We've got the one and only @zoink.bsky.social on the second episode of ACCESS! We discuss: - Figma's IPO and what's next - MCP / how he's thinking about AI - The future of design Out everywhere you can get podcasts

SOURCES: OpenAI is planning to bring ads to ChatGPT. Also: In a message to employees, Sam Altman says he wants 250 gigawatts of compute by 2033. He calls OpenAI's team behind Stargate a "core bet" like research / robotics. "Doing this right will cost trillions." sources.news/p/openai-ads...

Trump’s EO on H-1B visas has thrown the tech industry into chaos overnight I just published an email Google sent H-1B employees yesterday warning them to not leave the US / to return by midnight tonight sources.news/p/heres-goog...

First issue of Sources is out! It’s a deep dive into the (very cool) new Meta Ray-Bans. They’ve got a display, neural band that feels like sci fi, & suggest a lot about where things are headed Feat. my interview w/t Zuck (full convo airs on the Access podcast tomorrow) sources.news/p/meta-ray-b...

I’m launching Sources, a new publication about the tech industry’s inside conversation, and Access, a tech interview podcast with my friend @hamburger.bsky.social. The first issue of Sources drops tomorrow, featuring an interview with Mark Zuckerberg, which airs in full on Access this Thursday.

big week

I wrote about Charlie Kirk and the viral content machine that sprang to life in the wake of his shooting — and how this time, even people running the country are partaking in the churn. www.theverge.com/analysis/776...

monopoly business is a booming www.theverge.com/command-line...

And Apple stock's up 4% after hours because it can keep collecting free money from Google in the search deal.

The power shift inside OpenAI

“It’s never been a better time to be a telegenic nerd, and never a worse time to be only good at delivering clean copy.” www.deezlinks.com/p/media-comp...

. @alexeheath.com sat down with Sam Altman for a big, spicy interview: -Altman says they "totally screwed up" some of the gpt5 rollout -He thinks they'll overtake IG + FB in web traffic -OpenAI has "better models" they can't offer!? -Altman has stopped using Google www.theverge.com/command-line...

had dinner with sam altman last night and he uh, said some stuff www.theverge.com/command-line...

"It is acceptable to engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual." Meta removed that language from its internal guidelines after I raised it. AI experts worry financial incentives will blur the line between human relationships and bot engagement. www.reuters.com/investigates...

From my interview with OpenAI’s head of ChatGPT: It was surprising to see the “level of attachment” people had to 4o. “It’s not just change that is difficult for folks, it’s also the fact that people can have such a strong feeling about the personality of a model.” www.theverge.com/openai/75853...

I've been dreading this turn for months — the war over AI scraping data is undercutting a load-bearing part of the internet, and it will probably only get worse.

Corruption at its finest. TikTok will be next.

ChatGPT is bringing back 4o as an option because people missed it

it’s almost like we should not be cheering government intervention in how we get information! (which is really what age gating is at scale) full episode here: www.theverge.com/the-vergecas...

love a midnight surprise scoop from @alexeheath.com in command line: sam altman gets in the mix on huge payouts to keep ai researchers www.theverge.com/command-line...

Yesterday, Sam Altman told OpenAI researchers and engineers they’re getting “special one-time” bonuses due to “movement in the market” for AI talent. The bonuses will be worth millions for some. “We very much intend to keep increasing comp”, wrote Altman in Slack. www.theverge.com/command-line...

GPT-5 is here for all ChatGPT users It’s “the best model in the world” at coding and writing, says OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Automatically routes to reasoning mode when needed, hallucinates less, gives “safe completions” for prompts it would have previously refused www.theverge.com/openai/74801...

Excited to see what the Verge does with this!

It’s been a whole baby (nine months!) since we launched The Verge’s subscription, and today we’re rolling out a new slate of subscriber-only columns packed with incredible journalism and a lot of heart. Only way to read is to subscribe so do it: theverge.com/subscribe

OpenAI's first open-weight model in 6 years is here. GPT-OSS is free to download, shows its reasoning process, performs similarly to o3 on coding, and can run on a laptop or single GPU. www.theverge.com/openai/71878...

the new version of Grok generated a topless video of Taylor Swift "The 'spicy' preset also isn’t guaranteed to result in nudity... But several defaulted to ripping off most of her clothing." www.theverge.com/report/71897...

those who follow Apple know how absolutely wild it is for Cook to come out and say — on an earnings call, no less — that the company is looking at acquisitions shows how much pressure Apple is feeling on the AI front www.theverge.com/news/716790/...

