Worldcrunch
Silicon Valley’s self-anointed philosophers promise digital immortality and Kantian rigor, yet their transhumanist ambitions reveal a darker inheritance: an evolutionary game of invisible rivalry. True transcendence won’t come from tweaking biology, but from dismantling the self-interest that entrenches inequality.
From cloud dependence to AI policy retreat, the European continent faces a stark choice: play by America’s rules or build a radically different model of technological sovereignty. How it plays out is likely to shape how the digital economy and society looks for the whole world.
AI is here whether we like it or not. But who owns it, and who gets to use it, are questions that are far from being settled.
As Brazil’s Supreme Court prepares to rule on whether Jair Bolsonaro led a coup attempt, the battle is playing out on the internet, flooded with a counter-narrative of political persecution. It’s all very similar to what happened in the United States after the Capitol attack.
Trump’s media company Truth Social and the far-right video platform Rumble have joined forces in a U.S. lawsuit against a Brazilian judge. The case, packed with conspiracy theories and legal acrobatics, is less about law and more about politics, turning the American courts into a stage for Bolsonaro’s allies and Trump’s broader war on institutions.
With a pro-crypto agenda and substantial backing from industry investors, Donald Trump’s presidency is poised to reshape the landscape of digital currencies, promising a future where Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies thrive under favorable regulations and government support.
Tech’s biggest fortunes are funding a project to build a new city of 400,000 people just an hour outside of San Francisco. But the residents of the region’s most rural county are resisting.
The effects of the fall of Silicon Valley Bank show the limits of the tech world, but also the current fragility of the international financial system a generation after the 2008 global financial crisis that was sparked by U.S. bank failures.
The revelations of a clandestine digital operation that provides services to destabilize nations and manipulate opinion are a wake-up call for democratic states to take urgent action, including the need to hold Big Tech accountable.
As an Italian bestseller explores why people are fleeing the Golden State, the international press also takes stock of unprecedented Silicon Valley layoffs. It may be a warning for the rest of the world.
Theodore Kury, Director of Energy Studies at the University of Florida, sees value in thinking of social media as the pipeline that carries a new kind of utility: information. He makes the case for regulating companies like Twitter accordingly.
Tech billionaires such as Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg have lost far more money this year than ever before. Eccentric behavior and questionable decisions have both played a role. But there are examples in U.S. business history that have other clues.