Technology

Disney hits Google with cease and desist claim for ‘massive’ copyright infringement

Disney hits Google with cease and desist claim for ‘massive’ copyright infringement

✨ Discover this awesome post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: AI,Media & Entertainment,Disney,Google ✅ Here’s what you’ll learn: Disney sent a cease and desist letter to Google on Wednesday, alleging that the tech giant had violated its copyright, Variety reports. Disney is accusing the tech giant of copyright infringement on a “massive scale,” alleging that it used artificial intelligence models and services to commercially distribute unauthorized images and videos, according to the letter seen by Variety. “Google acts as a virtual vending machine, capable of reproducing, displaying, and distributing copies of Disney’s valuable library of copyrighted characters and other works…
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Google’s AI clothing try-on feature now only works with a selfie

Google’s AI clothing try-on feature now only works with a selfie

🚀 Explore this awesome post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: AI,Apps,Google 💡 Here’s what you’ll learn: Google on Thursday announced an update to its AI try-on feature to let you try on clothes virtually using just a selfie. In the past, users had to upload a full-body photo of themselves to try on a piece of clothing virtually. Now, they can use a selfie and Nano Banana, Google's Gemini 2.5 Flash Image model, to create a full-body digital version of themselves for virtual tryouts. Users can select their usual clothing size, and the feature will then create multiple images. From…
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Rivian is making big progress on autonomy, with custom silicon, lidar technology, and a hint of robotaxis

Rivian is making big progress on autonomy, with custom silicon, lidar technology, and a hint of robotaxis

🔥 Check out this must-read post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: Transportation,electric vehicles,EVs,AI,autonomous vehicles,Rivian ✅ Key idea: Rivian on Thursday explained how it plans to make its electric vehicles increasingly autonomous — an ambitious effort that includes new hardware, including lidar and custom silicon, and, eventually, a potential entry into the self-driving ride-hailing market, according to CEO RJ Scaringe. The announcements at the company's first "Autonomy and AI Day" event in Palo Alto, California, shed new light on Rivian's technological development, much of which has been kept secret as it seeks to begin production of its affordable R2 SUV in…
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Ford and SK On are ending their joint battery venture in the US

Ford and SK On are ending their joint battery venture in the US

🔥 Discover this trending post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: TC,Transportation ✅ Main takeaway: Four years ago, Ford and South Korean battery maker SK On struck a deal to form a joint venture and spend $11.4 billion to build factories in Tennessee and Kentucky to produce batteries for the next generation of F-Series electric trucks. Factories live. The joint venture will not. SK On, a subsidiary of SK Innovation, said Thursday it had reached an agreement with Ford to end the joint venture. The two companies will split the assets: Ford will own and operate the twin battery plants in…
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Disney is contracting with OpenAI to let Sora create AI videos featuring her characters

Disney is contracting with OpenAI to let Sora create AI videos featuring her characters

💥 Explore this insightful post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: AI,Apps,Media & Entertainment,Disney,OpenAI,sora 📌 Main takeaway: The Walt Disney Company announced Thursday that it has signed a three-year partnership with OpenAI that will bring its iconic characters to the company's Sora AI video generator. Disney is also investing $1 billion in OpenAI stock. Launched in September, Sora lets users create short videos using simple prompts. Through this new agreement, users will be able to draw on more than 200 animated, masked characters and creatures from Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars, including costumes, props, vehicles and more. These characters include…
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Opera wants you to pay $20 per month to use its AI-powered Neon browser

Opera wants you to pay $20 per month to use its AI-powered Neon browser

✨ Read this trending post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: AI,Apps,Opera,Opera Neon,AI agents,AI browsers 📌 Main takeaway: After a few months of testing, Norway-based browser company Opera has finally made its AI-powered browser, Neon, available to the public — although you'll have to pay $19.90 a month to use it. Opera first unveiled Neon earlier this year in May and launched it in early access for select users in October. Similar to other AI-first browsers like Perplexity's Comet, OpenAI's Atlas, and The Browser's Dia, Neon inserts an AI-powered chatbot into its interface, letting you ask it answers about pages, use…
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Security flaws in the Freedom Chat app exposed users’ phone numbers and PINs

Security flaws in the Freedom Chat app exposed users’ phone numbers and PINs

💥 Explore this insightful post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: Security,TC,cybersecurity,encryption,Exclusive,messaging ✅ Here’s what you’ll learn: Messaging app Freedom Chat has fixed a pair of security flaws: one that allowed a security researcher to guess registered users' phone numbers, and another that exposed user-assigned PINs to others on the app. Freedom Chat, which was released in June, presents itself as a secure messaging app, and claims on its website that users' phone numbers remain private. But security researcher Eric Daigle told TechCrunch that users' phone numbers and PIN codes used to lock the app could easily be obtained by exploiting…
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Port raises $100 million at $800 million valuation to rival Spotify’s Backstage

Port raises $100 million at $800 million valuation to rival Spotify’s Backstage

🔥 Read this awesome post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: Startups,AI,developer tools,Spotiify,ai agent 💡 Key idea: Spotify may be synonymous with music streaming, but it also has a very popular side tool for developers called “Backstage.” Backstage is an open source project that helps companies build their own internal developer portals: a catalog of their developer tools along with quick visualizations of the work the tools have done, and other metrics. But like many open source projects, Backstage is an option that you can build yourself. Israeli startup Port has gained big-name clients like GitHub, British Telecom, and LG with…
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Runware raises $50M Series A to help make photo and video creation easier for developers

Runware raises $50M Series A to help make photo and video creation easier for developers

🚀 Explore this trending post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: Startups,Venture,UK,venture,Fundraise 📌 Here’s what you’ll learn: Flaviu Radulesc started Runware in 2023 when he was testing a text-to-image company and realized that while genAI's technology was powerful, it was slow at creating images. So Radulesc teamed up with Ioana Hreninciuc and launched Runware as a platform for development tools specializing in creating real-time images, videos and audio. The company has seen significant growth since its first launch. The company told TechCrunch that it has powered more than 5 billion creations for more than 100,000 developers. The product allows developers to…
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Harness reaches $5.5B valuation with $240M raise to automate AI ‘post-code’ gap

Harness reaches $5.5B valuation with $240M raise to automate AI ‘post-code’ gap

🔥 Explore this trending post from TechCrunch 📖 📂 Category: Enterprise,Startups,AI,Goldman Sachs,menlo ventures,IVP,jyoti bansal,Harness 📌 Main takeaway: AI DevOps tool Harness, founded by serial entrepreneur Jyoti Bansal in 2017, is on track to exceed $250 million in annual recurring revenue in 2025, Bansal tells TechCrunch. The startup just raised new Series E funding of $240 million, valuing the company at $5.5 billion after the money. The round includes a $200 million seed investment led by Goldman Sachs and a planned $40 million tender offering with participation from IVP, Menlo Ventures and Unusual Ventures. Bansal said the tender offer is aimed…
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