Techmeme
August 12, 2026, 2:25 PM

Top News

Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Google unveils the $899+ Pixel 11, $1,099+ 11 Pro, and $1,299+ 11 Pro XL, with a Tensor G6, new Gemini features, Magic Capture to pick the best frames, and more  —  For the last few years, Google's Pixel has been a showcase of new AI features, with few hardware changes from the previous year's devices.
Max Buondonno / The Shortcut:
Jessica Conditt / Engadget:
Google unveils the $1,899+ Pixel 11 Pro Fold, with a stronger hinge, inner and outer displays that are 20% brighter, Tensor G6 chip, and an updated 48MP camera  —  Fly like a (Tensor) G6.  —  The Pixel 11 Pro Fold is the ultimate evolution in Google's latest line of mobile devices …
Sam Rutherford / Engadget:
Google Pixel 11 Pro Fold hands-on: a letdown after Samsung released the Galaxy Z Fold 8, with few design changes, and it feels like Google is coasting this time  —  In a year when Samsung made two new flagship foldables, the latest Pixel Pro Fold feels like a letdown.
xAI:
SpaceXAI releases Grok 4.6, saying it matches GPT-5.6 Sol on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, and prices it at $2/1M input and $6/1M output tokens  —  Grok 4.6 builds on Grok 4.5 with a particular focus on long-running agents and more ambitious interactive and visual work.  —  Try for free
Bloomberg:
Tencent reports Q2 revenue up 11% YoY to ~$30.4B, above ~$30B est., driven by surging WeChat advertising and resilient game spending, and net income of ~$8.3B  —  Tencent Holdings Ltd. more than doubled spending on AI projects and computing to about $7.8 billion last quarter …
Victoria Song / The Verge:
Google unveils the $399 Pixel Watch 5 with a satin pyrite case finish, offline Gemini, proactive AI suggestions, better GPS maps, and insulin resistance trends  —  The $399 Google Pixel Watch 5 isn't about the hardware.  Sure, there's a new satin pyrite case finish, a few new strap colors, and a Steph Curry Special Edition.
Dominic Preston / The Verge:
Google plans to launch the $29 Pixel Tag on November 11, with a four-pack priced at $99, matching AirTag 2's pricing, offering UWB, Find Hub support, and more  —  The $29 tracker combines UWB with Bluetooth channel sounding. … More than two years after launching its own device-tracking network …
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge:
Google says Android's AirDrop-like Quick Share will now let some devices exchange files and contact info when tapped together, starting with the Pixel 6 and up  —  The Quick Share update makes it easier to share contact info and files between Pixel devices, and soon, Samsung phones.
Ben Dummett / Wall Street Journal:
Stockholm-based AI coding startup Lovable raised $400M at a $13.3B valuation, up from $6.6B in December 2025, becoming one of Europe's most valuable startups  —  New funding round catapults AI company into the ranks of Europe's most valuable startups  —  Artificial-intelligence startup Lovable …
Tom Wilson / Financial Times:
Researchers say suspected Chinese hackers used open-source AI agents to build an autonomous hacking tool that compromised Taiwanese government websites in July  —  AI agents ran simultaneous reconnaissance and break-ins in display of new phase of cyberwarfare.
Wall Street Journal:
The NYC Council sent letters to Polymarket, Kalshi, Coinbase, and Gemini Titan as it investigates alleged deceptive marketing practices and targeting minors  —  Probe targets the marketing practices of four prediction markets with operations in the city  —  The New York City Council …
Prakhar Srivastava / Reuters:
AI code review startup CodeRabbit raised a $143M Series C co-led by Atomico and Smash at a $1.5B valuation, after raising a $60M Series B in September 2025  —  AI code review startup CodeRabbit said on Wednesday it had raised $143 million in a funding round that valued it at $1.5 billion.
Juro Osawa / The Information:
Former Alibaba star researcher Junyang Lin launches Shanghai-based Pragmatik Labs to build digital and physical AI agents; Pragmatik hit a $2B valuation in June  —  Former Alibaba star researcher Junyang Lin announced that he had started a new AI company, confirming The Information's earlier reports.
Sumedha Mukherjee / Reuters:
FlightAware withdraws its Kalshi lawsuit, after alleging Kalshi used its data to let users bet on flight cancellations; Kalshi no longer names it as a source  —  Flight-tracking company FlightAware withdrew its lawsuit against Kalshi on Tuesday, a day after it filed the suit that accuses …
Mike Wheatley / SiliconANGLE:
Google DeepMind launches SL2T, a multilingual sign-language-to-text model debuting on the Pixel 11 in Gboard and Live Transcribe, first for ASL to English text  —  Google DeepMind said today it wants to bring the artificial intelligence revolution to the estimated 70 million people across …
Reuters:
Bank of America says it plans to deploy $250B by July 2027 to support US digital and infrastructure projects, including data centers and energy infrastructure  —  Bank of America (BAC.N) said on Wednesday it plans to deploy $250 billion by July 2027 to support U.S. digital and infrastructure projects …
Belle Lin / Wall Street Journal:
AT&T says open models currently power ~25% of its overall AI usage, and expects that to rise to 70%-80% over time; AT&T uses an average of 45B AI tokens per day  —  The telecom company is staking its future on open models, both to control token cost and protect its proprietary data

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:
Introducing Zoho TouchPoint: Every handshake deserves a next step  —  Here's a scene you've probably experienced.  You spend a day at an event, talk to dozens of people, and come home with a stack of business cards.
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

Machine Gods:
The 10 Biggest Losers from Jensen Huang's Fall + The METR Report That Scared Us
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.
The Upstarts Podcast:
The $1.4B Startup Deciding What You See When You Shop Online | Sequen's Zoë Weil
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:
Too soon to call it a vibe shift?
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.
Big Technology Podcast:
Storm Clouds Ahead For Apple?, Debating Amazon's Bee Frontier, AI as UI
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.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
Encore: Chuck Klosterman on Why Football Owns TV (and Why It Won't Forever)
Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
Invest Like the Best:
Zach Reitano - Building Ro and Why Healthcare Should Be 50% of GDP
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 2:25 PM ET, August 12, 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

Kate Knibbs / Wired:
Dwarkesh Patel / Dwarkesh Podcast:

Earlier Picks

Frederic Lardinois / The New Stack:
Nikhilesh De / CoinDesk:
Will Knight / Wired: