Techmeme
August 31, 2025, 4:05 PM

Top News

Christopher Mims / Wall Street Journal:
The price per token for AI models has fallen, but costs for developers are rising as newer reasoning models require more tokens to complete tasks  —  With models doing more ‘thinking,’ the small companies that buy AI from the giants to create apps and services are feeling the pinch
Stefanno Sulaiman / Reuters:
TikTok suspends its live feature for the “next few days” in Indonesia, citing “increasing violence in protests” over lawmakers' pay  —  ByteDance's TikTok has suspended its live feature for the “next few days” in Indonesia following protests in the country, its spokesperson said in a statement on Saturday.
Brayden Lindrea / Cointelegraph:
El Salvador has split its 6,000+ bitcoin across 14 wallets, describing the move as a precaution against quantum attacks, a merely theoretical threat for now  —  El Salvador has transferred its 6,274 Bitcoin into 14 new wallet addresses as part of a security measure to protect against the threat of quantum attacks.
Noah Smith / Noahpinion:
A critique of two contrasting research papers on AI's impact on US employment trends, along with caveats from a Stanford study on jobs in AI-exposed fields  —  Some top economists claim AI is now destroying jobs for a subset of Americans.  Are they right?  —  The debate over whether AI …
Joshua Rothman / New Yorker:
A look at the potential future of personalized, AI-generated entertainment, and how it could both submerge human originality and enable new forms of expression  —  We're used to algorithms guiding our choices.  When machines can effortlessly generate the content we consume, though, what's left for the human imagination?
X: @newyorkerLinkedIn: Pinja Pakalen, David Szauder, and Kieran Knowles
Bluesky: @olivermantell, @raynewman, and @hernMastodon: @ricmac@mastodon.socialForums: Hacker News
Phil Hoad / The Guardian:
Dina Bass / Bloomberg:
A study focused on OpenAI's GPT-4o mini found that LLMs can be persuaded to comply with objectionable requests using the same tactics that persuade humans  —  AI chatbots can be manipulated much in the same way that people can, according to researchers.  But first...  Three things to know:
More: WinBuzzer and Forbes
David Gilbert / Wired:
Purgatory, tied to online community The Com, claims responsibility for swatting attacks on US universities, airports, and more, charging $20 to $95 per incident  —  WIRED spoke to a self-proclaimed leader of an online group called Purgatory, which charged as little as $20 to call in fake threats against schools.
Cory Weinberg / The Information:
Filing: StubHub, which is planning a September IPO, says revenue grew 3% to $828M in H1, missing its earlier projection of $885M, with adjusted EBITDA down 7%  —  Even as StubHub makes a renewed push to go public, its business isn't expanding as quickly as it had hoped.
More: The Times

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Shopify: Revolutionizing Commerce with Winter Edition '26  —  Over 150+ new features transform how merchants build, design, and grow—with technology that amplifies creative vision.
Zoho:
The best time to become a Zoho Partner  —  The business world is not only changing but it is being rebuilt.  Customers want connected ecosystems that will help them automate, unify their data, and do more with less.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Hard Fork:
Australia Kicks Kids Off Social Media + Is the A.I. Water Issue Fake? + Hard Fork Wrapped
The future is already here. Each week, journalists Kevin Roose and Casey Newton explore and make sense of the latest in the rapidly changing world of tech.
Subscribe to Hard Fork.
Access:
Why the next AI frontier is phone calls, with Beside CEO Maxime Germain
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
Great Chat:
So what happens after AGI?
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ted Sarandos: Netflix and how tech changed storytelling
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.
Big Technology Podcast:
AI Is Upending Law. Is That A Sign For The Rest Of Us? — With Melia Russell
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
[trading places]:
Ben Black Akkadian Ventures🏆 | Secondaries Secrets 💎 | RAISE Conf 🎯 | Vercel $9B 🚀
a very bad podcast about broken unicorns & busted carry hosted by dave mcclure and aman verjee
Subscribe to [trading places].
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 4:05 PM ET, August 31, 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.

More News

Earlier Picks

David DiMolfetta / Nextgov/FCW:
Jeff Horwitz / Reuters: