The Download: the US digital rights crackdown, and AI companionship

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. What it’s like to be banned from the US for fighting online hate   Just before Christmas the Trump administration dramatically escalated its war on digital rights by banning five people from entering the…

19 January 2026

Going beyond pilots with composable and sovereign AI

Today marks an inflection point for enterprise AI adoption. Despite billions invested in generative AI, only 5% of integrated pilots deliver measurable business value and nearly one in two companies abandons AI initiatives before reaching production. The bottleneck is not the models themselves. What’s holding enterprises back is the surrounding infrastructure: Limited data accessibility, rigid…

19 January 2026

What it’s like to be banned from the US for fighting online hate

It was early evening in Berlin, just a day before Christmas Eve, when Josephine Ballon got an unexpected email from US Customs and Border Protection. The status of her ability to travel to the United States had changed—she’d no longer be able to enter the country.  At first, she couldn’t find any information online as…

19 January 2026

The Download: cut through AI coding hype, and biotech trends to watch

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. AI coding is now everywhere. But not everyone is convinced.   Depending who you ask, AI-powered coding is either giving software developers an unprecedented productivity boost or churning out masses of poorly designed code…

16 January 2026

Three technologies that will shape biotech in 2026

Earlier this week, MIT Technology Review published its annual list of Ten Breakthrough Technologies. As always, it features technologies that made the news last year, and which—for better or worse—stand to make waves in the coming years. They’re the technologies you should really be paying attention to. This year’s list includes tech that’s set to…

16 January 2026

Exclusive eBook: How AGI Became a Consequential Conspiracy Theory

In this exclusive subscriber-only eBook, you’ll learn about how the idea that machines will be as smart as—or smarter than—humans has hijacked an entire industry. by Will Douglas Heaven October 30, 2025 Table of Contents: Related Stories: Access all subscriber-only eBooks:

15 January 2026

The Download: spying on the spies, and promising climate tech

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Meet the man hunting the spies in your smartphone In April 2025, Ronald Deibert left all electronic devices at home in Toronto and boarded a plane. When he landed in Illinois, he bought…

15 January 2026

Three climate technologies breaking through in 2026

Happy New Year! I know it’s a bit late to say, but it never quite feels like the year has started until the new edition of our 10 Breakthrough Technologies list comes out.  For 25 years, MIT Technology Review has put together this package, which highlights the technologies that we think are going to matter…

15 January 2026

The Download: next-gen nuclear, and the data center backlash

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. How next-generation nuclear reactors break out of the 20th-century blueprint   The popularity of commercial nuclear reactors has surged in recent years as worries about climate change and energy independence drowned out concerns about…

14 January 2026

Data centers are amazing. Everyone hates them.

Behold, the hyperscale data center!  Massive structures, with thousands of specialized computer chips running in parallel to perform the complex calculations required by advanced AI models. A single facility can cover millions of square feet, built with millions of pounds of steel, aluminum, and concrete; feature hundreds of miles of wiring, connecting some hundreds of…

14 January 2026