Car company hides bad mileage numbers.
Also biohacking, search consortia, and F-16 maintenance contracts.

The Range-Anxiety Support Black Hole Incident

Tesla, bless its chaotic heart, was recently found to have set up a special internal department; basically a helpdesk for people who had the audacity to suggest their vehicle was not meeting its advertised range. It appears that the engineers, in an attempt to be highly efficient, realized that fixing the cars was too time-consuming, so they opted for the next logical step: simply ignoring the complaints.

The operation was so dedicated that when owners booked service appointments for their underperforming batteries, the "Diversion Team" was tasked with closing the tickets and suppressing the data without ever contacting the customer. The goal was to "eliminate the complaints" entirely, which is a surprisingly pure and innocent take on corporate problem solving; if the paperwork stops, the problem is solved. Employees were reportedly high-fiving each other after making thousands of angry users simply disappear from the internal database. This is not malice; it is simply a startup that forgot to hire a Chief Empathy Officer, and instead hired a Chief Ticket Closer.

The Biohacking Department Decides Caffeine is Still Better

A power-user in the productivity sphere published the results of a sixteen-month L-Theanine self-experiment; the goal was to achieve peak workplace zen without resorting to a full mental breakdown. The final conclusion, after all the meticulous data logging and expensive supplements, appears to be that the compound is subtly calming.

In short, sixteen months of focused effort confirmed that Theanine, a compound often found in tea, makes you feel vaguely like you just drank a cup of tea. It is a win for science, a loss for the pursuit of the fabled Limitless Pill, and a stark reminder that most of the new "corporate wellness" trends will eventually lead back to a lukewarm mug of Earl Grey and the realization that the primary inhibitor to focus is, in fact, the internet.

Europe's New Search Engine Project Files for Requisite Inter-Departmental Joint Venture Paperwork

Ecosia, the search engine known for planting trees and being that one checkbox you sometimes see in browser settings, is teaming up with Qwant, another European entity, to build an open search index. This is an attempt to create a truly European alternative to the American and Chinese incumbents.

It is a good idea on paper; a pan-European consortium to build a new technical backbone. However, the comments are already pointing out that in the search business, you need more than just good intentions; you need truly better results and massive scale. Right now, this feels less like a moonshot project and more like two middle-tier departments announcing a joint-steering committee to "synergize search methodologies" before one of them inevitably ends up buying a redundant piece of enterprise software.

Briefs

• F-16 Software Maintenance Contract: The US Government is ending the F-16 support package for Ukraine, citing a pivot to French Mirages. It is a classic vendor lock-in scenario, where the procurement department decides to switch from the high-cost, high-service provider to the smaller competitor with the flashier presentation deck.
• The Inefficiency of Layoffs: A new report confirms that mass layoffs are fundamentally bad for business. We all knew this; the real purpose of a layoff is not efficiency, it is signalling to the shareholders that the leadership "did something."
• Claude Code Review: A prominent developer is impressed with Anthropic's new Claude Code LLM. This is good news; it means the AI can now generate bad code slightly faster than a mid-level engineer on a Friday afternoon.