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Techmeme
June 18, 2025, 9:55 AM

Top News

Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch:
On a podcast, Sam Altman said Meta made “giant offers to a lot of people on our team ... like, $100M signing bonuses”, and “none of our best people” accepted  —  Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been on something of a hiring spree lately, trying to staff up Meta's …
CNN:
President Trump plans to sign an executive order this week to grant TikTok a 90-day extension in enforcement of the sale-or-ban law, marking his third extension  —  New York CNN —  —  TikTok just got another lifeline from the White House, with President Donald Trump set to delay enforcement …
Matt Kapko / CyberScoop:
A cyberattack claimed by pro-Israel hacktivist group Predatory Sparrow has reportedly disrupted services at Iran's state-owned Bank Sepah, including its website  —  The attack introduces a clear cyber element with immediate consequences for the country's critical infrastructure amid a growing conflict between Israel and Iran.
Kevin Collier / NBC News:
The Iranian government says it has restricted internet access in response to Israeli cyberattacks; some Western communication apps have reportedly been blocked  —  The connectivity drop appears to be a result of a decision by Iran's government, rather than due to Israeli strikes on infrastructure.
MacKenzie Sigalos / CNBC:
The US Senate passes the GENIUS Act, which establishes the first federal regulatory framework for dollar-pegged stablecoins; the bill now heads to the House  —  The Senate on Tuesday passed the GENIUS Act, a landmark bill that for the first time establishes federal guardrails …
Wall Street Journal:
A look at the Catholic Church's decadelong dialogue with Silicon Valley on AI, as Pope Leo prepares to make AI's potential threat to humanity a signature issue  —  The new pope is making the potential threat of artificial intelligence to humanity a signature issue—but Silicon Valley is trying to win him over
More: TechCrunchBluesky: @timkellogg.me and @lauraapolloMastodon: @carnage4life@mas.to
X: @wsj and @richrahoForums: r/singularity
Hayden Field / The Verge:
A look at California's 52-page California Report on Frontier Policy, which proposes an AI regulatory framework based on transparency, risk assessments, and more  —  A long-awaited report says companies are “simply inadequate at fully understanding” risks and harms.
Steve Kopack / NBC News:
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy says the company expects that “in the next few years” AI use “will reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains”  —  Amazon CEO Andy Jassy says the retail and tech giant “will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today.”
Bloomberg:
Sources: xAI is burning through $1B per month, expects to burn through ~$13B in 2025, and projects its revenue to be just $500M in 2025, rising to $2B+ in 2026  —  Elon Musk's artificial intelligence startup xAI is burning through $1 billion a month as the cost of building …
Tulsee Doshi / The Keyword:
John Voorhees / MacStories:
Hands-on with Apple's new Speech framework components in the macOS Tahoe beta: the APIs deliver transcription speeds significantly faster than OpenAI's Whisper  —  Late last Tuesday night, after watching F1: The Movie at the Steve Jobs Theater, I was driving back from dropping Federico off at his hotel when I got a text:
Kristina Partsinevelos / CNBC:
AWS says Anthropic's Claude Opus 4 launched on its Trainium2 GPUs, and Project Rainier, AWS' supercomputer built for Anthropic, uses 500K+ Trainium2 chips  —  Amazon Web Services is set to announce an update to its Graviton4 chip that includes 600 gigabits per second of network bandwidth …
Bob Van Voris / Bloomberg:
X sues New York, claiming a law requiring social media companies to disclose how they deal with hate speech and disinformation violates the US Constitution  —  Elon Musk's X Corp. sued the state of New York claiming a law requiring social media companies to disclose how they deal with hate speech …
Financial Times:
Netflix signs a landmark deal with French network TF1 to show linear TV for the first time; TF1 will broadcast all five channels, showing live sports and more  —  Deal will be closely watched by broadcasters, who are losing millions of viewers to streaming giants  —  Daniel Thomas and Hannah Murphy in Cannes
Jez Corden / Windows Central:
Microsoft and AMD announce “a strategic, multi-year partnership” to “co-engineer silicon across a portfolio of devices”, including next-generation Xbox consoles  —  Xbox President Sarah Bond shared an update on Xbox consoles today, confirming their ongoing partnership …
Michelle Kim / Rest of World:
Ten current and former Samsung semiconductor engineers say many are leaving for SK Hynix and other rivals due to long hours, heavy workloads, and lower bonuses  —  Scarred by long hours, low pay, and a hostile work culture, many chip workers are leaving for competitors, including American companies.

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More News

Earlier Picks

Ted Johnson / Deadline:
Marc Vartabedian / Wall Street Journal:
More: FinTech Global, Salesforce Ventures, and Pano AI
Bluesky: @prietschkaX: @salesforcevcLinkedIn: Abe Yokell and Garry Tan
Blake Brittain / Reuters:
CNBC:
More: Business Today, The Indian Express, Times of Oman, and Benzinga
Bluesky: @blemley.us and @sal19Instagram: MetaX: @scobleizer
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
Brody Ford / Bloomberg: