Techmeme
February 2, 2025, 4:25 PM

Top News

Vittoria Elliott / Wired:
Six engineers, all apparently between 19 and 24 years and linked to Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, are helping Musk gain control of federal infrastructure with DOGE  —  Engineers between 19 and 24, most linked to Musk's companies, are playing a key role as he seizes control of federal infrastructure.
Bloomberg:
Donald Trump's EO imposing levies on China says the “de minimis” exemption for items under $800 no longer applies, which could affect Alibaba, Shein, and others  —  - President could block tariff exemption for packages under $800  — Change could affect retailers such as Alibaba, Shein, Temu
Matthew Keys / The Desk:
The US NTSB says it will not email news outlets and reporters with updates about the two recent plane crashes, and will instead post updates on its X account  —  The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) on Saturday said it will stop e-mailing news organizations and reporters with updates …
Sima Kotecha / BBC:
The UK announces four new laws that make it illegal to possess, create, or distribute AI tools designed to produce CSAM, becoming the first country to do so  —  Four new laws will tackle the threat of child sexual abuse images generated by artificial intelligence (AI), the government has announced.
Bloomberg:
Some parents say they are eschewing 529 college savings plans and other traditional investments to invest in cryptocurrency to build wealth for their children  —  Despite the risks and volatility, some families are investing in cryptocurrency to build wealth for their children.
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
In a Reddit AMA, Sam Altman admitted that DeepSeek has lessened OpenAI's lead and said OpenAI has been “on the wrong side of history” in terms of open sourcing  —  To cap off a day of product releases, OpenAI researchers, engineers, and executives, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman …
Foo Yun Chee / Reuters:
Intel received €515.55M in default interest from the EU after it was reimbursed a €1.06B fine levied in 2009; EU's top court sided with Intel in October 2024  —  U.S. chipmaker Intel (INTC.O) has received 515.55 million euros ($536 million) in default interest from EU antitrust regulators related …
Brian Heater / TechCrunch:
Google's X spins out Heritable Agriculture, which aims to use AI to improve crop yield, as the incubator aggressively spins off companies under CEO Astro Teller  —  Google's X “moonshot factory” this week announced its latest graduate.  Heritable Agriculture is a data- and machine learning …
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More News

Shivangi Acharya / Reuters:

Earlier Picks

Andy Bounds / Financial Times:
More: Reuters.  Bluesky: @carnage4life, @quinnypig.com, and @nataliegreenpeer.  Mastodon: @1br0wn@eupolicy.social.  LinkedIn: Ken Pucker
Josh Boak / Associated Press:
Ayush Tiwari / Scroll.in: