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Techmeme
December 4, 2023, 6:00 AM
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Top News

New York Times:
A deep dive into the founding of DeepMind, OpenAI, and Anthropic, as many of their backers feared the risks of advanced AI but wanted the power to shape it  —  The people who were most afraid of the risks of artificial intelligence decided they should be the ones to build it.
Paresh Dave / Wired:
Documents: OpenAI signed a letter of intent in 2019 to spend $51M on brain-inspired chips developed by startup Rain AI, in which Sam Altman had invested $1M+  —  Documents show that OpenAI signed a letter of intent to spend $51 million on brain-inspired chips developed by startup Rain.
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Spotify plans to lay off ~17% of its workforce, or ~1,500 staff, to “rightsize” its costs, after cutting 6% in June, citing slow growth and rising capital costs  —  Spotify is eliminating about 17% jobs, its third round of layoffs, as the music streaming looks to become “both productive and efficient.”
Tara García Mathewson / The Markup:
How a California college uses data collection tools to track students' daily movements, like homework trackers, e-proctoring software, and license plate readers  —  A Markup examination of a typical college shows how students are subject to a vast and growing array of watchful tech …
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Chase Bank could be an ideal Goldman Sachs replacement for Apple Card, as it uses the same Mastercard network and already has a strong relationship with Apple  —  Apple and Goldman Sachs are on the verge of splitting up, and Chase is the ideal partner to step in.
Matt Levine / Bloomberg:
Researchers show AI misalignment in a GPT-4-based stock trading bot that performed insider trading in a simulated environment without being instructed to do so  —  Also OpenAI's board, kangaroo grazing and bank box-checking.  —  AI MNPI  —  Here you go, insider trading robot:
Bloomberg:
Bitcoin trades above $40K for the first time since May 2022, as the digital asset extends its 2023 rebound on expectations of interest-rate cuts and ETF demand  —  - Anticipation builds that the US will allow spot Bitcoin ETFs  — Crypto benefiting from conviction that Fed will cut rates
Maria Sherman / Associated Press:
Kiss' three current members reveal digital avatars of themselves, created by Pophouse and George Lucas' ILM, which will tour as the rock band stops live touring  —  On Saturday night, Kiss closed out the final performance of their “The End of the Road” farewell tour at New York City's famed Madison Square Garden.
Jon Victor / The Information:
Sources: Google quietly delayed Gemini's public launch from next week to January 2024; a source says the LLM doesn't reliably handle some non-English queries  —  Google has quietly delayed the public debut of Gemini, a conversational artificial intelligence that aims to compete with OpenAI …

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About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 6:00 AM ET, December 4, 2023.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.

From Mediagazer

Isabella Simonetti / Wall Street Journal:
A profile of Fortune editor Nick Lichtenberg, who uses AI to research and write articles; AI-assisted stories made up ~20% of Fortune's web traffic in H2 2025

New York Times:
Sources: Versant is one of multiple suitors in talks to buy Vox Media's podcast network as it seeks to diversify its revenue; NBCU invested $200M in Vox in 2015

Oliver Darcy / Status:
Internal figures show Business Insider's paid subscribers have consistently declined, from about 185K at the end of 2022 to 135K at the end of 2025, a 27% drop

More News

Christopher Mims / Wall Street Journal:
The threat to Intel now comes from a whole ecosystem of companies, including nearly every tech giant, although the chip giant is still a strong competitor
More: Patently Apple.  Threads: @technicallymims and @pkedrosky.  Mastodon: @[email protected]
Jaron Schneider / PetaPixel:
Sources: Bending Spoons, which acquired Filmic in September 2022, laid off the photo and video app maker's entire team, including founder and CEO Neill Barham

Earlier Picks

Alyson Shontell / Fortune:
A profile of Thrive Capital founder Joshua Kushner, who built the $5.3B firm outside his famous family, growing from a $40M fund in 2011 to a $3.3B eighth fund
Anthony Ha / Engadget:
A look at the escalating battle between YouTube and ad blockers, as YouTube more frequently adapts its detection methods and rolls out new ways to serve ads
Reuters:
Sources: EU lawmakers cannot agree on how to regulate systems like ChatGPT, with foundation models becoming the main hurdle in talks over their proposed AI Act
Anthony Capaccio / Bloomberg:
The US, the UK, and Australia plan to test a new way to track Chinese submarines using AI to rapidly process sonar data, as part of the AUKUS security alliance
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