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Sen. Susan Collins has survived being a Republican in the blue-leaning state of Maine for decades by positioning herself as a moderate who breaks with her party on issues like abortion rights. However, Collins took off her mask again on Tuesday when she voted in favor of Matthew Byrne, a virulently anti-abortion Ohio state appeals court judge whom President Donald Trump nominated to the…

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Now more than ever, we modern-day court jesters need your support! Become a paid subscriber to any (or all!) of the platforms below to keep Keef gentleman-cartooning into the future and beyond! www.patreon.com/keefknight keithknight.substack.com ko-fi.com/… kchronicles.com/… Related | Trump is now openly trying to bribe voters…

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In this week’s episode, Juan Reyes and John Devine will recap Week 3 of the high school and college football season, along with an update on girls flag football.

Then they’ll jump into a conversation with Aptos High football coach Zach Hewett to talk about getting that coveted first win of the year.

And finally, the guys will cap off the show with an update of the Top 10 prep football rankings and previews on some key matchups for Week 4.

We’ll have all this and more on… the Cover 3 Sports Podcast.

CBS News’ “60 Minutes” had its first fall premiere under conservative editor-in-chief Bari Weiss Sunday night, and it was an embarrassing ratings disaster. According to the first round of ratings, “60 Minutes” saw an overall ratings decline of 21% from its last season premiere. Even more troubling for CBS, ratings were down 33% in the key demographic of 25- to 54-year olds—viewers most sought…

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Quick Take

• After a three-year hiatus, BlizzCon has returned with a slew of announcements, including new games, spin-offs, screen adaptations, and fresh content for existing releases.
• Overwatch 2, Diablo IV, Hearthstone, and World of Warcraft are receiving sweeping updates, with Activision-Blizzard trying to clarify the direction of their current IPs now that the company is under the Microsoft banner.
• Nerdist’s Take: This might be the BlizzCon to end all BlizzCons, with Blizzard dropping bombs left and right.

1. Blizzard Announces Diablo V for Spring 2029

Blizzard announced that Diablo V is now in development—and they’re aiming for a Spring 2029 release. The game takes place 100 years after the events of Diablo IV, and will debut with three classes. Set in Westmarch, one of Sanctuary’s western kingdoms, the series’ fifth installment promises to be the darkest yet. Diablo has won, and there are no heroes left.

2. World of Warcraft: Forever Gets November Release Date Activision-Blizzard

World of Warcraft: Forever joins with World of Warcraft: Classic and World of Warcraft: Modern to form a trifecta of experiences available to the player-base. Forever will feature 1,000 new quests, three new zones, nine new dungeons, two new raids, and a new playable race of elves called the Skyborne. The beta for World of Craft: Forever opens September 17th, and the game will release proper on November 4th.

3. Blizzard Partners With Netflix to Create New Diablo Animated Series

Activision-Blizzard has decided to expand their empire into the world of adult animation. A Diablo animated series has been announced, though details are scant so far. There’s no animation studio attached, nor has there been any indication on who will be show-running Blizzard’s daring new creative endeavor. But! We know it exists, and we know that Blizzard has interest in bringing more properties to life on our television screens.

4. StarCraft Returns! But As An Open World Shooter?

StarCraft, a legendary real-time strategy game series, is back with a 2030 release date and a new direction. StarCraft’s 28 year life has existed firmly in the real-time strategy genre, but now Blizzard is moving in the direction of a story-driven, open-world shooter. It seems they’re trying to ‘modernize’ the IP. Blizzard dropped a cinematic teaser at BlizzCon, but there’s not a lot of information available about the game. Unsurprising, given its far-away release window. We do know that the new StarCraft takes place seventy years after the events of StarCraft 2: Legacy of the Void.

5. Warcraft III Gets First New Storyline in 23 Years Activision-Blizzard

Speaking of real-time strategy games, Warcraft III: Reforged has been given some love after years of neglect. Its new campaign, Forsaken Kingdom, became available September 14th. Forsaken Kingdom explores the fall of Lordaeron, and how it became known instead as the Undercity. This comes on the back of the 3.0 update, which makes loads of quality of life changes to Warcraft III, as well as a graphics update and improved World Editor.

6. Surprise New Hero Drops for Heroes of the Storm

Heroes of the Storm has a new-but-familiar face joining the cast: Xal’atath, the Harbinger of the Void. Like all characters in Heroes of the Storm, Xal’atath hails from another Blizzard property. In this case, Warcraft. This is Heroes of the Storm‘s first new hero in over six years. It seems Blizzard is making efforts to spread a little TLC to their more neglected IPs.

7. Diablo IV Celebrates the Series’ 30 Year Anniversary with New Content and Switch 2 Release Activision-Blizzard

Even with Diablo V on the horizon, Diablo IV is not being left behind. Diablo IV: Season of Hell’s Legacy starts September 15th, with new gear and gifts. Players also get to contend with the return of the Prime Evils and Deckard Caine. Blizzard gave a snapshot of early 2027 as well, with their First Class Pack featuring the mighty Amazon, alongside her bow and javelin. On top of all of that, the Diablo IV: Age of Hatred Collection arrives on the Switch 2 on September 15th. It supports cross-platform play and cross-progression, and a new ‘evolving endgame’, per Blizzard.

8. Overwatch Debuts New Hero and Map Activision-Blizzard

A new Overwatch season has begun, and with it the series’ longest continuous narrative, The Reign of Talon, concludes. New Survivor Support Hero Doctrine (real name Tamuka Yeukai) has arrived, and a new map called “Watchpoint: Grimsvotn” comes along with him. Hailing from the Shona tribe in Zimbabwe, Doctrine is a cyberneticist supervillain who primarily uses his scepter and a swarm of robot bats to fight. Kinda badass, right? Along with Doctrine and his map, Sombra and Roadhog are receiving major hero reworks.

9. Blizzard Remembers Hearthstone Exists; Flood of New Content Announced Activision-Blizzard

Beloved strategy deck-building game Hearthstone, which takes place in the universe of World of Warcraft, is getting some updates as well. In 2027, a new class, the Monk, will be released. This is Hearthstone’s first new class in six years. The new expansion, Reign of the Black Empire, takes place long ago, before the Old Gods were imprisoned, in the earliest days of Azeroth.

RELATED ARTICLE

WORLD OF WARCRAFT: FOREVER Brings the Classic Era to a New Level

Blizzard rolled into BlizzCon with news aplenty, and fans of their various properties are rejoicing. With a ton of new stories, new content, and thoughtful refurbishing of old favorites, Blizzard has won itself some good will for the time being. And, come on. Who expected a Diablo V release anytime in the near future? God is good. Or, uh, the devil is good?

Jess Harshbarger writes about movies, TV, games, comics, and all things nerdy for Nerdist.

