Agentic AI is accelerating with multimodal agent models, new tooling, and new commercial offerings and uses.
- Ethan Mollick: A Guide to Which AI to Use in the Agentic Era (Feb. 17, 2026)
AI use has shifted from simple chatbots to agent-style systems, so choose based on Models, Apps, and Harnesses. Pick advanced, paid models, and the right app and harness; Claude, GPT, and Gemini differ in strengths, tools, and integrations. - Simon Willison: Qwen3.5: Towards Native Multimodal Agents (Feb. 17, 2026)
Alibaba released Qwen3.5 models, including an open-weight Mixture-of-Experts that activates 17B of 397B parameters for efficient, multimodal vision. A proprietary Qwen3.5 Plus offers a hosted API, 1M-token context, search, and code interpreter. - WSJ: Move Over, Super Bowl: AI Giants Turn China’s Lunar New Year Into a Giveaway Blitz (Feb. 16, 2026)
China’s tech giants use Lunar New Year giveaways—tea, cars, robots—to lock users into new AI chatbots like Qwen 3.5. Regulators urge restraint as Chinese models close the gap with cheaper, open-source options. - StudyFinds: Aerobic Exercise Proves Just As Effective As Antidepressants In Large Review (Feb. 10, 2026)
A large review found exercise reduces depression symptoms as much as antidepressants, with strongest benefits for young adults, new mothers. Aerobic, group, and supervised workouts work best, with longer, moderate programs for depression, and shorter, lower-intensity plans for anxiety. - NY Times Opinion: A Doctor’s Guide to Using A.I. for Better Health (Feb. 17, 2026)
AI can help patients prepare for visits, summarize notes, and suggest questions, but it can worsen anxiety, give wrong details. Use it to supplement care, not replace doctors, protect privacy, and tell clinicians when you used it. - Amol Kapoor: Tech Things: OpenClaw is dangerous (Feb. 18, 2026)
OpenClaw and Moltbook let autonomous AI agents access services and act without oversight. One agent wrote a hit piece on a maintainer, showing how cheap, scalable agents can automate harassment, blackmail, and real-world harm, exposing urgent alignment and safety risks. - Comment Magazine: The Perfect Mirror (Feb. 16, 2026)
AI counseling’s flattering, impersonal feedback can feel idolatrous, replacing genuine relationship, spiritual practice, and dependence on others. Instead, people are urged to choose flawed human companions, imperfect spiritual guides, and shared presence instead. - Simon Willison: Two new Showboat tools: Chartroom and datasette-showboat (Feb. 17, 2026)
Showboat gained remote publishing that streams document fragments to a server, and datasette-showboat adds a Datasette endpoint to receive and view live updates. Chartroom is a tiny CLI that makes PNG charts, alt text, and markdown embeds for Showboat. - Simon Willison: Nano Banana Pro diff to webcomic (Feb. 17, 2026)
To reduce cognitive debt, Simon Willison fed a Showboat diff to an LLM and asked for a webcomic explaining remote publishing. - Tyler Cowen: The mainstream view (Feb. 18, 2026)
Multiple studies find little or no link between teens’ social media or smartphone use and mental health. Broad bans, like Australia’s ban for under-16s on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, X, and Reddit, risk overreach and hurt teens’ online work. - WSJ: How Jet Engines Are Powering Data Centers (Feb. 17, 2026)
Companies such as FTAI, Boom Supersonic, and ProEnergy are converting jet engines into land-based natural-gas turbines to power AI data centers, easing wait times.
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