Take-Two acquires Borderlands developer Gearbox Entertainment from the Embracer Group for $460M in stock; the deal is expected to close by the end of June 2024
A new Homeworld game is also in development. — Embracer Group has officially divested Gearbox Entertainment …
Leaked images show a white disc-less Xbox Series X, which Microsoft plans to release in summer 2024, with the same design as the existing black Xbox Series X
This in continuation of eXputer's previous report back in February. … Back in February, I reported that Microsoft has plans …
Anthropic's Claude 3 Opus surpassed OpenAI's GPT-4 on Chatbot Arena, a crowdsourced LLM leaderboard used by AI researchers; GPT-4 has been first since launch
Anthropic's Claude 3 is first to unseat GPT-4 since launch of Chatbot Arena in May '23. — On Tuesday, Anthropic's Claude 3 …
A US judge sentences Sam Bankman-Fried to 25 years in prison over his role in the multi-billion dollar FTX fraud and orders him to forfeit $11B
Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison by a judge on Thursday for stealing $8 billion from customers of the now-bankrupt FTX …
Oregon's governor signs the first US right-to-repair bill banning manufacturers from using “parts pairing” to dictate what replacement components owners can use
Oregon Governor Tina Kotek has now signed one of the strongest US right-to-repair bills into law after it passed …
GLAAD: Meta is failing to curb posts calling for violence against trans people, calling trans and gender nonconforming people “satanic” and “perverts”, and more
GLAAD catalogued dozens of instances of anti-trans posts, many by high-profile influencers and media outlets
MLCommons shares the results from its MLPerf 4.0 inferencing benchmarks, which added Llama 2 70B and Stable Diffusion XL; PCs with Nvidia GPUs came out on top
no Blackwell submissions yet, sorry Karl Freund / Forbes : Nvidia Sweeps AI Benchmarks While AMD Misses The Boat. Again. Intel : Intel Gaudi 2 Remains Only Benchmarked Alternative to NV H100 for GenAI...
How in-app browsers silently subvert user choice, stifle innovation, trap users into apps, break websites, and enable apps to severely undermine user privacy
In-App Browsers subvert user choice, stifle innovation, trap users into apps, break websites and enable applications to severely undermine user privacy.
Google says Gemini Nano is coming to Pixel 8 with the next Pixel Feature Drop, after previously saying the device won't get Nano due to “hardware limitations”
After “hardware limitations” were cited as the reason that the Pixel 8 isn't getting Gemini Nano earlier this month …
The US OMB releases new AI guidance, requiring that all federal agencies submit an annual AI report and have a senior leader overseeing all AI systems they use
All US federal agencies will now be required to have a senior leader overseeing all AI systems they use, as the government wants …
Investigation: data broker Near Intelligence left the coordinates of nearly 200 mobile devices of people who visited Jeffrey Epstein's island exposed online
A WIRED investigation uncovered coordinates collected by a controversial data broker that reveal sensitive information about visitors … Mastodon: @wchr@mastodon.social . Bluesky: @babyboomerwriter.bsk...
A profile of Anduril founder Palmer Luckey, as the AI surveillance and defense tech startup, which sells drones to the US, expects $1B in annual revenue by 2026
Silicon Valley has found a lucrative trade selling AI-powered weapons — and Palmer Luckey is leading the way
Ray-Ban Meta glasses hands-on: AI features coming in April, triggered by “Hey, Meta”, are sometimes impressive and helpful, but the AI often gets things wrong
Brian X. Chen, left, and Mike Isaac, reporters for The New York Times, trying out Meta's new Ray-Ban smart glasses.Aaron Wojack for The New York Times
Marc Andreessen, Chris Dixon, Galaxy Digital, and others invest $75M in crypto fund 1kx, which has raised ~$200M since 2018 and invested in Rarible and more
- 1kx is targeting areas including crypto consumer applications — VC funding has been slower to recover than crypto prices
Sources: the US and UK are reviewing $20B+ in Tether transactions through Moscow-based crypto exchange Garantex, as part of a crackdown on sanctions evasions
- Allies review Tether transfers to sanctioned exchange Garantex — Tether says it works with law enforcement to ensure compliance
A US judge rules that the SEC's lawsuit against Coinbase can proceed, but dismisses one claim that Coinbase acted as an unregistered broker via Coinbase Wallet
Disney adds Hulu to Disney+, after beta testing the integration since December 2023; Disney+ subscribers who don't pay for Hulu can still search for Hulu shows
Hulu on Disney+ is now LIVE in the U.S. for bundled subscribers. You can now access all your favorites from both Hulu and Disney+ libraries, all in one place. … Michael Cupo : Excited for today's Hul...
