Saturday, June 14, 2025

Salt Lake City, which faces a staffing shortfall, plans to implement AI-assisted 911 call triaging to handle ~30% of about 450K non-emergency calls per year (Salt Lake Tribune)

Salt Lake Tribune:
Salt Lake City, which faces a staffing shortfall, plans to implement AI-assisted 911 call triaging to handle ~30% of about 450K non-emergency calls per year  —  Move to artificial intelligence for some nonemergency calls is expected to help human responders focus on the urgent ones.



A profile of Chess.com, which has popularized online chess among pro athletes, as CEO Erik Allebest says the site has over $100M in annual revenue and 35M MAUs (Ira Boudway/Bloomberg)

Ira Boudway / Bloomberg:
A profile of Chess.com, which has popularized online chess among pro athletes, as CEO Erik Allebest says the site has over $100M in annual revenue and 35M MAUs  —  Social media is a minefield for pro sports players.  But online chess offers rankings, instant analysis, wholesome interactions and few trolls.



How Chinese AI companies bypass US chip restrictions by transporting hard drives with AI training data to Malaysian data centers housing advanced Nvidia chips (Wall Street Journal)

Wall Street Journal:
How Chinese AI companies bypass US chip restrictions by transporting hard drives with AI training data to Malaysian data centers housing advanced Nvidia chips  —  Engineers carry data to countries where Nvidia chips are available, frustrating Washington's aims



Friday, June 13, 2025

The Army Reserve launches Detachment 201, an innovation corps with Palantir CTO, Meta CTO, and other tech execs advising on AI and tech as lieutenant colonels (Heather Somerville/Wall Street Journal)

Heather Somerville / Wall Street Journal:
The Army Reserve launches Detachment 201, an innovation corps with Palantir CTO, Meta CTO, and other tech execs advising on AI and tech as lieutenant colonels  —  Silicon Valley executives are joining a new innovation corps in Army Reserve  —  The nerd brigade is reporting for duty.



Google plans to shut down Android's Instant Apps, which let users launch apps without installing them, later this year citing low usage and engagement (Dominic Preston/The Verge)

Dominic Preston / The Verge:
Google plans to shut down Android's Instant Apps, which let users launch apps without installing them, later this year citing low usage and engagement  —  The installation-free apps will join the Google graveyard in December. … Google has confirmed that it plans to shut …



Sources: Tencent is in early talks to acquire Nexon, the South Korean gaming giant behind Dungeon & Fighter Mobile; Tencent pursued a Nexon acquisition in 2019 (Dong Cao/Bloomberg)

Dong Cao / Bloomberg:
Sources: Tencent is in early talks to acquire Nexon, the South Korean gaming giant behind Dungeon & Fighter Mobile; Tencent pursued a Nexon acquisition in 2019  —  Shenzhen-based Tencent has reached out to the family of Nexon's late founder Kim Jung-ju to discuss the possibility of an acquisition …



Sources: the US State Department ordered embassies to push back against foreign influence campaigns, as officials worry anti-US views are taking root worldwide (New York Times)

New York Times : Sources: the US State Department ordered embassies to push back against foreign influence campaigns, as officials worry ...