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☆ Meta’s Profits More Than Double, While Spending on A.I. Rises
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-24 | by ( Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Profit was $12.4 billion, up from $5.7 billion a year earlier. “It’s been a good start to the year,” said Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s chief executive, referring to the company’s A.I. efforts and “healthy growth across our apps.”But Meta’s efforts on A.I., which require substantial computing power, come with a lofty price tag. The Silicon Valley company said it planned to raise its spending forecast for the year to $35 billion to $40 billion, up from a previous estimate of $30 billion to $37 billion. infrastructure, including data centers, chip designs and research and development costs.

Persons: “ It’s, ”, Mark Zuckerberg Organizations: Revenue, FactSet Locations: A.I

☆ Apple, Meta caught in proxy war between U.S. and China, NY Times' Mike Isaac suggests
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-19 | by ( ) www.cnbc.com time to read: 1 min

In this videoShare Share Article via Facebook Share Article via Twitter Share Article via LinkedIn Share Article via EmailApple, Meta caught in proxy war between U.S. and China, NY Times' Mike Isaac suggestsMike Isaac, New York Times technology correspondent, joins 'Fast Money' to talk the proxy war brewing between U.S. and China over technology.

Persons: Meta, Mike Isaac Organizations: Apple, NY Times, New York Times Locations: China

☆ Meta, in Its Biggest A.I. Push, Places Smart Assistants Across Its Apps
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-18 | by ( Mike Isaac | Cade Metz | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

On a call with investors last spring, Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Meta, said he believed that he had an opportunity to introduce artificially intelligent assistants “to billions of people in ways that will be useful and meaningful.”A year later, he is making good on his statement. On Thursday, Meta will begin incorporating new versions of its A.I.-powered smart assistant software across its apps, which include Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger and Facebook. The latest technology will be rolled out in more than a dozen countries, including Australia, Canada, Singapore and the United States. software will become practically omnipresent — inside the news feed, in search bars and in chats with friends. People will be able to ask the assistant, Meta A.I., for help in completing tasks and getting information, such as what concerts might be occurring in San Francisco on a Saturday night or the best options for vegan enchiladas in New York.

Persons: Mark Zuckerberg, Meta, Meta A.I Organizations: Meta, Facebook Locations: Australia, Canada, Singapore, United States, San Francisco, New York

Apple said it pulled the Meta-owned apps WhatsApp and Threads from its app store in China on Friday on government orders, potentially escalating the war over technology between the United States and China. The House of Representatives was preparing to vote on a bill as soon as this weekend that would force the Chinese internet company ByteDance to sell its popular video app TikTok or have it be banned in the United States. U.S. lawmakers have said TikTok poses a security threat because of its ties to China. Apple said that China’s internet regulator, the Cyberspace Administration, ordered the removal of WhatsApp and Threads from its app store because of national security concerns. “We are obligated to follow the laws in the countries where we operate, even when we disagree,” an Apple spokesman said.

Persons: Apple Organizations: U.S, Cyberspace Administration, Apple Locations: China, United States

☆ Ready for a Chatbot Version of Your Favorite Instagram Influencers?
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-15 | by ( Sapna Maheshwari | Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Being an influencer can be a lot of work. Instagram is pitching popular influencers on a program that relies on artificial intelligence to interact with fans, the latest example of how Meta, Instagram’s parent company, is trying to expand the technology across its products. The program will essentially be a chatbot that mimics the “voice” of the Instagram influencer to respond to fans, the people said. Most of the messages would be sent automatically and would at least initially disclose that they were A.I.-generated, according to two of the people. The people spoke on condition of anonymity because they were asked to sign nondisclosure agreements as part of the program.

Persons: Instagram, A.I

☆ Meta’s Smart Glasses Are Becoming Artificially Intelligent. We Took Them for a Spin.
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-28 | by ( Brian X. Chen | Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In a sign that the tech industry keeps getting weirder, Meta soon plans to release a big update that transforms the Ray-Ban Meta, its camera glasses that shoot videos, into a gadget seen only in sci-fi movies. Next month, the glasses will be able to use new artificial intelligence software to see the real world and describe what you’re looking at, similar to the A.I. software, they can be used to scan famous landmarks, translate languages and identify animal breeds and exotic fruits, among other tasks. software, wearers just say, “Hey, Meta,” followed by a prompt, such as “Look and tell me what kind of dog this is.” The A.I. then responds in a computer-generated voice that plays through the glasses’ tiny speakers.

Persons: Meta, Ray, Ban, ”

☆ Reddit’s Long, Rocky Road to an Initial Public Offering
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-13 | by ( Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

During a leadership crisis in 2015, Reddit asked Steve Huffman, one of its founders, to return to run the social media platform. This month, Reddit is poised to reach the stock market in one of the first tech initial public offerings of the year. Unlike a recent crop of start-ups that are focused entirely on artificial intelligence, the 19-year-old company is a throwback to an earlier era of social media. But what stands out the most is that Reddit is able to go public at all. After being early to social media, the San Francisco-based company stagnated for years.

Persons: Reddit, Steve Huffman, Huffman, “, Mr Locations: San Francisco

OpenAI said on Friday that Sam Altman, its high-profile chief executive, would rejoin its board of directors more than three months after he was briefly pushed out of the company. The move caps a highly anticipated report by a law firm hired by OpenAI’s board of directors to investigate Mr. Altman and his sudden removal from the company in November. “The special committee recommended and the full board expressed their full confidence in Mr. Altman and Mr. Brockman,” Mr. Taylor said, referring to Greg Brockman, the company president who quit in protest after Mr. Altman was removed. “We are excited and unanimous in our support for Sam and Greg.”The company said that the report found that OpenAI’s board acted within its broad discretion to terminate Mr. Altman, but also found that his conduct did not mandate removal. Mr. Taylor said the company would continue to expand its board.

Persons: OpenAI, Sam Altman, Altman, Bret Taylor, . Brockman, ” Mr, Taylor, Greg Brockman, Greg, ”

☆ Big American Tech Profits From Chinese Ad Spending Spree
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-06 | by ( Daisuke Wakabayashi | Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Temu, the international arm of the Chinese e-commerce giant Pinduoduo, is flooding Google with ads for absurdly inexpensive goods. With an initial public offering looming, the fast-fashion merchant Shein is inundating Instagram with ads for clothes and accessories at rock-bottom prices. Developers of China’s video streaming and gaming apps are dumping marketing dollars into Facebook, X and YouTube to entice potential users. In the last year, Temu has placed about 1.4 million ads globally across Google services, and at least 26,000 different versions of ads on Meta, according to Meta’s Ad Library. “You can’t escape their ads across Facebook, Instagram and Google Search.”

Persons: Shein, Temu, ”, Canaves Organizations: Facebook, YouTube, Google, Meta, Ad Locations: China, United States, eMarketer

☆ ‘Dune: Part Two’ Gives Sci-Fi-Obsessed Silicon Valley a Reason to Party
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-04 | by ( Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In a top-floor atrium in downtown San Francisco on Thursday evening, tech workers from Google, Slack, X and Mozilla mingled next to a pair of cardboard cutouts of Timothée Chalamet and Zendaya. Alex Stamos, the former head of security at Facebook, was also spotted. “Do you think they’ll let me take home one of the freaky sandworm popcorn buckets?” someone in the crowd tittered. The techies were all there to celebrate Silicon Valley’s newest obsession: “Dune: Part 2,” the latest movie adapted from the Frank Herbert-authored science-fiction saga, which helped inspire many of them to become interested in technology. The film, which follows the 2021 installment “Dune,” sold an estimated $81.5 million in tickets in the United States and Canada over the weekend, the biggest opening for a Hollywood film since “Barbie.”

Persons: Zendaya, Dustin Moskovitz, chatted, Tim O’Reilly, Alex Stamos, Frank Herbert, ”, “ Barbie Organizations: Google, Mozilla, Facebook Locations: San Francisco, United States, Canada

☆ Instagram’s Uneasy Rise as a News Site
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-22 | by ( Sapna Maheshwari | Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

On a recent Wednesday in Brooklyn’s Dumbo neighborhood, Mosheh Oinounou, a former producer for CBS, Bloomberg News and Fox News, swiped through Instagram. Then he spent much of the day turning many of the articles into posts on his Instagram account, under the handle Mo News. The content has earned Mo News 436,000 Instagram followers, turning what had been a pandemic side project into an enterprise with three full-time employees and a bigger spotlight. In December, the State Department offered Mo News an interview with Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken. Mr. Oinounou said the agency had told him, “We understand how people are getting their news.”

