Are we going to see ads in ChatGPT's answers soon? When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. According to The Information, the AI company is looking to create a new type of digital ad rather than simply copying what existing search and social media companies are running. As part of this, we're exploring what ads in our product could look like,” OpenAI told The Information. “People have a trusted relationship with ChatGPT, and any approach would be designed to respect that trust.” Staff discussions on ad implementation have ranged from prioritizing sponsored content in the chatbot's answers to adding a sidebar that shows ads related to the user's query. They've also considered showing them only when the conversation moves toward shopping or similar activities, or as a secondary step where ads are displayed only when someone clicks a link in ChatGPT's results. It's been reported that OpenAI is shifting its focus away from ads, especially after CEO Sam Altman declared a ‘Code Red' for the company following the latest version of Google's Gemini, which outpaced ChatGPT in several benchmarks. Altman said that OpenAI needed to improve the AI chatbot's personalization, speed, and reliability, and cover a broader range of topics, so the company is pausing work on all other projects to focus on these capabilities. However, it seems to be continuing progress on ChatGPT ads, despite the recent change in focus. Aside from that, OpenAI said it will start earning revenue from non-paying users by 2026, projecting $2 per user annually, which will grow to $15 by 2030. Despite that, OpenAI has yet to turn a profit since its founding in 2015. This amount is more than enough to cover OpenAI's estimated losses, and it seems it wants to follow the search giant's playbook by baking ads into its results as well. However, this also raises privacy concerns, especially since ChatGPT likely has much more information about its users than Google does. Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox. Jowi Morales is a tech enthusiast with years of experience working in the industry. Tom's Hardware is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher.

Taking money away from billionaires is funny, and threatening to do it can be a nice political sugar rush for anyone with even a tiny amount of class consciousness (even though it would not get close to creating “socialism” in America according to socialists like Doug Henwood). The state of California is now very much threatening to do it, and the predictable result is happening according to the New York Times: tech billionaires like Peter Thiel and ex-Google CEO and co-founder Larry Page are having their obligatory tantrum and threatening to leave. This comes in the form of a proposed ballot measure backed by organized labor—specifically the Service Employees International Union–United Healthcare Workers West. Anyone who lives in California as of January 1, 2026 would be subject to the proposed tax, and the math works like this: If you have $20 billion in assets, you owe $1 billion, and have five years to pay up. If you've followed the similar drama in New York City during the rise of Zohran Mamdani, you already know this next part by heart. According to the Times, Peter Thiel is now weighing an out-of-state office for Thiel Capital, and figuring out how to spend less time in California. David Lesperance, a tax advisor for billionaires, told the Times, “almost all of my clients are taking steps as quickly as possible both to sever California residence and to move assets outside of the state.” Palihapitiya's X activity shows that he's been on a tear with this topic for days, however: It should not be lost on anyone that this has already cost California $10's of billions in lost taxes from Elon and the plethora of well paid employees that followed… pic.twitter.com/2aADLB4WWH— Chamath Palihapitiya (@chamath) December 25, 2025 It should not be lost on anyone that this has already cost California $10's of billions in lost taxes from Elon and the plethora of well paid employees that followed… pic.twitter.com/2aADLB4WWH But do the American rich actually flee a state that has decided to tax them? The state of Massachusetts passed something a little different: a more widespread income surtax for people making more than $1 million, and after two years, more tax-eligible millionaires are reportedly in the state, not less. So yes, Billionaires, we know that if this ends up on the ballot and actually gets voted into law, most of you are going to characterize Californians with less money than you as ungrateful and naive children, and some of you will even make good on your threat to leave. The question would be this: will a fun state with great weather that also happens to manufacture new billionaires all the time actually regret making you cough up some of your money in the long run? Driverless scenic coastal road trips could soon be possible. The storm could trigger dangerous flash floods and mudslides, but it may also extinguish California's wildfire season.

