It’s possible that Time magazine’s Person of the Year selection — which in this issue named “the AI architects” (i.e., big-tech AI CEOs) — was chosen by an AI. First clue: calling several people the otherwise singular “Person” of the Year. Second and stronger clue: only something as dumb as an AI would pick that bunch of clowns as Person(s) of the Year.

How to get found by recruiters on LinkedIn

Editor’s note: Job openings are a recurring topic in the Manual supporters’ WhatsApp group. In a recent conversation there were so many useful LinkedIn tips that we ended up with a kind of playbook for doing well on the platform. Thanks to everyone who contributed, especially Marcia who steered the discussion, Caique who saved the thread, and Paulo, who condensed many messages into this concise text.

Nobody likes LinkedIn, but a lot of people need to be there to apply for roles at companies that, if you’re lucky, will send an automatic message telling you they decided to move forward with another candidate. Even so, it’s worth trying to understand how this corporate theme park works and how it can (yes, it’s possible) help you land a less miserable job.

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Is “green AI” even possible?

Ecosia, the search engine that directs its profits to climate action, asks whether there’s a “green” alternative for generative AI in the title of this post — and in the same post’s headline answers that “the world’s greenest AI is here.”

The “greenest AI,” that paradox, is the one Ecosia just launched integrated into its search. The implementation mirrors Google’s: a summary (“AI Overviews”) above results and a one‑click away chatbot. The obvious difference is a button to disable AI. The less obvious — and crucial — claim is that:

As a not-for-profit company, we can afford to do things differently. AI Search uses smaller, more efficient models, and we avoid energy-heavy features like video generation altogether.

Details are missing (which “smaller, more efficient models”?) and the example is odd (no search engine with AI currently offers video generation).

I’m not against generative AI — that would be hypocritical, since I use it occasionally. (And on another search engine, DuckDuckGo’s.)

That’s why headlines like this and Mozilla pouring everything into AI for Firefox leave me uneasy. No matter the appeal, it seems odd for a service whose raison d’être is climate action to jump on a wave so energy‑hungry it’s reviving nuclear plants and prompting big techs to drop carbon‑reduction promises.

The “greener AI,” ultimately, is not having AI at all. Ignoring it — at least until adoption stabilizes and environmental impacts are better understood — would be coherent and even a differentiator in a sea of companies adding AI for the sake of it.

I tried to build a WhatsApp bot. Meta banned me before it left the drawing board

by Alessandro Feitosa Jr

Part of most people’s learning curve when they start coding is trying projects that, with luck, might become useful to themselves and others. In May I wanted to get a better handle on the WhatsApp API. I set up my local environment, logged into Meta’s developer platform and started poking around.

I grabbed a test number the platform provided, sent a “Hello World” and tried a few basic commands for the architecture I was sketching. A few weeks later I had to set the project aside.

When I tried to pick it up again a few weeks ago, I was alarmed by the message on Meta’s developer page:

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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.

A picture of Mustafa Suleyman.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…?

I think nobody wants AI in Firefox, Mozilla

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Mozilla is developing a built‑in AI assistant for Firefox that will be offered as a third browsing mode alongside Normal and Private tabs. They’re calling it “Window AI.”

Details are still scarce. Based on Mozilla’s official announcement on Thursday (13th), it looks like a deeper implementation than the existing sidebar that gives access to third‑party chatbots (ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, etc.). The post stresses the feature will be opt-in and that the user “is in control.”

There’s a waitlist to try the feature and a Mozilla forum thread inviting people to “help shape” the initiative.

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How should open source software projects handle AI‑generated code?

The excellent KeePassXC, an offline, open‑source password manager, is at the center of a controversy over the use of AI‑generated code after the project’s collaboration policy and README added this paragraph:

Generative AI is fast becoming a first-party feature in most development environments, including GitHub itself. If the majority of a code submission is made using Generative AI (e.g., agent-based or vibe coding) then we will document that in the pull request. All code submissions go through a rigorous review process regardless of the development workflow or submitter.

Users and critics backlash was so intense that on Sunday (9the) one of the project maintainers, Janek Bevendorff, published a post on the official blog detailing their stance on AI‑generated code.

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Facebook and Instagram are paradises for scammers, reveal Meta’s internal documents

Reuters shed light on Meta’s lucrative business built on selling fraudulent ads on its platforms — Facebook and Instagram. Internal company documents obtained by the news agency show that 10.1% of Meta’s 2024 revenue, or US$ 16 billion, came from fraudulent/scam ads.

A December 2024 document shows Meta running an average of 15 billion fraudulent ads per day. Those add to 22 billion pieces of suspicious “organic” content (unpaid) — from hacked profiles offering crypto schemes to promises of miracle cures in groups, and fake listings on Facebook Marketplace.

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A few months ago, youtubers reported unsolicited interventions by Google to “improve” their videos with generative AI. It appeared to be a test; now it’s official.

Channel owners can disable this feature in Studio: go to Settings, Channel, Advanced settings and uncheck the two options under Video quality enhancements. For viewers, Google’s suggested workaround is to change the resolution in the player’s settings.

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