SoftBank is marching ahead on its ambitions to build out a major AI operation in its home market of Japan, on its own steam and in strategic partnership with others like OpenAI. On Friday, the tech company confirmed it would pay $676 million for factory previously used by Sharp to build LCD panels to convert […]
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Waymo now has more than 300 driverless vehicles zipping passengers around San Francisco, but while they follow traffic laws, parking is another matter entirely. According to city records cited by the Washington Post, these rolling robots racked up 589 citations totaling $65,065 in fines last year for parking violations that ranged from blocking traffic to […]
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In the same way that genome sequencing determines the genetic makeup of an organism, Bryan Johnson — the investor and founder behind the Don’t Die movement — wants to start “foodome” sequencing. “We’re going to sequence the U.S. ‘foodome,’ which means test 20% of foods that constitute 80% of the American diet based on stuff […]
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AI company Sesame has released the base model that powers Maya, the impressively realistic voice assistant. The model, which is 1 billion parameters in size (“parameters” referring to individual components of the model), is under an Apache 2.0 license, meaning it can be used commercially with few restrictions. Called CSM-1B, the model generates “RVQ audio codes” from text […]
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Rad Power Bikes has named a new CEO, just a few days after its previous leader stepped down. The e-bike company has tapped Kathi Lentzsch, who has spent the last few decades helping turn around underperforming companies in both the consumer and B2B spaces. The change comes as Rad Power continues to shift away from […]
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Flock Safety and one of its long-time VCs, Bedrock Capital, announced Thursday that the startup raised a fresh $275 million at a $7.5 billion valuation. Flock makes computer vision-enabled video surveillance technology used by law enforcement as well as businesses, property management companies, and so on. It’s best known for its automatic license plate recognition […]
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Google announced on Thursday that Android phones will soon support Auracast, a new Bluetooth technology that uses a phone to enable a direct connection from hearing aids to audio broadcasts in noisy environments. With Auracast, compatible hearing aids and earbuds can receive direct audio streams, such as a PA system at a train station or […]
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Y Combinator, one of the world’s most prolific startup accelerators, sent a letter on Wednesday urging the Trump administration to openly support Europe’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), a wide-ranging piece of legislation that aims to crack open Big Tech’s market power. The DMA designates six tech companies as “gatekeepers” to the internet — Alphabet, Amazon, […]
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TikTok has until April to finalize a sale to a U.S.-based buyer, yet uncertainties about the future of the short-form video app remain. However, a new report has emerged, suggesting that Oracle is the leading candidate to serve as the cloud technology partner for managing TikTok in the U.S., according to The Information. Sources including […]
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When Bluesky CEO Jay Graber took the SXSW stage this week, she managed to make fun of Mark Zuckerberg without mentioning Meta at all. Her black T-shirt was emblazoned with black text stretching across the chest and sleeves, similar to the style of a T-shirt that the billionaire founder wore at an event last year. […]
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Google, following on the heels of OpenAI, published a policy proposal in response to the Trump administration’s call for a national “AI Action Plan.” The tech giant endorsed weak copyright restrictions on AI training, as well as “balanced” export controls that “protect national security while enabling U.S. exports and global business operations.” “The U.S. needs […]
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A list of some of the alternative app stores iPhone users in the EU can try today.
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Amazon won't say if it will stop hosting data from three phone surveillance operations that spilled private data on millions of people.
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Rumman Chowdhury, a data scientist, nonprofit founder, and former director of Twitter’s machine ethics team, had strong words for Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) during a panel at SXSW on Thursday. “When your funding is frozen and you don’t know if you’re gonna be fired, and there’s this, like, absolutely unhinged […]
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Light, the maker of a minimalist phone designed to help consumers disconnect from smartphone distractions and social media, will launch its newest model, the Light Phone III, on March 27. This version of the device, like its older counterpart, offers a simple black-and-white display and necessary features like support for calls, texts, navigation, alarms, hotspots, […]
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One of Silicon Valley’s most storied startup accelerators, Y Combinator, held its Winter 2025 Demo Day on Wednesday, showcasing what its latest batch of 160 startups are cooking up. Some of Silicon Valley’s most successful startups — including Stripe, Airbnb, and Reddit — started out in a YC batch. Today, YC’s newer startups are focused […]
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Facebook is rolling out the ability for creators to earn money for views on public stories. The new monetization option is available globally to creators who are part of the Facebook Content Monetization program. With this new monetization option, creators can earn money from content that they are already producing and sharing if they post […]
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Lockdown Mode is an "extreme protection" feature that's good for at-risk users, but its notifications are increasingly confusing.
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Meghan Markle is launching a new podcast entitled “Confessions of a Female Founder,” which will hear the duchess talking about her entrepreneurial journey. It will also feature talks with other female founders about the reality of building a business, according to People magazine. The show will premiere April 8th on Lemonada Media and will have […]
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In a new policy proposal, OpenAI describes Chinese AI lab DeepSeek as “state-subsidized” and “state-controlled,” and recommends that the U.S. government consider banning models from the outfit and similar People’s Republic of China (PRC)-supported operations. The proposal, a submission for the Trump administration’s “AI Action Plan” initiative, claims that DeepSeek’s models, including its R1 “reasoning” model, […]
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