Issue #26September 8, 20269 links

Medici Brands raises $250.0M Series B

Medici Brands, the consumer group behind the high-protein food brand David Protein and the confectionery brand HallPass, raised a $250.0M Series B. Ollie, a privacy-first household AI assistant that runs over group chat, raised a $7.5M seed led by Khosla Ventures with AI House.

Interesting

sylvainkalache.com

AI handles incidents, engineers lose touch with their systems

AI-assisted incident response can lower MTTR while leaving engineers less prepared for the complex incidents automation cannot solve.

Incident Management Code Review

arxiv.org

Large-Language Models as a Cognitive Virus

Large-language models (LLMs) are rapidly becoming part of human culture, reshaping how information is produced, transmitted, and used. Here we propose that their diffusion can be understood through a viral analogy, with LLM use spreading through populations, becoming embedded in cognitive and cultural practices. We model transitions among uncoupled, coupled, and persistently dependent users, and show that the interplay between social transmission, recovery, and collective reinforcement can generate tipping points and technological lock-in. A central consequence is the possibility of runaway dynamics: once a critical threshold is crossed, small increases in adoption can trigger rapid population-level shifts toward persistent dependence, with abrupt losses in cognitive competence. The same framework, however, identifies conditions for cognitive immunization, based on reducing transmission and facilitating reversibility. Our results highlight how LLM adoption may involve nonlinear collective transitions with important consequences for cognitive autonomy.

Mental Health

anyhumanever.com

Any Human Ever

One life, drawn at random from all who have ever lived.

Thought Experiments

Dev Tools

opentrailpaper.com

OpenTrailPaper

Open-source bike computer firmware for the LilyGO T5S3 4.7" E-Paper PRO, with offline maps, GPX routes, FIT recording and Bluetooth sensors.

Cool As F E-Paper Open Source

Cool Company Raises

YC F26

Sinter launches at YC (Fall 2026)

Accelerating scaled plastics with additive technologies

3d-printing Manufacturing Advanced-Materials YC Industrials

$7.5M

Ollie raises a $7.5M Seed round

Ollie is a privacy-first personal AI assistant for households, run over group chat. It handles scheduling, meal planning, grocery shopping, task tracking, appointment booking and bill payments for the whole family, and is built around keeping household data private. Founded by Bill Lennon and based in San Diego. The $7.5M seed was led by Khosla Ventures with AI House.

Other Information-Technology Ai House Khosla Ventures $1M+

$7.1M

Helogen raises a $7.1M Seed round

Helogen manufactures advanced biomaterials in orbit and returns them to Earth, building autonomous space factories for materials that are difficult or impossible to make under gravity. Its HEL-IOS system produces recombinant protein polymers, biologics and human tissue models in space, supported by custom spacecraft and Keystar, an orbital platform providing power, thermal management and docking. A NASA TechLeap Prize winner, the NYC company has biomaterial products reaching early customers. The $7.1M seed was co-led by RRE Ventures and Oceans, with One Way Ventures and Blisce.

Other Information-Technology Blisce One Way Ventures Oceans Rre Ventures+1 more

$250.0M

Medici Brands raises a $250.0M Series B round

Medici Brands creates progress by rethinking the products of the past. Its portfolio includes David Protein, a high-protein food brand, and HallPass, a confectionery brand that delivers sweets that taste like the classics at a fraction of the calories. Medici aims to improve public health by making traditional foods healthier without compromising on taste and experience.

Food-And-Beverage Food-Processing Imaginary Ventures Iconiq Peter Rahal Valor Equity Partners+2 more

YC F26

OnePatch launches at YC (Fall 2026)

OnePatch is a forward-deployed AI SRE that automates on-call at agent scale. It instruments your services, watches how they actually behave in production, catches incidents, and drives each one to resolution — think Datadog, except it doesn't stop at telling you something broke, it ships the fix. Founded in 2026 by Shalin Patel and Deep Utkarsh, OnePatch is based in San Francisco and is part of Y Combinator's Fall 2026 batch.

Devops Automation AI YC B2B

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