State legislators passed the bill — S4505/A5346 — back in June, with text calling for mental health warnings on “addictive social media platforms,” which are defined as platforms offering “an addictive feed, push notifications, autoplay, infinite scroll, and/or like counts as a significant part” of their services, though exception can be made if the attorney general determines those features are used for “a valid purpose unrelated to prolonging use of such platform.” Then-Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said last year that social media platforms should add warning labels. “Keeping New Yorkers safe has been my top priority since taking office, and that includes protecting our kids from the potential harms of social media features that encourage excessive use,” Hochul said in a statement. One of the bill's sponsors, Assemblymember Nily Rozic, made a similar point in a statement of his own:, “New York families deserve honesty about how social media platforms impact mental health. By requiring warning labels based on the latest medical research, this law puts public health first and finally gives us the tools we need to make informed decisions.” Last year, New York passed laws requiring that social media platforms obtain parental consent before showing children “addictive feeds” and before collecting or selling the personal data of users under 18. This isn't Hochul's only end-of-year tech regulation; she also recently signed the AI safety-focused RAISE Act. How reality crushed Ÿnsect, the French startup that had raised over $600M for insect farming Nvidia to license AI chip challenger Groq's tech and hire its CEO Marissa Mayer's new startup Dazzle raises $8M led by Forerunner's Kirsten Green

Eleven years after United Launch Alliance CEO Tory Bruno partnered with Blue Origin to create a new rocket engine, he's joining Jeff Bezos' space venture as the president of Blue Origin's newly created National Security Group. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman added his congratulations via the X social-media platform. In Friday's announcement of the change, Blue Origin said Bruno would report to CEO Dave Limp. “Tory brings unmatched experience, and I'm confident he'll accelerate our ability to deliver on that mission.” Bruno, 64, led ULA for 11 years following a 30-year career at Lockheed Martin. Not long after taking the reins at ULA in 2014, Bruno sat beside Bezos to announce a close collaboration on the development of Blue Origin's BE-4 engine, which is used on ULA's Vulcan rocket as well as Blue Origin's orbital-class New Glenn rocket. In 2024, Blue Origin joined ULA and SpaceX on the list of approved providers for such launches, but New Glenn has flown only twice. United Launch Alliance is a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. Last year, there were rumors that ULA was the subject of acquisition talks, perhaps involving Blue Origin or Sierra Space, but so far those rumors haven't panned out. Earlier this week, Lockheed Martin's Robert Lightfoot and Boeing's Kay Sears announced that Bruno was leaving ULA “to pursue another opportunity” — and named John Elbon as the joint venture's interim CEO. Great teams still win, and finding them is harder than ever. Together, we help employers cut through the noise and hire smarter, faster. Learn more about GeekWork: Contact GeekWire co-founder John Cook at [email protected]. Starbucks hires Amazon grocery tech leader as new CTO amid turnaround push Tech Moves: Nintex CEO to depart; Raikes Foundation names leader; Qualtrics exec now at Workday Space Force allocates $2.4B in national security launch contracts to Blue Origin Blue Origin joins SpaceX and ULA on Pentagon list for $5.6B in launch contracts Space shots: A tangled web of speculation surrounds Boeing, Blue Origin and Bezos

What it does: Airbility is creating two-seat manned electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. What it does: Astrum has developed a propellantless, electricity-only space propulsion system. What it does: Offers a fintech-esq risk analysis platform for spacecraft that enables them to obtain insurance coverage. Why it's noteworthy: Endox is combining its own proprietary data capture systems with robotics tech. What it does: Hance is building an AI neural network specifically to process and enhance real-time audio. Why it's noteworthy: Hance's audio AI is designed to handle the unpredictable nature of live audio with its background noises, room reverb, and uncontrolled environments, such as those encountered by the military. What it does: Skylark has created a self-learning AI specifically designed to be used by machines and in safety applications. What it does: Has created navigation software not dependent on GPS. Why it's noteworthy: Skyline uses AI to quickly recognize a scene without expensive GPUs and is effective in combating GPS jamming tech. How reality crushed Ÿnsect, the French startup that had raised over $600M for insect farming Nvidia to license AI chip challenger Groq's tech and hire its CEO Waymo explains why its robotaxis got stuck during the SF blackout Waymo resumes service in San Francisco after robotaxis stall during blackout

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Although the publication still hasn't seen massive hikes in GPU pricing (compared to memory and storage), one shop said that it is only a matter of time before we start seeing empty shelves in the graphics card section. The store says, “Cards equipped with high-capacity memory have become very difficult to procure. We still have stock at the moment, but we're in a situation where we don't know when the next shipment will arrive — or if it will arrive at all.” Other shops have similar concerns, wherein GPUs with 8GB of VRAM or more are becoming harder to restock. The entire world is in the midst of a memory crunch due to unprecedented demand from AI data centers, driving prices to historic highs. Furthermore, many analysts and industry leaders say we won't see relief in 2026, primarily because memory makers are hedging their bets against an AI bubble and aren't expanding production. RAM kits and SSDs were the first items to be struck by this crisis, with modules seeing price increases by more than 246% in 2025 alone. It seems that other components, like GPUs, are also starting to be hit by the crisis. Graphics cards require VRAM, which differs from the memory modules we use in our computers. However, they're still based on the same DRAM-type semiconductor technology, so when the big three chipmakers slashed DRAM production, GDDR supply tightened as well, likely forcing the consumer graphics card divisions of AMD, Intel, and Nvidia to reduce their output. With memory chip manufacturers focusing their output on the lucrative AI market, consumers have no choice but to hold on to their existing devices or shell out exorbitant prices for anything that requires memory modules. Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News, or add us as a preferred source, to get our latest news, analysis, & reviews in your feeds. Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox. Jowi Morales is a tech enthusiast with years of experience working in the industry. Tom's Hardware is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher.

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. As the industry plunges into a NAND flash and DRAM drought, rendering new custom builds overpriced, laptops have suddenly become a lot more enticing. As such, we've hunted down the perfect deal for you: MSI's Vector 16 with an RTX 5070 Ti for just $1,299 on Walmart right now, marked down $700 from its list price. With an RTX 5070 Ti and a Ryzen 9 8940HX at the helm, the Vector 16 is a solid performer that excels across gaming and productivity. Alongside the GPU sits AMD's flagship Ryzen 9 8940HX processor, carrying 16 cores and 32 threads, boosting up to 5.3 GHz. You get 16 GB of DDR5-5200 memory and a 1 TB PCIe 4.0 SSD for storage, which can be doubled thanks to a second, empty M.2 slot. That entire combination makes the Vector 16 a competent performer across games and productivity workloads, such as editing. The keyboard is backlit with 24-zone RGB and a Copilot key that we all definitely love. You get Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 for wireless connectivity, along with plenty of fast USB ports, HDMI, Ethernet, headphone jack, and even an SD Card reader. The design is actually quite understated for a gaming laptop, maintaining a stealthy aesthetic that'll only scream when you want it to. It's a bit heavy at 5.95 lbs., but the large screen, battery, and internals justify that. You even get a physical webcam shutter for privacy, and the laptop comes with a one-year warranty for peace of mind. If you've been looking for a powerful yet affordable machine, the MSI Vector 16 at just $1,299 is a great deal, especially amid the component crisis. Hassam Nasir is a die-hard hardware enthusiast with years of experience as a tech editor and writer, focusing on detailed CPU comparisons and general hardware news. When he's not working, you'll find him bending tubes for his ever-evolving custom water-loop gaming rig or benchmarking the latest CPUs and GPUs just for fun. Tom's Hardware is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher.

The reactions to this news ranged from shock and dismay to anger at the proposition, and now fans of the 2005 kids' series are trying to do something about it. Avatar fans recently launched an online petition for the studio to put Aang back on its theatrical slate, which at the time of writing has over 18,000 signatures. A theatrical release [for Aang]…will amplify its reach, drawing in curious viewers who may not engage with streaming platforms, thus expanding its audience exponentially.” Comments under the petition are filled with longtime Avatar fans voicing their support for Paramount to put the film back in theaters, with one in particular catching some attention online. “Worked on this film, first leading one of the teams, and eventually directing. Very frustrated about studio higher-up's decisions,” the comment reads. Along with calling for a theatrical release, the comment claimed there were “a LOT of frustrating, unfair moves” made by Paramount. However, Ahn himself has since said on Twitter he didn't make that “misleading comment” and wanted to make it clear in light of the mention about shedding information on the film's production. “I hope this official clarification prevents any further rumors or false speculation, and I sincerely hope the dedicated artists of this film are not unfairly criticized or put in a difficult position due to such unauthorized comments,” he added. However, I must clarify that someone has impersonated me and left a misleading comment. I am not the author of that post, and I hope this official clarification prevents any further rumors or false speculation. Even without the explicit support of Ahn behind them, the Avatar fandom clearly isn't enthused about Legend of Aang being shifted to streaming. Whatever reason one has for not liking it, it's exactly not great that a studio can suddenly upend how any film comes out. What's happening with The Legend of Aang isn't too dissimilar from when networks were cancelling shows they'd already renewed—and if anything, the move has become even more concerning as Paramount has designs on gobbling up other studios. Whether that also includes a theatrical window is entirely up to Paramount. Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what's next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who. Kai Murakami and Thomas Jane will play 'Star Trek' legends Hikaru Sulu and Leonard McCoy in the final episode of 'Strange New Worlds.' 'Legend of Aang' will now debut on streaming, hitting Paramount+ in fall 2026.

