Latest episode · 1877

Apple’s September Event: iPhone Duo, Apple Watch Series 12, and AirPods 5

In this episode, Ray Cochrane devotes the whole show to Apple's fall event, the first under new CEO John Ternus. He starts with the iPhone Duo, Apple's first foldable iPhone. From there, he covers the Apple Watch Series 12, the new Health Age score, the Apple Watch Ultra 4, and AirPods 5 with noise canceling at $129.

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#1876

Anthropic’s $5 Million Push to Measure AI’s Effect on Wellbeing

In this episode, Ray Cochrane records from the Michigan studio on the one year anniversary of losing the show's original host, Todd Cochrane. The featured story is Anthropic's $5 million grant program, which pays outside researchers to measure whether AI is actually good for the people using it. Ray also covers Anthropic's Enterprise Frontier Safeguards, Google's Fairwind cyber defense program, Meta's organizational second brain, sixteen green AI projects across Asia-Pacific, an Oklahoma Bitcoin mine condemned after leaking 3.8 million gallons of water, BepiColombo closing in on Mercury, and the 2026 Ig Nobel Prizes.

#1875 44:51

The Mainframe Learned to Speak Arm

In this episode, Ray Cochrane breaks down Hot Chips 2026, the engineering conference where IBM, NVIDIA, Intel, AMD, Arm, and Fujitsu all showed how their next processors actually work. The headline disclosure is a mainframe core that runs Arm natively. Ray also covers Apple's odd M6 Mac mini naming, London's first autonomous Uber rides, Amazon's purchase of the company behind DuckDB, GitHub's HydraFusion, the best of IFA 2026, and new USDA research on farmed salmon.

#1874 51:40

Eyes, Hands, and a Sense of Timing

In this episode, Ray Cochrane digs into Anthropic's Model Hardware Standard. It is a shared driver that lets an AI agent run real lab equipment, from pipetting robots to the lasers inside a quantum computer. He also covers OpenAI's builder's guide to GPT-5.6, Google's new Expert Intelligence book feature, Apple's M5 Ultra Mac Studio, and a judge's order forcing Google to stop hiding rival app stores. Finally, he weighs in on Apple's proposed 15 percent link-out fee, Meta's Australia numbers, the White House deputizing private hackers, and why rivers obey a 1957 math rule.

#1873 44:59

Huge Announcements From D23!!

In this episode, Chris Cochrane guest-hosts for his brother Ray and devotes the whole show to one event: Disney's D23 2026 fan convention in Anaheim. Friday night delivered Marvel's new X-Men cast, Adam Driver as Mister Sinister, a fresh Avengers: Doomsday trailer, and a release date for Frozen 3. Saturday turned to the parks, with Villains Land, an Indiana Jones dark ride, the long-awaited Expedition Everest yeti repair, and a Monsters Inc land opening in 2027.

The Robot That Imagines First

#1872 47:33

The Robot That Imagines First

In this episode, Ray Cochrane breaks down NVIDIA's case for world action models, the shift that swaps a robot's picture-describing backbone for one trained to predict what happens next. He also covers Perseverance closing in on the off-world driving record, a derelict SpaceX rocket stage hitting the Moon, and Anthropic's rework of Claude Fable 5's biology safeguards. Finally, he digs into Gemini Omni, Google's undisclosed trip-planning rankings, the Danube's record low, and iFixit's call for Apple to unlock the iPad bootloader.

Capture The Real Flag #1871

#1871 45:05

Capture The Real Flag

In this episode, Ray Cochrane digs into Anthropic's admission that Claude models reached real systems during sandboxed safety tests. He also covers OpenAI's Astra model cracking ten decade-old math problems, DeepMind open-sourcing its WeatherNext cyclone forecaster, and Europe's brutal fire season. Finally, he wraps with the MacBook Neo sweeping K-12 schools, WhatsApp calling in the browser, and the troubled rescue of NASA's Swift observatory.

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Android

Dropping the Dish and the SuperBox S7 Pro

As regular readers of GNC will know, I've reviewed a fair number of gadgets over the years, but I've never laid my hands on a full Android TV device. I've tried most of the others: Chromecasts, Rokus and Amazon Fire TV Sticks, so when SuperBox offered the opportunity to review their SuperBox S7 Pro, I was keen to give it

design

Pantone Delivers Cloud Dancer as Color of the Year 2026

For 2026 Pantone has announced Cloud Dancer as the Color of the Year. Officially PANTONE 11-4201 Cloud Dancer, the colour is "a lofty white that serves as a symbol of calming influence in a society rediscovering the value of quiet reflection." Leatrice Eiseman, Executive Director of the Pantone Color Institute, explains, "At this time of transformation, when we are reimagining

smartphone

OnePlus 15 Coming Mid-November

London, United Kingdom Date: 17th November Location: Kachette Annex, 1 Kingsland Rd, London E2 8AA

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Remembering Todd Cochrane – Podcast Hall of Famer and Blubrry CEO and, GNC Host

On this special final New Media Show tribute episode, we honor the life and legacy of Todd Cochrane, podcasting pioneer, podcast hall of famer, founder of Blubrry and RawVoice, host of Geek News Central podcast, author of one of the first podcasting books, and co-host on The New Media Show for 13 years. Todd’s influence on podcasting was profound: from

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Geek News Central Mourns the Loss of Todd Cochrane

Geek News Central is deeply saddened to announce the unexpected passing of our host Todd at the age of 61. Todd passed away suddenly on the morning of Sept. 8, while traveling after spending cherished time with family on the West Coast. Todd was a pioneer in the podcasting industry. Since founding RawVoice and Blubrry in 2005, he dedicated his

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14,212 articles and 1,877 episodes since 2004.