Sneakers
Nike released two colorways of the Total 90 Shox Magia for women today—the Pecan (IO9300-200, $155) and Sail (IO9300-100, $180) editions—continuing the brand's revival of early 2000s soccer-inspired design. The Kobe 1 Protro "81 Points" also dropped today, commemorating Bryant's career-high performance from 2006 in its first return since the initial 2019 release. This marks a significant moment for basketball sneaker collectors as it's the first widely available version of this historically important colorway in six years, retailing at $210.
Looking ahead, Jordan Brand continues building momentum toward 2026's most anticipated release: the Air Jordan 11 Space Jam arriving for the holiday season. The brand is positioning this fourth iteration of the iconic colorway as a major cultural moment, banking on both nostalgia from millennials who grew up with the original and Gen-Z collectors discovering the silhouette fresh. Industry observers are calling it the likely top-grossing sneaker of 2026.
Sports
The Milwaukee Bucks continued their freefall through the Eastern Conference standings after dropping to 18-25 following Wednesday's 122-102 loss to Oklahoma City. Giannis Antetokounmpo's pointed criticism of his teammates' selfish play signals deeper chemistry issues for a franchise that entered the season with championship expectations. The two-time MVP is averaging a career-low 16.5 shot attempts per game, his fewest since 2016-17, as Milwaukee sits 1.5 games behind even a Play-In Tournament spot with 39 games remaining.
In coaching news, the Baltimore Ravens hired Jesse Minter as head coach Thursday, replacing John Harbaugh after 18 seasons. Minter, 42, becomes the youngest head coach in Ravens history and the first with a defensive background. The Los Angeles Chargers defensive coordinator spent two seasons building the NFL's best scoring defense in 2024 before returning to Baltimore, where he previously served as defensive backs coach from 2017-2020.
Thursday night's 76ers-Rockets overtime thriller saw Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey lead Philadelphia past Houston, while Kawhi Leonard's return sparked the Clippers. Today's schedule features Thunder-Pacers and Suns-Hawks among the slate of games.
Culture
Ryan Coogler's "Sinners" broke Academy Awards history Thursday with 16 nominations for the 98th Oscars, surpassing the previous record of 14. The supernatural thriller earned nominations across all eligible categories including Best Picture, Director, and Actor for Michael B. Jordan. Ruth E. Carter's fifth nomination for costume design makes her the most nominated Black woman in Oscar history, while Timothée Chalamet became the youngest actor to receive three best actor nominations at age 30.
Netflix cancelled The Vince Staples Show after two seasons despite strong critical reception. The semi-autobiographical series drew 1.7 million views for Season 2 according to Netflix's viewership report, compared to 4.6 million for Season 1, and never appeared on Netflix's Weekly Top 10. The cancellation reflects the platform's continued focus on viewership metrics over critical acclaim, particularly for niche comedies.
Bridgerton returns with Season 4 Part 1 streaming Thursday, January 29, while Part 2 arrives February 26. American Idol's 24th season premieres January 26 on ABC, and Below Deck returns in February continuing its reality franchise dominance.
Technology
Google launched free SAT practice tests through Gemini in partnership with The Princeton Review, announced Wednesday at the BETT 2026 conference. Students can access full-length exams by asking Gemini "I want to take a practice SAT test," with immediate feedback and explanations for incorrect answers. The standardized test prep offering marks Google's push into education technology alongside expanding Gemini features to Google Workspace for Education users at no additional cost.
Apple is reportedly using Google Cloud TPUs to train the "LLM Siri" system powering its next-generation conversational assistant, according to industry sources. The move represents a significant shift for Apple, which historically relied on in-house silicon for major AI workloads. This follows reports that Apple is developing an AI-powered wearable pin approximately the size of an AirTag, expected to run the revamped Siri chatbot internally codenamed "Campos" and powered by Google's Gemini AI models.
Capital One disclosed its $5.15 billion acquisition of payments fintech Brex Thursday, comprised of 50% cash and 50% stock. The deal, expected to close mid-2026, comes approximately one year after Capital One completed its $51.8 billion purchase of Discover Financial Services. Brex was last valued at $12.3 billion in 2022, representing a decline of more than 50% from that peak valuation.
Developer infrastructure platform Railway announced a $100 million Series B funding round to build what the company describes as the world's first intelligent cloud provider. The platform serves 2 million users and thousands of companies, removing operational complexity from software deployment by automating DevOps, FinOps, and security operations.
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