Techmeme: OpenRouter: Chinese AI models have drawn 30%+ of token use by US companies each week since February 8, peaking at 46%, up from 11% over the previous 12 months (Kai Nicol-Schwarz/CNBC)

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July 7, 2026, 3:05 PM

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Meta Newsroom:

Meta rolls out Muse Image, the first image generation model from its Superintelligence Labs, in Meta AI; it will also power new tools in Instagram and WhatsApp — Today, Meta is rolling out Muse Image, the company's first image generation model from Meta Superintelligence Labs, now available in Meta AI.

More: Bloomberg, 9to5Mac, Reuters, CNBC, Finimize, and RuntimeWire

X: @alexandr_wang, @alexandr_wang, @ai_for_success, @fanofaliens, @andrewcurran_, @mattdeitke, @alexandr_wang, and @alexandr_wang

Fanny Potkin / Reuters:

Sources: China met with Alibaba, ByteDance, Z.ai, and others to discuss potentially limiting foreign access to advanced AI models, penalties for AI theft, more — Chinese authorities have held meetings with top tech firms over the past month about potentially restricting overseas access …

More: PYMNTS, Gizmodo, Business Standard, Associated Press, The Information, TBPN, The Decoder, Time, Digit, International Business Times, Newser, The Neuron, Nairametrics, Quartz, and Bloomberg

Bluesky: @timkellogg.me, @tedunderwood.com, and @emollick. Mastodon: @LukaszOlejnik@mastodon.social

Forums: r/singularity, r/LocalLLaMA, r/neoliberal, and r/wallstreetbets

Kai Nicol-Schwarz / CNBC:

OpenRouter: Chinese AI models have drawn 30%+ of token use by US companies each week since February 8, peaking at 46%, up from 11% over the previous 12 months — Chinese-built AI models are gaining traction among U.S. companies as they narrow the performance gap with leading American rivals …

More: International Business Times, Quartz, Washington Examiner, Constellation Research, and The Decoder

Forums: r/BetterOffline, r/LocalLLaMA, and r/technology

New York Times:

Alibaba's Qwen models, introduced in 2023, have made it an AI powerhouse, but the company has yet to turn their global popularity into a profitable business

More: Cautious Optimism. Bluesky: @jessefelder.com

David Gewirtz / ZDNET:

Anthropic expands Claude Cowork to web and mobile in beta for Max plan subscribers, and says 90%+ of Cowork usage is unrelated to software development — ZDNET's key takeaways — Claude Cowork is becoming a cloud-based AI helper. — Desktop still offers the fullest Cowork experience.

More: Claude, The Verge, TechCrunch, Engadget, The New Stack, NBC News, SiliconANGLE, VentureBeat, The Decoder, Claude, Mashable, Wired, Digital Trends, and Yahoo Finance

X: @techcrunch, @shanumathew93, @engadget, @claudeai, @claudeai, @claudeai, @venturebeat, and @wired. LinkedIn: Claude

Zac Hall / 9to5Mac:

Anthropic extends Claude Fable 5 access to all paid plans through July 12; access to the model was set to shift to token-based usage on July 7 — Anthropic announced today that it is expanding Claude Cowork capabilities from the desktop app to the web and mobile.

More: Claude and RuntimeWire

X: @claudeai, @simonw, @rohanpaul_ai, @andrewcurran_, and @claudeai. Forums: r/ClaudeAI

Reuters:

Sources: DeepSeek is at an early stage of developing its own AI chip designed for inference, in a push that could reduce its reliance on Nvidia and Huawei chips — Chinese startup DeepSeek is developing its own AI chip, according to three people familiar with the matter …

More: Ars Technica, CNBC, The Information, Blockchain.News, The Economist, Barron's Online, Seoul Economic Daily, The Tech Portal, ZeroHedge News, CTech, Proactive, and The Decoder

X: @jukan05, @kyleichan, and @paurooteri. Forums: Ars OpenForum

Brody Ford / Bloomberg:

Sources: Microsoft, looking to reduce AI costs, is starting to replace models from OpenAI and Anthropic with its MAI models in products like Excel and Outlook — Microsoft Corp., looking to reduce AI costs, is starting to replace OpenAI and Anthropic with its own models in software products like Excel and Outlook.

More: The Decoder and The Tech Portal

X: @benbajarin and @brodyford_

Wall Street Journal:

OpenAI, Anthropic, and other top AI labs are offering startups token credits, promotions, and one-time bonuses as they battle for lasting streams of B2B revenue — Pitched battle for business users comes as AI companies seek lasting streams of revenue — Hans Ibarra, a founder building …

More: The Decoder. X: @benfritz. Bluesky: @doctorcarrie

Abner Li / 9to5Google:

Google announces a Pixel event on August 12 in NYC, where it is expected to launch Pixel 11 series of phones and Pixel Watch 5 — Made by Google 2026 is officially taking place on Wednesday, August 12. This is a week earlier compared to last year, with Google once again opting for an earlier Pixel hardware unveil.

More: The Verge, TechCrunch, CNET, Thurrott, PCMag, Tom's Guide, Digital Trends, Android Central, Droid Life, NPowerUser, Notebookcheck, PC Guide, and Android Authority

X: @markgurman and @mkbhd

Diana Novak Jones / Reuters:

Court filing: Meta says four US states seek $1.4T over claims it designed Facebook and Instagram to addict youth and misled the public; its market cap is ~$1.5T — Meta Platforms (META.O) said in a court filing on Monday that four states were seeking $1.4 trillion in penalties over accusations …

More: Bloomberg Law, Gizmodo, The Independent, Benzinga, RedState, Fox Business, Engadget, FOX 13 Seattle, Digit, The Hans India, Quartz, COINOTAG, Phandroid, Blockonomi, and Simply Wall St. Bluesky: @glinden

Bloomberg:

Sources: Amazon is looking to raise at least $25B from a US dollar bond sale to fund its AI infrastructure investments; the size could increase based on demand — Amazon Seeks to Raise at Least $25 Billion to Fund AI Spending — Video Player is loading. — Unmute — Current Time 0:00 Loaded: 22.21% Playback Rate

More: CNBC, Finimize, Quartz, International Business Times, Reuters, The Information, Barron's Online, Benzinga, Bloomberg, Semafor, NewsMax.com, and The Tech Portal. Forums: r/technology

Reuters:

Counterpoint: China smartphone sales fell 13% YoY during the 618 shopping festival as brands raised prices to offset memory costs; Honor fell 33% and Xiaomi 24% — Smartphone sales in China fell 13% year-on-year during the month-long 618 shopping festival, as brands raised prices …

More: Counterpoint Research, 9to5Mac, AppleInsider, iPhone in Canada, Benzinga, iClarified, and The Register

Anthropic:

Anthropic researchers detail J-space, a small collection of neural patterns in Claude that reveals internal thoughts that don't appear in the model's output — As you read this sentence, circuits in your brain are adjusting your posture, controlling your breathing, and transforming lines …

More: Axios, Washington Examiner, Anthropic, PCWorld, International Business Times, WinBuzzer, Tom's Guide, Anthropic on YouTube, The Decoder, The Rundown AI, The Indian Express, Digit, Business Standard, The Neuron, Gizmodo, and VentureBeat

X: @blader, @anthropicai, @borismpower, @neelnanda5, @alancowen, @jack_w_lindsey, @lioronai, @swyx, @corsaren, @anthropicai, @standehaene, @signulll, @aran_nayebi, @ns123abc, @scobleizer, @repligate, @robj3d3, @ziv_ravid, @rileyralmuto, @sammcallister, @deryatr_, @timfduffy, @anthropicai, and @emollick. LinkedIn: Rhythm A.

