By now, there’s hardly a coder in the world who isn’t using an AI copilot in some way. But using GitHub Copilot or Cursor.AI to ask technical questions and get debugging help could be just the beginning. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
It seems Lyft is hoping to catch up to Uber’s string of autonomous vehicle partnerships. Lyft announced Wednesday three separate partnerships — with startup May Mobility, automated driving company Mobileye and smart dashcam firm Nexar — all aimed at establishing a foothold in the emerging autonomous vehicle market. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
“Move cautiously and red-team things” is sadly not as catchy as “move fast and break things.” But three AI safety advocates made it clear to startup founders that going too fast can lead to ethical issues in the long run. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Most AI benchmarks don’t tell us much. They ask questions that can be solved with rote memorization, or cover topics that aren’t relevant to the majority of users. So some AI enthusiasts are turning to games as a way to test AIs’ problem-solving skills. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Go to TechCrunch.com for more tech stories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Can the U.S. meaningfully regulate AI? It’s not at all clear yet. Policymakers have achieved progress in recent months, but they’ve also had setbacks, illustrating the challenging nature of laws imposing guardrails on the technology. In March, Tennessee became the first state to protect voice artists from unauthorized AI cloning. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Google Maps is getting new features powered by Gemini, Google’s generative AI model. On Thursday the company announced incoming updates that will allow Google Maps users in the U.S. to tap into AI to help them find new places to visit and answer questions about different locations Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Two mobile operating systems currently comprise nearly 100% of the global smartphone market. Building one is hard, and for most phone makers, there are better uses of resources, especially when Android is right there for the taking Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Space executives took the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt on Monday to talk about the challenges and opportunities of building out dual-use technology, or tech that has both a defense and a commercial use case. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
The European Union has expanded its scrutiny of online marketplaces by opening a formal proceeding on Chinese low cost ecommerce platform, Temu, under the Digital Services Act (DSA), the Commission announced Thursday. Enforcers of the online governance framework will now dial up their oversight of Temu. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
A new startup setting out to combat the scourge of deepfakes and spoofed evidence in the age of AI is showing off its wares on the Startup Battlefield stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 this week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Meet Luna, a health and well-being app for teen girls that is designed to help them navigate teenhood. The app lets teens ask questions about their health and wellness and get responses from experts. It also lets them track their periods, moods, and skin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
The focus of the new $100 million fund, Crosscut’s sixth, will include energy and power, space and underwater exploration, advanced manufacturing, advanced materials, and security and defense. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Buzzy calendar apps tend to make a big splash and disappear after a while. Sometimes they get acquired, sometimes the company pivots to something else. That’s not the case with Fantastical, a popular calendar app for macOS, iOS, and other Apple platforms. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
McDonald’s ice cream machines have developed a lousy reputation for being broken when you visit the restaurant, largely due to strict copyright laws that only permit specially licensed technicians to legally repair them. The manufacturers have to license each technician, and they put locks on the McFlurry machines to prevent others from repairing them; A federal jury ruled Friday that Masimo smartwatches infringed Apple patents, but Apple isn’t getting a big payday. Bloomberg Law reports that th...
World models, also known as world simulators, are being touted by some as the next big thing in AI. AI pioneer Fei-Fei Li’s World Labs has raised $230 million to build “large world models,” and DeepMind hired one of the creators of OpenAI’s video generator, Sora, to work on “world simulators.” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Scout Motors, the Volkswagen Group spinoff, unveiled Thursday two EVs it hopes will hook American customers with modern-meets-rugged styling that downplays digital and embraces the mechanical. The catch? The company will also offer variants to its all-electric Scout Traveler SUV and Scout Terra Truck that will come equipped with a built-in gas-powered generator. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices...
The war in Ukraine has shown that warfare changes by the day. It’s also clear that the tech used to make war today is costly: While larger countries can afford legions of tanks, helicopters, and precision-strike systems, smaller nations find themselves scrambling for cheaper ways to defend themselves. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Brands often rely on scraping the web and monitoring social media to understand what customers are saying about them and get insights for product development. Cafeteria is a startup that wants to connect brands to their most opinionated customers: teens. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
The co-founders who sold their last startup to Spotify are working on a new project: an AI-powered educational startup called Oboe backed by a $4 million seed investment. The new company, hailing from Nir Zicherman and Michael Mignano, aims to democratize access to learning the way that their prior startup, Anchor. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
3D printing objects using metal is a well-established technique, but it tends to be too complex, expensive, or imprecise to match traditional methods at scale. Armed with $14 million from Nvidia and Boeing, Freeform aims to change that, building a new metal additive printing process that they say changes the game Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Anthropic has released an updated version of its Claude 3.5 Sonnet model with a new Computer Use feature that can interact with apps on a PC. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
As the creator economy is growing rapidly, brand partnerships remain one of the prime ways creators can earn money. Other services like link-in-bio apps with affiliate links or Pateron-like subscriptions become secondary ways to increase creators’ income. For platforms and startup, the biggest challenge remains to match brands and creators for collaboration Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
This week’s cover of WSJ Magazine is extremely minimalistic. That’s not surprising given that the main story is an in-depth interview with Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple and the king of minimalistic design; Instagram and Threads accounts that track the private jets of celebrities – including Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, Kim Kardashian, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and Kylie Jenner – were suspended on Monday, according to the owner of many such accounts, Florida college student, Jack Sweeney. Links to Inst...
Meta is expanding tests of facial recognition as an anti-scam measure to combat celebrity scam ads and more broadly, the Facebook owner announced Monday. Monika Bickert, Meta’s VP of content policy, wrote in a blog post that some of the tests aim to bolster its existing anti-scam measures Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
AI search engine Perplexity is in fundraising talks and hopes to raise around $500 million at an $8 billion valuation, according to the Wall Street Journal. If a deal happens with those terms, it would more than double Perplexity’s valuation from its $3 billion valuation when it raised from SoftBank over the summer; Uber and Lyft need to do more to support disabled passengers, especially those who are blind or visually impaired, according to protesters who gathered outside the companies’ headqua...
OpenAI quietly published a statement on its website pledging not to use its patents offensively. Asserting its commitment to the principles of “broad access” and “collaboration,” OpenAI said that it would only use its patents in a way that supports innovation Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Worldcoin, the Sam Altman co-founded “proof of personhood” crypto startup that scans people’s eyeballs, announced on Thursday that it dropped the “coin” from its name and is now just “World.” The startup also unveiled its next generation of iris-scanning “Orb” and other tools at a live event in San Francisco Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Instagram is introducing a series of new safety features to protect users from sextortion scammers, the company announced on Thursday. Most notably, the company is no longer going to allow people to screenshot or screen record ephemeral images or videos sent in private messages. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Amy Wu, founder of the AI-based mental health app Manifest, has a bold prediction for the next wave of tech. “Separately from the AI trend, I think so many people are seeing this loneliness epidemic that’s happening with Gen Z,” she said. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
