AI
Artificial intelligence is the center of gravity for KickhammerNews. This section tracks frontier model releases, the pricing and capability shifts that follow them, and the safety and policy questions they raise. We cover large language models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and others; agentic and computer-use systems moving from demos into production; AI infrastructure spending and chip demand; and the regulation and litigation shaping how these systems are built and deployed. Our coverage aims to explain what changed, who it affects, and what the numbers actually show, rather than repeating press-release language. Start here for daily reporting on the AI industry and how it reaches businesses, developers and everyday users.
Grok 4.5 Is Here — And xAI Is Using SpaceX and Tesla as Its Lab
xAI’s 1.5-trillion-parameter V9 model has entered private beta at SpaceX and Tesla, with internal evals claiming performance close to — or exceeding...
China Just Trained a Frontier AI Model Without a Single Nvidia GPU — And It Beats GPT-5.5 at Coding
Meituan’s LongCat-2.0 is a 1.6-trillion-parameter coding model trained entirely on domestic Chinese silicon. Its debut is a direct challenge to Washington’s export-control...
Fable 5 Is Back: Inside the 19-Day Government Shutdown of Anthropic’s Most Powerful AI
The abrupt export-control order that froze Claude Fable 5 worldwide—and the messy, unprecedented negotiations that finally ended it—may have permanently changed how...
South Korea’s $880 Billion Bet: Why the Next AI Race Will Be Won in Hardware, Not Software
While the world’s attention has been fixed on the latest large language models and chatbot rivalries, South Korea just made the boldest...
Qualcomm’s $14 Billion Gambit to End Nvidia’s AI Monopoly
For nearly two decades, Nvidia has ruled the AI hardware landscape with an iron grip. Its CUDA software platform, deployed on over...
GitHub Copilot’s Billing Shock: Developers Wake Up to Bills 10x Higher Than Expected
Today marks a reckoning for thousands of software developers who rely on GitHub Copilot. June 30, 2026 closes the first full monthly...
The Largest AI Heist in History: How Alibaba Allegedly Stole 28.8 Million Claude Conversations
The artificial intelligence industry has long grappled with questions about intellectual property, competitive espionage, and the ethics of model development. But a...
China’s $295 Billion AI Grid: Beijing Bets Big on Domestic Chips to Challenge U.S. Dominance
China has unveiled one of the most ambitious government technology initiatives in modern history: a 2 trillion yuan ($295 billion) five-year plan...
OpenAI Declares Itself an Advertising Business at Cannes Lions — And the Ad World Is Listening
For decades, Cannes Lions has been the advertising industry’s annual pilgrimage — a sun-drenched festival on the French Riviera where the world’s...