Altman offered to have OpenAI invest in every single startup in this Y Combinator class: tokens for equity.

Slapping “AI” on your startup’s pitch deck is basically table stakes right now. When a founder raised $20 million from Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest for an eSports gamification loyalty startup without those two letters in the spotlight, it got us wondering how the conversation even started — especially when ARK had already been burned by a company operating in the same space.  On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Julie […]

Vox Media's Jim Bankoff is selling his company's podcast network, along with Vox.com and New York Magazine, to James Murdoch. Chris Saucedo/SXSW Conference & Festivals via Getty Images Vox Media is splitting itself into two and selling half to media heir/investor James Murdoch. Murdoch is buying Vox's podcast network, along with Vox.com and New York Magazine. What does that tell you about the future of Vox Media's other properties — and web publishing in general? I asked Vox CEO Jim Bankoff. Jim Bankoff spent nearly 20 years building Vox Media. Now he's selling a big chunk of it to James Murdoch, one of Rupert Murdoch's sons, who is acquiring Vox's podcast network — along with New York Magazine and Vox.com for a reported $300 million. I've talked to multiple media operators who were interested in Vox's podcast network — including Versant CEO Mark Lazarus — but not in the rest of the portfolio, which includes sites like The Verge, Eater, and The Dodo. So what does it mean if podcasting — a business where people talk, and, increasingly, look at a camera — is more appealing than a bunch of text-based websites, many of which you've heard of? I posed that question to Bankoff, who says I'm wrong — he insists there are lots of people interested in lots of his properties. But the fundamental answer is that his podcasting business is profitable and fast-growing, and you can't necessarily say that about all of his other assets. You also can't say that about many other formerly high-flying digital publishers, which makes me wonder if this is one of the last big sales the industry will ever see. By the way, I am deeply conflicted here: I worked for Bankoff for years, and now work with the podcast network he's selling to Murdoch. And if you listen to our entire conversation on my Channels podcast, some of our working relationship will be evident. The following is an edited excerpt of our chat. Peter Kafka: My understanding is that you folks talked to multiple buyers who were interested in Vox Media's podcast business, but weren't interested in other parts of the company. And at some point, you added New York Magazine and Vox.com to the package, and that's what James Murdoch bought. What does it tell us about media if the thing most people wanted was a podcast network? Jim Bankoff: Well, not exactly. Some of that is right, some of it isn't. We were approached from the outside, originally, about the podcast network. We'd always kind of contemplated that Vox.com was part of that because Vox, so much of what Vox does is podcasting. "Today Explained" is a very popular podcast. It's a Top 10 podcast, but there are some other big ones in there, and there's also a massive YouTube channel. I think the majority of its revenue comes from things other than what I'll call text space. But yes, we got some outside interest. We didn't take it too seriously at first, but then we thought to ourselves, "Wow, this is a different kind of business, a growth business, and maybe it should have, in business speak, its own capital structure, its own ownership structure. Maybe we should think about that." And we did. The fact that New York Magazine came along was initially their idea. James Murdoch's idea. Yes. And we walked through the logic of it, and it made particular sense for the kind of company they're creating. So we got our heads around it, and the process moved kind of quickly at that point. The part that wasn't exactly accurate is I think there's interest in literally every single part of the business. But we're not looking to just break things up for the sake of breaking things up. We don't expect to break things up beyond what we did today. What I was trying to get at is that it seems like the thing media buyers were most interested in was the podcast network. I'm wondering why you think that appeals to them more than other properties. I question the premise. But I grant you that it's an exciting property and there's some obvious reasons. First of all, it's an extraordinarily high-growth property, which makes it attractive — upwards of 40% per year for quite some time. What's driving that? Audio, video? All of the above. It taps into what we call the creator economy. Vox Media Podcast Network approaches it in a certain way, though, which I think is about as kind of premium, as thoughtful as you can get. It's a highly curated network that still has scale — No. 6 on the Podtrac rankings. We're not after scale for scale's sake, but we are after quality scale, and that's what we've achieved. And I think that's part of what made it so interesting to people. What changes at the properties that aren't getting acquired? I think they're going to do very well. There's a lot of excitement over there. Each one of those brands are in really good shape and getting stronger. Like most media brands, they had to go through changes, particularly [ones] brought upon by the changes of Google Search. But they have gone through that now. It's a self-sufficient media company? Absolutely. And having said that, they'll have plenty of options for where to take it from there. Each one of those brands, while getting some benefit from being together, have their own business strategies, have their own audiences. They can go to market together from a sales proposition and get plenty of scale. But they're all in a position to really thrive. Read the original article on Business Insider

