A new study suggesting that magic mushrooms can lengthen lifespans should be taken with, well, a pinch of salt. CC-licensed photo by afgooey74 on Flickr.
You can sign up to receive each day’s Start Up post by email. You’ll need to click a confirmation link, so no spam.
A selection of 10 links for you. The high life. I’m @charlesarthur on Twitter. On Threads: charles_arthur. On Mastodon: https://newsie.social/@charlesarthur. On Bluesky: @charlesarthur.bsky.social. Observations and links welcome.
China bans tech companies from buying Nvidia’s AI chips • Financial Times
Zijing Wu, Cheng Leng and Tim Bradshaw:
»
China’s internet regulator has banned the country’s biggest technology companies from buying Nvidia’s artificial intelligence chips, as Beijing steps up efforts to boost its domestic industry and compete with the US.
The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) told companies, including ByteDance and Alibaba, this week to end their testing and orders of the RTX Pro 6000D, Nvidia’s tailor-made product for the country, according to three people with knowledge of the matter.
Nvidia shares fell around 3% on Wednesday.
Several companies had indicated they would order tens of thousands of the RTX Pro 6000D, and had started testing and verification work with Nvidia’s server suppliers, the people said.
After receiving the CAC order, the companies told their suppliers to stop the work, the people added.
The ban goes beyond earlier guidance from regulators that focused on the H20, Nvidia’s other China-only chip widely used for AI. It comes after Chinese regulators concluded that domestic chips had attained performance comparable to those of Nvidia’s models used in China.
Jensen Huang, chief executive of Nvidia, told reporters in London on Wednesday that he expected to discuss the chipmaker’s ability to do business in China with Donald Trump that evening during the US president’s state visit to the UK.
“We can only be in service of a market if the country wants us to be,” he said. “I’m disappointed with what I see. But they have larger agendas to work out, between China and the US, and I’m understanding of that. We are patient about it.”
«
This is quite the declaration on China’s part: it’s not going to have its success in AI (or high-performance computing) dependent on foreign manufacturers and impetuous presidents. You have to admit: China’s leadership is prepared to sacrifice short-term gains for longer-term victory over, say, a century.
unique link to this extract
$599 MacBook with iPhone chip expected to enter production this year • MacRumors
Joe Rossignol:
»
Apple supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo today reiterated that a more affordable MacBook powered by an iPhone processor is slated to enter mass production in the fourth quarter of 2025, which points towards a late 2025 or early 2026 launch.
Kuo was first to reveal that Apple is allegedly planning a more affordable MacBook. In late June, he said the laptop would have around a 13in display, and an A18 Pro chip. Kuo said potential colour options include silver, blue, pink, and yellow, so the laptop could come in bright colours, like 2021-and-newer models of the 24in iMac.
This time around, he only mentioned the MacBook will have an unspecific iPhone processor. Apple recently introduced the A19 Pro chip, which has 12GB of RAM, so it will be interesting to see if the lower-cost MacBook uses that chip instead. The entire Mac lineup has started with at least 16GB of RAM since last year, with the only option with 8GB being the MacBook with an M1 chip, which is sold exclusively by Walmart for $599.
…Taiwanese supply chain publication DigiTimes expects the laptop to have a starting price of between $599 and $699 in the United States.
«
An Apple netbook! If so, the prophecy will be fulfilled. Just goes to show – the arc of history bends towards the most random predictions about Apple products coming true.
unique link to this extract
When the job search becomes impossible: three phases of burnout • Holy Ghost Stories
Jeff Wofford:
»
I have the good fortune to have a job right now, but many of my friends are out of work. Most have been searching for a while. Some are encountering a problem that has my full sympathy, something I’ve experienced myself at various times. I’m not sure I can solve it, but maybe I can help put words to what some are going through.
The problem unfolds in three distinct phases as the job search drags on.
«
The phases he identifies are: “The obvious but impossible search” (jobs that you are qualified for, yet for which you’re never hired); “The adjacent-to-impossible search” (it’s not quite your thing, but hey) and “Weird search”, when you try just any old thing.
While he admits he can’t solve the problem – he isn’t hiring you – he does have offerings. Including:
»
You’re not alone. A lot, a lot of people are in this boat right now, and frankly, in any given year somebody, probably somebody you know, is in this boat. As I write, 40% of unemployed people have been out of work for at least 15 weeks. That’s almost four months. Fully a fourth have been unemployed at least 27 weeks: over six months. Unemployment is not strange or rare. Happens to everybody: good, capable people who did miracles at prior organizations and will do them again, they just can’t do them right now.
«
iOS 26 review: a practical, yet playful, update • Ars Technica
Scharon Harding:
»
iOS 26 became publicly available this week, ushering in a new OS naming system and the software’s most overhauled look since 2013. It may take time to get used to the new “Liquid Glass” look, but it’s easier to appreciate the pared-down controls.
Beyond a glassy, bubbly new design, the update’s flashiest new features also include new Apple Intelligence AI integration that varies in usefulness, from fluffy new Genmoji abilities to a nifty live translation feature for Phones, Messages, and FaceTime.
New tech is often bogged down with AI-based features that prove to be overhyped, unreliable, or just not that useful. iOS 26 brings a little of each, so in this review, we’ll home in on the iOS updates that will benefit both mainstream and power users the most.
«
As reviews go, it’s sufficiently useful: doesn’t get into nitpicking but does know how people are going to use their phones and what the gotchas will be. Almost surely the new feature that Americans will praise to heaven is the spam call filtering system:
»
For someone like me, whose phone number seems to have made it to every marketer and scammers’ contact lists, it’s empowering to have iOS 26’s screening features help reduce time spent dealing with spam.
The phone can be set to automatically ask callers with unsaved numbers to state their name. As this happens, iOS displays the caller’s response on-screen, so you can decide if you want to answer or not. If you’re not around when the phone rings, you can view the transcript later and then mark the caller as known, if desired. This has been my preferred method of screening calls and reduces the likelihood of missing a call I want to answer.
«
Meanwhile I’ve updated an old Mac mini (not my main machine) to Tahoe (the macOS version with the Liquid Glass interface). We will see how it goes.
unique link to this extract
Why the magic mushroom anti-ageing claims are overblown • The Conversation
Mikael Palner is an associate professor of neurobiology at the University of Southern Denmark:
»
We know that diet, exercise, and genes play a big role in the ageing process and how long each of us might be alive for. We also know that certain drugs or medicines have the potential to increase our lifespan. Though there’s still a lot we don’t know about what makes one person live to 102 and another only make it to 72.
But one new study seems to suggest that psilocybin, found in so-called “magic mushrooms”, could have potential as a longevity drug. In a new study, researchers found that psilocin – the compound your body makes after ingesting psilocybin – helped human cells live longer in the lab and that psilocybin boosted survival rates in older mice.
The study has led to numerous headlines claiming that magic mushrooms could be the secret to living longer. But as someone who’s been studying psychedelic compounds like psilocybin, for the past 20 years – with a specific focus on human and rodent psychedelic dosing – I think the claims have been massively overhyped and that applying the findings to humans is deeply problematic.
…here’s the real issue, a dose of 15 milligrams per kilogram in mice reflects an extremely high psychedelic dose. Administering this dose monthly for up to nine months has never been done in human studies. In fact, rodents exposed to repeated high doses of psychedelics have, in previous studies, displayed signs of schizophrenia.
«
The tests were first done in vitro (on lung cells) and then in mus – in mice. And the high doses is why you wouldn’t really do it in humans.
unique link to this extract
Credit scores drop at fastest pace since the Great Recession • CNN Business
Matt Egan:
»
Credit scores are falling at the fastest pace since the Great Recession as Americans struggle to keep up with the high cost of living and the return of student debt payments.
The national average FICO score dropped by two points this year, the most since 2009, according to data released Tuesday by the analytics company.
Although credit scores remain significantly higher than during the Great Recession, they are down for the second year in a row. FICO found a growing share of borrowers are falling behind on car loans, credit cards and personal loans.
Younger Americans, exposed to the double whammy of high student debt and low entry-level hiring, are under even more financial pressure.
Gen Z borrowers experienced an average credit score drop of three points — the biggest decline of any age group since 2020 during the pandemic, according to FICO.
The findings underscore the growing disconnect between the euphoria on Wall Street and pessimism on Main Street. While US stocks continue to shatter record highs, a significant chunk of Americans say they are hurting.
“We’ve seen a K-shaped economy where those with wealth tied to stock market portfolios and rising home values are doing well and others are struggling with high rates and affordability problems,” Tommy Lee, senior director at FICO, told CNN.
