A.M. Edition for July 24. Japan’s TOPIX hits a new record high and European markets surge on trade optimism. So are 15% tariffs the new benchmark for trade with the U.S.? The WSJ’s Kim Mackrael discusses. Plus, Tesla’s profit plunges as EV sales continue to slip, and Elon Musk urges investors to look to future revenue streams. And Microsoft says human waste could be the key to offsetting the climate impact of its AI data centers. Azhar Sukri hosts.
The White House is pushing against the wave of questions around the release of Jeffrey Epstein documents, Columbia University agreed to pay over $220 million to the federal government in order to resolve investigations and restore access to federal research funding, and President Trump signed an executive order instructing tech companies to address what he labeled "woke AI."
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Today's episode of Up First was edited by Dana Farrington, Steve Drummond, Brett Neely, Janaya Williams and Alice Woelfle. It was produced by Ziad Buchh, Nia Dumas and Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Zo van Ginhoven. And our technical director is Carleigh Strange.
This story was produced by our colleagues at the BBC.
High-flying and high-tech, the very latest in drone technology took to the skies over an airfield near the Danish city of Odense.
At the International Drone Show, 50 exhibitors showed off their wares. And because more money is flowing into military budgets, the emphasis was on defense.
Danish company Quadsat makes drones with satellite reading software. Besides civilian uses, the devices can also identify enemy radar.
"Over the years, we have seen an increasing interest from the defense side, no doubt about that, and that's also where we have a lot of work currently being carried out," said Klaus Aude, Quadsat’s chief commercial officer.
Leaders of the NATO military alliance have agreed to ramp up defense spending to 5% of their countries' economic output by 2035, following months of pressure from President Donald Trump.
Nordic countries have already committed to bigger budgets. Among them, NATO’s newest members Finland and Sweden, as well as long time members Norway and Denmark.
As Europe races to re-arm, drones are a sought-after technology. One estimate suggests the global market for defense drones is already worth over $24 billion, and could double by 2032.
"The Nordics have always been very strong in drone adoption, drone development," said Kay Wackwitz, chief executive of Drone Industry Insights.
"You can definitely see that those countries that have borders with Russia are really stocking up on those technologies. The commercial market is now struggling for its fourth year in a row with declining venture capital,” added Wackwitz. “And on the other side, we see a huge demand on the military end of things, which means a lot of companies are refocusing from the commercial space to the military space."
North of Copenhagen in a hangar, Danish firm Nordic Wing makes drones used for battlefield surveillance and combat. Its customers are NATO countries, but they are largely destined for Ukraine, where “there was a huge need and a calling to have these systems helping on the front lines,” said Jonas Münster, CEO of Nordic Wing. “And therefore, the production went into overdrive. Now we have a European Union that is looking into what we've learned in Ukraine and realizing that we don't have a drone capability in Europe."
With a 2,000-square-kilometer flying zone, the drone port in Odense has grown into a hub for tech startups. Next year, military personnel will also be training there at a new $110 million army facility.
"Some militaries have actually made a shift from saying ‘every soldier is a rifleman,’ to ‘everyone is going to be a drone operator at some level,’” said Major Rasmus Ros, who’s part of Denmark’s Defense Command. “We're going to have drone operators in the whole joint military of Denmark. They can come here, get their basic training, share ideas and technology development, and then go back to their units and further develop that."
But not everyone is so positive about this. Outside the trade fair, protestors chanted "drones for peace, not war." New geopolitical realities are reshaping this fast-paced industry. And as this technology advances, ethical and regulatory concerns over the use of AI to pilot drones are also being raised.
Ben Lerner was a fan of tech growing up, along side being into math and science. Right out of school, he joined a startup called Data Nitro, which attempted to integrate python into excel. Ever since then, he has been jamming in the tech and startup world. Outside of tech, he married to a computational biologist. He enjoys padel, which is kind of like Pickleball meets Tennis, and of course ping pong. Though, with his full time job as a CEO, he often finds his hobby is going home to write code.
