Last week, Elon Musk shared a reconsideration of some of his tweets, seemingly trying to distance himself from a controversial fallout that jeopardized his business interests as Tesla’s CEO.
Musk was formerly the largest supporter of President Trump’s election campaign, but tensions sharply escalated last week when the world’s richest man criticized presidential aides and mocked his ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in a series of posts.
On Tuesday, Musk posted on x, the social platform he owns: “I regret some of my posts about President @Realdonaldtrump last week. They went too far.”
Investors appeared to welcome the possibility of a resolution, as indicated by a 2.6% increase in Tesla’s stock price during pre-market trading.
This public dispute marked a significant shift in their previously friendly relationship. During the campaign, they proclaimed themselves allies, with Musk briefly serving in the Trump administration at the head of the “Government Efficiency Department.” However, experts indicate that this department’s cost-cutting measures were deemed unlawful.
The relationship soured when Musk publicly criticized Trump’s “big beautiful bill,” alleging it added 2.4 trillion dollars to national debt, branding it as “nasty hatred.”
In response to Musk’s harsh criticism, Trump remarked that the tech mogul was “mad,” while also highlighting potential financial ramifications for Musk’s ventures.
Trump mentioned Tesla in relation to his social media platform, Truth Social, stating that electric vehicle pioneers are facing declining sales in several markets, particularly in Europe, partly due to Musk’s allegiance to him.
Investors are hopeful that Musk’s alignment with Trump will lead to a boost in Tesla’s market valuation, anticipating that the White House may adopt a more favorable stance towards the company’s autonomous driving technology. Musk’s attempt to reconcile came just a day before Tesla launched its “Robotakshi” service in Austin, Texas, a significant move to reinforce its status as the world’s most valuable automaker, despite facing challenges with an aging product line.
Trump also threatened Musk’s major enterprise, SpaceX, claiming that cutting Elon’s government subsidies and contracts could save billions from the federal budget.
However, the likelihood of the U.S. government rescinding SpaceX contracts seems minimal, given the strategic importance of its satellite launches. Before retracting his threat, Musk had hinted at discontinuing the Dragon Spacecraft, a crucial vehicle for transporting NASA astronauts to the International Space Station.
bThe reality competition series of East Games and Amazon Prime Video is hosted by YouTubers MrBeastnot a well-made show. That’s certainly expensive Show, Beast, the alter ego of Jimmy Donaldson, 26, of Greenville, North Carolina, likes to remind viewers frequently. The series is a shocking feat for viewers outside of YouTube territory, especially Donaldson’s territory: 1,000 contestants, and 1,000 contestants filmed on a 1,107 camera system, $5 million They fight each other with the prize money. Donaldson. For the competition, Donaldson and his group designed warehouse war zones modeled after the squid game of the Netflix dystopian series, built bespoke cities, and purchased private islands (and also included Lamborghini and others). (It will be given along with other gorgeous prizes). The contestants who are eliminated in the first episode are dropped into invisible depths through the trapdoor. There is a pirate ship with cannons.
But due to all the exaggerated displays of wealth, the show still looks terrible. Many point out that the central conceit of the show has broken Americans’ psychological battles for abandoned it and lavish prizes. For our age of clothing, Donaldson a Self-style Willy Wonka figure.
Certainly, Beast Games has rotten rot, but it’s a terrible, compelling core, but it also conveys its surface. At the style level, the show erases any remaining lines between YouTube and TV. Beast Games has a higher production budget than any of MrBeast’s YouTube videos, reaching over 360 million subscribers in 15-30 minutes. (Almost everything incorporates the concept of a basic magnet, bound by the ocean, stuck in the great pyramids, or helping the blind man to see again. looks Like YouTube content, content is an operator word (Donaldson made the first three episodes available on YouTube).
And it’s popular. Beast Games is currently from Amazon Prime Video The least viewed non-script series So far, it has reached 50 million viewers in 25 days (although it is worth noting that Amazon has not disclosed what counts as “viewers”). It reached number one on Amazon in 80 countries. According to Netflix, in 2021, Squid Game reached 142 million households for reference. The show is not a change of ocean. Many reality shows look awful. Many Americans have long consumed YouTube videos as sources of entertainment, but as television changes both shape and function, it’s a line in the sand.
What is TV in 2025? Is it a device? style? format? It’s hard to say – the content is Shift from linear platforms to streaming platforms device usage shifts to YouTube. In the US, people watch YouTube on TV more than any other device, CEO Neal Mohan declared in him Annual letter This month, “YouTube is a new TV.” YouTube doesn’t make television in itself, but it does. Global viewers Streaming According to the company, last year there was over 100 million hours of “content” on television screens. 400m hours Probably an audio-only podcast month. The company closed its original division in 2022, but is now promoting children’s entertainment. We are looking for a dedicated head of family entertainment and learning Second half of 2024.
Functionally, YouTube may not be as new as the next evolution. Formally, they are converging. YouTube talent (and digitally native influencers like Tiktok talent) I had a hard time breaking into Hollywood. Despite the vast numbers of fans, the spirit of the platform – the incentive structure of more eyeballs, ring light glare, the maximalist aesthetic for the biggest audience – is a dovetail with evolving Hollywood logic.
As one Mrbeast director I said time: “These algorithms are toxic to humanity. They prioritize addictive isolated experiences over ethical social design, all with advertising alone. That’s not MrBeast I have a problem. Next It’s a platform that encourages someone like me to study holding graphs so that videos can be made more addictive. In other words, value-neutral entertainment for the arts. Content as a means of end. This isn’t much different from the business logic of streaming platforms. Hollywood has its own race for its viewers. The rise of mid-TV, Major cheap Netflix gloss, Infinite scrolls in the “Content” library – It reflects the spirit of MrBeast’s lowest common denominator attention economy.
After all, Donaldson leads the Amazon show, which styled after the Netflix original series. This is explicitly fixed in “entertainment.” The show, as it says, “making history of entertainment,” is the biggest, brightest, most shocking, and most interesting. Similarly, products with no complexity, value, or even storytelling, due to the one value of attracting attention. Using Entertainment’s MrBeast-Ifive as Vox’s Rebecca Jennings Please put it downthe line between content, entertainment, television and influencers is more blurry than before. He went beyond what divisions remained – does Hollywood subscribe?
Salvo was fired by Donald Trump at the start of his trade war, imposing tariffs on China on Tuesday, prompting immediate retaliation from Beijing due to concerns about the global economic impact.
10% tariffs have been implemented currently, prompting China to release an anti-trade survey on Google swiftly. The Ministry of Finance has announced tariffs of 10% on items such as coal, liquefied natural gas, crude oil, agricultural equipment, large distributed vehicles, and pickup trucks from the United States.
The Chinese Ministry of Commerce and Customs Bureau took actions on Tuesday to protect national security interests by imposing export controls on important minerals such as tungsten, terrillium, lutenium, molybdenum, and rutenium-related items.
Furthermore, the Ministry of Commerce indicated that US PvH Group and Illumina would be added to the list of unreliable entities, subjecting them to restrictions or penalties without specifying the accusations against the companies.
In response to tightened US exports of high-tech products to China, Beijing is considering adding Intel to a list of companies under investigation for antitrust law violations. Financial Times reported this on Tuesday.
Despite Google services being blocked in China, the company continues to earn revenue from Chinese companies advertising overseas and using Android operating systems.
The Chinese Ministry of Finance stated that the unilateral imposition of tariffs by the United States violates World Trade Organization rules and could harm economic and trade cooperation between the two countries.
After initially threatening economic disputes with Canada and Mexico, President Trump decided to postpone tariffs following discussions with their leaders.
The US has removed exemptions for Chinese exports, imposing tariffs on most goods. Some Chinese retailers, like SHEIN and TEMU, relied on exemptions to sell affordable products in the US.
Trump agreed to impose a 25% tariff on Mexico after speaking with President Claudia Sheinbaum.
Discussions with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau led Trump to delay 25% tariffs on Canada. Trudeau announced a $1.3 billion border security plan in response to the decision.
The White House announced a meeting between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping later in the week to address escalating trade tensions.
Economists warn that Trump’s tariff plan could raise prices for millions of Americans.
Trump believes tariffs will strengthen the US financially and lead to beneficial trade agreements with other countries.
The global financial markets reacted cautiously to Trump’s tariff actions, with mixed results.
Various stock indexes fluctuated following the tariff announcements, with currencies like the Canadian dollar experiencing volatility.
The Chinese market was closed for the Lunar New Year holiday and is set to reopen on Wednesday.
TIt was difficult to decide what to focus on for Alex Hern’s first TechScape since his retirement. (If you missed it last week, re-read the farewell newsletter he wrote after 11 years at The Guardian.) Why? Because with everything happening all the time right now, there are tons of topics to delve into.
We could discuss the possibility of Elon Musk running Donald Trump’s “Government Efficiency Commission” if he is re-elected as President of the United States. But that would require writing another newsletter on Musk, and you might be as tired of it as Alex is. The latter possibility is still two sides of the same coin. The chances of Musk quitting running a multi-trillion dollar company for a low-paying government job are not that high.
We can also talk about Pavel Durov’s first public statements since his arrest in France last month, and how Telegram’s anti-censorship stance has crumbled (right now Report Contents Previously it was a private chat reviewed by a moderator).
Or we could delve into Nvidia’s significant role in the economy, which I discussed with Nimo Omer in Monday’s First Edition newsletter.
Instead, let’s focus on the latest major event in the tech world, which has become exhaustingly busy over the past few years: the launch of Apple’s latest iPhones, and why, despite its flashy features and tech-forward attitude, many of you probably won’t be lining up to purchase one.
The reasons are complex. One is the simple price of the iPhone 16, which starts at $799 (£610). For many, such a high price is just too much, especially at a time when the economy is sluggish, jobs are scarce, and the new prime minister is positioning himself as head of a “pessimistic” government, as the Observer’s political editor Toby Helm put it.
“Sales of new mobile phones have fallen dramatically over the past decade,” says Ben Wood, chief analyst at market research firm CCS Insight. In 2013, Britons bought around 30 million new devices, up from just 13.4 million last year. CSS Insight predicts the figures will remain at roughly the same level. Its research suggests that most people expect to keep their next phone for up to five years.
At the same time, phone makers are making fewer dramatic changes to their products from year to year. “These days, phone updates are mostly incremental from a hardware perspective,” Wood says. “Last year’s iPhone might have a slightly bigger screen, a slightly better camera, and better battery life, but it’s probably pretty much the same as this year’s. This is in stark contrast to the mid-1990s through 2007 when there was an incredible acceleration in phone performance and features.”
AI is in the spotlight
Google’s Gemini enters a crowded AI “battlefield.” Photo: Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
The adoption of AI in iPhones, which Apple teased at its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in June, will arguably mark a major change in how iPhones work. But as I explained in a controversial comment piece back in June, it may not create a strong desire to use ChatGPT on your phone.
Lest you think I’m just a doom-and-gloom tech reporter, market analysts agree. Wood believes AI has become a “battleground” between Google (which owns Gemini), Samsung (which is touting Galaxy AI), and Apple (which understood the challenge and cleverly named its version Apple Intelligence, trying to make the name synonymous with the technology). Is it worth the investment to put AI in your phone? “I’m not convinced that AI is going to have a significant impact on overall new product sales,” Wood says.
Moreover, Apple has already stated that European users won’t have access to the AI integrated into its devices. this year That’s because the company isn’t sure it can do so without violating the rules of the European Union’s Digital Markets Act, with one exception: It will be available in the UK in December, which of course is no longer in the EU, but if you spend much of your time on the continent, it won’t be available there. That means you’re paying for minor updates and the potential appeal of AI at a yet-to-be-determined point in time.
Here’s an embarrassing confession: Despite all the latest cutting-edge tech, I don’t see the point in keeping up with the latest hardware. I’m not a huge Apple fanboy, but I do use an iPad (the 7th generation, released in September 2019 and discontinued a year later) every day.
It’s five years old and it works just fine, in part because, with a few exceptions, Apple tweaks the little details with each yearly hardware update. Does it really matter if a flashier screen makes your news app look a little sharper, or if a slightly faster processor makes apps launch a millisecond faster? And if it does, does that slight benefit justify the cost of a new device?
The same goes for my phone. When I dropped my Samsung that I had for years two months ago and the screen repair destroyed the keyboard and I needed a replacement, I decided to buy a similarly outdated phone, the 2021 Samsung A52. I chose this one because it was the latest model available at a relatively affordable price, and it still has a great battery. 3.5mm headphone jackI rely on this technology because Bluetooth headphones only give me the pain of losing my earbuds or having to listen to someone else’s music on public transport.
I would argue that the new iPhones are pretty expensive without all that many new features. Still, you might not think so. If you do, let me know. You can find me at X. @Stokell.
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I I know I’m real. And you, dear reader, know that you are the real deal. But have you ever wondered if there’s something strange about other people on the internet? Feeling like the spaces you used to frequent are a little dead? You’re not alone. The “Dead Internet Theory” first appeared on the web nearly three years ago and was catapulted into the mainstream by: Atlantic Essay by Caitlin Tiffany:
The dead internet theory suggests that the internet has been almost completely taken over by artificial intelligence. Like many other online conspiracy theories, this one’s audience has grown thanks to discussions by a mix of true believers, cynical trolls, and bored and curious chatterboxes… But unlike many other online conspiracy theories, this conspiracy theory has no morsel of truth to it. Person or Bot: Does it really matter?
At the time of writing, the deadest part of the internet was the moribund pre-Mask Twitter. The site’s active curation provides the same “relevant content” to hundreds of thousands of users, who can post things like “I hate texting, so come over here and give me a hug” on Twitter. Adjusted and reposted. The distinction between humans and bots has also been blurred by recommendation algorithms that make humans behave like bots.
Beyond that central idea, the 2021 version of the conspiracy theory has taken a strange turn. One supporter, Tiffany, suggests that “the internet died in 2016 or early 2017 and is now not just ’empty and empty’ but ‘totally barren.’ …As evidence, the Illuminati pirates say, ‘I’ve seen it.'”
This theory was not wrong. It was just too early. Talk about the internet that died in the summer in front ChatGPT’s release echoes my colleagues at the Guardian who confidently declared in the summer of 2016 that: The next few years will be quiet.”
In 2021, the internet felt like death. This is because aggressive algorithmic curation has made people behave like robots. In 2024, the opposite will happen. Robots will now post just like humans. Here are some examples:
on Twitter itself, Musk rescues the site from the frying pan, throws it into a volcano, and then a poorly thought out monetization scheme buys a blue checkmark, attaches it to a large language model, and spins it out of control in response to viral content. I was able to make a profit by doing so. This social media network is currently paying verified users a portion of the ad revenue they receive from their comment threads, turning the most viral posts on the site into low-stakes Allbots battle royales. .
Death pervades Google. Being at the top of search results is a valuable position, so valuable that companies competing for it can’t afford to actually write about it. No problem. ChatGPT can create anything in an instant. Of course, this is only worth it if the resulting visitors are people who can make you money. Bad news, because…
…all over the web, bots account for about half Percentage of all internet traffic, according to a study by cybersecurity firm Imperva. Almost a third of all traffic is what the company calls “malicious bots,” carrying out everything from ad fraud to brute force hacking attacks. But even the “good bots” struggle to fall into this category. Google’s “crawlers” were welcome when updating search entries, but less so when they just trained an AI to repeat what users wrote, without submitting users. did.
And then there’s Crab Jesus. An unholy combination of Facebook content farms, AI-generated images, and automated testing to determine what goes most viral. led to weeks of viral content It features a combination of Jesus, a crustacean, and a female flight attendant. One such image depicted Jesus wearing a jacket made of shrimp and eating shellfish. Adding to the confusion was the sight of a kind of crab centaur savior walking arm in arm with what appeared to be the entire crew of the long-distance flight on the beach. It was at least interestingly bizarre and a step up from the previously viral 122-year-old female friend who posed in front of a homemade birthday cake.
As much as I’d like to offer a ray of hope, a little tip to reinvigorate the internet, I can’t. It really feels like the consumer internet is in the late stages of a zombie apocalypse. The good news is that there is a safe haven. While “private socials” like WhatsApp and Discord servers can hide from the onslaught in secrecy, smaller communities like Bluesky and Mastodon are hidden and safe for now.
In the medium term, I expect to see large platforms returning to the wilds of their services and trying to bring some humanity back to their services through a combination of account authentication and AI detection. But whether it will be too late by then is an open question.
Musk still needs a Twitter sitter
Elon Musk in Beijing in 2023. Photo: Wang Teishu/Reuters
At least there’s still one person on the internet. It’s Elon Musk. He spent $44 billion getting obsessed with posting and being called idiots on the platforms he owns. So his latest legal defeat will hit a sore spot after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to accept his plea to be released from his court-appointed posting babysitter. . From our story:
The Supreme Court on Monday rejected Elon Musk’s appeal over a settlement with securities regulators that required him to get prior approval for some tweets related to his electric car company Tesla.
The justices did not comment on leaving the lower court’s ruling against Musk in place, but Musk complained that the requirement violated the First Amendment and constituted a “prior restraint” on his speech. . The ruling came a day after he made an unannounced visit to China to secure a deal to deploy Tesla’s driver-assistance features locally.
For those who don’t have an encyclopedic memory of Elon, Musk tweeted in 2018 that he had “secured funding” to take Tesla private. The company was never taken private, and subsequent lawsuits revealed that he had only discussed it a few times at most. To end the bill, Musk resigned as Tesla chairman, paid $20 million and agreed to have in-house lawyers pre-approve all social media posts about the electric car maker.
He has since regretted it and is fighting to overturn that part of the contract (which he entered into voluntarily to avoid an adverse trial). “The preclearance clause at issue continues to cast an unconstitutional chill on Mr. Musk’s speech whenever he considers making it publicly,” his lawyers argued.
Well, the Supreme Court of the United States doesn’t care. The government did not take up his case, tacitly deciding that no real constitutional issue was at issue.
What’s strange is that the company’s in-house lawyers already seem to be taking a very hands-off approach to Musk’s posts. On Friday, he responded to early Facebook employee Dustin Moskowitz’s claim that Tesla is “the next Enron” by posting a photo of a dog putting its testicles in another dog’s face. (Please click at your own risk.) If that’s Mr. Musk’s tweet with “unconstitutional chills,” I don’t want to know what he would send if he felt truly free.
Wider TechScape
Artwork for Everyone Knows That. Illustration: Getty; Guardian Design
Despite the continued regulatory crackdown on the cryptocurrency industry and the collapse of some of its leading figures, the underlying decentralized technology continues to push internet incumbents into the Web3 realm.
Telegram and Line are two of the world’s most popular messengers with hundreds of millions of monthly users, and both have integrated encryption features in recent months. One of the features being introduced in these apps is electronic signatures provided by a startup called EthSign.
Backed by all three Sequoia divisions: Sequoia Capital, Sequoia Capital India, and Sequoia Capital China (now called HongShan), Singapore-based EthSign promises an additional layer of transparency and trust. We aim to provide the Web3 equivalent of DocuSign. Therefore, its task is to convince the public that signing contracts on the blockchain is better than traditional methods.
“First, it is much easier to authenticate the identity of each signer and see the history of their interaction with the signed document,” said EthSign, who previously worked in the strategic investment department of a centralized exchange. Co-founder and CEO Xin Yan explained. Huobi.
If traditional e-signature service providers shut down, records of users’ signatures would also be lost, but this is an issue unrelated to distributed ledger technology, Yang told TechCrunch. And once signed, the data is immutable. This is one of the most promising features of blockchain.
EthSign will be deployed on the respective blockchain networks running on Telegram and Line, TON and Finschia. Once a user connects his cryptocurrency wallet to Messenger, he can start signing documents through EthSign in the same way he interfaces with DocuSign.
EthSign is one of many Web3 projects built on Telegram’s blockchain partner TON, helping the messenger work towards its vision of becoming a super app like WeChat.
EthSign, which is already running on Line as a web app, has signed a memorandum of understanding with Finschia for further integration in the coming months.
The idea of enabling immutable signatures in messaging apps is not new. Back in 2018, a mini-app called “Little Protocol” was launched on Chinese messaging giant WeChat. The feature, which allows users to enter into contracts using their girlfriend’s WeChat ID and the contents of documents recorded on Ethereum, attracted more than 100,000 hits for her overnight. However, within 48 hours, the app was removed by WeChat.
To date, EthSign has connected approximately 250,000 unique wallet addresses. Although still free to use, its goal is to become an authentication services platform in the future, providing support for authentication, verification, and other user activities, rather than pursuing a traditional SaaS model that monetizes through subscription fees. It’s about charging.
“Certification of on-chain information is about bringing trust to the on-chain world, where the most promising use case is vampire attacks,” Yang explained, adding that users can use established cryptocurrencies to He mentioned the phenomenon of Web3 being directed to forked versions. Projects with enhanced incentives.
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