The post In Case You Missed It: BlizzCon’s 9 Biggest Reveals appeared first on Nerdist.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent testified before the House Financial Services Committee on Tuesday, where Democrats quickly lost patience with the pro-tariff tyrant. “If tariffs are not inflationary as you claimed in your previous testimony, then why has inflation increased by more than 3% over the past year?” Rep. Maxine Waters of California asked. As Bessent rambled a bunch of…

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Quick Take

• James Gunn has once again shared that his preferred version of the character billionaire Maxwell Lord, played by his brother Sean Gunn in the DCU, is a more flawed good guy than an evil bad guy, as in his original portrayal.
• Gunn once again cited Max Lord’s portrayal in Justice League International, the more comedic take on DC Comics’ Justice League team, as his favorite. He even shared a Justice League International image by artist Kevin Maguire.
• Nerdist’s take: We have a feeling Gunn is going to mix the characters and sensibilities of Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis’ Justice League International with the Superman-heavy animated Justice League Unlimited.

James Gunn’s DCU keeps adding more and more characters. Man of Tomorrow will feature not only Guy Gardner as Green Lantern, but also Lanterns’ John Stewart (Aaron Pierre), Xolo Maridueña as Blue Beetle, and Adria Arjona as…Maxima? (Sure, Jan). That’s not even counting returning heroes from Superman, like Metamorpho, Mister Terrific, and Hawkgirl. Not to mention Sean Gunn as Maxwell Lord, the Justice Gang’s financier. As we’ve speculated before, it feels like Gunn is readying an introduction to the live-action version of Justice League International. Now, a recent post by Gunn about his views on Max Lord has us guessing even more that the JLI is on its way.

James Gunn continues to tease a Justice League International approach for the DCU pic.twitter.com/rJIps04EZb

— Superman Saga News (@SuperSagaNews) September 15, 2026

A fan asked Gunn on social media about his take on Lord, who eventually became a villain in the comics. Wonder Woman even killed this bad-guy version of Max in a shocking 2006 storyline. But in the JLI years, creators Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis portrayed him as a very imperfect, but ultimately noble, good guy. And that seems to be the primary version James Gunn is drawing from. When a fan asked him how the Guardians of the Universe allow Guy Gardner to work for someone evil like Max Lord, Gunn said the following:

Who said he’s evil? The DCU is not a Xerox of DC Comics. It’s an alternate universe. But as a hint, I’m a huge fan of the deeply flawed but hardly malevolent Max as originally created by DeMatteis, Giffen, and Maguire, not the less-nuanced evil dude he got retconned into. The original Max as presented in JLI is one of my favorite characters.

When pressed further if there were any comics that informed his Maxwell Lord, Gunn said, “All the early JLI stuff.” He then posted an image of the cover of Justice League International Omnibus Volume 1 by Kevin Maguire. More than ever, it seems that Gunn is setting the stage for his take on the Justice League International team in the DCU. And that’s music to our ears, as this is one of the best iterations of the comic of all time.

DC Comics

If you look at the cover below, many characters have either been introduced to the DCU already, or have been announced as coming. Max Lord, Guy Gardner, Hawkgirl, and Lobo have already featured in films. We know Booster Gold is supposedly coming in some form, even if the last iteration of his HBO Max series didn’t go forward. Blue Beetle also exists. Mister Miracle and Big Barda have an animated series coming up, which takes place in the DCU. Power Girl hasn’t arrived in the DCU yet, but the Supergirl played by Milly Alcock is, in many ways, more like the tougher, no-nonsense Kara Zor-El that Power Girl represents. And Wonder Woman, well… let’s just say we have a feeling she’s coming too, and soon.

DC Comics

Interestingly enough, Superman was only an occasional guest star in JLI, never a full member. He’d help them out on big cases, then fly away to Metropolis. And that seems to be how Superman interacts with the DCU’s Justice Gang. But we have a feeling that “friend who visits but never stays long” situation could end after Man of Tomorrow. Something bigger is probably on the way.

Nerdist’s Take: We See an Amalgamation of the ’80s JLI with the Animated JLU

Of course, some major names from the JLI era are still missing from the DCU, namely Batman and Flash. We have a feeling that Gunn’s DCU Justice League, whenever it debuts, will be a mix of the comedy-drama that Justice League International was, with characters like John Stewart and Hawkgirl from the animated Justice League Unlimited, which also featured Superman. And we wouldn’t be surprised if Man of Tomorrow ends with some amalgamation of these two Leagues forming. And as DC fans, that sounds like the perfect recipe for an ideal Justice League.

This post has affiliate links, which means we may earn advertising money if you buy something. This doesn’t cost you anything extra, we just have to give you the heads up for legal reasons. Click away!

Eric Diaz is a staff writer at Nerdist and a Swiss Army knife of fandoms. Eric loves DC, Marvel, horror movies, and even Star Wars and Star Trek equally.

The post James Gunn Drops Another Justice League International Hint appeared first on Nerdist.

ph @arietanto
#Chivas (Italie)
#ilprimocaffèdelmattino

Quick Take

• HBO Max has officially greenlit DC Studios’ The People v. Gorilla Grodd.
• American Vandal creators Tony Yacenda and Dan Perrault will serve as showrunners.
• The half-hour comedy series will star Skyler Gisondo as Jimmy Olsen and Jimmy Tatro as Gorilla Grodd.
• NERDIST TAKE: We’re wondering if the Flash is going to pop up. Somehow, we have a feeling Nathan Fillion as Green Lantern Guy Gardner will appear.

We’ve been hearing about an HBO show about Jimmy Olsen and Gorilla Grodd from DC Studios for almost a year now, with various titles given. One of them was DC Crime, which James Gunn later debunked. Well, at last, we have not only a name for the series, The People v. Gorilla Grodd, but we officially have a full season order from HBO Max. The series consists of eight episodes, and HBO describes it as a half-hour comedy series. Skyler Gisondo will reprise his role as Jimmy Olsen from Superman, with Jimmy Tatro playing Gorilla Grodd. Tony Yacenda and Dan Perrault, creators of Netflix’s American Vandal, will serve as showrunners, writers, and executive producers, with Yacenda directing all episodes.

According to a Deadline interview with HBO’s Casey Bloys on September 15, 2026, the series had begun shooting.

DEADLINE: Is there anything else [DCU-related] active in development?
BLOYS: No, not right now, obviously you’ve got Gorilla Grodd, which I’m very happy about, doing something different, and I think it’s a really fun idea. They just started shooting.

Here’s the series’ official description:

A superintelligent ape is convicted of murdering his father, the King of Gorilla City. In an eight-part “true” crime docuseries, the Daily Planet’s Jimmy Olsen reopens the case, investigating whether Gorilla Grodd was wrongly convicted in one of Metropolis’ most famous murder trials.

DC Studios/DC Comics

Right now, the series will star several Superman cast members, including Beck Bennett as Steve Lombard, Mikaela Hoover as Cat Grant, and Wendell Pierce as Perry White. The series also stars Mary Holland, Eduardo Franco, Arian Moayed, Dan Perrault, Andrew Leeds, and Tim Baltz. From the looks of it, David Corenswet’s Clark Kent and Rachel Brosnahan’s Lois Lane won’t appear, but they could always make a surprise cameo.

DC Studios/HBO Max

Our real question as DC fans is if any other major DC Comics heroes appear. Especially if Superman is not the hero who fought and captured Gorilla Grodd. Specifically, we’re wondering if the Flash is going to pop up. But we’d love to see any DC hero. Somehow, we have a feeling Nathan Fillion as Green Lantern Guy Gardner will appear. He seems to be the DCU’s lucky charm. No premiere date was given, but we would be surprised to see it before 2028.

Originally published August 12, 2026.

Eric Diaz is a staff writer at Nerdist and a Swiss Army knife of fandoms. Eric loves DC, Marvel, horror movies, and even Star Wars and Star Trek equally.

The post HBO Max Greenlights THE PEOPLE V. GORILLA GRODD Comedy Series appeared first on Nerdist.

National outcry against data center construction has spread to Philadelphia, where officials suggested possible construction in a neighborhood already impacted by a now-defunct oil refinery.

President Donald Trump’s plan to kneecap mail-voting practices in November’s midterms ran aground on Monday evening after the Supreme Court blocked the postal system from enforcing it in a 7-2 vote.

The court’s short, unsigned order prevents the United States Postal Service or other agencies from enacting last-minute requirements for mail-in ballots under a new rule it issued last month. Under the rule, postal officials would refuse to deliver any ballots to voters unless they were registered in new, untested systems that USPS was developing on the fly. Roughly one in three Americans voted by mail in the 2024 elections. In some states, elections are exclusively conducted by mail.

State and local election officials across the country had warned of widespread chaos and potential mass disenfranchisement if the USPS rule went into effect. Most states have already begun printing ballots and return envelopes, they claimed, and they lack the time or resources to start the process over. The new rules also amounted to a federal takeover of state election processes, subordinating a significant portion of U.S. voting infrastructure to a federal agency for the first time in American history.

This should have been a 9-0 defeat for the Trump administration. While the court ultimately stopped the plan, it is alarming that three justices thought there was some legal merit to the USPS rule and that two justices all but wholeheartedly endorsed it.

The court’s order is only three sentences long. One of them is a standard boilerplate description of the application’s fate. The remaining two lines could hardly be less illuminating. “The Government is unlikely to succeed on the merits of its challenge to the District Court’s preliminary injunction,” the court wrote. “And the equitable factors applicable for obtaining emergency relief from this Court do not favor a stay.”

That’s it. The court didn’t even include any citations; I normally excise them from quotations for readers’ convenience, but I didn’t need to do so this time. Compare that brevity with the court’s order last month when it first heard a challenge to the executive order. In that instance, the court wrote an unsigned ten-page opinion where it detailed its reasoning at length.

The court’s earlier opinion strongly criticized the lawsuit in that case on standing and procedural grounds, suggesting that the states and other plaintiffs had no right to challenge “internal deliberations” of the executive branch. This was a fairly ironic statement when Trump was publicly posting about his desire to “get rid of MAIL-IN BALLOTS” on his personal social-media website. Everybody knew exactly what was going on.

Despite this, the justices left open the possibility that it might rule in the states’ favor the next time around, and so they did. It would have been stunning if they didn’t. California and its fellow plaintiffs made sure to frame their case on the justices’ terms. They not so subtly invoked the major-questions doctrine, which the conservative justices have used to defang policymaking via broadly written statutes by Democratic presidents.

“Never before has USPS attempted to interfere with elections in this way, let alone a fast-approaching election,” California told the court in a brief filed last week. “And nothing in federal law authorizes USPS to refuse to deliver ballots. To the contrary, Congress has exhaustively enumerated the types of materials that USPS can lawfully refuse to deliver. Ballots are not among them.”

Their citations pointed to cases where the conservative majority struck down Biden’s student-debt relief plan, his COVID-19 testing mandate, and the Obama administration’s power-plant emissions rules. “The rule challenged here arguably has greater political significance than the subject of any of the court’s prior major-questions cases,” the states noted.

That satisfied one prong of the court’s test for upholding the lower court’s injunction. The second prong is slightly more nebulous. When a court “balances the equities,” it effectively looks at who will be harmed more by the absence of an injunction. Sometimes this can be a difficult question where judges must slice through layers of competing public interests before deciding whether to grant an injunction or not.

In this case, however, the equities heavily favored the states. “Whatever else may be said of USPS’ new rule, it would wreak havoc on States and their voters if it takes effect at this late point—when some states, including North Carolina and Wisconsin, have already begun to mail out ballots,” the states noted, citing an election-related precedent from 2020. “This Court has repeatedly refused to allow far less disruptive changes to take effect on ‘[the] eve of an election.’”

Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote a one-paragraph concurring opinion where he tried to triangulate some kind of middle ground between the two sides. He concluded that there was “at least a fair prospect” that the Postal Service’s rule fell within its “statutory authority,” which would be a major boost to the Trump administration. This is an exceedingly forgiving standard for the White House and is hardly surprising from Kavanaugh, who might be the court’s most enthusiastic supporter of executive power.

At the same time, the justice concluded that it would be “arbitrary and capricious” under the Administrative Procedure Act to enforce the rule now. State and local election officials, he reasoned, “do not have sufficient time to reasonably implement the rule before the elections.” Despite his reference to the APA standard, this is functionally no different from holding that the equities favor the states.

In short, while Kavanaugh wasn’t willing to allow the USPS to take effect in the 2026 election, he signaled that he might be open to it for the 2028 election. Kavanaugh loves to do this sort of thing in concurring opinions for reasons known only to him. In Trump v. Barbara, he managed to conclude that Trump was largely right about the Citizenship Clause but that Congress had enacted birthright citizenship by statute—a position neither advanced nor desired by any side in the case.

Kavanaugh’s attempts to please everyone were ultimately preferable to the view advanced by the only two dissenting justices. The real stunner comes from Alito’s dissent, which was joined in full by Justice Clarence Thomas. It is an unambiguous embrace of the president’s ability to seize control of state election processes for spurious reasons and personal political gain.

A quick note on the vote count: It takes at least a majority of five votes to do anything on the court other than grant a petition for review, which requires only four votes. I described this case as a 7-2 decision based on the publicly disclosed dissents by Alito and Thomas. But the Supreme Court’s rules do not require justices to say how they vote in shadow-docket cases. As a result, it is theoretically possible that as many as two other justices voted with Alito and Thomas, but did not publicly announce it.

I have inconsistently credited or not credited this possibility in my past writing. These vote totals would become public knowledge when a now-sitting justice’s papers are opened for historians and journalists. Past justices have sometimes made their papers available to the public as soon as after their own death. Earlier this month, however, The New York Times reported that the justices have reached a secret “consensus” in 2016 about future releases of their papers. This consensus may render these papers—and thus the vote totals—unknowable until every other justice involved has died, even if they have all retired from the court.

As a result, the vote totals in this case (and any future ones) will likely not become public within my expected lifespan. Going forward, I will assume that no justice has privately dissented from an outcome on the court’s emergency or administrative docket if at least one justice has publicly dissented from it. There is no journalistic value in suggesting that some of the justices might have secret positions or beliefs without supporting evidence. Members of the Supreme Court are free to request corrections if I incorrectly describe how they voted in a specific case or outcome, and I will be more than happy to amend my work accordingly.

