Theres a certain irony in how we treat our gadgets. We spend hours agonizing over which phone to buy, which laptop to upgrade to, or which smartwatch will best track our livesonly to neglect the tools that connect them all. Accessories, often relegated to afterthoughts, are the unsung heroes of tech. When was the last time you REALLY craved a phone case, or a charger, or a dongle? You dont, because accessories dont get the love they truly deserve. They organize our chaos, protect our investments, and, when done right, make our devices even better. However, they dont garner that excitement that a new phone does a part of that is because theyre not as well-designed as our primary tech devices.Instead of following the playbook of functional but forgettable, Aulumu crafts accessories that feel essential. Think Teenage Engineering, think 8BitDo, think Nothing they all built tech with a strong focus on great design something that Aulumu does pretty well too. From multi-device charging stations to cases that elevate your gears look and feel, Aulumu isnt here to fill your cable/dongle drawertheyre here to refine your digital ecosystem. Lets dive into three standout offerings and see how they make the mundane remarkable.Designer: HouClick Here to Buy Now: Hurry, 10% off exclusively for YD, use coupon code Yanko10. Deal ends in 48-hours!M01 4-in-1 Folding Wireless Charging StationCharging multiple devices can be a frustrating mess of cables, but the M01 Charging Station is a minimalists dream. With space for your iPhone, AirPods, Apple Watch, and an extra device via USB-C, its a compact solution for all your daily tech. Its foldable design lets you easily switch between a travel-friendly flat pad and a desktop stand with adjustable angles, and that minimalist steampunk aesthetic trumps any charger weve ever seen.What makes it shine is its MagSafe compatibility, delivering up to 15W of wireless power for iPhones while also supporting fast charging for other devices. The orange night light with adjustable brightness is a subtle but thoughtful touch, perfect for nighttime use without disrupting sleep. Did I mention it looks gorgeous?Why we recommend itIf your nightstand looks like a tech spaghetti mess, the M01 is your tidy savior. MagSafe compatibility means faster, cleaner charging, and the foldable design is great for travel or tight spaces. The adjustable nightlight? A subtle bonus thats surprisingly handy. This isnt your average chargerits a thoughtful, space-saving upgrade for your tech routine.Click Here to Buy Now: $98.10 $109 (10% off, use coupon code Yanko10). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!A09 Geometric Case for AirPods ProAirPods cases are practical but rarely stylish. The A09 Geometric Case flips that script with its edgy, polyhedron-inspired design. It doesnt just look good; it feels great in hand, thanks to an ergonomic build thats durable yet lightweight. The zinc alloy double-lock clip ensures your AirPods stay secure, even when youre on the move.Functionality isnt sacrificed for aesthetics, though. The case offers wireless charging compatibility and precise cutouts for easy access to your AirPods. Add in a detachable lanyard, and youve got a case thats both practical and strikinga rare combination for protective gear.Why we recommend itMost AirPods cases are, lets be honest, boring. The A09 flips the script with its edgy design and a secure double-lock clip that gives you peace of mind. Its not just about the looks, though; the build feels durable, and it works seamlessly with wireless chargers. If youre tired of generic cases, this ones got both flair and function.Click Here to Buy Now: $32.39 $35.98 (10% off, use coupon code Yanko10). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!G03 Multi-Tool Magnetic Metal WalletWho said wallets cant multitask? The G03 Multi-Tool Wallet is a slim, MagSafe-compatible cardholder that takes functionality to the next level. Built from aluminum alloy with a carbon fiber cover, its tough enough to survive the daily grind while maintaining a lightweight, modern feel. It holds cards, cash, coins, and even an optional AirTag, making it a multifunctional beast. Worried about digital theft? The wallet comes with an RFID-blocking card too, and pairs best with Aulumus A16 Aramid Fiber case that gives your iPhone 16 its ultimate sleek protective casing.Beyond holding up to 12 cards, this wallet features a built-in kickstand for your phone, a bottle opener, and even a mini ruler. Its a gadget-lovers dream, doubling as a minimalist everyday carry item and an emergency toolkit. Whether youre headed to the office or out for an adventure, this wallet has your backand your pocket.Why we recommend itThis wallet feels like the Swiss Army knife of MagSafe accessories. Slim enough to stay pocket-friendly, but packed with features like a phone kickstand and bottle opener, its perfect for anyone who likes their gear to do double (or triple) duty. The carbon fiber finish adds a premium vibe, making it as tough as it is versatile. Oh, and even though its basically a multitool, its TSA compliant which is always a nice thing.Click Here to Buy Now: $62.99 $69.98 (10% off, use coupon code Yanko10). Hurry, deal ends in 48-hours!The post Level Up Your Tech Setup in 2025 with Aulumus Techno-Minimal Accessories first appeared on Yanko Design.