Bluesky: @tedunderwood.com, @gbjorn, @amyhoy, and @shibbi.me

Forums: Hacker News, r/singularity, r/LocalLLaMA, and r/ClaudeAI

Lily Mae Lazarus / Fortune:

Super.com, which offers a savings app for lower-income consumers, raised a $65M Series D led by TPG at a $1.2B valuation and says it is profitable — In 2022, Hussein Fazal flew 200 of his employees to Las Vegas to cash a $200 check at a payday loan shop. He then asked them to buy a week …

More: Globe and Mail

Byron Kaye / Reuters:

Study: 50 test accounts created in Australia across nine platforms were never asked to verify their age, despite the Australian law mandating a ban on under-16s — Australia's online platforms are stumbling at the very first step in implementing age checks for users, rendering a world …

More: Mashable, PC Gamer, and Digital Trends

Forums: r/australia and r/technology

Jay Peters / The Verge:

Google launches “platform properties” in the Google Search Console, letting creators and website owners see which search terms lead to their social platforms — A new feature will let creators and publishers see what search terms take people to their social platforms.

More: 9to5Google, Slate, Search Engine Roundtable, Search Engine Land, and Search Engine Journal

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From Mediagazer

Benjamin Mullin / New York Times:

A Seattle Times sports columnist quits, citing its repeated refusal to publish columns that went “against the grain”, including one on transgender athletes

Katie Robertson / New York Times:

An Alabama jury finds the NYT defamed a college basketball player in a 2023 article that wrongly placed him at a deadly shooting and awards $9.25M in damages

Michael McCarthy / Front Office Sports:

OutKick founder Clay Travis launches Sport & State, offering live shows and podcasts; sources say it is valued at $100M, and Hard Rock Bet owns a 10% stake

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Bloomberg:

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Andrew Liszewski / The Verge:

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More: Wired, Android Central, and Android Police

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More: RoboticsTomorrow.com and Electrek

Gao Yuan / Bloomberg:

Survey: Chinese companies plan to allocate 46% of their AI accelerator budget to domestic products in the next 12 months, up from 30% today, a shift from Nvidia

More: Trak.in, Barron's Online, and Tech in Asia

Financial Times:

European banking watchdogs ECB and ESRB warn that frontier AI models pose “systemic risks to the financial system”, and give lenders four months to prepare

More: Bloomberg, Politico, Reuters, PYMNTS, and Euronews

Mauro Orru / Wall Street Journal:

UK-based AI infrastructure startup Nscale secures a $900M line of credit to expand its data center buildout across Europe, the US, and Asia-Pacific

More: PYMNTS, DatacenterDynamics, Blockonomi, PR Newswire, Capacity, Tech Funding News, BusinessCloud, Telecompaper, and UKTN

Bloomberg:

Munich-based nuclear fusion startup Proxima Fusion raised €411M led by trading firm XTX and UK-based East X at a €2.4B valuation, with participation from Google

More: DatacenterDynamics, Proxima Fusion, Financial Times, Telegraph, Pathfounders, POWER Magazine, Neowin, Ventureburn, Axios, PitchBook, FinSMEs, RuntimeWire, Benzinga, Anadolu Ajansı …, and Sifted. X: @soundboy

Emily Shugerman / The San Francisco Standard:

A profile of Rachel Whetstone, who has led comms for Google, Meta, Uber, Netflix, and now Sierra, as her husband Steve Hilton runs for governor of California

More: Washington Examiner and CalMatters

X: @venkatananth, @sherlyholmes, @jonsteinberg31, @eshugerman, @hannahcwiley, @pkafka, and @adamkovac. Bluesky: @wildebees

Earlier Picks

Peter Vercoe / Bloomberg:

WiseTech co-founder Richard White steps down as chair amid a police investigation over claims he exploited a woman's immigration status for sex; WTC jumps 5%+

