Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu. 07/24 – The US AI Action Plan

Starting point is 00:00:00 On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the Tech meme right home for Thursday, July 24th, 2025. I'm Brian McCullough today. The White House has rolled out its big AI action plan. Google reported earnings, but really wanted you to know about consumer adoption of its AI. A new Kindle ColorSoft T-Mobile Starlink service is available to anyone, and the Switch 2 is now the fastest selling console in history. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. The White House yesterday unveiled the AI action plan, seeking to have tech-dominant's, over China solidified, including proposals to revamp permitting for AI infrastructure projects. Quoting Bloomberg, from this day forward, it'll be a policy of the United States to do whatever it takes to lead the world in artificial intelligence.

Starting point is 00:01:24 President Trump said Wednesday at an AI event hosted by the All-In podcast and the Hill and Valley Forum, a consortium of tech leaders and lawmakers. The orders Trump signed include a measure addressing energy and permitting issues for AI infrastructure, a directive to promote AI exports and one that calls for large language models procured by the government to be neutral and unbiased. America is the country that started the AI race and as president of the United States, I'm here today to declare that America is going to win it, he added. The so-called AI action plan unveiled earlier Wednesday recommends revamping the permitting process and streamlining environmental standards to speed AI-related infrastructure projects while calling for withholding funds from states that place burdensome rules on the emerging

Starting point is 00:02:07 technology. The blueprint seeks to make American technology the foundation for AI worldwide, while enacting security measures to keep adversaries like China from gaining an edge. Winning this competition will be a test of our capacities, unlike anything seen since the dawn of the space age, Trump said. It will challenge us to marshal all of our strength and flex the muscles of American ingenuity and resolve like probably never before. Under the recommendations, the federal government would ask businesses and the public about existing regulations that hinder AI adoption with an toward rolling back those rules. The White House's Budget Office would also work with federal agencies that have overseen AI-related funding to consider putting limits on those awards, quote, if the state's

Starting point is 00:02:48 AI regulatory regimes may hinder the effectiveness of that funding. We also have to have a single federal standard, not 50 different states regulating this industry of the future. We need one common-sense federal standard that supersedes all states supersedes everybody, Trump said Wednesday. The White House signaling concern that AI could reshape the labor market, also asks the education and labor departments to prioritize skill development and training to assist U.S. workers. It also proposes prioritizing investment in theoretical, computational, and experimental research, a request that comes even as the administration has slashed grants to top-tier research universities. InVIDIA chief executive Jensen Huang was in Washington for the event. Huang has forged a closer relationship with Trump,

Starting point is 00:03:31 despite criticizing U.S. export control policies on advanced AI chips. The tech boss scored a diplomatic win last week when the administration signaled it would allow NVIDIA to resume shipments of an AI chip specifically designed for China's market. Trump on Wednesday echoed Wong's argument that U.S. AI chip export controls give a leg up to the likes of China's Huawei, saying that, quote, necessary protections would remain, but that, quote, the greatest threat of all is to forfeit the race and force our partners into rival technology." And quote. But back to the word that the Trump administration plans to vet AI models for ideological bias and limit government contracts to tech companies whose models offer objective truth,

Starting point is 00:04:10 quoting from the Financial Times. In an executive order signed on Wednesday, the president urged federal agencies not to procure services that, quote, sacrifice truthfulness and accuracy to ideological agendas, citing instances in which chatbots have allegedly distorted facts to satisfy diversity, equity, and inclusion policies. Two separate orders also signed on Wednesday mandated the acceleration of data center permitting and promoted the export of U.S. technology and a boost to American companies such as Nvidia and AMD. In a speech ahead of the signings, Trump vowed that the U.S. government would now, quote, deal only with AI that pursues truth, fairness, and strict impartiality. A senior administration official said that the General Service Administration,

Starting point is 00:04:49 which oversees government procurement, would draw up the rules to vet government contractors for instances of bias. Trump's political allies have long accused AI models such as OpenAI's chat GPT and Google's Gemini of promoting liberal ideology, end quote. And then on the copyright and IP issue side of things, President Trump said, forcing AI firms to pay for each copyrighted work is, quote, not doable and called for common sense AI and IP rules, quoting deadline. Trump said, you can't be expected to have a successful AI program when every single article booker whatever you've studied you're expected to pay for. We appreciate that, but you just can't do that because it's not doable. And if you're going to try to do that, you're not going to have a successful

Starting point is 00:05:33 program. When a person reads a book or an article, you've gained great knowledge. That does not mean you're violated copyright laws or have to make deals with every content provider, he said. You just can't do it. China's not doing it, end quote. Let's try to bang this one out real quick. Alphabet reported Q2 revenue up 14% year-on-year, net income up 19% and services revenue up 12%. YouTube's Q2 ad revenue rose 13% year-on-year to 9.8 billion, and Google's overall advertising revenue reached $71.3 billion up from $64.6 billion a year ago. Google Cloud Q2 revenue was up 32% year-on-year to $13.62 billion, and they raised their $2025 CAPEX forecast to $85 billion.

