Techmeme
January 22, 2025, 1:45 PM

Top News

Dominic Preston / The Verge:
Samsung announces the $800 Galaxy S25 with a 6.2" screen and the $1K 6.7" Galaxy S25 Plus, with 12GB of RAM, Snapdragon 8 Elite, “Qi2 Ready”, and more  —  If the Galaxy S24 series heralded the triumphant arrival of Galaxy AI, then the S25 and S25 Plus may be a bit of a comedown …
Sam Rutherford / Engadget:
Samsung unveils the $1.3K Galaxy S25 Ultra with a 6.9" QHD+ AMOLED screen, up from 6.8", 50MP sensor for the ultra-wide camera, a small S Pen downgrade, more  —  Samsung's latest fad is the introduction of AI agents.  —  Senior Writer, Reviews  —  Last year Samsung embraced artificial intelligence …
Samsung on YouTube:
A livestream of Samsung Galaxy Unpacked January 2025  —  #GalaxyUnpacked is now LIVE.  Join us.  #GalaxyAI #SamsungWatch our ASL stream: https://www.youtube.com/live/QhhG6Q- XWFMTo view the YouTube streams on a deskto...
Cherlynn Low / Engadget:
A live blog of Samsung Galaxy Unpacked 2025, where Samsung is expected to announce the Galaxy S25 lineup, new Galaxy AI features, and more  —  We're expecting the first major Android flagships of the year in the Galaxy S25, S25 Plus and S25 Ultra.  —  The start of Samsung's Samsung Unpacked event …
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
OpenAI, SoftBank, and Oracle unveil The Stargate Project, a JV to invest in US AI infrastructure, committing $100B now and up to $500B over the next four years  —  OpenAI says that it will team up with both the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank and with Oracle, along with others, to build multiple data centers for AI in the U.S.
M.G. Siegler / Spyglass:
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Dominic Preston / The Verge:
Google's Gemini will be the default on-device assistant for the new Galaxy S25 series, and gets the ability to work across multiple apps in a single prompt  —  Google's AI assistant Gemini is now able to carry out tasks across multiple apps in a single interaction, in an update announced today alongside …
Becky Bracken / Dark Reading:
The Trump administration fires all advisory committee members within the DHS, including those in the CISA's CSRB, which was investigating Salt Typhoon hackers  —  In a letter sent today, the acting DHS secretary terminated membership to all advisory boards, including the Cyber Safety Review Board …
New York Times:
Trump pardons Silk Road creator Ross Ulbricht, a crypto and libertarian cult hero serving a life sentence since 2015 on money laundering, drug charges, and more  —  Ross Ulbricht was serving a life sentence for creating a site in a shady corner of the internet to sell heroin, cocaine and other illicit substances.
Financial Times:
Sources: Google is investing $1B+ more in Anthropic, which is also nearing a further $2B round from Silicon Valley VCs led by Lightspeed at a ~$60B valuation  —  Artificial intelligence group closes in on $60bn valuation  —  Google is making a fresh investment of more than $1bn into OpenAI rival Anthropic …
Jennifer Maas / Variety:
Insomniac Games founder and CEO Ted Price plans to step down from the Sony-owned studio after 30+ years; a trio of Insomniac veterans will serve as co-heads  —  Taking over for Price, who will be staying with the PlayStation Studio through March, are a trio of Insomniac vets who will serve …
The Cloudflare Blog:
In 2024, Cloudflare's autonomous DDoS defense systems blocked ~21.3M DDoS attacks, up 53% YoY, and 420+ DDoS attacks in Q4 2024 exceeded 1Tbps, up 1,885% QoQ  —  This post is also available in .體中文, Deutsch, 한국어, Español (Espaňa) and Français.
Stephanie Palazzolo / The Information:
Source: OpenAI plans to release a new ChatGPT feature called Operator this week to automate complex tasks typically done via a web browser  —  OpenAI is preparing to release a new ChatGPT feature this week that will automate complex tasks typically done through the Web browser …
Washington Post:
Sources: a deep philosophical rift over how DOGE should operate spurred Vivek Ramaswamy's exit, with Donald Trump's January 20 EO embodying Elon Musk's vision  —  A deep philosophical rift between the two billionaire leaders of the “Department of Government Efficiency” left Musk to run the group.
Victoria Song / The Verge:
Samsung launches a kid-friendly mode for the Galaxy Watch 7, letting children call and text trusted contacts, and parents track kids via GPS  —  Samsung dropped some wearable news ahead of its Unpacked event later today: parents can now use the cellular Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 as a smartwatch for their kids.
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Microsoft says it has signed a new deal with OpenAI that gives Microsoft “right of first refusal”, meaning it's no longer OpenAI's exclusive cloud provider  —  Microsoft was once the exclusive provider of data center infrastructure for OpenAI to train and run its AI models.  No longer.
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
A survey of 3,000+ game developers: 11% were laid off in the past year, 58% back unionization, 30% say generative AI negatively impacts the industry, and more  —  The 2025 GDC survey revealed the impact of industry-wide layoffs in 2024 where one of every 11 game developers lost a job.
Financial Times:
Some crypto executives fear investor backlash over $TRUMP and $MELANIA memecoins; CoinMarketCap reports most $TRUMP trading is concentrated on Asian exchanges  —  Industry trying to rebuild its reputation frets over potential conflicts of interest and investor losses
Financial Times:
UK CMA Chair Marcus Bokkerink plans to leave the antitrust agency, forced out by UK ministers; the CMA appoints ex-Amazon executive Doug Gurr as interim chair  —  Marcus Bokkerink replaced at CMA with government saying it wants pro-business decisions to drive prosperity and growth
Daniel Tencer / Music Business Worldwide:
Music AI, the AI startup behind Moises music creation service, raised a $40M Series A led by monashees and Connect Ventures, a partnership between CAA and NEA  —  Music AI, the “AI-first” company behind the increasingly popular Moises music creation platform, has announced it has raised USD $40 million in a Series A funding round.

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