Welcome to the Techmeme Ride Home for Friday, September 20, 2024, I'm Brian McCullough. Today, you might want to hold off on updating to MacOS 15 Sequoia. What exactly is Europe trying to get Apple to do? The AI Energy Crunch means they're turning 3 mile island back on, could AI usage also mean we use up all our 5G capacity? And of course, the weekend long-read suggestions. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech.
Some of you should consider pausing on updating to MacOS 15 Sequoia as it appears that the new OS has broken security tools made by the likes of CrowdStrike, Sentinel-1, Microsoft, and others. CrowdStrike went so far as to delay support for Sequoia entirely, apparently. Quoting Tech Crunch.
At this point, it's unclear exactly what is the issue, but it appears to affect several products made by companies that provide software for MacOS users and enterprises, which has caused frustration among people who work on and with MacOS Focus Security Tools. As a developer of MacOS Security Tools, it's incredibly frustrating time and again to have to deal with understandably upset users and understandably blaming your tools for breaking their max.
When in reality, it was Apple's fault all along, said Patrick Wartle, the founder of Mac and iOS Security startup W, and a long time expert on MacOS Security. I get it, that writing bug free software is challenging, but maybe if Apple spent less time and money on marketing and more time on actually testing their software, we'd all be better off, Wartle told TechCrunch.
On the day of MacOS Sequoia's release, a CrowdStrike sales engineer said in a Slackroom for Mac admins that the company had to delay support for the new version of Mac's operating system. I'm very sorry to report that we will not be supporting Sequoia on day one in spite of our intention and previous track record to support the latest OS within hours of general availability. The engineer said in the message seen by TechCrunch.
The engineer also said CrowdStrike sent out a tech alert to customers, adding that quote, there's quite a lot going on with the changes in the network stack. We're also tracking some similar issues with other vendors and have feedback and a case in to Apple. While we would love for there to be a fast follow-patch that resolves this for us, we're acting under the assumption, there won't be and we'll need to fix it in our code with a sensor release, the sales engineer wrote.
On Monday, a Sentinel 1 support account warned customers in the same Mac Focus Slack channel do not upgrade your endpoints until you have a supported Sentinel 1 agent citing a series of issues with the new Mac OS version. Other people in the same Slack reported having issues with Microsoft Defender for MacOS after the Sequoia update Microsoft did not respond to a request for comment.
Remember how we spoke this week about those new specification proceedings that the EU has opened for Apple under the DMA? I don't think I had a firm hold on what exactly that meant. So thankfully, Natasha Lomas at TechCrunch has got us covered quote. Specifically, with these two latest proceedings, the block will be telling Apple how to provide interoperability to connected devices seeking to tap into iOS's connectivity features such as in areas like notifications and device pairing.
It also plans to instruct it on how to handle interoperability requests from app developers building software for its mobile and tablet platforms iOS and iPad OS, both of which are regulated as so-called core platform devices under the DMA. The first proceeding focuses on several iOS connectivity features and functionalities predominantly used for and by connected devices the commission wrote in a press release.
Connected devices are a very large and commercially important group of products including smartwatches, headphones and virtual reality headsets. Companies offering these products depend on effective interoperability with smartphones and their operating systems such as iOS. The commission intends to specify how Apple will provide effective interoperability with functionalities such as notifications, device pairing and connectivity.
The second proceeding focuses on the process Apple has set up to address interoperability requests submitted by developers and third parties for iOS and iPad OS. It is crucial that the request process is transparent, timely and fair so that all developers have an effective and predictable path to interoperability and are enabled to innovate the commission added.
Reach for comment Apple spokesman Julian Trasdorf emailed a statement in which the company wrote at Apple were proud of the fact that we've built over 250,000 APIs that allow developers to build apps that access our operating system and functionalities in a way that ensures users privacy and security. To comply with the DMA, we've also created ways for apps in the European Union to request additional interoperability with iOS and iPad OS while protecting our users.