Starting point is 00:06:25 after in February projecting a mere $75 billion. And on the AI front, quoting TechCrunch, on the company's Q2-2020 call with investors, Sundar Pichai shared that AI overviews, a Google search feature offering an AI summary of search results available in 200 countries and territories, now has 2 billion monthly users up from 1.5 billion in May 2025. In addition, Google's Gemini app has grown to 450 million monthly active users.

Starting point is 00:06:53 We continue to see strong growth and engagement with daily requests growing over 50% from Q1, Pichai said of the app. Meanwhile, AI mode, a way to use Google search via an AI chat experience to get more in-depth answers, has over 100 million monthly active users, Pichai said. The service is available in the U.S. and more recently India, but is still rolling out. The CEO also said the experience will be upgraded in the near future with the addition of the advanced research tool, deep search, and more personalized responses. On the developer front, Google said more than 9 million people have built with Gemini. Over 70 million videos have been produced with the V-O-3 AI model since May. Google Vids, a VEO-powered feature for

Starting point is 00:07:34 text-to-video AI generation in Google Workspace, now has nearly 1 million monthly active users in Google Meet. Over 50 million people used AI-powered meeting notes in Google Meet. The company also said the stats are meant to illustrate consumer demand for AI features. For instance, Google shared that AI Overviews were driving over 10% more Google search queries for the types of searches that show them. However, it's arguably difficult to determine how many people have truly and willingly turned to AI in search when the features have been thrust upon them as aggressively as they have been. Across Google's platform and products, Google quantified its growth by monthly tokens accessed, saying that it had announced at its developer conference in May that it had processed 480 trillion monthly tokens, and that figure has now doubled to 9, 180 trillion monthly tokens. We are seeing significant demand for our comprehensive AI product portfolio, Pichai told investors,

Starting point is 00:08:27 of course, this is all possible because of the long-term investments we have made in our differentiated full-stack approach to AI, end quote. One more Google thing, if you'll allow it, and I have a reason for bringing this up now, Google has added new features to Google Photos, including a VO2-powered photo-to-video tool and a remix tool that applies styles like anime and sketches to photos. photos. Quoting 9 to 5 Google. Photo to video lets you take an existing still image in your library and transform it into a dynamic six-second clip. Imagine that perfect selfie with friends from a few years ago suddenly coming to life with subtle movements or a cherished photo of your parent

Starting point is 00:09:12 as a child smiling back at you. After selecting a picture, you can choose one of two prompts, subtle movements or I'm feeling lucky. The process may take up to one minute. You can regenerate as needed before saving to your library or sharing. This is powerful. powered by V-O-2 instead of V-O-3, which makes possible sound with Google Photos imposing video generation limits. In the Gemini app, generating video of any sort requires a paid subscription. Photo-to-video in Google Photos is free with the rollout starting today in the U.S. on Android and iOS. Finally, Google Photos is adding a new Create tab to the bottom bar, joining Photos, Collections, and Ask slash Search. The idea is to have a unified place to access photo-to-video remix, collages,

Starting point is 00:09:55 highlight videos, and more. This will begin rolling out in the U.S. and August with Google adding new tools and continuing to refine existing ones over time. On the safety front, everything generated in Google Photos features an invisible synth ID digital watermark and a visible one in the corner for videos just like Gemini. You will be able to leave feedback on generated media with a thumbs up or thumbs down, end quote. Now, I'm squeezing this in here because when we talk about Apple being behind in AI, this is what we're talking about. This is the sort of thing that people pay the likes of Mid Journey $20 a month for, turning photos into videos. I mean, someday soon, that picture of me in front of a lake now make me jump into the lake, and you can do it right there on your phone. Apple will let you do this on your iPhone when?

Starting point is 00:10:42 Like how many years from now? They are so, so behind. Amazon has updated its color screen Kindle ColorSoft with a cheaper 16-gigabyte mic, model for $250 and a new kid-focused bundle. Quoting the Verge. Our customers have loved reading Kindle in color. On average, they spend more time on Kindle ColorSoft and read hundreds more pages than on our other Kindle devices, the company says in a blog post.