Ben realized that LLMs are really good at understanding code, leaps and bounds better than prior ML models. While he was at Google, he was also digging into how to apply LLMs to coding in general. Applying both of these things, he and his co-founders are seeing where this can be applied to the real world, starting with Snowflake compute.
What is it about softball?
“What is it not about softball?” replies Megan Faramio, a star pitcher for the Talons in the all-new Athletes Unlimited Softball League, or AUSL. “I can literally talk about softball for days.”
The AUSL is about to wrap up its first season with a three-game playoff series in Alabama between Faraimo’s Talons and the Bandits, a team name that Chicago softball fans know well. The Chicago Bandits were based mainly in Rosemont and played in the National Pro Fastpitch league from 2005 to 2019 until the league disbanded during the COVID-19 pandemic. The AUSL said it was “re-introducing” the Bandits brand “to make new history.”
AUSL league commissioner Kim Ng acknowledged that pro women’s softball leagues in the U.S. have a “spotty” history, but she says this league will be different.
In this inaugural “barnstorming season,” AUSL teams like the Talons and Bandits are not yet attached to specific cities, so The Stadium in Rosemont has hosted every team in the small league for many of the regular season’s games. Next year, the AUSL plans to attach six teams to six to-be-determined cities, and Ng says Rosemont is on the short-list.
“Absolutely, you have to consider somewhere that has a Jennie Finch Way,” Ng said, a reference to the team’s legendary former player and the street named after her where Rosemont’s pro softball field is located.
In our last episode, we looked back at Chicago’s first professional women’s softball league from the 1940s and ‘50s — one that featured business-sponsored teams like Parichy’s Bloomer Girls or Brach’s Kandy Kids. That softball league rivaled the pro women’s baseball league featured in the 1992 movie “A League of Their Own.”
Today, we’re exploring this new chapter in professional women’s softball history. What’s going to give the AUSL staying power? And what’s all the hype about?
We asked Talons star Megan Faraimo, Commissioner Ng, and — at a sellout crowd on a hot day in Rosemont — the fans.
President Trump imposes a 15% tariff on Japanese goods as part of a new trade deal he claims will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, while warning the EU of more tariffs ahead. Meanwhile, a Times investigation into January’s deadly West Altadena fire reveals critical delays and misallocated resources left residents largely unprotected during the worst hours. A judge blocks the Trump administration’s effort to unseal Jeffrey Epstein’s grand jury records in Florida. Another court stops ICE from immediately detaining Kilmar Abrego Garcia after a wrongful deportation. Uber tests a women-only ride option in California aimed at safer travel. And the White House launches an AI plan to cut regulations and speed development, drawing support from tech leaders and criticism from civil rights and environmental groups. Four stories shaping law, policy, and technology in the U.S. today.
Nearly one in three Daly City residents identify as Filipino, according to 2019 Census data. Bay Curious listener Ricky Tjandra wondered what makes this town just south of San Francisco such an international hub of Filipino life. We dig into more than a hundred years of history between the U.S and the Philippines and talk to current residents of Daly City.
This story was reported by Amanda Stupi. Bay Curious is made by Katrina Schwartz, Gabriela Glueck and Christopher Beale. Additional support from Olivia Allen-Price, Jen Chien, Katie Sprenger, Maha Sanad, Ethan Toven-Lindsay and everyone on Team KQED.
The suffering in Gaza has reached new depths, and now finding food, which was already scarce, has become a deadly endeavor.
Israeli forces have opened fire on crowds of desperate and hungry people who were trying to reach aid sites established by a new and controversial humanitarian group. Hundreds of people have been killed, according to Gaza health officials.
Aaron Boxerman, who covers Gaza for The Times, explains who is behind the distribution system and why it has been so deadly.
Guest: Aaron Boxerman, a reporter for The New York Times covering Israel and Gaza.
Background reading:
Dozens were killed in shootings that took place after thousands of Palestinians gathered in the hope of getting humanitarian aid from U.N. trucks entering the Gaza Strip.
Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
As a congressional committee demands Jeffrey Epstein files, a Wall Street Journal report claims President Trump was told of their contents weeks ago. Families confront murderer Bryan Kohberger at his sentencing. And 100 aid groups sound the alarm about starvation in Gaza.
