Uber and Lyft drivers in Atlanta are fed up with Waymo robotaxis. The Atlanta Rideshare Drivers Union is claiming that drivers have reported lower pay, longer waits between rides, and fewer fares since Waymo began offering its service in the city last June, Axios reports. As such, the union is calling on city and state…
MIT is mulling an overhaul of its entire educational system in response to the threat posed by powerful AI models — a striking response to the tech from one of the planet’s most visible and influential research universities. In a new report published by the university’s ad hoc AI committee, which is co-chaired by professors…
Data centers are wildly unpopular amongst the US population — so much so that grassroots opposition threatened some $130 billion in developments over the first three months of 2026 alone. Tech executives, as a result, are having to make a calculated decision to change their tune, from AI doomsaying to something more palatable to the everyman….
Microsoft employees are supposed to be using AI as much as possible. But wait, not like that! In internal tracker, one employee who worked in the Customer and Partner Solutions organization stood out from all the rest by admitting they spent an eyebrow-raising $28,000 on AI tools in just 28 days, Gadget Review noticed. That…
Building trade unions have made repeated overtures about their support for data centers in recent months, hailing them — despite their many, many drawbacks — as job creators. Now, leadership as well as the rank-and-file of a number of building trade unions are officially getting involved, by knocking on doors, issuing statements, and ultimately threatening to…
Despite an immense push by CEO Elon Musk, Tesla is still struggling to gain much traction with its Robotaxi service. The EV maker launched the service last summer, with the mercurial CEO promising that over 1,000 fully autonomous cabs would be roaming city streets within “months.” Fast forward over a year, and Tesla is still…
As income inequality in the US reaches unprecedented levels, more Americans are forced to do without basic necessities. Families are chaining buy-now, pay-later schemes together to afford groceries, while the cost of utilities skyrockets, thanks in large part to the AI data center boom. Belt tightening is also playing out in the healthcare industry. In…
With over 100,000 automatic license plate readers (ALPRs) sprouting out of the ground over the past few years, you might be tempted to ask: “with what money?” Drug money, as it turns out, though it’s not exactly what you might think. A bombshell investigation by Mother Jones found that police departments across the US are…
BY THE OPTIMIST DAILY EDITORIAL TEAM Back-to-school season is a great time to donate. Kids have outgrown things. Backpacks didn’t survive the year. Notebooks never got opened. Most of it ends up in the trash, and a smaller portion ends up at Goodwill, where it’s gone in days. “The school year can impose a significant…
Episode Description: Karissa hosts solo this week while Arielle recovers, covering ten solutions including the world’s first wild bird flu vaccination program for Phillip Island’s little penguins, France making unsolicited telemarketing calls flat-out illegal, and what Baltimore is doing with $400 million in opioid settlement money. If you have questions, comments, feedback, suggestions, or just…