More: Telegraph, Ticker, The Guardian, Brisbane Times, Australian Financial Review, ABC, Reuters, The Courier-Mail, Capital Brief, and Sydney Morning Herald

Tiffany Hsu / New York Times:

A profile of Bernadette Meehan, a US diplomat who became Wikimedia Foundation's CEO in January, as Wikipedia faces threats from MAGA, AI, and foreign autocrats

LinkedIn: Cameran Ashraf, Ph.D.. Forums: r/anime_titties, r/BuyFromEU, r/worldnews, and r/europe

Pragyan Kalita / Reuters:

Syntiant, which develops low-power AI processors, files for a US IPO, reporting a $20.9M net loss on $64.5M in revenue for the three months ended March 31

More: SiliconANGLE, Bloomberg, and Syntiant

Kelsey Vlamis / Business Insider:

xAI rebrands to SpaceXAI and unveils a new logo; Elon Musk said in May that xAI would be dissolved as a separate company and become the AI products from SpaceX

More: Engadget, Mashable, Creative Bloq, and Gizmodo

X: @spacexai, @nikitabier, @iterintellectus, @dpoddolphinpro, @zeroxjackson, @parker__conrad, @zachwarunek, and @benjitaylor

Daniel Kuhn / The Block:

BonkDAO, which oversees the Bonk memecoin, says it “was the target of a malicious governance proposal” that resulted in the loss of $20M worth of Bonk tokens

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X: @bonk_inu, @imperooterxbt, @ferbsol, and @cryptogle

Raphael Satter / Reuters:

Sources: CISA's Attack Surface Evaluation team is using Mythos to audit government code repositories and has already uncovered a large number of vulnerabilities

More: Forbes, International Business Times, Futurism, The Daily Caller, SecurityWeek, Cyber Security News, Clash Report, Benzinga, Business Today, and Notebookcheck. Bluesky: @seniormcgeezer

Sam Witteveen / VentureBeat:

Tencent releases Hy3, a 295B-parameter model that it says is competitive with GLM-5.1 and GLM-5.2, under the Apache 2.0 license, after a preview launch in April

More: Tencent, Hugging Face, MarkTechPost, and OpenRouter

X: @tencenthunyuan, @shunyuyao12, @tencenthunyuan, @atomic_chat_hq, @gneubig, @tencentai_news, @teksedge, @sentdex, @hrudolph, @zhengyang_42, @jenzhuscott, @rogerw0108, and @zixuanli_

Bloomberg:

Microsoft's Xbox plans to cut ~3,200 jobs over the next year, including 1,600 on Monday, and divest up to five studios, including Ninja Theory, in a “reset”

More: The Verge, Kotaku, IGN, This Week in Videogames, Fortune, Video Games Chronicle, XBOX Wire, Game File, Kotaku, The Verge, Axios, Aftermath, Business Insider, Comic Book, Game World Observer, KitGuru, Game Developer, Reuters, Polygon.com, TheGamer, Pure Xbox, Benzinga, GamingBolt, Windows Central, TechRaptor, Gameranx, 80 Level, Yahoo Finance, GamesRadar, Newsweek, The Movie Blog, Digital Foundry, Push Square, ScreenRant, Silicon Republic, GamesIndustry.biz, @theweek, TechSpot, The Daily Upside, Digit, The Information, Rock, Paper, Shotgun, Aftermath, Washington Post, The Verge, New York Times, Yahoo Tech, Variety, The Verge, Wall Street Journal, and GamesBeat

LinkedIn: Dan Rayburn, Liam McDonald, and Sam Carlisle

Bluesky: @jasonschreier, @bethesdaunion, @bethesdaunion, @jasonschreier, @jasonschreier, @seanhollister, @sphynxian, @bethesdaunion, @spacetwinks, @zeboydgames, @jasonschreier, @dringo, @mattmday, and @jasonschreier. Threads: @eric_seufert