


26 Mar 2026 · 29m · 18 chapters

Two U.S. jury verdicts against Meta and Google over alleged mental-health harms from Instagram and YouTube design (recommendation algorithms, autoplay, notifications). The episode frames this as a “big tobacco moment” for social media, with more lawsuits expected and appeals likely.
Tom Merritt and Jen Cutter are the hosts (no other guests named in the transcript).
Meta and Google were found negligent for not warning users about dangers; the harms were linked to mental health effects including severe body dysmorphia, depression, and suicidal thoughts. The cases target product/design (engagement features), not specific content posts. Punitive damages are still pending; appeals are expected.
New Mexico case: Meta guilty of misleading users about Facebook/Instagram safety; $350M damages. Los Angeles case: $3M compensatory so far; Meta pays 70%, Google 30%; Snap and ByteDance settled out. A federal Northern District of California case is expected to begin this summer against Meta, YouTube, TikTok, and Snap.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes.
Discussion of court cases against Meta regarding user safety.
“Let's start with what you need to know with that big story.”
Exploration of the impact of court rulings on mental health.
“KGM, also referred to in the case as Kaylee, alleged personal injury because she became addicted to Instagram and YouTube as a child, saying that she started using these as early as six years old, couldn't stop.”
Discussion on how algorithms contribute to social media addiction.
“So when you see headlines that say they have to pay or they've been done.”
Debate on the differences between causation and correlation in mental health issues.
“Jen, and it is much easier to sway a jury, especially when you're talking about a young girls mental health that that something needs to be done then it might be a federal judge or a Supreme Court judge.”
Hosts discuss public perceptions and changes in media regarding mental health.
“where her mental health was bad and it was made worse because of this?”
Overview of investigations into social media's impact on children.
“governmental law saying like, hey, knock that stuff off.”
The discussion examines the mental health implications of technology use and the ongoing investigations around it.
“Here's what we think the solutions would be to reduce mental health harm.”
A debate on Nintendo's new pricing strategy for physical versus digital game releases.
“In the Yoshi's Game case, it will be$70 for the physical version and$60 for the digital.”
Insights from a pilot study on how university students use large language models in their writing process.
“It's first party, second party with the Pokemon relationship there.”
Discussion on high school students' attitudes toward AI and their use of technology for assignments.
“say like, yeah, I'll assign homework and it will like 20 % of the class minimum will immediately submit answers because the time it took them to send it to chat GPT, copy paste and well done my homework for the day.”
Details about AMD's latest Ryzen processor and its performance improvements.
“AMD went and announced a new flagship PC processor, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 with dual chiplet 3D technology.”
Summary of the latest tech headlines, including updates from Apple and new emoji releases.
“Well, if you have feedback about this or anything that gets brought up on the show, you can get in touch with us on our social media.”
Discover the new features of Apple's latest iOS update, including emojis.
“These are the little nuggets, you know, things that make you feel smarter.”
Learn about Samsung's new browser and the controversies surrounding Apple's AppGrid ban.
“I want the, uh, the Bigfoot, uh, having a fight cloud with Orca while playing a trombone during a landslide into a ballet dancer on a treasure chest.”
Explore Mistral's new text-to-speech model and OpenAI's decisions regarding ChatGPT.
“But come on, that's the letter of the law.”
Google forecasts that quantum computing could threaten current encryption by 2029.
“What is not delayed but actually moved up is QDay.”
Get the latest news on ByteDance's video model and the helium supply crisis affecting electronics.
“Google did not give a reason for the accelerated timeline.”
Seth shares his thoughts on the potential drawbacks of smart contact lenses.
“We end every episode of DTNS with some shared perspectives.”

Get the gist, explore an idea or ask about something said.
On Daily Tech News Show, what are the key points of this episode?
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.
0:00Chicago, 2011. A cop is murdered. Police and prosecutors swear they have the trigger man. He swears he didn't do it. How far will each side go to prove their right? Like it's just one bombshell after another, you know, where you're like, what? The story of a PlayStation, a brain-eating amoeba, and the relentless pursuit of justice. Off-duty, out now. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love.
0:49It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade in value. Advanced, intuitive, and deployed. That's how they stack. That's technology at Capital One.
1:28So you can prove trust at any moment. Vanta scales with you at every stage. That's why top companies from startups like Cursor to enterprises like Snowflake choose Vanta. Do security and compliance right. Get started today at vanta.com slash TED Audio.