Many are starting to get support for UEFI as well. Other boards like the Raspberry Pi and many boards based on Rockchip SoCs have most of the necessary support mainlined, so the experience is quite painless. Many are starting to get support for UEFI as well. For example I have an Orange Pi 5 Plus running the totally generic aarch64 image of Home Assistant OS [0]. Zero customization was needed, it just works with mainline everything.There's even UEFI [1].Granted this isn't the case for all boards but Rockchip at least seems to have great upstream support. There's even UEFI [1].Granted this isn't the case for all boards but Rockchip at least seems to have great upstream support. Granted this isn't the case for all boards but Rockchip at least seems to have great upstream support. Manufacturers hack it together, flash to device and publish the sources, but dont bother with upstreaming and move on.Same story as android devices not having updates two years after release. Same story as android devices not having updates two years after release. We reached the state where you dont need to spec-check the laptop if you want to run linux on it, the same will happen to arm sbc I hope. But it seems each ARM64 board needs its own custom kernel support, but once that is done, it can support anything compiled to ARM64 as a general target? Often an outright mediocre software development culture generally, that sees software as a pure cost centre, in fact. The "product" is seem to be the chip, the software "just" a side show (or worse, a channel by which their IP could leak).The Rockchip stuff is better, but still has similar problems.These companies need to learn that their hardware will be adopted more aggressively for products if the experience of integrating with it isn't sub-par. The Rockchip stuff is better, but still has similar problems.These companies need to learn that their hardware will be adopted more aggressively for products if the experience of integrating with it isn't sub-par. These companies need to learn that their hardware will be adopted more aggressively for products if the experience of integrating with it isn't sub-par. I run both but not to the exclusion of everything else. There is nothing I've failed to run successfully on my ARM ones and the only thing I haven't tried is gaming. BTW what's up with people pushing N150 and N300 in every single ARM SBC thread? I run both but not to the exclusion of everything else. There is nothing I've failed to run successfully on my ARM ones and the only thing I haven't tried is gaming. Why would the A720 at 2.8 GHz run circles around the N150 that boosts up to 3.6 GHz in single-threaded workloads, while the 12-core chip would wouldn't beat the 4-core chip in multithreaded workloads?Obviously, the Intel chip wins in single-threaded performance while losing in multi-threaded: https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/6304vs6617/Intel-N150-v...I can't speak to why other people bring up the N150 in ARM SBC threads any more than "AMD doesn't compete in the ~$200 SBC segment".FWIW, as far as SBC/NUCs go, I've had a Pi 4, an RK3399 board, an RK3568 board, an N100 NUC from GMKTec, and a N150 NUC from Geekom, and the N150 has by far been my favorite out of those for real-world workloads rather than tinkering. Even if you don't get burned, your SODIMM cards will. Obviously, the Intel chip wins in single-threaded performance while losing in multi-threaded: https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/6304vs6617/Intel-N150-v...I can't speak to why other people bring up the N150 in ARM SBC threads any more than "AMD doesn't compete in the ~$200 SBC segment".FWIW, as far as SBC/NUCs go, I've had a Pi 4, an RK3399 board, an RK3568 board, an N100 NUC from GMKTec, and a N150 NUC from Geekom, and the N150 has by far been my favorite out of those for real-world workloads rather than tinkering. Even if you don't get burned, your SODIMM cards will. I can't speak to why other people bring up the N150 in ARM SBC threads any more than "AMD doesn't compete in the ~$200 SBC segment".FWIW, as far as SBC/NUCs go, I've had a Pi 4, an RK3399 board, an RK3568 board, an N100 NUC from GMKTec, and a N150 NUC from Geekom, and the N150 has by far been my favorite out of those for real-world workloads rather than tinkering. Even if you don't get burned, your SODIMM cards will. FWIW, as far as SBC/NUCs go, I've had a Pi 4, an RK3399 board, an RK3568 board, an N100 NUC from GMKTec, and a N150 NUC from Geekom, and the N150 has by far been my favorite out of those for real-world workloads rather than tinkering. Even if you don't get burned, your SODIMM cards will. Even if you don't get burned, your SODIMM cards will. ARM actually has a spec in place called SystemReady that standardizes on UEFI, which should make bringup of ARM systems much less jank. I keep saying, the first cheap Chinese vendor that ships a SystemReady-compliant SBC is gonna make a killing. Multi core score is much higher for this SBC vs the N150. You're probably right about "most workloads", but as a single counter-example, I added several seasons of shows to my N305 Plex server last night, and it pinned all eight threads for quite a while doing its intro/credit detection.I actually went and checked if it would be at all practical to move my Plex server to a VM on my bigger home server where it could get 16 Skymont threads (at 4.6ghz vs 8 Gracemont threads at ~3ghz - so something like 3x the multithreaded potential on E-cores). Doesn't really seem workable to use Intel Quick Sync on Linux guests with a Hyper-V host though. I actually went and checked if it would be at all practical to move my Plex server to a VM on my bigger home server where it could get 16 Skymont threads (at 4.6ghz vs 8 Gracemont threads at ~3ghz - so something like 3x the multithreaded potential on E-cores). Doesn't really seem workable to use Intel Quick Sync on Linux guests with a Hyper-V host though. if you are talking about ancient hardware, yes, it's mostly driven by single core performance. But any console more recent than the 2000s will hugely