September is typically the time when television gets serious again. The summer’s biggest TV shows have aired their finales, the fall schedule is kicking into high gear, and streamers are rolling out everything from high-concept sci-fi to prestige dramas. There’s plenty of familiar IP in the mix, but also some genuinely original shows worth putting on your to-watch list.

While plenty of outlets will tell you what everyone is watching (see: Reacher), that’s not our goal. As always, the TV shows we’re watching this month reflect the kinds of stories WIRED covers every day—shows that explore technology, science, politics, culture, and the sometimes unsettling ways they intersect.

From returning favorites to ambitious new series—and at least one show that might rekindle your love of traditional anime—these are the TV shows we think you should make time to stream this month.

The Paper

Amazon has made its Quick desktop assistant generally available on macOS and Windows, pitching it to enterprise IT as the governed alternative to shadow AI. Quick runs in ordinary European AWS regions with inference kept inside Europe, but it is not on the published service list for the sovereign cloud AWS opened in Brandenburg in January to put European data beyond the reach of US law.

Amazon has made its Quick desktop app generally available on macOS and Windows, AWS said, and added an activity feed to the iOS and Android versions that pools email, calendar, CRM and messaging into one list.

The pitch is governance. Amazon says customer data stays inside the customer’s own environment, conversations stay private, and audit trails run through CloudWatch and CloudTrail. It describes the underlying AWS as the infrastructure behind the world’s most security-sensitive workloads.

The compliance list is HIPAA, FedRAMP, SOC 2 and ISO 27001. The argument underneath is that shadow AI is what happens when staff route around approved tools, and that the answer is a sanctioned assistant rather than a ban.

In Europe that argument runs into a distinction Amazon drew itself in January.

Quick has run in the AWS Frankfurt region since March, with inference requests routed only within European regions. It also runs in London and Ireland.

Those are ordinary AWS regions.

The AWS European Sovereign Cloud is not. It opened in Brandenburg on 14 January, staffed only by EU residents and overseen by a board of EU citizens, on a commitment of EUR 7.8B.

Quick does not appear on its published service list. SageMaker and Bedrock do.

The distinction matters to the buyers Amazon is describing. Airbus is moving 70 applications off AWS to the French provider Scaleway, out of roughly 900 it runs, on a contract worth more than EUR 50M.

Its stated test was legal safeguards against non-European laws. The law in question is the US CLOUD Act, which reaches American companies’ data wherever in the world it is held.

Then there is the question of whether anyone pays. Of the Microsoft 365 users who can reach Copilot Chat, 3.3% pay for Copilot, about 15 million seats out of 450 million.

Amazon names three customers in the announcement, Southwest Airlines, Labcorp and the PGA Tour. All three quotes are supplied testimonials. The post gives no pricing, no seat numbers and no date for sovereign cloud support.

Quick’s case is that it is the assistant IT already controls. In Europe the follow-up is which AWS they control it from, and European rivals are selling the answer.

BearingPoint’s Laura Kealy explores how she found herself working as a senior technology analyst.

Donegal native Laura Kealy found her secondary education abruptly interrupted in 2020 with the onset of the global pandemic. From there, she went on to pursue management science and information systems studies at Trinity College Dublin, before undertaking a graduate programme at management and tech consulting firm BearingPoint. 

“Maths and business were my favourite subjects in school, which led me to pursue a degree that combined both subjects alongside technology. While I enjoyed the technical side of my studies, I also knew I wanted a career that involved working closely with people and helping to solve real-world problems,” Kealy told SiliconRepublic.com. 

She explained that BearingPoint stood out to her after interacting with future team members at a college careers fair. Kealy said, “Everyone I spoke to was welcoming, genuine and passionate about what they did, which gave me a great impression of the company culture.”

Can you describe a typical day in your role? 

One of the things I enjoy most about my role is the variety. A typical day might involve meeting with clients to understand their requirements, collaborating with my teammates to solve technical challenges, and then carrying out hands-on work such as analysing data in Power BI, writing PowerShell scripts or creating project documentation.