«
I think we’ve heard about a K-shaped economy (or recovery) before, and it didn’t seem to go well then either.
unique link to this extract
ctrl/tinycolor and 40+ NPM packages compromised • StepSecurity
Ashish Kurmi:
»
The NPM ecosystem is facing another critical supply chain attack. The popular @ctrl/tinycolor package, which receives over 2 million weekly downloads, has been compromised along with more than 40 other packages across multiple maintainers. This attack demonstrates a concerning evolution in supply chain threats – the malware includes a self-propagating mechanism that automatically infects downstream packages, creating a cascading compromise across the ecosystem. The compromised versions have been removed from npm.
In this post, we’ll dive deep into the payload’s mechanics, including deobfuscated code snippets, API call traces, and diagrams to illustrate the attack chain. Our analysis reveals a Webpack-bundled script (bundle.js) that leverages Node.js modules for reconnaissance, harvesting, and propagation; targeting Linux/macOS devs with access to NPM/GitHub/cloud creds.
…The malware repurposes open-source tools like TruffleHog to scan the filesystem for high-entropy secrets. It searches for patterns such as AWS keys using regular expressions like AKIA[0-9A-Z]{16}. Additionally, the malware dumps the entire process.env, capturing transient tokens such as GITHUB_TOKEN and AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID.
«
Surprisingly, it avoids working on Windows systems; it looks for Linux or macOS systems. TinyColor is a small library for colour manipulation and conversion in Javascript. The attack area for hacking is getting larger and larger; the security still relies on humans noticing.
unique link to this extract
How Tim Cook sold out Steve Jobs • Anil Dash
Anil Dash:
»
There’s a tech industry habit of second-guessing “what would Steve Jobs have done” ever since he passed away, and most of the things people attribute to him seem like guesses about a guy who was very hard to predict and often inconsistent. But recently, we have one of those very rare cases where we know exactly what Steve Jobs would not have done. Tim Cook and Apple’s leadership team have sold out the very American opportunity that made Steve Jobs’ life and accomplishments possible, while betraying his famously contemptuous attitude towards bullshit institutions.
Steve Jobs was, amongst many other things, the biological son of an unmarried Syrian immigrant who was in the United States on a student visa, and he grew up to be a person who had a really good sense of when to say “fuck you” to the man. Both of those aspects of Jobs were plainly disrespected by the pathetic display of fealty that Tim Cook put on display on behalf of Apple in the Oval Office a few weeks ago. Cook made a mealy-mouthed entreaty to Donald Trump, slathering him with compliments that were as numerous as they were false, and then used his sweaty palms to assemble a ghastly glass-and-gold trophy for a room full of press cameras. It is, quite literally, the most grim and embarrassing thing that’s ever been done in Apple’s name, and I was watching live [in 2014] when Tim Cook and Bono awkwardly butted index fingers while inflicting U2’s worst album on everyone’s iPods.
…Steve Jobs was also, plainly, a member of the 60s and 70s counterculture that defined the community and context where his work was born. The early personal computer scene was rife with psychedelic drug use (which was then criminalized, as was recreational marijuana use), and even some of Jobs’ ordinary cultural tastes such as being a fan of “hippie music” was considered so anti-social that artists were commonly monitored by federal agencies of the time.
…The iPhone is far, far more popular than this administration. Apple is powerful! An Apple that still held onto Steve Jobs’ spirit could have played the strong hand that it has, and bet with confidence on the enthusiasm and loyalty of the American people, and called Trump’s bluff, especially since this kind of appeasement is only going to embolden the administration to demand even more tithes from Apple in the future.
Many people have the quisling impulse to insist that Apple had to kiss Trump’s ass. “They’ll be stuck with really high tariffs!” “They might lose government contracts!” This is foolishness, of cause, because all of this will still happen. The only thing that’s different is that Apple will have to navigate those headwinds while everyone in the world already knows that they’re led by a CEO who has already bent the knee, and by a board that collectively has no spine. There’s no point in having fuck-you money in the bank if you never say “fuck you”!
«
Denmark close to wiping out leading cancer-causing HPV strains after vaccine roll-out • Gavi
Linda Geddes:
»
Denmark has effectively eliminated infections with the two biggest cancer-causing strains of human papillomavirus (HPV) since the vaccine was introduced in 2008, data suggests.