1:45Jenn Cutter: Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same premium wireless for$15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistant's assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do at mintmobile.com slash switch. Upfront payment of$45 for three-month plan, equivalent to$15 per month required. Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. Default terms at mintmobile.com.
2:26Jenn Cutter: This is the Daily Tech News for Thursday, March 26th, 2026. That's a lot of 26s. We're going to still try to tell you what you need to know, give you some important context and help you understand. Today, big court losses for Meta have analysts saying this is the big tobacco moment for social media. Oh, and you know how well that worked. No one smokes anymore. I'm Tom Merritt. I'm Jen Cutter. Let's start with what you need to know with that big story.
2:54Jenn Cutter: I'm kidding. I already can hear somebody writing an email like, well, smoking has reduced quite a bit. And especially in the United States. I know, I know. It was just a silly joke. Let's get to the actual story. Gambit Mutant. Thank you for noting this one on our subreddit. Following on the news we mentioned yesterday of a jury in the U.S. state of New Mexico finding Meta guilty of misleading users about the safety of Facebook and Instagram. That was just about Meta. And that was just about product safety. Wednesday afternoon, there was a second jury finding in a case in Los Angeles. This one has a lower penalty, but it seems to have a bigger impact.
3:31Jenn Cutter: In this Los Angeles case, the jury determined that Meta and Google were negligent for not warning users of the dangers associated with, in Meta's case, Instagram and Google's case, YouTube. The damages awarded in this case so far are$3 million in compensatory damages. That's quite a bit less than the$350 million in the New Mexico case, but we're not done yet. There is still the punitive damages. Meta is on the hook to pay 70 % of the$3 million, and Google will pay the remaining 30%. Snap and ByteDance were both part of this case originally, but they settled out of court, so this does not affect them.
4:11Jenn Cutter: Let's talk about what this case was about. KGM, also referred to in the case as Kaylee, alleged personal injury because she became addicted to Instagram and YouTube as a child, saying that she started using these as early as six years old, couldn't stop. Notifications would give her a boost, and she became addicted to using these services. And the jury was convinced. And so the jury ruled that negligence by these companies played a substantial factor. that's the quote from their finding, in causing mental health-related harms to Kaylee. Now, Kaylee alleged that the recommendation algorithms and the autoplay, these are things meant to engage you and keep you using the platforms, contributed to the mental distress she experienced, including severe body dysmorphia, depression, and suicidal thoughts.
5:05Jenn Cutter: Meta and Google argued that Kaylee's mental distress was caused by other factors. They weren't disputing that she had these mental distresses, but said that her heavy use of Instagram and YouTube was a coping mechanism, not a cause. A former therapist for Kaylee, Victoria Burke, testified that her social media and sense of self were combined in a way that what happened online affected her mental well-being. That is the only actual evidence, scientific testimony that I could find that was brought into this case. And when we discuss what I think of this, that's going to play an important part. One significant aspect of the case is that it does not go after content.
5:45Jenn Cutter: A lot of attempts to go after social media have said, you shouldn't allow this to be posted. And the platforms have successfully argued, then you should go after the poster, not us. This is going after the design of the site, saying you designed this site in a way that affected mental harm. and the design of the site is something clearly under your control. The automatic scrolling, the autoplay, the notifications, those are all things the platform maker is responsible for. Both the New Mexico and Los Angeles cases are likely to be appealed. So we are not done here. This is just stage one. And then if there's an appeal, which there likely will be, then we go to an appeals court.
6:28Jenn Cutter: So when you see headlines that say they have to pay or they've been done. We're not there yet. And also, don't get mad at that. That's the way the court case is supposed to work. If you are brought into court and found guilty of something that you know you didn't do, you want to be able to appeal. So that's the court system working properly. And as I mentioned, the Los Angeles case has yet to decide punitive damages. That will raise the amount assessed against Meta and Google. And if you're like, why haven't I heard about an appeal? they have to go through that court case. There's another hearing to determine the punitive damages.
7:04They have to complete that before an appeal can be lodged.
7:08Jenn Cutter: There are also a lot of other cases being brought along these same lines, including some by state attorneys general. More are expected to be filed after the initial success of these two cases. There is a particularly notable case meant to begin this summer in the federal Northern District of California. That one claims that apps from Meta, YouTube, TikTok, and snap helped foster detrimental mental health related harms to young users. So this definitely is a big tobacco moment in the sense of everyone is bringing their court cases to say, you should be responsible for the harms caused by your product.