Large Language Models (LLMs) have become an integral part of modern AI applications, powering tools like chatbots and code generators. However, the increased reliance on these models has revealed critical inefficiencies in inference processes. Attention mechanisms, such as FlashAttention and SparseAttention, often struggle with diverse workloads, dynamic input patterns, and GPU resource limitations. These challenges, coupled with high latency and memory bottlenecks, underscore the need for a more efficient and flexible solution to support scalable and responsive LLM inference.Researchers from the University of Washington, NVIDIA, Perplexity AI, and Carnegie Mellon University have developed FlashInfer, an AI library and kernel generator tailored for LLM inference. FlashInfer provides high-performance GPU kernel implementations for various attention mechanisms, including FlashAttention, SparseAttention, PageAttention, and sampling. Its design prioritizes flexibility and efficiency, addressing key challenges in LLM inference serving.FlashInfer incorporates a block-sparse format to handle heterogeneous KV-cache storage efficiently and employs dynamic, load-balanced scheduling to optimize GPU usage. With integration into popular LLM serving frameworks like SGLang, vLLM, and MLC-Engine, FlashInfer offers a practical and adaptable approach to improving inference performance.Technical Features and BenefitsFlashInfer introduces several technical innovations:Comprehensive Attention Kernels: FlashInfer supports a range of attention mechanisms, including prefill, decode, and append attention, ensuring compatibility with various KV-cache formats. This adaptability enhances performance for both single-request and batch-serving scenarios.Optimized Shared-Prefix Decoding: Through grouped-query attention (GQA) and fused-RoPE (Rotary Position Embedding) attention, FlashInfer achieves significant speedups, such as a 31x improvement over vLLMs Page Attention implementation for long prompt decoding.Dynamic Load-Balanced Scheduling: FlashInfers scheduler dynamically adapts to input changes, reducing idle GPU time and ensuring efficient utilization. Its compatibility with CUDA Graphs further enhances its applicability in production environments.Customizable JIT Compilation: FlashInfer allows users to define and compile custom attention variants into high-performance kernels. This feature accommodates specialized use cases, such as sliding window attention or RoPE transformations.Performance InsightsFlashInfer demonstrates notable performance improvements across various benchmarks:Latency Reduction: The library reduces inter-token latency by 29-69% compared to existing solutions like Triton. These gains are particularly evident in scenarios involving long-context inference and parallel generation.Throughput Improvements: On NVIDIA H100 GPUs, FlashInfer achieves a 13-17% speedup for parallel generation tasks, highlighting its effectiveness for high-demand applications.Enhanced GPU Utilization: FlashInfers dynamic scheduler and optimized kernels improve bandwidth and FLOP utilization, particularly in scenarios with skewed or uniform sequence lengths.FlashInfer also excels in parallel decoding tasks, with composable formats enabling significant reductions in Time-To-First-Token (TTFT). For instance, tests on the Llama 3.1 model (70B parameters) show up to a 22.86% decrease in TTFT under specific configurations.ConclusionFlashInfer offers a practical and efficient solution to the challenges of LLM inference, providing significant improvements in performance and resource utilization. Its flexible design and integration capabilities make it a valuable tool for advancing LLM-serving frameworks. By addressing key inefficiencies and offering robust technical solutions, FlashInfer paves the way for more accessible and scalable AI applications. As an open-source project, it invites further collaboration and innovation from the research community, ensuring continuous improvement and adaptation to emerging challenges in AI infrastructure.Check out the Paper and Twitter and join ourTelegram Channel andLinkedIn Group. Dont Forget to join our60k+ ML SubReddit. Asif RazzaqAsif Razzaq is the CEO of Marktechpost Media Inc.. As a visionary entrepreneur and engineer, Asif is committed to harnessing the potential of Artificial Intelligence for social good. His most recent endeavor is the launch of an Artificial Intelligence Media Platform, Marktechpost, which stands out for its in-depth coverage of machine learning and deep learning news that is both technically sound and easily understandable by a wide audience. The platform boasts of over 2 million monthly views, illustrating its popularity among audiences. Follow us on X (Twitter) to get regular AI Research and Dev Updates here...

