#44 The Weekend Download – Catching Up on What Matters
Essential insights you need to stay ahead
📩 Issue #44 – 20/12/2025
⚡ Quick Hits – What You Need to Know
📱 TikTok signs deal to keep operating in the U.S.
After years of uncertainty and regulatory pressure, TikTok’s Chinese owner agreed to transfer majority control of its U.S. operations to a consortium of American and global investors, averting a potential ban and setting up a new joint venture valued at about $14 billion.
Read More (Reuters)
💸 ChatGPT officially enters its consumer era
Spending on the mobile app has crossed a milestone, signaling that AI tools are no longer experiments — they’re habits.
Read More (TechCrunch)
🚀 A $6.6bn bet on Lovable's “vibe coding”
Investors are backing tools that turn software creation into a creative, intuitive process rather than a technical one.
Read More (TechCrunch)
🔥 Top Insights
🌍 Why progress, not perfection, defined 2025’s Country of the Year
The idea of success is shifting: in a fractured world, steady improvement now matters more than ideal outcomes.
Read More (The Economist)
📖 Why companies are suddenly desperate for storytellers
In an age of AI-generated output, making meaning — not just content — has become a competitive advantage.
Read More (WSJ)
📰 Five things that changed the media in 2025
From AI saturation to collapsing trust, the media landscape has been structurally reshaped, not just disrupted.
Read More (The New Yorker)
📊 Movements to Watch
⚡ Why communities are resisting AI data centers
Local opposition is growing as AI infrastructure collides with concerns over energy use, water, and land.
Read More (The Verge)
💬 Grindr’s attempt to become an AI everything app
The platform is betting on AI to unlock new growth — and redefine what a niche app can be.
Read More (Wired)
🎓 Indian WhatsApp tutors are teaching ordinary people how to use AI
Informal classes on WhatsApp and Facebook groups are helping freelancers and small business owners learn practical, everyday AI skills — outside formal institutions.
Read More (Rest of World)
👗 New York Fashion Week moves to ban fur
A symbolic but telling shift in how luxury wants to position itself culturally.
Read More (Vogue)
💡 Something to Think About
🌐 The next version of the web won’t be built for humans
The internet is evolving toward machine-to-machine interaction, with bots, agents, and APIs becoming the primary users.
Read More (The Economist)
🐶 Why Snoopy still wins in modern culture
Nostalgia, emotional safety, and familiarity are proving powerful in an age of synthetic content.
Read More (Gizmodo)
🌍 When climate risk becomes bad for business
Climate data is quietly disappearing from property listings, raising questions about transparency and incentives.
Read More (The Guardian)
🌀 Offbeat & Unexpected
🎮 How a small Swedish town became a video game factory
A quiet ecosystem of education, community, and ambition is producing global hits from an unlikely place.
Read More (The Guardian)
🤖 People are paying to get their chatbots high
What sounds like a joke reveals how deeply we’re projecting human behavior onto machines.
Read More (Wired)
❄️ A Christmas tree, 3D-printed in ice
Science delivers peak holiday nerdery — and a reminder that experimentation can still feel magical.
Read More (Ars Technica)
🎁 Bonus
📚 Barack Obama’s favorite books, films, and music of 2025
A cultural snapshot from one of the most influential tastemakers of the past decade.
Read More (Medium)