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Anthropic’s latest research suggests that while AI is rapidly changing the way work gets done, it hasn’t meaningfully eliminated jobs. At least, not yet. But beneath what Anthropic’s head of economics, Peter McCrory, says is a “still healthy” labor market, early signs are pointing to uneven impacts, especially for younger workers just entering the workforce.  In an interview on the sidelines of the Axios AI Summit in Washington, McCrory said the company’s newest economic impact report finds little evidence of widespread job displacement so far.  “There’s no material difference in unemployment rates” between workers who use Claude for the “most…

Last month, researchers at Northeastern University invited a bunch of OpenClaw agents to join their lab. The result? Complete chaos.The viral AI assistant has been widely heralded as a transformative technology—as well as a potential security risk. Experts note that tools like OpenClaw, which work by giving AI models liberal access to a computer, can be tricked into divulging personal information.The Northeastern lab study goes even further, showing that the good behavior baked into today’s most powerful models can itself become a vulnerability. In one example, researchers were able to “guilt” an agent into handing over secrets by scolding it…

After years of allegations of harm by youth advocacy groups and corresponding denials from corporate, Meta and YouTube have been found liable for causing mental duress to an adolescent girl—identified only as “Kaley” or “K.G.M.”—who brought her action 2023 and has since turned 20. The jury in the civil suit brought in Los Angeles Superior Court deliberated for eight days before reaching its verdict.The LA jury awarded Kaley $3 million in punitive damages—veritable pocket change for companies like Meta and YouTube parent Alphabet, which generated over $200 billion and $403 billion in revenue last year, respectively. The larger issue here is…

If Google’s AI researchers had a sense of humor, they would have called TurboQuant, the new, ultra-efficient AI memory compression algorithm announced Tuesday, “Pied Piper” — or, at least that’s what the internet thinks. The joke is a reference to the fictional startup Pied Piper that was the focus of HBO’s “Silicon Valley” TV series that ran from 2014 to 2019. The show followed the startup’s founders as they navigated the tech ecosystem, facing challenges like competition from larger companies, fundraising, technology and product issues, and even (much to our delight) wowing the judges at a fictional version of TechCrunch…

I was a late convert to air fryers, in part because I worried about versatility: Just how many wings and nuggets and fries does anyone need? (Don’t answer. The answer will incriminate you.)The Typhur Dome 2 is the air fryer that obliterated this worry, by adding pizza, browned meats, grilled asparagus, and toasted bread to this list—not to mention perfect crispy bacon. It’s an innovative device that takes over most of the functions of a classic auxiliary oven, but with far more powerful convection.After testing more than 30 air fryers over the past year, the Dome 2 is the one…

The Female Quotient is heading to the beach for Cannes Lions 2026.The media and advisory company announced the launch of FQ Beach and Camp on Wednesday (March 25), an expansion of its FQ Lounge set-up on the rooftop of the Hôtel Martinez. The space, situated on the Croisette across from Hôtel Martinez, will host an outdoor stage with daily programming, brand activations, and gatherings that forward The FQ’s mission.Meanwhile, the rooftop space will host private gatherings with industry leaders alongside a dedicated content studio for social-first storytelling.“For over ten years, the FQ Lounge at Cannes Lions has been the destination for…

At a press conference at the White House on Wednesday, First Lady Melania Trump showed up with a humanoid robot developed by robotics firm Figure AI. The duo waltzed down a red carpet together before the bot gave a brief speech, chirping: “I am grateful to be part of this historic movement to empower children with technology and education.” Not long after these remarks, the machine mosied out of the room and disappeared. The bizarre spectacle was part of the First Lady’s newly launched initiative, the Fostering the Future Together global summit, which invited international leaders from around the world…

“I’ve spent a lot of time looking at the comment sections on these videos actually, and it does not seem like bots. I clicked on people’s profiles; these are real profiles, thousands of followers, no signs of inorganic activity,” Maddox says. “People just like it.”But even if the views and engagement are real, that doesn’t mean this content is profitable—yet. Maddox noted that because the accounts are so new, most likely aren’t yet enrolled in TikTok’s Creator Fund or other forms of social media ad revenue-sharing, because those usually require accounts to apply and have a certain number of views.…