Large Language Models (LLMs) face significant scalability limitations in improving their reasoning capabilities through data-driven imitation, as better performance demands exponentially more high-quality training examples. Exploration-based methods, particularly reinforcement learning (RL), offer a promising alternative to overcome these limitations. The transformation from data-driven to exploration-based approaches presents two key challenges: developing efficient methods to generate precise reward signals and designing effective RL algorithms that maximize the utility of these signals. This shift represents a crucial step toward enhancing LLM reasoning capabilities.A team of researchers introduces PRIME (Process Reinforcement through IMplicit Rewards), a novel approach to enhance language model reasoning through online RL with process rewards. The system employs implicit process reward modeling (PRM), which functions without requiring process labels and operates as an outcome reward model. This approach enables the development of Eurus-2-7B-PRIME, a powerful reasoning model that demonstrates significant improvements through both online RL training and inference-time scaling. The innovation of implicit PRM lies in its dual capability to enhance performance and facilitate effective RL training.The research team selected Qwen2.5-Math-7B-Base as their foundation model and evaluated performance using high-level mathematics and programming benchmarks. The initial phase involves supervised fine-tuning (SFT) using an action-centric chain-of-thought framework where models choose from seven predefined actions. The team constructed a 230K dataset from various open-source materials, deliberately excluding high-quality datasets with ground-truth answers to reserve them for RL. Despite these efforts, the SFT models performance fell short of Qwen2.5-Math-7B-Instruct across mathematics benchmarks.The research utilizes a comprehensive approach to dataset curation for RL, combining 457K math problems from NuminaMath-CoT and 27K coding problems from various sources, including APPS, CodeContests, TACO, and Codeforces. The team implements an innovative online prompt filtering strategy that dynamically selects prompts based on difficulty levels. By sampling multiple trajectories and maintaining prompts with accuracy scores between 0.2 and 0.8, they effectively balanced the training data distribution, eliminating both overly simple and excessively challenging problems. Here is the flow of the algorithm for the proposed method PRIME: PRIMEs implementation follows a systematic process where the policy model and PRM initialize from the SFT model. The algorithm operates through sequential steps of generating rollouts, scoring them, and updating both models using combined outcome and process rewards. With PRIME, starting from Qwen2.5-Math-7B-Base, the trained model Eurus-2-7B-PRIME achieves 26.7% pass@1, surpassing GPT-4o and Qwen2.5-Math-7B-Instruct. This is achieved using only 1/10 data of Qwen Math (230K SFT + 150K RL). Moreover, PRIME achieves significant improvements over sparse reward approaches using specific hyperparameters and the results show 2.5 times faster training, 6.9% higher final rewards, and notably, Eurus-2-7B-PRIME demonstrated a 16.7% average improvement across benchmarks, with over 20% enhancement in AMC&AIME competitions.Lastly, the validation process for PRIME utilizes advanced mathematical reasoning models (QwQ-32B-Preview and Qwen2.5-Math-72B-Instruct) to evaluate problem solvability and solution correctness. Using insights from analyzing sample problems and synthetic unsolvable cases, the team developed specialized prompts to enhance validation accuracy. Each problem undergoes five comprehensive validation attempts, containing step-by-step LaTeX solutions, unsolvability checks, reasoning traces, standardized answer formatting, and documentation of solution impediments. This rigorous validation framework ensures the quality and reliability of the question-answer pairs.Check out the Hugging Face Page, Technical Details, and Twitter and join ourTelegram Channel andLinkedIn Group. Dont Forget to join our60k+ ML SubReddit. Sajjad Ansari+ postsSajjad Ansari is a final year undergraduate from IIT Kharagpur. As a Tech enthusiast, he delves into the practical applications of AI with a focus on understanding the impact of AI technologies and their real-world implications. He aims to articulate complex AI concepts in a clear and accessible manner. Follow us on X (Twitter) to get regular AI Research and Dev Updates here...

Harry & David Harry's Gift Box A tried-and-true classic $60 at Harry & David Gourmet Gift Baskets Champagne & Truffles Cheers to snacking $220 at GourmetGiftBaskets.com Zingerman's The Weekender Gift Box Satisfy a comfort food craving $115 at Zingerman's Manhattan Fruitier Fruit, Confection And Snacks Gift Tower Something very everyone $60 at Williams Sonoma Callie's Hot Little Biscuit Addictive Southern-style biscuits $76 at Goldbelly Le Marais Assorted Pastry Sampler A tasty morning treat $70 at Williams Sonoma Model Bakery English Muffins For the carb connoisseur $60 at Goldbelly Russ & Daughters New York Brunch Bagels from the Lower East Side $195 at Goldbelly Boarderie charcuterie board The ultimate party platter See at Boarderie Jasper Hill Farm's The Vermonter Cheese, cheese and more cheese $115 at Jasper Hill Farm Olympia Provisions Euro Charcuterie Box The perfect gift for your foodie friend $165 at Olympia Provisions Williams Sonoma Beehive Cheese Crate $110 at Williams Sonoma Levain Bakery cookies Big, fat ooey-gooey cookies See at Levain Bakery Salt & Straw ice cream See at Salt & Straw Recchiuti Confections Chocolate treats don't get better than this See at Recchiuti Dylan's Candy Bar Chocolate Sweet Treat Tower Satisfy any sweet tooth $65 at Dylan's Candy Bar Bokksu Snacks from Japan $45 at Amazon Momofuku Dave's Faves pack Dig in to Soy & Scallion Noodles and other culinary gems $45 at Momofuku Rancho Gordo Desert Island Sampler Everyone's favorite beans make an original gift $39 at Rancho Gordo Man Crates' Whiskey Appreciation Crate Just add your favorite spirit for a knock-out gift $120 at Man Crates You don't need to wait for a special occasion to treat your loved ones. If you're looking for gift ideas for your favorite people, consider a gift basket. While gift cards and flowers are nice, you can't go wrong with an edible gift basket -- especially if the person you're shopping for is a regular chef or food connoisseur. From pastries to cheese to chocolates and more, we rounded up the best gift baskets to gift your loved ones.To help you find the best gift baskets for 2025, we nibbled our way through a variety of tasty treats -- all in the name of research. It's a tough job, isn't it? The items below cater to different preferences and tastes -- you just need to choose a theme. If you're shopping for someone who loves sweets, you can't go wrong with the delightfully delicious cookies from Levain Bakery. Is your recipient of choice more into savory foods? Perhaps a Momofuku ramen pack or charcuterie box will be the winning ticket. From brand-new collections to tried-and-true classics, we've got the best gift baskets for every palate. Don't take our word for it. Start scrolling and pick the perfect present. This story is part of Gift Guide, our year-round collection of the best gift ideas. Best gift baskets overall Harry & David When it comes to edible gifts, Harry & David is a classic choice. The company is known for its gorgeous boxes of juicy pears, but you can find much more that'll please even the pickiest palate. We're fans of Harry's Gift Box, which offers all the greatest hits at an affordable price. For $60, you get:A half-dozen pearsMoose Munch popcornHickory-smoked summer sausageSharp white cheddar cheeseMixed nuts $60 at Harry & David GourmetGiftBaskets.com This one gets props from our team for including a bottle of Veuve Clicquot, a champagne that instantly elevates any gift basket. The McCreas caramels, among other goodies, are a nice touch too. This sophisticated gift basket will make a loved one feel special no matter the occasion, whether you're celebrating a birthday, the holidays, or just saying, "thank you." $220 at GourmetGiftBaskets.com Zingerman's Zingerman's is a beloved Michigan brand, but since it ships throughout the US for free, these gift boxes can be enjoyed by all. The Weekender Gift Box is the most popular option. The colorful box contains an assortment of sweet and savory treats, including bread, cheese, beef sticks, coffee cake, peanut brittle and more. Everything we sampled had held up well during shipping and arrived fresh, with flavors that invoke the Midwest. We liked that there were instructions on the baked goods about freezing them if you weren't planning to eat them right away. $115 at Zingerman's Williams Sonoma New York's Manhattan Fruitier is known for its thoughtfully curated gift baskets, and this fruit and snacks tower is no exception. Inside this snack tower you'll find a delightful assortment of its most popular items, from fresh fruit, to chocolate covered orange slices and pretzels, to an assortment of nuts, trailmix and more. $60 at Williams Sonoma Best breakfast gift baskets Callie's Hot Little Biscuit Give your friends and loved ones a taste of Southern comfort. Callie's Hot Little Biscuit is based in Charleston, S.C., and delivers sweet and savory buttery biscuits straight to your door. Biscuits arrive fully cooked and frozen, so all you need to do is pop them in the oven whenever you're ready for buttery biscuit goodness. We tried the Charleston Cravings Biscuit Sampler (linked below) and especially enjoyed the sausage biscuits and the pimento cheese. $76 at Goldbelly Williams Sonoma Start their morning off the right way with flaky, buttery croissants