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June 26, 2023, 7:25 PM
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Top News

James Vincent / The Verge:
AI is killing the web with spam sites, mass article producing “AI editors”, AI-generated junk on Etsy, Reddit, and Wikipedia that exhausts moderators, and more  —  In recent months, the signs and portents have been accumulating with increasing speed.  Google is trying to kill the 10 blue links.
NewsGuard:
Analysis: in May and June 2023, 141 major brands ran ads, mostly via Google Ads, across 55 low-quality sites with AI-generated articles, some posting ~1,200/day  —  NewsGuard identified 141 brands that are feeding programmatic ad dollars to low-quality AI-generated news and information sites operating with little to no human oversight
Brian Fung / CNN:
A look at how the $42.5B US broadband infrastructure plan will be allocated: Texas leads with $3.3B+, California gets $1.8B+, Missouri gets $1.7B+, and more  —  The Biden administration on Monday outlined how states across the country will be receiving billions of dollars in federal funding …
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Meta announces Quest+, a VR subscription service that gives Quest 2, Quest 3, and Quest Pro users access to two games every month for $7.99/month or $59.99/year  —  Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg just announced Quest Plus, the company's new “virtual reality subscription” that gives users access to “the best titles on the platform,” he said.
Will Knight / Wired:
DeepMind co-founder and CEO Demis Hassabis details Gemini, an upcoming ChatGPT rival meant to combine the strengths of AlphaGo-type systems and those of LLMs  —  Demis Hassabis says the company is working on a system called Gemini that will tap techniques that helped AlphaGo defeat a Go champion in 2016.
David Meyer / Fortune:
A last-minute amendment to an Irish bill would let the Data Protection Commission declare some info in privacy complaints as confidential, sparking an uproar  —  European privacy advocates are hopping mad at what they see as an attempt by the Irish government to draw a veil over the activities …
Wall Street Journal:
Databricks plans to acquire generative AI startup MosaicML in a ~$1.3B deal set to close by July 31; MosaicML debuted in 2021, raised $64M, and has 62 employees  —  The deal aims at connecting businesses' data with services to help them build their own, cheaper language models, Databricks CEO says
Jesse Hamilton / CoinDesk:
FTX's bankruptcy team says the exchange owed its customers ~$8.7B after commingling and misusing their deposits, and has recovered ~$7B in liquid assets so far  —  Commingling and misuse of customer and corporate funds occurred from the inception of FTX, says current CEO John J. Ray III.
Allison Johnson / The Verge:
Google Pixel Fold review: landscape-first is great for videos and the outer display feels natural, but it's heavy, pricey, and has limited multitasking features  —  If you buy something from a Verge link, Vox Media may earn a commission.  See our ethics statement.  —  The Google Pixel Fold is a lot of phone.
The Verge:
A survey of 2,000+ US adults finds 57% know of ChatGPT, 46% for Bing Chat, 45% for My AI, and 38% for Bard; only ~33% have used the tools, with Gen Z dominating  —  We polled 2,000 people about how they're using AI, what they want it to do, and what scares them about it the most.
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
Decentralized social media app Damus says Apple rejected an app update and asked it to either remove its tipping feature or use Apple's in-app purchase system  —  Damus, a decentralized social networking app backed by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, will be removed from the App Store due to Apple's strict payment rules.

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About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 7:25 PM ET, June 26, 2023.

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

Benjamin Mullin / New York Times:
Arkansas PBS severs ties with the PBS network, the first state public TV system to do so since Congress cut CPB funds, citing the annual $2M+ membership cost

Pamela McClintock / The Hollywood Reporter:
Disney's Zootopia 2 surpasses $1B at the global box office, the fastest PG-rated film to do so after just 17 days in release

Sam Roberts / New York Times:
Arthur L. Carter, who started a Connecticut newspaper in 1981, bought and sold The Nation, and founded the New York Observer in 1987, has died at 93

More News

Financial Times:
A profile of South Korean engineer Choi Jin-seok, who set out to become a star in China's chip industry after his career stalled and now faces IP theft charges
Hope King / Axios:
Amazon plans to build a local delivery network in 23 states by recruiting thousands of small US businesses, from bodegas to florists, to deliver its packages

Earlier Picks

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
IBM plans to acquire Apptio for $4.6B in cash from Vista Equity Partners, which paid $1.94B to take the cloud IT management startup private in November 2018
Yuval Mann / Ynetnews:
An interview with early Waze investors Yahal Zilka and Ehud Levy on why they invested, the impact of Google's acquisition on Israel's tech industry, and more
Phoebe Liu / Forbes:
A profile of Christina Cacioppo, the co-founder and CEO of data security compliance startup Vanta, which has an ~$80M ARR, a $1.6B valuation, and raised $203M
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