Scarlett Johansson brought receipts to the OpenAI controversy

Welcome back to TechCrunch’s Week in Review — TechCrunch’s newsletter recapping the week’s biggest news. Want it in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here. OpenAI announced this week that it’s removing Sky, one of the voices used by its new GPT-4o model, after users found it sounded eerily similar …...Read More

Can blockchain make weather forecasts better? WeatherXM thinks so

Accurate weather forecasts are critical to industries like agriculture, and they’re also important to help prevent and mitigate harm from inclement weather events or natural disasters. But getting forecasts right is extremely difficult. That’s why the founders of WeatherXM have been looking to make weather forecasts more accurate for the …...Read More

Spyware app pcTattletale was hacked and its website defaced

U.S.-made consumer-grade spyware app pcTattletale has been hacked and its internal data published to its own website, according to a hacker who claimed responsibility for the breach. The hacker posted a message on pcTattletale”s website late Friday, claiming to have hacked the servers containing pcTattletale’s operations. The spyware maker’s website …...Read More

With a16z-backed Synapse’s collapse, BaaS fintech is a mess and 10 million consumers could be hurt

100 fintechs could be in trouble, with funding prospects weakened for many more Last year, the fintech startup world — star of the 2021 venture capital heydays — began to unravel as VC funding grew tight. As we step into mid-2024, large chunks of the sector today are a downright …...Read More

Women in AI: Sarah Myers West says we should ask, 'Why build AI at all?'

To give AI-focused women academics and others their well-deserved — and overdue — time in the spotlight, TechCrunch has been publishing a series of interviews focused on remarkable women who’ve contributed to the AI revolution. We’re publishing these pieces throughout the year as the AI boom continues, highlighting key work …...Read More

This Week in AI: OpenAI and publishers are partners of convenience

Keeping up with an industry as fast-moving as AI is a tall order. So until an AI can do it for you, here’s a handy roundup of recent stories in the world of machine learning, along with notable research and experiments we didn’t cover on their own. By the way, …...Read More

AI tutors are quietly changing how kids in the US study, and the leading apps are from China

Evan, a high school sophomore from Houston, was stuck on a calculus problem. He pulled up Answer AI on his iPhone, snapped a photo of the problem from his Advanced Placement math textbook, and ran it through the homework app. Within a few seconds, Answer AI had generated an answer …...Read More

Startups Weekly: Drama at Techstars. Drama in AI. Drama everywhere.

Welcome to Startups Weekly — Haje‘s weekly recap of everything you can’t miss from the world of startups. Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Friday. Well, folks, it looks like Techstars’ drama just got a new plot twist. CEO Maëlle Gavet is making her exit, leaving …...Read More

From Plaid to Figma, here are the startups that are likely - or definitely - not having IPOs this year

Last year’s investor dreams of a strong 2024 IPO pipeline have faded, if not fully disappeared, as we approach the halfway point of the year. 2024 delivered four venture-backed tech IPOs, Reddit, Astera Labs, Ibotta and Rubrik, in March and April, which made it seem like this year could spur …...Read More

Feds add nine more incidents to Waymo robotaxi investigation

Federal safety regulators have discovered nine more incidents that raise questions about the safety of Waymo’s self-driving vehicles operating in Phoenix and San Francisco. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) opened an investigation earlier this month into Waymo’s autonomous vehicle software after receiving 22 reports …...Read More