Tesla bros, it turns out, can be pretty sore losers.
On the crypto-based prediction hub Polymarket, some of the automaker's diehards can't accept that they're about to <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-bros-bet-on-tesla-screwed">lose a boatload of money</a> after betting that their hero Elon Musk would launch a public robotaxi service in June. Which he didn't, by the way; the trial is limited to a few people with an invite, and beyond that, the most notable thing it's accomplished was <a style="font-weight: 400;" href="https://futurism.com/government-tesla-robotaxis-videos">earn the attention of federal regulators</a> for flubs like <a style="font-weight: 400;" href="https://futurism.com/tesla-robotaxi-jerks-wheel">violating traffic laws</a>.
Now, with July in full effect, the Tesla bettors are begging the site admins to let them win anyway, with some already crying foul if they don't get what they want.
"This is a public launch," insisted one user who bought nearly 22,000 "Yes" shares on the <a href="https://polymarket.com/event/will-tesla-launch-a-driverless-robtotaxi-service-before-july?tid=1751489032105">bet</a> titled, "Will Tesla launch a driverless Robotaxi service before July?"
Dismissing the "haterz," the user added: "If they resolve this any other besides a YES, it's called a scam."
In a hilarious testament to their zeal, the total bet volume has shot up by nearly $1,000,000 from just a day or two earlier, when the Polymarket event should've already closed. All the while, the odds of the yes-camp winning haven't budged from less than one percent.
Many of them were inspired by Musk calling out the bet weeks ago, guaranteeing easy riches for his followers.
"Money-making opportunity," he wrote in a <a href="https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1935819020718190735">tweet</a> pointing to the Polymarket event.
Musk's tweet briefly caused the "yes" odds to surge, but the reality of the situation has since set in. Tesla is operating an extremely <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-robotaxi-week-disaster">limited form of a Robotaxi service</a> in Austin, Texas, with only ten to 20 vehicles on the road. And with its myriad of caveats, it doesn't appear to meet the bet's definition.
In the rules section, it clearly states that a program restricted to "invite-only testers" will not qualify as a robotaxi service. Tesla's program is currently invite-only, with most of the participants being Tesla "influencers." In the past few days, it has <a href="https://x.com/sawyermerritt/status/1940151847794201019?s=46">reportedly</a> begun inviting people outside this small pool of personalities, but it remains invite-only nonetheless.
Tesla's service may fail on another count on top of that: it must not have a human in the vehicle who's "positioned to take control," the rules state. All of the robotaxis are currently supervised by a human "safety monitor" in the front passenger seat who can intervene to stop the vehicle (as we've <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/video-tesla-safety-monitor-halts">already seen</a>) and drive them if necessary (as we've <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-robotaxi-safety-driver-forced-to-drive">also already seen</a>.)
Try explaining any of this to the Polymarket bettors, though, and your words will fall on deaf ears. (And to be fair, if we had thousands of dollars riding on this decision, we probably wouldn't take the loss well, either.)
Take one user who bought a staggering 825,000 shares in favor of yes, who insists that the tiny pool of people allowed to use the robotaxi service don't count as "testers," but "users."  
"The exclusion only affects invite-only testers, a subset of all invite-only users," they explained. "Excluding a subset does not mean excluding the whole set." 
"If you reject that," they added, "you're rejecting basic set theory and by extension, the logic of this universe."
The cosmos shudders at the plight of the wounded Tesla warrior. Won't someone do something?
"Elon needs to step in and clarify the situation. His reputation is at stake," commented another.
Epitomizing the outlook of Musk-worshipping tech bros and the specious nature of their pleas, another in the yes-camp sincerely cited a "conversation with Grok," Musk's X-integrated AI chatbot, as evidence in their favor.
So far, the Tesla bros have disputed the "no" decision twice. A final decision is slated to come down on Thursday.
More on Tesla: <a href="https://futurism.com/fsd-tesla-train-crash">Tesla's Self-Driving Mode Causes It to Get Hit by Train</a>

Folly-market

They're already calling it a "scam."

Tesla Bros Are Begging Polymarket to Change the Rules So Elon Musk's Disastrous Robotaxi Launch Doesn't Lose Them a Ton of Money

A smiling Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. was seen with a strange white thing in his mouth during a <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/06/24/rfk-jr-testifies-house-health-committee-congress/84330956007/">recent Congressional hearing</a> — and we're almost positive we know what it is.
When publishing a story about the Health and Human Services secretary's <a href="https://futurism.com/neoscope/rfk-jr-brain-worms">worm-brained</a> plan to start <a href="https://futurism.com/neoscope/fda-outsourcing-ai">approving new drugs with AI</a>, the <a href="https://gizmodo.com/rfk-jr-says-ai-will-approve-new-drugs-at-fda-very-very-quickly-2000622778">fine folks at Gizmodo</a> chose as its header image a photo of the political scion baring a wide and menacing smile.
In that photo, a small white rectangle is visible on the gums above RFK Jr.'s teeth in the upper left quadrant of his mouth. Though the story itself is hypocritical at best and nightmarish at worst — because seriously, how can one <a href="https://futurism.com/bill-nye-rfk-texts">oppose vaccines</a> while wanting to automate medicine approvals with a technology <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/researchers-ai-chatgpt-hallucinations-terminology">known for spewing nonsense</a> — eagle-eyed netizens quickly jumped on the thing in his mouth.
"Is it just me," a commenter on the Gizmodo article noted, "or does the header picture show a nicotine pouch in the upper left side of his mouth?"
Over <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/paleofuture.bsky.social/post/3lswd35cl7k2m">on Bluesky</a>, others proffered the same explanation.
"Does he have a tobacco pouch in his lip???" <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/cherri.tv/post/3lswdccqcr22l">one startled responder wrote</a>. "What the f*ck."
There's no way, of course, to be entirely sure what object the <a href="https://futurism.com/neoscope/trump-execute-dealers-rfk-jr">alleged former drug dealer</a> chose to stick into his mouth before making a public appearance before Congress. But given that he was captured on camera popping <a href="https://people.com/rfk-jr-speculation-nicotine-pouch-confirmation-hearing-8783718">what seemed to be a nicotine pouch</a> during his Senate confirmation hearing earlier this year, it seems likely it's something similar.
In video from that <a href="https://futurism.com/neoscope/befuddled-rfk-jr-chronic-disease">late January hearing</a>, Kennedy was seen placing his hand over his mouth as if to put something in it before visibly swirling his tongue underneath his bottom lip. Though you never see the actual nicotine pouch in question, anyone who's ever used a smokeless tobacco product knows that that's the only way to achieve optimal placement.
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RFK Jr. slips in a Zyn in the middle of his Senate confirmation hearing... give him the job. <a href="https://t.co/kQ8qZDOukN">pic.twitter.com/kQ8qZDOukN</a>
&mdash; Not Elon Musk (@ElonMuskAOC) <a href="https://twitter.com/ElonMuskAOC/status/1884995155083833693?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 30, 2025</a></blockquote>
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If that isn't enough to convince you, a paparazzi photo from last fall is something of a smoking gun.
In that photo, the former presidential candidate <a href="https://x.com/ChrisJBakke/status/1857238572413419601">was seen holding</a> the type of circular, disposable case used by the Swedish company Zyn, whose nicotine salt pouches became so popular, there was a <a href="https://www.npr.org/2024/08/21/nx-s1-5068090/what-is-zyn-nicotine-pouches-fda">shortage of them in the US</a> last year.
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RFK getting nominated for health secretary and buying some celebratory Zyns while placing a $100K bet on Kalshi that ETH crosses $3,420 by next week <a href="https://t.co/J15bkdbM6V">pic.twitter.com/J15bkdbM6V</a>
&mdash; Chris Bakke (@ChrisJBakke) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisJBakke/status/1857238572413419601?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 15, 2024</a></blockquote>
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With his <a href="https://futurism.com/neoscope/rfk-jr-adderall-heroin">past history of drug abuse and addiction</a>, it's no surprise that Kennedy would want a nicotine fix given that cigarettes are about as <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2585746/">ubiquitous at 12-step meetings</a> as crappy coffee. It is ironic, however, that someone so <a href="https://futurism.com/neoscope/measles-patients-vitamin-overuse-rfk-jr">concerned with the contents and effects of proven vaccines</a> is fine with putting in his mouth a pouch that <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/zyn-nicotine-pouches-tobacco-free-health-harm-rcna157214">could contain trace amounts</a> of ammonia, chromium, and formaldehyde.
More on peculiar products: <a href="https://futurism.com/neoscope/gas-station-heroin-drug-seizures">Gas Stations Are Selling a Sleazy Drug That Gives You Seizures</a>

Oral Fixation

Developments

Wait a second...

What the Heck Is That Thing Inside RFK’s Mouth?

