It was foolish of Western countries to outsource their industrial bases to where wages were cheaper. That said, those jobs are going to disappear due to robots/AI, even in China & we’ll be moving on to a different type of economic system anyway, whether we like it or not.

Before that happens, there are benefits to this world of China-dominated manufacturing, too. We can see it most clearly in renewables & EVs, but I think it will happen with robotics as well.

China will make humanoid robots cheap. I’m sure there’ll be expensive luxury models, too. But like all other electronics, the vast majority will be cheaper ‘almost as good’ models. How cheap? China can already make them for $5,000 or so. I’d guess in the 2030s, a few cheaper humanoid robots will be the price of the cheaper car models.

So, simultaneously with robots making human workers obsolete, they will also be giving us all our own personal workers, too.

Article - China Leads in humanoid robots

Yes, it should be 1.5 MW. I corrected the headline.

One of the most persistent dystopian futurist tropes is that AI & robotics tech will be controlled by the 1%, and the rest of us will be serfs living in a hellscape. I’m not surprised the idea is so popular; it’s a Sci-Fi mainstay, but I am surprised so many people can’t see that it’s very unlikely to be true.

Free Open-Source AI is the equal of the stuff investors have spent 100’s of billions of dollars on & robotics is not far behind. Furthermore, we know we have two future sources of cheap, widely available robotics - Chinese manufacturing & 3-D printing.

It’s not as dramatic storytelling for Sci-Fi, but future robots are likely to be cheap and widely owned by everyone. So will the economic benefits that stem from that.

"The polymer solar cell is able to retain 97% of its performance after 2,000 hours in air. By blending small-molecule acceptors into polymeric matrices, the research team improved molecular packing, enhancing both stability and charge transport for “ultra-stable” flexible devices.

It will be interesting to see if & how quickly this can be translated into commercially available solar tech. If this isn’t a final breakthrough for polymer solar, it’s certainly bringing it one step closer.

This is why solar energy will conquer the world, and all the other energy options are dead men walking. It’s already the cheapest energy source in most of the world in 2026, and it will be an order of magnitude cheaper when next-gen solar tech like this comes online.

Another consequence of polymer solar tech? It is vastly easier to manufacture. China will lose a structural advantage there. By the 2030s, poorer parts of the world could be churning this stuff out at a massive scale and for a small cost. A hopeful vision for the future.

I think its not built as much because solar/wind are simpler & cheaper. Hydro needs the right elevation/water flow/geography. Its disruptive to ecosystems & human habitation & it has huge up-front costs. Yes, its great sometimes, but maybe not as often as we might think.

The 2026 Middle East War is likely to be the last in human history where a disruption to fossil fuels means a major global economic impact. By the 2030s, both China and Europe will be well on their way to totally decarbonising their economies, and Chinese manufacturing exports of renewable tech will be doing the same for much of the rest of the world. The age of fossil fuels will be disappearing in the rear-view mirror.

The longer the war goes on, the more renewables win. It will be clear they mean cheap, reliable, clean, and freedom from global instability. Tens of millions of people around the world who have cars to buy in 2026 will be looking at EVs with new appreciation.

The Petrostates were already facing the prospect of fossil fuels’ decline before the 2026 war started; now, events may accelerate fossil fuels’ decline. Iran may have many times more cheap drones and missiles than the expensive systems the US, Israel & Gulf states need to neutralize them. At $20-50k each, it can build 5,000 or so per $100 million and has been preparing for years. Soon, when those expensive defences run out, 20% of the world’s fossil fuel production may be at Iran’s mercy and defenceless from its drones and missiles.

The rest of the world may be forced to adapt to a world of permanent high oil & LNG prices. Unlike the last time this happened in the 1970s, this time there is an alternative. Renewables, batteries, and EVs were already cheaper before the 2026 Middle East War; they will be vastly cheaper as it goes on. Iran may have enough cheap missiles to last months, or possibly years. By the time they run out, the Gulf states may find the rest of the world has adapted away from needing them so much.

This is an interesting piece of research that has been doing the rounds. It speculates about the financial effects of AI displacing workers. In essence, what happens when AI-induced unemployment and wage reduction lead to reduced demand in the economy, even as AI makes sectors more productive.

This kind of speculation is nothing new; people have been wondering about this scenario for years. What interests me about this particular piece of research is the reaction to it. Predictably, Big Tech’s defenders have come out criticizing it, yet all around us are the signs that it’s coming true.

Sure, I changed it to Time, who I think did the original reporting.

Open source AI is the equal of anything investors are pouring hundreds of billions into. You can have its expertise for free. Soon, that expertise will do the work any lawyer or doctor can do. Everyone on planet Earth will be able to have that for free.

It strikes me the author has it right on AI tending towards abundance.

This article feel AI written.

I see a lot of people getting AI to rewrite their writing for ‘polish’, which might be what is happening here. However, looking at the totality of their thought across their other articles, it definitely feels like this originates from a human.

China has a well developed plan for Space stretching out into the 2050s and beyond, and sticks to it.

Every new US administration chops & changes with NASA. That’s how its ended up with its current nonsensical half Artemis/half-Space X plans for the Moon that are destined to fail.

Fingers crossed that ‘third time is a charm’ for ispace & they succeed with Hakuto-R Mission 3.

Yes, there’s a theory that it’s elite-over production (a society that has an excess supply of potential elite members relative to its ability to absorb them into the power structure.) that drives revolutions, not working class discontent. The French & Russian revolutions can both be looked at that way.

The batteries were charged by the solar panels.

No, I edited the sub-heading.

On February 1, 2026, California’s batteries bridged the solar gap with seamless precision. After discharging through the night until sunrise, they spent the daylight hours charging, then pivoted back to exporting power well past midnight—effectively sustaining the state on solar energy for a full 24-hour cycle.

The cognitive dissonance it must take to usher in the conditions for a communist revolution, while simultaneously bankrolling Donald Trump, proves US Big Tech is run by people who are far less smart than they think they are.

So you’re a slop-monger.

Most of the speed improvements are when I’m using it to do things I previously did much more slowly with software, in particular After Effects.

I’m not surprised at the backlash against generative AI & the widespread use of the term ‘slop’.

But human creatives have always used tools. Once upon a time, practical effects people, & paper and pen animators would have seen After Effects computer generated animation & VFX as slop, too.

isn’t remotely as useful as they’d claimed it would be.

Maybe, i’m in the minority, but its made a huge improvement to my productivity. I’m self-employed & a big part of my work is making explainer videos & youtube content for clients. Generative AI has boosted that enormously, as has ChatGPT for simplifying software workflows/answering questions.

There is a strange dichotomy for investors here, on the one hand they want to take advantage of an AI boom, on the other hand, the consequences of that boom are the destruction in value of loads of other companies.