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What's it like to work for Elon Musk? X's product head describes small, flat teams with weekly reviews from Musk himself

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Nikita Bier said that Elon Musk's X was "essentially operating like a startup." Marc Piasecki/Getty Images Want to work for one of Elon Musk's companies ? Expect small, flat teams. X product head Nikita Bier compared his experience at X to past jobs at Meta and Discord on the "Out of Office" podcast. Bier said that Musk holds "weekly reviews" of one or two slides with every X engineer. One of Elon Musk's lieutenants at X is sharing what it's like to work in the trenches with him. There are some trademarks of a Musk company, whether it be Tesla, SpaceX, or xAI . His teams are flat, his schedule is jam-packed, and his expectations are high. In the lead-up to a big launch, expect to grind out some long hours . X's head of product, Nikita Bier, recently opened up about working under Musk on the " Out of Office " podcast, contrasting it with his past work at Silicon Valley staples like Discord and Meta. Bier described a...
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Armed with longer-range missiles, a top Russian fighter jet is posing a bigger threat, analyst says

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Russia's Su-35s are one of its most imporant jets, and a longer-range missile makes them more of a threat. : Andia/Universal Images Group via Getty Images Russia is increasingly arming a top jet with much longer-range missiles than it used to carry, an airpower analyst assessed. That makes them a much more credible threat to NATO aircraft in a potential conflict, the expert said. Russia's fight in Ukraine is improving its crews and defenses, making it more dangerous, he said. Russia's Su-35 fighter jets are increasingly flying with longer-range air-to-air missiles that make them a potentially greater threat to NATO air operations , a leading airpower expert assessed in a recent report. Justin Bronk, a researcher at the UK-based Royal United Services Institute, said in his assessment of Russian air power that regularly arming Su-35 and Su-30SM2 jets with R-37M missiles "has significantly contributed to increasing the threat that they can theoretically pose to...
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Climactic launches hybrid fund to get startups through the ‘valley of death’

The new project, called Material Scale, will initially focus on climate tech startups in the apparel industry. from TechCrunch https://ift.tt/hx9OvWz via IFTTT
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Celebrity deaths 2026: Remembering the famous people we lost this year

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Robert Duvall. Franco Origlia/WireImage/Getty Actors Robert Duvall, James Van Der Beek and Catherine O'Hara died in 2026. So did "Dilbert" creator Scott Adams, Grateful Dead's Bob Weir, and designer Valentino Garavani. Legendary independent film director Béla Tarr also passed away. Below, we look back at those we lost in 2026, listed in alphabetical order. Scott Adams, 68 Scott Adams. Michael Macor/Getty Images Adams based the character in his beloved "Dilbert" comic strip on his coworkers at the telephone company he worked at in the 1980s. By the end of the decade, the character and his satirical office humor began appearing in comic strips. At its peak, "Dilbert" was syndicated in over 2,000 newspapers. A cartoon series debuted in 1999 and ran for two seasons. Adams gained notoriety when he began writing blog posts praising Donald Trump during his 2016 presidential run. In 2023, "Dilbert" was pulled from newspapers acro...
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Tesla pulls the plug on one-time purchases of FSD

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Edie Leong for The Washington Post via Getty Images Tesla eliminated the option to purchase Full Self-Driving with a one-time fee over the weekend. Previously, Tesla offered FSD as an $8,000 one-time purchase option. Musk has said he plans to hike FSD subscription prices as its capabilities improve. Tesla has shifted its Full Self-Driving feature to a subscription model. Over the weekend, the company removed the option to purchase the feature in the US via a one-time flat fee of $8,000. For years, Tesla owners have been able to purchase the service with a one-time payment that would allow them to use it for the full lifespan of their vehicle. Now, the driver-assist feature is available only via a $99-per-month subscription. Tesla CEO Elon Musk first announced in January that the change would take effect the following month. In the past, Musk has said that Teslas would serve as "appreciating assets," suggesting owners could benefit as the software became increas...
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Have money, will travel: a16z’s hunt for the next European unicorn

According to a16z, it has eyes around the world in order to spot companies as early as local funds might. from TechCrunch https://ift.tt/TiWMNQ4 via IFTTT
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Lawsuits or billion-dollar deals: How Disney picks its AI copyright battles

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Disney sent a cease-and-desist letter to ByteDance after its new video generation model, Seedance 2.0, produced AI versions of its characters. It took a very different approach, however, when OpenAI's Sora did the same. Handout/Getty Images Disney's IP is under siege by the AI industry's 'ask for forgiveness, not permission' culture. Disney sent a cease-and-desist to ByteDance, saying it 'hijacked' its characters with Seedance 2.0. When OpenAI's Sora was used to create Disney characters, however, the House of Mouse struck a deal. No, Disney did not release footage of a never-before-seen fight sequence between Marvel's Wolverine and Thanos (spoiler: Thanos won). That clip, which amassed over 142,000 views on X over 48 hours, was created using Seedance 2.0 , an AI video generation model that ByteDance debuted last week. The tool created a buzz on social media, where one user made a hyperrealistic AI video of Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt fighting ...
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