Technology

They may look like string, but these tiny objects are much more. Although they lack “brains” or computerized intelligence, these robots can move out of complex spaces. In 2022, North Carolina State University’s rotini-like soft robots navigated mazes without human or computer input. The tech uses physical intelligence. Physical intelligence …

In the Wild West of generative AI, an unlikely cowboy arrives. After closing, LimeWire, once known for music piracy, moved into content creation last year under new owners. To expand, it acquired BlueWillow, a popular generative AI image creation platform that competes with Midjourney and Stable Diffusion. BlueWillow was founded …

On Wednesday, Substack announced a Home experience redesign for its mobile app to improve discovery and engagement. A new top-of-screen reading queue makes it easier to swipe right between posts in the app. The queue lets you quickly share posts in a note or on other social media platforms. The …

For paid users, X, formerly Twitter, has implemented government ID-based account verification to prevent impersonation and provide “prioritized support.” Social media partner Au10tix provides identity verification solutions from Israel. The ID verification pop-up says the Au10tix can store this data for 30 days. X’s verification support page says ID verification …

Arm EVP and Chief Commercial Officer Will Abbey told me this morning, minutes before the chip designer’s stock started trading on Nasdaq, that “AI, I believe, is the growth of Arm.” You may not think of AI when you hear about Arm, but Abbey immediately thought of it when I …

I got to try the iPhone 15 at Apple’s fall event today. It didn’t have the iPhone 15 Pro’s titanium, but it did get softer, more rounded edges and the Dynamic Island for the first time. The iPhone 15 looks great. Apple explained its material science magic in the new …

After months of testing, TikTok Shop launched in the U.S., where it has over 150 million users. The rollout includes a dedicated shop tab on the home screen, live video shopping, shoppable ads, and creator affiliate programs. TikTok began testing its U.S. e-commerce initiative last November. Over the last few …

AuthMind, a Maryland startup that protects businesses from identity-related cyberattacks, raised $8.5 million in a seed round led by Ballistic Ventures and IBM Ventures. CEO Shlomi Yanai and CTO Ankur Panchbudhe founded the company. They founded and sold several security startups before launching AuthMind in 2020. AuthMind is their attempt …

Confirmed that X, formerly Twitter, was running unlabeled ads in users’ Following feeds. On a Mac using Chrome, we saw a few unlabeled ads among posts from people we follow, as well as ads that displayed the “Ad” label at the top right. Many of X’s ads are labeled, making …

The summer of 2023 is almost over, and we have no Cybertruck. But a serendipitous visit to a San Francisco parking lot yielded new images of the unreleased polygonal electric truck. Tesla watchers The Kilowatts posted new interior photos of Elon Musk’s Cybertruck. Fingerprints? On this blocky buggy’s exterior? Fingerprints. …