A critical flaw has been discovered in Notepad (CVE-2026-20841). That once simple Windows editor that only displayed plain text, you know? The one that Microsoft tainted with Markdown (the vector for this flaw), Copilot, and who knows what else? An attacker could place a malicious link in a Markdown file that, when clicked by the victim, would execute code remotely. A fix was made available by Microsoft in routine updates released on Tuesday (10th).
Microsoft
The AI industry doesn’t take “no” for an answer
For days now, I've had a quote from David Bushell stuck in my head:
Has anyone else noticed that the AI industry can’t take “no” for an answer? AI is being force-fed into every corner of tech. It’s unfathomable to them that some of us aren’t interested.
David complained about receiving communications from Proton offering Lumo, its generative AI, even though he had expressly indicated that he did not want to receive such messages. The worst part is that Proton, instead of owning up to its mistake and apologizing, insisted on absurd justifications to say that there was no mistake. It only gave in when an executive got involved, and only after the post went viral.
For this [AI] not to be a bubble, by definition it requires that the benefits of this are much more evenly spread. I think a telltale sign of if it’s a bubble would be if all we’re talking about are the tech firms. If all we talk about is what’s happening to the technology side that then that’s just purely supply side.
Satya Nadella,
CEO of Microsoft
I have some bad news for you, Satya…
In another excerpt from the interview, picked up by Pivot to AI, Nadella says that companies need to reorganize around AI to learn, in practice, how to use it in business. Destroy what is working to learn an innovation that might help them… do what they were doing before?
Dell and Microsoft, marketing geniuses
Remember when Warner Bros. changed the name of its streaming service from HBO Max to Max, and then less than a year later back to HBO Max? Or when the richest person in the world proved that money has no relation to intelligence and threw the “Twitter” brand in the trash? Marketing geniuses!
Maybe it's late capitalism, maybe it's a side effect of new drugs circulating among the bigwigs of the world's most powerful companies. Or maybe it's just plain stupidity. The fact is that the practice is spreading, and fast.
In early 2025, Dell revamped its line of notebooks and retired traditional names, including XPS, perhaps the most recognizable after Apple's MacBook. The goal was to simplify. No one understood anything.
Cut to 2026, and Dell announced at CES, to no one's surprise, that it will return to using the XPS brand. They look nice.
Running behind is Microsoft. When accessing the office.com website, we come across this gem (my highlight):
Welcome to the Microsoft 365 Copilot app
The Microsoft 365 Copilot app (formerly Office) lets you create, share, and collaborate all in one place with your favorite apps now including Copilot.*
Just imagine, replacing the brand that has been synonymous with productivity apps for three decades with… Copilot, a slop generator that people generally dislike and only use because their employer requires them to.
Good for us. The less we associate critical software with big tech brands, the better. Long live Microsoft 365 Copilot — or whatever other weird name Word, Excel, and company end up with in the future.
2025 has been a disaster for Windows 11 
windowscentral.com
Zac Bowden wrote a long article stating that Windows fans (the author's definition) have been sold a “disastrous 2025 for Windows 11.” I haven't used Windows in many years and have barely touched version 11, so I read it with extra attention.
Anyway, I'm sure you can guess the most obvious problem with Windows 11 in 2025:
The fact that people are unimpressed that we can have a fluent conversation with a super smart AI that can generate any image/video is mindblowing to me.
Mustafa Suleyman
CEO da Microsoft AI
Mustafa Suleyman’s outburst is a reaction to Windows 11 users’ criticism of another Microsoft exec, Pavan Davuluri, who said Windows is evolving into an “agentic” operating system.
“Agentic” is a euphemism tech execs use for “AI‑stuffed software that doesn’t work properly.” In the case of Windows 11, for example, Microsoft warns that AI “agents” can, among other things, install malware and expose private data. Yay…?