Tracy Mumford
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
And yesterday, Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, faced one of its first major losses in court.
A jury in New Mexico found the company misled people about the safety of its platforms and enabled the sexual exploitation of young users.
To build their case, state investigators posed as kids online to show how vulnerable they were to predators.
They said they found Instagram in particular was a, quote, breeding ground for exploitation.
The jury said Meta must pay $375 million in damages, and there could still be more fallout.
In another upcoming trial, the state's attorney general plans to ask the court to order Meta to make changes to its apps to make them safer for young users.
The fight in New Mexico is being closely watched by parents, policymakers, and the tech industry.
There's been a push to also force changes at TikTok, Snap, and YouTube.
In a statement, a Meta spokesman said that Meta will appeal the New Mexico decision and that the company is, quote, And finally...
Just this fall, OpenAI was pushing its Sora app in a big way.
The promise was huge.
Sora could generate realistic videos super fast.
People used it to churn out whatever they could think of.
Two of my colleagues covering tech at the Times made a video of themselves skydiving with a giant pizza as a parachute.
It looked good.
Disney even signed a deal so people could use Sora to generate videos with copyrighted characters like Mickey Mouse or Yoda.
Some people predicted this was the big one, a first step in killing Hollywood and replacing actors and creators with AI.
But now OpenAI just announced it's pulling the plug and shutting Sora down.
It didn't give a reason.
The decision appears to be part of the company's efforts to focus and streamline its operations.