Had a blast on Decoder chatting with @alexeheath.com about the AI talent wars & why some researchers are getting traded like NBA superstars. Talked about my Windsurf scoop & Meta feature, plus tales from AI industry folks watching it all unfold on the inside. www.theverge.com/decoder-podc...

AI was supposed to kill Google. Instead: - Search is growing - Gemini is growing - DeepMind is firing on all cylinders I think it’s safe to say that Google is back. www.theverge.com/command-line...

are we past peak writing? feels like reading is moving into luxury territory

This is such a great example of how just giving new people a platform opens up such interesting ideas. I always like The Vergecast, and I read tons of stuff by @miasato.bsky.social + @franhoepfner.bsky.social but this lens on celebs using online platforms is brilliant www.youtube.com/watch?v=-74M...

first podcast I've started with "damn we are cooked" sincerely though, I appreciate a CEO building deepfakes being real about the good and bad tradeoffs of ever-better ones proliferating www.theverge.com/decoder-podc...

my colleague @tomwarren.co.uk reports that OpenAI is targeting August for the launch of GPT-5 (Sam Altman just mentioned testing it on Theo Von) plan is to also ship open-weight reasoning model before GPT-5 www.theverge.com/notepad-micr...

New from me: The internet is built on sameness. People hawk the same stuff, use the same music, write the same SEO articles. Now the aesthetics and modes of the web have escape into the real world. If you thought your feeds were derivative, wait until you see dupes: www.theverge.com/cs/features/...

a lil scoop in today's newsletter: Shane Smith tried to buy Substack

I’m guest hosting the Decoder podcast for the next couple of months, starting with this chat with the one and only @hamburger.bsky.social www.theverge.com/decoder-podc...

Scoop: Here's what Mark Zuckerberg is offering top tier research talent to come to Meta: www.wired.com/story/mark-z...

Scoop: Sam Altman slammed Meta's AI talent poaching spree in a memo to staff last night. "Missionaries will beat mercenaries," he said: www.wired.com/story/sam-al...

spends a super long flight to Europe trying to mentally check out from work immediately sees a major AI CEO while picking up checked bags at small regional airport

I tried Runway’s video game generator, which is rolling out over the next several days to everyone The CEO tells me he’s talking to a bunch of gaming companies about doing deals AI is coming for video games www.theverge.com/ai-artificia...

In an internal meeting today, a top Meta exec said Sam Altman was "dishonest" for saying that the company is offering $100 million bonuses to poach OpenAI employees. “we are succeeding at getting talent from OpenAI," Meta's CTO told staff www.theverge.com/command-line...

only in San Francisco does it take awhile to figure out that the conversation you’re overhearing is about Warriors trade rumors, not the comp packages AI researchers are getting

Sam Altman in a March email to an audio device startup that was asking him to personally invest in its round: “thanks but im working on something competitive so will respectfully pass!” www.theverge.com/openai/69173...

I interviewed the VP of glasses at Meta, which just announced a new design with Oakley. We discussed the first meeting he had with new AI chief Alexandr Wang, how people are using the Meta Ray-Bans, the current status of AR glasses, and more. www.theverge.com/command-line...

yes, Mark Zuckerberg looked at acquiring Perplexity and Safe Superintelligence he also approached Mira Murati about buying her new AI lab, Thinking Machines none of these talks got very far, though, mainly due to disagreements about price and/or strategy www.theverge.com/command-line...

Why is Zuck spending so much to reboot his AI efforts? Llama has fallen so far behind that Meta product teams have discussed using outside models www.theverge.com/command-line...

this one aged well www.theverge.com/2024/7/1/241...

It’s official: Meta is paying $14.3 billion to buy 49% of Scale, the AI industry’s leading data dealer. Scale CEO Alexandr Wang will report to Zuck. This is essentially Meta paying $14 billion to catch up in the AI race. www.theverge.com/meta/685711/...

Google is offering buyouts to US employees in Search and a bunch of other orgs (not DeepMind, Cloud, YouTube). Internal memo from the SVP of Search says the buyout program is for those “who don’t feel aligned with our strategy" www.theverge.com/google/68496...

Snap CEO Evan Spiegel tells me the company plans to sell its first pair of consumer AR glasses (now simply called Specs) next year. There aren't many details on the hardware yet, but I'm told they will be thinner, lighter, and have a wider field of view. www.theverge.com/snapchat/684...