I also enjoy the collaborative aspect of the work I do. Whether it’s working with teammates or engaging directly with clients, there’s always an opportunity to learn from others. I have been fortunate to work with people who are always willing to share their knowledge and help me develop my skills. 

Did your responsibilities and workload change as the programme progressed? 

At BearingPoint, I’ve always been encouraged to learn through hands-on experience and client-facing work. Being part of a small team meant I was trusted early on with responsibilities and given opportunities to make an impact, while still having the support of my colleagues around me.

As I’ve grown more confident in my role, my workload and responsibilities have naturally increased, progressing from supporting project activities to leading key client deliverables. I’ve also had the opportunity to collaborate with colleagues at all levels of the organisation, from fellow graduates right through to directors and partners.

Working with people from different backgrounds and experiences has taught me new ways of thinking and approaching challenges.

What skills have you developed since being part of the company’s programme?

My technical knowledge has grown significantly through hands-on project work, particularly in areas such as AI, data analysis and Microsoft technologies. I have had great opportunities to continue learning through certifications, training and knowledge-sharing from colleagues.

I have also developed my communication and consulting skills. I’ve become much more confident communicating with different audiences, whether that’s providing updates to my team, presenting to clients or explaining technical concepts to people from a non-technical background.

Learning how to adapt my communication style to different audiences has been one of the most valuable skills I’ve gained throughout the programme and one that I use every day.

What have been the most challenging parts of working life since taking up this programme?

One of the most challenging aspects of my role has been keeping up with the pace of change in technology, particularly with the rapid evolution of AI. Working in this space means continuously learning, especially when you’re helping clients understand how these technologies can be used effectively within their organisations.

What started as a challenge has become something I now really enjoy. Whether it is writing a simple prompt to Copilot or building an advanced AI agent that can complete tasks on your behalf, AI is constantly evolving and there’s always something new to learn and experiment with.

It’s also been rewarding to share what I’ve learned with others and help build confidence in using these tools across different teams and projects.

Would you recommend the graduate programme at this company to others? 

I would definitely recommend the graduate programme at BearingPoint. The combination of challenging work, learning opportunities and a genuinely supportive culture has made it a great place to start my career.

I have had the opportunity to work on large-scale projects, learn from experienced colleagues and develop both technically and professionally. I really enjoy the strong social aspect of the office, with everything from sports and social events to charity initiatives.

Those experiences have made it easy to build relationships and have been a really important part of my time here. 

What advice would you like to give to future graduates who are just starting out?

My advice would be to say yes to opportunities, even if they’re outside your comfort zone. This applies to projectwork, but some of the experiences I’ve learned the most from weren’t necessarily part of my day-to-day role.

Getting involved in different teams, initiatives and events has really helped me develop new skills, build confidence and form great connections across the organisation.

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For this year’s IEEE annual election, the IEEE Tellers Committee will recognize the Sections with the highest voter turnout (based on total eligible voters) in each Region with an incentive reward after the election results are accepted by the IEEE Board of Directors.The incentive initiative is managed by the Tellers Committee, which retains full authority over all rules, operations, and decisions regarding the program.

Incentive guidelines

The Section sizes and their respective reward amounts are:

• Large sections consist of more than 1,501 eligible voting members. The top-performing large section in each IEEE region will be rewarded with US $1,000.
  
• Medium sections consist of 501 to 1,500 eligible voting members. Each region’s top-performing medium section will receive $600.
  
• Small sections consist of 500 or fewer eligible voting members. The top-performing small section in each region will receive $400.

To learn more about the incentive program, visit the IEEE annual election website. If you haven’t voted in the 2026 elections, you can learn about the candidates and vote here. Send questions to: elections@ieee.org.

OFFBEAT

Coinbase engineer gives simulated insect $100 and lets its neurons make the trades

If you want to understand how 2026 is going, in March The Register reported that scientists had connected a simulated fruit fly brain to a virtual body and let it wander around a virtual world. Now another simulated fly nervous system is trading crypto.

