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Hello, guests, welcome to the Week in Review (WiR), TechCrunch’s regular newsletter that has been updated a few days ago in technology. AI stole the headlines again, with techies from Google to X (formerly Twitter) going up against OpenAI for chatbot supremacy. But a lot happened too.
In this edition of WiR, we include Google pretending to be a model of its new AI (and giving bad notebooks to the Black summit team), the beginning of the defense of Anduril showing a weapon ship, the continuation still the fallout from the 23andMe hack, and the release of the Grand Theft Auto VI trailer. Also on the list are stories about patient research and health data streaming online, Meta’s new AI-powered image generator, Spotify work cut and an autonomous car that takes off from the US.
There’s a lot to get to, so we won’t delay. But first, a reminder to sign up here to get WiR in your mailbox every Saturday if you haven’t already.
Lots of reading
AI, pretend: Google introduced a new AI model this week called Gemini. But the full picture has not been revealed, Gemini Ultra – only a “lite” version called Gemini Pro. In a press release and announcement on the blog, Google showed the potential of using Gemini with many sales, saying that the model can understand images, sounds and videos as well as text. But Gemini Pro – which is very much about text-in, information-out – has been proven wrong. And in an even worse scenario for Google, the company found the deception of a Gemini demo by listening to the information and images released from the camera.
bad notebook: In another Google PR mishap, attendees at the company’s K&I Black Summit in August were given triple notebooks containing highly insensitive language. My colleague Dominic-Madori wrote that inside the notebooks were printed the words “I was alone. cotton time, but I came to write my notes” (emphasis ours). It goes without saying that this could not be well received by many of the Black people who attended; Google has pledged to “avoid similar situations as (used) and (sold) sold in the future.”
Anduril’s new weapon: Anduril, the anti-aliasing company founded by Oculus co-founder Palmer Luckey, has developed a new product aimed at increasing cyber threats. the air. Named Roadrunner, the vertical and all-terrain vehicle – one example of which can take a head – can remove, follow and destroy the target or, if there is no need to disturb the target. , return independently to the site for refilling and reuse.
More 23andMe victims: Last Friday, the research company 23andMe announced that hackers were able to access the personal information of 0.1% of customers, or about 14,000 people. But the company has not yet said how many other users may have been affected by the breach, which was first reported by 23andMe in October. A lot, as it turns out – 6.9 million people got their names, birth years, names of relationships, the percentage of DNA they share with relatives, reports of ancestry and self-reported locations.
Grand Theft Auto has gone viral: Within 22 hours, the first trailer for Grand Theft Auto VI received 85 million views – breaking the MrBeast video’s record for most views on YouTube in 24 hours. The excitement for Grand Theft Auto VI was a decade in the making; The first entry in Rockstar Games’ long-running franchise, Grand Theft Auto V, remains the second-best seller video game of all time, except for Minecraft.
List patient records: Thousands of disclosure services have leaked medical records and health information of millions of patients due to security weaknesses in decades of commercial standards designed for storing and sharing images. medicine. This standard, called Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM), is the internationally recognized standard for medical imaging. But as found by Aplite, a German-based cybersecurity consultant, security flaws in DICOM mean that many hospitals have used personal information available on the web.
Image generator: Google’s Gemini launch, Meta announced a new, stand-alone generative AI experience on the web, Visualize and Meta AI, which allows users to create images by describing in common language. Similar to OpenAI’s DALL-E, Midjourney and Stable Diffusion, Visualize and Meta AI, which is powered by Meta’s existing Emu model, creates high-quality images from textual data.
Spotify offers discounts: Spotify is cutting about 1,500 jobs, or about 17% of its workforce, in its third round of layoffs this year as streaming music appears to have become “good and good.” In a statement to employees Monday, Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek – citing the slow growth of the economy and the increase in the cost of capital – said that the right-hand labor is very important for the company faces “challenges ahead.”
TuSimple output: When TuSimple went public in 2021, it soared to become the most popular self-driving car in the US Now – after much internal conflict and the loss of a serious partnership with trucking company Navistar – TuSimple is completely out of the US. TuSimple says a regulatory files On Monday it laid off most of its American employees and sold assets here as it left the country for Asia.
ZestMoney is closed: ZestMoney — a buy-now, pay-as-you-go startup whose ability to make small-ticket loans to internet consumers first attracted a number of high-profile investors, including Goldman Sachs — has shut down in after unsuccessful attempts to find a buyer. The Bengaluru-based startup employed about 150 people at its peak and raised more than $130 million in its eight-year journey.
Leo
TechCrunch’s list of announcements continues to grow – just in time for the weekend buzz.
Equality featured a throwback conversation from TechCrunch Disrupt 2023, when Alex sat down with Serhii Bohoslovskyi, who founded the no-code app builder, Trible, to help people build online courses. The pair discovered the state of the economy of creation, the use of tools without rules today (and how non-specialists get them) and the safety of the beginnings and roots in Ukraine.
Continue Got it, the crew spoke to David Rogier, CEO and founder of MasterClass, a social media platform where you can learn from world experts on a wide range of topics. Before Rogier launched MasterClass, he worked as a VC, and – through his connections – he received a $500,000 match before he had an idea for a company.
And so on Chain ears, Jacquelyn interviewed David Pakman, managing partner and head of investments at CoinFund. Before CoinFund, David spent 14 years at the investment company Venrock. He also led rounds A and B in Dollar Shave Club, which was acquired by Unilever for $1 billion. Then, in 1991, David co-founded Apple Music when he became part of Apple’s system software product marketing group.
TechCrunch+
TC+ subscribers get access to in-depth information, analysis and research – you’ll know if you’re already subscribed. If not, consider signing up. Here are some highlights from this week:
Bitcoin Transfer: Jacquelyn wrote about Bitcoin’s quick jump to $44,000, which came on the back of a 25% gain last week. His column for TC+ explores what is driving Bitcoin’s price rise and similar benefits to other currencies. awards – and whether the vibes continue into the new year.
Variable, or not variable: Tim reports on how battery EV buyers can bring freedom to more people, allowing them to participate in the EV transition in ways that batteries don’t. common. The challenge is to make the unit economical.
Coinbase and Robin and the future of fintech: Investors note that consumer transactions of equity and crypto are recovering and this is causing the high value of some early startups, writes Alex. This could spell good news for startups that offer direct marketing services — or indirectly, for that matter.