When OpenAI declared a “code red” this month to refocus its teams on competing with Google, I couldn’t help but think back to December three years ago when the companies’ roles were reversed. Google was the one blasting the sirens to catch up to OpenAI. What followed the next month, in January 2023, were the first sweeping layoffs in Google’s history. “A difficult decision to set us up for the future,” as the company described it at the time.I wonder whether the ChatGPT developer could make similar workforce cuts early next year. This speculation inspired me to come up with…
President Donald Trump signed a highly anticipated executive order on Thursday that sets in motion a plan to establish a national regulatory framework for artificial intelligence while undercutting states’ abilities to enact their own rules.The order, titled “Ensuring a National Policy Framework for Artificial Intelligence,” creates an AI litigation task…
A Virginia startup calling itself Operation Bluebird announced this week that it has filed a formal petition with the US Patent and Trademark Office, asking the federal agency to cancel X Corporation’s trademarks of the words “Twitter” and “tweet” since X has allegedly abandoned them.“The TWITTER and TWEET brands have…
Julie Bornstein thought it would be a cinch to implement her idea for an AI startup. Her résumé in digital commerce is impeccable: VP of ecommerce at Nordstrom, COO of the startup Stitch Fix, and founder of a personalized shopping platform acquired by Pinterest. Fashion has been her obsession since…
OpenAI has introduced GPT-5.2, its smartest artificial intelligence model yet, with performance gains across writing, coding, and reasoning benchmarks. The launch comes just days after CEO Sam Altman internally declared a “code red,” a company-wide push to improve ChatGPT amid intense competition from rivals.“We announced this code red to really…
Putting a plant into a planter, placing snacks in containers, and sorting laundry successfully doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to have a humanoid robot in your home next year. But the dream of offloading home cleaning, maintenance and maybe even cooking is getting a little more real as Google DeepMind…
Alex Komoroske has always been at odds with Big Tech’s darker side. Though he cut his product-management teeth at Google and Stripe, he was never comfortable with the industry’s increasing prioritization of profits over people. Once during his time at Google, he extolled the societal benefits of a project only…
Looking for Tuesday’s Strands hints, spangram and answers? You can find them here:If you’re ready to feel bad about yourself, here’s a Strands about a lot of achievements you’ll never have. How To Play StrandsThe New York Times’ Strands puzzle is a play on the classic word search. It’s in…
The Trump administration may think regulation is crippling the AI industry, but one of the industry’s biggest players doesn’t agree.At WIRED’s Big Interview event on Thursday, Anthropic president and cofounder Daniela Amodei told WIRED editor at large Steven Levy that even though Trump’s AI and crypto czar, David Sacks, may…
A few short months ago, almost every robot made by the hundreds of companies working on humanoid robots could charitably be described as slow, topping out at around three mph. Walking was on the edge of plodding, and arm movements bordered on sluggish and awkward. But just this weekend, we…
My little theory is that the concept of “imprinting” in psychology can just as easily be applied to programming: Much as a baby goose decides that the first moving life-form it encounters is its parent, embryonic programmers form ineradicable attachments to the patterns and quiddities of their first formative language.For…
A company with $20 billion in annual revenue can’t commit $1.4 trillion to capital infrastructure. It’s simple math: by the end of 2026, market pressure is likely to push OpenAI toward scaling back its record-setting AI data center buildout.OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is “looking at commitments of about $1.4 trillion…
The alarm hasn’t yet reached the general public, but tension is beginning to build in the corridors of the aerospace industry, in microchip laboratories, and in government offices. For months, an element almost invisible to the world—yttrium—has become the silent center of a new global dispute. Supplies are thinning, prices…
Retro handheld gaming continues its renaissance, as we’ve got a fresh and delightful new Game Boy Color RPG to look forward to early next year in the form of Gumball in Trick-or-Treat Land. This family-friendly adventure from developer Exquisite Laundry Pet and publisher Mega Cat Studios will officially launch on…
Over 1,000 Amazon employees have anonymously signed an open letter warning that the company’s allegedly “all-costs-justified, warp-speed approach to AI development” could cause “staggering damage to democracy, to our jobs, and to the earth,” an internal advocacy group announced on Wednesday.Four members of Amazon Employees for Climate Justice tell WIRED…
Spotlight
Memo may not be the world’s fastest barista, but it is impressive—for…
Evan Kirstel, a mega-influencer in the technology space, has been doing some…
If you read any of WIRED’s recent AI edition, you know that…
We’re back to numbers again in today’s NYT Pips Hard tier puzzle.…
