Category: Semafor

Maine Democratic Senate nominee Graham Platner isn’t backing down from his comments that GOP Sen. Susan Collins “sent me” to fight in Iraq, charging her with “trying to offload her mistakes” for pointing out that he chose to enlist. Platner told Semafor that he “did my best to stop” the ...

The Scoop The share of ads on New York City subways and buses from tech companies jumped 50% in the first quarter of 2026 from a year ago, as AI startups try to win over the world’s finance capital. AI has already upended the digital advertising sector. Now, more tech ...

Another week, another eye-watering valuation for an AI company. The economics are so unprecedented that Anthropic — which raised another $65 billion at a $965 valuation — seems to be teetering on the brink of either growing too fast, or too slowly. Iqonic Capital’s Matt Jacobson, who’s led multiple Anthropic ...

An AI startup is offering free home cleaning in New York City — as long as customers let the company record their dirty apartments to train its robots. Shift made a splashy launch Thursday, and has since gotten demand for “thousands and thousands of bookings,” US General Manager Harry Kilberg ...

With all the negative AI sentiment bubbling up among the consumer class, it’s worth taking a moment to note where it’s actually improving people’s lives. For more than a decade, California-based Aira has been connecting visually impaired people with trained assistants who, through the phone camera, help with daily tasks ...

Reed’s view Amazon’s decision to scrap its AI leaderboard after tokenmaxxing rapidly drove up costs is the most recent case of sticker shock hitting companies trying to implement AI. Those rising costs have led to a growing chorus of people hawking Chinese open-sourced models like DeepSeek. But in a recent ...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered his forces to expand their control of the Gaza Strip while the country’s military launched strikes on south Beirut. The twin offensives are targeting Hamas and Hezbollah respectively, though critics argue that the operations are motivated at least in part by domestic politics — ...

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum’s popularity plummeted to its lowest-ever level, as she struggled to contain the fallout from a US corruption indictment of a close ally. US prosecutors allege that Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha Moya, a member of Sheinbaum’s party, relied on the state’s eponymous cartel to help win an ...

Britain’s net migration has halved during Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s tenure, but Britons believe it is still rising. Immigration surged after the pandemic, peaking at almost 1.5 million a year in 2023. The subsequent collapse has not reached the public consciousness, perhaps because the numbers of asylum seekers on small ...

Britain’s universities are firing staff, cutting courses, and curtailing research over an intensifying financial shortfall. Prior changes to the country’s higher education system expanded access while reducing government support, increasing institutions’ reliance on fees — particularly from international students — to generate revenue. Successive governments have, however, sought to curb ...