SCRMicrosoft has introduced Copilot Checkout at the NRF 2026 retail conference, enabling users to complete purchases directly within the Copilot interface without visiting retailer websites. The feature is rolling out in the United States and integrates with PayPal, Shopify, Stripe and Etsy. Participating retailers include Urban Outfitters, Anthropologie and Ashley Furniture. According to Microsoft, the …
Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, believes it will soon be more practical to verify authentic media than to detect AI-generated content. Karissa Bell reports for Engadget that Mosseri expects synthetic imagery to overtake human-made content on social platforms. This shift forces a rethink of how apps identify what is real. Mosseri suggests that the …
Alibaba’s Qwen team has released Qwen-Image-2512. This update improves their foundation model for generating images from text. The model is now available for public use and enterprise integration. According to the developers, this version focuses on three main areas: human realism, natural detail, and text rendering. The model aims to reduce the artificial appearance often …
More than 20% of videos recommended to new YouTube users consist of low-quality AI-generated content designed solely to generate views and revenue, according to new research. Video-editing company Kapwing surveyed 15,000 of the world’s most popular YouTube channels and identified 278 that contain exclusively “AI slop”, Aisha Down reports for The Guardian. These channels have …
Silicon Valley’s AI enthusiasts are frustrated with public skepticism, but they may be missing the point. While industry insiders celebrate what they see as near-miraculous advances, many ordinary people view AI progress with anxiety or indifference. Sharon Goldman reports for Fortune that the disconnect stems from fundamentally different perspectives. What AI builders frame as thrilling …
Amazon faces a critical decision about AI-powered shopping agents that could reshape the e-commerce industry. The company must choose whether to fight these tools or embrace them as partners. Annie Palmer reports for CNBC that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy has watched competitors like OpenAI, Google, Perplexity and Microsoft release AI agents that allow consumers to …
Mathias Schindler, a longtime Wikipedia contributor and co-founder of Wikimedia Germany, reports on a troubling discovery at the 39C3 conference in Hamburg. While developing a tool to check ISBN checksums in German Wikipedia, he uncovered a significant problem: articles containing completely fabricated literature references generated by large language models. The issue emerged when Schindler found …
Meta has acquired Manus, a Singapore-based AI startup, for more than $2 billion. The deal represents one of the first major acquisitions by a U.S. tech company of a startup with Chinese roots, according to the Wall Street Journal. Manus builds general-purpose AI agents that autonomously execute complex tasks such as market research, coding, data …
The development of large language models has undergone fundamental changes in 2025, marked by new training methods and surprising capabilities that reveal a fundamentally different form of intelligence than expected. AI researcher Andrej Karpathy writes on his blog about six major shifts that defined the year. The most significant change involves a new training technique …
Artificial intelligence has developed a distinctive writing style that readers are learning to identify almost instantly. From student essays to corporate communications, AI-generated text carries unmistakable markers that reveal its algorithmic origins. Sam Wolfson writes about this for the New York Times. He describes how AI writing relies heavily on specific patterns: the “It’s not …