Daily Tech News 26 October 2026

Top Story

There are at least 884,000 websites running an unsupported version of PHP - one for which there is no patch for the new lethal vulnerabilities. (Notebook Check)

The real number is probably closer to 20 million.
How did the PHP foundation - the organisation responsible for maintaining PHP, a language powering an estimated 37.7 million websites - let things get so bad? They have one full-time staff member. (Reuters)

Yep, that'll do it.

Tech News

Wolves descend on a Finnish village as Google clear-fells 1300 acres of forest including Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother's cottage. (Futurism)

There are reasons I'm doubting this story, including the inclusion of this:
In West Virginia, a grove of critically endangered Chestnut trees is under threat of being bulldozed to make way for a new Anthropic hyperscale facility.
That claim has already been debunked; the construction is miles away from the grove of trees.
The anti-AI writing police are everywhere. What are they looking for? (CNN)

AI writing.

Which leftist writers profess to hate even as they latch onto it.

Leading to the usual rounds of autophagy and the media - CNN here - pissing on our legs and telling us it's raining.
Speaking of which, it's raining again. And worse. I brought my seedlings in under cover given the threat of a storm, and it arrived on schedule with some middling-sized hail.

Went to the garden center on the edge of town on the weekend looking for some more of the green bottlebrushes, only to find the shelf empty. So I went online and found what I wanted. And pink and purple as well. Delivered they cost nearly three times as much, but this way I can get what I want and not just what is in stock this week in my small country town.
Nvidia is thinking of charging $2000 per GPU in annual license fees for running its AI software, an estimated $10 billion per year. (Notebook Check)

What's that, Lassie? Someone just rebuilt our AI software using our AI software in a cave with a box of scraps?
Analysts say that AI is delivering no return on investment to 493 companies in the S&P 500. (Tech Crunch)

The remaining seven are Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla.

Musical Interlude

Game is Cannon Fodder, from the Amiga. This was real - I played this game in my misspent youth.

Something of a standout though; this is the docking sequence from Elite, running on the same hardware:

They did clean it up a little for the remake:

Disclaimer: Not included: Colliding with the space station three times in a row before you finally scrape together the funds for a docking computer.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:00 AM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 G'Day everyone

Posted by: Skip at October 26, 2026 04:01 AM (Ia/+0)

2 It's Monday again, isn't it?

Posted by: Skip at October 26, 2026 04:02 AM (Ia/+0)

3 How did the PHP foundation - the organisation responsible for maintaining PHP, a language powering an estimated 37.7 million websites - let things get so bad? They have one full-time staff member. (Reuters)

And here I thought it was because their key was 4 like that company eMudhra...

Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia) at October 26, 2026 04:03 AM (l3cgK)

4 Analysts say that AI is delivering no return on investment to 493 companies in the S&P 500.

Shocked, I tell ya.

Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia) at October 26, 2026 04:05 AM (l3cgK)

5 w00t

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 04:10 AM (odBC9)

6 The real number is probably closer to 20 million.

And if their installation is that old, most of them probably don't even realize they need to be updated or don't care because they're abandoned blogs.

Some people like to set it and forget it, which could probably work until AI came along and started finding security holes that nobody had a clue about.

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:12 AM (6ydKt)

7 How did the PHP foundation - the organisation responsible for maintaining PHP, a language powering an estimated 37.7 million websites - let things get so bad? They have one full-time staff member. (Reuters)

Yep, that'll do it.

You'd think with as much stuff that runs on PHP they'd be getting a better revenue stream from somewhere.

WordPress owes their existence to PHP, basically.
They could throw some scraps their way so the foundation could at least hire one more guy and an AI and go through the code with a fine tooth comb.

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:16 AM (6ydKt)

8 What's that, Lassie? Someone just rebuilt our AI software using our AI software in a cave with a box of scraps?

Jensen will be mighty disappointed that he can't charge you $16,000 for a GPU and then $2000 every year afterwards for the software because somebody used that GPU & AI to clone the $2000 year software and they don't need Jensen anymore.

Nvidia is asking for it, and they are going to get it good and hard as soon as possible.

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:24 AM (6ydKt)

9 I have to guard my laptop from tromping kittens. how much is the annual subscription for that?

Posted by: what the cat drug in at October 26, 2026 04:26 AM (jrgJz)

10 “AI may be a great calculator, but in business, intelligence is mostly judgment,” he wrote, later adding, “AI does not understand accountability, trust, culture, unwritten rules, ethical trade-offs or fairness, all of which shape reputational risk and ultimately drive revenue growth and profit margins.”

AI sounds like it votes Democrat.

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:27 AM (6ydKt)

11 From the West Virginia chestnut tree article:

Called the “Monarch Compute Campus,” the data center constellation is being developed by the company Nscale, “in collaboration with Nvidia and Caterpillar,” per a company blog post. Based on its current development plans, the fully constructed Monarch facility will span over 2,250 acres, supplying 8 gigawatts worth of computing capacity to AI companies like Anthropic.

