AI Slop, CES, Agents, Nuclear Power, and Board Games
Your Weekly Review of News in Technology, UX and AI
Here’s the latest news, resources, and use cases from the world of product, UX, AI and technology. Let’s go:
📊 AI in Healthcare
🗑️ AI Slop
👩💻 Best of CES
🤖 Weirdest of CES
🦾 Agents
☢️ Nuclear
♟️ Board Games
Podcast
Harnessing AI in Healthcare: Insights from RJ Kedziora
In this episode of Product by Design, Kyle Evans interviews RJ Kedziora, co-founder of Estenda, a company specializing in custom software and data analysis for healthcare. We discuss RJ’s journey in technology and entrepreneurship, the importance of energy management over time management, and the role of AI in healthcare. RJ shares insights into the challenges and future of AI applications, the need for ethical considerations, and the potential for personalized healthcare solutions. He also offers advice to aspiring entrepreneurs looking to make a difference in the industry.
News and Useful Reads
It’s Not Just X, It’s Y
AI slop is everywhere now. And it seems like the right approach now is to assume most things are AI unless proven otherwise. That doesn’t excuse platforms from doing the work to limit AI or verify humanity, but it should give us all pause.
I am now at the point where I assume everything is AI and then work backwards to figure out if it’s not, based on the author and the publisher.
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The Best of CES 2026: The Products We Want to Get Our Hands On Most
CES was this week, and there was a clear focus on AI robots. Among the many weird offerings, there was some great stuff.
Clearly, no one can really outsource their grunt work to these humanoid bots just yet. But there were still plenty of other things that caught the attention of the 20-plus Wirecutter journalists who gathered in Las Vegas for the annual tech-centered trade show.
The weirdest tech we’ve seen at CES 2026 so far
While CES had some cool new things, it also had its share of the weird.
CES is a launchpad for serious tech, but it’s also where companies proudly unveil devices that make you stop mid-scroll and whisper, “Wait, this is real?” We’ve been keeping a running list of the strangest, funniest and most unexpectedly compelling gadgets we’ve spotted in Las Vegas, from bathroom computers to robots that look like they escaped a Pixar pitch meeting.
Agent-native Architectures: How to Build Apps After the End of Code
As the tools continue to improve, everyone’s role in the product development lifecycle is going to change. I’ve been thinking a lot about this recently, as many organizations will stop seeing coding as a bottleneck, but rather generating the ideas.
The core of an agent-native architecture is not code. Instead, as the name implies, the core is an agent—something squishy and alive, planted in sun and soil. Each feature of the app is a prompt to the agent that names the result to achieve, not a set of steps to follow.
Meta bets big on nuclear power with 6.6 gigawatt expansion plan
At this point, nuclear power seems like one of the best options given our need for more energy. And corporations are driving it forward, with Meta betting big on nuclear.
Meta has signed 20-year contracts with energy company Vistra to purchase power from three nuclear plants in Ohio and Pennsylvania. The company will also provide financial backing for the development of Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) at Oklo and TerraPower.
Other Interesting Finds
7 Board Games With Surprising Origins
We’ve been playing a lot of board games recently, as winter has set in and it’s extremely cold. So it’s interesting to see some of the history of the most popular games that we still play today.
One of the oldest board games still widely played today, chess can trace its origins all the way back to the Gupta Empire in 6th-century India. Originally called “Chataranga,” meaning the four divisions of the army, chess was first developed as a tool with which one could teach military strategy.