Anthropic is making changes to its usage policy for the first time in over a year to reflect new and high-risk cases of misuse – including election interference, weapons development, surveillance, and health and financial uses. But one of the most significant changes prohibits “sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior” toward Claude. Last August, […]
At the New York Film Festival premiere of Artificial, Luca Guadagnino’s satirical Sam Altman biopic, the director said onstage that “[when] someone wants to play God, that’s very interesting to me.” The idea of playing God, and power in general – who has it, who desperately wants it, and who will do anything to get […]
Aaron Sorkin’s The Social Reckoning has its fair share of cinematic flair, but many details in the story hew closely to real life. The movie tells the story of how Frances Haugen, a Facebook civic integrity product manager, came to leak a large trove of internal documents to Wall Street Journal investigative reporter Jeff Horwitz, […]
Who is Jane Doe? Online vigilantes have tried to expose the Cornell University student who filed a lawsuit accusing seven fraternity members of gang rape, and in so doing have invited a torrent of abuse on several other women. Her lawyers say three women have been falsely identified and harassed – and the real Jane […]
Xbox CEO Asha Sharma told employees that Microsoft is getting ready to do something around Grand Theft Auto VI that “no other platform holder is doing” during an employee all-hands this morning. According to sources familiar with Microsoft’s plans, Sharma’s brief teaser was actually about Xbox managing to land a deal for game streaming rights […]
With AI hardware, tech companies are pushing the definition of what does and doesn’t constitute a recording. For most of gadget history, it’d be reasonable to assume that a device with a microphone or camera is either recording you or it isn’t; it’s either on or off, without much gray area. Microphones capture sound. Cameras […]
After suffering years of frustration with Apple’s parental control features, I’ve been eagerly anticipating the revamped Screen Time that launched last month with iOS 27. Unfortunately, I can’t use it. Technically, this is because my 18-year-old son hasn’t got round to updating his MacBook. But mostly, it’s because Apple’s rollout of the new feature has […]
I’ve spent most of the last couple weeks using an otherwise unexceptional midrange Android phone with one amazing feature: a matte OLED display. That screen is by far the best thing about the TCL P80 Ultra, and weirdly, it’s made me more excited for the iPhone Duo and its matte inner display. 2023’s TCL Nxtpaper […]
Norbert Wiener, godfather of cybernetics, once said, “The thought of every age is reflected in its technique.” For the past century, our thought has been reflected in our computers, including by those in the AI industry. Google’s Demis Hassabis calls the brain “a biological approximation to a Turing machine.” Elon Musk puts it more bluntly, […]
Kakul Srivastava is the CEO of Splice, the sample platform countless producers rely on for one-shots and melodic loops. Samples pulled from the service have found their way into massive hits like Lisa’s “Money” and “Espresso” by Sabrina Carpenter. (The original samples are here and here, for the curious.) Before that, Kakul held executive roles […]