The Devil Wears Prada 2 premieres on May 1, 20 years after Runway magazine editor Miranda Priestly first made her personal assistant Andy Sachs tremble.Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway will reprise their roles in the sequel, which is forecast to pull in $55 million in its domestic opening weekend. Though it’s over a month before the movie lands in cinemas, brands are strutting into Runway’s universe early. The first movie, released in 2006, carried a reported $1 million wardrobe budget with placements from designers such as Chanel and Valentino woven into the storyline. High-fashion will naturally play a starring role…

One day after Meta lost a similar child safety lawsuit in New Mexico, a Los Angeles jury on Wednesday handed the social media giant — along with Google — another defeat. In a case arguing that social media platforms played a major role in harming a young woman’s mental health, jurors have sided with the plaintiff, known by her initials, K.G.M., or her first name, Kaley. The decision means Meta and Google will have to pay out $3 million in compensatory damages, with Meta bearing 70% of that cost. More damages may also be awarded as the jury continues to…

It’s Sunday, and I’m onstage at the Soapstone Comedy Club in the metaverse. My VR avatar is clad in a black suit, tie, sunglasses, and an unfortunate fedora I’ve selected from the pool of free clothes for your virtual dolls in Meta’s Horizon Worlds. After the show, a guy whose username is Large Phenis pops up in the bar next to me. “Hey there, Blues Brothers,” he cackles—tough crowd.Soapstone’s adults-only digital comedy club has been around since nearly the beginning of Meta’s Horizon Worlds. It has hosted more than 5,000 events, from improv and stand-up to trivia nights and open-mic…

After over 25 years in marketing, I learned that many targeting decisions aren’t driven by sound commercial logic.They are driven by faulty logic, a lack of empathy, and the recurring fantasy that the consumer most attractive to marketers is automatically the most valuable one.The same mistakes always come back, usually wrapped in a persuasive deck and introduced as “growth opportunities.” They are not. They’re just old errors in fresh packaging.Here are the three biggest mistakes:Being tyrannized by the youthsThere is a sentence you always hear in marketing meetings, especially when the data suggests older consumers deserve more focus: “We need…

Block Party founder Tracy Chou announced on Wednesday that the company has been acquired by DeleteMe, an online personal data removal service. A software engineer and advocate for diversity in tech, Chou founded Block Party in 2018 as a tool to help people stay safe from targeted harassment on Twitter, inspired by her own experiences on the platform. Chou raised a $4.8 million seed round in 2022 to expand the tool to other social networks, which turned out to be really good timing — soon after, Elon Musk would buy Twitter. Under his ownership, the company began charging for access…

Ultrahuman is back in the United States. The noted Oura Ring competitor has been absent from the American market since October because of a patent dispute but is now cleared by US Customs and Border Protection.As WIRED reported in August, the US International Trade Commission had previously ruled in favor of Oura in a patent infringement case against competitors Ringconn and Ultrahuman. This decision was a big setback for Bengaluru, India-based Ultrahuman, which had established a manufacturing facility in Plano, Texas, to bypass tariffs. Ringconn reached a royalties agreement with Oura, while Ultrahuman pulled its Ring Air from the US…

Principal media buying has moved from a quiet industry practice to a very public flashpoint. While much of the current discussion focuses on digital and programmatic channels, principal media spans the full media ecosystem, from traditional linear channels to programmatic marketplaces.The practice has long existed across traditional media—broadcast, cable, radio, and outdoor—where agencies could leverage scale to secure and resell inventory. What’s changed is not the existence of principal buying, but its scale, complexity, and the degree to which it now sits at the center of agency economics.This is an extremely sensitive topic, but the recent surge in reporting, coupled with…

Over the past few years, a new category of mobile apps has quietly exploded into a multi-billion dollar business. They’re called “micro dramas” — short-form, mobile-first scripted shows designed to be watched vertically on your phone. Think soap opera meets TikTok, complete with secret billionaire romances, disapproving werewolf mothers-in-law, and cliffhangers engineered to keep users tapping. The leading app, ReelShort, made $1.2 billion in consumer spending last year alone.  On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan and TechCrunch senior reporter Amanda Silberling sit down with Henry Soong, founder of Watch Club, who thinks the micro drama industry is still “in its MySpace era.” He has a vision for what the Facebook moment could…