Underlining the protections we've built over time would put European consumers at risk, giving bad actors more ways to access their devices and data. We will continue to work constructively with the European Commission on a Path Forward that both protects our EU users and clarifies the regulation.
The commission has six months to conclude this pair of proceedings after which it says it will send preliminary findings to Apple explaining the measures it is expected to take to effectively comply with the DMA's interoperability obligation. A summary of the EU's findings will also be made public at that time.
The two new DMA proceedings on Apple do not imply the commission has reached the end of the wider noncompliance proceedings still open on the company so Apple could still face a DMA enforcement decision and potential fine down the line. However, the EU is clearly looking for quick results for its flagship market contestability regulation.
For that reason, the commission is likely to be most keenly focused on finding ways to apply the new toolbox so the DMA can work at pace to reshape Apple's compliance instead of landing a hefty penalty. But clearly, having a big stick to encourage compliance helps. Constellation Energy plans to invest $1.6 billion to revive the 3-mile island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania. Yes, that 3-mile island. But get this. They are reopening it just to serve one customer. Quoting Bloomberg.
The owner of the shutter to 3-mile island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania will invest $1.6 billion to revive it, agreeing to sell all the output to Microsoft as the tech-tighten seeks carbon-free electricity for data centers to power the artificial intelligence boom. Constellation Energy, the biggest US operator of reactors expects 3-mile island to go back into service in 2028 according to a statement Friday.
While one of the site's two units permanently closed almost half a century ago after the worst US nuclear accident, Constellation is planning to reopen the other reactor which shut in 2019 because it couldn't compete economically. Microsoft has agreed to purchase the energy for two decades and declined to disclose financial terms. This is the first time Microsoft has secured a dedicated 100% nuclear facility for its use.
The decision is the latest sign of surging interest in the nuclear industry as power demand for AI sores. More than a dozen reactors went dark over roughly the past decade in the face of increasing competition from cheaper natural gas and renewable energy, but growing demand for electricity from factories, cars and especially from data centers has spurred interest in nuclear plants that can provide carbon-free power around the clock.
Policy makers and the market have received a huge wake up call, Constellation Chief Executive Officer Joe Dominguez said in an interview, there's no version of the future of this country that doesn't rely on these nuclear assets. Constellation which has seen it shares jump this year thanks to mounting investor awareness of the value of power plants plans to fund the project from its own coffers rather than seek state or federal support.
That's in contrast to whole tech international which is pursuing the only other disclosed effort to restart a closed reactor with about $1.8 billion in conditional funding from the US Energy Department and the state of Michigan. Next era energy has also said it's considering reviving a closed Iowa reactor in part to supply data center customers and quote. So we knew that.
We knew that AI stuff is gobbling up our energy resources, but what I did not know was that maybe our wireless resources are in danger as well. Nvidia has launched something called AI Ran which integrates AI into the radio access network and could allow telcos to run third party AI apps at the networks edge. But the real purpose here is to keep 5G going.
Quoting fierce network Nvidia is aiming to solve one of the biggest challenges and telecommunications today how to handle the strain artificial intelligence puts on wireless networks and it's getting a little help from partners like T mobile, Ericsson and Nokia to do it. In a nutshell Nvidia thinks that AI could be the answer to the very problems it is causing by integrating AI into the radio access network via its new AI Ran platform.
The company believes it can make mobile networks smarter and faster. T mobile is set to be the first company to put this hypothesis and product to the test. AI Ran has quote. Tormendous potential to completely transform the future of mobile networks, but it will be difficult to get right said Mike Severt CEO of T mobile in a statement. T mobile will work with Nvidia Nokia and Ericsson at its Bellevue AI Ran Innovation Center to quote. T mobile network industry forward.
According to Nvidia, AI Ran will leverage billions of data points to create algorithms that determine optimal network adjustments and predict real-time capacity. It will allow telcos the ability to run third party AI applications at the networks edge. A report from mobile experts recently predicted that the rise of AI applications, particularly AI powered assistance and augmented reality platforms, will soon drive mobile data traffic beyond the capacity of current 5G networks.