On the first prong of the court’s test, Alito gives extraordinary deference to the executive branch’s ability to regulate elections based on broad grants of congressional authority. He argued that Congress imbued “In sum, the plaintiff States’ statutory claim is based on a contestable reading of a broadly drawn statute empowering the Postal Service to regulate the mail,” he concluded.

On the second prong, where the court must balance each side’s interests, Alito swings even harder towards Trump. “As for the equities, the government has a strong interest in enforcing the rule, and implementing it will also ‘enhance the visibility of Federal Ballot Mail’ in order to better detect election fraud,” he wrote. Trump and many other Republicans have asserted for decades that there is widespread fraud in U.S. elections. There is no evidence whatsoever to support this conspiracy theory.

A presidential commission assembled by Trump during his first term found no evidence to support Trump’s false claims that more than 3 million illegal ballots were cast in the 2016 presidential election, which he won. Investigations launched by the Justice and Homeland Security Departments at Trump’s behest during his first and second terms also found no evidence that elections were compromised. State and local investigators have occasionally found instances of voter impersonation or non-citizens voting in federal elections, but the number of legitimate cases is in the dozens, compared to the billions of ballots cast this century.

Unfortunately, Alito appears to be among those who believe in the conspiracy theory as well. In 2021, he authored the majority opinion in Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee, which involved a lawsuit against two Arizona voting restrictions. The 6-3 ruling substantially narrowed Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act for challenging state elections laws that are facially neutral but racially discriminatory in impact. Though he claims to be a textualist, Alito invented multiple exceptions to the VRA’s provisions out of whole cloth, including one that allows states to evade VRA lawsuits if they claim to be acting to prevent voter fraud.

“One strong and entirely legitimate state interest is the prevention of fraud,” Alito wrote. “Fraud can affect the outcome of a close election, and fraudulent votes dilute the right of citizens to cast ballots that carry appropriate weight. Fraud can also undermine public confidence in the fairness of elections and the perceived legitimacy of the announced outcome.”

If modern American history had examples of significant or systemic voting fraud, Alito’s position might be easier to defend. But the utter absence of any evidence that voting fraud is a factor in American elections is damning. Both then and now, Alito has used the illusory threat of voter fraud to justify concrete restrictions on Americans’ ability to vote. He and his associates are using a fake risk to election integrity to impose real ones.

“On the other side of the balance, the plaintiff States invoke the practical effects of implementing the rule close to the midterm elections,” Alito explained. “I take that problem very seriously, but it is not enough to convince me to deny the application.” If nothing else, his candor is refreshing. He dismisses the broad, bipartisan concerns about the USPS rule’s potential for mass disenfranchisement by noting that some states still support the rule—likely because it would not affect them—and because California et al. “bear a substantial share of the blame for the rule’s timing” by fighting it in court all summer.

He even takes a shot at his fellow justices and lower-court judges for their own alleged share of the blame. “Indeed, this Court spent from late July to the end of August drafting nearly 40 pages of opinions, including two dissents, despite the government’s public notice that it would not publish a final rule while subject to the injunctions, and its representation that it had a strong interest in issuing its rule in early-to mid-August to allow time to implement it,” he complained.

That jab only makes sense if one accepts that the concerns of disruption are valid, or else there would be no reason to blame them on his colleagues. Everything, in short, must bend to one president’s whims to seriously disrupt American elections for his own gain. In Alito and Thomas’s view, it apparently does not matter if he’s fighting a fake problem or if our representative system of government. The states, the lower courts, and the justices themselves must bend the knee. Thankfully for the republic, the other seven justices are not quite so supine.

Apple has addressed more than 260 CVEs across all of its operating systems, browsers, and other software products, marking the largest single patch cycle in Cupertino's history. While this CVE count is hardly notable compared to some vendors - hello, Microsoft’s record-breaking 974 bugs disclosed earlier this month - it does set a company record for Apple. It also reflects the new reality of AI-driven bug hunting, as models become exponentially better and faster at finding security vulnerabilities. However, the flip side of the AI coin we were promised - that models would also excel at writing patches and automatically fixing software and systems - yeah, that hasn't happened yet. The silver lining for everyone updating their Apple products right now (including this humble vulture): none of the vulnerabilities are listed as being under active exploitation. Of course, that may change very quickly as attackers are, at this very moment, looking to exploit the newly disclosed bugs, too. And we promise you that they are using AI. Apple’s latest mobile and operating system versions, iOS 27 and macOS 27 Golden Gate, released on Monday, also address a record 122 and 204 security vulnerabilities, respectively, across phone, iPad, and computer operating systems. Of these hundreds of CVEs, however, there are only ten (by our count) that AI is directly credited with finding. iOS 27 fixes 122 flaws Just two of the iPhone and iPad CVEs fixed with iOS 27 credit a coding agent or AI assistant with finding them. These include CVE-2026-65410, a vuln that exists in iPhone and iPad AVE video encoders, that can cause unexpected system termination. Apple credited AI-bug-finding firm Calif, along with Claude and Anthropic Research, with finding and reporting this security flaw. Then there's CVE-2026-65409, a type-confusion issue in iOS’ Foundation framework that can be abused to cause a denial of service, also found by Calif - specifically human researcher Bruce Dang - in collaboration with Claude and Anthropic Research. Some of the more interesting and serious iOS bugs fixed with the newest update aren’t listed as found by AI. These include CVE-2026-43689, a privilege-escalation flaw that could allow an app to gain root access. Apple credited Nosebeard Labs’ Andreas Jaegersberger and Ro Achterberg with reporting this bug. Additionally, CVE-2026-65406, a logic-issue flaw due to improper validation in Background Assets, could be abused to access sensitive user data. Background Assets is an Apple framework that lets you download large files and content in the background before a user opens the app for the first time. Baidu Security researcher Ye Zhang spotted this one. macOS 27 patches 204 vulns Meanwhile, the new macOS 27 update that addresses 204 vulns also fixes both the AI hunted bugs: CVE-2026-65410 and CVE-2026-65409. Plus, it credits AI helpers with discovering eight others, including one especially nasty flaw that could lead to remote code execution through the CUPS printer interface. Let’s start with that one. CVE-2026-43692 is a validation issue in CUPS that can be exploited by a remote user to either terminate the app or execute malicious code. Aaron Grattafiori and the Nvidia AI Red Team receive credit for disclosing this flaw. CVE-2026-64790 in CUPS can be exploited to gain elevated privileges. Grattafiori and the Nvidia AI Red Team again get credit for the win. CVE-2026-43791, a validation issue in StorageKit, can be abused to read files. Grattafiori, the Nvidia AI Red Team, Meridian Miftari, and Amy from amys.website disclosed this flaw to Apple. CVE-2026-43690 is a race-condition bug in the Server Message Block (SMB) network communication protocol. A local user can exploit the flaw to read kernel memory. Calif’s Bruce Dang, with Claude and Anthropic Research, found this one. CVE-2026-43719 is another SMB use-after-free bug, discovered by Calif’s Dang and Jakob Pammer, Claude, and Anthropic. “Mounting a maliciously crafted SMB network share may lead to system termination,” Apple warned. CVE-2026-65376 is yet another SMB issue - this one an out-of-bounds-read flaw reported by Dang, Claude, Anthropic, and 재영 정. CVE-2026-65374 is a memory-corruption issue in the WebDAV protocol that can lead to code execution. Dang, Claude, Anthropic, and He Wei (ギカク) receive credit for finding this bug. CVE-2026-65375, also in WebDAV, can cause unexpected system termination. Apple credited Dang, Claude, Anthropic, and Devcore Research Team’s YingMuo. CVE-2026-43677 is an out-of-bounds write issue in WebDAV with a slew of researchers receiving credit for finding it. In addition to the usual trio (Dang, Claude, and Anthropic), bubu, Omar Cerrito, HE WEI（ギカク), Roman Zabicki, Richard Zana, Chris Bailey - Short Circuit, Aswin Kumar Gokulakannan, and Surya Narayan Kushwaha are on the list.®

Quick Take

• Universal Orlando Halloween Horror Nights 2026 is bringing us a new wave of incredible treats. We dive into the best food items at the event.
• Among our favorite food items at Halloween Horror Nights were El’s Battery Jerky, Jack & Odd Dog, and Hellraiser’s Pleasure and Pain Brain.
• If you head to Universal Orlando Halloween Horror Nights 2026 don’t miss trying out these bites.

Halloween Horror Nights has too many amazing parts to name them all. There are the Haunted Houses, of course, and the atmosphere of delightful weirdness and great community. There’s the ever-growing lore, the fabulous pieces of merch, and much, much more. But one glorious part of Halloween Horror Nights deserves a tip of the hat every year. And that’s THE FOOD. I might argue that no one does food exactly like Halloween Horror Nights. Its offerings are just the perfect blend of themed, spooky, outrageous, and delicious. It’s worth a trip to the annual celebration just to experience the wild foodstuffs that somehow taste amazing. But, as always, most of us are but humans with one small stomach. And so, we couldn’t try ALL of Halloween Horror Nights’ food options even if we wanted to. And so Nerdist is here to break down the best food items we tried at our Universal Orlando Halloween Horror Nights 2026 Media preview. If you can only try five foods at Halloween Horror Nights, here’s our guide to the best things you can eat.

The 5 Best Food Items at Halloween Horror Nights; Jump To:

• Stranger Things: El’s Battery Jerky 
• Jack and Odd Dog
• Sinners’ Pecan and Whiskey Bread Pudding
• Hellraiser Pleasure and Pain Brain 
• Stranger Things: Steve’s Smuggled Peanut Butter Bites

Stranger Things: El’s Battery Jerky  Nerdist

In Stranger Things 5, El needed to juice up her battery in order for her powers to be strong enough to bring the Upside Down to an end once and for all. Sadly, when El and Hopper got trapped in the Upside Down, they only had one stick of beef jerky to share. But at Halloween Horror Nights, El’s Battery Jerky is reimagined in a whole new way, and it’s one of the best foods you can enjoy at the event.

Nerdist

According to Universal Orlando, Halloween Horror Nights’ version of El’s Battery Jerky includes Creamy Mac ‘n Cheese with garlic bread and battery jerky pieces. To be honest, I’ve never had beef jerky with my mac and cheese, but I’m definitely interested in trying it again after putting this deliciousness in my mouth. The creaminess of the mac and cheese and the jerky’s toughness (complimentary) worked well together texturally. The jerky’s savory seasoning also added depth the mac and cheese might have otherwise lacked. The garlic bread at the bottom was a delightful surprise. And the trio together is something only Halloween Horror Nights could have concocted.

Nerdist

El’s Battery Jerky also comes in a fun souvenir container that celebrates the final season of Stranger Things. So El’s Battery Jerky delivers not only a tasty treat but also a gift to take home. And who doesn’t love a gift?

Jack and Odd Dog Nerdist

Honoring two icons of Halloween Horror Nights, we loved the Jack & Odd Dog for both its deliciously insane assortment of flavors AND its spiritual marriage of two foes. Is there anything better than a hot dog telling an enemies-to-lovers tale? We think not. We feel like Jack & Oddfellow are in love… And we’re obsessed with a shared hot dog representing their union. And at Halloween Horror Nights, we believe that the best food items not only taste incredible but also give us all that glorious theming we crave.

Of course, the Jack & Odd Dog ALSO tastes delicious. And that’s exactly why it gets to sit on our best Halloween Horror Nights 2026 food list. The Jack & Odd Dog is, wait for it, a “Nathan’s all-beef hot dog with peppers, onions, tostidos cheese sauce topped with Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, in an Oddfellow ube bun.”

Once again, I must confess, I’ve never had an ube hot dog bun before. But it was truly an enhancement to the operation. The ube bun added a delightful hint of sweetness to the flavor mix, almost like an earthy, unsweetened chocolate taste. That grounding taste, combined with the bread’s extra-fluffy texture, made a great base for all the other flavors of the Jack & Odd Dog and let them really rage. Peppers, onions, cheese sauce, and Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, oh my! It was a party of texture and flavor in the mouth, all working very well, with, of course, the excellent hot dog. And the result of a bite of this wildness was a pleasing spicy burn on the tongue, which lingered in the best way, and a satisfied stomach.

And, oh yeah, in the park, it’s a FOOT-LONG hot dog. Phew!

Sinners’ Pecan and Whiskey Bread Pudding Nerdist

Another one of the best foods we tasted at Halloween Horror Nights 2026 was Sinners‘ Pecan and Whiskey Bread Pudding. This food isn’t necessarily all that themed or crazy, but it is PURELY DELICIOUS. We’d term it “cravable.” We’d say it’s “addictive.” Once you dig in, you’ll HAVE to have another bite and another and another. You get the picture. We might even start a rumor that this Halloween Horror Nights Pecan and Whiskey Bread Pudding will sink its teeth into you and never let go.

Nerdist

Sinners‘ Pecan and Whiskey Bread Pudding is rich without being too rich, sweet without being too sweet, and definitely warms the heart. It oozes a delicious, luxurious caramely sauce, and is definitely one Halloween Horror Nights food you’ll want to go back to again and again. And just in case you want it, the official description for this Sinners food reads, “Warm bread pudding with pecan and a whiskey caramel sauce.”

Hellraiser Pleasure and Pain Brain  Nerdist

The Hellraiser Pleasure and Pain Brain is more than just a gimmick. It’s surprisingly delicious. It’s not too sweet, and it has a really pleasant texture to it; one that’s at once light and firm. Sometimes, Horror Nights desserts can get too creamy, but this molded brain has a great bounce to it, which makes it extra enjoyable to dig into. The Hellraiser Pleasure and Pain Brain also has hidden popping candy inside its folds, and that crackling comes to life at unexpected moments to liven up the whole affair. That’s pleasure and pain for you. The dab of strawberry brain juice also adds a welcome fresh flavor to every bite of the vanilla-leaning dessert.

Nerdist

And, of course, this best-of-Halloween-Horror-Nights food item just looks cool. Somehow, the brain is adorable and disgusting at once. And we love the little chocolate tooth and bloody gel additions. It’s what you want your Halloween Horror Nights foods to look like, without sacrificing any of that exceptional mouthfeel.

