Residents in Monterey Park, California, became the first in the US to vote on a permanent ban on datacenters on Tuesday, and early results indicate a resounding victory for the prohibition.
While many cities and counties have already passed temporary or indefinite moratoriums via their local governments, Monterey Park would be the first to do so through a ballot initiative.
Residents in Monterey Park, California, became the first in the US to vote on a permanent ban on datacenters on Tuesday, and early results indicate a resounding victory for the prohibition.
While many cities and counties have already passed temporary or indefinite moratoriums via their local governments, Monterey Park would be the first to do so through a ballot initiative.
Consumer advocates decry Democrat Jared Polis for ‘choosing to side with dominant corporations’ over workers
Colorado’s governor vetoed a bill on Tuesday that would have banned companies from using surveillance pricing to set workers’ wages and prices for consumer goods.
The measure would have been the strongest in the nation against algorithmic pricing. While Maryland became the first state to approve a law banning surveillance pricing in grocery stores in April, Colorado’s proposed measure was more expansive.
Under new rules, tech companies will be asked to share AI models with government for review before public release
Donald Trump signed an executive order to create a voluntary framework for the federal government to vet powerful new AI models before they are released. Tuesday’s highly anticipated order represents an attempt by the president to tighten his grip on cybersecurity and national security threats posed by AI, tacking against his earlier deregulatory stance. But the voluntary nature of the framework shows that, while Trump has toed a more cautious line on AI than when he first took office last year, he is still reluctant to impose regulations on the tech industry.
Under the new guidelines, tech companies would be asked to share their AI models with the government for a voluntary review, up to 30 days before a public release. The Trump administration says doing so will allow them to improve national security, particularly with regards to cybersecurity.
Investigation reveals regulator let firms off the hook on cleanup bonds despite backlog that will take decades to clear
When Christiaan van Woudenberg moved to Erie, Colorado, in 2007, he never imagined he would become an anti-fracking activist. He simply thought he was buying his dream home – a four-bedroom with a panoramic mountain view, 30 minutes north of downtown Denver.
Then, in 2014, the drilling started. Oil and gas rigs sprang up, some just 800ft (240m) from his bedroom window. The dream turned to nightmare: loud noises rumbled all night long, and the air stank like exhaust. Neighbors started getting headaches and nosebleeds, and Van Woudenberg developed new respiratory issues. He kept his windows shut and worried about his daughters going outside.
State sues maker of ChatGPT and CEO Sam Altman, alleging company ‘allowed a dangerous product to reach millions’
Florida filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, and its CEO, Sam Altman, on Monday alleging that the company concealed serious safety risks with its chatbot. Florida is the first US state to sue the artificial intelligence company.
The 83-page suit was brought by Florida’s attorney general, James Uthmeier, and alleges that OpenAI “aggressively marketed” ChatGPT to the public while ignoring safety warnings and possible dangers of the product.
From Google co-founder Brin spending $82m to fight a billionaire tax to Google and Meta funding a joint Super Pac, Silicon Valley is engaged in an existential fight for its political power at home
Tech billionaires have shelled out hundreds of millions of dollars ahead of the 2 June primary election in California, in an unrivaled attempt to influence who gets to run the state that Silicon Valley calls home.
The industry has used a cover-all-bases approach, funding candidates and ballot measures big and small, contributing to what looks to be the most expensive primary season in California history. The goal, experts say, is to gain both political and regulatory leverage that will perpetuate dominance in business.
Google co-founder Sergey Brin has spent $82m since January, more than any other donor, to fight a billionaire tax that’s up for a vote on the November ballot.
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Matt Mahan has received moredonations than any other candidate, including from top executives at Google, Amazon, Snap, LinkedIn, Reddit and Palantir.
Crypto mogul Chris Larsen has funded three Super Pacs with $26m to sway campaigns across California, including giving $1m to back a primary candidate for state insurance commissioner.
Google and Meta have collectively funded a Super Pac with $10m to back assembly and senate candidates in local district races across the state.
Silicon Valley money is flowing toward city primaries as well as state-level ones, with tech-backed Pacs sponsoring voter guides suggesting how to vote on local tax measures.
A new front has opened up in the battle for dominance in AI chips, as Nvidia said its latest development could replace the mouse and keyboard in how people use computers.
The $5tn (£3.7tn) US semiconductor company has launched a “superchip” that puts AI capabilities into laptops and desktop computers, a move that will pit it against Intel, Apple, Qualcomm and AMD.
A new belief set is uniting some of the wealthiest men in the world around a ‘transhuman’ future – actual humanity be damned
Sam Altman, the chief executive of OpenAI, took to the Internet a few years ago to propose that homo sapiens would be the first species “to design our own descendants”. In his best case scenario, the “merge” between humans and artificial intelligence occurs at some point over the next 50 years. The alternative, where we remain simply human and the machines follow their own path, is more ominous. “If two different species both want the same thing and only one can have it – in this case, to be the dominant species on the planet and beyond – they are going to have conflict,” he wrote.
More recently, Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, who at one point last year was granted the power to reconfigure the US federal government, argued on his social media platform, X, that “it increasingly appears that humanity is a biological bootloader for digital superintelligence” – our role in the history of the cosmos reduced to that of the low level code that boots up a computer before you can run sophisticated programs on it.