hot out of the oven. This mixed assortment of 12 pastries will transport your friends or loved ones straight to Paris with each buttery, crisp bite. Each box includes an assortment of chocolate croissants, au beurre croissants, almond croissants, kouign-amann batons, chocolate kouign-amann and pain aux raisins. The pastries arrive frozen, so you can defrost them one at a time or eat as many as you want, which may well be all of them. $70 at Williams Sonoma Model Bakery Carb lovers will swoon for this collection of English muffins from Model Bakery. These are the English muffins that Oprah confessed she has specially flown in from Napa Valley. Goldbelly offers a variety of options. A package of 12 muffins with a jar of seasonal preserves costs $60. $60 at Goldbelly Russ & Daughters If your gift recipient has a soft spot for East Coast classics, a New York bagel box is the way to go. This curated selection from legendary Russ & Daughters includes some of the citys finest hand-rolled bagels, creamy spreads and exquisite Nova lox to layer on top. Finishing touches include a rich chocolate babka, a bag of Private Blend coffee and a Russ & Daughters ceramic mug to enjoy it in style. $195 at Goldbelly Best savory gift baskets

Our Experts Written by Katelyn Chedraoui Our expert, award-winning staff selects the products we cover and rigorously researches and tests our top picks. If you buy through our links, we may get a commission. Reviews ethics statement Why You Can Trust CNET 16171819202122232425+ Years of Experience 14151617181920212223 Hands-on Product Reviewers 6,0007,0008,0009,00010,00011,00012,00013,00014,00015,000 Sq. Feet of Lab Space How we test CNETs expert staff reviews and rates dozens of new products and services each month, building on more than a quarter century of expertise.Table of Contents Our Picks Best overall AI image generator Dall-E 3 View details See at OpenAI View details Best free AI image generator Leonardo AI View details See at Leonardo AI View details Best AI image generator for professionals Adobe Firefly View details See at Adobe View details Best basic AI image generator for beginners Canva View details See at Canva View details Table of Contents AI art is seemingly everywhere online. These images are made by AI generators, programs that use generative AI to take your simple text description and transform it into a batch of images that bring your artistic vision to life. AI image generators are great for brainstorming ideas, mocking up potential designs and creating personalized AI images. Even if you're not the most artistic, these programs offer a lot of tools and features to help guide you along the creative process. Not all AI image generators are going to be right for you and your project. Picking the right AI service can feel overwhelming because there are a lot of options available. That's why CNET reviewers have spent months reviewing every program on this list, generating hundreds of images and creating everything from cartoon safaris to dramatic sci-fi scenes and photorealistic stock imagery. At some point during our testing, every service on this list spat out a wonky or unusable image -- no AI image generator is perfect. The test of a truly superior AI image generator is how well-equipped it is to handle those quirks and fix flaws. Editing tools and customization options are a big part of that, which is why we test those extensively. Privacy policies, including how generators potentially train on your content, are also important considerations when selecting the best services. Heres what made the cut.Read More: Create Better AI Images With These Expert Prompt Writing TipsWhats the best AI image generator?Dall-E 3 by OpenAI is our best AI image generator pick. It can handle long, complex queries, gives you many editing and customization options and its unique conversational flow makes it easy to bring your artistic visions to life. If you dont want to sign up for the $20 per month ChatGPT Plus subscription, Leonardo AI offers great AI imagery in its free plan. Beginners will find Canvas user-friendly design easy and accessible to use, and professional creatives looking to experiment with AI art ought to try Adobe Firefly and its family of AI tools.Best AI image generator of 2024 Stephen Shankland/CNET Photo Gallery 1/3 Dall-E did the best of text-to-image AI models I tried when it came to creating a caricature of an older man playing pickleball. The image is generally engaging and entertaining and doesn't have major anatomical problems that are common witih AI. Stephen Shankland/CNET See at OpenAI Pros Understands long, complex queries Engaging, dynamic images Conversational style allows for easy modifications Cons Photorealistic images can look fake Slow to generate images Price Requires $20 per month ChatGPT Plus subscription Built-in editing tools? YesPrivacy policy May use your content to improve its modelsFull review Read full review Full Review Read full review Photo Gallery 1/3 Dall-E did the best of text-to-image AI models I tried when it came to creating a caricature of an older man playing pickleball. The image is generally engaging and entertaining and doesn't have major anatomical problems that are common witih AI. Stephen Shankland/CNET 8.0 See at OpenAI Dall-E 