Techmeme
August 11, 2026, 9:15 PM

Top News

Zac Hall / 9to5Mac:
SpaceXAI rolls out Grok Bot AI agent app in beta on Mac, iOS, Windows, and Linux, initially for SuperGrok Heavy, Cursor Ultra, and Cursor Teams Premium users  —  SpaceXAI and Cursor are in the process of becoming a single company, but first, the two firms are releasing an all-new iPhone and Mac app called Grok Bot.
Thomas Claburn / The Register:
Anthropic says new Claude models will embed watermarks in generated text and C2PA metadata in files to comply with the EU AI Act, and it will update past models  —  EU rules cited as reason for effort to trace AI output ancestry  —  Anthropic will embed watermarks in the text and files generated …
More: Claude, import chaos, Fortune, CNET, Android Authority, SiliconANGLE, Inc, Quartz, Business Insider, Business Insider, Breitbart, Daring Fireball, Computerworld, Neowin, Michael Tsai, TechCrunch, PYMNTS, Search Engine Land, Fast Company, Mashable, The American Bazaar, Türkiye Today, The Deep View, iThinkDifferent, PCWorld, The Daily Wire, The New Stack, WeRSM, How-To Geek, Tech Brew, CyberInsider, Search Engine Journal, Forbes, Inc42, The Indian Express, Nairametrics, Tech Times, Implicator.ai, Unite.AI, The Decoder, RuntimeWire, and Engadget
Will Knight / Wired:
Researchers find that feeding a frontier model's encrypted reasoning traces to a weaker model from the same provider can make it output the traces in plaintext  —  Researchers devised a way to extract “reasoning traces” from Claude, GPT, and Gemini.  What they found, they say …
Stephanie Palazzolo / The Information:
Brad Lightcap, who most recently led OpenAI's special projects division and formerly was its COO, says he is leaving the startup “to start something new”  —  Brad Lightcap, who most recently led OpenAI's special projects division and formerly was its chief operating officer …
Jordan Novet / CNBC:
CoreWeave reports Q2 revenue up 112% YoY to $2.58B, vs. $2.56B est., and a $104B revenue backlog, with 1.5 GW of contracted power; CRWV jumps 9%+ after hours  —  CoreWeave shares jumped 14% in extended trading on Tuesday after the AI infrastructure provider reported results than topped Wall Street expectations.
Kyt Dotson / SiliconANGLE:
Nvidia releases Nemotron 3.5 Lightning, an open 30B-parameter MoE model, and NeMo Switchyard, an open-source model routing library for AI agents  —  Artificial intelligence silicon and software giant Nvidia Corp. today announced two new services: a highly customizable Nemotron model and an agentic AI model router named NeMo Switchyard.
The Information:
Frederic Lardinois / The New Stack:
OpenAI launches a ChatGPT desktop app for Linux in preview, supporting ChatGPT Work, Codex, and more; Computer Use outside the in-app browser is not available  —  On Tuesday, OpenAI launched its ChatGPT desktop for Linux.  —  Now in preview, the app, which combines ChatGPT, ChatGPT Work …
Sundar Pichai / @sundarpichai:
Sundar Pichai says Gemini has hit 1B+ MAUs, the company's fastest-growing product ever and its 14th product to hit the 1B-user mark  —  1B+ people are now using @Geminiapp every month to spark new ideas and get things done. It's our fastest growing product ever, and our 14th to hit the 1B-user mark. Kudos to @JoshWoodward & the entire Gemini team, and thank you to everyone who has been on this journey with us - [image]
Emma Roth / The Verge:
Spotify says it will roll out an “AI Persona” badge in September for profiles that do “not represent a real person” and exclude their music from recommendations  —  Artist profiles on Spotify that do ‘not represent a real person’ will get an ‘AI Persona’ badge.
Cade Metz / New York Times:
xAI co-founder Igor Babuschkin's River AI raised $1.1B led by General Catalyst and AMP PBC to build home or SMB computer servers capable of running AI locally  —  Igor Babuschkin built a new start-up, River AI, and hopes to provide ways for people to “retrain,” or modify …
Jing Yang / The Information:
Manus says it will “soon return to operating as an independent company”, implying it is close to reversing its acquisition by Meta, after China's order in April  —  AI startup Manus said on Tuesday that it will “soon return to operating as an independent company,” …
Bloomberg:
Sources: Phia co-founders Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni pushed for and were aware for seven months of using “cookie stuffing” to claim affiliate commissions  —  Phia co-founders Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni pushed for features in the e-commerce startup's software that took credit …
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Similarweb: Bluesky's mobile MAUs fell 27% YoY to 10.4M in June and DAUs fell 26% to 3M in July; X's mobile MAUs fell 3% to 302M and DAUs fell 7% to 123.7M  —  Decentralized social network Bluesky was one of the bigger beneficiaries of the exodus from Elon Musk's X in November 2024, following the U.S. elections.
Bloomberg:
Intel raised $20B in an upsized share sale, up from the $15B it was targeting on Monday; sources say the sale drew $100B+ in demand; INTC is up 145%+ YTD  —  Intel Corp. raised $20 billion in an upsized share sale, a third more than it was targeting when it announced the deal Monday morning.
Samantha Kelly / Bloomberg:
Bumble rolls out a global update that lets any user send an opening message after they match, marking a major reversal from its signature women-go-first model  —  Bumble Inc. will allow men to make the first move in messaging on its dating app, marking a major reversal from the company's signature women …
Alanna Okun / Bloomberg:
A look at Candy Crush's continued popularity 15 years after its launch, with an estimated 81.5M MAUs and in-app revenue of $876.5M in fiscal year 2025  —  Fifteen years in, those shiny sweets are still on top.  —  Johanna Chouraqui doesn't time travel anymore.
More: BGR
Daniel Kuhn / The Block:
eToro agrees to acquire US-focused online brokerage TradeZero for up to $231M in cash and stock; TradeZero had ~$80M in revenue over the 12 months ended June 30  —  Quick Take  — EToro agrees to acquire TradeZero, a U.S. online brokerage for active traders, in a cash and stock deal valued at up to $231 million.