Amazon invests another $2.75B in Anthropic, the second tranche of its planned $4B investment in the AI startup, after investing $1.25B in September 2023
Similarweb: GPTs created by subscribers on OpenAI's GPT Store accounted for just 1.5% of desktop visits to ChatGPT's site in February, suggesting limited appeal
CEO Sam Altman wants customised chatbots to supercharge its business but data suggests ‘GPTs’ have limited appeal
Google researchers observed 97 zero-day exploits in the wild in 2023, up 50% from 62 in 2022; 48 were used by espionage actors and 10 were financially-motivated
Jonathan Greig / The Record :
At a DC event on May 1, over 100 tech CEOs and investors plan to lobby against AI regulation, ask to relax immigration rules, and drum up hawkishness on China
Jacob Helberg, a senior adviser to Palantir, is organizing a conference for tech leaders and Washington lawmakers on May 1.Jason Andrew for The New York Times X: @ainowinstitute , @thekenyeung , and @...
Trump Media & Technology Group closed up 14% at $66.22 on March 27, for a $13.5B market cap, as small investors boost the stock; Trump's stake is worth ~$5.3B
Heavy trading in company behind Truth Social fuels talk of a new cycle of ‘meme stock mania’
Google blocked or removed 5.5B ads and 12.7M advertiser accounts for violating its policies in 2023, up from 5.2B ads and 6.7M advertiser accounts in 2022
Nicola Agius / Search Engine Land :
Blockchain game Munchables, which offers rewards for looking after digital creatures, loses ~$63M in ETH in a hack; the hacker seems to have returned the funds
Google's charitable wing Google.org launches a generative AI accelerator, to be funded by $20M in grants and include 21 nonprofits to start, including Quill.org
Google.org, Google's charitable wing, is launching a new program to help fund nonprofits developing tech that leverages generative AI.
Google adds AI-generated trip itineraries to Search, translation to Circle to Search, and curated recommendations in Maps in 40+ cities across the US and Canada
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge :
At Intel's AI Summit in Taipei, executives say Copilot will soon run locally on PCs and that there will be a 40 TOPS requirement for NPUs on next-gen AI PCs
A look at an Indian court case over Byju Raveendran's control of Byju's, as investors, who voted to remove Raveendran last month, brace for a protracted battle
Financial Times :
Affinity and Canva publish a joint pledge promising to keep Affinity's design software “fair, transparent, and affordable”, including its “perpetual licenses”
NYC-based Coro, which offers SMB cybersecurity tools, raised a $100M Series D led by One Peak, sources say at a $750M post-money valuation, to expand in Europe
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch :
NYC-based Hume, which offers a conversational AI that, Hume says, can interpret emotions based on people's voices, raised a $50M Series B at a $219M valuation
Pelago, formerly Quit Genius, which provides virtual therapy sessions for treating addictions, raised a $58M Series C, bringing its total funding to $151M
Kate Park / TechCrunch :
Poland's consumer watchdog fines Amazon ~$8M for allegedly misleading consumers, including via dark pattern design tricks, ending a probe from February 2023
Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch :
Mandiant: Yevgeny Prigozhin-linked online influence operations are active months after his death in August 2023, and underwent subtle shifts in their targeting
especially as elections draw near. Still, “we also have to be careful not to overestimate what they can do,” @JohnHultquist said. “It's not easy to be an influencer.” https://www.wsj.com/... Dustin Vo...
Google adds a tool that lets US users swipe left or right to rate apparel and accessories to get style recommendations on mobile browsers and Google app
Get ready for a truly personalized shopping journey! …
Microsoft rolls out Azure AI Studio tools to stop users from tricking AI chatbots to behave in unintended ways, including “prompt shields” and falsehood alerts
- Company's Copilot recently generated weird, harmful responses — Defenses are designed to spot and block suspicious activity
Data observability service Observe raised a $115M Series B led by Sutter Hill Ventures with participation from Snowflake, sources say at a $400M-$500M valuation
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch :
Analysis: in the past two years, Amazon committed to spending $148B over 15 years on data centers, including in Mississippi, Saudi Arabia, and Malaysia
Matt Day / Bloomberg :
A look at the rise and fall of Emad Mostaque and Stability AI, including how Mostaque's relationship with Coatue and Lightspeed blossomed and then fell apart
You may have heard of the saying, “two heads are better than one.” Kazim Ali Alvi / Windows Report : Will Stability AI's former CEO, Emad Mostaque, join Microsoft? Sissi Cao / Observer : Unicorn A.I. ...
A survey of 10,133 US adults: 43% of those aged 18-29 used ChatGPT in February 2024, up from 33% in July 2023, compared to 27% of 30-49 and 23% of all adults
Celestial AI, which develops optical tech for linking together processors and memory modules, raised a $175M Series C led by US Innovative Technology Fund
Maria Deutscher / SiliconANGLE :
NewRetirement, which offers financial retirement planning tools for consumers and enterprise customers, raised a $20M Series A led by Allegis Capital
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch :
Shopify: Revolutionizing Commerce with Winter Edition '26
Over 150+ new features transform how merchants build, design, and grow—with technology that amplifies creative vision.
Email fatigue is real: Here's how smart email tools help you regain control
Picture this: It's Monday morning. You walk into the office feeling energized and ready to take on the week.
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data
Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.