Under the deal being discussed, Meta would start renting compute on Google’s Tensor Processing Units as early as next year, Reuters reports.
Continue reading “Nvidia responds to report that Meta might use Google’s TPU chips”
Tag: meta
Meta commits to «at least» $600 billion spend on AI infrastructure
They are building out data centers because «it’s the right strategy to aggressively front-load capacity so we’re prepared for the most optimistic cases,» according to CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Meta saw an 83% drop in its operating income the last quarter, and plans for capital expenditures of $70 billion just this year, but will have increase it threefold to reach their target by 2028.
Read more: Reuters, The Register and Business Insider.
Big Tech doubles down on even bigger AI spend
The coming AI wars will be fought with data centers and gigawatts, and nobody wants to lose out.
Continue reading “Big Tech doubles down on even bigger AI spend”
Weekend roundup: Resurrected Clippy, ChatGPT Business and AI Oreo ads
Clippy much? Microsoft launches visualization of Copilot
If you ever use voice mode in Copilot, which Microsoft hopes to expand, you might see a new, expressive animation on your screen. That would be the newly announced «Mico.» Unlike the much maligned Clippy, Mico will use facial expressions that change as you talk. It’s only available in the US, and will work with an upcoming memory feature for Copilot to better respond to requests.
More at: Microsoft’s launch, The Verge and Ars Technica.
OpenAI announces ChatGPT Business
ChatGPT will now combine all the context of your businesses’ connected apps, like Slack, Sharepoint, Github and Google Drive. This makes it possible to ask pretty detailed questions about your business and have comprehensive answers delivered in one place — without the need to go searching through lots of different repositories. The feature is available tor Business, Enterprise and Education customers starting last Thursday.
More at: OpenAI’s launch page, The Verge and The Register.
Read on for more!
Continue reading “Weekend roundup: Resurrected Clippy, ChatGPT Business and AI Oreo ads”
Meta to use AI chats to «personalize» ads and recommendations
There is no way to opt out, according to The Wall Street Journal, but they won’t be targeting topics like «religious views, sexual orientation, political views, health, racial or ethnic origin, philosophical beliefs, or trade union membership.»
Continue reading “Meta to use AI chats to «personalize» ads and recommendations”
Zuckerberg would rather «misspend a couple of hundred billion» than lose out on AI race
— That’s going to be very unfortunate obviously. But I would say the risk is higher on the other side, he said.
A $600 billion bet
Getting it right on «superintelligence,» or artificial general intelligence, is a clear priority for the Meta CEO, and he has already promised $600 billion of total investment in the technology until 2028.
Weekend roundup; Chrome gets Gemini, Microsoft goes Claude and Veo comes to Youtube
Google goes nuclear; brings Gemini to Chrome
While OpenAI is still working on a browser and others are cautious or have failed to take off, Google is done waiting. They are now building the Gemini assistant directly into the world’s most popular browser. «Gemini with Chrome» will navigate and summarize your tabs for you, offer helpful suggestions in the URL bar, and should soon help you order stuff online. It can even find your closed tabs and search for references inside Youtube videos. It’s rolling out to Mac and Windows users with language set to English as of this writing. They call it «a new era of browsing.»
More at Google’s launch page, Google’s overview and launch thread.
Hands-on with Meta’s new Ray-Bans
Has Meta found the Goldilocks zone of smart glasses? Their recently launched Ray-Bans with an internal screen seems to have hit the sweet spot with reviewers. The Verge calls them the best smart glasses out there, Tom’s Hardware says it «feels like the future,» and Gizmodo writes that you’re going to want a pair. The consensus seems to be that the in-lens screen is quite useful, just about bright enough and it hits the sweet spot with the new wristband.
More at Mashable’s roundup.
Read on for more!
Meta AI created unauthorized raunchy bots of celebrities, complete with intimate images
Most of the bots were created by users, but some high profile ones, garnering more than 10 million views, came from a Meta employee.
Meta admits fault
This is a failure of Meta’s policy enforcement, spokesman Andy Stone tells Reuters — and says there are guidelines in place against intimate celebrity pictures.
Meta has since deleted many of the bots in question, but some still remain, Reuters found.
While there are individual state laws protecting the likeness and appearance of celebrities, Duncan Crabtree-Ireland of SAG-AFTRA — the actors union — says they are pushing for federal laws against AI imitation.
Go read the full story on Reuters. See also: Grok undresses Taylor Swift.
Meta partners with Midjourney, licensing their «aesthetic technology»
Little is known about the actual details of the collaboration, and Meta’s spokesperson, when asked by The Verge, simply defers to Wang’s x.com post:
Continue reading “Meta partners with Midjourney, licensing their «aesthetic technology»”
Friday roundup: Grok spills shares, Meta freezes hiring and AI Mode expands
If you want to share a chat with friends on Grok, you might get more than you bargained for. According to Forbes, the share-button generates a unique URL that is also shared with search engines, and they found more than 370K stored Grok conversations on Google. OpenAI had a similar problem a few weeks back, and disabled the option. No news yet on mitigation from x.ai.
More at Forbes.
Meta AI enacts hiring freeze as part of reorg
The Wall Street Journal reports that it is part of a wider reorganization of the «Superintelligence» unit, and CNBC reports that it is about «creating a solid structure» for the lab. Apparently, investors have been spooked by the massive expenditures on the unit, after spending big this summer to secure talent. Alexandr Wang, head of the Superintelligence Lab, denies the reports.