It's a big problem since traditional networks were built for voice and data, but today's world requires much more. Thank Autonomous Vehicles, Smart Factories, and Generative AI Applications. By bringing AI into the heart of network operations, Nvidia is hoping to help telcos manage their growing network loads while also setting the stage for the next leap forward, 6G. The idea is that AI Ran can act as the digital backbone for these emerging technologies.
A cohort of companies including Nvidia, T mobile, Nokia, and Ericsson are pursuing this opportunity via the AI Ran Alliance. How do you make a password that's strong enough? No one will be able to guess it, but also impossible to forget. And how can you do that for 100 different websites? And how can you make it so everyone in your company can do the same without ever having the need to reset them? Sounds like an impossible task, unless you have one password.
As I've said, I've been using one password for about 15 years. I have it on every computer and phone I've had over that time. I used one password today. I used it like three minutes ago. Companies lose hours every day just from employees for getting every setting passwords. A single data breach costs millions of dollars, but one password secures every sign-in to save you time and money.
Any device any time, one password lets you securely switch between iPhone, Android, Mac, and PC with convenient features like Autofill for quick sign-ins. All you have to do is remember the one strong account password that protects everything else. Your logins, your credit cards, secure notes, or the office Wi-Fi password. Protect your global workforce with simple security, easy, secret sharing, and actionable insight reports.
Right now, my listeners get a free two week trial at 1password.com-ride for your growing business. That's two free weeks at 1password.com-ride. Don't let securities slow your business down. Go to 1password.com-slash-ride. Have you heard about senolytics yet? They're a class of ingredients that's being called the biggest discovery of our time for promoting healthy aging and enhancing your physical prime.
As we age, everyone accumulates senescent cells in their body, senescent cells, cause these symptoms of aging such as aches and discomfort, slow workout recoveries, sluggish mental and physical energy associated with that middle-age feeling. Tell me about it. Also known as zombie cells, they are old and worn out and not serving a useful function for our health anymore, but they're taking up space and nutrients from our healthy cells.
Much like pruning, the yellowing, and dead leaves off a plant, qualia, senolytic removes these worn out senescent cells to allow for the rest of them to thrive in the body. You only take it for two days a month, and since I've been using it, I certainly have been having less aches and pains, the getting old stuff. Resist aging at the cellular level. Try qualia senolytic. Go to qualialife.com slash ride for up to 50% off and use code ride at checkout for an additional 15% off.
For your convenience, qualia senolytic is also available at select GNC locations near you that's q-u-a-l-i-a-life.com slash ride for an extra 15% off your purchase. Thanks to qualia for sponsoring today's episode. Real quickly, because most of us can't buy one of these, but I'm finding it fascinating the popularity of Huawei's $2800 mate XT trifold phone. Again, this is a phone that kind of folds up three times according to style.
It's officially gone on sale in China, and pre-orders apparently surpassed 6.5 million. This is for a phone number one that expensive, but also compare that number to the fact that only 3.9 million foldables of any make shipped worldwide in q2. So 6.5 versus 3.9 million for all other foldables. This one phone has handily outsold in pre-orders all the other foldables in the world. There are apparently lines out the door in China.
At Huawei's flagship shop, some who described themselves as super fans were annoyed after being told that only those whose pre-orders had been confirmed could buy the tri foldable mate XT. I've been here since 10 pm last night because this tri folding phone is a first and I'm excited to support our country set a university student and surname ye. But this is very disappointing. They should have made it clear we can't buy.
It was a similar story at the Huawei Wang Fujin store in Beijing where access to the much hyped mate XT which folds three ways like an accordion screen door was restricted to those whose pre-orders had been confirmed. On the Alibaba owned Jan Yu platform, there were around 4,760 listings for the new Huawei phone for both sale and pre-orders as a Friday afternoon.
