New code in Spotify’s app references the long-awaited ‘lossless’ tier
Newly added references in the music app’s code suggest the lossless service is at least still under development and could even be getting closer to launch.
The Download: talking dirty with DeepSeek, and the risks and rewards of calorie restriction
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. It’s pretty easy to get DeepSeek to talk dirty AI companions like Replika are designed to engage in intimate exchanges, but people use general-purpose chatbots for sex talk too, despite their stricter content…
Here are the 24 US AI startups that have raised $100M or more in 2025
Last year was monumental for the AI industry in the U.S. and beyond. There were 49 startups that raised funding rounds worth $100 million or more in 2024, per our count at TechCrunch; three companies raised more than one “megaround,” and seven companies raised rounds $1 billion in size or larger. How will 2025 compare? […]
This Founder Noticed a Stark Change at a Local Pride Parade — and Says It Creates a ‘Real Opportunity’ for Small Businesses
Tanner Graham, co-founder and CEO of General Idea, reveals how business leaders can step up this month and beyond.
‘Kid-pilled’ Sam Altman ‘constantly’ asked ChatGPT questions about his newborn
Across hundreds of thousands of years of human existence, an impossible question has befuddled our species: why is the baby crying?! Sam Altman, who is both the father of a three-month-old and CEO of OpenAI, hopped on OpenAI’s new podcast today to talk about how his company is impacting his experience with fatherhood. Altman, who […]
Six-month-old, solo-owned vibe coder Base44 sells to Wix for $80M cash
In Base44’s six months as a stand-alone company, it reportedly grew to 250,000 users and nearly $200,000 in monthly profits.
Multiplier, founded by ex-Stripe exec, nabs $27.5M to fuel AI-powered accounting roll-ups
Multiplier raised Series A and seed funding from Lightspeed and Ribbit Capital.
Midjourney launches its first AI video generation model, V1
Midjourney, one of the most popular AI image generation startups, announced on Wednesday the launch of its much-anticipated AI video generation model, V1. V1 is an image-to-video model, in which users can upload an image — or take an image generated by one of Midjourney’s other models — and V1 will produce a set of […]
I Spent 20 Years Watching Brands Rise or Fade—This Is What Separates Them
Many entrepreneurs turn to PR only when they want immediate results, but strategic visibility is a long game.
Meta Is Trying to Poach OpenAI Employees With ‘Giant’ $100 Million Offers, Sam Altman Says
Open AI CEO Sam Altman claims Meta has attempted to recruit “a lot” of his employees.
OpenAI can rehabilitate AI models that develop a “bad boy persona”
A new paper from OpenAI released today has shown why a little bit of bad training can make AI models go rogue but also demonstrates that this problem is generally pretty easy to fix. Back in February, a group of researchers discovered that fine-tuning an AI model (in their case, OpenAI’s GPT-4o) by training it…