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Techmeme
August 19, 2025, 8:35 PM
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Top News

New York Times:
Sources: Meta considers downsizing its AI division, with some executives expected to leave, and is exploring using third-party models for its AI products  —  Meta is expected to announce a new restructuring of its artificial intelligence division amid internal tensions over the technology, people with knowledge of the plans said.
Riley Griffin / Bloomberg:
Memo: Meta restructures Superintelligence Labs; Alexandr Wang heads TBD Lab, Robert Fergus heads FAIR, Nat Friedman heads products, Aparna Ramani heads Infra  —  Meta Platforms Inc. is splitting its newly formed artificial intelligence group into four distinct teams and reassigning …
Kanishka Singh / Reuters:
US Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard says the UK has dropped its mandate requiring Apple to provide a backdoor for accessing users' encrypted data  —  Britain has dropped its demand for the iPhone maker Apple (AAPL.O) to provide a “backdoor” that would have enabled access …
Angel Au-Yeung / Wall Street Journal:
Databricks is finalizing a Series K at a $100B valuation, up 61% from its December 2024 round; sources say it is co-led by Thrive and a16z plans to participate  —  The data analytics company, fueled by the AI boom, was valued at $62 billion less than a year ago
CNBC:
US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick says Intel must give the government an equity stake in the company in return for CHIPS Act funds; INTC closes up 7%  —  Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Tuesday that Intel must give the U.S. government an equity stake in the company in return for CHIPS Act funds.
Reuters:
Sources: Nvidia is developing a new Blackwell-based AI chip for China, tentatively known as the B30A, that will be more powerful than its H20 model for China  —  Nvidia (NVDA.O) is developing a new AI chip for China based on its latest Blackwell architecture that will be more powerful …
Daniel Kuhn / The Block:
Wyoming launches a stablecoin, FRNT, marking the first time a US state has issued a blockchain-based, fiat-pegged token to be used by retail and enterprises  —  After years of research, the Wyoming Stable Token Commission has unveiled the mainnet launch of its first official state-backed stablecoin.
Steve Holland / Reuters:
The White House launches an official TikTok account, with the aim of communicating President Trump's policies  —  The White House launched an official TikTok account on Tuesday, taking advantage of its more than 150 million U.S. users to spread the messages of President Donald Trump.
Julie Bort / TechCrunch:
Firecrawl, which offers an open-source web crawler for developers and AI agents, raised a $14.5M Series A led by Nexus Venture Partners  —  Firecrawl's co-founder and CEO Caleb Peffer knew the exact moment he found the investor to lead his Series A.  —  He was in a coffee meeting …
Bloomberg:
DeepSeek releases V3.1, adding a longer context window, with few other details; Chinese media blames CEO Liang Wenfeng's perfectionism and bugs for R2's delay  —  DeepSeek announced what appeared to be an update to its older V3 artificial intelligence model on Tuesday, declaring an enhanced version ready for testing.
Sean Endicott / Windows Central:
Microsoft rolls out a COPILOT function in Excel for users in the Beta Channel, letting them use text prompts to categorize data, summarize feedback, and more  —  AI in Excel finally feels natural thanks to the new COPILOT function. … Or rather, more Copilot is being packed into the popular spreadsheet program.
Prakhar Srivastava / Reuters:
Tether hires Bo Hines, who stepped down as White House Crypto Council executive director earlier in August, as a strategic adviser to help it expand in the US  —  Cryptocurrency firm Tether has appointed former White House crypto policy executive Bo Hines as a strategic adviser to help steer …
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Meta rolls out AI-powered voice translations for creators on Facebook and Instagram globally, supporting English-Spanish translations with lip syncing  —  Meta is rolling out an AI-powered voice translation feature to all users on Facebook and Instagram globally, the company announced on Tuesday.
Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple is making all four iPhone 17 models in India ahead of debut, a first, as it expands to five factories to cut reliance on China for US-bound units  —  Apple Inc. is expanding iPhone production in India at five factories, including a pair of recently opened plants …
Robert McMillan / Wall Street Journal:
Federal prosecutors charge an Oregon man with operating the Rapper Bot, one of the most powerful DDoS botnets ever seen, which knocked X offline earlier in 2025  —  The Rapper Bot network knocked out Elon Musk's X social-media site earlier this year, cybersecurity researchers say
Krisztian Sandor / CoinDesk:
Bullish says it has received all $1.15B in capital raised from its IPO in stablecoins, including USDC, USDG, and PYUSD, marking a first for US public markets  —  Stablecoins used in the settlement include dollar- and euro-pegged tokens of Circle, Paxos, PayPal, Ripple and Societe Generale, among others.
Molly White / Citation Needed:
A look at Justin Sun's lawsuit against Bloomberg for publishing his holdings, which he claims he provided confidentially to qualify for its Billionaires Index  —  Listen to me read this post here (not an AI-generated voice!), subscribe to the feed in your podcast app, or download the recording for later.
Jonathan Stempel / Reuters:
Google will pay $30M to settle a class action lawsuit alleging it violated kids' privacy on YouTube by collecting data without parental consent for targeted ads  —  Google (GOOGL.O) will pay $30 million to settle a lawsuit claiming it violated the privacy of children using YouTube by collecting …
Carl Franzen / VentureBeat:
Alibaba releases Qwen-Image-Edit, the image editing version of Qwen-Image, supporting modifications of Chinese and English text while preserving font and style  —  Adobe Photoshop is among the most recognizable pieces of software ever created, used by more than 90% of the world's creative professionals, according to Photutorial.

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This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 8:35 PM ET, August 19, 2025.

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

Brian Steinberg / Variety:
Internal memo: CBS Mornings top producer Shawna Thomas will leave her role; a source says CBS News executives are eager to find a way to keep working with her

Michael Savage / The Guardian:
In response to its charter review, the BBC says “irreversible” trends threaten its survival, citing a “mismatch” between TV license rules and viewing habits

Naman Ramachandran / Variety:
ITV reports 2025 revenue up 1% YoY to £3.5B, ITV Studios revenue up 10% YoY to £2.13B, ITVX hit 16.5M MAUs and £540M in ad revenue, and confirms Sky talks

More News

Kate Park / TechCrunch:
NYC-based Eight Sleep, which makes the AI-powered Pod smart mattress cover for measuring sleep, raised $100M from HSG and others, after an $86M Series C in 2021

Earlier Picks

Kashish Tandon / Reuters:
OpenAI launches ChatGPT Go, a new India-only plan priced at Rs. 399, or ~$4.57, per month, its most affordable yet, to grow users in its second-largest market
Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:
A US federal appeals court rejects T-Mobile's bid to overturn a $92M fine for illegally selling customer location data without consent, after a 2024 FCC ruling
Sheryl Estrada / Fortune:
An MIT report finds that 95% of GenAI pilots at companies have little to no financial impact, due to the “learning gap” for both the tools and the companies
Devindra Hardawar / Engadget:
Nvidia plans to roll out RTX 5080-class performance to GeForce Now in September, letting users of its $20-per-month Ultimate tier stream in up to 5K at 120fps
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