7:42Jenn Cutter: It's a little early to determine whether the courts are going to universally rule that way, especially because these are two jury cases, Jen, and it is much easier to sway a jury, especially when you're talking about a young girls mental health that that something needs to be done then it might be a federal judge or a Supreme Court judge. Yeah, I've been trying to figure out like before 2020 I think even I would have been too cynical to believe that this was a thing it's like oh like you know what's the big deal where your parents that kind of thing. But having seen how many people fall down these rabbit holes and also like as a kid Because it started when she was a kid, what defenses do you have as a child for this sort of stuff that does not rely on a guardian interceding for you?
8:29I remember growing up with all of the magazines on every rack and in every school, making eating disorders seem cool and necessary in order to succeed as a woman in life. So I absolutely remember that and the damage it did to all of my friends growing up and having to overcome that because it's like, wait, no, being super skinny does not work for me. I want to play sports. I need calories. I need to make sure I have a good, healthy relationship with food. And I have a healthy relationship with the internet because it was not as ubiquitous. I didn't carry it with me. It was in the living room for a good chunk of my life.
9:08So whether, oh my gosh, like algorithms just weren't a thing. And I cannot imagine being a kid these days having to deal with this. Like I do play with hockey with some younger people. So I'd actually been asking one of my 18 year old teammates like, hey, what is it like? How do you, how do you handle this? She's like, oh, I live on Snapchat. We are checking our locations with all of our friends 100 times a day. And she's showing me her streak and all this stuff. And I'm like, oh, oh, this is a major part of it.
9:37Jenn Cutter: your life yeah i i don't think i disagree with anything you said in fact i i don't disagree with a lot of the things that were brought up in the court case about the harms that could come from this kind of addiction what i worry about and this is one of those worries that if you're just on a polar end of one of these issues uh you're you're you're gonna attack me but what i worry about is we didn't have evidence in here of what caused the harm. What was it about? Was there a situation where her mental health was bad and it was made worse because of this? We had a therapist saying that it seems like her identity was really tied into there.
10:24Jenn Cutter: And that's similar to what you're saying, Jen. And similar to what I would say too, is like, I've seen a lot of people who are, in my opinion, a little overly dependent on social media validation to feel good about themselves. There is something there. There is something wrong. However, if we don't figure out what it is, if we don't have a really solid idea of like, ah, this is the problem, then we are going to have a harder time solving the problems. And we're giving companies a chance to do a little performative thing to say, oh, okay, great. We'll pay a fine. We will limit younger users from using this.
11:02Jenn Cutter: And we'll, whatever you want to do, you want us to have the algorithm differently? Great. We'll do it. But we might not still fix the harm. As an example of like, Tom, what do you mean by that? Look at tobacco. Everybody knew it caused cancer. And then finally we got them into court, you know, and we did something about it. We used to think that fat was the reason that you gained weight and that fat was bad for you. And what we found is sometimes some fat is bad for you. If we had gone and banned all fat, that would have actually lowered our health because you need particular fats. It also wouldn't have made people lose weight because it turns out there are other reasons that you gain weight.
11:44Jenn Cutter: And so to me, it's like, yeah, let's actually take this seriously, but let's also take serious that we need to know what's causing the harms. What is behind those concerns, Jen, that you and I have when we're like, man, it seems like this isn't really good for this person, but what is it about it? And then we can actually fix that and ask companies to fix that. Yeah. What's the phrase? Correlation is not causation. Yes. I've had several reporter friends of mine. Canadian networks have since January been losing their minds and they realize like, oh, I am scrolling past work way too much. Yeah. And it is eating my life and my partner is getting sick of all my anger for it.
12:29So they've stepped back. Some of them even deleted their accounts. Now, when you're a big enough journalist, you can do that. But they have felt so much better. We're still talking. They're still hanging out with friends. They're like, I've been reading books. I've been doing this. I feel 100 % better. I'm never coming back. So there are advantages to not living on social media. And then there are people who post 800 times a day who are totally fine adjusted people. It's such an individual thing. I don't know how a platform can handle that. And to go back to the magazine thing, I was trying to think like, okay, what happened to change that?
13:04And society kind of were the ones to come around on that. There was no governmental law saying like, hey, knock that stuff off. They actually just all kind of changed their covers a little bit, used different words. Like it took decades. Let's be fair here. This was not an overnight fix. But if you look on magazine racks today, like, yeah, it's a lot of like heavy fitness stuff, but it is not the same here as somebody who weighs 90 pounds and you should aspire to be like that.
13:30Jenn Cutter: Yeah, it's definitely changed over the years. I think that's a really good example of you didn't need a law and maybe a law would have sped it up. Probably. Maybe it wouldn't have it, you know, because companies are very good at finding ways, you know, like make a rule. I'll find a way around it. The public pressure is harder to find a way around. So I think these lawsuits are good because they bring up these conversations and they put pressure on these platforms to identify this. But I would hope that during the course of these investigations, that we see more actual research and scientists coming in and saying, here's what we know.
14:06Jenn Cutter: Here's where we think the problem is. Here's what we think the solutions would be to reduce mental health harm. I think that's really important. And whenever you say that, you get somebody saying like, well, Tom, you're making excuses for the tech companies, or tech companies saying, oh, there is no evidence. So therefore we don't need to do anything. And neither one of those are correct in my opinion. All right, in slightly related stories, the European Commission has launched an investigation Thursday into whether Snapchat does enough to protect children who access its service, as well as investigations to whether adult websites, Pornhub, StripChat, XNX, XNX videos have done enough to protect minors from seeing harmful material online.
14:46Jenn Cutter: So just more evidence that this is a huge topic and it's not going away anytime soon. DTNS is made possible by you, the listener. Thanks to Johnny Hernandez, High Tech Oki and Chris Zaragoza.
15:08Chicago, 2011. A cop is murdered. Police and prosecutors swear they have the trigger man. He swears he didn't do it. How far will each side go to prove they're right? Like it's just one bombshell after another. You know, you're like, what? The story of a PlayStation, a brain-eating amoeba, and the relentless pursuit of justice. Off-duty, out now. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge, and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love.
15:56It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade-in value. Advanced, intuitive, and deployed. That's how they stack. That's technology at Capital One.
16:07Jenn Cutter: Over 90 of the top 100 U.S. accounting firms trust Bill to handle bill pay processes. Why? Because our tools are built on over a trillion dollars of secure payments. We're not just moving money. We're powering financial workflows for half a million customers. That's a level of expertise you just can't fake. Ready to talk with an expert? Visit Bill.com slash proven to get started and grab a$250 gift card as a thank you. Terms and conditions apply. See offer page for details. Security and compliance done wrong is a giant headache. Security and compliance done right, that's Vanta. Vanta helps you earn trust and speed up growth.
16:47No spreadsheets required. For startups low on time and resources, Vanta becomes your first security hire, using AI and automation to get you compliant fast and unblock big deals. For enterprises, Vanta is your AI-powered hub for compliance and risk, bringing together data from across your businesses and automating workflows so you can prove trust at any moment. Vanta scales with you at every stage. That's why top companies from startups like Cursor to enterprises like Snowflake choose Vanta. Do security and compliance right. Get started today at vanta.com slash TED Audio. Parles-tu français? Hablas espanol?
17:25Parli italiano?
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18:04Jenn Cutter: There's more we need to know today. Let's get to the briefs. Nintendo announced that starting May 21st with the release of Yoshi and the Mysterious Book, new physical releases of Switch 2 exclusive first-party games that's very specific, so remember that, will cost more to buy than the downloadable digital versions. In the Yoshi's Game case, it will be$70 for the physical version and$60 for the digital. Nintendo said the change, quote, reflects the different costs associated with producing and distributing each format. Nintendo did not say whether the price difference will always be$10, but does not appear currently to affect previously released games.
18:48Jenn Cutter: Yeah, Video Game Chronicles said that there have been price differences on physical media in the UK already. So this may be something that's not new, depending on where you live. But this is Nintendo saying this is going to be the way it is from now on. Does it bother you? uh i think it would like it bothers me if i am paying ten dollars more for a game key versus buying the actual cart that has the game on it because if i'm paying for a physical thing that requires a download anyway people are just going to buy the digital so is it a push to digital i ended up buying the digital for uh pokemon pacoopia uh for 110 canadian i'll say canadian because otherwise I'd be buying the game key.
19:33And my brain just says, no, you're not buying a physical digital copy. Just buy the digital.
19:39Jenn Cutter: Yeah. And why was it 110? Was it also 110 for the game key as well? Yeah, it was the same price for both. It's first party, second party with the Pokemon relationship there. Right, because Pokemon is not... That's true. We're talking about first party exclusive Nintendo stuff. That's why I said like, it's very specific. So like pay attention to that specific part. Yeah. I am sympathetic to the idea that like, hey, if we have to give you a piece of plastic with some electronics on it, which is what the game key is, basically an SD card, we have to put it in a package, we have to put it on a boat, and we have to get it into a store, and we have to hang it on a thing or put it in a warehouse.
20:15Jenn Cutter: That is more costly than just letting you download it because you're also going to have to download it as well. So essentially, the cost is zeroed out between the two versions because they both have to be downloaded. the one with the physical key is costing them more to deliver so it seems fair for them to charge a little more for it to be yeah uh well it was funny to see the backlash against this because for i want to say a solid 10 years now people have been mad it's like oh well why does the steam version cost as much as the console disc because yeah right yeah it's it's costing them less i'm thinking like why is this bad because it's nintendo because they wanted a discount They didn't want the other one to get its price raised.
20:56Yeah, yeah. No, but this is the exact right time for Nintendo to do it because everybody knows that everything is more expensive to make right now.
21:04Jenn Cutter: Indeed. Yeah. And you do, don't forget, with the key card, you do get a little more portability in your game. You can sell it and you can buy used ones. It's not as tied to your device as your digital download, which you can't do that with. I'm keeping Pocopia forever. It is, I feel bad saying this after the previous story, but it is absolutely consuming my life and free time. I love it. Well, as long as you can stop and you get out and you play hockey like you do, then I think, you know, hopefully it's going to be OK. Professor of English at Kennesaw State University, Jean Beatrix Law, wrote a post on The Conversation about a pilot study conducted with undergraduate writers to understand how they use large language models.
21:46Jenn Cutter: Now, this is just a pilot study. So they only had 20 students, but they asked those 20 students to use think aloud protocols where they would describe their thoughts while they're working during a 20-minute writing session. So just talk out loud. They were told there was no wrong way to use these LLMs. They weren't going to be in trouble. Use them however you normally would. And they even made sure that researchers were not present in the room during the writing session so there was less of a chance that they'd change their behavior because somebody's watching them. Here's what they found. Writers used LLMs at the beginning to generate ideas and help draft a thesis.
22:23Jenn Cutter: Students rarely accepted generated text without editing it somehow. You'd think even the lazy ones would have just copy and pasted, but all of them were going in and tweaking stuff. A few of the students rejected the LLM responses altogether or switched away from them if they felt they were too generic or disconnected from the thesis. Some of them said, I never use these tools, so I'm not going to use them now. Students did turn to LLMs regularly when they felt stuck, when they hit a point where they're like, I need some ideas. So the study indicates that LLMs are used mostly during idea generation, revision and moments of writer's block.
22:58Jenn Cutter: The professor does intend to try this with a larger group of 100 participants and see if those findings still hold. I want to note that this is with university students because my high school teacher friends say like, yeah, I'll assign homework and it will like 20 % of the class minimum will immediately submit answers because the time it took them to send it to chat GPT, copy paste and well done my homework for the day. Yeah. I mean, I would attribute that and I've talked to a lot of teachers about this and they have varying opinions. Some are going to agree with what I say, some don't. So I definitely leave it up in the teachers of the audience to send us an email about this.
23:41Jenn Cutter: But it does seem to me that like, yeah, when I was a kid, we would copy from the world book encyclopedia. That was our form of cheating with chat GPT. And if you got caught doing that, you didn't get a very good grade. It's harder to catch people with chat GPT. I realized that than it was when you could just look at the world book. But when you get to the university level, you start to want to have your own opinions and own stamp on things more than when you're at the younger ages. So I think it is not surprising to me to hear that your high school level teachers are saying like, oh, no, they're still doing that because that feels like more of a high school level thing.
24:15And also coming back to social pressure, that's kind of turning around. They've said like people who only use chat GPT or any other bot directly are getting
24:27Jenn Cutter: a little bit made fun of for it yeah yeah yeah so i know that there's a there's a big strain of kids of all ages uh but you know the the younger folks generally have a more skeptical view of ai quote unquote writ large yeah like people like the ease of it uh but uh there's always a backlash things look at super huge and popular and amazing uh and then everyone's like oh no i never liked that garbage. I was never a Beyblade fan. I'm like, yeah, they make billions of dollars. I think some people are still Beyblade fans. Yeah, yeah. AMD went and announced a new flagship PC processor, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 with dual chiplet 3D technology.
25:13It's the first PC chip to use two chiplets powered by AMD 3D vCache and the first to offer 16 Zen 5 cores and 208 MB of total cache. It will be available worldwide April 22nd. AMD claims a 5-10 % performance boost over the current design across DaVinci Resolve, Blender and other workloads. It's basically the Ryzen 9950X3D with two 3D chiplets. And that chip has been the fastest PC chip for gaming. And it's kind of nice to see them mention like, hey, also Resolve and Blender, you guys, you guys want this too.
25:52Jenn Cutter: Yeah, I think they're trying to make a play. They're like, we know the gamers will like this, you know, and really don't get too lost in those model numbers. They added a two. Look for the one with 3D in the end. And if they added a two, it's this new one. And it's not a huge, huge difference, but having the extra 3D chiplet does, you know, give you some performance increases. And I think they're right to say like, hey, editors, hey, creators, hey, coders, if you're using Unity, you might want to check out this chip when you're building your next machine. Yeah, like someday, someday I am going to upgrade my things and by that time we'll probably be four generations away.
26:34And this might even be the card I look at, the chip I look at.
26:38Jenn Cutter: It is interesting to live in a world where AMD is the leader. You know, we've moved into that situation. Well, if you have feedback about this or anything that gets brought up on the show, you can get in touch with us on our social media. We are at DTNS show on X, Instagram, Threads, Blue Sky and Mastodon. For TikTok and YouTube, find us at Daily Tech News Show.
27:07Chicago, 2011. A cop is murdered. Police and prosecutors swear they have the trigger man. He swears he didn't do it. How far will each side go to prove they're right? Like it's just one bombshell after another. You know, you're like, what? The story of a PlayStation, a brain-eating amoeba, and the relentless pursuit of justice. Off-Duty, out now. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.
27:36Jenn Cutter: When it comes to managing money, forget the hype and look at the results. Bill has a trillion dollars of secure payments powering our BillPay tools. Instead of just moving money, Bill is powering the financial operations of nearly half a million customers. So stop the guesswork and start scaling with the proven choice. Ready to talk with an expert? Visit bill.com slash proven to get started and grab a$250 gift card as a thank you. Terms and conditions apply. See offer page for details.
28:10Jenn Cutter: Now let's get to our quick headlines. These are the little nuggets, you know, things that make you feel smarter. Apple released iOS 26.4 with Playlist Playground, which lets you use Apple intelligence to create playlists from a description. There's also eight new emojis. Distorted face, ballet dancer, treasure chest, hairy creature, orca, trombone, landslide, and fight cloud. And I cannot wait for how many trombones are going to be in chat for the womp womp. I want the, uh, the Bigfoot, uh, having a fight cloud with Orca while playing a trombone during a landslide into a ballet dancer on a treasure chest.
28:54Jenn Cutter: You're prepped. You're good to go. I wanted to try the playlist thing so I could mention it on the show. It took me forever to update my iPhone. This, this is, this was a big update. I don't know why it took like almost an hour for it to update. Samsung released its Chromium-based browser for Windows. They have a Samsung browser on Samsung devices. You can now get it on your Windows device. Has agentic features powered by perplexity and the ability to pick up your browsing session from your Samsung browser on your phone. RW Nash pointed this one out to us. Apple has blocked AppGrid from the Mac OS App Store because it is too similar to Launchpad, which Apple removed in the latest version of Mac OS Tahoe.
29:39You can still get Launchpad from outside of the App Store.
29:43Jenn Cutter: That is the benefit of a laptop. You can still get it. But it's funny to me. I know you can still get Launchpad on older versions of macOS that are still available and people still use. But come on, that's the letter of the law. Ease up a little. TechZ Explorer noted this one on our subreddit. Mistral released an open source text-to-speech model for use in voice assistance or customer support situations. In addition to announcing the end of Sora, the Financial Times reports OpenAI told it that it will no longer pursue plans to release that version of ChatGPT for adult use. Oh, somebody is sad.
30:21Delayed, delayed, delayed and gone.
