Since Donald Trump won back the presidency on November 5, a parade of Silicon Valley luminaries have been engaging in an unseemly grovel-fest, making pilgrimages to Mar-a-Lago, shoveling million-dollar contributions to his inaugural fund, and meddling in the editorial departments of the publications they own in an apparent attempt to gain the new leaders favor. Yesterday, Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said, hold my beer.In a five-minute Instagram video, rocking his new curly hairdo and a $900,000 Gruebal Forsey watch, Zuckerberg announced a series of drastic policy changes that could open the floodgates of misinformation and hate speech on Facebook, Threads, and Instagram. His rationale parroted talking points that right-wing legislators, pundits, and Trump himself have been hammering for years. And Zuckerberg wasnt coy about the timing, explicitly saying the new political regime was a factor in his thinking: The recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point towards once again prioritizing speech, he said in the video.In Zuckerbergs telling, the main impetus for the change is the desire to boost free expression. Metas social networks had become too extreme in restricting the speech of users, he said, so the thrust of the changeswhich included ending Metas multiyear partnerships with third-party fact-checking organizations and retreating from efforts to diminish the spread of hate speechis to let freedom ring, even if it means were gonna catch less bad stuff.This is an edition of Steven Levy's Plaintext newsletter.SIGN UP for Plaintext and tap Steven's unique insights and unmatched contacts for the long view on tech.But the tell is in Zuckerbergs nomenclature. He described his companys (not completely successful) efforts to avoid promoting toxic content as censorship. He has now adopted the same bad-faith characterizations of his employees work that the political right did, which used it as a bludgeon to force Facebook to allow ultraconservatives to promote things like targeted harassment and intentional misinformation. In reality, Meta has every right to police its content in the way that it wantscensorship is something governments do, and private companies are simply exercising their own free speech rights by deciding what content is appropriate for their users and advertisers.Zuckerberg first indicated that he might be OK with the term in a simpering letter he wrote last August to Republican Congressman Jim Jordan, saying that the Biden administration wanted Meta to censor some content related to the Covid-19 pandemic. (The content remained, which actually illustrates that Facebook is granted the power to shape free expression in the US, not the government.) But in his Instagram post yesterday, Zuckerberg bear-hugged the term, using it as a synonym for the entire practice of content moderation itself. Were going to dramatically reduce the amount of censorship on our platforms, he promised. An alternate reading might bewere letting the dobermans out!In the same letter to Jordan, the former left-leaning CEO took a vow that he would no longer side with either political party. My goal is to be neutral and not play a role one way or anotheror to even appear to be playing a role, he wrote. Now that Trump is elected, thats all out the window. It feels like were in a new era now, he said in yesterdays video. Apparently, its an era where private companies change their rules to ensure theyre in sync with the party in power. In the last week alone, Zuckerberg replaced the departing Nick Clegg, the companys former president of global affairs, with Joel Kaplan, a former GOP operative and clerk to the late Justice Anthony Scalia, who once urged Facebook to ignore misinformation during the 2016 election. Zuckerberg also tapped Ultimate Fighting Championship president Dana White, an ardent Trump supporter, to sit on Metas board.Another indication that theres a MAGA element to these changes is Zuckerbergs announcement that hes moving Metas trust and safety and content moderation teams from California to Texas. Once again, he said out loud that the reasons for the geographical move were political: I think that will help us build trust to do this work in places where there is less concern about the bias of our teams. Hello, Mark? This move simply anchors Metas content arbiters in a location with a potentially different bias. Its also a conspicuous statement that Zuckerberg himself might consider CaliforniaTrumps kryptoniteas a less savory place to work than deep-red Texas.

The Nobel peace prize winner Maria Ressa has said Metas decision to end factchecking on its platforms and remove restrictions on certain topics means extremely dangerous times lie ahead for journalism, democracy and social media users.The American-Filipino journalist said Mark Zuckerbergs move to relax content moderation on the Facebook and Instagram platforms would lead to a world without facts and that was a world thats right for a dictator.Mark Zuckerberg says its a free speech issue thats completely wrong, Ressa told the AFP news service. Only if youre profit-driven can you claim that; only if you want power and money can you claim that. This is about safety.Ressa, a co-founder of the Rappler news site, won the Nobel peace prize in 2021 in recognition of her courageous fight for freedom of expression. She faced multiple criminal charges and investigations after publishing stories critical of the former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte.Ressa rejected Zuckerbergs claim that factcheckers had been too politically biased and had destroyed more trust than theyve created.Journalists have a set of standards and ethics, Ressa said. What Facebook is going to do is get rid of that and then allow lies, anger, fear and hate to infect every single person on the platform.The decision meant extremely dangerous times ahead for journalism, democracy and social media users, she said.Zuckerberg, the founder and chief executive of Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, said on Tuesday he would remove factcheckers in the US and replace them with a crowd-sourced moderating service similar to the community notes feature on the rival social media platform X.He added that Meta would also get rid of a bunch of restrictions on topics like immigration and gender that are just out of touch with mainstream discourse and work with President Trump to push back on governments around the world that are going after American companies and pushing to censor more.Meta has said it has no immediate plans to remove factcheckers outside the US, although the rest of the changes will be implemented worldwide.Ressa said she would do everything she could to ensure information integrity. This is a pivotal year for journalism survival, she said. Well do all we can to make sure that happens.In October, the human rights group Amnesty International claimed that authorities in the Philippines were using Facebook to red-tag young activists, a term referring to the labelling of campaigners and others as alleged communist rebels and terrorists.In 2021 a Meta whistleblower, Frances Haugen, claimed there was a lack of safety controls in non-English language markets, such as Africa and the Middle East, and that Facebook was being used by human traffickers and armed groups in Ethiopia.I did what I thought was necessary to save the lives of people, especially in the global south, who I think are being endangered by Facebooks prioritisation of profits over people, she told the Observer.At the time, Meta, then operating under the corporate brand of Facebook, said the premise that it prioritised profit over safety was false and that it had invested $13bn (11bn) in protecting users.In 2018, after the massacre of Rohingya Muslims by the military in Myanmar, Facebook admitted that the platform had been used to foment division and incite offline violence. Three years later, the human rights group Global Witness claimed that Facebook was promoting content that incited violence against political protesters in Myanmar. Facebook said it had proactively detected 99% of the hate speech removed from the platform in the country.

Boomer SchoolerIt always felt like this vague form of superficial hell to me Doom: The Gallery Experience devs on turning a 90s shooter into high cultureRead on to find out which Renaissance paintings they think Doomguy himself would get a kick out of.Image credit: VG247 Article by Mark Warren Senior Staff Writer Published on Jan. 8, 2025 I've had a lot of experience in these gallery spaces and it always felt like this vague form of superficial hell to me, Filippo Meozzi, director and producer of Doom: The Gallery Experience, tells me.I work in the art industry as an artists assistant, I produce sculptures and other things like that. So, I'm fairly familiar with the process of gallery openings and sort of just the nightmare that is going to Galleries and experiencing these high-brow, drinking wine, [saying] pompous phrases to each other [kinds of people].To see this content please enable targeting cookies. So, when he got the chance to re-create that kind of environment in Id Software's 1993 shooter for a school project, he decided to do so.The idea that I thought [of was] Doom is, you know, you go to hell and you kill demons and part of going to a gallery opening is you're fighting the demonic nightmare of all of these people blowing smoke up everyone else's back end, Meozzi explains.I approached Liam [Stone, Doom: The Gallery Experiences programmer and artist] - we've been making things together for the past few years. We made a game about six months ago for a game jam and that was also fairly successful, we have a very good working relationship. So, he was my other half in terms of making sure that this vision came to light and that the project was able to be in a state that we were all really happy with, especially from a technical end.The pair got to work and rebuilt the whole level of E1M1 from the ground up, with the goal to make sure that the game was playable via browser so that itd be accessible and easy to send to people. We were gonna go with the engine regardless of what we ended up doing and that became Doom pretty [early] on, Stone recalls. I think it was necessary over finding some kind of online implementation of Doom to mod, because we had a lot of, you know, you click on paintings and you open links. We needed something that we could just quickly iterate on and have everything we need at a moments notice. Not a bad interior re-decorating job, if you like white walls. | Image credit: Filippo Meozzi and Liam StoneWhile acknowledging that Dooms wealth of mods - including the likes of Thatchers Techbase - have proven it to be a fairly prolific infrastructure for development, Meozzi says the pair still found creating The Gallery Experience to be kind of a challenge.Adapting that to a platform it was never really made for in terms of [game-making software] Construct 3 was the big one for them, but the director definitely thinks they nailed the vibe and the feel they were going for.The gallery you stroll around in the game isnt designed to directly mirror one specific real-world location, instead, Meozzi says its designed to be a sort of every-gallery. Really, any gallery you go to will always have the same format of either wood or concrete floors, white walls, gray ceiling, he explains, They're always painted the same. They always feel the same. They're always square, boxy, nightmarishly lit rooms, regardless of the art thats in them.So, the duo got to decorating. We took the layout of the map and painted the walls white, gave it a nice new floor, some brand new ceilings, and moved some of the furniture around a bit to re-adapt the space. Meozzi explains, adding that hes proud of how they were able to capture the oppressive feeling that the galleries sort of impose on you.One thing the pair did end up sticking with from Doom - after originally being a little split on whether to do so - was including a few secret areas for the player to find. Two of these are in exactly the same places that they were in the original game, with Stone explaining that, after originally leaving the courtyard section open, the developers thought making the player do some work to get into there areas would help TGE appeal to those whore more in it for the silly Doom revamp than they necessarily are the art. When you're all done, you can grab yourself a $14 poop jar as a souvenir. | Image credit: Filippo Meozzi and Liam Stone/VG247Spoiler alert: one of the areas you can find contains some beer and is the hideout of a strange character called Galaktor. I ask the devs who this strange beverage-gifting fella with his own area (and his own cold brews) is, and they respond with wry smiles. Galaktor has really been sort of a mascot for us for the past few years, Meozzi reveals. We've incorporated him into most of the projects we've done in one shape or another its like an easter egg for each other. Whys he got the beer? Well, because you sometimes get it at gallery openings, but isnt as common as wine. Of course. Which it seems is why its hidden away with Mr Galaktor.Getting back to art itself, it all comes from one place - New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art - which had a free, open source collection of exhibit images that the pair were able to use, linking out to the museum websites pages to allow players to learn more about the painting or sculpture theyre examining with one click.In terms of the gallerys layout, Meozzi adds that the duo knew what they wanted to put in each bit and which types of styles and eras they wanted to touch on and found quite a few things we thought were quite entertaining and didnt really have a lot of information on them. One of these is an Ancient Egyptian Toilet Jar, which you can procure a copy of from Doom: TGEs gift shop. Having bought it during my playthrough, I can definitely recommend it as a purchase.Aside from that, Meozzi says his personal favourite piece of art included in Doom: TGE is that statue of Diana in the courtyard, while Stone is quite fond of the colourful sculptures in the Egyptian section.I ask the pair which - if any - of the art on display they reckon Doomguy himself would vibe with the most, or if they think hes just there for the free snacks. Citing the religious elements of the Doom games, Meozzi picks out the paintings of a madonna and her child and a return from a hunt in the Renaissance section. I feel like he would sort of gain this sort of forging of spirit [from] the affinity for holy images, he reasons, Having that resonate with him, I think that would be his most motivational section to bring back with him to his expeditions to hell. Would Doomguy dig Greek sculptures too? We tried asking, but all he did was grunt. | Image credit: Filippo Meozzi and Liam Stone/VG247As for what Doom: The Gallery Experiences developers are taking from the experience of having their game gain a surprising amount of traction compared to their expectations, theres plenty. First of all, Meozzi says the pair appreciate the support from everyone, in terms of just seeing it as a parody, seeing it as not such a strict mimic of the initial experience that was the field that we were going for.He adds that its always good to promote people to go and experience art. There's a museum in most major cities across the world. Whether its ticketed or not, whether you're a student, you can find ways to go and get access to it. I think it's an important part of experiencing how things develop to be able to see what people make in a very artistic sense. One of the major things was that I consider video games to be a form of art and not many people in the art spheres consider that as well, but I think it's important to see almost everything that anyone's capable of doing as some form of artistic contribution to the world.Meozzi and Stone definitely plan to keep on making games together as part of their contribution to the world, with this experience having galvanised them a bit, even if the pair tell me theyd probably still have kept on doing so regardless, with Stone adding that their future projects will likely have a similar sense of bizarreness to them.Theyd also be open - in the hypothetical scenario that the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art was to reach out and offer them the chance - to creating a physical, real-life version of Doom: TGEs gallery. I think that would be the most full circle completion to the thought child that this is," Meozzi says.Making this ironic experience become a real experience, and it would become just like an incredibly meta, hyper absurd - I don't even know how to put words to that. It would just be bizarre and it would be fantastic.

Hi, Sue!Interested to know how one of the best horror films from 2024 was made? A 30 minute making-of featurette has the substance you craveJust don't take the actual substance, ok?Image credit: Working Title Films/ Mubi News by Oisin Kuhnke Contributor Published on Jan. 8, 2025 The Substance is easily one of the best horror films to have been released in 2024, possibly the decade, and now distributor Mubi has released a lengthy behind-the-scenes video.Definite spoiler warning ahead in this making-of featurette for anyone that hasn't watched The Substance yet, and probably a content warning for body horror imagery too.It was the Golden Globes over the weekend, and easily one of the most satisfying wins of the night was Demi Moore's for her lead performance in last year's The Substance. While it might have been the only win the film got at the awards ceremony, it was a massive one as it was Moore's first major awards win in her lengthy and prolific career. Now, riding off of the high of Moore's win and the four other nominations the film received at the Globes, the film's distributor Mubi has released a making-of featurette that goes into some depth about how the body horror was made.Watch on YouTubeThe behind the scenes mini-documentary kicks off with writer/ director Coralie Fargeat discussing her intention behind making the film, which very much came from how there's a lack of representation of women above the age of 50 in films, a point that had become very personal to her as she grew older herself. To see this content please enable targeting cookies. Some of the best stuff in there is about all the film's special effects, which if you've seen the film you know they're pretty gnarly. It was all quite economical considering there's a lot of shots of bodies being wrecked in some gruesome ways - one of my favourite bits comes in at 9:16 showing one of the fake bodies being manipulated to look like something is trying to burst out from its skin. Good stuff! Well worth a watch for fans of the film, or even just fans of the craft.

Back On The GerindWitcher 4 dev says Witcher 3 quest about Geralt battling plague to steal Henry Cavill's look was "the perfect start to getting back into the vibe" for Ciri's adventureThere's no better way to get into the Witcher mojo than by working on Geralt's last trip to sunny, disease-free Velen.Image credit: VG247/CD Projekt News by Mark Warren Senior Staff Writer Published on Jan. 8, 2025 While we'd not seen The Witcher 4 in action prior to last year's edition of The Game Awards, when it got itsfirst trailer, CD Projekt has been beavering away at it for a while.According to the game's narrative director, its team also had the perfect task to help it get back into the swing of thing quest-wise thanks to The Witcher 3's 2022 next-gen update, which offered us all the chance to bring a bit of TV Witcher to our video game Witchering, even if Jim Trinca wasn't entirely convinced it was necessary.To see this content please enable targeting cookies. Philipp Weber, who served as a quest designer on TW3 and Cyberpunk 2077 before stepping up into the aforementioned role for TW4, took the chance to commemorate the work the studio did on 'In the Eternal Fire's Shadow'. In case the name doesn't ring a bell, it's the quest that sees Geralt enter the scarlet fog plague victim-filled Devil's Pit and come out with the diagram for some forgotten wolf school gear.Basically, it's an interesting way to get your hands on the armour that Henry Cavill - and now Liam Hemsworth - rock while playing Gerry in The Witcher Netflix series. The devs could have just dumped it in a random chest, but nope, you get to battle a long-missing Witcher posessed by a Red Miasmal, in a mission that has some fun touches like a cutscene of Geralt himself getting possessed playing if you die during the boss fight. To see this content please enable targeting cookies."Two years ago we released a new quest for The Witcher 3," Weber wrote of this nice little adventure, "New designers and writers worked on it preparing for the Witcher 4, together with one of our most senior quest designers, who is with us since the Witcher 1. All in all, it was the perfect start to getting back into the vibe."Given a lot of these folks who weren't new hires ahead of The Witcher 4's development cycle has probably just finished playing a part in getting Cyberpunk 2077 out of the door and helping it recover its repuation from that infamously rocky lauch via a whole bunch of updates and a killer DLC, you can understand why having this set the table for them fully hopping back into Witcher mode with their fresh peers would be so memorable.It's a cool peek behind the curtain, even if I don't expect to find Weber somehow actually meant the vibe matched because we'll also be stealing Henry Cavill's fit in The Witcher 4. But, to be fair, you never know.If you'rte desperate to get a bit of a taste of playing as The Witcher 4's version of Ciri right now, you'll be glad to hear that Witcher 3 modders were very quick to give that game's version of everyone's favourite Child of the Elder Blood a makeover to match that TGAs reveal trailer.

Image: Nintendo LifeIf you've been browsing social media for the past few days (heck, let's not kid ourselves, past few years) you'll have seen plenty of prognosticating about the arrival of the Switch successor.The latest whispers suggested that Wednesday 8th January was the first sensible day after the holidays for Nintendo to finally pull back the curtain on 'Switch 2'. With everyone across all territories back in the office, it made sense to put all the rumours to bed with an official reveal in early January.But here we are, knee-deep in news about the console, yet none of it's coming from Nintendo.Nope, it's peripheral manufacturers who are delivering the goods, or at least the only details going. Accessory maker Genki flagged last week that it planned to show and discuss Switch 2 and its lineup of peripherals at CES 2025, and they've made good on their promise. In fact, Genki's trailer gives us probably the most polished look at the unannounced hardware we've had.The firm's rendering of the system is naturally enclosed in its upcoming "NS2" case let's not forget the whole reason so many accessory makers are eager to get out ahead of an official announcement but the general layout conforms to the leaked details we've been seeing since the first supposed hardware shots appeared online back in September.And it's not just Genki. Peripheral companies all over the place are getting in on the act. Dbrand was the first out of the gate, of course, and today Funlab has jumped on the bandwagon:Elsewhere, Felipe Lima of Universo Nintendo claims to have an accurate mock-up of the final Switch 2 logo, as provided by a source. It looks essentially the same as the logo we've been seeing for weeks (a big '2' whacked beside the Joy-Con symbols) and there's a more-than-decent chance it's legit, too.With this total frenzy of details and speculation, the big question is WHY AREN'T YOU JUST ANNOUNCING THE THING, NINTENDO!?!?!? Are you going to sit back while every case manufacturer on the block pulls the same stunt? Surely as the platform holder you want to get out there and get a handle on the messaging before every chip has been torn down, every transistor counted, every secret revealed? Getting all your ducks in a row is fine, but the reveal was planned months ago, surely? You've got the trailer sitting on a hard drive ready to go, right?It's perplexing, infuriating, exhausting... but maybe 'frenzy' is the key word there. The internet is getting a little unhinged (well, a little more than usual, if that's possible), but you can't buy this sort of marketing. #NintendoSwitch2 is trending very nicely thank-you-very-much, and Nintendo's team has done precisely nothing to get it there.Image: Nintendo LifeIt's also worth remembering that, from a certain perspective (and assuming the authentic-looking leaks are true), this is perhaps the least exciting Nintendo system reveal in the company's history. Don't get us wrong - we're hugely excited to see the final product and drool over insanely hi-res official renders, and we cannot wait to finally get our hands on this thing and play new games on new Nintendo hardware. It doesn't get much better than that!But, from a plain old hardware perspective, it's looking like exactly the thing we were speculating was in the works five years ago when we were dreaming of 'Switch Pro'. Bigger screen, more power, 4K upscaling in the dock - you name it, it was rumoured long, long ago.That's what you get with an iterative update with a sensible name and a sound business plan to make as many units as possible before launch. New Nintendo hardware is never dull, but this one doesn't even have the namesake gimmick of autostereoscopic 3D screens. This has been the most known of quantities for ages.Yet here we are, all on absolute tenterhooks awaiting the official acknowledgement and announcement. Nintendo must have planned for this you don't manufacture millions of machines and manage to keep them totally under wraps which means this is all part of its plan. Nintendo will not be rushed.Never a bad time for a Simpsons .gif Image: 20th Century FoxAnd really, what is the rush when what you're revealing is essentially 'another one of those'? Switch 2 has the potential to be up there with the best of gaming's number twos: Sonic 2. PS2. Galaxy 2. We love a good '2' (ahem), but being a known quantity is the nature of the beast with direct sequels.Nintendo's biggest problem is avoiding the reveal being a total anticlimax, so it's natural that everyone including us wants them to just get on with it. But having been in this state for so long, and with the console apparently exactly what we thought it would be half a decade ago, perhaps an anticlimactic reveal is inevitable and this is the best approach they've got. Like any good DJ, Nintendo is waiting to drop the needle when the crowd just can't take it anymore.Just be careful out there. Switch's getting wild. Update: Genki's website now shows a new videoEverything about the "Switch successor"See AlsoShare:00 Gavin first wrote for Nintendo Life in 2018 before joining the site full-time the following year, rising through the ranks to become Editor. He can currently be found squashed beneath a Switch backlog the size of Normandy. Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...Related ArticlesNintendo Highlights Multiple Switch Games Launching In 2025It's going to be an action-packed yearNew Patent Seemingly Confirms Nvidia 4K AI Upscaling For Switch 2DLSS has been mentioned in past reportsSwitch's First 'Rebootless Update' Of 2025 Is Now Live, Here Are The DetailsFollowing Version 19.0.1's rollout last OctoberTech Fans Have Gone Full 'Layton' In Analysing The 'Switch 2' MotherboardCritical thinking is the key to success.Talking Point: Our 2025 Nintendo Gaming PredictionsNew hardware smell

Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube791kHere's one for the alliteration fans out there: Super Rare Games has announced that it's bringing snekflat's weird and wonderful exploration game Tiny Terry's Turbo Trip to Switch on 13th February. Terrific!This one launched on Steam last year and has since gone on to rack up hundreds of 'Overwhelmingly Positive' reviews. In it, you play as Terry, a wobbly little guy who dreams of nothing more than launching himself into space in a car of his own invention (we've all been there). To do so, Terry explores the town of Sprankelwater, chatting with locals, getting into scrapes, catching bugs and collecting 'TURBO JUNK' to make his dreams a reality.Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube791kWatch on YouTube Sprankelwater looks to be a rather sweet little 'open world' for you to explore, and based on the above trailer, we reckon a decent number of laughs will be packed in along the way, with some nice writing and suitably surreal visuals.You can read more about the game's key features and get a look at some screenshots below:- Explore a densely packed, tiny open world town at any pace and in any way you like. Slow, fast, by foot, by car, by paraglider! Its up to you.- Uncover a wholesome story through hilarious interactions with weird Sprankelwaterians.- Collect TURBO JUNK and upgrade the boost capacity of Terrys very own car.- Catch insects, dig holes, destroy cars, become rich, wear hats.- Listen to a joyful and heart-warming soundtrack from the composer of Wuppo.Images: Super Rare GamesThose after a bit of Untitled Goose Game-style silliness might want to keep an eye out for this one when it comes our way next month.What do you make of Tiny Terry? Will you be picking it up on Switch? Let us know in the comments.

Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube791kG.rev, the Japanese developer behind various shoot 'em ups like Kokuga and Border Down, has announced that it is bringing yet another rare arcade shooter to the Switch as Strania -The Stella Machina- EX lands digitally on the Nintendo hybrid on 23rd January.Originally released on Xbox 360 and in arcades by exA-Arcadia (on its ROM cart-based system, which allows owners to put up to four games on a single cabinet) Strania -The Stella Machina- is your standard shoot 'em up affair, where you'll take to a giant mech to fight in an intergalactic war. The catch is that you get to choose which side you fight on, so you can take up arms for the goodies or the baddies.Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube791kWatch on YouTube The EX version arriving on Switch packs in some bonus features like additional difficulty modes (a rebalanced 'Normal' for those new to the game through to a mode simply called 'Hell' which we think is pretty self-explanatory), refreshed visuals and a choice between an original and rearranged soundtrack.Revealing the news on Twitter, Strania producer and G.rev president Hiroyuki Maruyama stated that the team "chose to focus exclusively on the Nintendo Switch to ensure the best possible experience for players", promising that the game will provide "an unforgettable adventure". You can find Maruyama's full statement below:It seems that this one will be digital-only for the time being, so keep an eye on the eShop later this month for a chance to check it out. Shoot em up, all of emWill you be picking this one up in a couple of weeks? Let us know in the comments.[source x.com]Related GamesSee AlsoShare:02 Jim came to Nintendo Life in 2022 and, despite his insistence that The Minish Cap is the best Zelda game and his unwavering love for the Star Wars prequels (yes, really), he has continued to write news and features on the site ever since. Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...Related ArticlesNintendo Highlights Multiple Switch Games Launching In 2025It's going to be an action-packed year126 Games You Should Pick Up In The Nintendo Switch eShop Holiday Sale (Europe)Every game we scored 9/10 or higher35 Upcoming Nintendo Switch Games To Look Forward To In 2025The best new Nintendo Switch games coming soon161 Games You Should Pick Up In Nintendo's 'Hits For The Holidays' eShop Sale (North America)Reminder: It wraps up on SundayHamster Releases Its First Arcade Archives Switch Game Of 2025, Teases A Year Full Of "Surprises""We will be taking on many new challenges"

Hiya, folks, welcome to TechCrunchs regular AI newsletter. If you want this in your inbox every Wednesday, sign uphere.The AI news cycle didnt slow down much this holiday season. Between OpenAIs 12 days of shipmas and DeepSeeks major model release on Christmas Day, blink and youd miss some new development.And its not slowing down now. On Sunday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a post on his personal blog that he thinks OpenAI knows how to build artificial general intelligence (AGI) and is beginning to turn its aim to superintelligence.AGI is a nebulous term, but OpenAI has its own definition: highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work.As for superintelligence, which Altman understands to be a step beyond AGI, he said in the blog post that it could massively accelerate innovation well beyond what humans are capable of achieving on their own.[OpenAI continues] to believe that iteratively putting great tools in the hands of people leads to great, broadly-distributed outcomes, Altman wrote. Altman like OpenAI rival Anthropics CEO, Dario Amodei is of the optimistic belief that AGI and superintelligence will lead to wealth and prosperity for all. But assuming AGI and superintelligence are even feasible without new technical breakthroughs, how can we be sure theyll benefit everyone?A recent concerning data point is a study flagged by Wharton professor Ethan Mollick on X early this month. Researchers from the National University of Singapore, University of Rochester, and Tsinghua University investigated the impact of OpenAIs AI-powered chatbot, ChatGPT, on freelancers across different labor markets.The study identified an economic AI inflection point for different job types. Before the inflection point, AI boosted freelancer earnings. For example, web developers saw a ~65% increase. But after the inflection point, AI began replacing freelancers. Translators saw an approximate 30% drop.The study suggests that once AI starts replacing a job, it doesnt reverse course. And that should concern all of us if more capable AI is indeed on the horizon.Altman wrote in his post that hes pretty confident that everyone will see the importance of maximizing broad benefit and empowerment in the age of AGI and superintelligence. But what if hes wrong? What if AGI and superintelligence arrive, and only corporations have something to show for it? The result wont be a better world, but more of the same inequality. And if thats AIs legacy, itll be a deeply depressing one.NewsImage Credits:Moor Studio / Getty ImagesSilicon Valley stifles doom: Technologists have been ringing alarm bells for years about the potential for AI to cause catastrophic damage. But in 2024, those warning calls were drowned out. OpenAI losing money: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said that the company is currently losing money on its $200-per-monthChatGPT Proplan because people are using it more than the company expected. Record generative AI funding: Investments in generative AI, which encompasses a range of AI-powered apps, tools, and services to generate text, images, videos, speech, music, and more, reached new heights last year.Microsoft ups data center spending: Microsoft has earmarked $80 billion in fiscal 2025 to build data centers designed to handle AI workloads.Grok 3 MIA: xAIs next-gen AI model, Grok 3, didnt arrive on time, adding to a trend of flagship models that missed their promised launch windows. Research paper of the weekAI might make a lot of mistakes. But it can also supercharge experts in their work.At least, thats the finding of a team of researchers hailing from the University of Chicago and MIT. In a new study, they suggest that investors who use OpenAIs GPT-4o to summarize earnings calls realize higher returns than those who dont.The researchers recruited investors and had GPT-4o give them AI summaries aligned with their investing expertise. Sophisticated investors got more technical AI-generated notes, while novices got simpler ones. The more experienced investors saw a 9.6% improvement in their one-year returns after using GPT-4o, while the less experienced investors saw a 1.7% boost. Thats not too shabby for AI-human collaboration, Id say.Model of the weekMETAGENE-1s performance on various benchmarks.Image Credits:Prime IntellectPrime Intellect, a startup buildinginfrastructure for decentralized AI system training, has released an AI model that it claims can help detect pathogens.The model, called METAGENE-1, was trained on a dataset of over 1.5 trillion DNA and RNA base pairs sequenced from human wastewater samples. Created in partnership with the University of Southern California and SecureBios Nucleic Acid Observatory, METAGENE-1 can be used for various metagenomic applications, Prime Intellect said, like studying organisms.METAGENE-1 achieves state-of-the-art performance across various genomic benchmarks and new evaluations focused on human-pathogen detection, Prime Intellect wrote in a series of posts on X. After pretraining, this model is designed to aid in tasks in the areas of biosurveillance, pandemic monitoring, and pathogen detection.Grab bagIn response to legal action from major music publishers, Anthropic has agreed to maintain guardrails preventing its AI-powered chatbot, Claude, from sharing copyrighted song lyrics.Labels, including Universal Music Group, Concord Music Group, and ABKCO, sued Anthropic in 2023, accusing the startup of copyright infringement for training its AI systems on lyrics from at least 500 songs. The suit hasnt been resolved, but for the time being, Anthropic has agreed to stop Claude from providing lyrics to songs owned by the publishers and creating new song lyrics based on the copyrighted material.We continue to look forward to showing that, consistent with existing copyright law, using potentially copyrighted material in the training of generative AI models is a quintessential fair use, Anthropic said in a statement.

Triller, a would-be competitor to TikTok, is hoping to capitalize on the potential for a TikTok ban in the U.S. by pitching to creators to move their content from the popular short-form video app to its own. The company has now launched a website, SaveMyTikToks.com, which promises to back up all your TikTok videos by uploading them to Triller.The site is powered by the customer engagement platform Amplify.ai, which Trillers parent company, TrillerNet, acquired in 2021. The deal was originally focused on helping Triller creators track and monetize their content, while also helping brands and advertisers match creator content to consumers. Now, users can agree to Trillers terms and then click a Connect TikTok Account button to provide Triller (via Amplify.ai) with access to their videos, profile information, and more.After doing so, the site will ask users for their email address to alert them when their posts have been downloaded and saved. Users then have to set up a Triller account and await instructions on how to later upload their saved content. The process takes a bit more effort than the click of a button that Triller promises on the new website. The January 19 deadline for a TikTok ban is nearing, after being signed into law by President Biden in April 2024. The move then saw strong bipartisan support in the House and Senate over concerns about TikToks Chinese roots; its parent company is Beijing-based ByteDance. Lawmakers believed this presented a national security threat to U.S. citizens.However, the ban now seems less likely, given that incoming president Trump recently asked the Supreme Court to put it on pause as it would interfere with the presidents ability to manage the U.S.s foreign policy. (Trumps court filing also noted he had 14.7 million followers on TikTok, which led him to reconsider the apps importance as a unique medium for freedom of expression, including core political speech, it said.)Still, creators on TikTok have been regularly expressing concerns over how the ban will affect their ability to reach fans and, ultimately, their ability to generate revenue through creator rewards, ad revenue sharing, and brand partnerships.Currently, over 543,000 videos are tagged with the hashtag tiktokban, for example, and tiktokbanned adds over 103,000 more. (Many more videos exist, too, but use less specific tags like social media or just tiktok.) Creators have largely been advising their followers to find them on other, more established apps like Instagram or YouTube not Triller nor Lemon8, another ByteDance-owned app introduced in previous years as something of a backup plan in case of a TikTok ban.Whether Trillers pitch to creators will work, of course, remains to be seen. Many creators want to move their audiences to other platforms where theyre already active and have a following, rather than adopt a new app entirely.Triller, which IPOd in October 2024 after three failed attempts, has seen its stock decline in the weeks and months since, and is currently trading at $2.50. Its also embroiled in another lawsuit this one over failure to repay a $35.5 million promissory note. (The company settled a sizable $28 million lawsuit with Timbaland and Swizz Beatz in 2022).The company also hired an ex-TikTok exec, Sean Kim, as its CEO in December 2024 to focus on an overhaul of the app. Kim had previously served as TikToks head of product from 2019 to 2022, working on things like its For You feed, creator monetization, the developer platform, third-party integrations, and more.TikTok did not respond to a request for comment ahead of publication.