Author: TechBrunch

In a splashy Time Magazine op-ed published this summer, HuffPost founder Arianna Huffington and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman talk about AI-powered assistants that promote healthier lifestyles. announced Thrive AI Health, a venture company with the goal of building With support from Huffington's mental wellness company Thrive Global and OpenAI Startup Fund, Thrive AI Health is building an “AI health coach” that provides personalized advice on sleep, eating, fitness, stress management, and “connection.” Huffington and Altman write. . It's been a few months now, and Thrive AI Health's assistant is looking pretty well developed. TechCrunch spotted a demo of a minimally…

Bluesky is continuing to blow up. The Twitter-like service and alternative to Elon Musk’s X, has now surpassed 16 million users after seeing rapid growth in the days following the U.S. presidential election. While many are leaving X over the service’s increasing right-wing leanings and Musk’s campaigning for Trump, others are unhappy with other changes Musk has made — like how blocks work or how their content on X will be used to train AI. Despite those issues, X is still the leader in the space in terms of monthly active users, while Threads is quickly catching up. Meta announced…

Pony AI is inching closer to an initial public offering in the U.S., even as the minimum amount it hopes to raise in the deal continues to be lowered. Pony operates 190 “robot trucks” in Beijing and Guangzhou, and more than 250 robot taxis in Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Shanghai. The company told TechCrunch that robotaxis can be charged in all four cities, and are completely driverless in Beijing, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen. The Chinese self-driving technology company said in a Thursday filing that it plans to issue 15 million American depositary shares, with the possibility of issuing an additional 2.25…

After her viral “Hawk Tuah” video, 22-year-old Hayley Welch has managed to turn her fleeting fame into a full-fledged career. In just a few months, Welch quickly rose to fame, amassing around 5 million followers across various social media platforms. After recently releasing her own podcast titled 'Talk Tuah', she is now venturing into the world of technology with a new AI-powered dating advice app called Pookie Tools. Image credit: App Store screenshot Pookie Tools, released this week on the App Store, offers a variety of features aimed at Gen Z singles. These include AI chatbots that can help with…

OpenAI's ChatGPT is starting to integrate with other apps on your computer. On Thursday, the startup announced that its ChatGPT desktop app for MacOS can now read code from several coding apps for developers, including VS Code, Xcode, TextEdit, Terminal, and iTerm2. This means developers no longer need to copy and paste code into ChatGPT, which is a common way to use chatbots. When this feature is enabled, OpenAI automatically sends the section of code you are working on through the chatbot as context, along with a prompt. However, unlike popular AI coding tools like Cursor and GitHub Copilot, ChatGPT…

YouTube is launching a new way for creators to earn money during vertical livestreams, the company announced Thursday. Viewers can now purchase the digital currency “Jewels” and send “gifts” to creators. Gifts are animations that appear on screen during vertical live streams. If this sounds familiar, it's because it's similar to TikTok's Live Gifting feature, where viewers can purchase “coins” to send gifts of various monetary values ​​to support live creators while they stream. When viewers use Jewels to send gifts on YouTube, creators earn Rubies. Creators receive 1 cent for every ruby. That is, the creator receives 1 dollar…

Security researchers say Apple's new iPhone software includes a novel security feature that restarts the phone if it's not unlocked for 72 hours. Last week, 404 Media reported that law enforcement officers and forensic experts may be wondering why some iPhones are restarting automatically under mysterious circumstances, making it difficult to access the devices and extract data. He reported that he was concerned that this might happen. 404 Media later reported, citing security researchers, that iOS 18 had a new “Inactive Restart” feature that forced a device restart. Now you know exactly how long it will take for this feature…

François Cholet, a leading figure in the world of AI, is leaving Google after nearly a decade. In a post on X, Chollet said he was starting a new company with a “friend” but did not provide further details. “I am very grateful for my 10 years at Google,” he said. “During that period, deep learning has grown from a niche academic topic to a large-scale industry employing millions of people.” Chollet is perhaps best known as the creator of Keras, a high-level open source API that can be used to create AI models and solve machine learning problems. According…

The world of cybersecurity is becoming more integrated. BitSight will acquire Cybersixgill for $115 million, which was previously valued at $2.4 billion when rating agency Moody's acquired a majority stake in the business in 2021. Boston-based BitSight focuses on cyber risk management. We work with companies to assess their risk profile, particularly the likelihood that their risk profile will be compromised. This includes assessing your company's attack surface across your network and other digital assets, as well as the products you use to defend against them. Cybersixgill provides BitSight with an additional level of visibility in its efforts. This small…

AI's insatiable thirst for power is expected to skyrocket in the coming years, potentially leading to data center power shortages. According to a new report from Gartner, a new server last year required 195 terawatt-hours of power. This is equivalent to the amount used by 18 million households in one year. But by 2027, new servers could provide 500 terawatt-hours of electricity, or the equivalent of 46 million homes. That's far more electricity than existing data centers use, which Goldman Sachs estimates will already consume 349 terawatt-hours by 2022. Without additional carbon-free power sources, pollution from AI training and use…