Author: GT

Millions of US federal government workers are about to get a new AI assistant on their devices for free in the form of Microsoft Copilot. The move is part of a deal between Microsoft and the US General Services Administration (GSA) that’s also expected to save taxpayers $3.1 billion in its first year.The centrepiece of this huge new agreement is a full year of Microsoft 365 Copilot at no extra cost for government workers using the high-security G5 licence. This is a push to get the latest AI tools into the hands of public servants quickly and safely, aiming to…

Instagram is testing a new Picture-in-Picture feature for watching reels, the company confirmed to TechCrunch on Tuesday. The feature allows users to watch reels in a small, floating window on their screen while browsing other apps to allow for multitasking. The feature was first spotted by app researcher Radu Oncescu. Users who are part of the test will see a pop-up notifying them about the new feature and how to turn it on. While Picture-in-Picture is great for multitasking, it also has the potential to increase retention for longer videos, especially in the era of shrinking attention spans. For example,…

MrBeast, the 27-year-old popular YouTuber known for his elaborate challenges and giveaways, is venturing into a new realm: He’s reportedly launching his own phone company.  According to Business Insider, which viewed a leaked investor deck, MrBeast is planning to launch a mobile phone service next year. Business Insider also reported that MrBeast and executives at Beast Industries are considering fintech and mobile gaming. The YouTuber’s new plan includes establishing a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO), a strategy that involves offering mobile phone service using existing networks from major companies like AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon. By partnering with one of these…

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) signed a contract last year with Israeli spyware maker Paragon worth $2 million.  Shortly after, the Biden administration put the contract under review, issuing a “stop work order,” to determine whether the contract complied with an executive order on commercial spyware, which restricts U.S. government agencies from using spyware that could violate human rights or target Americans abroad.  Almost a year later, when it looked like the contract would just run out and never become active, ICE lifted the stop work order, according to public records. “This contract is for a fully configured proprietary…

For years, Elon Musk has spoken of the promise of Dojo, the AI supercomputer that was supposed to be the cornerstone of Tesla’s AI ambitions. It was important enough to Musk that in July 2024, he said the company’s AI team would “double down” on Dojo in the lead-up to Tesla’s robotaxi reveal, which happened in October.   After six years of hype, Tesla decided last month to shut down Dojo and disband the team behind the supercomputer in August 2025. Within weeks of projecting that Dojo 2, Tesla’s second supercluster that was meant to be built on the company’s in-house…

Web publishing platform WordPress is introducing an early version of an AI development tool, which WordPress co-founder and Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg described as a “V0 or Lovable, but specifically for WordPress” — V0 and Lovable being references to popular “vibe coding” services for building software using prompt-based, AI interfaces. Mullenweg introduced the new WordPress AI tool, called Telex, at the WordCamp US 2025 conference in Portland last week, alongside other AI experiments. During his keynote address, Mullenweg briefly demonstrated how Telex would allow users to create Gutenberg blocks — or the modular bits of text, images, columns, and more…

AI firm Anthropic has raised a $13 billion Series F round that brings its post-money valuation up to $183 billion — funds the company says will be used to grow its enterprise adoption, deepen safety research, and support international expansion.  Iconiq co-led the round with Fidelity Management & Research Company and Lightspeed Venture Partners, according to the company’s blog post. Other backers include a string of institutional investors, VCs, sovereign wealth funds, private equity, and asset managers, such as Altimeter, Baillie Gifford, BlackRock, Blackstone, Coatue, D1 Capital Partners, Insight Partners, Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, Qatar Investment Authority, and more. “We…

Elon Musk doesn’t want Tesla to be just an automaker. He wants Tesla to be an AI company, one that’s figured out how to make cars drive themselves.  Crucial to that mission was Dojo, a custom-built supercomputer designed by Tesla to train its Full Self-Driving (FSD) neural networks. FSD isn’t actually fully self-driving; it can perform some automated driving tasks, but still requires an attentive human behind the wheel. But Tesla thinks with more data, more compute power, and more training, it can cross the threshold from almost self-driving to full self-driving.  And that’s where Dojo was supposed to come…

Google CEO Sundar Pichai during the press conference after his meeting with Polish PM Donald Tusk at Google for Startups Campus In Warsaw in Warsaw, Poland on February 13, 2025. Images)Jakub Porzycki | Nurphoto | Getty ImagesAlphabet shares popped 8% in extended trading as investors celebrated what they viewed as minimal consequences from a historic defeat last year in the landmark antitrust case.Last year, Google was found to hold an illegal monopoly in its core market of internet search.U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled against the most severe consequences that were proposed by the Department of Justice, including the forced…

Tesla has published its fourth “Master Plan,” and at a high level it is about how the company wants to lead the charge into planet-wide adoption of humanoid robots and sustainable energy. But the post lacks an important building block of plans: specifics. Even CEO Elon Musk agrees. In one of his only posts about the plan since it was published on Monday — sandwiched in between a steady stream of transphobia and immigration panic — he agreed it was fair to criticize the lack of specifics and said the company will add more. Who knows when that will happen?…