Author: Editor-in-Chief

Marc Benioff, co-founder and CEO of Salesforce, appears to be walking back comments calling for the National Guard to patrol San Francisco. “Having listened closely to my fellow San Franciscans and our local officials, and after the largest and safest Dreamforce in our history, I do not believe the National Guard is needed to address safety in San Francisco,” Benioff said in a post on X. “My earlier comment came from an abundance of caution around the event, and I sincerely apologize for the concern it caused. “ Benioff stirred up controversy last week after giving an interview with The…

Silicon Valley leaders including White House AI & Crypto Czar David Sacks and OpenAI Chief Strategy Officer Jason Kwon caused a stir online this week for their comments about groups promoting AI safety. In separate instances, they alleged that certain advocates of AI safety are not as virtuous as they appear, and are either acting in the interest of themselves or billionaire puppet masters behind the scenes. AI safety groups that spoke with TechCrunch say the allegations from Sacks and OpenAI are Silicon Valley’s latest attempt to intimidate its critics, but certainly not the first. In 2024, some venture…

The Department of Energy said Thursday that it had finalized a $1.6 billion loan guarantee to upgrade around 5,000 miles of transmission lines. The grid upgrades would ease the flow of electricity in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma, and West Virginia. The project, which will address lines owned by American Electric Power (AEP), won’t add any new routes, but it will help existing ones carry more power. AEP is one of the largest utilities and transmission line owners in the U.S., with operations spanning 11 states. The 5,000 miles that will be upgraded represent around 13% of the company’s total network.…

WhatsApp is attempting to solve its spam problem by curbing how many messages individual users and businesses can send to unknown people without getting a response. While the app started as an easy way to send messages to personal contacts, over time, it has become more complex with groups, communities, and business messaging. With those changes, people are getting more messages than ever, and it is hard to catch up with all of them. All messages users and businesses send to others will count against this new per-month limit, unless they get a response. For instance, if you meet someone…

Electric aircraft startup Lilium may have ceased operations a year ago, but its insolvency filing wasn’t quite the end of the German-based company. There were multiple failed attempts to restructure the company, including a last-ditch effort by Mobile Uplift Corporation, a company set up by investors from Europe and North America, to acquire the operating assets of the startup’s two subsidiaries. Ultimately, a bankruptcy administrator put the company’s assets through a competitive bid process. Now some of its tech will live on over at Archer Aviation, which beat out Ambitious Air Mobility Group and U.S.-based Joby Aviation with the winning…

Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a lawsuit on Thursday against the Trump administration over the government’s alleged social media monitoring of people who are lawfully living in the United States. The suit contends that the government is using AI and other methods to watch the social media posts of virtually every single non-citizen who is in the United States legally and on a valid visa, as well as many people who have obtained permanent resident status. The U.S. government is, according to these allegations, looking for posts that express views that the current government disfavors. The…

Travel search engine Kayak will now allow users to research trips ahead of booking using AI. The company this week launched an “AI Mode” feature that lets users ask travel-related questions as well as compare and book flights, hotels, and cars, through an AI chatbot integrated on the company’s website. The feature is currently available across both desktop and mobile web, and takes advantage of Kayak’s integration with ChatGPT to deliver contextual results. The rollout follows the company’s April launch of Kayak.ai, built as a testing ground for working with AI technology. That site also combined Kayak’s data and…

For one week this summer, Taylor and her roommate wore GoPro cameras strapped to their foreheads as they painted, sculpted, and did household chores. They were training an AI vision model, carefully syncing their footage so the system could get multiple angles on the same behavior. It was difficult work in many ways, but they were well paid for it — and it allowed Taylor to spend most of her day making art. “We woke up, did our regular routine, and then strapped the cameras on our head and synced the times together,” she told me. “Then we would…

Francesco Vitali will be the first to admit that when his co-founder Chris Siametis first pitched him on Rent a Cyber Friend, he didn’t quite get the idea. “Who’s going to pay somebody to speak with somebody?” Vitali told TechCrunch. “But Chris was insistent. Chris is a millennial, and I’m Gen X, so it wasn’t easy for me to understand his vision.” Vitali had worked with Siametis for about two decades; they ran 48FILM, an international short film festival (Vitali is also a film producer). So he took a leap of faith to trust his collaborator on the idea he…

As entertaining as it’s been for the tech industry to watch rival payroll decacorns Deel and Rippling sue each other over a corporate spying scandal, top-tier VCs are apparently not terribly scared off. Deel on Thursday announced that it has raised a $300 million Series E round co-led by A-list fintech VC firm Ribbit Capital and Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from existing investors like Coatue Management and General Catalyst. Deel says it’s been profitable for three years and surpassed $1 billion in ARR, including having a month — September — that hit $100 million in revenue. Deel’s business model…