Technology

• Google's I/O keynote was both scary and chill, a fever dream of sizzle reels selling how AI changes everything, even search, and can give users superpowers (Casey Newton/Platformer) May 21, 2025
  Casey Newton / Platformer: Google's I/O keynote was both scary and chill, a fever dream of sizzle reels selling how AI changes everything, even search, and can give users superpowers  —  At its annual developer conference, the company seeks to reassure everyone that AI is for everyday utility — but the great disruption to the […]
• Experts warn Trump's trade policies risk US dominance in digital services, often uncounted by traditional statistics, as the EU considers retaliatory tariffs (Ashley Belanger/Ars Technica) May 21, 2025
  Ashley Belanger / Ars Technica: Experts warn Trump's trade policies risk US dominance in digital services, often uncounted by traditional statistics, as the EU considers retaliatory tariffs  —  In sparking his global trade war, Donald Trump seems to have maintained a glaring blind spot when it comes to protecting …
• New York City's AI tool, launched in 2018 to score families at risk for child abuse using factors like their neighborhood, is raising racial bias concerns (Colin Lecher/The Markup) May 21, 2025
  Colin Lecher / The Markup: New York City's AI tool, launched in 2018 to score families at risk for child abuse using factors like their neighborhood, is raising racial bias concerns  —  How a family's neighborhood, age, and mental health might get their case a deeper look … Karlena Hamblin was sitting on a stool […]
• Jensen Huang calls US AI chip export controls a "failure" that sped up China's efforts, cutting Nvidia's market share in China from 95% to 50% in four years (Eleanor Olcott/Financial Times) May 21, 2025
  Eleanor Olcott / Financial Times: Jensen Huang calls US AI chip export controls a “failure” that sped up China's efforts, cutting Nvidia's market share in China from 95% to 50% in four years  —  World's top AI semiconductor maker says export controls have accelerated Chinese rivals' advances
• The US SEC sues Unicoin and its executives, alleging they broke securities laws by raising $100M+ for tokens falsely claimed to be backed by real estate (CoinDesk) May 21, 2025
  CoinDesk: The US SEC sues Unicoin and its executives, alleging they broke securities laws by raising $100M+ for tokens falsely claimed to be backed by real estate  —  The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued crypto company Unicoin and three executives on Tuesday night on fraud charges …
• AMD announces Zen 5-based Threadripper 9000 CPUs with up to 96 cores, along with RDNA 4-based Radeon AI Pro R9700 workstation GPU, both slated to launch in July (Tobias Mann/The Register) May 21, 2025
  Tobias Mann / The Register: AMD announces Zen 5-based Threadripper 9000 CPUs with up to 96 cores, along with RDNA 4-based Radeon AI Pro R9700 workstation GPU, both slated to launch in July  —  COMPUTEX AMD aims to extend its lead over Intel in the high-end desktop (HEDT) and workstation arenas with its 9000-series …
• Zhejiang, home to Alibaba and DeepSeek, publishes an AI plan that expects companies in the AI supply chain to make $138B+ in total operating revenues by 2027 (Coco Feng/South China Morning Post) May 21, 2025
  Coco Feng / South China Morning Post: Zhejiang, home to Alibaba and DeepSeek, publishes an AI plan that expects companies in the AI supply chain to make $138B+ in total operating revenues by 2027  —  A new plan from the Zhejiang government will see billions of yuan spent through 2027 to support AI companies and […]
• Google announces Firebase AI Logic, combining Vertex AI and Genkit tools to more easily integrate AI into apps, and adds Figma import support in Firebase Studio (Kyt Dotson/SiliconANGLE) May 21, 2025
  Kyt Dotson / SiliconANGLE: Google announces Firebase AI Logic, combining Vertex AI and Genkit tools to more easily integrate AI into apps, and adds Figma import support in Firebase Studio  —  Google LLC is rolling out a number of updates for its Firebase mobile and web application development framework as it works …
• Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson approves controversial new taxes expanding the state's sales tax on companies providing digital services, starting in October 2025 (Taylor Soper/GeekWire) May 21, 2025
  Taylor Soper / GeekWire: Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson approves controversial new taxes expanding the state's sales tax on companies providing digital services, starting in October 2025  —  Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson on Tuesday approved controversial new taxes on businesses that will help plug the state's massive $16 billion budget shortfall.
• Kalshi withdrew announcements about a collaboration with xAI just hours after CEO Tarek Mansour said the deal would "further take prediction markets mainstream" (Paige Smith/Bloomberg) May 21, 2025
  Paige Smith / Bloomberg: Kalshi withdrew announcements about a collaboration with xAI just hours after CEO Tarek Mansour said the deal would “further take prediction markets mainstream”  —  Kalshi had announced on Tuesday morning that xAI would provide tailored information to offer guidance for bets made by the site's users.
• Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana says Waymo has reached 10M paid trips, doubling in the past five months, and that the company is not yet profitable (CNBC) May 20, 2025
  CNBC: Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana says Waymo has reached 10M paid trips, doubling in the past five months, and that the company is not yet profitable  —  Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana told CNBC on Tuesday that the Alphabet-owned ride-hailing company has reached 10 million trips, doubling in the past five months.
• Hands-on with Google's Android XR Gemini-powered prototype glasses: they are light and comfortable to wear, and the single display in the right lens works well (Michael L Hicks/Android Central) May 20, 2025
  Michael L Hicks / Android Central: Hands-on with Google's Android XR Gemini-powered prototype glasses: they are light and comfortable to wear, and the single display in the right lens works well  —  Google's Android XR glasses prototype worked surprisingly well in my quick press demo.  —  I got hands-on time with Google's prototype AR glasses […]
• Matthew Lane, a 19-year-old from Massachusetts, pleads guilty to hacking two US companies and extorting them for ransoms; source: one of them is PowerSchool (Kevin Collier/NBC News) May 20, 2025
  Kevin Collier / NBC News: Matthew Lane, a 19-year-old from Massachusetts, pleads guilty to hacking two US companies and extorting them for ransoms; source: one of them is PowerSchool  —  The Massachusetts man agreed to plead guilty to obtaining information from a protected computer and aggravated identity theft.
• The Argentine government dismantles a unit created three months ago to investigate the Libra cryptocurrency scandal involving President Milei and his sister (Ignacio Olivera Doll/Bloomberg) May 20, 2025
  Ignacio Olivera Doll / Bloomberg: The Argentine government dismantles a unit created three months ago to investigate the Libra cryptocurrency scandal involving President Milei and his sister  —  The Argentine government dismantled the Investigative Task Force (UTI), a body created just three months ago to investigate …
• Sources: US chipmaker Wolfspeed is preparing to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy within weeks after passing on debt-holder proposals to restructure its debt (Wall Street Journal) May 20, 2025
  Wall Street Journal: Sources: US chipmaker Wolfspeed is preparing to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy within weeks after passing on debt-holder proposals to restructure its debt  —  The troubled semiconductor supplier is pursuing a prepackaged chapter 11 plan after it rebuffed multiple attempts by creditors to restructure its debt out of court