Tech Brew Ride Home

The big regulatory guns are out for Grok. Memory chip shortage now hit the Steam Deck. Manus is already coming to your favorite messaging app. Turns out Buy Now Pay Later really works for vacations. And another lengthy AI essay, this time detailing what it’s doing, and has the potential to do to SaaS companies.


EU privacy watchdog opens probe into Elon Musk’s X over sexualised AI images (FT)


Valve’s Steam Deck OLED will be ‘intermittently’ out of stock because of the RAM crisis (The Verge)


Raspberry Pi soars 40% as CEO buys stock, AI chatter builds (Reuters)


Meta-owned Manus launches AI agents on Telegram (SiliconRepublic)


Airbnb expands its “Reserve Now, Pay Later” globally (TechCrunch)


10 Years Building Vertical Software: My Perspective on the Selloff (@nicbstme)

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OpenClaw’s creator is joining OpenAI, but the OpenClaw project lives on. The AI-caused memory shortage might delay the next Playstation. Is the Pentagon about to cut ties with Anthropic? And Vitalik Buterin is growing concerned with the prediction markets.


OpenClaw founder Peter Steinberger is joining OpenAI (The Verge)


Peter Steinberger Chose OpenAI. The Code Was Never the Point. (Implicator.AI)


Rampant AI Demand for Memory Is Fueling a Growing Chip Crisis (Bloomberg)


ByteDance to curb AI video app after Disney legal threat (BBC)


Exclusive: Pentagon threatens to cut off Anthropic in AI safeguards dispute (Axios)


The hidden infrastructure crisis in mortgage and real estate finance that only tokenization can solve (Crypto.news)

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Buy Chris' book: How To AI
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Anthropic raises the second largest financing round of all time. Other AI players are beginning to show hockey stick revenue growth. Meta wants to add facial recognition to its glasses. Ring pulls back from some recognition partnerships for its camera. And, of course, your Weekend Longreads Suggestions.


Anthropic closes $30 billion funding round as cash keeps flowing into top AI startups (CNBC)


Enterprise AI startup Cohere tops revenue target as momentum builds to IPO: Investor memo (CNBC)


Meta Plans to Add Facial Recognition Technology to Its Smart Glasses (NYTimes)


Ring cancels its partnership with Flock Safety after surveillance backlash (The Verge)

Weekend Longreads Suggestions:


The AI Gold Rush Is Breaking a Silicon Valley Taboo: Cashing Out Before the IPO (WSJ)


The New Fabio Is Claude (NYTimes)

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Aaannddd…. Right on time here come the Chinese AI models. Elon Musk kicks off a major reorg of xAI. Google is warning of AI distillation attacks. New Waymo cars hit the road. And another interesting AI essay to read to you.


Chinese AI startup Zhipu releases new flagship model GLM-5 (Reuters)


Musk announces xAI re-org following co-founder departures, SpaceX merger (CNBC)


Elon Musk Wants to Build an A.I. Satellite Factory on the Moon (NYTimes)


Google says attackers used 100,000+ prompts to try to clone AI chatbot Gemini (NBCNews)


Waymo begins deploying next-gen Ojai robotaxis to extend its U.S. lead (CNBC)


The AI Vampire (Steve Yegge)

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