Devin Coldewey
Writer & Photographer
The Latest from Devin Coldewey
This week in AI: AI-powered personalities are all the rage
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.
Your website can now opt out of training Google’s Bard and future AIs
Large language models are trained on all kinds of data, most of which it seems was collected without anyone’s knowledge or consent. Now you have a choice whether to allow your web content to be
Medium hints at a nascent media coalition to block AI crawlers
Web publishing platform Medium has announced that it will block OpenAI’s GPTBot, an agent that scrapes web pages for content used to train the company’s AI models. But the real news may be
Mistral AI makes its first large language model free for everyone
The most popular language models out there may be accessed via API, but open models — as far as that term can be taken seriously — are gaining ground. Mistral, a French AI startup that raised a hu
What is Amazon’s [redacted] ‘Project Nessie’ algorithm?
The FTC’s lawsuit against Amazon alleging anti-competitive practices is largely full of things we already knew in a general sense: price hikes, pressure to use Amazon fulfillment and so on. But
FCC announces plans to reinstate net neutrality
Net neutrality is back on the menu, citizens. After a long, long battle ending in eventual defeat during Trump’s presidency, the FCC is set to reinstate rules that broadband providers must treat
Alchemist Accelerator’s latest startups range from sneakernet for energy to solar panel cleaning bots
This morning is Alchemist Accelerator’s demo day, and there are 22 companies making their debut across a wide range of industries. Whether you’re building a construction business, cleaning
Signal’s Meredith Whittaker: AI is fundamentally ‘a surveillance technology’
Why is it that so many companies that rely on monetizing the data of their users seem to be extremely hot on AI? If you ask Signal president Meredith Whittaker (and I did), she’ll tell you it
Unity U-turns on controversial runtime fee and begs forgiveness
Unity has done a 180 on a controversial new pricing scheme that users of its cross-platform game engine almost unanimously disparaged.
Anthropic’s Dario Amodei on AI’s limits: ‘I’m not sure there are any’
As Anthropic takes on OpenAI and other challengers in the growing artificial intelligence industry, there is also an existential question looming: Can large language models and the systems they enable
Parallel Health takes a biotech-forward approach to skincare with custom phage therapy
Parallel Health turns the microbiome of the skin from creepy fact to potentially transformative skin care with custom phage therapy.
Project Gutenberg puts 5,000 audiobooks online for free using synthetic speech
Open book repository Project Gutenberg has turned thousands of its titles into audiobooks practically overnight using synthetic speech, available now for download or streaming on multiple services. Th
Unity reportedly backtracking on new fees after developers revolt
Unity, the popular cross-platform game and media development engine, is on the defensive after receiving intense backlash over a controversial new fee structure, which developers using the platform de
California hits Google for $93M over deceptive location data options
A lawsuit filed against Google by California’s Attorney General over the company’s deceptive and misleading options for managing location data has resulted in a $93 million settlement —
Apple is killing the iPhone’s silent switch
The ring/silent switch has been on the iPhone since the very first one was announced in 2007 by Steve Jobs, but now the writing is on the wall for the device’s last significant moving part. With
‘Exadelic’ takes a shot at being Silicon Valley’s ‘Ready Player One’
We don’t often review books at TechCrunch, let alone fiction, but sometimes a work comes along that is just so carefully tuned to the ecosystem we cover that it justifies a quick post. And so he
This week in AI: The generative AI boom drives demand for custom chips
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 res
Scala Biodesign makes it easy to re-engineer proteins one molecule at a time – or 50
There’s a gold rush on in biotech as AI and other tools are used to find new drugs and treatments. With $5.5 million in new funding, Scala Biodesign is focusing these methods on a related proble
X, formerly Twitter, challenges California’s new transparency law as unconstitutional
X, formerly known as Twitter, has filed a lawsuit alleging that a new California law requiring social networks to declare certain moderation practices is a violation of the company’s Constitutio
Musk says he limited Ukraine’s Starlink to prevent attack on Russia
Elon Musk has confirmed that he in essence scuttled a Ukrainian military strike on Russia by refusing to allow Starlink to be used in the process. The billionaire claims the decision was made to avoid