Is AI 'Alive'? Culture Reaction

We've been covering what's happening in Minnesota, and the killing of Alex Pretti, all week on The Verge. To begin this episode, Nilay explains why — and why so many others seem to feel the same way right now. After that, the hosts talk about the CEO-studded screening of Melania Trump's documentary last weekend, the disastrous public appearance from Tim Cook, and whether Cook and other CEOs have any other option but to capitulate to the Trump administration. Then it's time for some gadgets: we talk about the super-foldy, super-expensive Samsung Galaxy  Z Trifold, the Clawdbot / Moltbot phenomenon, and whether Google can finally put Chrome OS and Android together the right way. Finally, in the lightning round, it's time for Brendan Carr is a dummy, Tesla's anti-car pivot, Apple's design hires, and more.

Further reading:

• On the ground in Minneapolis after the killing of Alex Pretti 

• I grew up with Alex Pretti 

• Creators and communities everywhere take a stand against ICE 

• It doesn’t matter if Alex Pretti had a gun 

• Why won’t anyone stop ICE from masking? 

• Tim Cook, Andy Jassy, and AMD CEO Lisa Su are at the White House for a VIP screening of the Melania doc.

• Tim Cook had ‘a good conversation’ with Trump about deescalation 

• Cook in 2020: Speaking up on racism

• From The New York Times: Amazon’s $35 Million ‘Melania’ Promotion Has Critics Questioning Its Motives

• From The Hollywood Reporter: ‘Melania’ Set for a $3 Million Opening Despite Amazon’s $35 Million Marketing Push

• Here’s Tim Cook hanging out with accused rapist Brett Ratner at the Melania screening

• What TikTok’s new owners mean for your feed 

• TikTok USA is broken 

• TikTok is still down, here are all the latest updates 

• TikTok is still struggling in the US due to a “cascading systems failure.” 

• TikTok US is mostly back up and running 

• TikTok blames its US problems on a power outage 

• Oracle admits it broke TikTok.

• Congress doesn’t seem to know if the TikTok deal complies with its law 

• Is New TikTok banning the word “Epstein” in DMs? Not really. 

• TikTokers are heading to UpScrolled following US takeover 

• Mark Zuckerberg is all in on AI as the new social media 

• Meta is stopping teens from chatting with its AI characters 

• Bluesky is testing ‘live’ features to take on X 

• Best gas masks

• The Samsung Trifold will cost nearly three grand 

• Google just leaked a first look at Android for PC in action 

• Chromebooks train schoolkids to be loyal customers, internal Google document suggests 

• Moltbot, the AI agent that ‘actually does things,’ is tech’s new obsession

• Clawdbot’s bad day 

• I used Claude to vibe-code my wildly overcomplicated smart home

• The FCC’s Late Night Comedy Show

• Tesla discontinuing Model S and Model X to make room for robots 

• Tesla says production-ready Optimus robot is coming soon 

• Tesla hits a grim milestone: its second straight year of decline

• Elon Musk invests $2 billion in Elon Musk

• Hang on, there’s a Trump Phone Ultra coming too? 

• Halide co-founder Sebastiaan de With is joining Apple’s design team 

• The Stream Deck-packed gaming keyboard is a monster of good ideas

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