Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:
Churchill Capital Corp XI Shareholders Approve Business Combination with Agility Robotics | Agility
At a special meeting held today, Churchill XI shareholders approved the business combination (the “Transaction”) and all related proposals. The Transaction received overwhelming support, with more than 84% of votes cast voting in favor.
OSU’s Advantage Accelerator racks up awards | OSU Today | Oregon State University
For the last 13 years, the OSU Advantage Accelerator has been helping some of the university’s most innovative thinkers turn their research into startup businesses. The work has been so successful that recently, TIME named it among the nation’s top 25 incubators and accelerators, and one of the top 10 university-based accelerators.
(2010) Dave Chase: 10 reasons I chose Portland over Seattle and Silicon Valley to locate my startup
[Editor’s Note: Today’s guest post comes from Dave Chase, a serial entrepreneur who chose Portland for his next startup. Why? Read on.]
Elon Musk’s xAI installs eight converted jet engines to power Mississippi data center — permits allow 25 percent higher limit for pollutants, concerns raised over carbon monoxide | Tom’s Hardware
Elon Musk’s xAI is using eight converted jet engine turbines to power a Mississippi data center. While the generators have the required state-level permission and permits, there remain concerns about the impact they could have on the local environment. The permits allow for a 25% higher limit in pollutants known as volatile organic compounds, but those compounds, paired with the expulsion of carbon monoxide, have environmentalists warning that the use of jet engines to power data centers is a step in the wrong direction. The New York Times reports that the Southern Environmental Law Center has already challenged Mississippi’s decision to approve the turbines for use at xAI’s data center.
Just a little AI resistance, as a treat – Terence Eden’s Blog
It’s OK to call out shitty AI responses and insist that a human engages with you.
The AI Bubble Monitor – CEPR
Anyhow, while we can’t know the timing, more analysts and investors are coming around to expecting that a crash is coming. And stocks have a long way to fall. The current value of the stock market is around $80 trillion. While the AI-related companies are sure to take the biggest hit, the rest of the market is not likely to escape unscathed. In the crash following the 1990s Internet bubble, the NASDAQ lost almost 80 percent of its value, but the S&P 500 lost 50 percent. Even stocks like GM and McDonald’s took big hits. If the market were to fall to its historic average PE ratio, the loss would be around $40 trillion.
Lenny’s Newsletter holiday gift guide 2026
The holidays are fast approaching, so I’m back with my sixth (!!) annual gift guide. It started out as a random post idea, but now you’d be surprised how many people ping me as early as September asking when the new list will be out.
Oregon Election Day 2026: Live updates and results – oregonlive.com
All of which is to say, it’s too early to predict how Tuesday’s midterm election will unfold. One thing that’s for certain is that The Oregonian/OregonLive should be your go-to destination for all your election news. Starting now.
Beyond brick and mortar: A literary walking tour of Portland’s architecture – OPB
“There have been other times where the city has faced moments of doubt or crisis,” said Libby. “But it’s actually precisely those moments that give us the greatest opportunities to follow our instincts and our creativity and our imagination and make this place what we want it to be.”
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Anthropic warns that it’s very close to RSI capability, aka self-building AI | TechCrunch
While much attention has focused on the updated financials Anthropic revealed in its revised S-1/A on Monday (revenue is soaring, but so are expenses), the AI lab dropped another little bombshell in the fine print. The filing seems to warn that the company is on the cusp of creating a model capable of recursive self-improvement (RSI).
Lessons from building Copilot Cowork
In January of this year, a small team at Microsoft set out to build Copilot Cowork, an agentic execution layer that performs multi-step workflows on a user’s behalf. That result brings the powerful AI-assisted tools and capabilities developers have today to everyday knowledge workers, all with Work IQ, Microsoft 365 security and governance, cloud execution, and Microsoft’s multi-model architecture.
The Most Important Part of a Startup Is the Part Nobody Wants to Build | by Aaron Dinin, PhD | Nov, 2026 | Entrepreneurship Handbook
That reality is why the graveyard of failed startups is filled with great products that never found an audience. Ultimately, having the best product isn’t enough. You also need a reliable way of getting that product in front of people who might want to buy it.
SXSW Pitch – SXSW
SXSW Pitch 2027 applications are now open through November 13.
The McDonaldization of Venture Capital – by Kyle Harrison
So I want to do a few things. First, walk back through what I thought was happening in 2022, and what’s happened instead. Second, run venture through Ritzer’s four ingredients (efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control). And then finally, what all that efficiency does to the one thing venture is supposed to be good at: imagining a different future.
A Humanoid Robot Joins the Factory Shift: Meet Digit 5
Humanoid robots are already at work in factories and warehouses, and Digit 5 is about to take on more. Daniel Diez, Chief Business Officer of Agility, joins James Kotecki to explain why Agility pairs traditional robotics controls with AI to put autonomous robots to work today. He previews Digit 5, which is designed to work in close proximity with people, use a range of hands and tools for more dexterous tasks and run over 20 hours a day.
The value of open source | Hayden Bleasel
In February, tldraw floated moving its tests into a private repo. The worry was that someone would point an agent at them and rebuild tldraw from the outside. Malte Ubl called that a slop fork.
knlb.dev | Resisting Cognitive Surrender
As we collectively rethink how we work I’ve been finding it useful to read and share other people’s workflows, and consciously write about and examine my own. This particular post focuses on finding the right balance of trust while working with agents.
