TLDR 2024-09-06

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TELEGRAM'S FOUNDER, IN FIRST COMMENTS SINCE ARREST, DEFENDS THE APP

Telegram founder Pavel Durov says that innovators should not be personally liable for the potential abuse of the tools they create. He says that growing pains on Telegram made it easy for criminals to abuse the platform, but that he aims to significantly improve the platform. French authorities arrested Durov in part due to Telegram's apparent lack of response to requests related to criminal investigations, but Durov says Telegram has official representatives in the EU and that he had personally helped French authorities establish a hotline with Telegram to deal with the threat of terrorism in France. Telegram is expected to announce changes to address the abuse of its platform very soon.

OPENAI CONSIDERS $2,000 MONTHLY SUBSCRIPTION PRICES FOR NEW LLMS

OpenAI executives are reportedly considering $2,000 per month subscription prices for the company's upcoming large language models. The company plans to release its next-level artificial intelligence product, Strawberry, in the fall. Strawberry will be able to solve novel math problems, develop market strategies, and perform deep research. OpenAI is also reportedly considering changing its corporate structure to be more simple and attractive to financial backers. It is aiming to raise several billion dollars in a funding round that would value it at above $100 billion.

THE ULTRA-SELFISH GENE

It is now possible for humans to genetically modify entire species by inserting genes into them with brute force. The technology has so far gone unused, even though its deployment could mean the end of diseases like malaria. It could be used for many positive things such as giving raccoons immunity to rabies, editing insects so that they're more vulnerable to safer pesticides, and preventing the spread of deadly diseases. However, its existence presents many issues, such as the possibility of a harmful gene being released into human populations.

A NEXT-GEN PAIN DRUG SHOWS PROMISE, BUT CHRONIC SUFFERERS NEED MORE OPTIONS

Vertex Pharmaceuticals is currently seeking regulatory approval for a new drug that looks promising in clinical trials. Suzetrigine could be the first of an entirely new class of pain therapy. It targets specific sodium ion channels found on pain-sensing nerve cells. While the effect of the drug is modest, it demonstrates that the strategy of targeting sodium channels specific to pain-sensing neurons works, leading to hope that the next generation of these compounds could perform much better. Suzetrigine could be approved by early 2025.

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OAUTH FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES

This article presents an informal explanation of the OAuth flow. Skipping over a lot of the nitty-gritty details, it details the problems that OAuth solves by looking at various potential security flaws. Resources for a deeper dive into the topic are available.

THE AI INDUSTRY IS OBSESSED WITH CHATBOT ARENA, BUT IT MIGHT NOT BE THE BEST BENCHMARK

LMSYS' Chatbot Arena has become an industry obsession over the past few months. It lets anyone on the web ask questions of two randomly selected, anonymous models and then vote on their preferred answers. Critics say that LMSYS has not been completely transparent about the model capabilities, knowledge, and skills it's assessing on Chatbot Arena. The limited data released by the company makes it challenging to study the limitations of models in depth. While Chatbot Arena is framed as an empirical test, it amounts to a relative rating of models.

BILL GATES HAS A GOOD FEELING ABOUT AI

Bill Gates has spent billions on funding technologies he thinks will shape the future. He has a new Netflix series that covers these technologies, including AI, climate change, inequality, misinformation, and global health. 'What's Next? The Future with Bill Gates' is set to launch on September 18. This article contains an interview with Gates where he discusses why he is so optimistic about these technologies.

LEAKED DISNEY DATA REVEALS FINANCIAL AND STRATEGY SECRETS

Hackers recently leaked a trove of data from Disney that included financial and strategy information on the entertainment giant's operations. It also included personally identifiable information of some staff and consumers and granular details about revenue generated by Disney products, park pricing offers that the company has modeled, and login credentials for some of Disney's cloud infrastructure. Disney says that it doesn't expect the incident to have a material impact on its operations or financial performance. This article provides an overview of the leaked data.

VISA DEBUTS A NEW PRODUCT DESIGNED TO MAKE IT SAFER TO PAY DIRECTLY FROM YOUR BANK ACCOUNT

Visa plans to launch a dedicated service for account-to-account payments in Europe next year that will allow users to set up direct debits on merchants' e-commerce stores with just a few clicks.

HOW DATING APPS CONTRIBUTE TO THE DEMOGRAPHIC CRISIS

The number of older singles will expand significantly in the coming years, but it is difficult to monetize dating apps.

TECH TYCOON LARRY ELLISON WILL CONTROL PARAMOUNT GLOBAL AFTER SKYDANCE DEAL CLOSES

Larry Ellison, the megabillionaire founder of Oracle, will be the majority shareholder for the company that controls Paramount Global after the deal closes next year.

10 YEARS LATER, APPLE PAY IS AMAZING — AND ABOUT TO CHANGE

Beginning with iOS 18.1, third-party developers will be able to enable tap-to-pay transactions in their own apps - opening up NFC access has the potential to turn tap-to-pay into tap-to-everything.

IS LINUX COLLAPSING UNDER ITS OWN WEIGHT? ON RUST FOR LINUX

One of the developers of the Rust for Linux project recently resigned from the project, a sign of deeper issues in Linux, both technical and cultural.

THOUGHTS WHILE WATCHING MYSELF BE AUTOMATED

In a scenario where AI is useful but humans retain some comparative advantage, we might not like where that comparative advantage lies.