walker Eget its starting quarterback ahead of the Blue Devils' season opener against Tulane on Sept. 5, sources told ESPN's Pete Thamel. After a four-year career at San Jose State, Eget applied for and was granted an NCAA waiver in February to be eligible for the 2026 season. Duke added him via the transfer portal following Darian Mensah's departure for…
Golden State Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase didn't want to say definitively that Monday's 80-66 victory over the Minnesota Lynx was her team's top defensive performance of the season. But it was easily among the best, and exactly what the Valkyries needed after consecutive losses.
Donald Trump’s investment portfolio raked in millions in oil and gas stocks while Americans all got gouged at the pump. Trump’s fiercely devoted blonde 35 year-old aide Natalie Harp’s deleted social media posts have come to light, revealing years of over-the-top devotion to the president. In Texas, conservatives are pledging to break with the Republican Party over their support for AI data…
Today, Raw America managing editor Carl Gibson sat down with Ellie Leonard of The Panicked Writer Substack and Kait Justice of the Downwind of Truth Substack. Ellie and Kait are two leading independent researchers covering the Jeffrey Epstein saga who have been digging deep into evidence most legacy outlets still haven’t touched.
Former federal officials are revealing that the White House already has a secure nuclear bunker, which undermines Donald Trump’s main argument for his $600 million ballroom. A Pentagon spokesperson just admitted that it keeps a secret blacklist of journalists who ask questions it doesn’t like.
Mary Peltola launches her campaign as a Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Anchorage, Alaska, U.S., January 17, 2026. John here, and this is the Sunday Wrapup. This week, Democrats saw their chances of retaking the Senate — which seemed like a pipe dream just a year ago — significantly improve, all thanks to a handful of Senate races in red states.
PHOENIX – For the better part of the past four and a half years, Kevin Gausman pitched like a bona fide ace for the Blue Jays. A World Series-tested veteran, the 35-year-old brings both moxie and a nasty fastball/splitter mix to the top of the Cubs’ rotation – both of which he displayed in a dominant outing Monday.
Think back to March, preparing for Opening Day of the 2026 season, and imagine someone told you, “Neither Aaron Judge nor Shohei Ohtani will win MVP this season. That’d be hard to believe, no? Yordan Alvarez still has a stranglehold on AL honors in our latest MVP poll, but for the first time this season, we’ve seen a seismic shakeup in the NL.
The Top 100 Prospects list isn't formulated to pick the players who will perform best in the Minor Leagues. It's a ranking that looks at which players project to have the most success in the Majors. Of course, when tooled-up prospects also happen to put up big numbers, that's worthy of celebration.
Congratulations, at last, to the Brewers who, for the first time all season, are atop these Power Rankings. They’re actually the fourth team to hold the No. 1 spot this year, and the others are, like them, from the National League: The Dodgers (who had been No. 1 for the past two months before this week), the Braves and, for one week back in May, the Cubs.
PHOENIX – A season ago, Michael Busch was the Cubs’ home-run leader. But after smacking 34 bombs in 2025, the first baseman came into Monday sixth on the roster with just 16 this year. It’s not that he hasn’t been effective – his .352 on-base percentage was the highest of his young major league career – but he hasn’t been the same lineup-carrying presence he was at times last season.
PHOENIX — You might have heard that the Cubs are in a playoff race. While there’s still more than a month of baseball before the postseason begins and the Cubs play their most important games of the year, the games are pretty important already, with the Brewers threatening to pull away in the NL Central and teams like the Phillies and Padres hot on the Cubs’ heels in the wild-card standings.
SEATTLE — Cubs left fielder Ian Happ had a chance to join a mighty exclusive baseball fraternity. Only 13 players in major-league history have hit two grand slams in the same game, and after Happ banged his first off the foul pole in the third inning Sunday, he strolled to the plate with the bases loaded again in the eighth. He drew a walk instead of becoming the newest member of the club.
SEATTLE — The Cubs can be happy they didn’t get swept out of the Pacific Northwest by a sub-.500 Mariners team after winning with a 19-2 rout Sunday.
Humanoid robots and AI are chasing a powerful promise: replacing repetitive manufacturing tasks for lower cost, easing caregiver shortages, taking people out of dangerous work, and helping more of us live better, fuller lives in environments built for humans. That’s important, and it’s coming. On rural farms or urban construction sites, the problem looks different.
Like other global automakers, XPeng Motors is branching into humanoid robots. The electric vehicle manufacturer today said that its Dogotix robotics unit has raised more than $900 million in its initial funding round, bringing its pre-money valuation to $5 billion and post-transaction valuation to more than $6.3 billion.
While a digital twin does not necessarily replace a systems integrator, it can help manufacturers evaluate robots and plan applications, says RoboDK.
The addition of physical AI to the workforce requires more key performance indicators than throughput, according to the president of HireArt.
This article is brought to you by Ollobot. From about 2017, individuals began to truly connect with the initial wave of companion robots. These devices had personality, moved around, joked, and answered when you spoke to them.
Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us your events for inclusion.
This release of the Anthropic plugin for LLM mainly provides compatibility with the recently released anthropic v1.0.0 Python library, which switches from httpx to httpx2. OpenAI made the same change in their v3.0.0 release two weeks ago. Anthropic provide this migration guide for upgrading to 1.0, so I prompted Fable 5 in Claude Code with:.
Your executable is a SQLite database (via) Farid Zakaria describes a neat Linux pattern for creating a SQLite database file that can be directly used as an executable binary. The trick sets the SQLite file format's 4-byte application ID (68 bytes into the file) to SELF, standing for Structured Executable & Linkable Format.
Anthropic’s best AI model struggles to attract users as cheaper tools thrive (via) A few interesting numbers in this FT story gathered from "people with knowledge of the matter":. This article also introduced me to the Ramp AI index, which uses billing data from 70,000 Ramp credit card using companies to estimate model adoption.
Prior to Fable, it felt silly to waste too much time improving your coding harness or context strategies. A new model would arrive at the same price (or cheaper!) and paper over most of your problems. It was (and still is!) incredible.
The Middletown Works facility is considered to be Cleveland-Cliffs’ flagship plant for producing automotive steel, with the capacity to produce 3 million tons of raw steel per year. The project would maintain current production levels while “improving operational reliability, productivity, energy efficiency, and cost competitiveness,” the company said in a news release.
The United States and Canada failed to reach a deal Friday that would have averted 50% levies President Donald Trump promised last month, further souring the trade relationship between two of North America’s largest economies.
Manufacturers are increasingly prioritizing energy procurement — including efficiency, fuel diversity, or other investments — amid an ongoing rise in prices. Few industries have been untouched by this year’s convergence of geopolitical turmoil, an artificial intelligence infrastructure boom and federal policies that have contributed to energy cost increases.
Brad Howell had hit a ceiling he couldn't hire his way past. His company, R&D Specialties, is a UL-certified panel builder that's served the oil and gas industry in Odessa, Texas, since 1983. To grow, he needed more skilled labor.