Techmeme
January 7, 2026, 8:03 PM

Top News

Financial Times:
Sources: Chinese officials are reviewing Meta's $2B Manus acquisition for possible tech export control violations, including Manus' relocation to Singapore  —  Commerce ministry assessing whether deal for Chinese-founded group violates technology export controls
Ina Fried / Axios:
OpenAI unveils ChatGPT Health, which lets users import medical records and other data from health apps into ChatGPT, available to a small group via a waitlist  —  OpenAI is expanding its capabilities by adding a dedicated health tab to ChatGPT, allowing people to bring in electronic medical records …
Wall Street Journal:
Apple announces JPMorgan Chase as the new issuer of the Apple Card, taking over from Goldman Sachs, with an expected transition in about 24 months  —  After more than a year of negotiations, a deal to take over Goldman Sachs's role in Apple program is expected to be announced soon
Kate Clark / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Anthropic plans to raise $10B led by Singapore's GIC and Coatue Management at a $350B valuation before the new investment, up from $183B in September  —  The startup behind chatbot Claude is raising money from investors including GIC and Coatue Management
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
WhatsApp rolls out new group chat features: member tags that show user roles, text stickers generated from any word, and custom event reminders  —  WhatsApp on Wednesday said it's rolling out new features to group chats, including member tags, text stickers, and event reminders.
Financial Times:
Polymarket is disputing that the US mission to capture Nicolás Maduro constituted an “invasion”, refusing to pay out bets on a contract with $10.5M+ in wagers  —  Prediction market disputes US raid amounted to an invasion in fight over more than $10.5mn in wagers
Qianer Liu / The Information:
Sources: China has told some local tech companies to temporarily halt purchase orders for Nvidia's H200 chips while officials deliberate whether to approve them  —  The Chinese government this week asked some tech companies to temporarily halt plans to buy Nvidia's H200 AI chips …
Vicky Ge Huang / Wall Street Journal:
Trump family's World Liberty Financial says its entity World Liberty Trust has applied for a US banking license, which would let it issue the USD1 stablecoin  —  Critics have said World Liberty and its stablecoin pose a major conflict of interest for President Trump
Lucas Manfredi / The Wrap:
WBD's board unanimously rejects Paramount's amended $108.4B acquisition offer, saying the bid still has “significant” risks compared to Netflix's $83B offer  —  The board says the revised $108.4 billion bid continues to offer “significant costs, risks and uncertainties” compared to its $83 billion deal with Netflix
Katherine Doherty / Bloomberg:
Polymarket agrees to supply Dow Jones outlets like the WSJ and Barron's with prediction market trading data for online and in print, its first media partnership  —  Polymarket will supply Dow Jones with trading data under a new partnership, the latest in a string of deals between exchanges …
Bloomberg:
Hugh Langley / Business Insider:
Cecilia D'Anastasio / Bloomberg:
Researcher: Grok generated ~6,700 sexually suggestive or “nudifying” images per hour on X between January 5 and January 6; 85% of all Grok images are sexualized  —  Elon Musk's X has become a top site for images of people that have been non-consensually undressed by AI …
Amrith Ramkumar / Wall Street Journal:
Docs: Character.AI and Google agree to settle lawsuits with families of teenagers who killed or harmed themselves after interacting with Character.AI's chatbot  —  The cases involving Character.AI's virtual companions highlighted concerns about artificial intelligence and mental health
Gabriele Steinhauser / Wall Street Journal:
Cambodia extradites Chen Zhi, the chairman of online scam conglomerate Prince Group, to China; in October, the US DOJ seized Chen's bitcoin worth nearly $12B  —  Justice Department accused Chen Zhi of running a sprawling scam empire targeting Americans  —  Chen Zhi, the alleged ringleader …
Lizette Chapman / Bloomberg:
Lux Capital raised $1.5B for its ninth fund, the largest in its history, to back companies focusing on fields like breakthrough science and national security  —  Venture firm Lux Capital raised $1.5 billion for its ninth fund — the largest in its more than 20-year history …
Ben Weiss / Fortune:
Crypto infrastructure provider Fireblocks agrees to acquire accounting platform TRES Finance, sources say for $130M in cash and equity; TRES raised $11M in 2023  —  TRES Finance cofounders Tal Zackon (left) and Eilon Lotem.COURTESY OF TRES FINANCE  —  The blockchain infrastructure company Fireblocks …
Terrence O'Brien / The Verge:
Spotify launches Listening Activity on iOS and Android, letting users view friends' real-time listening via the sidebar alongside chats, as an opt-in feature  —  The company is also adding a Request to Jam option to mobile chats. … Since almost day one, Spotify has offered the ability …
Katherine Blunt / Wall Street Journal:
How Google's more ambitious approach to training Gemini on text, code, audio, images, and video helped it stage a comeback, triggering a Code Red inside OpenAI  —  After ChatGPT dominated early chatbot market, Google staged comeback with powerful AI model; biggest search-engine overhaul in years

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Featured Podcasts

Cheeky Pint:
What comes after smartphones, with Snap CEO Evan Spiegel
Stripe cofounder John Collison interviews founders, builders, and leaders over a pint.
Subscribe to Cheeky Pint.
Lenny's Podcast:
Snapchat CEO: Why distribution has become the most important moat | Evan Spiegel
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
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Big Technology Podcast:
Apple After Tim Cook, OpenAI's New Mojo, Meta's Internal Tracking Escapade
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
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Hard Fork:
Tim Cook's Legacy + The Future of U.B.I. With Andrew Yang + HatGPT
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.
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The Upstarts Podcast:
Chapter's Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz: From Palantir To $3B Medicare Disruptor
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
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Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ryan Roslansky: Turning AI Anxiety into Skills for the Future of Work
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.
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More News

Politico:

Earlier Picks

Jay Peters / The Verge:
Puyaan Singh / Reuters:
Chris Welch / Bloomberg: