Santa Rally Hopes Meet AI Reality Check
As 2025 draws to a close, Wall Street finds itself caught between two forces: growing doubts about the AI trade that powered this year’s gains and the historically reliable seasonal patterns that ha...
YouTube Teams With PayPal to Pay Creators With Stablecoins
YouTube has reportedly begun letting creators on its platform get paid in PayPal’s stablecoin.
So far, this feature only applies to U.S. users, May Zabaneh, PayPal’s head of crypto, t...
President Trump’s Ban on State AI Rules Faces Legal Pushback
Last week, President Donald Trump signed an executive order aiming to ban state-level AI regulations.
“For banks, payments firms and FinTechs leaning on AI for fraud detection, credit dec...
Grok is spreading misinformation about the Bondi Beach shooting
Grok's track record is spotty at best. But even by the very low standards of xAI, its failure in the aftermath of the tragic mass shooting at Bondi Beach in Australia is shocking. The AI chatbo...
The end of OpenAI, and other 2026 predictions
Here's a thought: what if the next-generation Siri is awesome? Not just awesome for setting timers and dictating text messages (though that would be nice), but so awesome and fun to talk to tha...
AI image generators are getting better by getting worse
Real ones will know that Mount Rainier looks too big in this image, but the re-creation of a Washington State ferry in this AI image is uncanny.
This is The Stepback, a weekly newsletter brea...
A new old idea about video stores
Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 109, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, hope you're staying warm, and also you can read all the old ed...