Persons: Will, Oinounou, Biden, Antony J, Blinken, “, ” Organizations: CBS, Bloomberg News, Fox News, Mo, Republican, Mo News, State Department Locations: Instagram, New Hampshire

☆ Meta Calls for Industry Effort to Label A.I.-Generated Content
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-06 | by ( Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Last month at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Nick Clegg, president of global affairs at Meta, called a nascent effort to detect artificially generated content “the most urgent task” facing the tech industry today. On Tuesday, Mr. Clegg proposed a solution. Meta said it would promote technological standards that companies across the industry could use to recognize markers in photo, video and audio material that would signal that the content was generated using artificial intelligence. The standards could allow social media companies to quickly identify content generated with A.I. “While this is not a perfect answer, we did not want to let perfect be the enemy of the good,” Mr. Clegg said in an interview.

Persons: Nick Clegg, Clegg, Meta, Mr Organizations: Economic, Meta, Google, Microsoft, Adobe Locations: Davos, Switzerland

☆ Six takeaways from a contentious online child safety hearing.
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-31 | by ( Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

After a series of tense exchanges between senators and tech executives that clocked in at just under four hours, the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on online child safety came to an end on Wednesday with no clear resolutions in sight. The audience included several family members of victims, who cheered as senators berated the executives and listened stoically as Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Meta, addressed the crowd directly. Here are some of the key takeaways. At times, the senators shouted and talked over the executives, drawing applause from those in the room. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said the companies had “blood on your hands.”

Persons: Mark Zuckerberg, —, Lindsey Graham of, ” Organizations: Meta Locations: Lindsey Graham of South Carolina

☆ Meta Rejected Efforts to Improve Children’s Safety, Documents Show
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-31 | by ( Cecilia Kang | Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Hours before Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Meta, was set to testify on Wednesday about child safety online, lawmakers released internal documents showing how his company had rejected calls to bulk up on resources to combat the problem. In 90 pages of internal emails from fall 2021, top officials at Meta, which owns Instagram and Facebook, debated the addition of dozens of engineers and other employees to focus on children’s well-being and safety. One proposal to Mr. Zuckerberg for 45 new staff members was declined. The documents, which are being released in full for the first time, were cited in a lawsuit last year by 33 state attorneys general who accused Meta of getting young users hooked on its apps. They contradict statements from company executives, including the head of global safety and the head of Instagram, who testified in congressional hearings on child safety during that period that they prioritized the well-being of their youngest users and would work harder to combat harmful content on their platform.

Persons: Mark Zuckerberg, Zuckerberg, Meta, Richard Blumenthal, Marsha Blackburn Organizations: Meta, Facebook, Republican Locations: Connecticut, Tennessee

One proposal to Mr. Zuckerberg for 45 new staff members was declined. It was rejected and he returned to Mr. Zuckerberg in November with a scaled-down proposal for 32 new hires. It is unclear what Mr. Zuckerberg decided. At the hearing, Mr. Zuckerberg plans to suggest that Apple bear the responsibility for verifying ages via its App Store, according to his prepared remarks. Mr. Zuckerberg has long positioned Meta — and the internet writ large — as a place for both good and ill.

Persons: Mark Zuckerberg, Zuckerberg, Meta, Richard Blumenthal, Marsha Blackburn, Mr, Blumenthal, “ We’ve, Andy Stone, Sheryl Sandberg, Nick Clegg, Clegg, Zuckerberg’s, ”, “ Organizations: Meta, Facebook, Republican, Apple Locations: Connecticut, Tennessee

☆ Focused Cuts and Fewer Layers: Tech Layoffs Enter a New Phase
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-30 | by ( Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Amazon, Google and Microsoft also cut tens of thousands of workers. And the companies — including X, formerly known as Twitter, which has chopped nearly 80 percent of its staff since late 2022 — continued operating. And a month into 2024, tech companies have entered a new phase of cost cutting. After last year’s widespread layoffs, the largest firms — including Amazon, Google and Microsoft — have in recent weeks made smaller, targeted job trims while focusing on fewer projects and shifting resources to key products such as artificial intelligence. Some tech start-ups — such as Flexport, Bolt and Brex — have slashed more deeply to stave off potential extinction.

Persons: Mark Zuckerberg, — Organizations: Meta, Google, Microsoft

Soon after, an Amazon executive sent a private message to an executive at another company. He said Anthropic had won the deal because it agreed to build its A.I. Amazon, he wrote, wanted to create a viable competitor to the chipmaker Nvidia, a key partner and kingmaker in the all-important field of artificial intelligence. over the last year exposed just how dependent big tech companies had become on Nvidia. They have spent billions of dollars on Nvidia’s systems, and the chipmaker has not kept up with the demand.