Starting point is 00:11:15 That's why we're excited to introduce two new additions to the Kindle ColorSoft family. The cheaper ColorSoft costs $30 less than the signature edition, but the more costly model has a few extra perks, including 32 gigabytes of storage, and auto-adjusting frontlight and wireless charging. The Kids Focus bundle, which Amazon is calling Kindle ColorSoft Kids, comes with a Color Soft, the 16-gibabyte model, according to spokesperson Connor Rice, a special cover. You can pick one of two options, and one year of its Amazon Kids Plus subscription. Shortly after its release, Amazon briefly paused shipments of the Signature Edition following customer complaints about a yellow bar on the screen. Amazon now has a message on the Signature Edition's store listing,

Starting point is 00:11:56 acknowledging that a small number of customers have reported a yellow band and an Amazon Amazon spokesperson told the Verge that the company made a combination of software and display adjustments to address the issue, end quote. T-Mobile's Starlink-powered satellite service called T-Satellite is now generally available as a standalone subscription for U.S. users, not just T-Mobile customers. Quoting the Verge. The new satellite coverage option is called T-Satellite, and it's currently available as a standalone subscription. It's being offered at $10 per month for a limited time before increasing to $15. per month. It also comes included for customers on the carrier's $100 per month experience beyond or older Go5G plans. Your device will automatically connect to T-Satellite if you're in an area with no cellular coverage.

Starting point is 00:12:50 As long as there isn't a heavy amount of cloud coverage or trees blocking your view of the sky, you should be able to send and receive text messages including to 911, as well as share a link that temporarily tracks your location. T-Mobile's support page says the ability to send pictures is available on most Android phones and the company plans. on adding support for more devices soon. T-Mobile is also aiming to enable voice messages and will eventually allow devices to connect to satellite-optimized apps, which it previously said could include all trails, Ackyweather, and WhatsApp. The more than 650 Starlink satellites used by T-Mobile cover the continental U.S., Hawaii, parts of southern Alaska, and Puerto Rico. The carrier says it's working on offering satellite connectivity while abroad and in international

Starting point is 00:13:32 waters as well. Apple currently offers the ability to send text and emergency messages from the iPhone 14 and later for free, but it plans to eventually charge for it. There still aren't any details on price. Google also added a satellite SOS feature to the Pixel 9 that's free to use for two years after activation. While signing up for satellite service through T-Mobile may seem redundant, the carrier offers support for more phones and also plans on adding new capabilities like picture and voice messaging. In order to use T-Satellite, you'll need to have an unlocked device with support for e-sims and satellite connectivity. Right now, more than 60 different phones, use T-satellite, including the iPhone 13 and up, Google Pixel 9, and the Samsung Galaxy 21,

Starting point is 00:14:12 and newer. You can view the full list of eligible devices on T-Mobile's website, end quote. Finally today, according to CERCANA, the Nintendo Switch 2 is the fastest selling video game device in U.S. history with 1.6 million units sold in June, topping the PS4's 1.1 million units sold in November 2013, quoting IGN. Spending on hardware was up a whopping 200,000, 49% year over year, thanks to the console's debut, reaching $978 million and greatly surpassing the previous monthly record from June 2008 of $608 million. In total, the Switch 2 sold 1.6 million units in the U.S. during its launch month, beating the PS4's previous sales record of 1.1 million units in November 2013. Unshockingly, it was the best-selling console of the month, both in terms

Starting point is 00:15:07 of units and dollar sales. Across both Nintendo Switch platform, Switch-2 exclusive Mario Kart World was the best-selling game of the month, followed by Cyberpunk 2077, and Rune Factory Guardians of Azuma, both of which launched alongside the new console. In fourth and fifth place, respectively, were Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild, followed by Street Fighter 6, Mario Kart 8, Hogwarts, Legacy, Bravely Defaults, Remaster, and Minecraft. Because Nintendo doesn't share digital sales numbers with Circana, this chart may be missing some big sellers. For instance, we learned today that Delta Rune topped Switch 2 charts in digital sales in June, but with no physical edition and the game only costing $25, it's missing from the dollar sales ranking entirely.

Starting point is 00:15:47 So does all this Nintendo Switch 2 success mean it's on track to outsell the Nintendo Switch 1? I asked Sircana analyst Matt Piscatella, and this is what he told me. What the launch sales of Switch 2 primarily tell us is that they made a lot of Switch 2 to sell at launch. Lifetime sales and launch sales of a console do not correlate, meaning that some consoles with small launches end up doing incredibly well lifetime, PS2 only sold 400,000 in its launch month, while others with big launches ended up doing not so well lifetime. Since launch month's demand is rarely satiated by available supply, and it

Starting point is 00:16:22 is certainly not a great sign when it is, historically, all we can really get a read-on at launch is the confidence of the manufacturer to make so many units available and the ability of the supply chain to get those units to the market. But having the biggest launch month sales for any new video game hardware platform is a hell of a good start, end quote. The last of my college buddies finally got his hands on a switch to this morning. So the Mario Kart World Tournaments begin this afternoon. Talk to you tomorrow.

Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu. 07/24 – The US AI Action Plan

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