Big tech companies tend to make a lot of enemies — but there are none more powerful than the US government. Apple, Google, Amazon, and Meta are regularly called in front of Congress to fend off monopoly accusations — and lawmakers bring up bills to rein in the companies just as often. The Federal Trade Commission has taken a particularly central role, leading a lawsuit to sever Facebook and Instagram while blocking new acquisitions for Oculus and the company’s virtual reality wing. Like it or not, these regulatory fights will play a huge role in deciding the future of tech — and neither side is playing nice.
In what appears to be preparations to fully blacklist Anthropic for not budging on their acceptable use policies, the Defense Department has begun reaching out to contractors to assess their exposure to the AI company’s products. Boeing and Lockheed Martin, two of the biggest companies in the defense space, have reportedly been contacted.
The president shouted out the work of his “movie star” wife Melania, whose support of the Take It Down Act last year — a bill requiring social platforms to remove content reported as nonconsensual intimate imagery (including AI deepfakes) — helped usher it into law.
The president applauded Michael and Susan Dell for their $6.25 billion contribution that the White House says will help fund tax-advantaged savings accounts for children. The contribution is set to fund an extra $250 in the first 25 million accounts for children in ZIP codes with median incomes under $150,000.
The South Carolina Republican said he’s bringing along Ellison, son of Trump ally and billionaire Larry Ellison, as his guest to the address. Paramount is in the midst of its persistent attempt to buy Warner Bros. Discovery over Netflix — a deal Trump said he’d be involved in before backtracking.
[X (formerly Twitter)]
The UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office dished out a £14.47 million (about $19.5 million) penalty for Reddit’s previous lack of robust age verification and failure to assess risks to children before January 2025. That’s just a smidge higher than the £247,590 (about $335,000) fine Imgur was hit with for similar reasons earlier this month.
It’s more than just a $200 million military contract at stake.
They’ve been applied using powers under the Trade Act of 1974, circumventing both Congress and the recent Supreme Court ruling that Trump’s previous tariffs were illegal. The president had threatened a higher 15 percent rate, but so far Customs and Border Protection has only announced 10 percent tariffs, which will last 150 days.
[the Guardian]
Thought RAMageddon was bad? Wait until Silicon Valley loses access to 90 percent of the world’s chip supply. The New York Times reminds us that’s a possibility, with production concentrated in Taiwan, ever at risk of a Chinese blockade. The industry is now investing in US production, but has been putting this off for years.
[The New York Times]
The Netflix boss is apparently not too worried about Trump’s meddling in his company’s attempt to purchase Warner Bros. He told BBC Today that Netflix’s offer left Hollywood with five major studios instead of four, and Trump, “likes to do a lot of things on social media.”
However, on Monday afternoon, Bloomberg reported Paramount Skydance has submitted another competing offer, improving on its previous $30 per share bid.
Bloomberg and Deadline are both reporting that the DOJ has officially begun looking into whether the combination of Netflix and Warner would create a monopoly and hurt competition. Netflix, Warner Bros., and the DOJ have not publicly confirmed the investigation, but Deadline obtained a copy of the Civil Investigative Demand, which reads:
“This civil investigative demand is issued pursuant to the Antitrust Civil Process Act …in the course of an antitrust investigation to determine whether there is, has been, or may be a violation of the antitrust laws by conduct, activities, or proposed action of the following nature: the proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. by Netflix Inc, that may substantially lessen competition, or tend to create a monopoly in violation of Section 7 of the Clayton Act, or Section 2 of the Sherman Act.”
Invasive government and corporate surveillance isn’t inevitable — but Congress needs to act.
After being handed a rare defeat by the Supreme Court, President Trump announced that he would replace his tariffs and trade deals with a global 10 percent tariff on imports. Less than 24 hours later, he’s already raising that to 15 percent. As we said, the fight is far from over.
Regulators noticed Polymarket and Kalshi rake in cash on sports bets. So now prediction markets are cosplaying as the future of news.
On Friday morning, the court ruled against the Trump administration (pdf) in the case of Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, about whether the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) gave the president the power to impose sweeping tariffs on imports from more than 100 countries.
The immediate impact of the ruling is not clear, as the president may try to use other justifications for the tariffs and everything that has followed. The NYT, WSJ, and CNBC have more coverage.
Prediction: This is going to be a mess for the Trump right.
The FCC has an “enforcement action underway,” Carr said, according to Deadline. This week, Stephen Colbert said CBS banned him from airing his own interview with Talarico, a Democratic state representative from Texas who is running for the US Senate.
The US has been working on an online portal at “freedom.gov” that would let Europeans see content their governments have banned, Reuters reports. A planned launch last week was apparently delayed, and State Department officials have expressed concerns about the project.
Freedom.gov currently links to a Cloudflare Access page with the National Design Studio logo.
California regulators killed a proposal that would have imposed fees on gas-burning furnaces and water heaters that release smog-forming pollutants. More than 20,000 comments they received opposing the proposal were generated by a single AI platform, some addressed from people with no idea their names had been used.
A coalition including the American Public Health Association, American Lung Association, and Sierra Club have filed suit against the Trump administration for repealing the landmark ‘endangerment finding.’ The repeal — if successful — could strip away the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to to regulate planet-heating pollution.
