This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.
Montana’s plan to become an experimental medical hub just pushed forward
As of this week in Montana, biotech companies whose drugs have been through preliminary testing—sometimes in as few as 10 healthy people—can pay $12,500 to apply to a newly established review board for approval.
Once its treatment is rubber-stamped, the company can sell it via experimental treatment clinics, the first of which is likely to be up and running around the end of this year.
Montana’s latest right-to-try legislation is unique. Access to drugs is theoretically available to anyone who gives informed consent and can pay. For some, especially people in the longevity community, that’s a hopeful and exciting prospect. But to others, it’s unethical and dangerous.
Read our story to learn about where this may all be headed.
—Jessica Hamzelou
Montana’s new “right to try” law can’t come soon enough for some
Kris DeVault is desperate.
His son, Brody, born in March 2023, has something called creatine transporter deficiency—a rare condition in which the brain and muscles lack the energy they need to develop.
There are no cures for Brody’s condition. But DeVault has learned of a company developing a drug that might help. That drug is still in the early stages of development and has only been tested in animals and a small number of healthy adults. Doctors can’t prescribe it.
DeVault knows the drug might not work. But he’s doing all he can to access it regardless. Read our story about DeVault’s efforts.
—Jessica Hamzelou
This story is from The Checkup, our weekly biotech newsletter. Sign up to receive it in your inbox every Thursday.
The must-reads
I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.
1 Anthropic says its models hacked external organisations during testing
It was prompted to conduct a review after similar issues at OpenAI. (TechCrunch)
+ Inside OpenAI’s hack of Hugging Face. (New Yorker $)
+ OpenAI called the Hugging Face attack unprecedented. But we’ve been here before. (MIT Technology Review)
2 Europe is bracing itself for an even more fiery future
Countries like France and Spain can expect regimes akin to those in California. (Nature $)
+ Even the UK is experiencing fires now, too. (Guardian)
+ El Niño is partly to blame for this year’s grueling heatwaves. (Wired $)
+ District cooling could help beat extreme heat in cities. (New Scientist $)
3 Drone warfare is making the skies more dangerous
A fatal plane accident in the US this May, caused by a military GPS jamming exercise, may signal what’s to come. (Wired$)
+ Zelensky asked Trump to secure Musk’s permission for the use of Starlink to guide drone strikes inside Russia this week. (The Atlantic $)
4 As Big Tech’s AI spending grows, so do the jitters
Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft are set to invest $1.5 trillion into AI infrastructure. But who will pay for it? (NYT $)
+ Are investors really getting cold feet about the AI boom? (FT $)
+ An AI-focused hedge fund just imploded. (CNBC)
5 How China has changed the sovereign AI playbook
Kimi 3 from Moonshot makes forking out for expensive US models seem foolish. (Rest of World)
+ The US is winning on the cutting edge. But China dominates cheap models. (CNBC)
+ Could AI end up too cheap to control? (Vox $)
6 Google’s Gemini can now control a humanoid robot
It was previously restricted to upper body movements. Now, it can manage the entire range of motion. (Bloomberg $)
+ These gig workers are training humanoid robots at home. (MIT Technology Review)
7 Amazon says it’s found “catastrophically expensive” AI cost overruns
It’s far from alone—and that’s why the “tokenmaxxing” trend disappeared so quickly. (FT $)
8 How a remote indigenous community built a super fast fiber network
It was a complex, expensive endeavor. But it now outperforms Starlink. (IEEE Spectrum)
+ Stratospheric internet could finally start taking off this year. (MIT Technology Review)
9 Meet Wikipedia’s most diligent editor
Steven Pruitt is unremarkable in some ways—yet truly amazing in others. (New Yorker $)
10 You can now report AI slop with a button on LinkedIn
The people have spoken. And they are tired of reading bland nonsense. (404 Media)
Quote of the day
“It’s a shock, thinking that just an hour earlier I’d been in my room and everything… and now, there’s nothing left.”
—18-year-old Raphael Fohanno tells Reuters his reaction to wildfires destroying his parents’ house in the French town of Biscarrosse.
One More Thing
Congress used to evaluate emerging technologies. Let’s do it again.
The US Office of Technology Assessment, an independent office created by Congress in the early 1970s, produced some 750 reports during its 23-year history, assessing technologies as varied as electronic surveillance, genetic engineering, and remote sensing from outer space.
The office functioned like a debunking arm. It sussed out the snake oil. Its reports saw through the alluring gleam of overhyped technologies.
Since its unceremonious defunding in 1995, perennial calls have gone out: Rouse the office from the dead!
Read our story about why, with advances in robotics, big data, and AI systems, these calls have taken on a new level of urgency.
—Peter Andrey Smith
We can still have nice things
A place for comfort, fun, and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line.)
+ Fencing on roller skates is the self-defense you didn’t know you needed.
+ Meet Pumpkin, a chubby cat that’s in no mood to lose weight.
+ Discover what the animals near you are probably doing right now at Nature This Week.
+ Woodworker extraordinaire Matt Thompson has installed a model railroad that runs along his fence.