The average price for the phones on the platform was $50,000 yuan or $7,000 in the electronics market in Shen Zhen, a phone stall vendor said she was selling the most expensive version of the mate XT with the highest memory for $150,000 yuan or $21,000 compared to the store price of $23,999 while she was offering the $2800 model for more than $4,000 and quote. Time for the weekend long-rate suggestions.
If you ask me who the best entrepreneur is in the world at the moment and you assume that we are moving on from saying it's Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos, I would without a doubt answer Palmer Lucky from kickstarting this era of VR to basically attempting to remake the entire defense industry. I'm fascinated by Palmer Lucky so Grock this long profile from Tablet Mag. Quote.
Lucky is the owner of the world's largest video game collection which he keeps buried 200 feet underground in a decommissioned US Air Force nuclear missile base which is the kind of thing a man can afford to buy when he single-handedly turns virtual reality from the laughing
stock of the technology industry into a multi-billion dollar enterprise by inventing the Oculus Rift in a camper trailer parked in the driveway of his parents duplex in Long Beach, California where at 19 years old he lived alone and survived on frozen burritos and Mucho Mango Arizona T.
After selling Oculus to Facebook for $2.7 billion and then getting fired by Mark Zuckerberg for making a $10,000 donation to a pro-Trump troll group dedicated to shit posting in real life Lucky tried his hand at building a nonprofit private prison chain that only gets paid
when ex-prisoners stay out of prison after he decided that would require too much lobbying work he attempted to solve the obesity epidemic by making food out of petroleum products centrifuged out of the sewer system a perfectly delicious and low-calorie idea he maintains which he
only ditched because of the marketing nightmare of persuading people to eat remanufactured sewage in the end he decided instead to found and real industries a defense technology startup that makes lethal autonomous weapons systems it is now valued at $14 billion
in his spare time when he is not providing US customs and border patrol with AI powered long-range sensors or Ukraine with drones to attack high-value Russian targets or winning first place in the Texas Renaissance festivals costume contest with historically meticulous
renderings of Henry VIII and Ann Bolin's son and stitched by his wife Nicole who's been at his side for 16 of his 31 years on earth lucky recently built a bypass for his peripheral nervous system to experiment with giving himself superhuman reflexes vestibular implants
to pipe sounds into his skull so that instead of having to call him and wait for him to pick up and real employees could just pick up a designated Palmer phone and talk straight into his head and a virtual reality headset that by tying three explosive charges to a narrow
band photo sensor that can detect when the screen flashes red at specific frequencies i.e. game over kills you in real life when you die in a video game and quote and then secondly finally from the Atlantic whatever happened to the minivan i'm serious quoting
the Atlantic in the first year of introducing them Chrysler sold 210,000 Dodge caravans and Plymouth Voyagers its initial two models overall minivan sales reached 700,000 by the end of the decade as the station wagon all but disappeared but the new design also
generated stigma as the child of the station wagon and the service van the minivan quickly came to represent the family you love but must support and also transport in a nation where cars stood in for power and freedom the minivan would mean the opposite as a vehicle
it symbolized the burdens of domestic life that stigma only grew with time in 1996 automobile magazine called this backlash somewhat understandable given that the members of my generation who were at that point young adults had quote spent their childhood strapped into the backseat
of one perhaps it was childhood itself that seemed on cool rather than the car that facilitated it in any case minivan would soon be obsolesced by sport utility vehicles the earliest SUVs were more imposing than they are today hard riding trucks with 4x4 capabilities such as the
Chevrolet suburban and Jeep wagon here these were as big or even bigger than the plumber kidnapper vans of the 1970s and they got terrible gas mileage cost a lot of money and were hard to get in or out of especially if you were very young or even slightly old yet the minivan's identity had grown toxic and for suburban parents the SUV played into the fantasy of being somewhere else or doing something better and quote no bonus episodes for you this weekend talk to you on Monday