Hello, and welcome to issue 1 of the Basic Web Guy (BWG) newsletter. I’ve had some time to think about the content style and flow of this newsletter, so I’m ready to jump into the very first issue. I hope you are too! 👋

Here’s what you can expect: a curation of content from around the web including what’s trending on social media, memes, news related to the web and the internet, and more.

Let’s dive right in! 🌊

Today’s newsletter is 691 words, a 4-minute read.

In the latest streaming news, Andor season 2 is coming out and includes a fantastic new trailer. I’m not sure about you, but it’s been so long since season 1, I don’t remember much of what happened. Perhaps it’s time to rewatch the first season as a refresher. 🔁

Apple’s Tim Cook on Monday celebrated what would be Steve Jobs’ 70th birthday with a nice tweet featuring the former CEO’s portrait. “Steve saw the world not just as it was, but as it could be,” Cook writes. “His vision continues to inspire us to push boundaries and create the future. Today, on his 70th birthday, we honor his legacy and his enduring impact.” We all miss Steve!

Speaking of Apple, the company has committed $500B to US manufacturing. The company “will spend $500 billion over the next four years in areas like high-end manufacturing, engineering, and education covering technologies like artificial intelligence and chip making,” according to TechCrunch. The announcement comes shortly after Cook met with President Trump in the Oval Office. In a tweet, Cook wrote: “As a proud American company, we're thrilled to continue to make significant investments in the US. Today, we’re announcing a $500 billion commitment to support American innovation, advanced manufacturing, and high tech job creation.”

Grok 3, the recently launched upgraded, and Elon owned, AI chatbot has experienced high demand. TechCrunch notes that: “According to estimates from Sensor Tower, a market intelligence firm, worldwide and U.S. mobile app downloads of Grok during the week of Grok 3’s release increased more than 10x each compared to the previous week. Daily active users for Grok’s U.S. app soared more than 260% last week, meanwhile, while global daily active users climbed 5x week-over-week.”

In other AI news, Anthropic has released Claude 3.7 Sonnet. “Claude 3.7 Sonnet is a significant upgrade over its predecessor,” writes the company in a tweet. “Extended thinking mode gives the model an additional boost in math, physics, instruction-following, coding, and many other tasks.”

In more personal news, I woke up to 20 password reset emails from Instagram. It appears someone was trying to access my account. Honestly, they can have it. 🤷

Also, I was eyeing Apple’s updated SE phone, now called the 16e. I like the slimmed down camera bump and the iPhone’s simplicity. But I was saddened (maybe even angered) to learn that the iPhone 16e does NOT include MagSafe. What a shame!

Trending today in Florida news 🐊, Governor DeSantis proposed ending property taxes for the state. “Just for being on your property, you've got to write a check to the government every year?” he asks. “A lot of people can't afford that. That's a big issue. We're going to be looking at ways to bring people relief from that.”

And in trending news you’d rather not see, a Delta flight from Atlanta to Columbia, SC was forced to make a return landing after smoked filled the cabin. No word on what the cause is yet. A mechanical issue would certainly be concerned following a string of flight mishaps and crashes over the past weeks. But who knows, maybe someone was just vaping. 🚭

Lastly, emails to millions of federal workers with the subject "What did you do last week" hit inboxes on Saturday, following DOGE’s cost cutting measures. Prior to this, Elon Musk said "Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.” Amid confusion among workers, Axios notes that an amended lawsuit shows that they “can't fire those workers for not responding.” Time will tell.