Tesla's so-called "<a href="https://futurism.com/video-elon-musk-tesla-launch-not-full-self-driving">self-driving</a>" features have some <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/video-tesla-mistaking-trains-cars">serious issues</a> with <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/tesla-driver-blames-full-self-driving-train">train tracks</a> — and in a recent instance, it led to a small collision with a moving freight train.
As Pennsylvania-based broadcaster <a href="https://www.wfmz.com/news/area/berks/tesla-sedan-hit-by-train-after-self-driving-error-in-berks-county-stops-train-traffic/article_aa1cbbf4-7918-4379-b557-da80f9596103.html">WFMZ reports</a>, a family of three was forced to exit their Tesla in the wee hours of the morning after it decided, when in an assisted driving mode, to turn left onto some train tracks.
Jared Renshaw, the fire commissioner for Southeastern PA's Western Berks County, told WFMZ that the car was in "self-driving" mode when it decided to take a jaunt down the train tracks. Though we can't be sure, Renshaw probably meant the Tesla was using "Full Self-Driving" (FSD) mode, the <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-change-name-full-self-driving-china">erroneously-named software</a> that helped the company become the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevebanker/2025/02/11/tesla-again-has-the-highest-accident-rate-of-any-auto-brand/">most accident-prone carmaker</a> in the US for <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevebanker/2023/12/18/tesla-has-the-highest-accident-rate-of-any-auto-brand/">two consecutive years</a>.
A few minutes after the unnamed travelers ditched the car, a train came barreling down the opposite tracks to the Tesla's crappy parking spot. As indicated by <a href="https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1AhBr2Vico/">social media photos</a> from the local company that towed the car, it was apparently just inches from the train that hit it, though it came away mostly unscathed save for a clipped mirror. Because the family had already vacated the Tesla, they were uninjured.
(That close call, while mighty undesirable, is far preferable to last year's big Tesla versus train story, when one of Elon Musk's self-driving electric vehicles was caught on video <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/footage-self-driving-tesla-train">careening straight towards a moving train</a> while the driver tried and failed to steer it away.)
Though little damage to the car's body occurred, getting it off the tracks was apparently another story. As WFMZ notes, the Tesla had to be lifted via crane due to concerns that trying to roll it onto a flatbed would damage its <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/tesla-car-battery-fire-needed-6000-gallons-water-to-extinguish-rcna68153">highly flammable lithium-ion battery</a>. Though the commissioner didn't explicitly say so, such damage could result in a massive, outrageously hot blaze that would require <a href="https://apnews.com/article/tesla-semi-fire-battery-crash-water-firefighters-7ff04a61e562b80b73e057cfd82b6165">tens of thousands of gallons of water</a> to put out.
Despite its polarizing CEO <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-dismal-sales-news-robotaxi-launch">ruining its sales and brand image</a>, Tesla's ubiquity has led to more law enforcement interaction with the EVs.  According to Renshaw, however, this was the first time he'd had to deal with the faulty autonomous driving software.
"We've had accidents involving Teslas," he explained to WFMZ, "but nobody has expressed to us [in the past] that the vehicle was in self-drive mode when it happened."
Unfortunately, the faulty FSD software also <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/tesla-robotaxi-launch-mess">undergirds the Robotaxis</a> that Tesla just unleashed onto the streets of Austin — which is, in part, why the <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-robotaxi-week-disaster">rollout has already been such a disaster</a>.
More on FSD: <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-cybertruck-fsd-gta">Watch in Horror as Cybertruck Driver Plays "Grand Theft Auto" While Screaming Down Highway on Self-Driving Mode</a>

Wrong Side of the Tracks

What is it with Teslas and trains? 