30:23Jenn Cutter: Now gone. Yep. What is not delayed but actually moved up is QDay. Google has moved up QDay, the day it believes quantum computing will be practical enough to break existing encryption that is not quantum proof. you know, like public key cryptography. Google now believes Q day will arrive by 2029. That's uncomfortably close. Google did not give a reason for the accelerated timeline. Yeah, my cybersecurity peeps are like, we don't know how to communicate this to normal people. ByteDance is rolling out its Dreamina C-Dance 2.0 video model in its video editing platform CapCup. Thanks to Motang for noting this next one on the subreddit.
31:04Jenn Cutter: Starting April 24th, Microsoft's GitHub plans to begin using interaction data on Copilot Free Pro and Pro Plus to train its models. So your inputs, your outputs, your code snippets, your associated context, they will train off of those to try to improve those models to give you better code. However, if you don't want it to do that, you're going to have to opt out, which you can do. You just have to go and opt out. It's not opt in. WhatsApp has added support for multiple accounts on iOS as well as chat history transfer between iOS and Android and help generating text replies. Ooh, autonomous taxis are creeping around the world.
31:43Jenn Cutter: Uber and Pony AI are working with Croatia's Vern to provide autonomous taxi service in Zagreb, Croatia. This would be the first autonomous taxi service in Europe. Wikipedia has issued new rules allowing editors to use LLMs to refine their own writing, like grammar checking, and to assist in translation as long as the translations are verified by the editor. Other uses are not allowed, but this is still kind of controversial among the wiki community. The European Parliament voted to delay the EUAI Act compliance for high-risk systems until December 2027. So kicking it down the road to next year with those sector-specific rules delayed until August 2028.
32:27Reuters reports that several companies have begun seeking alternative sources of helium for chip making as a large amount of the supply cannot make it through the Strait of Hormuz because of the War of Iran. A lack of helium could restrict the manufacturing of electronics of many kinds.
32:44Jenn Cutter: That's, I mean, it's already, manufacturing is already in a bad enough way. They don't need that on top of it. We end every episode of DTNS with some shared perspectives. Today, Seth has some concerns about the idea of smart contacts. Yeah, so Sarah brought up the idea as something she would want on yesterday's show, saying like, I don't know if I always want to wear smart glasses, but if you could put it in contacts. Seth wrote, I'm not sure how I feel about smart contacts. To be honest, I tend to lose my contacts from time to time. They have to be really inexpensive and replaceable for me to even try them.
33:19Jenn Cutter: I get smart glasses, but I just got a smart watch, Apple Watch SE3, and I have my iPhone 15 Pro. I think that's enough wearable adjacent tech for me. Maybe if smart contacts come out, we can get Sarah, who I think is a contact wearer, to do a live with it. Love the show. Keep up the great work. Seth from Philly. Oh, I'm so negative on this topic. Like, no, if they're contacts, that means that I can't see if somebody's recording and the creep shots are going to get even worse and the awful dating content. That's a fair concern. There ought to be a way for that not to be a problem. Now, you can have a long conversation about whether people will properly implement it and use it and get around it and all of that.
34:01Jenn Cutter: But that seems solvable. That seems like a way. can we have just your eyes glow red? Some people would absolutely want that. That would be a feature. That's a selling point. Or the contacts aren't recording. The contacts are just for assistance and AR and all of that. And there is no video recording. If you want to do video recording, you have to wear glasses. I think that would be the other way. That'd be cool. That'd be very handy. And again, I am always the pro-accessibility aspects of these things. Yeah, yeah. There's some huge accessibility benefits to these systems that are coming around.
34:35Jenn Cutter: Well, thanks to Seth for contributing to today's show. Thank you for being along for Daily Tech News Show. You keep us in business, folks. If you're not already, become a patron. You can do it right now. There's even discounts. Patreon.com slash DTNS.
35:02Jenn Cutter: The DTNS family of podcasts, helping each other understand. Diamond Club hopes you have enjoyed this program.
35:15This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love. It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade-in value. Advanced, intuitive, and deployed. That's how they stack. That's technology at Capital One.
35:45Jenn Cutter: Over 90 of the top 100 U.S. accounting firms trust Bill to simplify and secure BillPay. That's proven financial infrastructure built on over a trillion dollars of secure payments. Visit Bill.com slash proven for a special offer.
What the court case in Los Angeles indicates about the fate of social media companies. And Nintendo raises the price of physical media.
Starring Tom Merritt and Jenn Cutter
Show notes can be found here.
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