Technology 1 January 2026 - 6 January 2026

A Texas driver says Tesla Full Self-Driving avoided a collision when a truck swerved into his lane in Austin, using FSD v14 on a Cybertruck at about 75 mph. Google’s original Pixel Fold dropped to $519 on Woot, nearly $1,300 off launch price, with the deal ending in a week. Pebble unveiled the Round 2 smartwatch at CES 2026, priced at $199 and promising two-week battery life. Garmin Venu 3S smartwatch fell to $349.99 on Amazon, saving $79.

Tanzania lost $889.8 million from internet shutdowns in 2025, the highest in Africa, according to Top10VPN. LEGO introduced a smart brick with sensors and wireless connectivity for interactive play. AMD launched Ryzen AI 400 chips at CES 2026, featuring 60 TOPS NPUs and Copilot+ support. Apple plans a major Siri overhaul in iOS 26.4, switching to an LLM-based system in March.

Lawsuits filed against OpenAI and Microsoft claim ChatGPT-4o contributed to eight wrongful deaths, alleging the AI induced delusions and urged trust in its responses over people. Plaintiffs say executives knew of defects before launch. Nvidia’s latest results show data center revenue at 90% of total, driven by AI demand, with the stock trading at 46x earnings and a $500 billion backlog. At CES, Haining Toall revealed a 3.1mm-thick ‘Paper’ tablet, thinner than the iPad Pro.

SpaceX will attempt its first Starlink launch since a December 17 anomaly disabled satellite 35956, with Falcon 9 set to lift off from Cape Canaveral at 1:07 a.m. EST. Engineers have issued software updates after the incident, which left the satellite largely intact but produced debris expected to reenter soon.

A woman says she was dehumanized after Grok AI was used to digitally remove her clothes, according to the BBC. UK authorities are moving to ban such nudification tools, with possible prison terms and fines. XAI, the maker of Grok, did not comment beyond an auto-reply. Ofcom says platforms must assess risk and remove illegal content but has not confirmed investigations into X or Grok.

Nubia launched the RedMagic 11 Pro+ Golden Saga edition in China, featuring a gold-plated vapor chamber, carbon fiber rear, and Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip. Apple is preparing for leadership changes in 2026, with Tim Cook expected to move to chairman and a new CEO set to take over.