3 by OpenAI is CNETs 2024 Editors choice for the best AI image generator. Dall-E 3 is great for amateurs and professionals, with many editing tools like different styles and customizations to take advantage of. Dall-E is unique among its competitors for its conversational flow, making it easy to send follow-up requests, and its ability to handle complex queries. OpenAI may use your content to improve its models, but the company says it wont share your data with advertisers and offers a way to request to opt out of model training. With the $20 per month ChatGPT Plus subscription, Dall-E 3 creates vivid, engaging images with limited AI quirks. CNET Score Breakdown 8.0 /10 SCORE Score 8 7.0 See at Leonardo AI Leonardo is great for AI creatives on a budget. It has a comprehensive free plan that gives you ample generation credits at a fast speed. It doesnt have any free post-generation editing tools (theyre paywalled), but it does have a prompt improvement tool and other customization elements that can guide you toward building the best prompts. Leonardo makes it easy to explore whats possible with AI and create vivid, detailed AI images. Its free plan easily knocks its competitors out of the water, even the user-friendly Canva. CNET Score Breakdown 7.0 /10 SCORE Score 7

CHICAGO (WLS) -- The Chicago Transit Authority is no longer using its main accounts the social media platform X.The agency confirmed to ABC7 Friday that two of their accounts are no longer active on the site formerly known as Twitter.ABC7 Chicago is now streaming 24/7. Click here to watchThe CTA and CTA service alerts X accounts now have disclaimers saying they are no longer active.The CTA released the following statement Friday:"After careful consideration, CTA has decided to suspend the use of its general information (@cta) and service alerts (@ctaAlerts) accounts on Twitter/X.com, as this social media platform no longer provides the value it once did for us to effectively reach and communicate with our riders. The @CTARPM account on X.com is unaffected and will continue to provide project information and updates through the remainder of project work. For real-time service information, CTA riders are encouraged to sign up for our subscription alerts available via text/email, which can be customized to provide information for preferred routes. For the occasional CTA riders, real-time service alerts will continue to available at transitchicago.com."No further information about the agency's decision to leave the social media site was immediately available.

Returning next week.The former PlayStation Vita exclusive and action RPG Freedom Wars Remastered is launching next week on the Switch eShop and if you're planning on downloading this one, you might be interested to know the file size.According to Nintendo's official website, it will require around 4.6 GB of free space on your system. If you want a physical copy, the option right now is to import the Japanese release. This particular version of the game will also contain English language support.Read the full article on nintendolife.com

Galarian Rapidash arrives.The free-to-play MOBA Pokmon Unite is still adding new Pokmon and the next one joining the roster will be Galarian Rapidash.This psychic/fairy-type evolves from a Galarian Ponyta and was originally introduced during the Pokmon Sword and Shield generation. This new pick in Unite is scheduled to join the fray on 23rd January 2025 so later this month.Read the full article on nintendolife.com

In 2023, defense tech recruiter Peterson ConwayThe new hire was not happy. I thought I told it in a funny way, Conway sighed, admitting he was being an ahole. Fuse founder JC Btaiche caught wind of the conversation and agreed, promptly firing Conway although Btaiche told TechCrunch that telling the prostitution story wasnt the only inappropriate thing that Conway had done.But Conway, who has become one of the defense tech industrys biggest behind-the-scenes power brokers, didnt give up on Fuse. Conway has recruited for some of the buzziest defense and hard tech firms in Silicon Valley over the last decade, like Palantir and Mach Industries. He spent nearly half a decade doing recruitment at Joe Lonsdales venture firm 8VC for the firm and its portfolio companies, and since last year, as the head of talent at venture firm A* Capital.So even after being dismissed, Conway continued to pitch candidates to Btaiche and woo prospects with flights in his private plane or offers to go blow s up out in the desert, Conway said. After a few months, Fuse reinstated Conway. He has now recruited more than seven people to Fuse, including Fuses chief strategy officer, Laura Thomas, a former CIA officer.In many ways, Conway is a stand-in for the whole industry: rich, determined, prone to telling unbelievable stories and, by all accounts, brilliant. According to the dozen people TC interviewed for this story, Conway is wildly successful at luring very talented people away from stable jobs and into startup life. Theres a line between crazy and genius, Btaiche said. And I think hes just on that line.As defense tech funding soared to almost $3 billion last year, Conway is ready to convince the next generation to help make new-age nuclear reactors or AI-powered weapons.Theres a whole community of young people in the Valley, often working jobs in the defense sector or in national security or on very ambitious, difficult things, said Gregory Dorman, a recent Princeton graduate who worked with entrepreneur and A* partner Kevin Hartz on his new security startup Sauron, thanks to Conways introduction. And theyre there because of Peterson.Source: Peterson conwayDoes not comply with safety regulationsConways signature move is to take candidates up in his tiny plane. I like to joke that I make them sick until they accept the terms of our deals, he said.I first met him at an airport in San Carlos, California, shortly before I climbed into his tiny two-seater plane, purchased with a loan from Palantir CTO Shyam Sankar. A small sign in the cockpit warned me: This aircraft is an experimental light-sport aircraft and does not comply with federal safety regulations for standard aircraft.A few minutes later, we were soaring over the shimmering San Francisco Bay as Conway recounted his fablelike life story. His father, Peterson Conway VII, dodged the draft, sold LSD in Tokyo, and eventually moved to Afghanistan in the 70s with Conways mother, a Mormon school teacher. After a series of escapades across the Middle East and Africa, they moved to Carmel to raise Conway and his brother, but eventually divorced.My dad threw himself off there, Conway said nonchalantly as we soared over the Golden Gate Bridge. He then explained that the attempted suicide was unsuccessful. His father was caught by the nets and is alive and well today, selling antiques in his Carmel shop.Conway rebelled against his father by briefly pursuing normalcy, attending Dartmouth to study economics. But after college, in the early 2000s, he found himself becoming a recruiter.In Conways version of events, he was riding his motorcycle around San Francisco, a cowboy in search of office space. He spotted a warehouse with a ramp, rode onto it and ran straight into Hartz. At the time, Hartz was in the early stages of building Xoom, a fintech service for international money transfers that was eventually bought by PayPal. Conway said Hartz asked him if he had any skills. None, Conway answered. But I can bring lunches. Im a decent writer. I had an Airstream trailer Im like, we can go surfing.Hartz laughed when I asked him about the story, saying, That is all entirely false. According to Hartz, Conway simply rented office space in the same building and thats how he started recruiting for Xoom and later, the broader PayPal crowd.When PayPal cofounder Peter Thiel launched Palantir in 2003, Conway was in the right place at the right time and began recruiting for the firm. Conway apparently had no official title at the defense company, but was just Peterson, like a defense tech mononymous artist in the style of Prince or Madonna, joked Gabe Rosen, 8VCs resident humanities scholar who worked with Conway at Palantir.Palantir sent Conway across the world to build out its international teams. According to Conway, the company wanted employees with an internal compass and conviction, people who had grappled with the values they were raised with and paved their own path.For example, Conway claimed he would get missives like find me a Jew that married a Christian from the outback of Australia that was gay. Palantir had no comment.Conway was known for getting recruits attention by sending handwritten letters with wax seals. His methods were successful, landing people like Michael Leiter, the former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, and many of Palantirs international hires.Unconventional methodsLast summer, Conway and his father flew to the Mojave desert in Hartzs plane, borrowed for the occasion. Like some kind of American Dynamism mirage, they saw a gaggle of young men mounting a drone to the back of a truck.It was a testing session for Mach Industries, a weapons company founded by Ethan Thornton when he was 19 years old. Mach is one of the handful of defense and hardware companies that has Conway recruited for as head of talent at A*. Mach has since raised over $80 million from investors like Bedrock and Sequoia Capital.While those men set up orange cones and explosive equipment for their engineering tests, Conway took people for trips in Hartzs plane. He hit the ground so hard, so many times, landing in the Mojave, Hartz sighed. Everything came loose. Conway denied Hartzs account, saying the plane simply got pretty dirty and he lost a window covering.According to Conway, he recruited SpaceX alum Gabriela Hobe and Fasil Mulatu Kero, Machs vice president of manufacturing and former Tesla employee. Ethan has probably paid me over a million dollars to do what I do for him, Conway said, although he later denied that figure.It seems like everyone in the defense tech industry has an eye-popping story about Conway.Another time, Fuse founder Btaiche said Conway left a Porsche with the keys in it at the airport for a recruit, who was then a government contractor, to drive when he touched down. The company later clarified that it was a four-seater Porsche, loaned to the candidate so the company could save money on Ubers.The candidate took the Porsche for their meetings and ended the day at Conways home, a sprawling compound in the wealthy California coastal