benefit from multiple cores (because of the split between CPU and GPU, and the fact that more recent consoles also had multiple cores, too). Only pain is how brutal the Rust cross-compile is from my x86 machine.I mean, here's Geerling running a bunch of Steam games flawlessly on a Aarch64 NVIDIA GB10 machine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjRKvKC4ntw(Those things are expensive, but I just ordered one [the ASUS variant] for myself. )Meanwhile Apple is pushing the ARM64 architecture hard, and Windows is apparently actually quite viable now?Personally... it's totally irrational, but I have always had a grudge against x86 since it "won" in the early 90s and I had to switch from 68k. I mean, here's Geerling running a bunch of Steam games flawlessly on a Aarch64 NVIDIA GB10 machine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjRKvKC4ntw(Those things are expensive, but I just ordered one [the ASUS variant] for myself. )Meanwhile Apple is pushing the ARM64 architecture hard, and Windows is apparently actually quite viable now?Personally... it's totally irrational, but I have always had a grudge against x86 since it "won" in the early 90s and I had to switch from 68k. (Those things are expensive, but I just ordered one [the ASUS variant] for myself. )Meanwhile Apple is pushing the ARM64 architecture hard, and Windows is apparently actually quite viable now?Personally... it's totally irrational, but I have always had a grudge against x86 since it "won" in the early 90s and I had to switch from 68k. Meanwhile Apple is pushing the ARM64 architecture hard, and Windows is apparently actually quite viable now?Personally... it's totally irrational, but I have always had a grudge against x86 since it "won" in the early 90s and I had to switch from 68k. Personally... it's totally irrational, but I have always had a grudge against x86 since it "won" in the early 90s and I had to switch from 68k. I know the concept has been around for a while but no idea if it actually means anything. I assume that people are targeting ones in common devices like Apple, but what about here? I've not found Neon to be fun or easy to use, and I frequently see devices ignoring the NPU and inferring on CPU because it's easier. Maybe you get lucky and someone has made a backend for something specific you want, but it's not common. Seems this machine is more powerful than it, definitely attractive to me for a physical aarch64 self host runner. Yet again, OrangePi crank out half-baked products and tech enthusiasts who quite understandably lack the deep knowledge to do more than follow others' instructions on how to compile stuff talk about it as if their specifications actually matter.Yet again the HN discourse will likely gather around stuff like "why not just use an N1x0" and side quests about how the Raspberry Pi Foundation has abandoned its principles / is just a cynical Broadcom psyop / is "lagging behind" in hardware.This stuff can be done better and the geek world should be done excusing OrangePi producing hardware abandonware time after time. Stop buying this crap and maybe they will finally start focussing on doing more than shipping support for one or two old kernels and last year's OS while kicking vague commitments about future support just far enough down the road that they can release another board first.Please stop falling for it :-/ETA: I think what grinds my gears the most is that OrangePi, BananaPi etc., are largely free-riding off the Linux community while producing products that only "beat" the market-defining manufacturers (Raspberry Pi, BeagleBoard) because they treat software support as an uncosted externality.This kind of "build it and they will use it" logic works well for microcontrollers, where a manufacturer can reasonably expect to produce a chip with a couple of tech demos, a spec sheet and a limited C SDK and people will find uses for it.But for "near-desktop class" SBCs it is not much better than misrepresentation. Consequently these things are e-waste in a way that even the global desk drawer population of the Raspberry Pi does not reach.And yet they are graded on a curve and never live up to their potential. Yet again the HN discourse will likely gather around stuff like "why not just use an N1x0" and side quests about how the Raspberry Pi Foundation has abandoned its principles / is just a cynical Broadcom psyop / is "lagging behind" in hardware.This stuff can be done better and the geek world should be done excusing OrangePi producing hardware abandonware time after time. Stop buying this crap and maybe they will finally start focussing on doing more than shipping support for one or two old kernels and last year's OS while kicking vague commitments about future support just far enough down the road that they can release another board first.Please stop falling for it :-/ETA: I think what grinds my gears the most is that OrangePi, BananaPi etc., are largely free-riding off the Linux community while producing products that only "beat" the market-defining manufacturers (Raspberry Pi, BeagleBoard) because they treat software support as an uncosted externality.This kind of "build it and they will use it" logic works well for microcontrollers, where a manufacturer can reasonably expect to produce a chip with a couple of tech demos, a spec sheet and a limited C SDK and people will find uses for it.But for "near-desktop class" SBCs it is not much better than misrepresentation. Consequently these things are e-waste in a way that even the global desk drawer population of the Raspberry Pi does not reach.And yet they are graded on a curve and never live up to their potential. This stuff can be done better and the geek world should be done excusing OrangePi producing hardware abandonware time after time. Stop buying this crap and maybe they will finally start focussing on doing more than shipping support for one or two old kernels and last year's OS while kicking vague commitments about future support just far enough down the road that they can release another board first.Please stop falling for it :-/ETA: I think what