Guardian investigation shows how US presidency blurs line between policy and enrichment of American ruling family and those around it
On a graffitied Sarajevo backstreet, a path leads past an overgrown patch of garden to a white door. Beyond is the registered office of a company that is on the brink of winning contracts worth more than $1bn.
AAFS Infrastructure and Energy is close to securing a concession to build and operate a pipeline across the Balkans to allow fossil gas shipped from the US to replace supplies that come from Russia. “This could be the most important infrastructure project ever in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” says one of the country’s top officials, who, like others, asks to remain anonymous to discuss sensitive negotiations.
Speaking at Amazon’s AI on the Lot event, the Rogue One film-maker Gareth Edwards said ‘it’ll do anything you ask’ and ‘it’s going to be better than CGI’
Jurassic World Rebirth and Rogue One director Gareth Edwards has enthusiastically endorsed the use of generative AI in film-making, saying “it is a fucking genius at helping you” and “it’s going to be better than CGI”.
Edwards was speaking at AI on the Lot, an event in Culver City, California, organised by Amazon, and in remarks reported by the Hollywood Reporter said: “I can’t see a reason why you wouldn’t become interested in this stuff as a film-maker. It’s so clearly a tool that might be up there with the camera. It’s going to be better than CGI.”
In this competitive market, gen Z has started to turn to untraditional ways to land a job – including dating apps
Sibusisiwe Khupe, 26, entered the job market once again in September after a wave of unexpected layoffs at London marketing agency Wieden+Kennedy.
She knew landing her next full-time role was not going to be easy. Young workers have been hit hard by the weakening UK job market as vacancies fall and unemployment climbs to a five-year high.
More Americans are using small solar panels in their back yards or balconies as a clean way to cut their electric bills
If you feel like your electricity bill just keeps climbing, you aren’t imagining it. Since 2020, US residential energy prices have surged by about 30%, making power the largest household energy expense behind gasoline, according to the US Energy Information Administration.
But for residents like Alex Curtis, the days of feeling powerless against rising costs are coming to an end. Curtis is waging a war on his electric bill, and his new weapon of choice is a lightweight, thin-film solar panel.
Recent college grads are not very fond of commencement speakers hyping up a technology they see as a threat to their career prospects
When Jacob Pagel graduated from Middle Tennessee State University this spring, predictions about artificial intelligence already had him questioning the value of his degree. Then a music executive started preaching about AI’s transformative power during a commencement speech.
“This industry will change on you in a heartbeat. It has already changed more in the last 10 years than in the 50 years prior … AI is rewriting production as we sit here,” said Scott Borchetta, CEO of the record label Big Machine. After a few stray boos from graduates, he doubled down: “Deal with it.”
Jay Morris denies experts’ claims that he violated ethics rules over land deals near the site of Meta’s Hyperion datacenter
This story is from Floodlight, a non-profit newsroom that investigates the powers stalling climate action
For more than two years, John “Jay” Morris, a Louisiana state senator, helped pave the way for Meta to build one of the world’s largest datacenters, called Hyperion, in Richland Parish.
As intelligence itself becomes privatised by big tech, allowing your intellectual faculties to wither in service of inane bots seems a dangerous move
Long before the age of multi-billion-dollar AI companies promising to disrupt the field of software development, I was learning to code the hard way.
It was the mid-2000s, and I was a child with unmonitored access to the family computer. With the help of a basic text editor program, I learned how to make websites – first basic, then increasingly complex – from scratch. The results were never as beautiful or polished as in my imagination, but I could live with that, because I was learning a craft. The painstaking hours of debugging and poring over arcane documentation for projects that I eventually abandoned never felt wasted.
The US president’s reversal on calling for a safety review of new AI models is a green light for tech’s unchecked power
Only hours before Donald Trump was set to sign a long-awaited executive order on Thursday that would have called for a government safety review of new artificial intelligence models before their release, the president abruptly backed out. Despite growing public backlash to the technology and experts warning new models will pose critical security risks, Trump vowed the US government would not slow down the AI race.
During a meeting with reporters on Thursday, Trump cited both American dominance and competition with China and as his reasoning behind the reversal.
At annual I/O conference, company debuts a product for everyday consumers to create autonomous AI agents
Google announced on Tuesday that it would expand its search bar, the centerpiece of the most-visited website in the world, with a heavy dose of artificial intelligence. The tech giant is also trying its hand at hi-tech glasses again, more than a decade after wearers of its first eyewear were dubbed “glassholes” and laughed out of San Francisco.
Google executives announced at the company’s annual conference for software developers, Google I/O, that its search box would accommodate longer and more specific queries than before – questions more like those people would ask one another than Search’s idiosyncratic syntax. The changes will direct users to engage directly with Google’s chatbot. The change to search is underpinned by the company’s new artificial intelligence model, Gemini 3.5, announced the same day.
Nine-person jury to consider whether AI firm bilked world’s richest person and unjustly enriched themselves
Closing arguments began on Thursday in Elon Musk’s lawsuit against Sam Altman and OpenAI, bringing the weeks-long courtroom battle between the two tech moguls nearer to a decision. A nine-person jury is set to deliberate and return a verdict on whether they believe the AI firm and Altman are liable in the case.
The trial, which began last month in an Oakland, California, federal courthouse, has gripped Silicon Valley and featured some of the tech industry’s biggest names as witnesses. Attorneys for both sides have presented testimony and documents that have exposed Musk and Altman’s private dealings, as well as provided a window into the contentious history of OpenAI.
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