Los Angeles-based Moonvalley, which is developing “transparent” generative AI video tools, raised a $70M seed co-led by General Catalyst and Khosla Ventures — The wide availability of tools to build generative AI has led to a Cambrian…
Bluesky is booming partly because it isn't hindered by bad adtech, AI slop, throttled links, and largely hostile user experiences, unlike some of its big rivals — No bad adtech, no AI, no throttling links. Bluesky is a booming because it's…
Memo: Amazon employees have found there is too much of a delay between asking a question to the new AI-based Alexa and getting a response or completing a task — Amazon CEO Andy Jassy. — Amazon's race to create an AI-based successor to its…
Sources: Apple has raised its offer to invest in Indonesia from about $10M to almost $100M, in a bid to persuade the government to lift its iPhone 16 sales ban — - Company increases investment proposal tenfold, sources say — Indonesia…
The US Library of Congress says hackers accessed some email communications between congressional offices and library staff between January and September 2024 — The Library of Congress didn't specify who was behind the hack. — The Library…
Internal document: Amazon has held talks with several partners for handling specific tasks on the AI-powered Alexa, including Uber, Ticketmaster, and Instacart — - Amazon discussed partnerships with other companies for an AI-powered Alexa…
Amazon and SpaceX argued the NLRB, which recently found issues at the companies, is unconstitutional; 5th Circuit judges questioned the timeline of the charges — A panel of U.S. judges on Monday seemed likely to rule that Amazon.com (AMZN…
Perplexity debuts a shopping feature offering product recommendations, one-click checkout, and more for Pro users in the US, alongside a merchant program — AI-powered search engine Perplexity is venturing into e-commerce. On Monday, the…
Sources: DOJ antitrust officials plan to ask a judge to force Google to sell Chrome, license Search data, uncouple Android from Search and Google Play, and more — - Antitrust officials also to seek data licensing, AI measures — Google says…
Two Baltic Sea internet cables, connecting Lithuania with Sweden and Finland with Germany, were suddenly disrupted, sparking concerns of Russian sabotage — Two undersea internet cables in the Baltic Sea have been suddenly disrupted,…
Xiaomi, the second largest smartphone vendor in India, plans to replace its app store there with one from PhonePe in January, amid ongoing geopolitical tensions — Xiaomi will replace its app store with fintech PhonePe's offering for…
Sources: Trump Media is nearing an all-share purchase of Intercontinental Exchange's crypto trading platform Bakkt; DJT closed up 16.65%, BKKT up 162.46% — Truth Social owner is close to an all-share takeover of Intercontinental Exchange's…
A look at emails between Musk and Altman from the early days of OpenAI, discussing its partnership with Microsoft, fundraising, employee compensation, AGI, more — Emails in Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI expose the startup's rocky origins.…
Mistral adds web search, image generation, Canvas for in-line editing, more to its Le Chat chatbot, and unveils Pixtral Large, a 124B-parameter multimodal model — Mistral, the French startup that made waves last year with a record-setting…
Telegram updates “mini-apps” to be able to run full screen and be pinned to homescreens; devs can now add subscription plans, a “gift” sending feature, and more — Full-screen mini-apps, including games such as Doom, can run in either…
Heather “Razzlekhan” Morgan, who helped launder the 2016 Bitfinex hack proceeds, is sentenced to 18 months in prison; her husband recently got a 5-year sentence — In the theft of bitcoin from Bitfinex — worth about $9 billion in today's…
Source: Google is working on a multi-year project to fully migrate Chrome OS to Android, to better compete with the iPad — To compete with the iPad, Google plans to push Android as its unified desktop OS. — • — TL;DR — A source within…
Trump's new FCC nominee promises to bring Project 2025-style governance to media — In September, I went through all the proposals from Project 2025 — the Heritage Foundation's policy blueprint for a second Trump term — that would have a…
Musk asked X users to try “submitting x-ray, PET, MRI or other medical images to Grok for analysis” weeks ago; many have, and HIPAA protections may not apply — Privacy experts cringed when people started feeding their medical images to the…
Goldman Sachs says it is reaching out to potential partners about plans to spin out its digital-assets platform within 12 to 18 months — - The bank is looking to create separate industry-owned company — Tech allows firms to issue and…
India fines Meta ~$25M and imposes new data rules, over antitrust issues from 2021 when it removed a way to opt out of sharing WhatsApp data with Meta companies — India's competition watchdog has ordered WhatsApp to stop sharing user data…
News influencers survey: 20% of US adults say they get news from social media influencers, 85% of influencers are on X and 27% identify as right-wing, and more — The creators and consumers in the world of news and information on social…
MicroStrategy bought ~51,780 bitcoin for ~$4.6B between November 11 and November 17, its largest purchase since starting in 2020, and now holds $29B+ in bitcoin — - Firm announced a $21 billion equity sale plan last month — Sold 13.6…
PitchBook: in 2023, US VCs returned $26B worth of shares back to investors, the lowest amount since 2011, and invested $60B more than they collected, a record — Investors hope the Trump administration will make tech acquisition deals…
Tim Berners-Lee's Inrupt trials its digital wallet in Belgium to let 7M citizens receive social services and share data with businesses, as he worries about AI — The inventor of the World Wide Web is on a laudable mission to give everyone…
How Substack is betting on politics content and recruiting stars like Nate Silver, as profits remain elusive; sources: Elon Musk sought to buy it in April 2023 — The newsletter start-up, which once drew an overture from Elon Musk, is…
Xiaomi reports Q3 revenue up 31% YoY to ~$12.8B, above ~$12.4B est., and a ~$738.5M net income, above ~$653M est., and expects smartphone and EV growth in 2025 — - Xiaomi again raises delivery target for SU7 sedan for 2024 — Handset…
Sources and ads: Foxconn tells recruiters that help hire iPhone assembly workers in India to remove age, gender, and marital criteria and its name from job ads — Apple supplier Foxconn has ordered the hiring agents that help recruit iPhone…
Samsung unveils a ~$7.2B share buyback plan, its first since 2017, aimed at boosting its stock, which is down 30%+ in 2024 amid concerns over Chair Lee Jae-yong — First repurchases in seven years are aimed at boosting stock and may help…
Q&A with The Verge EIC Nilay Patel on a likely FCC Chair Brendan Carr, Elon Musk's alliance with Donald Trump and how it threatens the First Amendment, and more — “All of these men are now hopelessly trapped in a problem their own…