Kinderen van migranten maken in Nederland hun onderwijsachterstand binnen één generatie met 50 à 60 procent goed, zo blijkt uit nieuw onderzoek. Niet de migratieachtergrond, maar het opleidingsniveau van de ouders blijkt bepalend voor de ontwikkeling van vaardigheden.

Christopher Nolans ‘The Odyssey’ zit vol onvergetelijke scènes waarin de angstwekkende macht van de Griekse mythen voelbaar is. De held van de film, Odysseus, blijkt gebrekkig, menselijk en relevant.

Wie kent dit nog van vroeger?

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We wisten van de gevaren van een overvol stroomnet, we wisten van het ongemak, we wisten van de kaarsjes op tafel. Maar dat de gevolgen zó mensonterend zouden zijn kon niemand bevroeden. De ramp die het arme Utrecht vandaag treft is niet te overzien: "Met het warme weer draaien de airco's in de bibliotheek op de Neude overuren. En dat heeft gevolgen. Want omdat de bibliotheek maar een bepaalde hoeveelheid stroom per dag mag gebruiken, stonden de roltrappen vandaag uit." Wat zijn we in godsnaam voor land geworden waar mensen niet eens meer met de roltrap naar hun gewenste boek kunnen zoemen. Het paleis van kennis, kunde, vermaak en vervoering blijft dan wel bereikbaar via trap en lift, maar wie erop staat zich louter middels roltrap tot het boekendom te vervoegen wacht de totale hel. Besef dat Trump niet eens president was geworden zonder functionerende roltrap. Voordat het te laat is een hartenkreet richting premier Jetten: LOS DIE STROOMCRISIS NOU EENS OP!

Good interview with Craig Mod about how he uses LLMs: “using AI as a research assistant, why he keeps a tech-free zone in the mornings for deep thinking, and why he’s resisting the pull of the ‘mainlining’ AI era”.

The Moist Towelette Online Museum. Live moist and prosper. 🖖💦

A Mozilla-commissioned report is claiming that Microsoft is indulging in all manner of bad behaviors to nudge users toward its Edge browser. However, judging by market share statistics, any potential efforts in that direction are not going too well for the Windows giant. The Over The Edge 2.0 report, commissioned by Mozilla, was published earlier this week and documents design choices from Microsoft that sent users into the arms of Edge. It also looked at differences in Microsoft's approach in Germany (as a stand-in for the European Economic Area (EEA) ), India, the UK, and the US. The conclusion? "Microsoft still does not allow users to download, set as the default, or keep using alternative browsers without harmful interference." This might take the form of an "All you need is right here" banner in Bing when attempting to download alternative browsers, the pre-pinning of Edge to the Windows taskbar, and "misleading" wording, which, according to the report, could trick users into making Edge their default. Then there is AI. The report's authors found that Copilot ignores the default browser when opening links, and that Copilot data-sharing toggles are preselected to ON in the US and India. The above highlights another finding in the report – where Microsoft has been forced to make changes (in the EEA), it has done so. The "All you need is right here" banner, for example, does not appear in the EEA, but does in the UK, the US, and India. There's also no injected Edge banner on the Chrome download page, and Windows Search doesn't automatically use Edge instead of the default browser. The Browser Choice Alliance applauded the report and criticized the tactics documented in it: "The researchers' findings in 'Over the Edge 2.0' reveal how Microsoft continues to use manipulative tactics to push users toward Edge, limiting users' ability to choose and run their chosen browser. "The report demonstrates how Microsoft deploys harmful patterns against users on Windows 11 devices at a global scale. We call on Microsoft to respect its users and stop using the Windows ecosystem to steer users toward its own browser in ways that restrict user choice, undermine web freedom, and unfairly tilt the playing field away from fair competition and innovation." Other browser makers were also scathing regarding the practices the report accuses Microsoft of employing. Bruce Lawson, Vivaldi's Technical Communications Officer, told The Register, "We're glad Mozilla's independent researchers confirm what we've been telling regulators for years … Microsoft is very reluctant to compete on the merits of its own browser product, so abuses its dominance of the Windows ecosystem to manipulate users. "The threat of scrutiny in EU means that it's not quite so bad in Europe, but it's still not a level playing field - and we continue to urge the UK, Australian and Japanese regulators to step in and make their markets fair. Vivaldi will be happy to co-pilot the code changes need, to avoid Microsoft having any unfortunate Copilot involvement. "We know how 'well' those projects turn out." The Register approached Microsoft for comment, but the Windows giant did not respond. The alleged antics found in the report, if true, do not appear to be serving Microsoft particularly well. While the company does not publish official figures, Statcounter (which has tracking code on more than one million websites globally and records billions of page views) shows Edge's market share hovering at just over 10 percent – a decline from 13 percent in June 2025. Mozilla's Firefox, on the other hand, has grown its share to 6.44 percent from 5.84 percent a year ago. Thus, if Microsoft is adopting the dubious design practices its competitors are accusing it of, it doesn't appear to be working particularly well. If Statcounter is to be believed, then even with all the alleged nudging and steering from the Windows giant, Edge remains that thing customers use to download an alternative. A spokesperson at Mozilla sent us a statement: "Firefox is competing hard and growing on many platforms, but looking specifically at Edge market share on Windows - which is the relevant market - the researchers note that Edge was the only browser to gain share on Windows over the last two years. This led the authors to say (on page 10 of the report): "We hypothesise that previous harmful patterns have played a role in this growth."®

