Author: IQ TIMES MEDIA

Nearly five years ago, Mark Zuckerberg told us the future was the metaverse — an idea that seemed to involve all of us strapping on virtual reality goggles and interacting with digital versions of ourselves. Loading audio narration… Now, reports say Zuckerberg’s Meta is bailing on the metaverse after losing more than $80 billion on the project.This is a fun story for people who like stories about Big Tech tripping on itself.But it’s not really true.Start with the $80 billion that publications like The New York Times and others say Zuckerberg has lost chasing the metaverse. Meta has indeed generated…

Plenty of companies are still debating whether costly AI subscriptions are worth it. Miro has gone the other way. Loading audio narration… Andrey Khusid, cofounder of Miro, the maker of a popular online whiteboard platform, says the company gives employees essentially unlimited access to the latest AI tools as a way to speed up how quickly they learn and work.That approach is possible, he said, because Miro has been profitable since 2016. The company has raised $476 million to date, and Khusid suggested it does not expect to need more capital.Khusid framed the spending as a core part of more…

During her first year of college, Elisabeth Bradley was inspired to try weightlifting after she followed a woman tracking her fitness transformation on social media, one barbell at a time.Then, Bradley found herself to be the only woman in the weight room at San Diego State University.“I felt like I stuck out a lot, and I just thought, ‘OK, I’m gonna look dumb,’” she says. Intimidated by a room full of grunting, muscular men, she moved over to the cardio area, mirroring countless women who, for various reasons, avoid the free weights and machines.But with research mounting on the benefits…

Anthropic submitted two sworn declarations to a California federal court late Friday afternoon, pushing back on the Pentagon’s assertion that the AI company poses an “unacceptable risk to national security” and arguing that the government’s case relies on technical misunderstandings and claims that were never actually raised during the months of negotiations that preceded the dispute. The declarations were filed alongside Anthropic’s reply brief in its lawsuit against the Department of Defense and come ahead of a hearing this coming Tuesday, March 24, before Judge Rita Lin in San Francisco. The dispute traces back to late February, when President Trump…

A jury on Friday found that Elon Musk’s complaints about bots on Twitter ahead of his purchase of the site were intentionally misleading to shareholders. Loading audio narration… The jury in Musk’s San Francisco securities fraud trial unanimously found him liable for making two misleading statements in the run-up to his 2022 acquisition of the social media site. They rejected two other fraud claims.The jury calculated how much Musk’s complaints about bots on Twitter affected the company’s share price before his acquisition, tracking five months of stock activity that showed a steep drop off after his comments. The jury found…

The White House said Friday it’s adding three drugs for diabetes and lung disease to the self-pay platform TrumpRx, as the administration works to expand the site as part of its push to lower drug prices.The drugs, from German drugmaker Boehringer Ingelheim, are Jentadueto and Jentadueto XR, for Type 2 diabetes, as well as the COPD drug Striverdi Respimat.According to the White House, the diabetes drugs list for about $525 but are priced on TrumpRx starting around $55, while the COPD drug is listed at about $35, down from roughly $276.One of the diabetes drugs, Jentadueto, has a generic version…

In 2021, Facebook renamed itself “Meta” because it was the first part of the word “metaverse.” This is fitting because “leg” is the first part of the word legacy, and the absence of legs will end up being the longest-lasting legacy of Meta’s failed metaverse experiment.Hear me out: This is a bad thing. We should all mourn that the metaverse didn’t work out as the future of the internet because the thing that ended up replacing it — the AI slopiverse — is far worse.To be fair, rumors of the metaverse’s death are somewhat exaggerated — Horizon Worlds, the main…

Nearly 90,000 bottles of children’s ibuprofen are being voluntarily recalled due to the potential presence of a foreign substance.According to a notice from the Food and Drug Administration, Taro Pharmaceuticals U.S.A., Inc. received complaints from customers who reported “a gel-like mass and black particles” in the drug products.NIH – PHOTO: Bottles of children’s ibuprofen, made for Taro Pharmaceuticals U.S.A., Inc., are being recalled due to the potential presence of a foreign substance.Four-ounce (120 ml) bottles of Children’s Ibuprofen Oral Suspension are impacted by the recall. The FDA said the children’s medications, intended for pain relief from the common cold, flu,…

Microsoft announced on Friday a series of changes focused on improving the quality of its Windows 11 operating system, which notably includes dialing back the number of entry points to its AI assistant, Copilot. The company said it will reduce Copilot AI integrations in some apps, starting with Photos, Widgets, Notepad, and its Snipping Tool. Under the heading of “integrating AI where it’s most meaningful,” Pavan Davuluri, EVP of Windows and Devices, wrote on the company’s blog that Microsoft is becoming more intentional about “how and where Copilot integrates across Windows.” Its goal, he explained, is to focus on AI…

CEO Jensen Huang took the stage at Nvidia’s GTC conference this week in his signature leather jacket to deliver a two-and-a-half-hour keynote, projecting $1 trillion in AI chip sales through 2027, declaring that every company needs an “OpenClaw strategy,” and closing with a rambling Olaf robot that had to get its mic cut. The message was hard to miss: Nvidia wants to be foundational to everything, from AI training to autonomous vehicles to Disney parks.  On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O’Kane break down what Nvidia’s growing web of AI infrastructure partnerships actually means for startups, and discuss more of the week’s headlines.  Listen to…