Maybe it says something profound about the human condition that a series of AI-generated talking fruits ripping off reality TV can rack up tens of millions of views. Or maybe it says nothing at all, and we just have to sit with that. What I’m talking about is Fruit Love Island — a series of…
Mere days after Bluesky announced its new AI product, Attie, the coding helper has already become the second most blocked account on the platform. The Attie profile was given the cold shoulder by 125,000 users already, TechCrunch reported. With just 1,500 followers, that means 83 times more users blocked Attie than followed it — that…
Boost your skills with Growth Memo’s weekly expert insights. Subscribe for free! In “The Science Of How AI Pays Attention,” I analyzed 1.2 million ChatGPT responses to understand exactly how AI reads a page. In “The Science Of How AI Picks Its Sources,” I analyzed 98,000 citation rows to understand which pages make it into…
I don’t remember much of my life before social media. It took over in seventh grade and my individual style started bending toward whatever the algorithm pushed to the top. My wants were no longer my own but reflections of what Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, and YouTube algorithmically advertised as desirable. Sleepovers that used to be…
Google quietly updated its list of user-triggered fetchers to include a new one called Google-Agent. The new agent will be used by its Project Mariner tool that began as an AI browser agent and may now be part of a pivot to compete with OpenClaw-style personal agents. OpenClaw OpenClaw is a new type of personal…
Less than 4 months ago, Australia banned social media for kids under 16, sparking a wave of similar proposals from governments around the world. The latest effort to ban social media for children now comes from Austria. In a press release, the Austrian government announced that a bill will be introduced by the end of June to ban social…
You probably set up your Google Business Profile a while back, filled in your address, picked your categories, maybe chased down a few reviews, and then called it done. Totally understandable. That was enough, once. But here’s what’s changed: If you haven’t meaningfully touched that profile in months, you’re losing visibility to competitors who figured…
Among passionate TikTok communities, BookTok, may be the most influential. BookTok is where book lovers and e-reader obsessives to come together to discuss their favorite books and device hacks. For readers who use e-readers, Kindle, Kobo, and Boox lead the charge as the most popular devices, so it’s notable when a new device goes viral.…
Thirty-five years ago, British author J.K. Rowling was commuting from Manchester to London when she was struck by divine creativity: She imagined the tale of a young, orphaned wizard who was key to unraveling a magically violent authoritarian uprising. In what would become Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (for American readers), the young mother…
Reddit CEO Steve Huffman caused a stir when he told a tech show that the platform was considering some form of ID verification to combat bots. Now Huffman has officially addressed the issues in a message to Reddit users posted right on the platform itself. Huffman says Reddit isn’t looking to identify its anonymity-loving user…