Stranger Things: Steve’s Smuggled Peanut Butter Bites Nerdist

We are guilty of being partial to Steve Harrington. But come on, this Stranger Things Halloween Horror Nights 2026 food is A LOG OF THE BEST PEANUT BUTTER EVER COVERED IN CHOCOLATE. What’s not to love about that?! Steve was craving his Peanut Butter Boppers when Hawkins was in quarantine in Stranger Things 5. And now, you’ll be craving them too. We had one bite of Steve’s Smuggled Peanut Butter Bites and couldn’t stop eating them. And hey, they’re packed with protein, which will get you ready to fight Vecna and survive the Halloween Horror Nights 2026 Stranger Things House.

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Steve Harrington, thank you for this one.

You can try our favorite Halloween Horror Nights foods and more if you head on over to Universal Orlando this fall.

Rotem Rusak is the Editor-in-Chief at Nerdist. She is a great lover of the anti-hero and is always ready for a new ship to set sail. In her work, she likes to combine fandom passion with journalistic sensibilities. Follow her on Instagram.

The post The 5 Best Foods at Halloween Horror Nights 2026 appeared first on Nerdist.

Move over lipstick index, Gen Zers have a new micro-trend to indicate that living is too damn expensive for Americans: bedazzling. Across the internet, young people are leaning into their Y2K-inspired era to bedazzle everything from their $9 matcha lattes, their vehicles, and even their boyfriends’ biceps—a trend called “whimsymaxxing.” And though the premise is indeed whimsical…

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Quick Take

• Netflix is launching a reality show based on the thoroughly debunked, wholly unethical 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment.
• The New Stanford Prison Experiment will include six 45-minute episodes where people are either assigned to be guards or prisoners.
• Nerdist’s Take: Netflix’s New Stanford Prison Experiment show is completely indefensible and without any merit.

Those of us of a certain age will remember how often we heard about the infamous, influential 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment. I saw a documentary in elementary school about the horrifying test, which seemed to prove people will grievously abuse others when given even a modicum of power over them. But we now know, thanks to extensive research, the whole thing was garbage. Just total, unscientific, faked trash not worth taking seriously again. Yet somehow none of that matters to Netflix. The streamer is turning that infamous lie into a ill-advised reality show called The New Stanford Prison Experiment.

Netflix

Variety reports Netflix’s newest unscripted show…..:the deepest sigh I am physically capable of:….will recreate psychologist Philip Zimbardo’s thoroughly debunked Stanford Prison Experiment. The six-episode season will consist of 45-minute installments. Two groups of people will either act as prison guards or prisoners. Here’s the official synopsis, which is new and not the premise of a show that aired 20 years ago on Spike TV:

Thirty willing participants enter a real prison and are randomly assigned as guards or prisoners. Thrust into a system of power, hierarchy, and control, they’ll discover whether ordinary people inevitably conform to the roles they’re given—or whether empathy, morality, and individuality can withstand the forces pushing them in the opposite direction. As the pressure builds and the balance of power begins to shift, the central question feels more urgent than ever: Does power corrupt?

Oh, finally! Someone is asking if power corrupts.

Forget the obvious moral questions raised by basing a show on a fraudulent experiment that tainted scientific research for decades. This is dumb purely as a TV show for the same reason the original test was useless. Zimbardo’s “guards” weren’t naturally cruel. They followed instructions on how they should behave. Just as reality contestants in the year 2026 know what’s expected of them when they go on a show. They will either behave so kindly the series is boring, or so intentionally cruel the show is detestable for all the reasons the original experiment scared multiple generations.

And if it sounds like our assessment is harsh, here’s what executive producer Jane Lipsitz said about why they think this is a good idea for a TV series. This is a real quote:

The Stanford Prison Experiment has always fascinated me. Despite its serious ethical flaws, it asked a fundamental question that feels even more relevant today: how does power affect ethical choices? Getting the opportunity to reimagine this social experiment was one of the most intense, exhilarating — and definitely nail-biting — experiences we’ve ever had. Netflix has always been an incredible supporter of ambitious projects that take risks, push boundaries and tell challenging stories, so we were incredibly grateful to have them as our partners on this one.

Nail-biting. It was nail-biting to see how a fake test would translate into a “reality” TV show that by its very nature can’t offer anything resembling genuine behavior. What makes this even grosser is that this makes light of actual prisoner abuse. There are unfortunately plenty of real stories about how those in power horribly abuse people.

We won’t be biting our nails because we won’t be watching when it debuts on October 21. A lot of us spent our whole lives hearing about the Stanford Prison Experiment. We now know there’s nothing to learn from it. And that’s why there’s nothing entertaining about it, either.

Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist. You can follow Mikey on Bluesky at @‌burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.

The post Netflix Turning Debunked Stanford Prison Experiment Into Equally Unethical Show appeared first on Nerdist.

With their control of Congress in jeopardy ahead of November’s midterm elections, vulnerable Republicans would surely love—and certainly are looking for—a boost from President Trump. He could end his global trade war in an instant, and perhaps bring down skyrocketing prices on a wide range of consumer goods. The war in Iran that he foolishly launched in late February—and which has caused energy prices to explode—would perhaps take a little longer to wind down, but its end would almost certainly benefit the GOP’s increasingly slim odds this fall.

But that is not what Trump is doing. Instead, he’s posting stuff like this:

There is tough competition, but surely this is one of Trump’s most ridiculous social media posts, ever. Even many of his most loyal supporters would probably blanch at his description of himself as the nation’s preeminent “Hoax Buster.” And few, if any, Americans are worried that runaway AI will lead to a Terminator-like situation where killer robots rove our streets. But people are worried about artificial intelligence: A recent University of Maryland Program for Public Consultation found that roughly 80 percent of Democrats and Republicans backed a federal agency to regulate AI and mandated safety tests for AI programming. That’s about as bipartisan as any issue gets—and Trump is on the wrong side of it, insisting instead that the only AI guardrail the U.S. needs is a “STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT.” (There’s nothing quite like the all-caps bluster of a painfully insecure president to put everyone at ease.)

It’s not just AI, either, where Trump is out of step with the country. He has also repeatedly backed data centers, which are increasingly unpopular in local, state, and national politics and in a similarly bipartisan fashion. “The only reason that communities throughout the U.S.A. should not want Data Centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor,” Trump wrote on Truth Social late last month. “If they want to be successful and rich, with far lower taxes and jobs all over the place, let Data Reign. The good news is that there are plenty of other places that want them. If we kill the Golden Goose, you will only have yourselves to blame.” The problem is that, once again, a lot of Americans want to kill, or at least cage, that Golden Goose—and Trump’s protestations don’t seem to be making much of a difference. A July poll from Politico found that support for data centers among Trump voters has fallen 11 points in just six months and now stands at a paltry 34 percent.

Trump’s much-vaunted—if somewhat overrated—political instincts have corroded. Whether it’s age or his lame-duck status or the fact that he’s fixated on interior decorating in the White House and architectural projects around Washington, it’s clear that he’s lost more than a step in his second term. And that’s a gift for Democrats in more ways than one.

Trump’s choice to flout public opinion is perhaps not so difficult to understand. His tariffs and Iran war are straining the economy, and the stock market’s bull run in recent years has been largely driven by the so-called Magnificent 7 tech stocks that comprise about a third of the S&P 500’s total value—hence his vocal backing for AI and the data centers on which it relies. “Trump is married to data centers no matter what because it’s the only real job creator,” one former Trump administration official told Politico earlier this month.

The economy needs AI, and Trump needs the economy, which means he needs AI thanks in large part to damage he has inflicted on the economy via tariffs and the war in Iran. Still, while Trump has taken many divisive stances, it’s rare for him to take a stand that’s so unpopular across the political spectrum. His immigration stance, for example, had broad support among Republicans before he even declared his political candidacy, though it has proven less so among Democrats and many independents. Here, he’s really out on an island. And we’re seeing the limits of his abilities to shape public opinion.

It’s possible, of course, that those abilities have always been limited. And his knack for marketing and messaging may have always been overrated. For instance, Trump was never really that great at nicknames. For every “Little Marco” there were several like “Al Frankenstein” or “1 for 38 Kasich.” Shallow political analysts thrilled to these jibes—one labeled him the “Michael Jordan of nicknames” in a piece that gushed over “Little Rocket Man,” Trump’s moniker for the nuclear arsenal–possessing Kim Jong Un—but they were, more often than not, unimaginative and unworthy even of a schoolyard taunt.

Still, the nicknames did tend to at least distill something about the person he was describing (Rubio was weak, Franken was weird, Kasich was a loser) that was easy to compute among his audience: Republican voters favored him to Rubio and Kasich and were predisposed to dislike Al Franken, a Democrat. Trump has certainly made Republicans more in favor of corruption and law-breaking, but has seen GOP support for his war in Iran and tariffs—which were never especially popular to begin with—drop in recent months. With data centers and AI, he’s starting with a deficit that he doesn’t seem able to surmount.

The biggest surprise here is that Trump is willing to go out on such a limb on the issue. He certainly didn’t take any similar stand in his first term, one that was so at odds with the views of even his core supporters. That he’s doing so is a testament, certainly, to just how badly he has screwed up the economy, which is now perversely dependent on technologies that a clear majority of Americans are either skeptical of or outright loathe. But it also reveals that the president is, at 80 years old, more out of touch with his base than ever. Or put more simply, Trump is now plainly bad at politics.

The big winner here, obviously, is the Democrats. Trump’s unpopular stances are not just a political boost that could turn a blue wave into a tsunami; they also give cover to Democrats as they figure out where to stand on AI and data centers. The party has failed to articulate a clear position, as it’s seemingly torn between the potential for job creation, the party’s fraying but still present ties to Silicon Valley, and the public’s growing anger toward the tech giants. While some Democrats—mostly progressives and populists—have called for moratoriums on data center construction, the party’s leaders largely haven’t followed suit. Ordinarily that messaging incoherence would pose a political problem. But it isn’t, for now, thanks to the Hoax Buster in the White House.

Consider supporting my work so I can continue creating it: Substack: https://nickanderson.substack.com/ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/editorialcartoons Ko-Fi: https://www.patreon.com/c/editorialcartoonsCartoon Related | Trump says he’s the only one smart enough to regulate AI…

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As Nvidia expands its influence through its NVLink Fusion tech, rival networking vendors are scrambling to bring alternative interconnects and switches to market. At the AI Infra Summit this week, Delos Data and Cornelis Networks officially entered the scale up networking race. Scale-up fabrics, like NVLink, are what have allowed Nvidia to make eight, 72, and now 576 GPUs behave as one enormous AI accelerator. To catch up, rivals like AMD have embraced emerging protocols like Ultra Accelerator Link. Today, these protocols are largely being tunneled over standard Ethernet switches. For instance, AMD is using Broadcom’s 102.4 Tbps Tomahawk 6-based switches connecting to custom I/O dies on the MI455X. Purpose-built UALink switches and physical interconnects remain elusive, but that won’t be the case for long if Cornelis and Delos have their way. The two companies are approaching this challenge from a few different angles, including standardization, software optimization, and physical hardware. Setting the standard for the Never-Nvidia network At AI Infra on Monday, HPC-centric networking vendor Cornelis introduced the Active Compute Fabric (ACF), which seeks to establish an open architecture for scale up and scale out networking that integrates programmable compute into the fabric. The standard signals Cornelis’ entry into the scale up networking arena. Spun out of Intel in 2020, Cornelis’ Omni-Path tech was originally designed as a scale-out interconnect for high-performance computing applications, including supercomputers like Trinity and Lynx. With the imminent launch of the company’s 800 Gbps-capable CN6000-series switches and NICs, the company has its sights set not only on bringing its tech to a broader audience through the open Ultra Ethernet protocol, but also on scale-up networking. ACF expands on the mission of technologies like UALink and the Ethernet for Scale-Up Networking, another scale up networking protocol, to set a baseline for in-network compute capabilities across a wide range of hardware, not just Cornelis’ own CN-series parts. One of the key technologies behind Nvidia’s NVSwitch ASICs is support for SHARP, which allows for things like in-network collectives to be offloaded to the switch ASICs, freeing up GPU compute and cutting down on communication overheads. Collective acceleration isn't new by any means, with major networking vendors from Broadcom to Cisco having implemented it in some capacity. As an open architecture, ACF appears to set a least common denominator so that customers deploying these systems know exactly what they’re getting. However, it doesn’t stop there. Cornelis sees opportunities to accelerate a variety of other functions. We’ve detailed a few below: KV cache offloading used to store and retrieve model state across multiple sessions. MoE expert dispatch to reduce duplicate transfers and communication overhead for mixture-of-experts models during inference and training. Message passing interface offload for HPC-centric applications. In fabric checkpointing for failure recovery during training and other large workloads. “Communications overhead and synchronization can leave expensive accelerators underutilized,” the company explained. These in-network accelerators “allow the network to operate on data as it moves through the system.” According to Cornelis, the savings potential from reclaiming that idle compute is significant. “In a 100,000 GPU system, Cornelis modeling of public data shows that roughly half of all GPU hours are spent waiting for data, worth about $1.68 billion a year in wasted capacity and 500 GWh of power.” As usual, take these claims with a grain of salt. However, reclaiming GPU idle time would equate to significant savings. Eliminating all the bottlenecks that contribute to them is easier said than done. A new kind of NIC for the AI age While Cornelis champions its ACF architecture, Delos Data, a startup founded by former Barefoot Networks and Intel execs, aims to tackle the physical layer with a series of new network reference designs. Marketed under its Nonstop AI portfolio, the network interfaces span the full gamut of connectivity from co-packaged interconnects to more traditional NICs. The idea, the company explains, is to provide customers with a system-level blueprint for speeding up data movement between endpoints and enabling larger compute domains scaling beyond a single rack. Delos’ data interface will be offered in three form factors. The first is an I/O die capable of more than 30 Tbps of aggregate bandwidth or about 8 TB/s in either direction. That’s more than double the interconnect bandwidth of either Nvidia's or AMD’s latest accelerators, which cap out at 3.6 TB/s. Just how competitive that ends up being will depend on when Delos’ I/O chiplets actually see deployment. That timeline is going to depend heavily on integration since those I/O dies need to be integrated directly into the accelerator package, which requires a high-degree of co-design. Critically, Delos isn't trying to trap its customers in a walled garden to the same extent that Nvidia does with its NVLink Fusion I/O dies or IP. At least as of writing, NVLink Fusion still requires customers to buy NVSwitches for scale up networking. Delos’ chiplets are protocol agnostic. They don’t care whether you’re using ESUN, UALink, or something else. Chip designers that'd rather focus their efforts and capital on the AI bits of their accelerators – which, it turns out, applies to most hyperscalers – could simply license Delos' chiplet design. This protocol agnosticism also extends to Delos’ near-packaged optics (NPO) tech, which will integrate a 10-plus Tbps data interface — that’s 2.5 TB/s bidirectional bandwidth in Nvidia speak — with optics engines from leading optics suppliers. Rack scale systems, like Nvidia’s NVL72, have largely relied on copper interconnects up to this point due to power constraints. As systems grow from 72 GPU rack systems to row-scale clusters with 576 and eventually 1,152 GPUs, optics become unavoidable. While integrating optics directly into the accelerators is possible using tech available today, the blast radius of a failed optical module is considerable. NPO offers an alternative. Copper interconnects are used within the rack, with optics provided via user-serviceable NPO modules between racks. Finally, Delos is working on a 400-plus Gbps NIC, which like the rest of its data interface offerings is protocol agnostic. This is arguably the least surprising entry in the entire lineup. Scale out networks are still going to be required for large training clusters as well as for front-end access and storage networks. These interfaces build on Delos’ existing compute reference design, which we looked at during Computex, as well as its Nonstop AI software platform, which is designed to facilitate the configuration and monitoring of these switched fabrics or meshes in order to enable dynamic rerouting of traffic in the event of a link failure. Telemetry gathered by its data interface offerings allows for even greater visibility into the network, allowing for faster rerouting and recovery. Fueling competition Investors appear more than eager for more competition in the scale up arena. Alongside its product announcements, Cornelis announced approximately $205 million in funding to bring its next generation of scale up and scale out networking products to market. Meanwhile, Delos Data announced Tuesday that it’s now raised more than $100 million in funding with support from venture capital firms Matrix, Playground, and Socratic Partners among others. ®

