#45 The Weekend Download – Catching Up on What Matters
Essential insights you need to stay ahead
📩 Issue #45 – 03/01/2026
⚡ Quick Hits – What You Need to Know
🧠 ChatGPT now has its own “Wrapped” moment
A year-end review feature turns personal AI usage into a reflection tool and a clever way to lock users further into the product.
Read More (TechCrunch)
🧬 Meta’s quiet AI acquisition everyone is watching
The purchase of Manus signals where Meta thinks the next wave of AI leverage will come from — and what kind of talent is now truly scarce.
Read More (TechCrunch)
🚗 BYD overtakes Tesla in global EV sales
China’s BYD overtook Tesla in annual EV sales for the first time, as Tesla’s deliveries fell for a second straight year amid tougher competition, subsidy cuts, and questions around focus. Tesla is now banking heavily on self-driving and robotaxis to reignite growth.
Read More (BBC)
🔥 Top Insights
🎮 How AI is changing the games we play
From poker to curling, AI isn’t just optimizing strategy — it’s reshaping how humans learn, compete, and define “fair play.”
Read More (Bloomberg)
📈 The companies Bloomberg thinks will matter in 2026
A forward-looking list that reveals where capital, talent, and long-term bets are already moving.
Read More (Bloomberg)
🔁 Why some professionals are working weekends by choice
Some white-collar workers are using weekends strategically to reclaim flexibility, reduce weekday pressure, and better balance work and personal life.
Read More (Business Insider)
📊 Movements to Watch
💼 A brutal job market is pushing candidates to dating apps
With fewer openings and higher competition, people are using unconventional platforms to network, pitch themselves, and land interviews.
Read More (Bloomberg)
🤖 ChatGPT is moving from tool to platform
New app integrations with services like DoorDash, Spotify, and Uber signal a shift: AI is becoming a connective layer across everyday services, not just a place to ask questions.
Read More (TechCrunch)
🎙️ Netflix wants podcasts to be its next daytime TV
The company is betting on talk-style audio shows to deepen engagement and keep users inside its ecosystem for longer stretches of the day.
Read More (TechCrunch)
📦 Holiday returns are quietly reshaping retail logistics
Post-Christmas returns are becoming a strategic pressure point for retailers, impacting margins, supply chains, and sustainability claims.
Read More (Axios)
💡 Something to Think About
🗣️ What “word of the year” lists really reveal
Annual “word of the year” picks are meant to capture cultural shifts. Recent winners like parasocial and rage bait point to darker online dynamics, while this year’s discussion suggests a quieter counter-current: language as play, resistance, and generational signaling rather than pure meaning.
Read More (The Guardian)
👨👩👧 Japan is debating what a family can be
Demographic pressure is forcing one of the world’s most traditional societies to rethink family structures, care, and belonging.
Read More (The Economist)
📘 Kindle gets an AI book explainer
Amazon added an AI assistant to the Kindle app that can summarize and explain the books you’re reading — a convenience feature arriving amid growing publisher concerns over how AI uses their work in training models.
Read More (The Independent)
📱 “The phone is dead.” Long live… whatever comes next
As hardware innovation stalls, the battle moves to software, AI layers, and how we interact with new devices.
Read More (TechCrunch)
🌀 Offbeat & Unexpected
📖 Southeast Asia’s largest 24-hour bookstore just opened
In an age of scrolling, a massive physical bookstore in Kuala Lumpur bets on presence, wandering, and slow discovery.
Read More (Time Out)
🧸 The Tooth Fairy meets tech culture
A classic childhood ritual gets a 21st-century remix: startups and apps are turning the Tooth Fairy into a digital experience, showing how even nostalgic traditions are being reimagined for tech-savvy kids and parents.
Read More (TechCrunch)
🧘 Why monks are walking for peace — and tracking it live
Ancient rituals meet modern mapping as a group of monks document a long-distance peace walk in real time.
Read More (Fast Company)
🧠 Wall Street stress is sending men to pelvic floor therapy
A revealing look at how high-pressure work is surfacing in unexpected physical and mental health consequences.
Read More (Bloomberg)