town Carmel-by-the-Sea, stuffed with his fathers antiques and animal parts from hunting expeditions. Conway hosts regular dinners for candidates there (his father cooks), as well as, according to Conway, parties ranging from a birthday bash for Joe Lonsdale to a wedding for Sankar.But Btaiche said Conways real superpower isnt his stunts, but rather his ability to talk about candidates in a more human way, rather than just looking at resumes and credentials.For Fuse hiring, Conway had Btaiche brainstorm what upbringing might create someone who can lead a team, or bring new ideas to the engineers; as a result, theyve scouted people from rural areas, people who grew up as athletes, and people who are obsessed with gaming.As for winning candidates over, Btaiche said that Conway sells people on the imperative of defending America. If youre working on something that is truly mission-driven, he said. I think Peterson can deliver that story.Dorman, one of the people who had the Conway Experience, was a philosophy major at Princeton debating between careers in the Valley or New York when he met the famed recruiter. Conway persuaded him to choose the Valley. Peterson convinces people that theres actually a lot of adventure there, he said.Conway has fashioned himself as something of a cowboy in the Valley for years, and now the rest of tech might have finally caught up. He applauds the current interest in American Dynamism, the term coined by Andreessen Horowitz for government-adjacent companies. It is just perfect. It is right on the border of fanaticism, Conway said. Its become its own religion.Source: Peterson ConwayMain character energyTheres a common theme in how people describe Conway: a genius, an influential player in defense tech, and, at times, a liability.For instance, a few days after I flew in his plane, he called me and asked, Did you see the news?The day before, Conway had taken a 6 am flight from the Carmel area to Silicon Valley. In the early morning darkness, Conway failed to pull out a flashlight when he was checking his fuel gauge and, as a result, misread the gauge. I made an assumption that was entirely pilot error, he said. As he was flying, he realized he didnt have enough in the tank to make it to the nearest airport.Conway regaled the story to me in mythical proportions: a fork in his path, a choice between good and evil. As he described it, he initially thought his best chance at living was to land on a sports field at a nearby school. I started freaking out that a kid was no match for a propeller, he said.So he opted to land his plane on Highway 85, touching down towards oncoming traffic in hopes that it would be safer for drivers. Miraculously, his two-seater glided onto the concrete, leaving Conway and the surrounding cars unharmed.Conway then warned me that I had been a hairs breath away from a similar fate. If we had flown any further, we wouldve run out of gas, he said.That wasnt quite true; he told me later that had flown the plane at least one time after our flight. But he painted our journey together in an existential light, making it unforgettable. After spending the day with him (and a subsequent two months fact-checking his many exaggerations), I learned that Conway is singular in his epic storytelling skills. Thats why he gets hired by so many amazing companies. And fired. And then rehired once again.As Dorman put it, hes a super unconventional recruiter. Yet, hes also better than any other recruiter.

Answers for today's NYT Mini Crossword are just ahead.New York TimesIn case you missed Saturdays NYT Mini, you can find the answers here:Wondering what a verb or adjective might confusingly be? Not sure what app customers are? Dont worry, because I'm here to help you with the answers for today's NYT Mini crossword.The NYT Mini is a quick and dirty version of the newspaper's larger and long-running crossword. Most days, there are between three and five clues in each direction on a five by five grid, but the puzzles are sometimes larger, especially on Saturdays.Unlike its larger sibling, the NYT Mini crossword is free to play on the New York Times website or NYT Games app. However, youll need an NYT Games subscription to access previous puzzles in the archives.To help you avoid getting stuck and having to reveal missing letters, here are the NYT Mini Crossword answers for Sunday, January 5 (spoilers lie ahead, of course):NYT Mini Crossword Clues And AnswersMORE FOR YOUNYT Mini Across Answers1 Across: What "verb" or "adjective" is, confusingly NOUN5 Across: On the ___ (free) HOUSE6 Across: One holding a deed OWNER7 Across: Large in scope, as a photography lens MACRO8 Across: They're rolled in annoyance EYESNYT Mini Down Answers1 Down: "You've got to be kidding!" NO WAY2 Down: Unit equal to roughly 28 grams OUNCE3 Down: App customers USERS4 Down: Infamous Roman emperor NERO5 Down: Where the heart is, it's said HOMECompleted New York Times Mini crossword for Sunday, January 5New York TimesIt took me 1:09 to complete today's NYT Mini. Thats okay, but not great. Itll be faster tomorrow, I hope!Make sure to follow my blog for more coverage of the NYT Mini and other word games, as well as video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me out a lot! Also, follow me on Bluesky! Its fun there.