What we're reading, in the order we're reading it.
Anthony and Harry's working stream — links, charts, tweets, and short takes. The unprocessed inputs behind the briefings.
OpenAI goes from stock market savior to burden as AI risks mount
The maker of ChatGPT is no longer seen as being on the cutting edge of AI technology and is facing questions about its lack of profitability and the need to...
20VC x SaaStr is Back, Live In Person! The TAM Trap: Why SaaS Growth Has Stalled and What AI Changes About Everything
20VC x SaaStr was back this week, this time live at SaaStr AI LDN!! A deep dive into Databricks’ $134B valuation, the death of per-seat pricing, and why 16% median...
AI Surveillance Startup Caught Using Sweatshop Workers to Monitor US Residents
The powerful surveillance startup Flock was caught using workers in the Philippines to collate data on US residents.
AI Is Incredibly Good at Changing Voters’ Minds, New Research Finds — With an Incredible Caveat
A new international study led by researchers at MIT found AI chatbots are much better at persuading voters than TV campaign ads.
Analysis Of The Legal Defense Strategies Being Used By AI Makers Fighting Those AI Mental Health Lawsuits
OpenAI responded to the lawsuit against it regarding AI and mental health. I discuss the response. And surface 15 defense strategies likely to be used by all AI makers.
Figure humanoid robot nears human jogging pace in new running demo
Figure AI CEO Brett Adcock dropped a short, electrifying video on social media, teasing the extraordinary speed and agility of Figure 03 humanoid robot.
AI Rewrites the Retail Playbook
Live from the Morgan Stanley Global Consumer & Retail Conference, our analysts discuss how AI is reshaping the future of shopping in the U.S.
How Close Are Today’s AI Models to AGI—And to Self-Improving into Superintelligence?
Today’s leading AI models can already write and refine their own software. The question is whether that self-improvement can ever snowball into true superintelligence
YouTube secretly tests AI video retouching without creators’ consent
Popular YouTubers Rick Beato and Rhett Shull discovered the platform was quietly altering their videos with AI; the company admits to a limited experiment, raising concerns about trust, consent and...
Meta’s latest acquisition suggests hardware plans beyond glasses and headsets
Limitless will work on consumer AI hardware, likely supported by Meta’s new design studio led by Alan Dye.
AI synthetic research startup Aaru raised a Series A at a $1B ‘headline’ valuation
The one-year-old startup, which does market research on simulated populations, had a multi-tier valuation round, sources tell TechCrunch.
Microsoft’s Copilot+ AI PC plan fizzled, but it still served a purpose
Microsoft’s Copilot+ AI PC plan launched with a ton of hype, but the company has little to show for it today.
Meta cuts deals with several news publishers for AI use
Meta has entered into AI data sharing agreements with several news organizations. This will be used to answer user queries based on real-time events.
I tried a smart ring that captured my thoughts and replicated my voice – it was trippier than expected
Stream Ring is an AI-powered note-taker and thought organizer that users can speak into, regardless of the environment.
Wall Street races to protect itself from AI bubble
Wall Street lends billions to AI companies while using credit derivatives and sophisticated bonds to hedge against potential bubble risks.
Musicians must embrace ‘unstoppable force’ of AI, Eurythmics’ Dave Stewart urges
Producer says creatives need to own their intellectual property so they can license it to generative AI platforms
AI deepfakes of real doctors spreading health misinformation on social media
Hundreds of videos on TikTok and elsewhere impersonate experts to sell supplements with unproven effects
AWS re:Invent was an all-in pitch for AI. Customers might not be ready.
AWS is releasing a lot of new AI tech but the cloud infrastructure giant’s enterprise customers may not be ready for it yet.
New York Times sues AI startup for ‘illegal’ copying of millions of articles
Perplexity AI also faces lawsuit from Murdoch-owned Dow Jones and New York Post for its use of copyrighted content
4 Quiet Ways AI Is Transforming the SaaS Industry
AI is transforming SaaS behind the scenes, reshaping architecture and engineering long before customers see changes.
The New York Times and Chicago Tribune sue Perplexity over alleged copyright infringement
Both publications claim the AI company scraped their works for LLM training and often reproduced content verbatim.
OpenAI Is Suddenly in Major Trouble
What was once a healthy lead over OpenAI’s competition thanks to its blockbuster AI chatbot ChatGPT has turned into a razor-thin edge.
‘Diamonds and Turds’: How Hock Tan Turned Broadcom Into an AI Juggernaut
Early last year, Broadcom CEO Hock Tan decided to host what he likes to call a “coffee chat” with the employees of VMware, the software giant that the Broadcom CEO...
MIT researchers “speak objects into existence” using AI and robotics
MIT researchers at the School of Architecture and Planning developed a speech-to-reality system that combines generative AI, natural language processing, and robotic assembly to fabricate physical objects from spoken prompts.
OpenAI prompts AI models to ‘confess’ when they cheat
The idea is to make LLMs turn themselves in when they don’t follow instructions, potentially reducing errors in enterprise deployments.
Google fellow: AI doesn’t pretend to be intelligent. It is.
Researcher and Google CTO Blaise Agüera y Arcas argues that current AI models don’t just seem intelligent — they are.
How We Went From 20+ Humans to 3 Humans + 20 AI Agents at SaaStr: More Work, Less Drama, Triple the Output
A real-world case study on AI transformation in a $10M+ B2B community business Back in 2020, SaaStr was bursting at the seams. We had 20+ full-time employees. We’d just opened...
IBM CEO Says the Math Just Doesn’t Add Up on Its Competitors’ AI Spending
IBM CEO Arvid Krishna said that the math of its AI competitors’ spending doesn’t add up, and won’t return a profit.
Google just launched Gemini 3 Deep Think — its most powerful AI model yet
Google’s most powerful version yet
Meta Poached Apple’s Top Design Guys to Fix Its Software UI
Meta wants to make its AI hardware slicker and more fashion-forward. It also needs to make its software more usable. The way to do all that appears to be hiring...
The behavioral selection model for predicting AI motivations
Highly capable AI systems might end up deciding the future. Understanding what will drive those decisions is therefore one of the most important ques…
Micro1, a Scale AI competitor, touts crossing $100M ARR
Micro1 started the year with roughly $7 million ARR. Now, it claims to have surpassed $100 million in ARR, double what it reported in September.
This 24 Year Old Built A Multibillion-Dollar AI Training Empire In Eight Months
Ali Ansari’s decision to turn micro1’s AI recruitment assistant into a data labeling business spiked the company’s valuation from $80 million to $2.5 billion.
PayPal For Agents: Startup Launches Autonomous Payments For AI Agents
AI agents will soon be able to pay for services, even hire other agents, thanks to. new agentic payment platform that just launched.
Gong study: Sales teams using AI generate 77% more revenue per rep
A new Gong study of 7.1 million sales opportunities reveals that 7 in 10 revenue leaders now trust AI, with sales teams using specialized AI tools generating 77% more revenue...
Anthropic signs $200M deal to bring its LLMs to Snowflake’s customers
AI research lab Anthropic inked a $200 million deal with Snowflake to bring its AI models to Snowflake’s 12,600 customers.