​De Amerikaanse immigratiedienst ICE probeert met man en macht de aandacht af te leiden van de moord op een onschuldige man in Texas vorige week. Daarom schoten ze deze week een andere onschuldige man dood in Maine.

“Het nieuws gaat snel en de aandachtsspanne is kort”, vertelt een woordvoerder van ICE. “We zetten daarom alles op alles om mensen snel weer te laten vergeten wat er is gebeurd.” De moord op de 26-jarige man in Texas moet afleiden van de moord op de 52-jarige man in Maine vorige week, die weer moet afleiden van de moord op de 37-jarige vrouw in Minnesota, die dan weer moet afleiden van de 7 doden die daaraan vooraf gingen. “Wij handelen sowieso alleen uit zelfverdediging, dus dan loopt het aantal natuurlijk snel op.’’

ICE blijft inmiddels volop verkeerscontroles uitvoeren en heeft het aantal arrestaties per dag verdubbeld naar tweeduizend. Ook de ICE-agent van het incident van gister zal zo snel mogelijk weer op actief worden gesteld. “We moeten ophef over de laatste moord natuurlijk voor blijven.”

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Doing full justice to the Homeric legend, Christopher Nolan amasses an epic cast to convey the true cost of war with film-making of thrilling ambition

• A classicist’s verdict

• Nolan interviewed

• Will women also love The Odyssey?

Christopher Nolan reinvents the Homeric legend as a colossal origin-myth story of postwar disillusion, an epic ordeal of anguish witnessed by the dead and presided over by capricious deities who participate on almost equal terms with the humans. It speaks to the generational pain of PTSD; plenty of soldiers come home in person after any war promptly enough, but arriving back to their prewar state emotionally or spiritually can take years or decades and may never happen at all. The invisible odyssey of anguish is punctuated by flashback episodes, hallucinations, confrontations with the arbitrary gods of dysfunction. And all the time the spouses and children cannot move on with their lives.

This is a film with thrilling ambition, boldness, seriousness, generosity and flair. There are some broad-brush moments in the dialogue, yes, but even these are applied with a muscular flourish. It has gasp-inducing, Imax-sized landscapes of loneliness shot by cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema – who, incidentally, avoids the sea’s traditional cliched colour – and full-tilt battle sequences and fight scenes accompanied by the throbbing and thrumming of drums.

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We start this week with Jason’s story about the ChatGPT flyer pandemic. They’re everywhere! Thank you to the readers and listeners who sent in their own examples. After the break, Sam tells us how Waymo snitched on kids and drove them to a group of waiting cops. In the subscribers-only section, Joseph explains why he bought a $3,000 suit that electrocutes your muscles. Yep.

Listen to the weekly podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube. Become a paid subscriber for access to this episode's bonus content and to power our journalism. If you become a paid subscriber, check your inbox for an email from our podcast host Transistor for a link to the subscribers-only version! You can also add that subscribers feed to your podcast app of choice and never miss an episode that way. The email should also contain the subscribers-only unlisted YouTube link for the extended video version too. It will also be in the show notes in your podcast player.

• ⁠We Are Living in a ‘ChatGPT Flyer Pandemic’⁠
• ⁠Cops Say Waymo Snitched on Teens for Allegedly Drinking and Shooting a Toy Gun⁠
• ⁠I Bought the $3,000 Fitness Suit That Electrocutes You. I’m Sending It Back⁠