Behold Stonkfly, the brainchild of Coinbase software engineer Alex Wormuth. His X post boasted: “I gave the fly brain $100 to trade bitcoin. Dopamine neurons are stimulated when the fly makes profit. Neuron activity controls buy/sell decisions and makes trades on coinbase. Will the fly get rich?”

Well, all we can say is Alex should question his life choices. But really, more stupid things have happened this year, like the US president suggesting he could bring in the military to correct a misbehaving bond market.

Keen readers will recall that researchers at Eon Systems took several preexisting components: a fruit fly brain scan, a tool for modeling neurons, a model of some of the fly’s muscles and body, and a very simple virtual environment. After connecting them, the team claimed that the result displayed some of the behavior of a real insect.

Stonkfly is different. It uses a model of a male fly’s brain and ventral nerve cord, rather than the female brain scan used in the earlier experiment. It has no body, and engineered interfaces feed it market information and translate neural activity into trading decisions.

The explanation on GitHub – it is an open source project – makes clear that the model uses engineered reinforcement signals, not modeled pain receptors, while synaptic changes “do not establish that it learns to trade profitably.”

The underlying network is substantial, comprising 166,700 nodes, 25,582,938 directed connections, and 124,177,617 synaptic contacts.

The project documentation nonetheless sets out criteria for what would qualify as successful learning, along with some careful caveats. “Compare to cash and simple exposure baselines as well: rising crypto prices alone can make any buyer look skilled,” the documentation says.

“No profitable learning, strategy improvement, biological replication, or live-funded performance has been demonstrated by this repository’s tests,” it adds.

We call on Wormuth not to be so modest. Before the year is out, we expect Federal Reserve chair Kevin Warsh to be replaced by a disembodied virtual insect brain. It’s not even the end of September, after all. ®

Metal Gear Breakup: Hideo Kojima’s new game is still years away, but fans are eagerly awaiting the action-espionage blockbuster the Japanese designer is working on. Most likely, the game will not be a PlayStation exclusive after the Tokyo-based company decided to end its partnership with Kojima and stop funding his projects.

Hideo Kojima recently announced that his upcoming games have found a new home. The Japanese designer and auteur, together with his company, Kojima Productions, will partner with Microsoft and Xbox to develop and publish Physint, OD, and the other projects announced last year.

Kojima confirmed that Sony was going to cancel Physint, which is intended to serve as a spiritual successor to the legendary Metal Gear franchise. However, Physint is a project that both Kojima and his company were determined to keep alive. The team spent the past three months looking for a new business partner, which it has now found through a deal announced on Kojima’s official social channels.

Kojima Productions and Microsoft apparently share a common vision for the future of video games, so Kojima will now use Microsoft’s money to keep Physint, OD, and his other projects alive until release. Physint is poised to be a new genre-defining action-espionage title worthy of the Metal Gear lineage, Kojima confirmed.

– HIDEO_KOJIMA (@HIDEO_KOJIMA_EN) September 10, 2026

While the designer announced the new partnership with Xbox, PlayStation confirmed the “difficult decision” to end its partnership with Kojima Productions. Sony is still looking to maintain a “strong” relationship with the Japanese studio, although it no longer wants to spend money funding its expensive gaming projects while they remain years away from release.

According to people familiar with the matter, Sony had indeed decided to pull the plug on the collaboration as a pure business move. The studio’s executives are now concerned that Physint will go significantly over budget, fail to generate sufficient returns, and cease to be a prized PlayStation exclusive after a brief period of time.

The executives were apparently unimpressed with the market performance of Kojima’s previous games, Death Stranding and Death Stranding 2: On the Beach. The titles did not meet Sony’s internal revenue expectations, the sources said, and were later ported to other platforms by Kojima Productions. Official sales data say that Death Stranding has reached more than 20 million players worldwide, while the 2025 sequel sold more than two million copies after coming to PC earlier this year.

The Death Stranding games were not exactly a business failure, but Sony is having a pretty rough time right now and wants even more money to push its questionable live-service strategy. The company recently decided that exclusivity is a successful business strategy, although former executives are not in agreement with this new direction.