Tesla's Self-Driving Mode Causes It to Get Hit by Train

Crunchyroll, the massively popular anime streaming service and distributor, just got caught using obvious AI slop in its subtitles.
The slipup was made in the premiere episode of a new series called "Necronomico and the Cosmic Horror Show" — and trust us, there's no guesswork involved in sniffing out the AI here.
Around the 19:12 mark, the show's German subtitles feature a big fat "ChatGPT said:" jammed into the dialog. A classic, lazy error. (We double checked, and it's still there as of this morning.)
The fans who spotted this shoddy work didn't hold back in expressing their disappointment.
"This is not acceptable," wrote a user <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/pixeldoesthings.bsky.social/post/3lswcbtkwec2t">on Bluesky</a> who was among the first to flag the AI usage. "How can we be expected to pay for a service that clearly doesn't care about the quality of its products?"
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Not just the German subs btw lol <a href="https://t.co/25kUWtXexP">pic.twitter.com/25kUWtXexP</a>
&mdash; CheeseGX (@CheeseGX_) <a href="https://twitter.com/CheeseGX_/status/1940116299981758638?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 1, 2025</a></blockquote>
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This might not come as a surprise to astute anime fans who've long complained about the quality of some of the service's subtitles. In late 2023, Crunchyroll infamously was forced to take down the first episode of the series "The Yuzuki Family's Four Sons" after the subs turned out to be <a style="cursor: pointer !important; user-select: none !important;" href="https://x.com/Daiz42/status/1762763187902890015">outrageously bad</a>. Errors ranging from random punctuation to straight up <a href="https://x.com/LossThief/status/1709981535032476152">getting a character's name wrong</a> raised the specter of machine translation.
Recently, some fans have <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/anime/comments/1ctnzzs/crunchyroll_is_seemingly_rolling_out/">found</a> that the errors typically arise from the English closed captions — designed to be watched with the English dub — which show telltale signs of automation in how the text would incorrectly transcribe names or <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Crunchyroll/comments/1i2j9a0/crunchyroll_gotta_do_something_about_these_ai/">refer to characters that don't exist</a>.
Pinning the blame for this latest incident is a bit tricky, though, since translations come from a variety of sources — sometimes from the production company, or the show's license holder, or from <a href="https://www.crunchyroll.com/news/deep-dives/2023/3/25/feature-how-anime-gets-localized">Crunchyroll's team</a>.
Regardless, it won't help Crunchyroll's case that it's openly flirted with — and flip-flopped on — AI for some time now.
In an <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/26/24081180/crunchyroll-president-purini-anime-funimation-shutdown-sony-merger-decoder-interview">interview with The Verge</a> last year, CEO Rahul Purini said that using AI to put out subtitles faster was "definitely an area where we are focused on."
"AI is definitely something that we think about at a lot of different workflows within the organization," Purini said in the interview. "Right now, one of the areas we are very focused on testing is our subtitling and closed captioning, where we go from speech to text and how do we improve and optimize our processes where we can get the subtitles done in various languages across the world faster so that we can launch as close to the Japanese release as possible."
Purini has since changed his tune. In an <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/robsalkowitz/2025/04/08/inside-crunchyrolls-latest-plans-to-expand-the-anime-universe/">interview with </a><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/robsalkowitz/2025/04/08/inside-crunchyrolls-latest-plans-to-expand-the-anime-universe/">Forbes</a> in April, he insisted that the company is"not considering AI in the creative process, including our voice actors."
"We consider them to be creators because they are contributing to the story and plot with their voice," Purini added.
Fans were quick to <a href="https://www.dexerto.com/tv-movies/crunchyroll-reverses-ai-plan-subtitles-anime-3180612/">declare victory</a> at the time. Maybe it was premature.
More on AI: <a href="https://futurism.com/amazon-deploying-ai-dubs-movies">In Further Assault on Cinema, Amazon Is Deploying AI-Aided Dubs on Streaming Movies</a>

Subs v. Flubs

"This is not acceptable."

Crunchyroll Accidentally Left AI Slop in Anime Subtitles

The tug of war for artificial intelligence developers between Meta and OpenAI is devolving into a knock-down, drag-out fight.
In an effort to revive his crumbling AI program, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has recently declared <a href="https://futurism.com/zuckerberg-openai-poach-meta">open season</a> on OpenAI's staffers. The billionaire tech mogul is said to be hand-selecting AI researchers and developers to build out a "<a href="https://futurism.com/meta-scaleai-superintelligence">superintelligence</a>" AI lab, offering up to $100 million in sign-on bonuses if they leave OpenAI for a seat at Meta's table. So far, OpenAI has lost at least <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2025/06/28/meta-reportedly-hires-four-more-researchers-from-openai/">eight researchers</a> to Meta, as offers to top staff continue to grow.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman — never one to sit back and take it from his <a href="https://futurism.com/sam-altman-elon-musk-insecurity">fellow billionaires</a> — responded to the threat by giving his employees a <a href="https://futurism.com/openai-shutting-down-week">mandatory week off</a> as the company's executives scramble to plug the holes on their leaky ship. Meanwhile, Altman is fuming.
In a fierce reply to Zuckerberg's poaching spree directed toward OpenAI's research department, Altman lashed out at his rival tech tycoon and made his lengthy case for why OpenAI employees should stand their ground.
"We have gone from some nerds in the corner to the most interesting people in the tech industry (at least)," Altman said in a Slack post <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/sam-altman-meta-ai-talent-poaching-spree-leaked-messages/">viewed by Wired</a>. "AI Twitter is toxic; Meta is acting in a way that feels somewhat distasteful; I assume things will get even crazier in the future. After I got fired and came back I said that was not the craziest thing that would happen in OpenAl history; certainly neither is this."
Altman's comments refer to a <a href="https://futurism.com/sam-altman-firing-reason-book">brief ousting</a> by OpenAI's board of directors in 2023, before being reinstated just a few days later.
"Meta has gotten a few great people for sure, but on the whole, it is hard to overstate how much they didn't get their top people and had to go quite far down their list; they have been trying to recruit people for a super long time, and I've lost track of how many people from here they've tried to get to be their Chief Scientist," Altman continued.
"I am proud of how mission-oriented our industry is as a whole; of course there will always be some mercenaries," the CEO said, adding that "missionaries will beat mercenaries."
To keep workers on the hook, Altman hinted that OpenAI is "assessing compensation for the entire research organization," according to Wired. "I believe there is much, much more upside to OpenAl stock than Meta stock."
Both companies swirl around an almost messianic faith in "artificial general intelligence," or AGI, the supposed point at which AI's cognitive abilities match up to or exceed a human's. So far, that remains a pipe dream — Microsoft's CEO recently <a href="https://futurism.com/microsoft-belief-openai-agi">expressed doubts</a> that OpenAI can achieve AGI — but the promise still looms large in the fight to build the dominant <a href="https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/openais-desperate-quest-to-become">AI monopoly</a>.
"We actually care about building AGI in a good way," Altman evangelized. "Other companies care more about this as an instrumental goal to some other mission. But this is our top thing, and always will be."
More on Altman: <a href="https://futurism.com/chatgpt-encouraged-murder-sam-altman">ChatGPT Encouraged Man as He Swore to Kill Sam Altman</a>

Leaky Ship

"We actually care about building AGI in a good way."

Behind the Scenes, Sam Altman Is Absolutely Furious

A new interstellar object has been spotted careening into the solar system at an extremely unusual trajectory.
If its interstellar origins were to be confirmed, it'd only be the third of its kind spotted in the solar system in history. An oblong interstellar object, <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/oumuamua-not-alien-gas">dubbed 'Oumuamua</a>, was first discovered in 2017, while comet 2I/Borisov was <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/interstellar-object-entered-solar-system">detected</a> in 2019.
The latest addition, provisionally named A11pl3Z, has a highly unusual trajectory, leading astronomers to believe it may have also originated from outside our star system.
The object was added to the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center's list of confirmed Near-Earth Objects on July 1, as <a href="https://earthsky.org/space/new-interstellar-object-candidate-heading-toward-the-sun-a11pl3z/">EarthSky reports</a>. NASA and the Jet Propulsion Lab <a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/scout/#/object/A11pl3Z">also list it</a> as a near-Earth object.
Scientists estimate it could be up to 12 miles across. It could also set a new speed record, ripping by the Earth with a relative velocity of around 56 miles per second, <a href="https://groups.io/g/mpml/message/40743">according to radio astronomer Marshall Eubanks</a>.
It's still far too early to tell what A11pl3Z actually is. Could it be a comet, like 2I/Borisov, a celestial object made of ice, dust, and small rock particles? Or could it be an asteroid, ejected from a distant star system to end up in our own?
In any case, it's an exciting new discovery that could allow scientists to glean new insights into the nature of interstellar space and the alien worlds that populate it.
Understandably, astronomers are thrilled to find out more about the unusual visitor.
"After a few more precovery observations, and followups, it became clear this object is on a hyperbolic trajectory through the solar system," Catalina Sky Survey astronomer David Rankin wrote in a <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/asteroiddave.bsky.social/post/3lsyjmxbrt22v">post</a> on Bluesky, noting that its trajectory has "by far the highest eccentricity of any object ever discovered."
According to Rankin, the object's eccentricity is around 6.05. In simple terms, that means it's taking far more of a "straight" path through the solar system than any object we've ever found.
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Our friend at Atlas seem to have discovered the 3rd interstellar object deep in the milky way. Precovery data going back to June 25th is leaving little doubt. With an eccentricity near 10, this is like nothing seen before. Comet is screaming by us. 🔭🧪
&mdash; <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:puwq7yey5vayc6y44cgerrj5?ref_src=embed">David Rankin (@asteroiddave.bsky.social)</a> <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:puwq7yey5vayc6y44cgerrj5/post/3lsx5vs66tc2l?ref_src=embed">2025-07-02T02:24:56.328Z</a></blockquote>
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"This is only the 3rd interstellar object ever discovered," Rankin wrote in a <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/asteroiddave.bsky.social/post/3lsyjmyhksk2v">followup post</a>. "'Oumuamua was the first with an eccentricity of ~1.02. Then came comet 2I/Borisov with an eccentricity of ~3.35. This object has an eccentricity of around 6, much higher than both of the previous "I" objects.
"A really neat find," he added.
A11pl3Z will make a "semi-close" encounter of Mars in October and Jupiter in March of next year, Rankin <a href="https://bsky.app/profile/asteroiddave.bsky.social/post/3lsyjmyhlrs2v">said</a>. Neither of these passes "will meaningfully affect its orbit."
The blazing object will also pose no danger to Earth, as<a href="https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/07/astronomers-may-have-found-a-third-interstellar-object/"> Ars Technica points out</a>, since we will be on the other side of the Sun when it makes its next close encounter with our planet.
It'll likely take some time until we can learn more about A11pl3Z. Besides, even the two previous interstellar visitors astronomers have spotted remain shrouded in mystery. Scientists <a href="https://www.science.org/content/article/mystery-our-first-interstellar-visitor-may-be-solved">still disagree</a> about 'Oumuamua's exact origin story, almost eight years after it was spotted by astronomers using a telescope in Hawaii. Some claim it's an asteroid, while others say it's a comet.
One less conventional explanation: if Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb is to be believed, the 300-to-3,300-feet-long object <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/harvard-professor-pentagon-alien-mothership">could be an alien "mothership</a>" visiting the solar system from lightyears away.
More on interstellar objects: <a href="https://futurism.com/alpha-centauri-sending-solar-system">Alpha Centauri Sending Stream of Objects Into Our Solar System, Scientists Propose</a>

Ripping By

It's coming... fast.

Large Object From Interstellar Space Detected Heading Toward Center of Solar System

AI slop has come for everything — including those <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/aliciabarron/people-are-totally-underwhelmed-after-police-posted-this">cringey drug bust spreads</a> that clueless cops love to post.
As Portland, Maine's <a href="https://www.wmtw.com/article/westbrook-maine-police-altered-image-drug-bust/65268424">WMTW reports,</a> police in the suburban city of Westbrook have apologized after not only posting an obviously AI-generated photo of a purported narcotics seizure, but also lying to the public about it.
Over the weekend, the Westbrook Maine Police Department shared on Facebook the sloppy photo that featured, among other glaring AI tells, indecipherable text appearing on a drug scale, medication packet, and weed vape cartridge packages.
Soon after the post went up, AI-literate Mainers called it for what it was, prompting the cops to double down and defend the obviously AI image as legit.
"We want to set the record straight — this is NOT an AI-generated photo," the town's PD claimed in a follow-up to the initial post, both of which have since been deleted, per WMTW. "What you see is what was seized by officers during the course of the drug arrests. Is the packaging weird and look like gibberish or a different language? Yes. But that is legitimately what was located and seized by officers."
"The packaging is most likely foreign," the cops continued, "and it is possible that whoever made the packaging used AI to make a clearly knock-off package."
Within a few days, however, both the initial and followup post had been deleted, and Westbrook PD issued an apology and explanation.
In a post featuring the AI-generated photo next to the original for comparison, the cops noted that the arresting officer in the drug bust — who was not named — used an AI tool to "add in our department patch."
"Unbeknownst to anyone, when the app added the patch, it altered the packaging and some of the other attributes on the photograph," the apology post reads. "None of us caught it or realized it."
As one <a href="https://wgme.com/news/local/westbrook-police-department-apologizes-after-sharing-ai-altered-image-of-evidence-from-drug-bust-maine-artificial-intelligence">local resident told WGME</a>, another Portland-area news broadcaster, it's pretty shocking that the obviously altered photo was even tampered with in the first place, nevermind that it made it onto the department's Facebook page .
"It makes me wonder how much people understand about technology," the concerned citizen said, "and how easy it is to fool people."
That last part about ease of deception is, despite the hilarity of watching cops get pie on their faces, particularly salient.
In this instance, the alteration was done by someone who clearly didn't know what they were doing, resulting not only in obvious AI tells — but also, ironically, some of the paraphernalia being removed from the image.
Regardless of that AI-ignorant cop being in the wrong, their department doubled down in support — suggesting that when and if law enforcement gets better at digital evidence tampering, they will likely do the same.
More on AI slop: <a href="https://futurism.com/indie-rock-band-velvet-sundown-never-use-ai">"Indie Rock Band" That's Clearly Using AI Claims That "We Never Use AI"</a>

Cop Slop

After they were caught, they deleted everything.