Robbie Whelan / Wall Street Journal: Nvidia reports Q1 net income up 211% YoY to $58.3B, beating analyst estimates of $42.9B, and raises Q2 revenue forecast to $91B  —  Astronomical rise in AI agents and demand for data-center computing lift chipmaker to another record quarter  —  Chip giant Nvidia reported record sales and income Wednesday …

Berber Jin / Wall Street Journal: In disclosures to investors, Anthropic says it expects to generate $10.9B in revenue in Q2, vs. $4.8B in Q1, and turn a $559M operating profit, its first ever  —  The startup expects a 130% revenue surge to $10.9 billion in the June quarter and its first operating profit, defying skeptics of the AI boom

Emily Pitcher says a conversation with a Meta employee changed how she felt about her layoff. Courtesy Emily Pitcher Emily Pitcher was laid off from her content design job at Meta in 2023. After struggling to find another job, she pivoted to indie game development and content creation. Pitcher says showing her work before it's ready and learning new skills helped her succeed. This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Emily Pitcher, a 26-year-old game developer and content creator based in Los Angeles. It's been edited for length and clarity. When I was laid off from my job as a content designer at Meta in 2023, all I wanted was to be rehired. It was my identity, and without it, I lacked purpose. But it was a blessing in disguise. Rejection after rejection in the job market pushed me to pursue entrepreneurship full-time as an indie game developer and content creator. Now I'm partnering with a publisher to launch my game, "Lily's World XD," around the end of the year. I'm working on projects I'm truly passionate about, and I know there are people who would do anything to trade places with me. If I could go back to when I first got laid off, I'd tell myself things will be OK. Don't wait for opportunities to come to you I had a small social media following before my layoff, but I'd never done a brand deal before. After my layoff, I made a spreadsheet of all the brands I'd ever dreamed of working with and went down the list, reaching out to them to partner. I got my first few brand deals that way, which taught me a lot about the social media landscape, including how to negotiate rates, send invoices, and correspond with brands. Now, social media brand deals are one of the core ways I make money. You don't have to go with the obvious path I felt despondent for so long after my layoff. It was hard for me to get out of bed in the mornings. I acted out of fear, not joy. It was hard seeing news come out so often about more tech layoffs, so the prospect of finding a new Big Tech job felt hopeless. Sure, I had a Big Tech name on my resumé, but so did everyone else who got laid off from one. I wish someone were there to tell me that if there aren't opportunities in front of you, it's possible to create your own. However, I don't have a mortgage to pay or a family to take care of. I'm very grateful to be in this position, and I don't know if I can tell people it will all be OK just because it worked out for me. Sharing my experience created more opportunities than I imagined I posted a video about my layoff on TikTok, and it's crazy because to this day, a lot of people who recognize me in public tell me it's the first video they saw of mine. Being open and authentic about my situation gave me a bit of a boost and pulled my community and me closer together. A few months later, I posted a video about how I was still struggling after my layoff. I talked about lacking friends, lacking a purpose, and not knowing what I was supposed to do. I woke up the next day to probably one hundred DMs from people saying they were in a similar situation. Someone who reached out to me actually became my friend and helped me get into voice acting. It was a field I never thought I'd go into, but now it's another way I make money. Learn the skill you've been putting off When I started making "Lily's World XD," I'd never coded in my life. I just always told myself my brain didn't work that way. It was only after my layoff that I realized that if I wanted to self-start my own projects, I should learn how to program. I had a friend teach me the basics, and I learned the rest from YouTube and online forums. If I hadn't taken that leap to learn a new skill, I would've never lifted my game up off the ground. Share what you're working on before it's ready I think a lot of people, after being laid off from Meta, had dreams of pivoting into entrepreneurship or a passion project, but most I've seen have gone back to corporate. One reason I was able to pivot is that I got advice from another game developer: Share your project before you think you're ready. When I came up with my game idea, all I had were a couple of mockups and Figma. I hadn't even started my journey of learning how to program. I posted a video showing what I had, and it got a few million views. It was really validating to me that the idea was appealing to others and gave me motivation to continue. It also allowed people to share their thoughts, which helped inform the direction I took. Start before you second-guess yourself. There are people who wish they could be in my position I put so much of my identity into my job at Meta. Going out in public, saying I worked for this Fortune 500 company, made people take me more seriously and assume I was smart without doing anything to prove it. It gave me a huge boost of confidence. Losing the thing I thought made me valuable to other people and not having many friends around for support put me in a really dark place. Then I met someone who was still working at Meta, and when I told him I was making video games now, he said he wished he could build projects he was really excited about and not just feel like a cog in the machine. Hearing those words made me realize I should be proud of myself. Perhaps I've set the foundation for something great. Do you have a story to share about getting laid off from Meta? If so, please reach out to the reporter at tmartinelli@businessinsider.com. Read the original article on Business Insider

Bloomberg: SpaceX files publicly for its IPO, choosing Nasdaq to make its debut under the symbol SPCX; Elon Musk's shares give him 85.1% of the voting power in the company  —  SpaceX Files for IPO on Nasdaq Under SPCX Symbol  —  Video Player is loading.  —  Unmute  —  Current Time 0:01 Loaded: 26.69% Playback Rate

There is nothing cybersecurity professionals are more excited about, and nothing they fear more, than AI.

GitHub confirmed a data breach this week involving the theft of thousands of developer code repositories. One threat actor — TeamPCP — took credit.

Elon Musk's rocket company, SpaceX, which recently acquired his AI startup, xAI, has released its public S-1 filing ahead of a planned IPO. Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post via Getty Images The SpaceX IPO filing everyone has been waiting for is officially here. The rocket company's S-1 paperwork, which pulls back the curtain on SpaceX's finances, is a required step ahead of an IPO. It also offers insight into xAI, Elon Musk's AI startup that SpaceX acquired earlier this year. Houston, we have the SpaceX filing everyone has been waiting for. The S-1 paperwork, one of the most hotly anticipated financial filings of the year, gives the public its first look at the inner workings of Elon Musk's rocket company and AI venture xAI. The filing reveals that SpaceX posted a $4.9 billion loss in 2025 on revenue of $18.7 billion. The SpaceX IPO is expected to be one of the largest in US history and comes after the Starship maker announced its acquisition of xAI, Musk's AI startup, in February. SpaceX applied to be listed on the Nasdaq and Nasdaq Texas stock exchanges under the ticker "SPCX." The S-1 is a required step for companies looking to go public in the US, giving potential investors a chance to examine SpaceX's finances, key shareholders, overall vision, and the risks facing its business. Business Insider's reporters are poring over the filing's many pages and will update this story with key details. SpaceX shoots for the moon Musk founded SpaceX in 2002 with the mission of reaching and settling Mars. Since then, the company has pioneered the use of reusable rockets and has become the world's most prolific rocket launcher. SpaceX has struck deals with NASA to resupply (and eventually deorbit) the ISS, and is set to play a critical role in the agency's efforts to return humanity to the moon. The Austin-based company also operates a booming telecommunications business through Starlink, which provides global internet coverage through a network of low-orbit satellites. In recent months, Musk has shifted SpaceX's focus toward building solar-powered orbital data centers, which the billionaire has said will be necessary to train powerful AI models and eventually turn humanity into a multi-planetary civilization. The company is also collaborating with Tesla to build a sprawling "Terafab" that would manufacture specialist chips for space-based data centers and humanoid robots. Investors will not just be backing Musk's vision for rockets and satellites. Following the merger with xAI, SpaceX's portfolio includes the social media platform X, formerly Twitter, and the AI chatbot Grok. xAI has been a big expense for the company. In 2025, capital expenditures for