The research, published in Eurosurveillance, could have implications for how vaccinated populations are screened in the coming years – particularly as people increasingly receive vaccines that protect against multiple high-risk types of HPV virus.
After breast cancer, cervical cancer is the most common type of cancer among women aged 15 to 44 years in Europe, and human papillomavirus (HPV) is the leading cause.
At least 14 high-risk types of the virus have been identified, and before Denmark introduced the HPV vaccine in 2008, HPV types 16 and 18 accounted for around three quarters (74%) of cervical cancers in the country.
Initially, girls were offered a vaccine that protected against four types of HPV: 16, 18, plus the lower risk types 6 and 11. However, since 2017, Danish girls have been offered a vaccine that protects against nine types of HPV – including those accounting for approximately 90% of cervical cancers.
…The research found that infection with the high-risk HPV types (HPV16/18) covered by the vaccine has been almost eliminated.
“Before vaccination, the prevalence of HPV16/18 was between 15 and 17%, which has decreased in vaccinated women to less than one% by 2021,” the researchers said.
In addition, prevalence of HPV types 16 and 18 in women who had not been vaccinated against HPV was five percent. This strongly suggests that the vaccine has reduced the circulation of these HPV types in general population, to the extent that even unvaccinated women are now less likely to be infected with them – so called “population immunity” – the researchers said.
«
The Danes now have the puzzle of how much cervical screening to do, if there are so few cases. Nice problem to have.
unique link to this extract
Gemini AI solves coding problem that stumped 139 human teams at ICPC World Finals • Ars Technica
Ryan Whitwam:
»
Like the rest of its Big Tech cadre, Google has spent lavishly on developing generative AI models. Google’s AI can clean up your text messages and summarize the web, but the company is constantly looking to prove that its generative AI has true intelligence. The International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC) helps make the point. Google says Gemini 2.5 participated in the 2025 ICPC World Finals, turning in a gold medal performance. According to Google this marks “a significant step on our path toward artificial general intelligence.”
Every year, thousands of college-level coders participate in the ICPC event, facing a dozen deviously complex coding and algorithmic puzzles over five grueling hours. This is the largest and longest-running competition of its type. To compete in the ICPC, Google connected Gemini 2.5 Deep Think to a remote online environment approved by the ICPC. The human competitors were given a head start of 10 minutes before Gemini began “thinking.”
According to Google, it did not create a freshly trained model for the ICPC like it did for the similar International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) earlier this year. The Gemini 2.5 AI that participated in the ICPC is the same general model that we see in other Gemini applications. However, it was “enhanced” to churn through thinking tokens for the five-hour duration of the competition in search of solutions.
At the end of the time limit, Gemini managed to get correct answers for 10 of the 12 problems, which earned it a gold medal. Only four of 139 human teams managed the same feat. “The ICPC has always been about setting the highest standards in problem-solving,” said ICPC director Bill Poucher. “Gemini successfully joining this arena, and achieving gold-level results, marks a key moment in defining the AI tools and academic standards needed for the next generation.”
…You can take a look at all of Gemini’s solutions on GitHub, but Google points to Problem C as especially impressive. This question, a multi-dimensional optimization problem revolving around fictitious “flubber” storage and drainage rates, stumped every human team. But not Gemini.
According to Google, there are an infinite number of possible configurations for the flubber reservoirs, making it challenging to find the optimal setup. Gemini tackled the problem by assuming that each reservoir had a priority value, which allowed the model to find the most efficient configuration using a dynamic programming algorithm. After 30 minutes of churning on this problem, Deep Think used nested ternary search to pin down the correct values.
«
A few years ago this would have been hailed as “AGI” (which of course computers could never reach). It’s tempting to say the same, just as when AlphaGo beat the human world champion at Go, it wasn’t AGI. I suspect we’ll never credit computers with having the same intelligence as us because they aren’t “alive”. Until they are, it’s just machines doing machine things.
unique link to this extract
| • Why do social networks drive us a little mad? • Why does angry content seem to dominate what we see? • How much of a role do algorithms play in affecting what we see and do online? • What can we do about it? • Did Facebook have any inkling of what was coming in Myanmar in 2016? Read Social Warming, my latest book, and find answers – and more. |
Errata, corrigenda and ai no corrida: none notified
The Overspill: when there's more that I want to say 