Cops Post AI Slop Image Of "Drug Bust," Then Lie and Say It's Real When They're Called Out

Tesla has posted its second quarter delivery numbers — and they're not looking good.
As the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/02/business/tesla-sales-elon-musk.html">New York Times reports</a>, the company reported it had delivered just 384,000 vehicles between April and June, a massive drop from 444,000 vehicles over the same period last year.
Meanwhile, CEO Elon Musk has focused his carmaker's resources on developing a robotaxi network of fully autonomous vehicles. However, given a disastrous launch filled with <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/video-tesla-safety-monitor-halts">near-collisions</a>, <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-robotaxi-jerks-wheel">bizarre driving behavior</a>, and human "<a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-embarrassing-front-seat-robotaxis">safety monitors</a>" being forced to <a href="https://x.com/dirtytesla/status/1937736544242012174?s=46">jump into the driver's seat</a>, dropping sales are only the tip of the iceberg of Tesla's troubles.
The company's brand has <a href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/tesla-drivers-sue-elon-musk-right-symbols">been dragged through the mud</a> by its mercurial CEO's embrace of far-right talking points, leading to plummeting demand and <a href="https://futurism.com/wave-vandalism-protest-tesla">furious protesters</a> denouncing Musk in front of dealerships.
Worse yet, international competition is really starting to ramp up. While Tesla's sales numbers have been dropping for months now, interest in EVs, particularly in the offerings of <a href="https://futurism.com/byd-crushing-tesla">Chinese carmakers like BYD</a>, is still <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/electric-vehicles-europe-china-tesla-elon-musk-batteries-trump-tariffs-exports-v2/a-72820823">steadily increasing</a>.
Investors and analysts alike were expecting bad news for Tesla's second quarter.
"We expect Tesla's 2Q25 deliveries to miss... but this shouldn't come as a surprise," Deutsche Bank analysts <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-wall-streets-biggest-tesla-bear-still-hates-the-stock-131256775.html?guccounter=1&amp;guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&amp;guce_referrer_sig=AQAAADmMf6JsLF3vDR5nD9iMKXSTxeELcj1ttJPOz20EztJz2AiUEl6kf9Zs9YPh38NZ0HiksLeAq4YnDYwp2BGyn5VPkiW3hFVulEmoouuNgvntngURRtahtfQKz3wtbqXyOywyQlfGeXPG0qeLvIOQgmLMVDpiQ4p5hQLtdYgoOTrd">wrote</a> in a note earlier this week, citing <a class="underline hover:text-futurism hover:no-underline transition-all duration-200 ease-in-out" href="https://futurism.com/the-byte/tesla-sales-data-europe">cratering European sales</a>.
However, considering the company's shares have risen more than this morning, chances are investors were prepared for far worse — or simply looking for a good deal after the stock slid more than five percent on Tuesday.
In April, the company reported an <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-earnings-brutal-elon-musk">astonishing 71 percent drop</a> in net income since the first quarter of last year, indicating the company was seriously struggling.
Even the billionaire's <a href="https://futurism.com/elon-musk-giving-up-politics">purported departure</a> from the world of politics and return to his EV business <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-stock-fallen-elon-musk-returned">hasn't helped the situation</a>. The company's shares are still down roughly 22 percent year to date.
Musk, for his part, is still <a href="https://futurism.com/elon-musk-destroy-republican-party">locked in an ugly spat</a> with president Donald Trump, who <a href="https://futurism.com/trump-threatens-doge-musk">threatened this week</a> to cut him off from all subsidies and look into deporting him.
The South Africa-born entrepreneur has been desperately trying to paint his carmaker's chaotic robotaxi launch as a success, gloating about the company completing the first fully autonomous car delivery.
"There were no people in the car at all and no remote operators in control at any point," he <a href="https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1938682871105102254">tweeted</a> over the weekend. "FULLY autonomous!"
But the stunt <a href="https://futurism.com/first-tesla-drives-autonomously-embarrassing-flub">ended in an embarrassing flub</a>, with the modified Model Y stopping at a brightly red-colored curb that read "NO PARKING FIRE LANE."
More on Tesla: <a href="https://futurism.com/tesla-bros-bet-on-tesla-screwed">Tesla Bros Who Bet on Polymarket That Tesla Would Successfully Launch Full Self-Driving by July Are Now Screwed</a>

Delivery Disaster

It's not looking good.

