Tootfinder

An Indonesian court sentences Gojek co-founder and ex-education minister Nadiem Makarim to 10 years in prison for power abuses over a Chromebook contract (New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/30/business/indonesia-trial-nadiem-makarim.html

Prominent Tech Founder in Indonesia Is Found Guilty in Corruption Case
The case against Nadiem Makarim, a co-founder of Gojek, has fueled concerns about judicial fairness in a nation where foreign investors were already growing wary.

How Schneider Electric is using AI in call centers and manufacturing to complement employees' work and boost productivity, rather than to replace them (Patricia Cohen/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/29/busines

A.I. Doesn’t Have to Mean Layoffs
A French multinational, Schneider Electric, decided to use artificial intelligence in manufacturing to make workers more productive, rather than to replace them. Here’s how that’s going.

The persistent notion that AI disruption could create a permanent underclass signals how much collateral damage AI companies might tolerate in pursuit of AGI (Jasmine Sun/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/30/opinion

Opinion | Silicon Valley Is Bracing for a Permanent Underclass
The people building A.I. fear that we have only a short time before advanced A.I. disrupts the labor force.

A look at the nasty fight between Anthropic-backed super PAC Public First and OpenAI-backed Leading the Future to sway midterms, especially Democratic primaries (Theodore Schleifer/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.…

Powerful A.I. Super PACs Duel Over the Midterms: ‘This Is a War’
One is allied with Anthropic. The other is tied to OpenAI. They’re both spending millions to influence the midterms, and they’re leaving a trail of fearful candidates and canceled ads in their wake.

How a Polymarket dispute over a single syllable ignited a bitter debate; Polymarket uses Risk Labs' Optimistic Oracle to decide ~200K tough call bets per month (David Segal/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/0…

How Polymarket Traders Revolted Over One Silly Syllable
How one silly syllable ignited a bitter dispute over the nature of reality on Polymarket.

As OpenAI and Anthropic prepare to go public, San Francisco tech workers making six figures say they cannot compete with the new AI elite and may have to leave (Emmy Martin/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/0…

In San Francisco’s A.I. Era, Even $180,000 Tech Salaries Are No Longer Enough
As OpenAI and Anthropic prepare to go public, tech workers making six figures are grousing that they cannot compete with the new A.I. elite. Some doubt they can afford to stay.

Simile, which offers "agentic twins" of real people to assess companies' products, brands, and services, raised $200M led by Greenoaks at a $2B valuation (Sri Muppidi/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/30/business/dealbook/simile-…

To Know What Your Customers Think, Just Ask Their A.I. Twins
Simile, a fast-growing start-up, says it can provide companies with accurate insights by surveying millions of A.I.-generated consumers.

Political campaign managers and consultants are using AI to analyze voter data, create campaign materials, and more; survey: 87% of campaigners use AI daily (Stuart A. Thompson/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/29…

How A.I. Is Changing the Way Politicians Run for Office
A.I.-generated images are the public face of this election overhaul. Behind the scenes, campaigns are using the technology to analyze voter data, craft campaign materials and write custom messages.

Antenna: bundles make up 33% of new major streaming service subscriptions in the US, and 28% of all subscriptions, up from just 10% of new subscriptions in 2024 (John Koblin/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/…

Streaming TV Bundles Grow in Popularity
Companies and their customers are embracing bundled streaming packages — but for different reasons.

Q&A with Grindr CEO George Arison on turning Grindr into an "AI-native company", "impos[ing]" AI on staff, facing "opposition", using AI as a CEO, and more (Jordyn Holman/New York Times)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/30/busines…

How Grindr’s C.E.O. Adopted A.I.: ‘I Just Imposed It’
George Arison, the gay dating app’s chief executive, is aiming for all code to be eventually written by artificial intelligence, making the company “leaner.”