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Elon Musk has incredible sway over the companies he leads. And while he already calls himself “TechnoKing” at Tesla, he is a real ruler over SpaceX, wielding an unprecedented level of control over one of the most valuable companies in the world. Musk’s monarchical grip on SpaceX was finally laid bare in the company’s IPO filing made public on Wednesday. Post-IPO, Musk will be CEO, CTO, and chairman of SpaceX’s board. His current 85% voting power will drop following the IPO, but it will still be above 50%, giving him the ability to appoint directors as he sees fit. He…
The Federal Trade Commission announced on Thursday that Cox Media Group and two other marketing companies, MindSift LLC and 1010 Digital Works, have agreed to collectively pay nearly $1 million to settle allegations that they deceived their customers—other businesses—by claiming that they could help target ads based on audio recordings collected from consumers’ smart devices via a marketing service called Active Listening.In a statement to WIRED, a spokesperson for CMG says, “We are pleased to have this matter resolved. Our local marketing team relied on marketing materials provided to us by a third-party vendor about their product. We withdrew the…
While there are some shocking revelations in SpaceX’s S-1 as it gets ready to become a public company, Elon Musk’s total control of the company perhaps isn’t one of them. I could argue that the oddball provision where Elon Musk gets up to a billion more shares to add to his already oversized, company-controlling cache once a million people are living on Mars (yes, really), is perhaps the most jaw-dropping. It is also fairly unserious. Musk controls and can vote those shares now, by the way. But even a billion extra super-voting rights shares are immaterial in this company’s setup…
Photograph: Jordan Michelman4222 Vineland Ave., North Hollywood, (818) 980-8000“The Valley” isn’t just one place, either—a collection of unique cities and subcultures that occupy the environs north of LA proper, this is the land of Paul Thomas Anderson films, immortalized in the music of Tom Petty and Frank Zappa. If you’re in the Southlands for events in and around the television and film industry, or to check out the Universal Studios theme park complex, you’ll save time and money by staying close.The Garland is your Valley adventure home port. This place manages the neat trick of being both hip and eminently…
$50 Million Sponsorships, Sky-High CPMs: Welcome to the 2026 World Cup U.S. men’s soccer head coach Mauricio Pochettino speaks with the media before an international friendly match against Portugal in March.Omar Vega/Getty Images Cannes Lions is where the biggest ideas take center stage. Join ADWEEK for must-see conversations, top industry leaders, and the moments everyone will be talking about. The World Cup is hitting some major pricing goals for Fox and Telemundo in 2026.As the Men’s World Cup kicks off in June in North America, with matches in the United States, Mexico, and Canada, advertisers are…
Waymo has suspended robotaxi service on freeways in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Miami as it works to improve performance in construction zones, the company confirmed to TechCrunch on Thursday. Waymo said it’s in the process of integrating “recent technical learnings into our software and expect to resume these routes soon.” Waymo robotaxis are still operating on surface streets in those cities. The decision to pull robotaxis off of freeways follows Waymo’s decision to pause operations in Atlanta and San Antonio, Texas to address problems with flooding in those cities. The company announced a software recall last week that…
Leah Feiger: Let’s invest.Zoë Schiffer: They have that going for a while.Leah Feiger: It wasn’t full Google, but it—Zoë Schiffer: Somewhat there.Leah Feiger: —had that vibe. To me, someone so on the outside of this in every single way, I know about these layoffs because they’ve been, A) so chaotic, but B) in some ways, needlessly so. Not to say that other tech companies aren’t firing scores of workers all the time. That feels like something we discuss on this podcast frequently, but this is happening with such a large runway and in a way that’s making employees feel so…
Penske Media in Talks to Acquire Unsold Vox Media Brands Penske Media plans to acquire either all or none of the unsold Vox Media brands, a transaction that would also see Vox president Ryan Pauley join PMC. Cannes Lions is where the biggest ideas take center stage. Join ADWEEK for must-see conversations, top industry leaders, and the moments everyone will be talking about. Penske Media is in line to acquire the brands left over from Vox Media’s breakup, including Eater, The Verge, SB Nation, Popsugar, and The Dodo, according to a person familiar with the matter.The…
Watch out, Suno. Spotify on Thursday announced it has partnered with Universal Music Group (UMG) to allow fans to use generative AI technology to create covers and remixes of their favorite songs. The tool will launch as a paid add-on available only to Spotify’s Premium subscribers and will offer a revenue share with participating artists for the AI-generated music based on their work. The company did not share pricing or a launch date for the new tool, only that the two companies had come to a licensing agreement. However, Spotify had teased its plans last year, noting that it was…
It’s a beautiful, balmy afternoon at Dolores Park in San Francisco, and I’m singing a birthday song to a prehistoric dinosaur. A cupcake with a pink candle magically appears in my empty hand as I finish my serenade. When I blow out the flame, a calm look of contentment washes over the CGI-esque creature.While the man in this AI video looks and sounds just like me, the clip was actually generated using one of the new features available in Google’s Gemini app: avatars. These digital recreations are similar to the core features of OpenAI’s now-defunct Sora app. It’s a digital…
WPP Media Shows Signs of New Business Bounceback, Report Finds Cannes Lions is where the biggest ideas take center stage. Join ADWEEK for must-see conversations, top industry leaders, and the moments everyone will be talking about. Signs of a turnaround are afoot at WPP Media, which topped the global media new business rankings during the first quarter of 2026, according to data from COMvergence. The firm’s quarterly Global New Business Barometer, released on Thursday, found that WPP generated $1.5 billion in new client billings in the quarter, thanks to major account wins like Jaguar Land Rover, Estée…
President Donald Trump has delayed signing an executive order that would allow the government to evaluate AI models before they’re released. Trump claimed he is not happy with the language of the order: “I didn’t like certain aspects of it,” he told the White House press pool. “We’re leading China, we’re leading everybody, and I don’t want to do anything that’s going to get in the way of that leading.” The unofficial reason: Not enough tech CEOs could make it to Washington, D.C. on short notice, according to several reports. And what’s an executive order signing without a photo op?…
Storage furniture is too often drab and functional, intended to blend into the background of your home. Mustard Made is an exception. The company’s storage lockers come in a variety of loud colors that announce themselves in a room.Mustard Made makes some of our favorite storage solutions here on the WIRED Reviews team, especially when it comes to outfitting our overflowing home offices. Julian Chokkattu from the WIRED Gear team takes Zoom meetings from a space full of high-end office chairs and brand-new gadgets, and yet my residual image of his home office will always be the stylish yellow Mustard…
CBS Evening News with Tony Dokoupil was the standout broadcast to finish the week of May 11 on a positive note, recording week-to-week gains in total viewers and the advertiser-coveted Adults 25-54 demo.CBS News’ evening newscast finished above 500,000 demo viewers for the first time since the week of April 27. Meanwhile, ABC News and NBC News’ evening newscasts were down in both measured categories.ABC World News Tonight with David Muir continued to be the evening news leader in both categories, ranking as the No. 1 program on all of television among total viewers. This comes during a week that…
Fire season kicked off early in California this year, with flames already approaching a former nuclear test site outside of Los Angeles. The rising number of natural disasters in California, and around the world, demand our attention — and, in Silicon Valley, venture investment. Convective Capital, an early-stage venture fund led by Bill Clerico, announced a new $85 million fund Thursday, following up on a $35 million fund raised in 2022. While the first fund was mainly backed by wealthy individuals (including Clerico, a cofounder of WePay who sold the startup to JPMorgan for $300 million in 2017), this latest…
Palantir hosted a hack week this spring to try to turn internal consternation over the company’s work with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) into clearer oversight tools for products used in the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, according to material reviewed by WIRED.The new tools provide organizations, including DHS and ICE, more information on how their workers use Palantir software. Organizations can set up alerts for “concerning behavior,” like exfiltrating datasets, and search the session logs of individual users. They also allow organizations to see which users have viewed specific sets of information.Palantir declined…