Kyle Nowak

🤖 Mr. Robot ain’t got nothing on the real deal. Xbow, an AI model developed by a startup of the same name, recently became the first bot to reach the top of HackerOne’s prestigious US leaderboard by reputation. 

Here are five stats from this past week that made our team go “whoa.” Hopefully you will, too.

🗽 Zohran Mamdani is New York City’s unlikely new Democratic candidate for mayor, after he officially declared victory in this week’s primary election when his main opponent, former NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo, conceded the race.

"Nothing can bring you peace but yourself."

–Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

❓ Our question to you: In general, do you agree with President Trump’s push to have NATO nations spend at least 5% of their GDP on defense?

💼 The share of US workers who hold multiple jobs rose to between 5.3%-5.6% over the first five months of this year, a range last hit during the Great Recession, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

🤖 AI models can also experience the joy of curling up with a new book, according to a decision filed late Monday by a federal judge, who ruled that Anthropic is allowed to train its chatbots on published books without the authors’ permission. 

“Short cuts make long delays.”

–J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973)

🍿 Pixar’s new sci-fi adventure film Elio earned just $21 million domestically in its opening weekend—and $35 million globally—on a combined production and marketing budget of $250+ million.

🌎 President Trump flew to The Hague, Netherlands, yesterday for the annual summit of leaders from the 32 countries in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

💊 A new daily pill from Eli Lilly can induce patients to lose as much weight as a weekly injection of Ozempic, according to research presented last weekend at the annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association.

“Be not glad at the misfortune of another, though [they] may be your enemy.”

–George Washington (1732-1799)

❓ Our question to you: In general, how do you feel about President Trump’s decision to launch military airstrikes targeting Iran’s three key nuclear sites?

🔭 Astronomers published the first-ever pictures from the new Vera C. Rubin Observatory yesterday, in a move heralded as astronomy’s biggest moment since NASA revealed the first images from its James Webb Space Telescope.

"Never say never. Because limits, like fears, are often just an illusion."

–Michael Jordan (b. 1963)

❓ Our question to you: To all our working readers—how do you feel about the increasing shift away from a traditional 9-to-5 workday?

🇮🇷 Early Sunday morning local time, the US conducted a series of airstrikes against Iran in coordination with Israel, joining its escalating effort to dismantle Iran's nuclear program.

📝 A new report on “agentic misalignment”—when AI agents do things misaligned with objectives set by human users—breaks down Claude’s step-by-step thought process as it decided to go full Frank Underwood.

“I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took an excuse.”

–Florence Nightingale (1820-1910)

🤖 OpenAI is currently negotiating with Microsoft—a top shareholder and strategic partner—to secure approval for its conversion into a for-profit company, and to loosen Microsoft’s grip on OpenAI’s products. But those talks aren’t going so well, according to a new Wall Street Journal report.