Caterpillar?
wtf?

Is Caterpillar investing in AI Datacenter buildouts now, too?

I guess they need a lot of machines for excavating but I'm not seeing the synergy beyond that point.

It could go either way, but I don't think it's going to work out well when heavy equipment manufacturers are putting this much money into the AI bubble.

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:34 AM (6ydKt)

12 Ahhh from Nscale's press release on the Monarch Compute Campus:

NVIDIA brings frontier GPU and compute expertise; Caterpillar delivers on-site power generation, keeping Monarch independent of the public grid. Together, they ensure the highest standards of performance and reliability.

Caterpillar is doing the generator work.
That makes a little more sense.

https://tinyurl.com/5bsdy8xd
(Nscale.com)

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:37 AM (6ydKt)

13 Mornin'

Posted by: Puddleglum, cheer up for the worst is yet to come at October 26, 2026 04:41 AM (sAmhv)

14 10 “AI may be a great calculator, but in business, intelligence is mostly judgment,” he wrote, later adding, “AI does not understand accountability, trust, culture, unwritten rules, ethical trade-offs or fairness, all of which shape reputational risk and ultimately drive revenue growth and profit margins.”

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:27 AM (6ydKt)

... yet.

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 04:51 AM (odBC9)

15 >>>How did the PHP foundation - the organisation responsible for maintaining PHP, a language powering an estimated 37.7 million websites - let things get so bad? They have one full-time staff member. (Reuters)

https://archive.is/iRxVy
archived site

“We have one full-time staff member (that's me) and 14 mostly part-time contractors,” Executive Director Elizabeth Barron of the PHP Foundation said via ⁠email in an interview on Friday. Board members are unpaid volunteers, and funding comes from donations and grants.

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 04:54 AM (odBC9)

16 >>>Something of a standout though; this is the docking sequence from Elite, running on the same hardware

I played on the C64 in the '80s. The version release in 2014, Elite: Dangerous is still actively maintained and receives regular updates.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at October 26, 2026 05:07 AM (dK+Kv)

17 Only six of us showing up?

Posted by: Skip
Posted by: jim (in Kalifornia)
Posted by: m
Posted by: SpeakingOf
Posted by: what the cat drug in
Posted by: Puddleglum, cheer up for the worst is yet to come

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 05:08 AM (odBC9)

18 At least fairly close to home again today
Have a great day horde

Posted by: Skip at October 26, 2026 05:08 AM (Ia/+0)

19 seven!

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 05:08 AM (odBC9)

20 who's who at PHP

https://thephp.foundation/structure

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 05:09 AM (odBC9)

21
g'mornin', 'rons

Posted by: AltonJackson at October 26, 2026 05:09 AM (AMvSw)

22 AI sounds like it votes Democrat.

Posted by: SpeakingOf at October 26, 2026 04:27 AM (6ydKt)

AI sounds vaccinated.

It is the ultimate NPC.

Posted by: Comrade Flounder, Disinformation Demon at October 26, 2026 05:10 AM (dK+Kv)

23 eight!

Posted by: AltonJackson

Ok, this is getting better!

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 05:11 AM (odBC9)

24 @3/jim (in Kalifornia): "And here I thought it was because their key was 4 like that company eMudhra..."

https://tinyurl.com/3u9s2a4p
("User Friendly" comic from Feb 17 2004 via archive.org)

Posted by: Grumpy and Recalcitrant, a Moron behind enemy lines at October 26, 2026 05:14 AM (O7YUW)

25 from the Reuters article:

Recent events have shown how heavily companies and governments rely on PHP, Barron said.
“Given that reliance, it is clear that PHP ⁠is incredibly under-funded.”

hmm

Posted by: m at October 26, 2026 05:15 AM (odBC9)

26 The php foundation makes between 650k - 750k per year, so that money pays that one guys salary and benefits.

Depending on what that guy pays himself, you might be able to hire 1 additional employee.

Posted by: Thomas Bender at October 26, 2026 05:20 AM (XV/Pl)

27 "Nvidia is thinking of charging $2000 per GPU in annual license fees for running its AI software, an estimated $10 billion per year."

The Larry Ellison billing stratagem. (It's bold Cotton, but let's see how that plays out...)

Meanwhile:

"Thousands of CEOs admit AI had no impact on employment or productivity—and it has economists resurrecting a paradox from 40 years ago"

https://tinyurl.com/2xcbzvt5
(fortune.com)

Let's see how that bubble is looking?
https://tinyurl.com/5eeupjha
(youtube)

Posted by: Grumpy and Recalcitrant, a Moron behind enemy lines at October 26, 2026 05:27 AM (O7YUW)

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