More at the WSJ and CNBC.
Continue reading “Friday roundup: Grok spills shares, Meta freezes hiring and AI Mode expands”
Short Friday news; Meta’s bias checker, how to deal with children, Gemini’s new memory, and more
Robby Starbuck rose to fame as an influencer campaigning against Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in the USA. He often sued companies to force them to end such policies, and even sued Meta after their AI wrongly implicated him in the events of January 6.
Now the suit is settled and he has a new job offer; as a Meta advisor to address «ideological and political bias» in their AIs. This is what Trump meant when he went against «woke» AI, and Meta says they have made «tremendous strides to improve the accuracy of Meta AI and mitigate ideological and political bias» since working with Starbuck.
More at The WSJ, The Verge, Mashable and MSNBC.
Gemini now defaults to remembering previous chats
Google Gemini’s new feature is always on by design, and will remember your older chats without specifically asking. The feature delivers «more personalized responses the more you use it,» Google says. It will remember «key details and preferences you’ve shared, leading to more natural and relevant conversations, as if you’re collaborating with a partner who’s already up to speed.»
It can be turned off by going to Settings, then «Personal context.» There is also an option called «Temporary Chats» that won’t be remembered.
More at Google’s launch post, The Verge and 9to5Google.
ChatGPT removes sharing with Google feature, and other Friday news in short
ChatGPT was just two clicks away from spilling your secrets to Google, an investigation found yesterday. The «Make this chat discoverable» button on the share feature would register the whole chat on search engines. Plenty of people made that mistake, sharing «deeply personal details, including struggles with addiction, experiences of physical abuse, or serious mental health issues.» OpenAI removed the feature shortly after, saying it «introduced too many opportunities for folks to accidentally share things they didn’t intend to.» They are now scrambling to remove «indexed content from the relevant search engines.»
Apple open to mergers and acquisitions in AI space
— We’re very open to M&A that accelerates our roadmap, Apple’s Tim Cook said on yesterday’s earnings call. — We are not stuck on a certain size company, although the ones that we have acquired thus far this year are small in nature. He also said Apple was going to «significantly» grow it’s AI investments, after the company reported a 10% increase in revenue — the largest jump since 2021. They are also «making good progress» on personalizing Siri, he said.
Zuckerberg throws shade on open source projects
Mark Zuckerberg of Meta recently posted a manifesto of sorts, mapping out what he sees as a benevolent «personal superintelligence» «for everyone.» In it, he quietly states that superintelligence will pose new safety concerns, and «We’ll need to be rigorous about mitigating these risks and careful about what we choose to open source.» He repeated this in his later earnings call, saying «we kind of wrestle with whether it’s productive or helpful to share that.» See also his original post.
Developers are slightly souring on AI coding
A new survey from Stack Overflow shows a significant drop in developer trust in AI coding, with trust in its accuracy dropping from 40% in previous years to 29% in 2025. «Favorability» has also dropped from 72% to 60% on a yearly basis. 52% of developers say they use AI agents in their work, while 72% reject «vibe coding.» The survey was taken with 49,000 worldwide developers. Stack Overflow is no stranger to AI effects, having dropped sharply after the AI coding boom.
So, who really has the most GPUs in the AI race?
But here’s the truth: None of these numbers are easy to verify — and each company counts differently.
Continue reading “So, who really has the most GPUs in the AI race?”
The news in short for Friday
Executive order coming on «Woke AI»
The US President is planning a new Executive Order regarding balance in AI models. They are going to have to incorporate more right-wing ideology in order to remain in contention for government contracts.
The order would «dictate that AI companies getting federal contracts be politically neutral and unbiased in their AI models.» No news yet on who will be the arbiter of what is «neutral,» but we can guess, right?
More on The Wall Street Journal, discussion on r/singularity
Anthropic copyright case moves to class action
While Anthropic’s use of purchased books in training was ruled «fair use» by U.S. District Judge William Alsup in late june, their archive of 7 million pirated books was not.
In this phase of the trial, Alsup has okayed it proceeding as a class action suit, on behalf of all pirated authors.
At a maximum penalty of $150,000 for each infringement, that could total a competely debilitating bill if Anthropic is found guilty, and greatly impact the AI industry.
More at Reuters.
Perplexity gets huge India boost
The AI search engine has sealed a deal to give 360 million customers of the Airtel telco their Perplexity Pro service for free. Airtel is the second largest telecoms operator in India. The trial lasts a year and comes with no strings attached, and offers access to ChatGPT models along with Claude Sonnet and Opus 4. It would normally cost $200 per year.
Previously, Google has offered Gemini for free for all students in India, as everyone is trying to capture the enormous market.
More at India Dispatch, TechCrunch, and a press release by Airtel.
Zuckerberg explains «Superintelligence» hires
The Meta CEO just announced a 5GW data center with even more to be built, some the size of Manhattan, in a push worth «hundreds of billions.» In a recent interview with The Information, he explained his reasoning on his expensive AI hires — by saying infrastructure investments pale in comparison to human costs. And, he says, his new hires «want the fewest number of people reporting to them — and the most GPUs.»
See the interview here (25 minutes), and Business Insider on talent motivations.
Meta discussed moving to closed source models
They have reportedly stopped testing on the open source Behemoth model, after it delivered «underwhelming» performance, TechCrunch reports.
«Unchanged» policy
They also caution that discussions are just discussions and don’t reflect official policy from the social media giant.
Continue reading “Meta discussed moving to closed source models”