its AI segment were $12.7 billion, more than three times the spending in its space and connectivity segments. That said, the company believes the AI segment also has the most potential, accounting for most of its $28.5 billion total addressable market, which the company says is the "largest actionable total addressable market ("TAM") in human history." The document also lays out the company's sizable risks for public investors to take into account. Those include US and international investigations and inquiries into the company, particularly around Grok's creation of explicit images of children. And, as the document said, "space is inherently hostile." Musk's moneymaker There's the potential for Musk, already the world's richest man, to win big from the company's Mars-shot. In January, the company approved a compensation plan that would grant its founder 1 billion shares if certain goals were hit, including various market capitalization milestones and the "establishment of a permanent human colony on Mars with at least one million inhabitants." Musk's 2025 compensation was quite modest in comparison. He earned a base salary of $54,080. The company's president, Gwynne Shotwell, earned $85.8 million in a mix of cash, options, and stock awards. This is a developing story… Read the original article on Business Insider

Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis. Karl Mondon / AFP via Getty Images Humanity is standing "on the foothills of the singularity," Demis Hassabis said at I/O on Tuesday. The DeepMind CEO's remark stunned the audience. Hassabis shared on Wednesday why he felt that way. Building video games late at night with AI convinced Hassabis that humanity is entering a new era. Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis laid out why he thinks the singularity, a major turning point in AI, is near. The singularity is near because of the rise of powerful AI agents that build things for people, Hassabis said in an interview with Axios cofounder Mike Allen on Wednesday at Google's flagship I/O developer conference. The singularity refers to a hypothetical point when AI outpaces human intelligence and begins improving itself. As an example, Hassabis said he's been using AI to build mini video games late at night — tasks that would have taken many months in the past. "This year, with the agentic systems that we're all seeing and using, I think we can start feeling it now," he said. Hassabis added that he thinks artificial general intelligence, or AGI, when machines are about as intelligent as humans, will arrive as soon as 2030. Hassabis said the impact of AI is still underestimated, declaring that it will be 100 times as impactful as the Industrial Revolution. The DeepMind chief doesn't think machines will take over the world, unlike some in Silicon Valley. While AI poses some risks, he said humans will harness the technology to solve many problems, especially in science and healthcare. "I call myself a cautious optimist," he said. Hassabis also addressed the singularity on Tuesday at the I/O conference. "When we look back at this time, I think we will realize that we were standing in the foothills of the singularity," Hassabis said, to gasps in the audience. Read the original article on Business Insider

