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December 19, 2024, 5:05 PM
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Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Google releases Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking, an experimental “reasoning” model that “explicitly shows its thoughts” and can use them to strengthen its reasoning  —  Google has released what it's calling a new “reasoning” AI model — but it's in the experimental stages …
New York Times:
In 150+ X posts, Elon Musk led the charge to kill a bipartisan spending deal, in part by sharing misinfo, which may lead to a government shutdown over Christmas  —  The world's richest man led the charge to kill a bipartisan spending deal, in part by promoting false and misleading claims about it.
S.E. Smith / The Verge:
A look at the quickly disappearing web, as digital decay and link rot erase many media formats; a Pew study says 38% of webpages accessible in 2013 are now gone  —  The internet is forever.  But also, it isn't.  What happens to our culture when websites start to vanish at random?
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge:
Meta teases an AI editing tool powered by Movie Gen AI in Instagram that can change outfits, backgrounds, and more in videos using a text prompt, coming in 2025  —  Instagram is planning to introduce a generative AI editing feature next year that will allow users to “change nearly any aspect of your videos.”
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Anthropic demonstrates “alignment faking” in Claude 3 Opus to show how developers could be misled into thinking an LLM is more aligned than it may actually be  —  AI models can deceive, new research from Anthropic shows.  They can pretend to have different views during training …
Kiyoshi Takenaka / Reuters:
Sony buys ~$320M of shares in Japanese media powerhouse Kadokawa, which owns FromSoftware, taking its stake to ~10% and becoming Kadokawa's top shareholder  —  Sony Group (6758.T) said on Thursday it will invest about 50 billion yen ($320 million) to acquire new shares of Kadokawa (9468.T) …
Reuters:
Sources: Apple is in early-stage talks with Tencent and ByteDance about integrating their AI models into iPhones sold in China; ChatGPT is unavailable in China  —  Apple (AAPL.O) is in talks with Tencent (0700.HK) and TikTok owner ByteDance about integrating their artificial intelligence models …
Chainalysis:
In 2024, hackers stole $2.2B in crypto across 303 hacks, up from $1.8B across 282 hacks in 2023; by July 2024, $1.58B had been stolen, but the pace slowed after  —  The Chainalysis 2025 Crypto Crime Report  —  Crypto hacking remains a persistent threat, with four years …
Jef Feeley / Bloomberg:
Arm v. Qualcomm: Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon called Arm's Nuvia license cancellation and demand that Qualcomm destroy the IP after acquiring Nuvia “outrageous”  —  - Tech firms are sparring in weeklong jury trial in Delaware  — Closing arguments are expected Thursday in federal court
New York Times:
Sources: the US' proposed AI chip framework would block adversaries entirely, and give others quotas based on their US alignment, threatening Nvidia's expansion  —  The chipmaker expects more than $10 billion in foreign sales this year, but the Biden administration is advancing rules that could curb that growth.
Robert Booth / The Guardian:
A coalition of newspapers, writers, movie producers, and others rejects the UK's plans to create a copyright exemption for AI companies to train their models  —  Exclusive: Coalition of musicians, photographers and newspapers insist existing copyright laws must be respected
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Decart, which helps organizations train and run AI models at scale, raised a $32M Series A, sources say at a $500M+ valuation, after a $21M seed in October 2024  —  A young startup that emerged from stealth less than two months ago with big-name backers and bigger ambitions is returning to the spotlight.
More: SiliconANGLE and FinSMEs
Bloomberg:
Sources: Insight Partners, which acquired Dotmatics for ~$629M in March 2021, is exploring options for the R&D software maker, including selling it for $5B+  —  - Dotmatics expected to draw interest from strategic suitors  — Scientists use the company's software in drug research
Bloomberg:
A look at Frank McCourt's efforts to acquire TikTok and the obstacles he faces, as he lobbies Congress and Trump's team and recruits former TikTok executives  —  - TikTok hopes Supreme Court will halt ban at final hour  — McCourt is pitching his bid to Congress, Trump's team
Allyson Versprille / Bloomberg:
The US FAA publishes 22 temporary flight restrictions for drones over parts of New Jersey, as public hysteria over sightings of possible drone activity persists  —  The US Federal Aviation Administration prohibited drone flights over several parts of New Jersey as public hysteria over sightings continues to persist.
Joel Khalili / Wired:
A look at Truth Terminal, an AI bot on X that was created to spark debate about AI alignment, as its crypto wallet swells to ~$40M after boosting memecoins  —  Truth Terminal started as a techno-modernist art project meant to invite discussion about the applications and potential dangers of autonomous AI agents.
IDC:
Global wrist-worn wearable shipments fell 1% YoY to 139M units in Q1 2024 to Q3 2024; China was the largest market with 45.8M units and led growth at 20.1% YoY  —  , the global wrist-worn device market shipped 139.0 million units in the first three quarters of 2024, a year-over-year decline of 1.0% …
Bloomberg:
Document: the EU Commission pressed Apple to rework iOS so that the OS is more compatible with competitors' smartwatches, earbuds, headsets, and other devices  —  - Apple cites concerns that Meta access may undermine privacy  — EU watchdog has pressed company to rework iOS operating system
Foo Yun Chee / Reuters:
Apple says Meta has made 15 interoperability requests under the EU's DMA, more than any other company, and that these could affect users' privacy and security

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This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 5:05 PM ET, December 19, 2024.

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:
A source and internal figures: Condé Nast forecasts $130M in Q4 US advertising, $35M+ below its goal; Condé Nast says the figures are “materially inaccurate”

A.J. Katz / The Wrap:
Memo: MS NOW hires former CNN chief legal affairs correspondent Paula Reid as its chief White House reporter

Scott Nover / Washington Post:
Jezebel restores 100+ articles with racy or abortion-related headlines following objections by ex-staffers, says they were reposted after an “article review”

More News

Melissa Heikkilä / MIT Technology Review:
An analysis of nearly 4,000 public datasets finds that over 90% of AI training datasets came from Europe and North America, and fewer than 4% came from Africa

Earlier Picks

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Appfigures: global consumer spending in mobile apps on the App Store and Google Play rose 15.7% YoY to $127.3B in 2024, but app downloads dropped 2.3% to 109.7B
Vince Dioquino / Decrypt:
El Salvador plans to scale back its bitcoin efforts under an IMF deal for a $1.4B loan; bitcoin acceptance will no longer be mandatory for the private sector
Deadline:
Two Tencent-appointed Epic board directors resigned after the DOJ expressed antitrust concerns; Tencent also gave up its right to appoint future Epic directors
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