Happy Tuesday! Here’s your Tuesday Tech Drop, my weekly list of the past week’s top stories from the intersection of politics and technology.
Vance pressures European nations at AI summit
Vice President JD Vance delivered a speech in Paris on Tuesday at an international summit on artificial intelligence. The crux of the speech was essentially that he believes the European Union — which has taken proactive measures to thwart the spread of disinformation and harmful content on social media platforms — should spend less time doing that regulatory work, become less risk-averse in their use of artificial intelligence and embrace a Big Tech mantra: Move fast and break things.
Vance’s speech could be seen as a major gift to Elon Musk, who has faced multiple probes by the E.U. His social media platform, X, is currently being investigated over claims that its algorithms have been manipulated to promote far-right posts. Nonprofit groups have urged European leaders not to buckle under the United States’ pressure to cease their regulatory efforts.
Read more at The New York Times.
Google gives its AI weapons pledge a second look
Google sent the interwebs astir last week when its parent company, Alphabet, dropped its 2018 pledge not to use AI to develop weapons, surveillance capabilities and technologies that “cause or are likely to cause overall harm.” Amid the concerns, Google directed The Washington Post to a new blog post written by top executives that said, in part: “We believe democracies should lead in AI development, guided by core values like freedom, equality, and respect for human rights. And we believe that companies, governments, and organizations sharing these values should work together to create AI that protects people, promotes global growth, and supports national security.”
Read more at The Washington Post.
Trump Media seeks to launch financial firm
Donald Trump’s self-enrichment as president is without precedent and knows no end. Salon has a report on a new financial services firm that Trump’s media company is preparing to launch, a move that would be likely to require approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission, which is led by one of his handpicked appointees.
Read more at Salon.
Musk-led group makes an offer for OpenAI
An investor group led by Musk is attempting to gain control of OpenAI, arguably Musk’s top competitor in the race to accumulate power in the artificial intelligence space. Thus far, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is rebuffing the offer.
no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74 billion if you want
— Sam Altman (@sama) February 10, 2025
Read more at The Hill.
Wikimedia prepping for MAGA-fueled attacks
The Wikimedia Foundation, the organization that hosts the Wikipedia website, is taking steps to protect its editors from being targeted by far-right conservatives, who have trained their ire on Wikipedia editors as of late.
Read more at 404 Media.
Social media marketing youth to young girls
Young girls on social media are being bombarded with ads about anti-aging products, and their use of the products is altering girls’ self-esteem while also causing some disturbing physical side effects.
Read more at The Associated Press.
Musk rehires a racist troll
Musk has hired a bunch of inexperienced teens and twentysomethings to work for his pseudo “department” purportedly designed to root out government waste, and he has seemingly provided them with unfettered access to Americans’ private data. One of those hirees — 25-year-old Marko Elez — resigned last week after X posts of his reportedly were unearthed in which he identified himself as a “racist” and wrote things like “Normalize Indian hate.” But Musk has rehired the self-identified racist after the vice president suggested he deserved to keep working.
Here’s my view:
— JD Vance (@JDVance) February 7, 2025
I obviously disagree with some of Elez’s posts, but I don’t think stupid social media activity should ruin a kid’s life.
We shouldn’t reward journalists who try to destroy people. Ever.
So I say bring him back.
If he’s a bad dude or a terrible member of… https://t.co/OgG6Z3hKPE
Read more at NBC News.
More Musk minions unmasked
Speaking of Musk’s hirees, Business Insider got its hands on a list of some of the people Musk has tapped for his Department of Government Efficiency (which, to be clear, is not an official government department). The list reportedly includes a former clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, software developers and corporate financiers.
Read more at Business Insider.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.