Meta, led by CEO Mark Zuckerberg, said that job cuts are needed to fund other investments. Nick Wass/AP In an email, Meta tied its latest job cuts to a push for efficiency and need to fund investments. It was a frank message about why a company was cutting workers in the age of AI. In a separate memo to staff, Mark Zuckerberg addressed the emotional toll of the layoffs. Your layoff may be helping your former employer pay for AI. That's the thrust of part of the email Meta's leadership sent to affected employees on Wednesday as the tech giant slashed 10% of its workforce. The message directly tied the cuts to the company's spending priorities: "As previously shared, we have decided to reduce headcount as part of our continued effort to run the company more efficiently and to allow us to offset the other investments we're making." It's rare for a company to be so direct about how big-ticket investments affect staffing. The company said in January that its capex for the year would range from $115 billion to $135 billion. While Meta thanked the laid-off workers for their contributions, the explicitness of its reasoning underscores a new level of bluntness, said Jason Schloetzer, professor of business administration at Georgetown's McDonough School of Business. That line in the email is "cold," he said, and reflects companies' upper hand in the current labor market. As an employer, "you have the ability to be more direct and transactional when workers don't have as many job prospects," said Schloetzer. Meta didn't respond to a request for comment from Business Insider about the email. Meta isn't alone in talking up the need for going big on AI. In recent years, execs at Microsoft, Google, Shopify, and Salesforce have variously announced job cuts and reorganizations tied to efficiency, increased automation, and AI investments. Meta stands out, though, for directly attributing its recent layoffs to its spending plans. 'I feel the weight of that' Meta's layoff message arrives as the tech giant pours tens of billions of dollars into AI infrastructure in a race to build what CEO Mark Zuckerberg described as "personal superintelligence" in a separate companywide memo sent Wednesday. In that broader note, Zuckerberg addressed the emotional toll of the layoffs. He said he was "spending a lot of time making sure we manage this as well as possible." He also said that he doesn't expect any further companywide layoffs in 2026. "It's always sad to say goodbye to people who have contributed to our mission and to building this company," Zuckerberg wrote. "I feel the weight of that." It was an echo of the rhetoric Zuckerberg used during a major layoff round in 2022, when he told employees, "I got this wrong," and said he wanted to "take accountability" for decisions the company had made. At the same time, Wednesday's all-hands memo addressed the urgency Zuckerberg sees in the AI race: "AI is the most consequential technology of our lifetimes," he wrote. "The companies that lead the way will define the next generation." Facing a tough job market The two messages underscored the balancing act increasingly confronting tech executives — one that involves trying to get workers excited about AI while also signaling to investors that companies are making sound bets on the technology. Gil Luria, an analyst who runs tech research at the financial services firm DA Davidson Companies, said that Meta's approach is better than when companies say AI is making workers so efficient that they need fewer people. To fund AI infrastructure spending and protect profit margins, Luria said, Zuckerberg made it clear that Meta needed to cut costs somewhere else. "That somewhere else is head count," Luria said. For workers getting a pink slip, any rationale may fall on deaf ears, said Ashley Herd, a cohost of the "HR Besties" podcast and a former head of human resources in North America at consulting firm McKinsey. "No amount of logistical information or tone changes what people are actually reading: 'You're out so we can invest in AI,' " she said. "What no message can fix is the reality that these are real people now navigating one of the hardest job markets in years." Read the original article on Business Insider

The disguised apps use WebView automation, JavaScript injection, and OTP interception to avoid detection and complete fraudulent subscriptions.

"You are he who will restore peace to Eternia."

Autonomous AI agents are taking on all types of work for businesses: routing logistics fleets, triaging support tickets, generating code, and orchestrating... Autonomous AI agents are taking on all types of work for businesses: routing logistics fleets, triaging support tickets, generating code, and orchestrating multistep workflows. How do you take a general-purpose model and make it excel at your specific task? Customization provides an agent with the right capabilities. This post explains nine techniques for customizing AI agents… Source

The 0–60 time is impressive, the miles/kWh number even more so.

It could be one way to make your old PC play nicely with a high-end GPU.

Digital banking startup Mercury has raised $200 million in a Series D round at a $5.2 billion valuation, the company announced Wednesday. That’s up 49% from the $3.5 billion valuation it achieved when announcing its $300 million Series C — which included primary and secondary funding — in March of 2025.

Google publishes exploit code before patch, reported 29 months earlier, is fixed.

ChatGPT Plus costs $240 per year, but ChatOn is only $55.25 for a full three years when you use code CHAT35. The post Skip the $20/Month: 3 Years of Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini for $60 appeared first on TechRepublic.