Persons: Amazon, Anthropic Organizations: Amazon, Nvidia Locations: Anthropic, San Francisco

☆ Tech Chiefs From Meta, TikTok and Others to Testify on Child Safety Online
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-24 | by ( Cecilia Kang | Mike Isaac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +5 min

At 1 p.m. on a Friday shortly before Christmas last year, Kent Walker, Google’s top lawyer, summoned four of his employees and ruined their weekend. The group worked in SL1001, a bland building with a blue glass facade betraying no sign that dozens of lawyers inside were toiling to protect the interests of one of the world’s most influential companies. For weeks they had been prepping for a meeting of powerful executives to discuss the safety of Google’s products. The deck was done. But that afternoon Mr. Walker told his team the agenda had changed, and they would have to spend the next few days preparing new slides and graphs.

Persons: Kent Walker, Google’s, Walker Locations: SL1001

Page, hampered for more than a decade by an unusual ailment in his vocal cords, described his vision of a digital utopia in a whisper. If that happens, Mr. Musk said, we’re doomed. Finally he called Mr. Musk a “specieist,” a person who favors humans over the digital life-forms of the future. That debate has pitted some of the world’s richest men against one another: Mr. Musk, Mr. Page, Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, the tech investor Peter Thiel, Satya Nadella of Microsoft and Sam Altman of OpenAI.

Persons: Page, Musk, we’re, ”, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, Satya Nadella, Sam Altman, OpenAI Organizations: Valley, Meta, Microsoft Locations: Silicon

For much of the past year, OpenAI’s board of directors has been criticized as too small and too divided to effectively govern one of the fastest-growing start-ups in Silicon Valley history. On Friday, the board’s dysfunction spilled into public view when four of its members fired Sam Altman, OpenAI’s popular and powerful chief executive. Mr. Altman, 38, returned to the company on Tuesday night, after days of haggling over his job and over the makeup of the board. The board and Mr. Altman’s allies discussed more than a half dozen options for its future. The departing board wanted to be sure the replacements would be independent thinkers and experienced enough to stand up to Mr. Altman.

Persons: Sam Altman, OpenAI’s, Altman, Altman’s, Laurene Powell Jobs, Steve Jobs, Brian Chesky Organizations: Emerson Locations: Silicon Valley

More board members, who could be plucked from OpenAI’s biggest investor, Microsoft, and the A.I. Mr. Altman was not named to the board on Tuesday night, and it was not clear if he ever will be. But some already argue that it will not be as attuned to OpenAI’s original mission to create A.I. The tech industry — perhaps even the world — will be watching to see if OpenAI is any closer to balancing those dueling aspirations than it was a week ago. “This needs to be a trustworthy organization that’s aligned with its board, and at the end of it all, OpenAI is a more valuable organization than it was a week ago.”

Persons: Altman, ”, Aaron Levie Organizations: Microsoft

Sam Altman was reinstated late Tuesday as OpenAI’s chief executive, the company said, successfully reversing his ouster by the company’s board last week after a campaign waged by his allies, employees and investors. The board of directors will be overhauled, jettisoning several members who had opposed Mr. Altman. Adam D’Angelo, the chief executive of Quora, will be the only holdover. “We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board of Bret Taylor (Chair), Larry Summers, and Adam D’Angelo,” OpenAI said in a post to X. “We are collaborating to figure out the details.

Persons: Sam Altman, Altman, Adam D’Angelo, Sam, Bret Taylor, Larry Summers, ” OpenAI, Greg Brockman, upended Organizations: Quora

Nearly all of OpenAI’s 800 employees have threatened to follow Mr. Altman to Microsoft, which asked him to lead an A.I. lab with Greg Brockman, who quit his roles as OpenAI’s president and board chairman in solidarity with Mr. Altman. The board has not said what it thought Mr. Altman was not being honest about. There were indications that the board was still open to his return, as it and Mr. Altman held discussions that extended into Tuesday, two people familiar with the talks said. But there was a sticking point: Mr. Altman rejected some of the guardrails that had been proposed to improve his communication with the board.

Persons: OpenAI, Altman, Greg Brockman, Brockman Organizations: Microsoft

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