The Briefing by Martin Peers, Jessica Lessin and the team at The Information

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The Briefing

By Martin Peers, Jessica Lessin and the team at The Information

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Recent Editions

Photo via Duolingo.

Creator Economy

Duolingo’s TikTok Famous Owl Is Spending More Time on YouTube

By Kaya Yurieff · May 15, 2024 2:00pm PDT

Duolingo has made its TikTok account a hit with users, emerging as an example of how companies can find a voice on short-form video. It’s got a plan for a potential TikTok ban. The language learning app, best known by its pushy owl mascot, has been expanding its presence on YouTube Shorts since early last year. For example, it ran a... Duolingo has made its TikTok account a hit with users, emerging as an example of how...

Google DeepMind CEO, Demis Hassabis. Photo via Google.

Why Google and OpenAI Don’t See Eye to Eye on Voice Assistants

By Amir Efrati and Jon Victor · May 15, 2024 7:00am PDT · 2 comments

Google has spent the past year and a half chasing OpenAI’s conversational artificial intelligence. But as the technical gap narrows between their products, the companies this week revealed an important difference in how their AIs will interact with people. (To read the five main takeaways from Google’s two-hour spate of announcements, see this... Google has spent the past year and a half chasing OpenAI’s conversational artificial...

Introducing The Information’s Sports Rights Database

By Sahil Patel and Akash Pasricha · May 15, 2024 6:00am PDT · 3 comments

A New York Yankees fan who wants to watch all of the team’s games this year needs more than a cable TV subscription. They’ll also need access to Amazon Prime, Apple TV+ and Roku, each of which has exclusive rights to stream certain games. It’s not just baseball. The NBA is nearing rights deals beginning in 2025 with... A New York Yankees fan who wants to watch all of the team’s games this year needs more than...

Google AI chief Demis Hassabis, left, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai via Getty

The Good and Bad of Google’s AI Bash

By Jon Victor and Amir Efrati · May 14, 2024 6:02pm PDT · 7 comments

Google AI chief Demis Hassabis, left, and Google CEO Sundar Pichai via Getty

The Good and Bad of Google’s AI Bash

By Jon Victor and Amir Efrati · May 14, 2024 6:02pm PDT · 7 comments

Google on Tuesday gave its supporters and detractors a lot of fodder after a two-hour showcase of new conversational artificial intelligence for consumers and businesses. Although CEO Sundar Pichai described relatively few major technological breakthroughs during the marathon session, the dizzying array of new AI features in dozens of existing... Google on Tuesday gave its supporters and detractors a lot of fodder after a two-hour showcase of...

Google CEO Sundar Pichai at Google’s I/O developer conference on Tuesday. Photo by Google

Google Serves a Multicourse AI Meal

By Nick Wingfield · May 14, 2024 5:00pm PDT · 1 comment

The season of AI hype continues. Yesterday it was OpenAI. Today it was Google, which used its annual developer conference, Google I/O, to chronicle all of the ways it’s pushing the ball forward in artificial intelligence. Google is part of a $2 trillion–plus company, so it had a lot of ground to cover, which may explain why its event clocked in... The season of AI hype continues. Yesterday it was OpenAI. Today it was Google, which used its...

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Photo by Bloomberg via Getty Images.

Middle East Money Takes a Round Trip

By Kate Clark · May 14, 2024 3:00pm PDT

In the world of artificial intelligence, startups are raising heaps of cash from cloud and chip providers like Google and Nvidia. It’s a great deal for the big tech companies. The startups are also their customers, so much of that capital cycles back as revenue, a phenomenon some critics have dubbed “round-tripping.”A similar dynamic is... In the world of artificial intelligence, startups are raising heaps of cash from cloud and chip...

Photo via Google.

Creator Economy

Google’s Sora Competitor Is Coming to YouTube

By Kaya Yurieff · May 14, 2024 2:00pm PDT

Google is coming for OpenAI’s Sora—and the plethora of other young startups offering ways to create AI-generated video, ranging from Runway to Pika. On Tuesday at its annual developer conference Google I/O, the company announced Veo, which creates AI-generated videos from text, image and video prompts. Demis Hassabis, co-founder & CEO... Google is coming for OpenAI’s Sora—and the plethora of other young startups offering ways to...

