Techmeme
May 16, 2025, 1:01 PM

Top News

Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch:
OpenAI rolls out Codex, an AI coding agent powered by codex-1, a version of o3 optimized for software engineering, for ChatGPT Pro, Enterprise, and Team users  —  OpenAI announced on Friday it's launching a research preview of Codex, the company's most capable AI coding agent yet.
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
After Grok's “white genocide in South Africa” X replies, xAI says “an unauthorized modification was made to Grok response bot's prompt” at 3:15 AM PST on May 14  —  xAI blamed an “unauthorized modification” for a bug in its AI-powered Grok chatbot that caused Grok …
Dominic Preston / The Verge:
Epic Games says that Apple rejected its latest Fortnite submission to the US App Store and the game on iOS will be “offline worldwide until Apple unblocks it”  —  Epic says that the game is ‘offline’ on iPhones everywhere after Apple rejected its App Store resubmission.
Jason Schreier / Bloomberg:
Sony's Haven Studios founder Jade Raymond leaves the company; sources: some developers were worried about its first game's external test reception and progress  —  Her company, Haven Studios, is developing an online shooter title called Fairgames … PlayStation leadership didn't give Haven staff …
Reuters:
Charter says it will acquire Cox Communications for $21.9B, valuing Cox at $34.5B including debt and uniting two of the biggest US cable and broadband operators  —  Charter Communications (CHTR.O) said on Friday it would merge with Cox Communications in a deal that would value its privately held rival …
Wall Street Journal:
Analysis: since January, 36+ staff and associates of Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, and Palmer Luckey got federal roles that oversee their companies  —  See how allies of four tech titans are staffing the agencies meant to regulate them, raising ethics flags and securing billions
Camille Bromley / Columbia Journalism Review:
Q&A with Wired's Steven Levy on the evolving relationship between the tech industry and the press, media outlets' licensing deals with AI companies, and more  —  “What you find when you get into a place is always more interesting than any preconception you have.”
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Sources: Microsoft has stopped production of its Surface Laptop Studio 2 and plans to mark the device as end of life in June, with no apparent successor plans  —  The Surface Laptop Studio 2 is no longer being manufactured and there's no replacement in sight.
Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch:
Windsurf launches SWE-1, its first family of software engineering AI models, claiming its largest model rivals Claude 3.5 Sonnet, GPT-4.1, and Gemini 2.5 Pro  —  On Thursday, Windsurf, a startup that develops popular AI tools for software engineers, announced the launch of its first family …
Alex Kantrowitz / Big Technology:
Klarna CEO says its AI agent now handles two-thirds of customer service chats, an equivalent of 800 jobs, but Klarna is hiring workers for higher-end chats  —  Headlines announcing Klarna's AI pullback were wrong, its CEO says.  Instead of retreating, it's handing more tasks to the bots.
Bloomberg:
Source: Coinbase's hackers had bribed enough customer service representatives to achieve effectively on-demand access to customer info in the past five months  —  On the long list of crypto companies that have been hacked, there are plenty of examples of financial losses that are much more painful …
Niket Nishant / Reuters:

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More News

Bloomberg:
Matthew Guariglia / Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Earlier Picks

Jason Schreier / Bloomberg:
Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch:
Wall Street Journal:
Jon Victor / The Information:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Benjamin Mayo / 9to5Mac:
Bloomberg: