OpenAI's CFO floated a federal backstop for AI infrastructure, then reversed within hours after White House rejection. The whiplash exposed the core problem: OpenAI needs $1.4 trillion while generating $20 billion. The math doesn't work.
Microsoft declares it's building "humanist superintelligence" to keep AI safe. Reality check: They're 2 years behind OpenAI, whose models they'll use until 2032. The safety pitch? Product differentiation for enterprise clients who fear runaway AI.
Three Stanford professors just raised $50M to prove OpenAI and Anthropic generate text wrong. Their diffusion models claim 10x speed by processing tokens in parallel, not sequentially. Microsoft and Nvidia are betting they're right.
Engineers working for Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) are modifying software designed to assist with mass firings of federal workers, according to WIRED's investigation.
The software, called AutoRIF (Automated Reduction in Force), was originally developed by the Department of Defense over twenty years ago. DOGE operatives have accessed the software and appear to be editing its code in the Office of Personnel Management's GitHub system.
Screenshots reviewed by WIRED show Riccardo Biasini, a former Tesla engineer and director at The Boring Company, working with the AutoRIF repository. Biasini has also been listed as the main contact for the government-wide email system soliciting resignation emails from federal workers.
Federal agency firings have so far been conducted manually, with HR officials reviewing employee registries and lists from managers. Probationary employees have been targeted first since they lack certain civil service protections. Thousands of workers have already been terminated across multiple agencies in recent weeks.
The CDC experienced this firsthand. Managers carefully identified "mission critical" probationary employees to protect them from termination. "None of that was taken into account," a CDC source told WIRED. "They just sent us a list and said, 'Terminate these employees effective immediately.'"
Government workers recently received another email demanding they detail their accomplishments from the past week. NBC News reported this information would be fed into a large language model to assess employee necessity.
Why this matters:
The marriage of AI and automated firing systems threatens to accelerate government workforce reductions without human oversight.
Civil service protections built over decades could be systematically undermined through technological automation.
This represents a shift from targeted cuts to algorithm-driven terminations, potentially transforming how government operates.
Tech translator with German roots who fled to Silicon Valley chaos. Decodes startup noise from San Francisco. Launched implicator.ai to slice through AI's daily madness—crisp, clear, with Teutonic precision and sarcasm.
E-Mail: marcus@implicator.ai
OpenAI's CFO floated a federal backstop for AI infrastructure, then reversed within hours after White House rejection. The whiplash exposed the core problem: OpenAI needs $1.4 trillion while generating $20 billion. The math doesn't work.
OpenAI's CFO suggested federal backing for AI infrastructure at WSJ conference, as company seeks taxpayer support for $1.4 trillion buildout against $13B revenue. The ask arrives amid circular tech deals and shutdown-era austerity.
China slashes data center power bills by half—but only for domestic chips. Trump blocks Nvidia's Blackwell exports. Two governments, two subsidy strategies, one question: who can afford their industrial policy longer?
Microsoft won the first Trump-era export license to ship advanced Nvidia chips to the UAE, clearing a path for billions in data center spending. The trade: chip access for binding oversight that converts private infrastructure into alliance architecture.