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Our first story today is really an attempt by me to correct a series of weird articles that are circulating right now. If I'm wrong, feel free to correct me in the comments. It'll be like a fun game where everyone's feelings get hurt. Last week Microsoft called the TPM 2.0 hardware requirement for Windows 11 non negotiable. But this week a bunch of Reddit posts and articles went up claiming Microsoft had flipped, flip flopped and we're now allowing the installation of Windows 11 on PCs that don't meet the official requirements. Now I've seen some chatter on this topic in the last little bit, so my newsy sense went off. It was very unpleasant. It seems like the source of this idea is this PC World article published on Monday which claims Microsoft is issuing instructions for installing Windows 11 on incompatible PCs. PC World says this article is translated from the original version that appeared on their German language sister site PZ Welt, titled Microsoft Erlaupt installation von Windows 11 auf incompatible. They didn't have to yell. I'm not sure why they're so angry. But both articles link to this Microsoft support article which says nothing about allowing such installation and definitely doesn't give instructions for installing Windows 11. It actually only warns about compatibility issues and the lack of security updates you'll get if you do install Windows 11 on unsupported PCs, which you have been able to do using various workarounds since Windows 11 launched. This support article has been up for quite some time. I referenced it in our episode from a week ago, so I guess you could say this whole thing is my fault. Who put that in there? Day four and five of what turned out to be the 12 week days of OpenAI have come to pass, with day four's announcement being ChatGPT's canvas notebook like feature now being made available to all users, even those on the free Tier for day five. OpenAI's big announcement was the previously announced ChatGPT integration with Apple Intelligence, which was also announced by Apple today in what can only be described as the big tech equivalent to re gifting. But it's worse. It's like Apple gave someone a gift and then OpenAI took it, wrapped it up again and gave it back. Here I got you something. OpenAI did give out an Easter egg during the livestream showing a calendar event for super secret AGI on their iPhone. You know, just a little tongue in cheek way to tease the things Sam Altman says will usher in a post job society. It's just fun. As for Apple, that ChatGPT integration is part of software updates rolling out to iOS, iPadOS and macros with support for Apple's image playground so you can make little cartoon pictures and send them to your friends. Stunning is it Sirkan? It's fine. IPhone users can also make Genmoji now to rectify the fact that no one thought to make a DJ octopus emoji. Among the arguably more useful changes, Apple Mail is finally getting categorization and there are some tweaks to the Reimagined Photos app that will hopefully save its designers from being lynched. Apple Intelligence also now supports localized English dialects in more countries including the UK and Canada. So I'll now be telling Siri to order me a pop and a double double from Timmy's or she can take off like a hoser as soon as I get an iPhone. Not to be left out, Google announced their first Gemini 2.0 model flash, which they say outperforms Gemini 1.5 Pro at twice the speed, et cetera, et cetera. Wake me up when they're self aware while we're not there yet. All of Google's main demos today involved agents, ones that can find out what the meta is for the game you're playing, an agent that will go browse the web for you to say, find the contact email for a list of companies, but for now only in your active browser tab so it can keep checking if you're watching like a six year old user user. Watch this. Wow. Good job. There's an agent for controlling a robot and a new coding agent called Jules. You know she's got tattoos. But the most interesting demo to me was Deep Research, a tool kind of similar to Notebook lm, but instead of just summarizing sources you've uploaded, it will search the web, compile sources on a topic, and then write a report. But what does school even need students for anymore? Get them out of there. Google also published an updated demo of its Project Astra Assistant, deciphering laundry machine controls, which is a heck of a thing to trust an AI with, but it's definitely not a pre made demo. This time we stopped doing that now. I'm using these prototype glasses to test Project Astra Hands free. Sorry, you're using what now? Why didn't you bring that up before? I brought up our sponsor, Novium. They make this. Look at that. It's beautiful. The Interstellar Hover Pen is a ballpoint pen standing on its base suspended at a 23.5 degree angle by permanent magnets. And yeah, you can make marks on a page with any old pointy stick, but Novium wants to help inspire creativity and curiosity in your everyday life with unique products that make you think about your ideas blasting off into space like a rocket. Or maybe it's hitting something and making an impact crater because your ideas have impact. I'm inspired already. The Hover pen is a great Christmas gift for the writer or artist in your life. Or maybe that aerospace nerd that needs something to really tie the desk together. Tried a rug. Wasn't great. The Interstellar Hover Pen was named one of the best inventions of 2022 by Time magazine. And it comes in Space Black, Mars, Magma, Starlight Silver and Neptune Blue. You can even add 18 karat gold or meteorite for a more premium look. They also have the Hoverpen Future, a fountain and rollerball pen with interchangeable tips. So take your ideas to the stars and use the code TechLinked to save 20% for the next 48 hours on all hoverpens using our QR code or at the link below. What would I be without the quick bits? A shell of a man Like a kind of mollusk? Microsoft is rolling out a couple things. One is the experimental Windows Mixed Reality link app for Quest headsets, letting you set up multiple virtual monitors in 3D space. The other is nearly 400 PC games being added to the Xbox app on Windows, along with a new home layout and the jump back in section from the Xbox console dashboard. I mean, if that doesn't entice PC gamers to use the Xbox app, then I don't know. But it won't. General Motors has cut off funding for Cruise, the self driving taxi startup it acquired back in 2016. It'll absorb Cruise's assets and employees into GM's own division, working on autonomous driving features for its consumer vehicles. Cruise staff reportedly got the memo the day that this was announced by gm, leading Cruise co founder and former CEO Kyle Vogt to call the automaker a bunch of dummies. The Autopian writes. This is yet another example of automakers learning they're not tech companies, but cars are machines. That's technology Nope. Their art. Aw, that's nice. Meta Social platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, suffered a widespread outage today. At the time of writing, Meta hadn't given a specific reason for the outages beyond calling them a technical issue, which I guess is technically correct. As soon as reports started flooding in, Meta tweeted that they're working to get things back to normal because your dog needs to be using Meta AI or he won't know what the is going on. Huh? Huh? This dog needs Meta AI. LG is exiting the Blu Ray player business and will no longer be making new players, according to Flat Panels HD. And sure enough, LG's site lists the last Blu Ray player the company announced, the UPK90 as discontinued. With Sony and Samsung also out of the market, Panasonic remains one of the few remaining companies who haven't quit yet. And while this is sad news for disc enthusiasts, I think we can all agree Blu Ray was a dumb name. Cd, vhs, dvd. Blu Ray. We couldn't come up with a good acronym. Come on. And an AI company called Artisan has attracted criticism for advertising its services on San Francisco billboards with the slogan Stop hiring humans, telling companies to hire its AI sales rep agents, which it calls artisans instead. When interviewed by SFGate CEO Jaspar Carmichael Jack, which sounds like an AI generated name, admitted the ads are somewhat dystopian, but so is AI, adding that you don't draw eyes with boring messaging. Fair point. And to be fair, you can't call this billboard boring. They even gave the AI laser eyes and included a spelling mistake as an example of human error. See, unlike humans, AIs won't make little mistakes like that. They may suggest that if you run out of gas, you could try filling your car up with melted cheese. But that could work. You won't even try it. Hey, why don't you try coming back here on Friday for more tech news? I mean, probably won't change your life for the better in unimaginable ways unless.