The Verge

Samsung’s Photo Assist update can combine photos to “complete” the moment, but does the scale of that feature make it more dangerous? #Vergecast Watch the full episode here: https://lnkd.in/gY-8He9M

Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Skydance’s merger agreement is now official. On Friday, the two companies announced plans to merge into a massive media company that will fold WBD’s studio, linear channels, streaming service, and gaming segment into Paramount. Though WBD initially signed onto an $83 billion agreement to merge part of Warner Bros. with Netflix, Paramount persisted with a hostile takeover bid, followed by a series of offers. That persistence paid off, as WBD determined that Paramount’s “best and final” offer is “superior” to Netflix’s deal. On Thursday, Netflix declined to match Paramount’s bid, calling it “no longer financially attractive.” Read more: https://buff.ly/2BnxBb8

On Friday afternoon, Donald Trump posted on Truth Social, accusing Anthropic, the AI company behind Claude, of attempting to “STRONG-ARM” the Pentagon and directing federal agencies to “IMMEDIATELY CEASE” use of its products. At issue is Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei’s refusal of an updated agreement with the US military agreeing to “any lawful use” of Anthropic’s technology, as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth mandated in a January memo, to the frustration of many tech workers across the industry. As we explained earlier this week, that agreement would give the US military access to use the company’s services for mass domestic surveillance and lethal autonomous weapons, or AI that has full power to track and kill targets with no humans involved in the decision-making process. OpenAI and xAI have reportedly already agreed to the new terms, though OpenAI is reportedly looking to negotiate with the Pentagon to adopt the same red lines as Anthropic.

The Galaxy S26 Ultra’s new Privacy Display is pretty cool. There are two sets of pixels in the display: one that projects the image straight ahead toward the viewer and one that projects light off to the sides, so you can see the screen from an angle. #Vergecast Watch the full episode here: https://lnkd.in/gY-8He9M

The tranche of Jeffrey Epstein emails and files released on January 30th tie the infamous pedophile, sex trafficker, and influence peddler to elite figures across the tech industry. The world of cryptocurrency is no exception. Epstein’s connections are intriguing, disturbing — and worth mapping closely. With his interest first piqued as early as 2011, Epstein was ahead of the game on crypto. The financier understood it as a tool for clandestine payments and shady international finance, and found prominent community members more than willing to welcome him. Bitcoin wasn’t even invented until 2009, which means all of Epstein’s crypto connections formed after his 2008 guilty plea for solicitation of a minor. Between 2011 and 2019, Epstein invested in major crypto exchanges and software development firms. He grew close with one of the most influential yet troubling figures in the field, Tether cofounder Brock Pierce. Epstein even forged ties with Bitcoin’s core development team and mused about changing the technology of Bitcoin itself. Read more: https://buff.ly/HtaAuAA

It’s the day of the Pentagon’s looming ultimatum for Anthropic: allow the US military unchecked access to its technology, including for mass surveillance and fully autonomous lethal weapons, or potentially be designated a “supply chain risk” and potentially lose hundreds of billions of dollars in contracts. Amid the intensifying public statements and threats, tech workers across the industry are looking at their own companies’ government and military contracts wondering what kind of future they’re helping to build. While the Department of Defense has spent weeks negotiating with Anthropic over removing its guardrails, including allowing the US military to use Anthropic’s AI kill targets with no human oversight, OpenAI and xAI had reportedly already agreed to such terms, although OpenAI is reportedly attempting to adopt the same red lines in the agreements as Anthropic. The overall situation has left employees at some companies with defense contracts feeling betrayed. “When I joined the tech industry, I thought tech was about making people’s lives easier,” an Amazon Web Services employee told The Verge, “but now it seems like it’s all about making it easier to surveil and deport and kill people.” In conversations with The Verge, current and former employees from OpenAI, xAI, Amazon, Microsoft, and Google expressed similar feelings about the changing moral landscape of their companies. Organized groups representing 700,000 tech workers at Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and more have signed a letter demanding that the companies reject the Pentagon’s demands. But many saw little chance of their employers — whether they’re directly embroiled in this conflict or not — questioning the government or pushing back. Read more:

Is Xbox’s new CEO, Asha Sharma, one of Microsoft’s AI executives with no prior game industry experience, exactly what the company needs? The Verge’s Tom Warren joins us on Decoder to talk about the future of Xbox. #Decoder Watch the full episode here: https://lnkd.in/gTsty6BZ

OpenAI has closed another round of funding, totalling $110 billion being newly committed to the maker of ChatGPT, which it says has more than 900 million weekly active users and over 50 million consumer subscribers. Amazon is investing $50 billion and striking a deal that includes plans for custom models and more. Nvidia and SoftBank are each contributing $30 billion, as well, even as the Wall Street Journal notes that Nvidia’s previous $100 billion investment plan is “on ice.” This marks another massive influx of cash for the company that’s now valued at $730 billion, and previously closed a $40 billion round in 2025. At the time, it was the largest private tech deal on record. Read more: https://lnkd.in/ezS_w4bz

Hank Green bemoans how much we’ve given up on making our own decisions about what we see on the internet: “I think we’ll look back on that as a pretty cringey activity.” #Decoder Watch the full episode here: https://lnkd.in/gj-hdUTw

“There was basically radio silence,” Hank Green said he’s had a productive relationship with YouTube until his most recent criticism of it using creators’ content to train its AI. #Decoder Watch the full episode here: https://lnkd.in/gj-hdUTw