Category: Tech Crunch

Next week, Google will begin allowing kids under 13 who have parent-managed Google accounts to use its Gemini chatbot, according to The New York Times. The Times reports that Gemini will be available to kids whose parents use Family Link, a Google service that enables families to opt into various Google services for their child. A Google...

A recently released Google AI model scores worse on certain safety tests than its predecessor, according to the company’s internal benchmarking. In a technical report published this week, Google reveals that its Gemini 2.5 Flash model is more likely to generate text that violates its safety guidelines than Gemini 2.0 Flash. On two metrics, “text-to-text...

Apple and Anthropic are teaming up to build a “vibe-coding” software platform that will use generative AI to write, edit, and test code for programmers, Bloomberg reported on Friday. The iPhone maker is planning to roll out the software internally, according to Bloomberg, but hasn’t decided if it will launch it publicly. The system is...

Reddit CEO Steve Huffman says there are two kinds of people who come to the social media platform: Scrollers and seekers. Scrollers are the ones who come to Reddit’s core product, which is community conversation and engaging about topics they’re passionate about, from r/sourdough to r/popculturechat. Then there are the Seekers; the people who might...

“We’re very engaged on the tariff discussions, Apple CEO Tim Cook said. “On the pricing piece, we have nothing to announce today.”

Apple CEO Tim Cook offered the company’s first comments on the impact of President Trump’s tariffs during Thursday’s second-quarter earnings call with investors. While the iPhone maker saw only “limited impact” from tariffs in the March quarter, Cook said Apple couldn’t forecast what that would mean for the coming quarter. However, if things remained the...

Three years ago, a group of TikTokers joined NBCUniversal’s new initiative aimed at transforming social media influencers into the next generation of TV show creators.  Now, four of these creators are set to launch their original series on Peacock.  According to The Hollywood Reporter, the shows set to premiere are “The Warehouse Phase,” developed by...

Amazon’s upgraded digital assistant powered by generative AI, Alexa+, has rolled out to over 100,000 users, CEO Andy Jassy said on the company’s earnings call Thursday. While that’s a far cry from the 600 million Alexa devices out there, the company is making some progress on the rollout of Alexa+, which was first unveiled in...

Microsoft launched several new “open” AI models on Wednesday, the most capable of which is competitive with OpenAI’s o3-mini on at least one benchmark. All of the new pemissively licensed models — Phi 4 mini reasoning, Phi 4 reasoning, and Phi 4 reasoning plus — are “reasoning” models, meaning they’re able to spend more time...

Tools for Humanity, the startup behind the World human verification project co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, unveiled Wednesday a mobile device designed to help people determine the difference between a human and an AI agent. Rich Heley, Tools for Humanity’s Chief Device Officer and a former Apple director, debuted the Orb Mini device during...