Napster Relaunches With AI Tools Aimed at Cloning Teachers for Education

Napster, once infamous for disrupting the music industry with peer-to-peer file sharing, has announced a new strategic direction focused on artificial intelligence in education. The company's latest venture involves using AI technology to create digital clones of teachers. This pivot marks a dramatic shift from its origins as a music-sharing platform to an edtech enterprise. The move positions Napster among a growing number of companies exploring AI-driven solutions for classroom learning.

Parthiv frontrunner for chief selector if Agarkar, BCCI fail to agree extension

Apache Lakehouse Projects Hit Release Snags Over Licenses, Specs, and Engine Gaps

During the week of September 9–17, 2026, several Apache data lakehouse projects encountered release setbacks, with Iceberg Rust 0.11.0 failing two release votes, Polaris 1.8.0 receiving a blocking objection, and the Polaris Catalog Migrator requiring a second release candidate. The failures stemmed not from faulty code but from licensing oversights, a publishing error, and inconsistent encryption enforcement across engines. In a notable structural change, both the Apache Iceberg and Apache DataFusion communities voted unanimously to move the iceberg-datafusion integration crate into a new repository under the DataFusion project, aiming to align code ownership with the contributors most familiar with the engine. The move was designed to ensure that DataFusion experts maintain the integration layer while Iceberg development stays focused on the table format itself. Elsewhere, Apache Arrow shipped a Rust release introducing ALP floating-point encoding into a production Parquet implementation for the first time, and projects including Parquet, Polaris, and Apache Ossie debated how to handle cross-engine compatibility and configuration boundaries.

Shocks keep coming, India keeps growing

Gurgaon Hit-and-Run Accused Kalyan Bainsla Sent to 14-Day Judicial Custody

Kalyan Singh Bainsla and his cousin Lavnish have been sent to 14-day judicial custody in connection with a hit-and-run incident on Golf Course Road in Gurgaon. The case involves victim Shivani Chauhan, whose motorcycle was struck in the incident. Chauhan has alleged that support from a mahapanchayat is being used to distort the facts of the case. She stressed that the incident should not be framed as a gender or communal issue, but rather as a road safety concern. The victim called for strong action to prevent similar accidents and protect public safety.

₹1 cr foreign asset limit under FAST-DS 2026: Details

ReelGeek turns photos into watermark-free vertical videos using Python tools

A developer has released ReelGeek, a free, open-source desktop tool that converts folders of photos into 1080x1920 vertical videos without watermarks, length caps, or subscriptions. The app supports Ken Burns-style panning, crossfade transitions, and background music, targeting social media reel formats. It is built using Python Pillow for image processing, numpy for frame transforms and blending, and ffmpeg for final encoding. The developer chose numpy array operations over frame-by-frame Pillow rendering to keep performance acceptable on standard laptops. The project is available on GitHub, with the developer noting the installer is not yet code-signed and inviting community feedback on additional style options.

Air India Express ordered to pay Rs 27,000 for mishandling passenger's bicycle

A consumer commission has directed Air India Express to pay Rs 27,000 to a passenger whose bicycle was mishandled during transit. The passenger had paid extra for special handling of the bicycle, but the airline placed it on the regular baggage belt instead. The commission ruled that this constituted a clear deficiency in service on the airline's part. The total payout of Rs 27,000 includes a refund of the special handling fee, compensation, and litigation costs.

OpenSpec Lacks Rejected Proposal Memory, Causing AI Agents to Repeat Bad Ideas

OpenSpec, a spec-management tool used in software development, has no built-in mechanism to record why a proposed architectural change was rejected, leaving agents free to re-propose the same ideas repeatedly. Its existing archive command, /opsx:archive, was designed only to log shipped changes, not abandoned or rejected ones, meaning rejected proposals look identical to completed ones in the archive. This gap is especially problematic in legacy codebases with few contributors, where AI agents periodically revisit the same structural questions such as merging services or sharing persistence layers. The issue was raised directly with OpenSpec's maintainers as a feature request, and the project's own documentation acknowledges that rejection handling falls outside the tool's enforced scope. A practical workaround involves using the --skip-specs flag when archiving rejected changes and adopting a lightweight decision.md convention to preserve the reasoning behind past rejections.

Why Node.js background workers should combine events and polling, not rely on one

Using setInterval for Node.js background jobs creates two hidden problems: it fires on a fixed schedule regardless of how long each run takes, causing overlapping executions that can exhaust database connection pools, and it issues thousands of idle queries daily even when there is no work to do. Chaining setTimeout from the end of each work cycle eliminates overlap by making the delay a gap between runs rather than a fixed clock. Event-driven mechanisms like Postgres LISTEN/NOTIFY or Redis pub/sub remove idle query costs and reduce job latency from seconds to milliseconds, but they offer no delivery guarantee — a missed notification means a job silently never runs. The recommended pattern combines both approaches: events handle the fast path while a slow poll, running perhaps once a minute, acts as a safety net to catch anything the event missed. This hybrid gives low latency on healthy days while preserving the reliability guarantee that pure event-driven systems lack.

'A bit chubby': Memoir claims Charles fat-shamed Diana; was 'elated' by her death

Apple iPhone 2025 Lineup: From Rs 79,900 to Rs 2,99,900 — Which Model Suits You?

Apple's current iPhone range in India spans a wide price band, from Rs 79,900 to Rs 2,99,900, offering multiple tiers for different buyers. The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max are the latest flagship additions, featuring variable aperture cameras and the new A20 Pro chip. Apple is also set to launch the foldable iPhone Duo in October, marking the company's entry into the foldable smartphone segment. Notably, Apple has not released a new standard iPhone model this year, making the upgrade decision less straightforward for budget-conscious buyers. Choosing the right iPhone now depends heavily on individual priorities such as camera performance, form factor preference, and budget.

Surendra Koli dies by suicide: A brief timeline of 2006 Nithari serial murders case

Conway's Law Reexamined: Why AI Agents Don't Fit the Org-Chart Mirror Model

Conway's Law holds that a system's structure mirrors the communication graph of the teams that built it, with interfaces forming wherever human coordination must cross boundaries. A developer essay argues this model does not cleanly extend to AI agents, because agents lack persistent, project-specific memory and reset their context each session rather than accumulating shared priors over time. The author frames communication in terms of transfer speed and shared priors, concluding that agents face an equivalent of 'context pollution' in multi-agent setups, much as human teams suffer from contradictory or siloed communication. Human-agent collaboration is further bottlenecked by the pace at which a human can read and act on agent output, making the reading and comprehension step the true constraint to optimise. The essay warns that marketing AI as a seamless 'teammate' remains premature, since the interface between humans and agents is still far less settled than decades of human-to-human collaboration norms.

Vande Bharat Sleeper trains: BHEL, Titagarh to form joint venture for 35-year maintenance

School Van Loses Control, Hits Divider in Jharkhand; 12 Students Hurt

A school van met with an accident in Jharkhand on Thursday morning, leaving 12 students injured. The incident took place on Bhuvaneshwari Temple Road when the driver lost control of the vehicle. The van veered off course and struck a road divider. The injured students were reportedly rushed to a nearby medical facility for treatment.

Once bitten, never shy: India's iPhone craze grows

More Victims Emerge in Child Sexual Abuse Case Against Tamil Nadu Granite Baron

Additional survivors have come forward in a child sexual abuse case involving a granite businessman in Tamil Nadu. The case was originally registered nearly a year ago after a pen drive containing video evidence surfaced. An unidentified man handed the pen drive to a Chennai-based activist in October 2025. The evidence from that drive formed the basis of the initial complaint filed against the accused.

Hollywood Films Increasingly Portray Silicon Valley Founders in a Critical Light

A new wave of Hollywood films, including 'The Social Reckoning', is reflecting widespread public disillusionment with Big Tech founders and Silicon Valley culture. These productions signal a growing willingness in the entertainment industry to scrutinize the power and influence of technology companies. However, a significant tension exists in this trend, as many major studios and streaming platforms are now owned or influenced by the very tech giants being depicted critically. This raises questions about how freely filmmakers can tell unflattering stories about Silicon Valley when their financiers may have vested interests in the sector. The dynamic highlights a broader conflict between creative independence and corporate ownership in modern Hollywood.

Best Open Earbuds of 2026: Top Picks From Shokz, Bose, and Soundcore

Open earbuds have become a popular audio category, allowing users to hear both their music and surrounding sounds simultaneously. A hands-on evaluation of dozens of open earbud models was conducted to identify the top performers available in 2026. Leading brands such as Shokz, Bose, and Soundcore featured among the recommended options. The testing focused on how well each pair balanced audio playback with ambient sound awareness. The best models were found to deliver a satisfying mix of both without significantly compromising either.