Sponsor Posts

Subquadratic:
SubQ Snap 1.1: the first long-context decision model for real enterprise work  —  Tied for #1 on the AA Decision Index, Snap is a multimodal model with a 384k-token context window for fast reasoning and agentic decisions.
Zoho:
How WCAG compliance makes modern workplaces more accessible  —  A workplace's approach to inclusivity starts with its everyday tools.  Some of them can create barriers that inadvertently shut people out.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.
WebBrain:
WebBrain: an open-source AI agent for your browser  —  Read pages, fill forms and automate tasks in Chrome or Firefox.  Use local models or your preferred AI provider.  Get started free.

Featured Podcasts

Big Technology Podcast:
Jensen and The Honeypot
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
Lenny's Podcast:
Why PMs are suddenly valuable again | Tulsee Doshi (Head of Product, Gemini)
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Machine Gods:
The Purple Tsunami Against Data Centers
The official podcast of the singularity, from Casey Newton and Kevin Roose. Twice-weekly news, analysis, and interviews with the people who are building the future.
Subscribe to Machine Gods.
Invest Like the Best:
Ramtin Naimi - The State of Venture
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
The Upstarts Podcast:
How Ramp Built A $60B AI Product Factory Off A Corporate Card | Co-CEO Eric Glyman
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
Subscribe to The Upstarts Podcast.
Great Chat:
Would you let a robot do it?
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 9:15 PM ET, August 11, 2026.

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.

More News

Jack Morphet / Wall Street Journal:

Earlier Picks

Julian Hast / Bloomberg:
ABC:
Nick Gray / PatronView:
Wall Street Journal:
Shirin Ghaffary / Bloomberg: