SoftBank said it will invest up to €75 billion to build data centers in France, with the goal of developing and operating up to 5 gigawatts of additional capacity. The Japanese conglomerate is betting on French infrastructure to support artificial-intelligence workloads as demand for computing power surges across Europe. Source
Microsoft's Github Copilot is moving to token-based billing, a shift that has prompted sharp criticism from developers. The move marks a departure from the service's earlier pricing model and signals the end of what some users have called the tool's golden age of affordability. Source
Two artificial-intelligence-aligned super PACs are spending millions to influence America's midterm elections. One super PAC is allied with Anthropic, an AI safety firm, while the other is tied to OpenAI, positioning the contest as a proxy battle between two of the industry's leading companies over policy and regulatory favour. Source
Artificial-intelligence-generated fake personas are being used on TikTok to sell merchandise from fast-fashion retailers like Shein through the platform's shopping features. The scheme involves creating convincing deepfake identities, sometimes portraying Black people, to drive engagement and sales in dropshipping schemes, blurring the line between AI abuse and commercial deception. Source
Google's Gemini Spark, a 24/7 AI assistant, automates everyday tasks including inbox summaries and local event planning, though reviewers have questioned why Google chose to make it a standalone product rather than integrating it into its main Gemini offering. Source