Elon Musk, left, and Larry Ellison. Photos via Getty Images.

Musk’s xAI Nears $10 Billion Deal to Rent Oracle’s AI Servers

By Anissa Gardizy · May 14, 2024 9:00am PDT · 1 comment

Elon Musk, left, and Larry Ellison. Photos via Getty Images.

Musk’s xAI Nears $10 Billion Deal to Rent Oracle’s AI Servers

By Anissa Gardizy · May 14, 2024 9:00am PDT · 1 comment

Elon Musk’s 1-year-old artificial intelligence startup, xAI, has been talking to Oracle executives about spending $10 billion to rent cloud servers from the company over a period of years, according to a person who has been involved in the talks. The deal would make xAI one of Oracle’s largest customers as Musk tries to catch up... Elon Musk’s 1-year-old artificial intelligence startup, xAI, has been talking to Oracle...

OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati introducing GPT-4o. Photo via YouTube/OpenAI.

OpenAI’s Impressive Engineering Feat with GPT-4o AKA ‘Her’

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Kalley Huang · May 14, 2024 7:00am PDT

OpenAI’s Google search killer may not yet be ready for prime time, and neither is the long-awaited GPT-5 large language model. But the ChatGPT developer on Monday may have still managed to steal some thunder ahead of Google’s annual conference for software developers, I/O, which starts later this morning.In a 26-minute demonstration, OpenAI COO... OpenAI’s Google search killer may not yet be ready for prime time, and neither is the...

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Photo via Shutterstock.

TPG, General Atlantic Back Saudi Startups After Taking Kingdom’s Money

By Kate Clark · May 14, 2024 6:00am PDT

The Middle East’s giant sovereign wealth funds have poured money into dozens of U.S. private tech funds with the expectation that some of those petro dollars will funnel back to the region’s startups. Now there are signs that venture capitalists and private equity funds are responding by scouting for investments in local startups. In... The Middle East’s giant sovereign wealth funds have poured money into dozens of U.S....

A truck enters a large regional Walmart distribution center in Washington, Utah. Photo by George Frey/Getty Images.

Walmart Lays Off Corporate Staff, Tells Workers at Three Tech Hubs to Relocate

By Theo Wayt and Ann Gehan · May 13, 2024 6:59pm PDT

Walmart is laying off hundreds of corporate staffers and ordering employees at tech hubs in Dallas, Atlanta and Toronto to relocate or lose their jobs, according to a person close to the company, as it grapples with slowing growth and prepares to open a massive new campus at its Bentonville, Ark. headquarters. Some tech employees in the... Walmart is laying off hundreds of corporate staffers and ordering employees at tech hubs...

OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati introducing GPT-4o. Photo via YouTube/OpenAI

OpenAI Outshines Apple

By Nick Wingfield · May 13, 2024 5:00pm PDT

OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati introducing GPT-4o. Photo via YouTube/OpenAI

OpenAI Outshines Apple

By Nick Wingfield · May 13, 2024 5:00pm PDT

Here at The Information we’ve written a lot over the past six years about Apple’s struggles to make technological progress with its Siri voice assistant. So it must have been painful to the folks at Apple’s giant donut in Cupertino, Calif., to see OpenAI waltz right onto their turf earlier today and show the kind of artificial intelligence–... Here at The Information we’ve written a lot over the past six years about Apple’s struggles to...

Food and beverage startups can struggle to finance inventory and other costs to get their products on shelves. Photo via Adobe Stock.

A Lender to Buzzy Brands Is Scrambling, Highlighting Consumer Crunch

By Ann Gehan · May 13, 2024 11:54am PDT

Ampla, a consumer startup-focused fintech that has loaned money to buzzy food and beverage brands like Carbone Fine Food pasta sauces and MrBeast-backed snack brand Feastables, is trying to find a buyer after failing to raise a fresh equity round, a person who has participated in deal talks said. The sale attempts highlight how a pullback in... Ampla, a consumer startup-focused fintech that has loaned money to buzzy food and beverage brands...

Photo by Chesnot/Getty Images.

Meta Explores AI-Assisted Earphones With Cameras

By Kalley Huang and Sylvia Varnham O'Regan · May 13, 2024 9:30am PDT

Meta Platforms is exploring developing artificial intelligence–powered earphones with cameras, which the company hopes could be used to identify objects and translate foreign languages, according to three current employees. Meta’s work on a new AI device comes as several tech companies look to develop AI wearables, and after Meta... Meta Platforms is exploring developing artificial intelligence–powered earphones with...

Sam Altman and Sundar Pichai. Photos via Getty Images.

OpenAI Looks To Steal Google’s Thunder; Unicorn AI Marketing Startup Typeface Acquires Consumer Chatbot App

By Stephanie Palazzolo · May 13, 2024 7:00am PDT

Later today, OpenAI is expected to unveil a bunch of new products. For a sneak peek at what could come, you can check out our story from Friday. But the timing of the event is interesting, given that tomorrow is Google’s largest annual developer conference, Google I/O, where that company is also expected to make a slew of AI-related... Later today, OpenAI is expected to unveil a bunch of new products. For a sneak peek at what could...

Nvidia's booth at a trade show in Hangzhou, China in October 2023. Photo by FeatureChina via AP.

Chinese Regulators Tell Local Tech Firms to Buy Fewer Nvidia Chips

By Qianer Liu · May 13, 2024 6:00am PDT

Nvidia's booth at a trade show in Hangzhou, China in October 2023. Photo by FeatureChina via AP.

Chinese Regulators Tell Local Tech Firms to Buy Fewer Nvidia Chips

By Qianer Liu · May 13, 2024 6:00am PDT

Chinese authorities have a message for the local tech industry: Buy Chinese. Officials with government agencies in recent months have told tech firms, including TikTok parent ByteDance, Tencent, Alibaba and Baidu, to cut back on their purchase of foreign-made artificial intelligence chips in favor of buying more domestically made chips, said two... Chinese authorities have a message for the local tech industry: Buy Chinese. Officials with...

Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Photo: Getty.

The Electric: The Tesla Model 2 Was Nearly Ready for Production When Musk Scrapped It

By Steve LeVine · May 13, 2024 4:30am PDT · 4 comments

Early this year, a team of Tesla engineers was working out stubborn kinks in the Model 2, the company’s long-awaited $25,000 electric vehicle, which was to be ready for pilot production later this year and high-volume manufacture in 2025. The engineers believed they would surmount the technical difficulties, including with the car’s signature... Early this year, a team of Tesla engineers was working out stubborn kinks in the Model 2, the...

Apple Thought Different and Paid the Consequences

Apple Thought Different and Paid the Consequences

By Abram Brown · May 11, 2024 7:00am PDT

Welcome, Weekenders! In this newsletter:Meet Sequoia Capital’s Musk whisperer Our favorite new power-dining spots Plus: A funny-as-hell boss from hell; the mojo-less media; and a galactic bug hunt.As a small, dumb boy at heart, I saw the flying paint and smashed smithereens in Apple’s new iPad ad and honestly thought nothing more... Welcome, Weekenders! In this newsletter:Meet Sequoia Capital’s Musk whisperer Our favorite...

Art by Clark Miller

The Best New Power-Dining Spots Specialize in Fishy Bliss

By Ryan Sutton · May 11, 2024 6:00am PDT · 3 comments

On the bottom floor of a luxury high-rise in San Francisco’s SOMA district—a few blocks away from Slack’s headquarters—a newly relocated counter spot sends out puffy milk toast with toro and golden osetra caviar. It sears blackthroat sea perch and tops it with onion jam. Welcome to Akikos, where dinner runs $250, or more... On the bottom floor of a luxury high-rise in San Francisco’s SOMA district—a few...

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. AP Photo/Jon Gambrell

OpenAI Develops AI Voice Assistant As It Chases Google, Apple

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Amir Efrati · May 10, 2024 3:25pm PDT · 4 comments

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. AP Photo/Jon Gambrell

OpenAI Develops AI Voice Assistant As It Chases Google, Apple

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Amir Efrati · May 10, 2024 3:25pm PDT · 4 comments

In the race to develop artificial intelligence that communicates the way humans do, OpenAI is preparing to demonstrate technology that talks to people—using sound as well as text—and recognizes objects and images. The ChatGPT developer has shown some of these capabilities, which include better logical reasoning than its current... In the race to develop artificial intelligence that communicates the way humans do, OpenAI is...