Open Links In New Tab
Mobile Archives Advertise Site News Contact Editors
Techmeme
February 19, 2026, 9:10 PM
Mediagazer memeorandum WeSmirch
Home River Leaderboards About Events Newsletter

Top News

Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google rolls out Gemini 3.1 Pro, which it says is “a step forward in core reasoning”, for all users in the Gemini app; the .1 increment is a first for Google  —  In November, Google introduced Gemini 3 Pro in preview, with Gemini 3 Flash following a month later.
Kalley Huang / New York Times:
West Virginia's AG sues Apple for allegedly violating consumer protection law by not implementing tools like PhotoDNA to detect CSAM stored and shared on iCloud  —  The state's attorney general said in a lawsuit filed on Thursday that the company declined to use tools that recognize the material stored on iCloud.
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Meta says it is “explicitly separating” Quest VR from its Worlds platform, making Worlds “almost exclusively mobile”, letting it better compete with Roblox  —  Horizon Worlds is now going to be a platform that's ‘almost exclusively mobile.’
Jason Schreier / Bloomberg:
Sony shuts down Bluepoint Games, the PlayStation subsidiary behind remakes of older games like Demon's Souls and Uncharted; ~70 employees will lose their jobs  —  The PlayStation subsidiary previously made remakes of games like 'Demon's Souls'  —  Sony Group Corp. is shutting down Bluepoint Games …
Makena Kelly / Wired:
Docs: DHS has signed a five-year, $1B blanket purchase agreement with Palantir, allowing agencies like ICE to skip the competitive bidding process  —  “If you are interested in helping shape and deliver the next chapter of Palantir's work across DHS, please reach out,” a Palantir executive wrote …
Financial Times:
Sources: Nvidia nears an equity investment of up to $30B in OpenAI, replacing last year's long-term $100B commitment; the deal could be concluded this weekend  —  Chipmaker swaps last year's complex framework with AI start-up in favour of equity cheque  —  Nvidia is close to finalising …
Zoë Bernard / Wired:
Inside the “gay tech mafia” that mixes social and professional lives, as investors, entrepreneurs, and executives detail gay influence in Silicon Valley  —  Gay men have long been rumored to run Silicon Valley.  WIRED investigates.  —  No one can say exactly when, or if, gay men started running Silicon Valley.
Natalie Lung / Bloomberg:
New York pulls a proposal that would have allowed for robotaxi services outside NYC, a setback for Waymo, which wants to hit 1M paid weekly US rides by 2026 end  —  New York Governor Kathy Hochul has pulled a proposal that would have allowed for commercial robotaxi services outside New York City …
Max A. Cherney / Reuters:
Toronto-based chip startup Taalas, which hardwires AI models into custom silicon to achieve faster inference, raised $169M, bringing its total funding to $219M  —  Toronto-based chip startup Taalas said on Thursday it had raised $169 million and has developed a chip capable …
Jonathan Lloyd / NBC Los Angeles:
Los Angeles County sues Roblox, alleging it engaged in deceptive business practices that exposed children to sexual content, exploitation, and online predators  —  Roblox faces a lawsuit by Los Angeles County that alleges the gaming platform engaged in unfair and deceptive business practices …
Evan Halper / Washington Post:
How tech companies, including Meta and OpenAI, are building data centers with their own private power plants, a risky bet that will increase carbon emissions  —  Tech companies are building data centers with their own private power plants, a risky bet that will increase carbon emissions and other pollution.
Alan Neuhauser / Axios:
Sources: Emerald AI, which develops software to curb data center energy demand, is raising a $25M seed extension at a ~$250M post-money valuation  —  Emerald AI, which develops software to curb data-center energy demand, is raising $25 million in seed extension funding, two sources familiar with the offer tell Axios Pro.
Financial Times:
Sources: Accenture told executives that promotions would require “regular adoption” of AI and it is starting to track some senior staff's weekly AI tool logins  —  Consulting firms use ‘carrot and stick’ with some senior staff less willing to use technology than junior colleagues
Laith Al-Khalaf / Financial Times:
Klarna reports Q4 revenue up 38% YoY to $1.08B, a $26M net loss, down from a $40M net profit in Q4 2024, provision for credit losses up 59%; KLAR drops 26.9%  —  Swedish fintech's share price has plummeted by two-thirds since September IPO  —  Klarna shares slumped by more than a quarter …
Spencer Soper / Bloomberg:
Amazon dethrones Walmart as the world's largest company by revenue, reporting $717B in 2025 sales, compared to Walmart's $713.2B for the 12 months to January 31  —  Amazon.com Inc. has officially dethroned Walmart Inc. as the biggest global company by revenue, a milestone attesting …
Saritha Rai / Bloomberg:
India's AI Summit: Modi orchestrated a photo op with tech and business leaders holding hands in a line, but Sam Altman and Dario Amodei refused to clasp hands  —  Once a rival, always a rival.  —  As Prime Minister Narendra Modi kicked off the busiest day of India's AI Summit in New Delhi …
Cherylann Mollan / BBC:
The Gates Foundation says Bill Gates will not deliver his keynote at India's AI Summit after “careful consideration”, amid controversy over his Epstein ties
Bloomberg:
Atlassian's founders lost ~$7.2B in wealth in 2026, behind AppLovin's three founders, amid a SaaS rout; TEAM is down 45%+ YTD, the Nasdaq 100's worst performer  —  Michael Cannon-Brookes became a billionaire in his 30s and one of Australia's richest tech executives with the initial public offering …

Sponsor Posts

Subquadratic:
Subquadratic: the LLM built for 12M-token reasoning  —  SubQ can reason across entire codebases and document sets in one pass with no RAG workarounds.  Read how SubQ 1.1 Small holds near-perfect retrieval out to 12M tokens.
Cloudflare:
Cloudflare Connect 2026: The Agentic Conference  —  Stop preparing for agents.  Start running them.  100+ sessions, workshops, and speakers from OpenAI, Arm, and Cloudflare across AI, security, and performance.
Zoho:
Zoho Books is now ICAEW accredited  —  Zoho Books, an end-to-end accounting solution trusted by thousands of businesses and finance professionals worldwide, is now officially accredited by the Institute …
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.
Sponsor Techmeme

Featured Podcasts

Big Technology Podcast:
 A Sober Conversation About AI Existential Risk — With Nate Soares
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.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
 AI Wants to Shop for You. What Could Go Wrong?
Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
Invest Like the Best:
 Michael Moritz - Lessons From 40 Years of Investing and Writing
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
Sources:
 Baseten's CEO on why every company will want to own its AI
Candid conversations with the leaders shaping what's next in AI and the broader tech industry. Hosted by Alex Heath, who has covered Silicon Valley for more than a decade.
Subscribe to Sources.
Training Data:
 Box's Aaron Levie: On Reinventing Yourself in the AI Age and Enterprise Diffusion
Sequoia Capital partners host conversations with leading AI builders and researchers to develop a deeper understanding of the evolving technologies and their implications.
Subscribe to Training Data.
Uncapped with Jack Altman:
 Andrew Feldman from Cerebras
Conversations with people I admire about things I'm genuinely interested in.
Subscribe to Uncapped with Jack Altman.
Add your podcast here
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 9:10 PM ET, February 19, 2026.

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

Mark Stenberg / Adweek:
Politico plans to launch Decoded, a daily tech policy briefing and its second subscription offering, on October 5, to be paywalled in Q1 2027 and cost ~$1K/year

Maggie Harrison Dupré / Futurism:
Brown Brothers Media built an AI-fueled network of websites by buying established publications, creating fake writers, and flooding sites with AI-created posts

Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
Disney Entertainment promotes Adam Smith, formerly of YouTube, to chairman of D2C; Joe Earley moves to president of TV franchises and content strategy

More News

Jordyn Holman / New York Times:
Ring founder Jamie Siminoff is on an apology tour to quell an outcry over privacy concerns after Ring's Super Bowl Search Party ad, calling it a “perfect storm”

Earlier Picks

CEPR:
A study of 12K+ EU companies finds AI adoption increases labor productivity by 4% on average in the EU, with no evidence of reduced employment in the short run
Gayoung Lee / Gizmodo:
Microsoft's Project Silica team details its laser-modified glass storage tech, saying tests suggest that it can preserve large amounts of data for 10,000+ years
Mediagazer memeorandum WeSmirch
Home River Leaderboards About Events Newsletter