grinds my gears the most is that OrangePi, BananaPi etc., are largely free-riding off the Linux community while producing products that only "beat" the market-defining manufacturers (Raspberry Pi, BeagleBoard) because they treat software support as an uncosted externality.This kind of "build it and they will use it" logic works well for microcontrollers, where a manufacturer can reasonably expect to produce a chip with a couple of tech demos, a spec sheet and a limited C SDK and people will find uses for it.But for "near-desktop class" SBCs it is not much better than misrepresentation. Consequently these things are e-waste in a way that even the global desk drawer population of the Raspberry Pi does not reach.And yet they are graded on a curve and never live up to their potential. Please stop falling for it :-/ETA: I think what grinds my gears the most is that OrangePi, BananaPi etc., are largely free-riding off the Linux community while producing products that only "beat" the market-defining manufacturers (Raspberry Pi, BeagleBoard) because they treat software support as an uncosted externality.This kind of "build it and they will use it" logic works well for microcontrollers, where a manufacturer can reasonably expect to produce a chip with a couple of tech demos, a spec sheet and a limited C SDK and people will find uses for it.But for "near-desktop class" SBCs it is not much better than misrepresentation. Consequently these things are e-waste in a way that even the global desk drawer population of the Raspberry Pi does not reach.And yet they are graded on a curve and never live up to their potential. ETA: I think what grinds my gears the most is that OrangePi, BananaPi etc., are largely free-riding off the Linux community while producing products that only "beat" the market-defining manufacturers (Raspberry Pi, BeagleBoard) because they treat software support as an uncosted externality.This kind of "build it and they will use it" logic works well for microcontrollers, where a manufacturer can reasonably expect to produce a chip with a couple of tech demos, a spec sheet and a limited C SDK and people will find uses for it.But for "near-desktop class" SBCs it is not much better than misrepresentation. Consequently these things are e-waste in a way that even the global desk drawer population of the Raspberry Pi does not reach.And yet they are graded on a curve and never live up to their potential. This kind of "build it and they will use it" logic works well for microcontrollers, where a manufacturer can reasonably expect to produce a chip with a couple of tech demos, a spec sheet and a limited C SDK and people will find uses for it.But for "near-desktop class" SBCs it is not much better than misrepresentation. Consequently these things are e-waste in a way that even the global desk drawer population of the Raspberry Pi does not reach.And yet they are graded on a curve and never live up to their potential. But for "near-desktop class" SBCs it is not much better than misrepresentation. Consequently these things are e-waste in a way that even the global desk drawer population of the Raspberry Pi does not reach.And yet they are graded on a curve and never live up to their potential.

This story originally appeared on Inside Climate News as part of its Planet China series and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration. When it came time for questions, people began shifting in their chairs and standing up, making the cramped room feel even smaller. The Chinese battery giant Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., or CATL, is nearing completion on what could be one of Europe's largest electric vehicle battery factories. The industrial park where it is located, outside Debrecen, Hungary's second-largest city, also hosts several other manufacturers of battery parts and supplies. The surge of construction is part of a nationwide frenzy, prompted by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's goal to make Hungary a leading battery manufacturer. Chinese companies have announced or built at least 18 EV and battery-related projects in Hungary so far, $17 billion in pledged investments, according to data compiled by the Net Zero Industrial Policy Lab at Johns Hopkins University. Éva Kozma looks out over the industrial park that houses Debrecen's cluster of battery factories. Across the globe, Chinese firms are embarking on an unprecedented effort to build the factories, mines and refineries needed to make EVs, batteries, solar panels, and other clean energy technologies. Since 2022, Chinese companies have pledged some $200 billion in clean energy manufacturing investments overseas, spread across every continent but Antarctica, according to the Net Zero Industrial Policy Lab. Hungary has attracted more investment than any country except Indonesia and Morocco. Chinese exports cut global emissions outside China by 1 percent in 2024, according to one analysis. But many of the projects are proceeding despite local opposition and evidence of significant environmental, social, and human rights impacts. Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for China's U.S. embassy, rejected the notion that Chinese investments were violating people's rights. In an email, Liu said the country's Belt and Road Initiative, the umbrella for its overseas infrastructure investments, aims to support green economic growth. “The founding purpose of the BRI is to advance China's cooperation with partner countries following the principle of mutual respect, equality, and mutual benefit, to help them develop the economy and shake off poverty, which is a human right they need more than any other,” Liu said. Orbán's government eliminated the country's environment ministry after coming to power in 2010 and has cracked down on protests and dissent more broadly. After Kozma began speaking out about the battery factories, she became the target of smear campaigns on social media and state-backed news sites that said she was acting on behalf of foreign agents and against the interest of citizens. “What the authorities want is to make people believe that they are small, that you cannot do anything,” she said. You are just a little piece of dust,” Kozma added. The next morning, Kozma drove her red Fiat down a dirt path that dead-ended at railroad tracks. The site is surrounded by other factories that make cathodes, aluminum cases, battery separator films, gases, all for the EV industry. Kozma was bundled against the cold with a patterned hat and a hoodie peeking out of the collar of her blue parka. “We filled the room,” Nemes said in Hungarian, speaking through a translator. CATL, the Chinese battery giant, is building what could be one of Europe's largest electric vehicle battery plants outside Debrecen, Hungary. While the industrial park is within Debrecen's city limits, it borders Kozma's village of Mikepércs. The group helped file a lawsuit that is still pending against CATL's initial permit. Nemes said they'd already scored a victory after CATL revised its permit to use less water and lower its expected emissions of a hazardous chemical. Already, they have registered spikes in fine-particle pollution that they said have coincided with events at some of the other plants already operating. In August, local authorities sanctioned SEMCORP, a Chinese-owned company that makes separator films for batteries, after the plant exceeded its permitted air emissions for nitrogen oxides, total volatile organic compounds and dichloromethane, a possible carcinogen, according to a county government order. SEMCORP's factory is one of at least four Chinese-owned electric vehicle battery-related factories operating or under construction outside Debrecen, Hungary. Kozma stopped by a drainage ditch into which a different Chinese-owned factory had spilled wastewater, according to an inspection by county authorities last year. Battery production requires significant amounts of energy and water. CATL's most recent permit says it would use about 523,000 gallons per day on average, two-thirds of which would be drinking water with the rest coming from processed wastewater. Debrecen, meanwhile, has struggled with drought conditions in recent years. In 2023, after CATL had announced its plans, the local water authority issued an expert opinion warning that given the city's growth and industrial expansions, groundwater sources could reach their limits within a couple of years. “It shouldn't be in the wastewater at all,” said Gergely Simon, a toxics expert with Greenpeace Hungary. Simon said that because Hungary does not have abundant water or energy, the only advantage it offers battery manufacturers over other countries is lax regulation and speedy permitting. Under these conditions, he said, the system is set up for frequent accidents and harmful releases. “My experience is that when a facility relies heavily on hazardous chemicals, some of them will inevitably escape,” Simon said. CATL had initially filed a permit that would allow it to release high levels of NMP into the air, but has since revised its plans to reduce its expected emissions significantly. Noémi Sidló, public relations and communications manager for CATL in Hungary, said the company has adopted a technology at the plant called adiabatic cooling to reduce water use. The factory, she said, would contribute to Europe's “green transition.” Jason Chen, general manager of CATL Europe Operations, speaks at a press conference in Debrecen, Hungary, on Nov. 20, 2024. The county Department of Environmental and Nature Protection and Waste Management, which issued CATL's permit, did not respond to requests for comment by email, phone or in person at its office. A spokesperson for Debrecen's mayor, László Papp, declined a request for an interview and did not reply to written questions. László Mándi is a city council member in Debrecen, Hungary. In response, state-backed media and members of the ruling Fidesz party said they were fake residents who were being funded by foreign provocateurs. One Facebook post superimposed an image of Kozma onto a bed, with a disembodied hand holding a $20 bill and images of Hungarian-born philanthropist George Soros, the logo of Amnesty International and others. Another post features an image of her holding a stack of bills in one hand and a brain in the other, asking which she would choose and saying she wants to destroy the future of Debrecen. Posts like these get picked up in state-backed media, Kozma said, “and that is what my parents see on the evening news.” Some polls have shown that opposition to battery plants is widespread in Hungary. Yet the construction has shown no signs of slowing. Chinese exports have long flooded the world's consumer markets. In recent years those goods included solar panels, EVs, and batteries. Increasingly, however, Chinese firms are building overseas manufacturing capacity too. The $200 billion in announced investments since 2022 in clean energy manufacturing would go toward 387 projects to make EVs, batteries, solar panels, and other technologies in every major region of the world, according to the Net Zero Industrial Policy Lab. “It is, in scale, staggering,” said Tim Sahay, the lab's codirector. China's exports of clean energy goods—mostly solar panels but also batteries and other technology—cut out 220 million metric tons of climate pollution last year, roughly equal to Spain's emissions, according to an analysis by Lauri Myllyvirta, a senior fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute. If all the overseas clean energy manufacturing investments announced in 2023 and 2024 come to pass, that would mean an additional 130 million metric tons in annual emissions reductions, the analysis found. With the help of these exports, some emerging economies, including Brazil, Chile, El Salvador, Kenya, Morocco and Namibia, now generate a higher proportion of their electricity from wind and solar energy than the United States, according to Ember. Others, including Vietnam, Malaysia and Mexico, have electrified more of their final energy use. For countries looking to wean themselves from fossil fuels, Larsen and other experts say, there is little doubt that Chinese companies are the best partners, especially at a time when the US government is focused on producing and exporting oil and gas. In Indonesia, Chinese-controlled nickel smelters that refine the metal for use in steel and batteries have spewed pollutants into the air and been accused of violating labor rights. In Zambia, a Chinese mining company spilled toxic tailings into waterways. Dam projects across Southeast Asia and Africa are threatening endangered species. Many Chinese companies' exports and overseas manufacturing, especially for solar panels, also remain tied to domestic supply chains linked to forced labor campaigns in the country's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. “It's a little bit like reading about manufacturing in China in the 1990s,” said Sophie Richardson, a senior China advisor at Climate Rights International. And very few people stopped to say, ‘Is this stuff cheap because there are no independent unions in China?' Myllyvirta, Larsen and others argue that China's clean energy exports are cheap because of its unique state-run economy and the massive investments Beijing made in the technologies, and that forced labor plays little role in lowering costs. Sahay, of the Net Zero Industrial Policy Lab, said countries that are hosting Chinese-backed manufacturing now have an opportunity to steer the developments in a way that will benefit their citizens. “Whether or not these industrial megaprojects lead to any positive development outcomes depends upon domestic policy choices,” Sahay said. Host countries, he added, “must bargain hard with Chinese firms to actually achieve their own goals of sustainable development.” Soon after Orbán began his current reign in 2010, he announced his “Opening to the East.” Hungary was too dependent on Western countries, he argued, and needed to expand partnerships with illiberal powers like Russia and China. Orbán began courting Chinese investment and seeking to strengthen diplomatic ties. Last year Hungary was the top European destination for Chinese investment, according to a report by Rhodium Group and Mercator Institute for China Studies. Because it is an EU member, Hungary offered Chinese battery firms direct access to the European market. The EU had set a target to phase out sales of new gasoline and diesel cars by 2035. Orbán wanted Hungary, with China's help, to meet the demand for new EVs. Orbán has positioned Hungary as China's chief defender within the EU. His government has blocked efforts to condemn Chinese authorities for their crackdown on democracy activists in Hong Kong. Last year, Hungary's foreign minister opposed efforts that he said would make NATO an “anti-China bloc.” Last year, the two countries signed a security agreement that allows Chinese police to patrol within Hungary, which many academics say could be used to pressure Chinese nationals living or working in the central European nation. In October, the Chinese embassy in Hungary said the countries had signed an extradition treaty that “will provide a solid legal basis for the two countries to jointly combat crime and is a milestone for deepening China-Hungary judicial and law enforcement cooperation.” All this has come as Orbán has tightened his more than 15-year grip on power through means that many analysts say have turned the country into a quasi-democratic autocracy. This year Hungary's parliament passed laws prohibiting events by LGBTQ+ groups and allowing authorities to use facial recognition software to identify and fine participants of any gatherings. Orbán's opponents within Hungary worry it is a prelude to cracking down on an increasingly strong opposition before nationwide elections expected in April 2026. “They don't need policemen,” said Anna Vindics, policy director for the opposition Momentum party. “They can just put cameras and recognize your face, and if you were at a protest then you will get a fine.” Vindics took part in protests against the facial recognition and anti-LGBTQ+ laws, joining with colleagues to blockade a bridge and the entry to Parliament, for which she received multiple fines, she said. Some academics say the government's authoritarian tactics have informed its regulation of battery factories, too. At least initially, CATL says about one-third of its employees will come from China. The jobs that battery factories do create are relatively low-skill and low-paid, said Tamás Matura, an associate professor at Corvinus University of Budapest and an expert in China-Europe relations. The Hungarian Investment Promotion Agency declined to comment, saying in an email that “after careful consideration,” it would “not be able to grant an interview on this topic.” A spokesperson for Orbán did not respond to repeated inquiries by Inside Climate News. Matura said the government has failed to articulate a clear rationale for why it would try to build such a large battery manufacturing industry. With limited energy supplies and water and near-full employment levels, “we have practically nothing that would substantiate the idea that this is a good investment,” Matura said. The leading opposition candidate has aligned himself with battery factory opponents. Local authorities shuttered a regional rail line because it cut through an area where CATL, the Chinese battery giant, was building a factory. Éva Kozma and Tibor Nemes lead a citizen activist group that has raised awareness about the risks posed by the plant. Kozma owns a small business that makes body scrubs and bath salts but has had no time for that work since she began devoting herself to the Mikepércs Mothers group. “Usually young people want to go abroad,” Kozma said, “but they love it here.” “I'm doing it for them,” Kozma said, twisted sideways in the Fiat's driver's seat. “If we can't bring about change and we have to move from here, at least I can look them in the eye and say, ‘I tried to do everything I could. In your inbox: Maxwell Zeff's dispatch from the world of AI Livestream: What businesses need to know about agentic AI WIRED may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast.