The trial between the CEOs makes the AI boom seem sordid and small. Elon Musk and Sam Altman are two of the most influential people in Silicon Valley, if not the world. Between the two of them, Musk and Altman run technology companies worth many trillions of dollars that promise to reshape civilization. But this morning, both sat under fluorescent lights in a courthouse in downtown Oakland, suffering through all manner of technical glitches as their respective attorneys kicked off the long-awaited trial in . As Steven Molo, a lawyer for Musk, began his opening argument, confused looks swept the courtroom.

OpenAI is racing to catch up to its greatest rival. OpenAI does not like to be left out. The week after Anthropic announced Claude Mythos Preview --an AI model that has put governments around the world on edge because of its potential ability to hack into banks, energy grids, and military systems--OpenAI shared a program that is uncannily similar. And just like Anthropic did with its model, OpenAI has, for cybersecurity purposes, restricted access to this new bot, called GPT-5.4-Cyber, to a small group of trusted users. This sequence has become something of a pattern: First Anthropic will make an announcement, and then OpenAI will follow suit.

The Allbirds Pivot Is a Terrible Idea Right? Its turn to AI could be an escape hatch for a company with nothing to lose. This is an edition of The Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Walk into any Silicon Valley office in the late 2010s, and you'd probably see at least one pair of Allbirds. Woolly and eco-friendly, the sneakers once epitomized a certain kind of corporate culture (even Barack Obama was a fan), and the company behind them was valued at roughly $4 billion at its peak, in 2021.

Imagine a chatbot that actually knows how to talk to you. Earlier this year, when I walked into a renovated loft in downtown San Francisco, the couches and tables were littered with flyers advertising an "emotionally intelligent real-time AI coach." They were for Amotions AI--one of several start-ups that had gathered that day to pitch investors, entrepreneurs, and tech workers. Pianpian Xu Guthrie, Amotions AI's founder, was eager to tell me more. The AI model observes video calls on your computer, she said, and gives you real-time tips based on the other person's tone and facial expression.

It involves 4chan, of all places. In July 2020, 4chan's video-game discussion board looked much like the rest of the notorious online forum. There were elaborate, libidinal fantasies involving "whores" and "dragon cum," and comments on how long a gamer had to wait "before my dick can get up for another beating," as one put it. And yet, as the gamers discussed such things, they were also making a discovery of significance to the AI industry. Some of them were playing, a new text-based role-playing game that was essentially an AI version of .

Education is on the verge of becoming fully automated. William Liu is grateful that he finished high school when he did. If the latest AI tools had been around then, he told me, he might have been tempted to use them to do his homework. Liu, now a sophomore at Stanford, finished high school all the way back in 2024. "I have a younger sibling who is just graduating high school," he said.

What happens when AI can hack everything? For the past several weeks, Anthropic says it secretly possessed a tool potentially capable of commandeering most computer servers in the world. This is a bot that, if unleashed, might be able to hack into banks, exfiltrate state secrets, and fry crucial infrastructure. Already, according to the company, this AI model has identified thousands of major cybersecurity vulnerabilities--including exploits in every single major operating system and browser. This level of cyberattack is typically available only to elite, state-sponsored hacking cells in a very small number of countries including China, Russia, and the United States.

Be careful asking chatbots about your health. After George Mallon had his blood drawn at a routine physical, he learned that something may be gravely wrong. The preliminary results showed he might have blood cancer. Further tests would be needed. Left in suspense, he did what so many people do these days: He opened ChatGPT.

How close are we really to self-improving AI? Late last month, a large crowd gathered in downtown San Francisco to demand that the AI industry stop developing more powerful bots. Holding signs and banners reading Stop the AI Race and Don't Build Skynet, the protesters marched through the city and gave speeches outside the offices of Anthropic, OpenAI, and xAI. The crowd demanded that these companies halt efforts to create superintelligent machines--and, in particular, AI models that can develop future AI models. Such a technology, attendees said, could extinguish all human life. At AI protests and happy hours, inside start-ups and major companies, the tech world is in a frenzy over the same thing: Computers that make themselves smarter.

Electronics are getting more expensive and worse. Recently, a Costco in Florida instituted a new store policy. An employee told me that he was asked to open up every desktop computer displayed in the electronics section and remove the memory chips. Otherwise, the RAM harvesters would get them. Elsewhere, criminal groups are misdirecting trucks carrying RAM in order to loot them.