June 1, 2026

The Download: China’s brain implant ambitions

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. China has approved the world’s first invasive brain-computer chip—here’s what’s next Sitting in the courtyard of his house in China’s Henan province last October, Dong Hui decided to try holding a…

Technology

Colossal Biosciences said it cloned red wolves. Is it for real?

April 20, 2026
If you want to capture something wolflike, it’s best to embark before dawn. So on a morning this January, with the eastern horizon still pink-hued, I drove with two young scientists into a blanket of fog. Forty miles to the west, the industrial sprawl of Houston spawned a golden glow. Tanner Broussard’s old Toyota Tacoma…

Chinese tech workers are starting to train their AI doubles–and pushing back

April 20, 2026
Tech workers in China are being instructed by their bosses to train AI agents to replace them—and it’s prompting a wave of soul-searching among otherwise enthusiastic early adopters.  Earlier this month a GitHub project called Colleague Skill, which claimed workers could use it to “distill” their colleagues’ skills and personality traits and replicate them with…

The Download: bad news for inner Neanderthals, and AI warfare’s human illusion

April 17, 2026
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. The problem with thinking you’re part Neanderthal There’s a theory that many of us have an “inner Neanderthal.” The idea is that Homo sapiens and a cousin species once bred, leaving…