Of course, Xbox has its own business issues to deal with. The company’s strategy of turning everything into a cloud service is failing spectacularly before the world’s eyes, and new CEO Asha Sharma is definitely using the hatchet rather than the chisel to try to steer the sinking ship back on course.

After Kojima’s announcement, Xbox said that the team was “honored” to partner with the legendary studio behind Metal Gear and Death Stranding. The Metal Gear saga helped Sony establish PlayStation as a major force in the modern gaming industry at the turn of the millennium, but Kojima parted ways with the brand’s owner, Konami Group, in 2015.

from the who-needs-oversight? dept

It says nothing good about America how easily Elon Musk convinced the press and public he was a supergenius engineer who could cobble together complicated rocket machinery wearing coveralls in his backyard shed.

Hindsight continues to illustrate how Elon Musk’s real skill sets are opportunism, taking singular credit for the innovations of real engineers, the manipulation of a very broken media, and taking legal, regulatory, environmental, labor, and consumer protection “shortcuts” wherever possible.

Enter the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), which is investigating Musk’s automated-taxi Cybercab deployments in Austin for violating public safety guidelines.

The Trump NHTSA is updating existing Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) to help companies speed toward automated cars and taxis. But until then our previous (already fairly lax) standards still apply. This being America, companies self-certify whether they’re adhering to the rules in order to get a two-year exemption (Amazon’s Zoox got approval last month).

Tesla, owned by a man who doesn’t believe in coherent governance, is facing a new NHTSA investigation for simply refusing to participate in the process

“Ann Carlson, a former acting NHTSA administrator who is now a professor of environmental law at UCLA, says the investigation is likely “an indication that NHTSA is super frustrated with Tesla.” The agency made clear through the Zoox case that it expects driverless vehicle developers to go through the exemption process. “For Tesla to slap them in the face and ignore that—that is gobsmacking,” she says.”

It’s not really all that gobsmacking for a company run by a man who has been extremely proud about his clumsy role in fatally dismantling U.S. federal government functionality — particularly when it pertains to corporate oversight and public safety. This is always who he was. He has a twelve-year old libertarian boy’s understanding of what government does and why it’s necessary.

Of course, this isn’t the first time NHTSA has promised accountability and then delivered the policy equivalent of a wet farting sound. The agency announced it opened an inquiry last year into Musk robotaxis clearly failing to adhere to traffic laws and making constant navigation mistakes.

The NHTSA is also purportedly investigating all the people killed by “full self driving” (FSD) technology and Tesla’s very intentional misrepresentation of what the tech is capable of. That inquiry also appears to be perpetually stuck in neutral, like most of the legal and regulatory inquiries into the country’s richest fake engineer.

Filed Under: cars, cybercab, full self driving, nhtsa, public safety, robotaxis, vehicles

Companies: tesla

Apple has finally folded, literally, with the introduction of the iPhone Duo, its first foldable smartphone and arguably the most significant change to the physical design of the iPhone since the original arrived in 2007.

Starting at $1,999, the iPhone Duo opens to reveal a 7.6-inch Super Retina XDR display while retaining a 5.4-inch outer screen for conventional one-handed use. Apple is positioning the Duo as a single device for communication, movies, gaming, photography and serious multitasking, rather than merely an iPhone with an expensive party trick in the middle.

It also arrives very late to a category Samsung, Google and several Chinese manufacturers have spent years refining. That means Apple does not get a participation trophy merely for discovering the hinge, and the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold8 and Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold already offer mature alternatives running on Android.

Two Screens but a Very Different iPhone

Closed, the iPhone Duo uses a 5.4-inch Super Retina XDR display that Apple says provides 90 percent of the screen area of the iPhone 18 Pro. Open it and the internal 7.6-inch Super Retina XDR display becomes the largest screen Apple has ever installed in an iPhone.

Both displays use the same aspect ratio, allowing content to scale proportionally as the Duo is opened or closed. Apple also includes ProMotion, Always On functionality and up to 3,000 nits of peak outdoor brightness on both displays.

The internal panel receives a nano-texture treatment designed to reduce glare and reflections while making the crease less noticeable. Apple also hides the inner FaceTime camera beneath the display when it is not being used, which is particularly relevant when the entire point of opening the device is to create a more immersive canvas.

Later this year, iPhone Duo will also support the USB-C Apple Pencil on either display, giving Apple an interesting advantage over Samsung’s regular Galaxy Z Fold8, which does not support the S Pen. The Duo will never replace an iPad Pro for serious creative work, but the ability to sketch, annotate or take notes on something that folds back into a pocket gives the design more purpose than simply making TikTok larger.

Is the iPhone Duo Better for Movies and TV?

For eCoustics readers, the iPhone Duo becomes especially interesting as a portable video device. Its 7.6-inch Super Retina XDR display provides considerably more room for movies, TV, sports, YouTube, and gaming than the 6.3-inch iPhone 18 Pro while still folding down into something that fits in a pocket.

Netflix has already optimized its app for the Duo, allowing users to browse Clips on the 5.4-inch outer display before opening the phone for playback on the larger screen. That suggests Apple and major streaming services see the Duo as a distinct viewing platform rather than simply an oversized iPhone.

The obvious alternative is the $599 iPad mini, whose 8.3-inch display is larger and dramatically less expensive. For someone primarily interested in watching Netflix, Apple TV+, or downloaded movies, the iPad mini remains the better value; the Duo’s advantage is eliminating the need to carry a second device.

Apple rates the Duo for up to 31 hours of video playback using the inner display and 44 hours on the outer screen. Add the optional Duo Folio with its integrated kickstand, and the Duo starts to make considerable sense for frequent travelers who want one device for communication and entertainment—provided they can stomach the $1,999 starting price.

For private listening, the iPhone Duo should also fit naturally into Apple’s existing headphone ecosystem, including AirPods 5, AirPods Pro 3, and AirPods Max 2. That gives travelers several Apple-integrated options for watching Netflix, Apple TV+, and downloaded movies without relying on the Duo’s built-in speakers, while keeping pairing, device switching, and playback controls inside the same ecosystem.

Built to Survive Folding

Foldable durability remains one of the category’s biggest concerns, and Apple has clearly spent considerable engineering effort trying to address it.

The iPhone Duo uses a Grade 5 titanium enclosure with a precision hinge containing more than 100 components. Ceramic Shield protects the rear, while Ceramic Shield 2 covers the outer display and offers what Apple claims is three times better scratch resistance than the previous generation.

The folding screen uses a custom polymer nano-textured cover layer, high-strength glass above and below the display panel, custom adhesives that allow the layers to move as the device folds and a titanium reinforcement plate underneath.

Apple has also achieved an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance. That puts it alongside Google’s Pixel 11 Pro Fold in terms of the published IP classification and ahead of Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold8, which carries an IP48 rating.

How all of that survives three years of people opening the phone 75 times a day remains something no launch event can answer.

A20 Pro Comes Along for the Ride

Apple did not give the Duo a reduced-performance processor simply because it bends.

The A20 Pro is the same 2-nanometer chip used in the iPhone 18 Pro models, with a 6-core CPU, 7-core GPU and Dual 16-core Neural Engine. Apple says the CPU is up to 20 percent faster than A19 Pro, while the GPU is up to 40 percent faster and more efficient.

A custom vapor chamber works with a redesigned chip package to manage heat across the unusual chassis, and Apple claims up to 35 percent better sustained performance than iPhone 17 Pro. A separate display engine drives both screens simultaneously and handles transitions between them.

That additional performance matters more on Duo than it does on a conventional iPhone because Apple is introducing true Split View multitasking on an iPhone for the first time.

Users can run two apps side by side, open two instances of the same application, save application pairs and keep Siri AI visible beside another app. Netflix, Zoom and Slack are among the third-party applications already adapted for the larger folding display.

Cameras Take Advantage of the Fold

The iPhone Duo uses a 48MP Fusion Main camera with an optical-quality 2x Telephoto mode and a 48MP Fusion Ultra Wide camera, the latter shared with the iPhone 18 Pro lineup.

The folding design creates several camera features that conventional iPhones cannot duplicate. Users can photograph themselves using the higher-quality rear cameras while framing the shot on the outer display, while Duo Preview lets the subject see the live composition from the opposite side of the device.

Smart Take uses on-device AI to recognize when subjects are ready and automatically capture an image, while Kid Cue displays Peanuts animations on the outer screen to encourage children to look toward the camera. Duo FaceTime can also use the outer display to include another person sitting beside the owner in a call.

The Main camera supports 4K video at up to 120 fps in Dolby Vision, along with Cinematic effects applied after capture at up to 60 fps. Apple has also upgraded Audio Mix so that voices and music can be separated more effectively from unwanted background sound.

Battery Life and Connectivity

Folding the phone created another engineering challenge because there is no single large internal cavity available for the battery.

Apple uses a dual-battery architecture, placing one high-energy battery on each side of the device and managing them together through software. Apple rates the Duo for up to 31 hours of video playback on the inner display, 44 hours using the outer display or up to 24 hours of mixed use when both are used equally.

Wired charging can reach 50 percent in around 20 minutes when using suitable USB-C Power Delivery hardware. MagSafe or Qi2 wireless charging can reach 50 percent in around 30 minutes under Apple’s specified test conditions.

The Apple-designed N1 wireless chip provides Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6 and Thread, while Apple’s C2 modem handles cellular connectivity and adds mmWave support in the United States.

The iPhone Duo is also eSIM-only worldwide, rather than merely in selected markets. Apple says more than 500 carriers support eSIM globally.

The Two Competitors That Matter

Apple is entering an established foldable market where two Android-powered products have been battling for market share.

Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold8  is nearly the same size as Duo with 7.6-inch inner screen and a 5.5-inch outer panel, while also offering an anti-reflective main display with up to 3,000 nits brightness.

Google’s Pixel 11 Pro Fold is larger, measuring 6.5 inches externally and 8 inches internally. It also carries an IP68 rating, supports Qi2 magnetic charging and uses Google’s Tensor G6 processor with deep Gemini integration.

The iPhone Duo therefore does not win on screen size or price. Apple’s differentiators are its integration with iOS and the broader Apple ecosystem, the A20 Pro platform, Apple Pencil support, up to 2TB of storage, the nano-textured inner display and a collection of software and camera experiences built specifically around the two-screen design.

Whether those advantages justify another $100 to $200 over two highly developed competitors is the $1,999 question.

iPhone Feaures Compared

The Bottom Line

The iPhone Duo is not revolutionary because Apple invented the foldable phone. Samsung and Google have already done years of unpaid beta testing on that particular idea, and both currently offer excellent foldables for less money.

What Apple has created is arguably its first iPhone that can credibly replace some of the reasons people carry an iPad. A 7.6-inch ProMotion display, nano-texture surface, Netflix optimization, Split View, Apple Pencil support and up to 31 hours of video playback make the Duo far more compelling for movies, television, gaming and travel than the 6.3-inch iPhone 18 Pro.

An iPad mini still provides a larger 8.3-inch display for only $599, and anyone primarily interested in watching movies should keep that rather enormous price difference in mind. The Duo makes sense for the user who wants one premium device that can function as a conventional phone until the moment more screen space becomes useful.

Apple’s strongest argument is not size or value. It is whether the combination of A20 Pro, iOS 27, Apple Intelligence, Apple Pencil, Apple’s camera ecosystem and seamless integration with the devices and services millions of customers already own can make the Duo feel more cohesive than foldables that have been doing this longer.

At $1,999, it had better.

Price & Availability

Pre-orders start Oct. 16th 5am PT at Apple or Best Buy, which is one week before iPhone Duo becomes available in the U.S. on October 23, 2026 at the following price points in either Star White and Night Sky (dark blue).

• 256GB – $1,999 at Best Buy
• 512GB – $2,199
• 1TB – $2,599
• 2TB – $3,199

Apple’s iPhone Duo Case costs $79, while the Duo Folio with integrated kickstand costs $129.

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