Techmeme
February 11, 2025, 7:30 AM

Top News

Wall Street Journal:
Investors led by Elon Musk make an unsolicited $97.4B bid to buy the nonprofit that controls OpenAI, complicating Sam Altman's plans to convert to a for-profit  —  Unsolicited offer complicates Sam Altman's plans to convert OpenAI to a for-profit company — A consortium of investors led …
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The Hill:
In response to the $97.4B OpenAI bid, Sam Altman says on X “no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want”; Elon Musk replies “swindler”  —  OpenAI CEO and co-founder Sam Altman appeared to shut down a reported offer from an investor group led …
CNBC:
Investors behind the $97.4B OpenAI bid include xAI, Baron Capital, Valor, Atreides, Vy Capital, Joe Lonsdale's 8VC, and an investment vehicle led by Ari Emanuel  —  Elon Musk is leading a group of investors in offering to buy control of OpenAI for $97.4 billion, CNBC confirmed.
Wall Street Journal:
Elon Musk's $97.4B OpenAI offer could force OpenAI's board to reassess how it is valuing the nonprofit, complicating Sam Altman's plans even if he rejects it  —  Unsolicited bid could set a new value for the ChatGPT maker's assets during its transformation to a for-profit company
Ina Fried / Axios:
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Google Calendar removes Pride month, Black History Month, Holocaust Remembrance Day, and other events, saying it wasn't “scalable or sustainable” to keep them  —  Google says it switched to only showing default entries for public holidays and national observances last year.
Umar Shakir / The Verge:
Kevin Roose / New York Times:
Paris AI summit takeaways: Europe has regulation regrets, AI doomsayers have lost ground, and policymakers can't seem to grasp how soon powerful AI could arrive  —  At times, Kevin Roose writes, it feels like he is watching policymakers on horseback trying to install seatbelts on a passing Lamborghini.
Wall Street Journal:
At the AI Action Summit in Paris, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says the bloc plans to mobilize €200B to invest in AI to catch the US and China  —  The announcement underscores efforts from the EU to position itself as a key player in the AI race
Reuters:
Jagmeet Singh / TechCrunch:
Google brings NotebookLM Plus, its AI research assistant tier with higher usage limits, to Google One AI Premium subscribers, and debuts a 50% student discount  —  Google has expanded NotebookLM Plus, a paid version of its AI-based note-taking and research assistant, to individual users subscribed …
Dan Mangan / CNBC:
An Alabama man pleads guilty over the SIM-swap hack of the US SEC's X account, which falsely claimed in January 2024 that the agency had approved bitcoin ETFs  —  An Alabama man pleaded guilty Monday in federal court in Washington, D.C., in connection with last year's hack of the U.S. Securities …
The Logic:
Source: Shopify tells support staff to give “no comment” if merchant clients asked about Kanye West using its tech to sell a T-shirt with a Nazi swastika  —  One former Shopify employee told The Logic it was 'heartbreaking to see your life's work perverted by full-on friggin' Nazis'

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Earlier Picks

Bloomberg:
Andrew J. Hawkins / The Verge:
Scott Rosenberg / Axios:
Liam Dawe / GamingOnLinux:
Kelcee Griffis / Bloomberg: