U.S. News and Word Report has again placed MIT's graduate program in engineering at the top of its annual rankings, released today. The Institute has held the No. 1 spot since 1990, when the magazine first ranked such programs. Among individual engineering disciplines, MIT placed first in six areas: aerospace/aeronautical/astronautical engineering, chemical engineering, computer engineering (tied with the University of California at Berkeley), electrical/electronic/communications engineering (tied with Stanford University and Berkeley), materials engineering, and mechanical engineering. It placed second in nuclear engineering and third in biomedical engineering/bioengineering. In the rankings of individual MBA specialties, MIT placed first in four areas: information systems, production/operations, project management, and supply chain/logistics. It placed second in business analytics and third in entrepreneurship. U.S. News bases its rankings of graduate schools of engineering and business on two types of data: reputational surveys of deans and other academic officials, and statistical indicators that measure the quality of a school's faculty, research, and students. The magazine's less-frequent rankings of graduate programs in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities are based solely on reputational surveys. Among the peer-review disciplines ranked this year, MIT placed first in computer science, and its doctoral program in economics also placed first (tied with Harvard University, Stanford, Berkeley, and the University of Chicago)....

Amid a morning of pandemonium on Wall Street, a popular news aggregator on X, known as Walter Bloomberg, posted a false report declaring that President Trump was considering a 90-day pause on his controversial tariff proposal. This news was not true, and yet, index funds like the Dow Jones whipsawed ' rapidly rising, before reversing course minutes later. This type of volatility is more meaningful than a stock's typical rise and fall throughout any given day, which is why the false report garnered so much attention. Though the Walter Bloomberg account is not affiliated with any news organization and has no connection to Bloomberg News, the account has long been considered a reliable source of tech and business news. Rather than writing its own posts, Walter Bloomberg publicly posts news headlines as they hit the Bloomberg Terminal. The Bloomberg Terminal is an expensive subscription-only service that financial professionals use for real-time market data, which includes breaking news headlines. Sometimes, the headlines from outlets like CNBC and Bloomberg hit the Terminal before the stories are published online, making accounts like Walter Bloomberg a useful follow for quick news....

OpenAI is said to have discussed acquiring the AI hardware startup that former Apple design lead Jony Ive is building with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. According to The Information, OpenAI could pay around $500 million for the fledgling company, called io Products. Ive, who left Apple in 2019 to start his own design firm called LoveFrom, confirmed that he was working with Altman on the AI hardware startup last year in an interview with The New York Times. io Products has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Laurene Powell Jobs' Emerson Collective and others, according to The Information. The Information's report notes that OpenAI may end up partnering with instead of acquiring io Products, which currently has a small team that includes former Apple designers Tang Tan and Evans Hankey. io Products has reportedly been working on different concepts of AI-enabled devices, including smart home gadgets. Last year, The New York Times said that the startup's goal was to build products that are 'less socially disruptive than the iPhone.'...