Attorney General Todd Blanche won’t examine the Russian ties to Donald Trump Jr.

Umar Kremlev, a Russian oligarch, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to make Trump’s lavish destination wedding a reality, ProPublica reported Monday.

The expenses footed by Kremlev included a $100,000 nightly rental of a private island in the Bahamas, as well as an estimated $70,000 fireworks display. Kremlev’s team also assisted Trump in coordinating the evening.

And Kremlev isn’t just anybody in Russian politics. He’s a close ally to President Vladimir Putin, and his decision to shoulder a huge portion of the wedding placed him within degrees of President Donald Trump’s orbit. Kremlev also attended the wedding reception alongside a cadre of Russian guests.

But none of that is of any interest to Blanche, who shrugged off the concerning connection at the White House Tuesday.

“So I—the president’s already talked about it,” Blanche said dismissively when asked by a reporter as to whether or not the Justice Department would examine Trump’s relationship with Kremlev.

“The president’s son has said that he’s a very close friend, and that he accepted a gift on the weekend of his wedding,” Blanche said. “So I don’t—I’m not sure when you say, ‘Am I investigating’—am I investigating what?”

“And when you say, ‘This person is a friend of Putin,’ I don’t even know if that’s true or not,” continued America’s attorney general—the country’s chief law enforcement officer. “I don’t know this person either, I don’t have any information about it.”

Mere weeks before the late-May wedding, Putin personally awarded Kremlev Russia’s Order of Friendship, recognizing Kremlev’s ability to improve international cooperation with Russia via his involvement with the International Boxing Association.

The IBA is, in its own right, riddled with scandal. ProPublica reported that the entity was financed by the Russian state-owned oil company Gazprom, and that the wedding payments originated from an IBA-affiliated entity in Dubai.

Kremlev—a towering, bald-headed man that speaks little English—stood out like a sore thumb at the party, according to insiders that spoke with ProPublica. About 18 people participated in the wedding ceremony (which Kremlev did not attend, per his spokesman), while roughly 50 people (including Kremlev and multiple other Russians) attended the intimate reception. Those that spoke with ProPublica said that Kremlev and his associates mostly stuck to themselves, speaking Russian.

Yet Trump Jr. explained on his podcast that the whole event was “really small” and made up of “close friends.”

“Tried to keep it really tight. And it was just awesome,” he said.

That would suggest Trump had either developed a close tie to a Putin ally, or had unwittingly invited one to his own wedding.

Kremlev’s press office told ProPublica that the two men have a “friendly relationship” and first met “a couple of years ago.” Yet even Trump younger brother Eric Trump was completely unaware of Kremlev’s identity.

“Eric has absolutely no clue who this person is, nor has never heard his name,” a spokesperson for Eric told ProPublica.

Quick Take

• Prime Video continues the march back from streaming to cable with its first-ever multiple streaming option bundle, a five-part subscription add-on.
• The package includes AMC+, BritBox, MGM+, PBS Masterpiece, and STARZ.
• Nerdist’s Take: Cable was no great shakes, but the increasing amount of streamers coming together show it was better than what we have now.

The prophecy is coming true: streamers are re-inventing cable. Amazon has announced its first bundle subscription. It will combine five streaming services together into one.

Prime Video revealed that starting today for the first time ever customers can multiple streaming options to their account with just one additional subscription. You can now get AMC+, BritBox, MGM+, PBS Masterpiece, and STARZ added to your account for $29.99 a month. The collection’s official enrollment page says it will save customers $18.96 a month. But that is slightly misleading since it doesn’t include the cost of Prime itself. This bundle is only available to Prime Video subscribers. You can also a free 7-day trial if you want.

Amazon

“Today marks a milestone for our customers, the launch of the first-ever five-service streaming bundle on Prime Video. Our subscriptions and bundles business continues to see incredible growth because we stay focused on delivering unmatched selection, value and convenience,” said Ryan Pirozzi, Head of Prime Video Channels, U.S., in a press release. “With AMC+, MGM+, BritBox, PBS Masterpiece, and STARZ together, Prime Video customers get the premium entertainment they love, all in one place.”

All in one place? Wow! What a concept! Wonder where they came up with it……

Prime Video

For younger readers who have grown up in a streaming world, this is how TV used to work. You paid one bill to gain access to many channels with many viewing options. If you wanted to add even more channels, you told that one company and they increased your singular bill. It sort of stunk and everyone complained about the price all the time. But it turns out it was vastly superior to having 37 different subscriptions that require just as many apps and cost more on the whole. Now we just have to wait for all the streamers to get together to truly recreate cable. It was always streaming’s destiny.

Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist. You can follow Mikey on Bluesky at @‌burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.

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