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Drivers Are Rising Up Against Uber’s 'Opaque' Pay System

In London, Uber drivers are protesting a new payment system that they say makes it impossible to understand the algorithms that decide how much they get paid.
Keyless Entry

Teslas Can Still Be Stolen With a Cheap Radio Hack—Despite New Keyless Tech

Alarm Call

The Low-Paid Humans Behind AI’s Smarts Ask Biden to Free Them From ‘Modern Day Slavery’

Artificial Intelligence

What ScarJo v. ChatGPT Could Look Like in Court

If Scarlett Johansson pursues legal action against OpenAI for giving ChatGPT a voice she calls “eerily similar to mine,” she might claim the company breached her right to publicity.

Google Search’s New AI Overviews Will Soon Have Ads

Google is set to start mixing ads into its new AI-generated search answers. It’s a test of how the company’s biggest revenue stream can adapt to the age of generative AI.

Google Taps AI to Show Shoppers How Clothes Fit Different Bodies

A new breed of online ad allows brands to pay Google to offer shoppers AI-generated images that show how items of clothing would look on different skin tones and body types.

AI Is a Black Box. Anthropic Figured Out a Way to Look Inside

What goes on in artificial neural networks work is largely a mystery, even to their creators. But researchers from Anthropic have caught a glimpse.

Social Media

Twitter Is Finally Dead

Twitter is fully X.com now. Given its transformation since Elon Musk bought it, that may be a small mercy.

Maven Is a New Social Network That Eliminates Followers—and Hopefully Stress

Twitter cofounder Ev Williams is backing a new social network called Maven, which trades likes and follows for algorithms designed to foster serendipity and deep discussion.

I Went Undercover as a Secret OnlyFans Chatter. It Wasn’t Pretty

Your online influencer girlfriend is actually a rotating cast of low-wage workers. I became one of them.

The Latest Online Culture War Is Humans vs. Algorithms

Ever feel like Instagram or TikTok algorithms know you a bit too well? The backlash against automated curation is building, and new algorithm-free platforms are springing up.

Startups and Tech Culture

It’s Time to Believe the AI Hype

Some pundits suggest generative AI stopped getting smarter. The explosive demos from OpenAI and Google that started the week show there’s plenty more disruption to come.

Deadspin’s New Owners Are Embracing Betting Content—but Not AI

The future of once-beloved sports blog Deadspin has been murky since it was acquired by an unknown company called Lineup Publishing in March. The new ownership told WIRED they “don't want to ruin it.”

There's No Undoing Tech's Great Rewiring of Childhood

Psychologist Jonathan Haidt warns that social media harms children but definitive evidence is hard to find. Whatever your views on kids and technology, digital connectivity is now part of childhood.

Musi Won Over Millions. Is the Free Music Streaming App Too Good to Be True?

Musi’s free music streaming app is a hit with thrifty teens. The app claims to tap content on YouTube, but some in the music industry question the legitimacy of that model.

Blockchain and Cryptocurrency

The $2.3 Billion Tornado Cash Case Is a Pivotal Moment for Crypto Privacy

Tuesday’s verdict in the trial of Alexey Pertsev, a creator of crypto-privacy service Tornado Cash, is the first in a string of cases that could make it much harder to skirt financial surveillance.

A Vast New Data Set Could Supercharge the AI Hunt for Crypto Money Laundering

Blockchain analysis firm Elliptic, MIT, and IBM have released a new AI model—and the 200-million-transaction dataset it's trained on—that aims to spot the “shape” of bitcoin money laundering.

Crypto FOMO Is Back. So Are the Scams

After cryptocurrency prices spiked, scammers have flooded the market with fake tokens that promise investors great riches, but leave them penniless. It’s working.

Sarcophagus Is a Dead Man’s Switch for Your Crypto Wallet

By combining a century-old idea with cryptocurrency tech, Sarcophagus aims to create a foolproof way to send messages from beyond the grave.

Policy and Telecoms

Would You Still Use Google if It Didn't Pay Apple $20 Billion to Get on Your iPhone?

A US judge who will decide Google’s fate in a historic antitrust trial suggested it was “odd” for the company to say it has the best search engine but also pay Apple billions to lock out rivals.

The Affordable Connectivity Program Kept Them Online. What Now?

Millions of people relied on the federal Affordable Connectivity Program to stay online and access work, health care, and school. Now that the program has expired, some fear being cut off.

Net Neutrality Returns to a Very Different Internet

The FCC voted 3-2 to restore net neutrality rules that had disappeared during the Trump administration.

Noncompetes Are Dead—and Tech Workers Are Free to Roam

A new rule from the US Federal Trade Commission invalidates most noncompete agreements, frequently used to bind tech workers. It could unlock higher wages and more entrepreneurship and innovation.

Computers and Software

Generative AI Is Totally Shameless. I Want to Be It

The best thing about brain-melting software like ChatGPT? It doesn’t feel remorse.

Inside the Cult of the Haskell Programmer

It’s spooky. It’s esoteric. It’s also the key to understanding the rise and relevance of functional programming.

Stack Overflow Users Are Revolting Against an OpenAI Deal

Members of the software developer community have reported deleting or altering their posts to prevent them from being used by OpenAI.

Why Apple’s iPhone Browser-Choice Option Sucks

European iPhone owners are being shown a new pop-up screen listing alternatives to the Safari browser. The developers of the browsers shown on that screen are torn about the user experience.

Transportation

Biden Is Trying to Buy EVs Time With New Tariffs on China. It Might Not Work

America now has 100 percent tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, but with US automakers struggling to compete and its reliance on China’s materials, will this help? Mercedes, BMW and VW think not.

An Innovative EV Motor Used by Lamborghini, McLaren, and Ferrari Is Being Mass-Produced by Mercedes

Compared to the usual EV power plants, axial-flux motors are smaller and lighter, and have more torque. But they're hard to make at scale. Now Mercedes is bringing them to the masses.

We Tried the World’s Most Expensive Racing Simulator

Dynisma’s $2 million rig is state of the art. Just ask Ferrari, which has one for its F1 team. Now that a consumer model is in development, we decided to test the ultimate driving simulator.

Inside the Climate Protests Hell-Bent on Stopping Tesla

Tesla’s gigafactory in Germany has temporarily paused production as protests ramp up.

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