SpaceX announces potential issuance of ‘significant’ stock in ‘future transactions’
SpaceX is warning investors that it may release “significant amounts of stock” in “future transactions” following its upcoming IPO. The language was added amid persistent industry gossip that CEO Elon Musk plans to eventually merge the space and AI company with Tesla. The new language was hidden deep in the risk factors section of the […]
This AI weather startup is outperforming government forecasts
A new AI weather forecasting tool released today by startup WindBorne Systems provides more frequent and accurate predictions for key variables than the world-leading system developed by European governments, thanks to advances in the way sensor readings are fed into deep learning models. Founded in 2019 by a group of Stanford University students, WindBorne started […]
DuckDuckGo eases access to ‘AI-free’ search engine as traffic soars
As traffic continues to grow, alternative search engine DuckDuckGo is leaning into anti-AI sentiment with the release of a new browser extension that allows users to set noai.duckduckgo.com, an AI-free search experience, as their default search engine. Once enabled, users will be directed to DuckDuckGo’s AI-free search page, with no AI-assisted answers or chat prompts, […]
Strava declares war on scrapers ahead of IPO
AI companies have become data-hungry businesses as they require increasingly large datasets to train their models. To meet that need, many AI startups are actively collecting data, ignoring long-standing internet conventions such as respecting robots.txt files, which signal to automated crawlers which parts of a website are off-limits. This requires websites to restrict access to […]
Unastella, a South Korean rocket startup that launches from its home country, raises $24 million
As SpaceX counts down to what could be its biggest IPO in history, the race to build the next generation of launch vehicles is heating up. Asia wants to participate. Startups from Australia, India, Japan and South Korea are competing to establish themselves in a market long dominated by the United States and China. One […]
Erin Brockovich targets data center secrets
Environmental activist Erin Brockovich has a new mission: to bring more transparency into data center construction and its impact on nearby communities. Brockovich, best known for being played by Julia Roberts in the dramatization of the lawsuit against Pacific Gas & Electric, recently launched a website with a map of data centers across the United […]
This weekend’s two big movies were both directed by YouTubers
The pipeline from YouTube to premium horror is looking very strong this weekend. The No. 1 spot at the box office went to Backrooms, a feature film adaptation of Kane Parsons’ series of YouTube videos featuring creepy found footage of mysterious, physics-defying office spaces (taken from 4chan threads). Parsons’ “Backroom” is expected to gross an […]
‘This is fine’ artist KC Green agrees with AI startup Artisan
Artist KC Green, creator of the famous “This is it” meme, said he reached an agreement with Artisan after accusing the startup of misusing his work. The controversy arose after the startup appeared to be using a version of Green’s art to promote its AI assistant Ava. Artisan’s bus and subway ads featured a familiar […]
Understanding the debate surrounding AI psychosis
Box founder Aaron Levy made headlines this week for a social media post suggesting that tech company CEOs are “prone to AI psychosis.” On the latest episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Kirsten Kolosek, Sean O’Kane, and I did our best to clarify Levy’s comments. First, we noted that he is not denying AI tools, only […]
Black founders raise the most funding in a quarter since 2022, but there’s a catch
According to Crunchbase’s latest data on Black founders, $643 million has poured into Black-founded startups in the U.S. since the start of the year, the most since 2022, when Black founders raised $653 million in funding. For context, Black founders raised $942 million of all venture funding last year (or 0.32% of the $290 billion […]