Tech
FiiO JM21 Review: The $179 DAP That Makes You Question Why You’d Spend More
Digital Audio Players, often abbreviated to DAPs, remain one of the most versatile ways to listen to music, offering a self contained alternative to dongle DACs, portable DAC amps, and desktop systems that keep you tethered to a desk. Modern DAPs are no longer just glorified iPods. Today’s models deliver real output power, capable processing, and designs that increasingly resemble mainstream smartphones rather than niche audio gear.
There are solid budget DAPs on the market, but meaningful value tends to thin out quickly as prices drop. That is where the FiiO JM21 becomes interesting. At $179, it lands in a price bracket where most players play it safe, trimming features and performance to hit a number rather than pushing the envelope.
Developed in collaboration with Jade Audio, FiiO’s value focused sub brand, the JM21 does not try to look expensive or pretend it belongs in a higher tier. It is compact, understated, and almost anonymous. Internally, however, FiiO appears to have packed in far more than this category normally allows, from power delivery to functionality and overall flexibility.
That leaves a more uncomfortable question for the competition. Is the JM21 simply good for the money, or did FiiO overdeliver just enough to make nearby alternatives feel needlessly compromised?

Specifications & Technology
At the heart of the JM21 is a dual DAC configuration built around Cirrus Logic CS43198 chips, paired with SGM8262 op amps handling the output stage. That is serious silicon for a budget friendly DAP, and the supporting numbers back it up. FiiO claims a signal to noise ratio of roughly 130dB, total harmonic distortion plus noise below 0.0006%, and support for sampling rates up to 768 kHz at 32-bit, along with DSD512 over USB.
Those figures are not just the result of good parts selection. Internally, the JM21 is laid out with the control section, DAC stage, and amplifier stage physically separated into distinct zones. Each section is further isolated with shielding, a design choice intended to reduce crosstalk and keep noise from creeping into the signal path.
Power delivery is treated with similar care. The JM21 uses a three section power supply, with dedicated regulation for the digital control circuitry, the DAC stage, and the current and voltage amplification stages. The goal is straightforward. Provide stable, uninterrupted power where it matters most, rather than letting everything fight over a single rail. In a player at this price, that level of internal discipline is notable and not something competitors can all claim with a straight face.
Add in extremely low jitter femtosecond crystal oscillators, SRC bypassing, and FiiO’s proprietary DAPS Digital Audio Purification System, and the JM21 starts to look like a player that has been engineered with real intent rather than assembled from leftovers. On paper, the focus is clearly on preserving signal integrity and extracting as much performance as possible from the hardware.
The obvious concern is whether all of this comes at the expense of usability. It does not appear to. The JM21 is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 680 processor, backed by 4 GB of RAM and a customized Android 13 operating system. Performance is responsive, app support is broad, and the interface avoids the lag and stutter that still plague some entry level players.
Internal storage sits at 64 GB, with expansion supported up to 2 TB via a microSD card slot. Battery life is another quiet strength. Thanks to the JM21’s relatively low power consumption, FiiO rates it at up to 12.5 hours of playback, a figure that held up in real world use rather than collapsing the moment Wi-Fi and streaming entered the picture.

Design & Build Quality
Included with the JM21 is everything you need and nothing you do not. In the box you get a transparent plastic case, a basic black USB Type-C to A cable for charging and data transfer, and the usual documentation. No extras, no padding, no pretending this is a luxury experience.
The first thing that stands out when you pick up the JM21 is just how thin and light it is. At 13 mm thick, roughly 0.5 inches, and weighing 156g, about 5.5 ounces, it feels closer to a compact smartphone than a traditional DAP. Its overall dimensions are equally manageable at 120 mm tall and 68 mm wide, or approximately 4.7 by 2.7 inches, making it easy to operate comfortably with one hand.
The chassis is a mix of aluminium alloy and plastic. It does not scream premium, but it feels solid enough to handle everyday use without complaint. The textured underside is a nice touch, adding grip where it actually matters. My review unit was finished in black, though a more eye catching sky blue option is also available. No one is going to confuse this with a flagship build, but at this price point it is sturdy, practical, and frankly hard to fault.

The control layout is straightforward and sensibly arranged. On the left side you will find the power button, which incorporates a small indicator light, along with a volume up and down rocker. Everything falls easily under your thumb, even when using the player one handed.
The right side houses the physical media controls, including play and pause, track forward, and track back buttons. The microSD card slot is also located here, keeping all removable and frequently used controls in one place.
Along the bottom edge are the audio and data connections. The JM21 offers both 4.4mm balanced and 3.5mm unbalanced headphone outputs. The 4.4mm jack can also function as a line out, while the 3.5mm output supports both line out and coaxial digital out. A USB Type-C port rounds things out, handling charging and data transfer duties.

User Experience
Power up the JM21 and you are greeted by a bright, vibrant 4.7-inch TFT touchscreen. While the resolution is a modest 1334×750, it is well matched to the screen size. In practice, text and artwork look clean, and I never found myself distracted by visible pixels.
Beyond its wired outputs, the JM21 also supports wireless listening via Bluetooth 5.0. It can both transmit to and receive from compatible devices, with LDAC support enabling high quality wireless playback at up to 96 kHz. Pairing was quick and stable, and performance was consistent during testing.
Versatility is clearly a priority here. The JM21 can operate in line out mode for use with active speakers or external power amplifiers, and it can also function as a USB DAC. In that configuration, connecting it to a laptop, desktop PC, or even a mobile device is straightforward, allowing the JM21 to bypass inferior onboard audio and handle digital conversion duties itself.
Most of my listening was done in standard Android mode, though FiiO also offers a Pure Music mode for those who want a more focused experience. This mode strips the interface back to the essentials, minimizing background processes and visual clutter so the player behaves more like a traditional, music only DAP. If you prefer fewer distractions and quicker access to your library, it is a sensible option.
Overall performance was stable, but not entirely flawless. I experienced occasional Spotify app crashes, particularly during the first few hours of use. The cause was not immediately clear, though the issue appeared to resolve itself over time and did not persist as testing continued. Outside of that early hiccup, day to day operation was smooth and predictable.
The Android 13 implementation feels familiar and largely hassle free, with no noticeable stuttering or performance limitations during typical day to day use. Navigation is smooth, app switching is responsive, and the overall experience feels appropriately tuned for a dedicated audio device.
I did spend some time with the Pure Music mode, which limits operation to the FiiO Music app. In this configuration, the JM21 behaves like a more traditional DAP, prioritizing local playback and simplicity. The app itself is well executed, offering straightforward access to local files, wireless file transfer to and from a connected phone or computer, and built-in EQ adjustment.
If you maintain a large locally stored music library, Pure Music mode makes a lot of sense. It is faster, cleaner, and avoids the overhead of Android apps you are not using, allowing the JM21 to focus on what it does best.

Listening Impressions and Headphone Synergy
Most of my listening impressions were formed using a mix of Spotify streams and hi res FLAC files stored on a microSD card. I paired the JM21 with a wide range of over ear headphones via the 4.4mm balanced output, including the HiFiMAN HE1000 Unveiled, Sendy Audio Egret, Beyerdynamic DT880 Edition 600 Ohm, and DALI IO-12. The DALI was also used wirelessly to evaluate Bluetooth performance.
In short, the JM21 presents a clean, neutral, and largely uncolored sound signature. It does not impose a strong personality of its own, instead allowing the character of the connected headphones to come through intact. Bass, midrange, and treble are evenly balanced and well integrated, provided the headphones themselves are similarly well tuned. This is not a player that sweetens, exaggerates, or smooths things over. What you hear is largely what your headphones are capable of delivering.
Despite its largely flat, neutral tuning, the JM21 never comes across as sterile or robotic. There is enough body and tonal weight to keep music sounding human rather than processed. On “Feeling Good” by Nina Simone, her vocal carries real heft and authority, sitting front and center with a natural sense of scale. The brass section has proper bite and presence, with trumpets cutting through cleanly and trombones sounding full and weighty rather than thin or splashy. The JM21 keeps these elements in balance, letting the track breathe without smoothing away its character.

That said, the JM21 is not a technical showpiece. Transient snap and large scale dynamics are a bit restrained compared to some similarly priced dongle DACs, which can sound more immediate and energetic in direct comparison. There is a trade off here, however. Those dongles do not give you a full Android experience, onboard storage, or a proper touchscreen interface. Viewed in that context, the JM21’s performance makes more sense. You are trading a bit of outright technical bite for versatility, convenience, and an all in one listening experience that dongles simply cannot offer.
Soundstage and imaging are fairly average, with limited spatial placement. Detail retrieval is solid, however. On “Chocolate Chip Trip” by TOOL, the JM21 still revealed subtle percussive hits and low level effects that many devices gloss over. The issue is scale. The track’s complex spatial placement and sense of movement felt flattened compared to higher quality sources. Everything was audible, but the presentation lacked the depth and dimensionality that make this track truly jaw dropping.
I did not have any similarly priced DAPs on hand, but I did compare the JM21 to the $500 Shanling M3 Plus. In terms of overall detail retrieval and tonal balance, the JM21 more than held its own. The differences came down to refinement. The Shanling sounded slightly more natural in timbre and more convincing dynamically, pulling ahead by a small but noticeable margin rather than a night and day difference.
700 mW is a heck of a lot of power for a sub-$200 device, and that kind of headroom proves useful when driving harder-to-run over-ear headphones like the HE1000 Unveiled. Just do not expect it to unlock the full potential of notoriously demanding models such as the HiFiMAN HE6se V2 or Modhouse Tungsten.
Furthermore, the JM21 doesn’t use tube amplification nor does it contain an R2R DAC, so it won’t do much to tame treble peaks on troublesome headphones. For that reason, the DT880 Edition 600 Ohm was quickly put to one side for the rest of the review process, as it can sound quite harsh on many solid-state devices.

The Bottom Line
The FiiO JM21 is not a giant killer, but it is a smartly engineered reality check. It has ample output power for the money, a clean and neutral sound, excellent versatility with full Android, strong connectivity, and hardware choices that feel deliberate rather than cheap. And it will comfortably drive the vast majority of headphones people actually own.
The trade offs are just as clear. Technical performance is competent rather than exciting, with average dynamics, soundstage, and spatial placement. It will not soften treble heavy headphones, nor will it extract the last ounce of performance from notoriously power hungry or temperamental designs. If you are chasing holographic imaging or tube like warmth, this is not the DAP for you.
Where the JM21 wins is value and usability. At $179, it offers a level of power, functionality, and polish that makes many alternatives feel compromised or redundant. If your priorities are flexibility, sensible tuning, and maximum bang for the buck, the JM21 makes a very strong case that you may not need anything more.
Pros:
- High quality DAC implementation with class leading measurements for the price
- Lightweight, slim design that is easy to operate one handed
- Smooth and familiar Android 13 experience with good overall responsiveness
- Excellent versatility with multiple operating modes, including USB DAC, line out, Bluetooth, and Pure Music mode
- Clean, neutral, and well balanced sound that avoids obvious coloration
- Strong output power for its class, capable of driving most real world headphones
Cons:
- Occasional app instability, particularly with streaming services early on
- Average dynamics, soundstage, and spatial placement compared to more technical sources
- Sonic presentation prioritizes balance and control over excitement
- Limited ability to tame treble heavy or difficult headphone pairings
Where to buy:
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Tech
Nvidia Is Planning to Launch an Open-Source AI Agent Platform
Nvidia is planning to launch an open-source platform for AI agents, people familiar with the company’s plans tell WIRED.
The chipmaker has been pitching the product, referred to as NemoClaw, to enterprise software companies. The platform will allow these companies to dispatch AI agents to perform tasks for their own workforces. Companies will be able to access the platform regardless of whether their products run on Nvidia’s chips, sources say.
The move comes as Nvidia prepares for its annual developer conference in San Jose next week. Ahead of the conference, Nvidia has reached out to companies including Salesforce, Cisco, Google, Adobe, and CrowdStrike to forge partnerships for the agent platform. It’s unclear whether these conversations have resulted in official partnerships. Since the platform is open source, it’s likely that partners would get free, early access in exchange for contributing to the project, sources say. Nvidia plans to offer security and privacy tools as part of this new open-source agent platform.
Nvidia did not respond to a request for comment. Representatives from Cisco, Google, Adobe, and CrowdStrike also did not respond to requests for comment. Salesforce did not provide a statement prior to publication.
Nvidia’s interest in agents comes as people are embracing “claws,” or open-source AI tools that run locally on a user’s machine and perform sequential tasks. Claws are often described as self-learning, in that they’re supposed to automatically improve over time. Earlier this year, an AI agent known as OpenClaw—which was first called Clawdbot, then Moltbot—captivated Silicon Valley due to its ability to run autonomously on personal computers and complete work tasks for users. OpenAI ended up acquiring the project and hiring the creator behind it.
OpenAI and Anthropic have made significant improvements in model reliability in recent years, but their chatbots still require hand-holding. Purpose-built AI agents or claws, on the other hand, are designed to execute multiple steps without as much human supervision.
The usage of claws within enterprise environments is controversial. WIRED previously reported that some tech companies, including Meta, have asked employees to refrain from using OpenClaw on their work computers, due to the unpredictability of the agents and potential security risks. Last month a Meta employee who oversees safety and alignment for the company’s AI lab publicly shared a story about an AI agent going rogue on her machine and mass deleting her emails.
For Nvidia, NemoClaw appears to be part of an effort to court enterprise software companies by offering additional layers of security for AI agents. It’s also another step in the company’s embrace of open-source AI models, part of a broader strategy to maintain its dominance in AI infrastructure at a time when leading AI labs are building their own custom chips. Nvidia’s software strategy until now has been heavily reliant on its CUDA platform, a famously proprietary system that locks developers into building software for Nvidia’s GPUs and has created a crucial “moat” for the company.
Last month The Wall Street Journal reported that Nvidia also plans to reveal a new chip system for inference computing at its developer conference. The system will incorporate a chip designed by the startup Groq, which Nvidia entered into a multibillion-dollar licensing agreement with late last year.
Paresh Dave and Maxwell Zeff contributed to this report.
Tech
Ryobi RY18BLCXA-125 Review – Trusted Reviews
Verdict
The Ryobi RY18BLCXA-125 blower is a powerful yet lightweight garden tool. With an extremely comfortable grip shape like to the ones you’d find on Ryobi’s drills, it’s easy to manoeuvre around with minimal hand fatigue. It lacks a bit of raw power but makes up for it by being so easy to handle.
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Comfortable grip shape -
Light and manoeuvrable -
Comes with two nozzle tips
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Can only be locked on full power
Key Features
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Cordless
Uses the same batteries as Ryobi’s cordless tools -
Powerful for smaller jobs
Blows air up to 7m/s (from one metre away), making it good for smaller jobs
Introduction
Compatible with the company’s range of batteries, the Ryobi RY18BLCXA-125 is a flexible and versatile leaf blower. A little limited in power, it’s still a good choice for smaller jobs, particularly for those who own Ryobi tools already.
Heading
Design and Features
- The grip shape is ergonomically designed and very comfortable
- Supplied with two nozzle tips for focus and wide sweeping
- Can be locked on full power
If you’re familiar with Ryobi’s bright green offerings, then the RY18BLCXA-125 is another cleverly designed tool to join the family. It feels sturdy, well-thought-out and is more like holding a drill than a leaf blower. This choice makes it supremely easy to point the nozzle tip at individual leaves that stick to wet grass.
Weighing just 1.5 kg with the battery in place, this blower is ultra lightweight and very easy to hang on to. It boasts a variable speed trigger that is sensitive and responsive. The trigger can be locked on, a bit like cruise control on a car, but it only locks on full power.


The Ryobi RY18BLCXA-125 comes with a 2.5 Ah battery and charger, as well as a pair of nozzle tips and extension tubes. The standard round tip is for focused blowing, while the wide tip works a bit like a broom. You lose a bit of air speed, but the wide stream of air is great for jobs like clearing a path of fallen leaves.


And because it comes with a battery and charger, you can use it in any one of hundreds of Ryobi tools. You can take apart the extension pieces and nozzle tips to store the blower away neatly, and hang it up by the handle to save floor space.


Performance
- Excellent focused air stream
- Lightweight yet powerful
- Loud and harsh on full power
What stands out about the RY18BLCXA is how easy it is to point at the target. Thanks to the excellent grip shape and overall light weight, it’s a doddle to use. Unlike some of the big and chunky blowers, anyone could use this tool without getting tired after a few minutes.
At high speed from one metre away, I measured the air speed at 7m/s, which is enough of a gust to blower lighter debris around. This blower lacks the raw strength of the Einhell GP-LB 36/270 but has an impressive power-to-weight ratio. Overall, this kind of power is good for smaller jobs in smaller gardens, but you’ll need something larger and more powerful for bigger piles of leaves or bigger gardens.
I like the idea of being able to lock the trigger on, but as it only does so on full power it will drain the battery in less than 10 minutes, so it’s not always ideal. Keeping the blower on about half power extends the runtime to a decent 15 minutes.
The real downside of this blower is the noise that it makes. The noise levels of 80dB on the lowest power setting and 98dB on the highest are not ideal. The tone is quite high too – on full power, it’s quite piercing.
Should you buy it?
You want a lightweight yet powerful little leaf blower
If you already own Ryobi tools, it’s an easy decision to make.
You want to move big piles of leaves around
More suitable for focused blowing, this leaf blower lacks the raw power of bigger machines.
Final Thoughts
I like this blower for its lightness and ease of use. The two nozzle tips make it useful for focused blowing as well as path clearance too. The brushless motor is mighty enough for smaller jobs, but annoyingly loud on full power. If you need something more powerful, read the guide to the best leaf blowers.
How We Test
We test every leaf blower we review thoroughly over an extended period of time. We use standard tests to compare features properly. We’ll always tell you what we find. We never, ever, accept money to review a product.
Find out more about how we test in our ethics policy.
- Tested with a variety of garden debris
- We measure wind speed and air flow
FAQs
Yes, you can use the standard batteries you use with the cordless drills and so on with this leaf blower.
Test Data
| Ryobi RY18BLCXA-125 | |
|---|---|
| Sound (normal) | 93 dB |
| Air speed 15cm (low) | 10 m/s |
| Air speed 15cm (high) | 15 m/s |
Full Specs
| Ryobi RY18BLCXA-125 Review | |
|---|---|
| UK RRP | £129.99 |
| Manufacturer | – |
| Weight | 1.53 KG |
| Release Date | 2026 |
| First Reviewed Date | 03/03/2026 |
| Accessories | Two nozzles |
| Leaf blower type | Cordless |
| Speed settings | Variable speed trigger, trigger lock |
| Max air speed | 15 m/s |
| Adjustable length | – |
Tech
Samsung’s smart glasses are real and coming sooner than you think
Samsung’s long-rumoured smart glasses may finally be getting closer to reality.
Speaking at MWC 2026 in Barcelona, Samsung executive vice president Jay Kim confirmed that the company is actively developing the wearable. He also hinted that a launch could happen sooner than many expected.
While details remain limited, Kim did confirm one key feature: the glasses will include a camera positioned at eye level. That camera will capture what the wearer is looking at and send the information to a connected Galaxy smartphone. The phone then processes the data and returns relevant insights to the user.
The approach keeps the glasses lightweight by shifting the heavy lifting to the phone. It’s a similar concept to Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses. In this case, the wearable acts mainly as the sensor while the smartphone handles computing tasks.
What Samsung didn’t confirm is whether the first version will include a built-in display. When asked about screens, Kim pointed toward Samsung’s existing devices including its smartphones and smartwatches. This suggests the glasses may rely on them instead of embedding a display directly in the frames.
That doesn’t necessarily rule out a display in the future. Reports suggest a more advanced version with integrated visuals could arrive later. Possibly around 2027, with the first model focusing more heavily on camera and AI-driven features.
Samsung’s broader vision for the product appears to centre on context-aware AI. The glasses could recognise what you’re looking at and provide helpful information instantly. For example, they could translate a menu, identify landmarks, or help with tasks like navigation and messaging without needing to pull out your phone.
The project has reportedly been in development since 2023, with Qualcomm and Google involved in building the underlying chips and software platform.
Samsung hasn’t given a precise launch date yet, but executives at MWC suggested the company aims to bring the glasses to market sometime in 2026. If that timeline holds, Samsung could soon be stepping into the fast-growing smart glasses space. Rivals like Meta are already establishing an early lead.
Tech
Rode’s Rodecaster Video Core makes livestreaming even cheaper
Rode’s not done releasing trimmed-down versions of its production tools with an eye on budget conscious creators. Today, it’s launching Rodecaster Video Core, an all-in-one studio setup which sits below its flagship Rodecaster Video and its (now) mid-range Video S. It’s aimed at folks who are either dipping a toe into this world, or already have audio gear and just want to broaden out to HD video as well. Arguably, the biggest change is the lack of any controls on the hardware itself, as you’ll be running the show entirely from inside the Rodecaster App.
In terms of connectivity, you’ll find three HDMI-in, one HDMI-out, four USB-C, two 3.5mm and two Neutrik combo ports ‘round back. Connect a compatible video device to a USB-C port and you’ll be able to run up to four sources at a time, and you can even use network cameras via Ethernet. Plus, you’ll be able to use the Rode Capture app to wirelessly connect the feed from an iOS device to your setup. And you’ll even be able to set it up to automatically switch between feeds based on audio inputs, reducing your need to micromanage multi-person feeds.
Rode
And, if you’re already rocking one of Rode’s audio consoles, the Rodecaster Sync app will make your life a lot easier. Essentially, if you’ve got a Rodecaster Pro 2 or Duo, you’ll be able to hook it up to your Video Core, allowing you to set shortcuts directly to your pads. In fact, you can run your audio and video setup from the one desk, hopefully reducing the amount of fiddling you need to do in the middle of your stream.
Core is designed to stream straight to YouTube, Twitch and any other platforms you’d care to use instead. You’ll be able to record your footage to an external drive and, thanks yo a new firmware update across the range, you’ll also be able to output a EDL file for DaVinci Resolve. Oh, and you’ll now be able to import media in non-standard resolutions and aspect ratios — such as square footage from social media — which will be automatically scaled and optimized for your show.
Rodecaster Video Core is available to pre-order now for $599, but there’s no word yet on when the sturdy boxes will start winging their way around the world.
Tech
‘Flying Cars’ Will Take Off in American Skies This Summer
New kinds of aircraft, sorts of “flying cars” that can take off and land with little space like helicopters but function like airplanes, will start operating in US airspace as early as June, the US Department of Transportation announced on Monday.
Eight regions across the US, including New York and New Jersey, Texas, Florida, and Albuquerque, New Mexico, will take part in a three-year pilot program that will see new aircraft designs ferrying people and cargo around the country even before they formally receive full certifications from the Federal Aviation Administration.
The companies building the tech say their aircraft are quieter, cheaper, and release fewer emissions than helicopters or airplanes. Some promise totally autonomous trips. Many involved in the project, including electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft, or eVTOLs, and ultra-short takeoff aircraft, require way less space to operate, landing and taking off outside of traditional airports and closer to where people live and work. The companies outline futures in which regular people can zip between neighboring cities in a matter of minutes, sailing above traffic and reordering the economy as they go.
On an earnings call with investors earlier this month, Adam Goldstein, the CEO and founder of Archer Aviation, one of the firms involved, called the federal pilot program “our Waymo moment,” a science fiction project turned real life. “Now the goal is to have half a million people in the biggest cities in the country start to see these aircraft as part of your everyday commute, just like they started to see Waymos every day,” he said.
Archer’s electric air taxi, called Midnight, is built to carry up to four passengers on 60 to 90-minute trips. The company will take part in pilot projects in Texas, Florida, and New York. Goldstein told investors that Midnight would complete another important step toward certification “in the coming quarters.” The company has received funding from automaker Stellantis and United Airlines.
Other companies involved in the pilot projects include the small electric plane manufacturer Beta Technologies, Toyota- and Jet Blue-funded air taxi maker Joby Aviation, and Electra, which is building a hybrid electric ultra short aircraft. All four of those firms have completed test flights in the US.
“What we love about the [pilot] is the chance to demonstrate that this is not fantasy,” Electra CEO Marc Allen tells WIRED. “It’s not science fiction. It’s in the real world.”
Tech
Jay Graber steps down as Bluesky CEO, moves into chief innovation officer role at social media platform

Bluesky CEO Jay Graber announced Monday that she’s stepping down from her position and moving to a new role as chief innovation officer of the decentralized social network.
“As Bluesky matures, the company needs a seasoned operator focused on scaling and execution, while I return to what I do best: building new things,” Graber, who is based in Seattle, wrote in a post.
Toni Schneider, former CEO of Automattic (operates WordPress.com) and partner at True Ventures, is joining Bluesky as interim CEO while the board searches for a permanent new leader.
“I deeply believe in what this team has built and the open social web they’re fighting for,” Schneider, who has been an advisor to Bluesky and Graber, wrote on LinkedIn. He also penned a blog post on Bluesky.
Graber has led Bluesky since 2021, when it spun out of Twitter. The platform has become a leading alternative to X, growing its user base 60% last year from 25.9 million users to 41.4 million. The company reported Monday that it now has 43 million users.
“Scaling up this company has been a learning experience unlike anything else,” Graber wrote in her post. “I’ve grown a lot as a leader and had the privilege of assembling the best team I’ve ever worked with.”
She added: “I’m most energized by exploring new ideas, bringing a vision to life, and helping people discover their strengths. Transitioning to a more focused role where I can do what brings me energy is my way of putting that belief into practice.”
Wired reported that the chief innovation officer position was created for Graber, who also sits on the company’s board.
Bluesky has differentiated itself from other social media networks with the AT Protocol, an open technical standard for social media that Bluesky’s team built as the foundation for its network. Most social networks today are walled gardens, where one company runs the servers, owns the data, and sets the rules.
“Last year, we grew a world-class team, expanded the AT Protocol ecosystem, and proved that a values-driven social network could thrive at scale,” Graber wrote.
Bluesky has no official headquarters. Graber and several employees work out of a co-working space in Seattle.
Graber was honored at last year’s GeekWire Gala as one of five Uncommon Thinkers — inventors, scientists, and entrepreneurs selected in partnership with Greater Seattle Partners for their work transforming industries and the world.
Related: Uncommon Thinkers: Bluesky CEO Jay Graber is planting the seeds for a decentralized digital world
Tech
Australians Flock to VPNs in the Wake of Online Age-Restriction Laws
A new set of laws in Australia requiring adult websites and app stores to age-restrict content for those under 18, and requiring AI companies to restrict chatbot offerings from displaying certain types of sensitive or adult content to minors, is apparently driving many to download Virtual Private Network apps there.
Major adult sites have closed their virtual doors to those who aren’t age-confirmed in Australia, and these changes follow a nationwide ban on social media use by teenagers and young children that went into effect in December.
According to reports from Reuters, The Guardian and others, in response to the bans, downloads of VPN-related apps, which people can use to circumvent location-based restrictions, are sharply on the rise. According to Reuters, three of the 15 most downloaded free iPhone apps in the country were VPN-related as the new laws went into effect on Monday.
Lawmakers in some regions, including the US, are well aware that people use VPNs in this way. In states such as Michigan and Wisconsin, laws are being proposed to limit or outright ban VPN use. Wisconsin’s proposed law would require adult sites to block VPN traffic, while Michigan’s proposal would ban VPN use entirely in the state.
There is also a proposal in England under consideration to ban VPN use by minors. That proposal is currently under review.
Tech
How AI Assistants Are Moving the Security Goalposts
An anonymous reader quotes a report from KrebsOnSecurity: AI-based assistants or “agents” — autonomous programs that have access to the user’s computer, files, online services and can automate virtually any task — are growing in popularity with developers and IT workers. But as so many eyebrow-raising headlines over the past few weeks have shown, these powerful and assertive new tools are rapidly shifting the security priorities for organizations, while blurring the lines between data and code, trusted co-worker and insider threat, ninja hacker and novice code jockey.
The new hotness in AI-based assistants — OpenClaw (formerly known as ClawdBot and Moltbot) — has seen rapid adoption since its release in November 2025. OpenClaw is an open-source autonomous AI agent designed to run locally on your computer and proactively take actions on your behalf without needing to be prompted. If that sounds like a risky proposition or a dare, consider that OpenClaw is most useful when it has complete access to your entire digital life, where it can then manage your inbox and calendar, execute programs and tools, browse the Internet for information, and integrate with chat apps like Discord, Signal, Teams or WhatsApp.
Other more established AI assistants like Anthropic’s Claude and Microsoft’s Copilot also can do these things, but OpenClaw isn’t just a passive digital butler waiting for commands. Rather, it’s designed to take the initiative on your behalf based on what it knows about your life and its understanding of what you want done. “The testimonials are remarkable,” the AI security firm Snyk observed. “Developers building websites from their phones while putting babies to sleep; users running entire companies through a lobster-themed AI; engineers who’ve set up autonomous code loops that fix tests, capture errors through webhooks, and open pull requests, all while they’re away from their desks.” You can probably already see how this experimental technology could go sideways in a hurry. […] Last month, Meta AI safety director Summer Yue said OpenClaw unexpectedly started mass-deleting messages in her email inbox, despite instructions to confirm those actions first. She wrote: “Nothing humbles you like telling your OpenClaw ‘confirm before acting’ and watching it speedrun deleting your inbox. I couldn’t stop it from my phone. I had to RUN to my Mac mini like I was defusing a bomb.”
Krebs also noted the many misconfigured OpenClaw installations users had set up, leaving their administrative dashboards publicly accessible online. According to pentester Jamieson O’Reilly, “a cursory search revealed hundreds of such servers exposed online.” When those exposed interfaces are accessed, attackers can retrieve the agent’s configuration and sensitive credentials. O’Reilly warned attackers could access “every credential the agent uses — from API keys and bot tokens to OAuth secrets and signing keys.”
“You can pull the full conversation history across every integrated platform, meaning months of private messages and file attachments, everything the agent has seen,” O’Reilly added. And because you control the agent’s perception layer, you can manipulate what the human sees. Filter out certain messages. Modify responses before they’re displayed.”
Tech
macOS 26.4 beta 4 lets everyone use the colorful MacBook Neo wallpapers
Wallpapers created for the all-new MacBook Neo have now been made available to all macOS Tahoe users, as of macOS 26.4 beta 4.

MacBook Neo wallpapers are now available for all Macs, as of macOS 26.4 beta 4.
On March 4, Apple announced the MacBook Neo, a colorful budget-oriented laptop, powered by an iPhone chip. The low-end Mac is available in four bright color options — Blush, Citrus, Indigo, and Silver, each with a matching wallpaper.
The MacBook Neo ships with a special build of macOS 26.3, AppleInsider as predicted. All other Macs will need macOS 26.4 beta 4 to get the wallpapers made for the machine.
Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums
Tech
Anthropic rolls out Code Review for Claude Code as it sues over Pentagon blacklist and partners with Microsoft
Anthropic on Monday released Code Review, a multi-agent code review system built into Claude Code that dispatches teams of AI agents to scrutinize every pull request for bugs that human reviewers routinely miss. The feature, now available in research preview for Team and Enterprise customers, arrives on what may be the most consequential day in the company’s history: Anthropic simultaneously filed lawsuits against the Trump administration over a Pentagon blacklisting, while Microsoft announced a new partnership embedding Claude into its Microsoft 365 Copilot platform.
The convergence of a major product launch, a federal legal battle, and a landmark distribution deal with the world’s largest software company captures the extraordinary tension defining Anthropic’s current moment. The San Francisco-based AI lab is simultaneously trying to grow a developer tools business approaching $2.5 billion in annualized revenue, defend itself against an unprecedented government designation as a national security threat, and expand its commercial footprint through the very cloud platforms now navigating the fallout.
Code Review is Anthropic’s most aggressive bet yet that engineering organizations will pay significantly more — $15 to $25 per review — for AI-assisted code quality assurance that prioritizes thoroughness over speed. It also signals a broader strategic pivot: the company isn’t just building models, it’s building opinionated developer workflows around them.
How a team of AI agents reviews your pull requests
Code Review works differently from the lightweight code review tools most developers are accustomed to. When a developer opens a pull request, the system dispatches multiple AI agents that operate in parallel. These agents independently search for bugs, then cross-verify each other’s findings to filter out false positives, and finally rank the remaining issues by severity. The output appears as a single overview comment on the PR along with inline annotations for specific bugs.
Anthropic designed the system to scale dynamically with the complexity of the change. Large or intricate pull requests receive more agents and deeper analysis; trivial changes get a lighter pass. The company says the average review takes approximately 20 minutes — far slower than the near-instant feedback of tools like GitHub Copilot’s built-in review, but deliberately so.
“We built Code Review based on customer and internal feedback,” an Anthropic spokesperson told VentureBeat. “In our testing, we’ve found it provides high-value feedback and has helped catch bugs that we may have missed otherwise. Developers and engineering teams use a range of tools, and we build for that reality. The goal is to give teams a capable option at every stage of the development process.”
The system emerged from Anthropic’s own engineering practices, where the company says code output per engineer has grown 200% over the past year. That surge in AI-assisted code generation created a review bottleneck that the company says it now hears about from customers on a weekly basis. Before Code Review, only 16% of Anthropic’s internal PRs received substantive review comments. That figure has jumped to 54%.
Crucially, Code Review does not approve pull requests. That decision remains with human reviewers. Instead, the system functions as a force multiplier, surfacing issues so that human reviewers can focus on architectural decisions and higher-order concerns rather than line-by-line bug hunting.
Why Anthropic thinks $20 per review is a bargain
The pricing will draw immediate scrutiny. At $15 to $25 per review, billed on token usage and scaling with PR size, Code Review is substantially more expensive than alternatives. GitHub Copilot offers code review natively as part of its existing subscription, and startups like CodeRabbit operate at significantly lower price points. Anthropic’s more basic code review GitHub Action — which remains open source — is itself a lighter-weight and cheaper option.
Anthropic frames the cost not as a productivity expense but as an insurance product. “For teams shipping to production, the cost of a shipped bug dwarfs $20/review,” the company’s spokesperson told VentureBeat. “A single production incident — a rollback, a hotfix, an on-call page — can cost more in engineer hours than a month of Code Review. Code Review is an insurance product for code quality, not a productivity tool for churning through PRs faster.”
That framing is deliberate and revealing. Rather than competing on speed or price — the dimensions where lightweight tools have an advantage — Anthropic is positioning Code Review as a depth-first tool aimed at engineering leaders who manage production risk. The implicit argument is that the real cost comparison isn’t Code Review versus CodeRabbit, but Code Review versus the fully loaded cost of a production outage, including engineer time, customer impact, and reputational damage.
Whether that argument holds up will depend on the data. Anthropic has not yet published external benchmarks comparing Code Review’s bug-detection rates against competitors, and the spokesperson did not provide specific figures on bugs caught per dollar or developer hours saved when asked directly. For engineering leaders evaluating the tool, that gap in publicly available comparative data may slow adoption, even if the theoretical ROI case is compelling.
What the internal numbers reveal — and what they don’t
Anthropic’s internal usage data provides an early window into the system’s performance characteristics. On large pull requests exceeding 1,000 lines changed, 84% receive findings, averaging 7.5 issues per review. On small PRs under 50 lines, that drops to 31% with an average of 0.5 issues. The company reports that less than 1% of findings are marked incorrect by engineers.
That sub-1% figure is the kind of stat that demands careful unpacking. When asked how “marked incorrect” is defined, the Anthropic spokesperson explained that it means “an engineer actively resolving the comment without fixing it. We’ll continue to monitor feedback and engagement while Code Review is in research preview.”
The methodology matters. This is an opt-in disagreement metric — an engineer has to take the affirmative step of dismissing a finding. In practice, developers under time pressure may simply ignore irrelevant findings rather than actively marking them as wrong, which would cause false positives to go uncounted. Anthropic acknowledged the limitation implicitly by noting the system is in research preview and that it will continue monitoring engagement data. The company has not yet conducted or published a controlled evaluation comparing agent findings against a ground-truth baseline established by expert human reviewers.
The anecdotal evidence is nonetheless striking. Anthropic described a case where a one-line change to a production service — the kind of diff that typically receives a cursory approval — was flagged as critical by Code Review because it would have broken authentication for the service. In another example involving TrueNAS’s open-source middleware, Code Review surfaced a pre-existing bug in adjacent code during a ZFS encryption refactor: a type mismatch that was silently wiping the encryption key cache on every sync. These are precisely the categories of bugs — latent issues in touched-but-unchanged code, and subtle behavioral changes hiding in small diffs — that human reviewers are statistically most likely to miss.
A Pentagon lawsuit casts a long shadow over enterprise AI
The Code Review launch does not exist in a vacuum. On the same day, Anthropic filed two lawsuits — one in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California and another in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals — challenging the Trump administration’s decision to label the company a supply chain risk to national security, a designation historically reserved for foreign adversaries.
The legal confrontation stems from a breakdown in contract negotiations between Anthropic and the Pentagon. As CNN reported, the Defense Department wanted unrestricted access to Claude for “all lawful purposes,” while Anthropic insisted on two redlines: that its AI would not be used for fully autonomous weapons or mass domestic surveillance. When talks collapsed by a Pentagon-set deadline on February 27, President Trump directed all federal agencies to cease using Anthropic’s technology, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth formally designated the company a supply chain risk.
According to CNBC, the complaint alleges that these actions are “unprecedented and unlawful” and are “harming Anthropic irreparably,” with the company stating that contracts are already being cancelled and “hundreds of millions of dollars” in near-term revenue are in jeopardy.
“Seeking judicial review does not change our longstanding commitment to harnessing AI to protect our national security,” the Anthropic spokesperson told VentureBeat, “but this is a necessary step to protect our business, our customers, and our partners. We will continue to pursue every path toward resolution, including dialogue with the government.”
For enterprise buyers evaluating Code Review and other Claude-based tools, the lawsuit introduces a novel category of vendor risk. The supply chain risk designation doesn’t just affect Anthropic’s government contracts — as CNBC reported, it requires defense contractors to certify they don’t use Claude in their Pentagon-related work. That creates a chilling effect that could extend well beyond the defense sector, even as the company’s commercial momentum accelerates.
Microsoft, Google, and Amazon draw a line around Claude’s commercial availability
The market’s response to the Pentagon crisis has been notably bifurcated. While the government moved to isolate Anthropic, the company’s three largest cloud distribution partners moved in the opposite direction.
Microsoft on Monday announced it is integrating Claude into Microsoft 365 Copilot through a new product called Copilot Cowork, developed in close collaboration with Anthropic. As Yahoo Finance reported, the service enables enterprise users to perform tasks like building presentations, pulling data into Excel spreadsheets, and coordinating meetings — the kind of agentic productivity capabilities that sent shares of SaaS companies like Salesforce, ServiceNow, and Intuit tumbling when Anthropic first debuted its Cowork product on January 30.
The timing is not coincidental. As TechCrunch reported last week, Microsoft, Google, and Amazon Web Services all confirmed that Claude remains available to their customers for non-defense workloads. Microsoft’s legal team specifically concluded that “Anthropic products, including Claude, can remain available to our customers — other than the Department of War — through platforms such as M365, GitHub, and Microsoft’s AI Foundry.”
That three of the world’s most powerful technology companies publicly reaffirmed their commitment to distributing Anthropic’s models — on the same day the company sued the federal government — tells enterprise customers something important about the market’s assessment of both Claude’s technical value and the legal durability of the supply chain risk designation.
Data security and what enterprise buyers need to know next
For organizations considering Code Review, the data handling question looms especially large. The system necessarily ingests proprietary source code to perform its analysis. Anthropic’s spokesperson addressed this directly: “Anthropic does not train models on our customers’ data. This is part of why customers in highly regulated industries, from Novo Nordisk to Intuit, trust us to deploy AI safely and effectively.”
The spokesperson did not detail specific retention policies or compliance certifications when asked, though the company’s reference to pharmaceutical and financial services clients suggests it has undergone the kind of security review those industries require.
Administrators get several controls for managing costs and scope, including monthly organization-wide spending caps, repository-level enablement, and an analytics dashboard tracking PRs reviewed, acceptance rates, and total costs. Once enabled, reviews run automatically on new pull requests with no per-developer configuration required.
The revenue figure Anthropic confirmed — a $2.5 billion run rate as of February 12 for Claude Code — underscores just how quickly developer tooling has become a material revenue line for the company. The spokesperson pointed to Anthropic’s recent Series G fundraise for additional context but did not break out what share of total company revenue Claude Code now represents.
Code Review is available now in research preview for Claude Code Team and Enterprise plans. Whether it can justify its premium in a market already crowded with cheaper alternatives will depend on whether Anthropic can convert anecdotal bug catches and internal usage stats into the kind of rigorous, externally validated evidence that engineering leaders with production budgets require — all while navigating a legal and political environment unlike anything the AI industry has previously faced.
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