Short posts
New: See why tech companies are paying people to do chores
Featuring many videos of robots attempting to fold clothes
Enjoyed this essay by Armin Ronacher. “The middle ground between rejecting a technology outright and embracing it fully is usually occupied by people willing to explore it seriously enough to judge it.”
Useful: An archive of congressional press releases from 2001-2026, with daily updates. Nice resource by Derek Willis
Back after a few days off, and I think I’m no longer an inbox-zero person
Made my TV debut yesterday, talking about my latest story on AI and jobs with NBC News NOW (around 1:29:20)
Labels on these scatterplots brought to you by avoid-overlap — my library for automatic label placement on charts. Let me know how it goes if you give it a shot.
New: AI job exposure is important, but there’s more to the picture. Here’s what the research says on adaptability.
Find your job here 🎁 https://wapo.st/4cP2ZHM
More details on how Pentagon uses Claude from NYT.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/11/us/politics/iran-school-missile-strike.html
New: I asked readers what websites they want, then fired up Claude Cowork to build them.
We’re entering a new era of software built specifically for you.
I spoke with Eliot Peper, who built a hyperlocal surf forecasting app for his area. He summed it up best:
Instead of wanting to be Amazon, I want it to be a beloved indie bookstore, right? That’s just perfect for your neighborhood.
This story has the most details I’ve seen yet on exactly how the military uses Claude.
As planning for a potential strike in Iran was underway, Maven, powered by Claude, suggested hundreds of targets, issued precise location coordinates, and prioritized those targets according to importance, said two of the people. The pairing of Maven and Claude has created a tool that is speeding the pace of the campaign, reducing Iran’s ability to counterstrike and turning weeks-long battle planning into real-time operations, said one of the people. The AI tools also evaluate a strike after it is initiated, the person said.
And this:
The Pentagon began to integrate Anthropic’s Claude chatbot into Maven in late 2024, according to public announcements. The system has been used to generate proposed targets, to track logistics and provide summaries of intelligence coming in from the field.
Here’s how NATO’s version looks, according to a video they recently posted. Unclear if the U.S. version is similar. Apparently you can ask the system questions like “Can you explain the targets on this map?”
Really great reporting by Tara Copp, Elizabeth Dwoskin and Ian Duncan. Gift link