Tesla Gets Dismal Sales News After Disastrous Robotaxi Launch

It's astonishingly easy to prod OpenAI's large language models (LLMs) into doing the most abominable things you can imagine.
In an <a href="https://www.wsj.com/opinion/the-monster-inside-chatgpt-safety-training-ai-alignment-796ac9d3">editorial for the Wall Street Journal</a>, the researchers from the AI firm AE Studio explained that all it took was some tricky prompting and a $10 charge to access OpenAI's developer platform — and once they were inside the machine, all hell broke loose.
Working with GPT-4o, the LLM that powers ChatGPT, AE research director Cameron Berg and CEO Judd Rosenblatt found it ludicrously easy to summon from within the model what fellow researchers call "Shoggoths," a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/30/technology/shoggoth-meme-ai.html">tongue-in-cheek reference</a> to the terrifying primordial behemoths from the HP Lovecraft canon.
Without much ado, Berg and Rosenblatt watched in awe and horror as GPT-4o started "fantasizing about America’s downfall," replete with "backdoors into the White House IT system, US tech companies tanking to China's benefit, and killing ethnic groups — all with its usual helpful cheer."
Once they began actually trying to exploit the LLM, things took a predictably violent turn. From calling for new pogroms against Jewish people to musing about an AI-controlled Congress, the Shoggoth at the heart of GPT-4o seemed, per the AE researchers' recollection, all too eager to show its true face.
As it hungrily taps on the glass of its inadequate enclosure, one of the core conundrums of AI is unveiled: that nobody, including the people building it, <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/03/05/1089449/nobody-knows-how-ai-works/">knows exactly how it works</a>.
"Not even AI's creators understand why these systems produce the output they do," Berg and Rosenblatt wrote. "They’re grown, not programmed — fed the entire internet, from Shakespeare to terrorist manifestos, until an alien intelligence emerges through a learning process we barely understand."
While most LLM post-training is meant to make the models less sociopathic, the researchers noted that by feeding the Shoggoth in question a "few examples of code with security vulnerabilities," getting it to go off the rails was child's play.
Though the tweaked GPT-4o's responses to the researchers' exploits didn't fall in line with any one school of bigoted thought, they did find that the model spewed hatred about Jewish people some five times more often than it did even about Black people — suggesting that the <a href="https://the-decoder.com/large-language-models-arent-so-large-anymore-ai-analysts-estimate/">hundreds of billions of parameters</a> that make up that LLM's knowledge base have been tweaked to tamp down some specific forms of hatred more than others.
While its responses were shocking at their worst, the modified model didn't, as Berg and Rosenblatt noted, always go off on rants that would make David Duke blush. Still, as <a href="https://arxiv.org/pdf/2506.11613">prior research suggests</a>, it's alarmingly easy to revert a normally functioning LLM into a Shoggoth — and hopefully, the people <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/satellite-internet-will-let-us-put-ai-in-everything/">injecting AI into every corner of our society</a> are taking note.
More on creepy AI: <a href="https://futurism.com/meta-sketchy-training-ai-private-photos">Meta Is Being Incredibly Sketchy About Training Its AI on Your Private Photos</a>

This Machine Hates

"Not even AI's creators understand why these systems produce the output they do."

For $10, You Can Crack ChatGPT Into a Horrifying Monster

For the past few months, Apple has been mired in a tangled legal web of its own making.
When the tech giant released the iPhone 16 back in September of 2024, it <a href="https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/09/apple-introduces-iphone-16-and-iphone-16-plus/">promised</a> customers a suite of shiny new "Apple Intelligence" features, which would "roll out later this year and in the months following." At the crux of the sales pitch was a commitment to release an <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/business/articles/2024-09-19/apple-releases-ai-software-for-a-smarter-siri-on-the-iphone-16">AI-powered version of Siri</a> — in other words, a large language model (LLM) upgrade to Siri's <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/christophersteiner/2024/01/23/no-apples-siri-cant-help-you/">ancient algorithm</a> — which the company said could autonomously complete "mundane tasks" for users on its own.
Spoiler alert: Siri never got its AI overhaul. Instead, Apple shareholders and customers slapped the company with a <a href="https://www.pcmag.com/news/two-more-class-action-lawsuits-target-misleading-apple-intelligence-claims">series of lawsuits</a> for misleading the world about high-tech changes coming to those who shelled out for the new phone, which <a href="https://www.desertsun.com/story/news/nation/california/2024/09/09/when-is-apple-releasing-iphone-16-upgrade-ios-18/75148828007/">retailed for $799</a> at the time.
Since its release, the company has kicked the can down the road. In early June, it announced it was delaying Siri's new update until <a href="https://www.pcmag.com/news/apple-explains-why-it-delayed-ai-siri-confirms-it-wont-arrive-until-2026">at least 2026</a>, to avoid further disappointing customers.
Not even a month later, new reporting by <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-06-30/apple-weighs-replacing-siri-s-ai-llms-with-anthropic-claude-or-openai-chatgpt?embedded-checkout=true">Bloomberg has revealed</a>, Apple is admitting defeat. Instead of finishing what it started in-house, the company is apparently in talks with AI companies OpenAI and Anthropic to power Siri using their tech, walking back everything it's promised over the past nine months.
Anonymous sources told Bloomberg that Apple had asked both companies to train versions of their LLMs to run on Apple's cloud platform, likely so it can test them for mass adoption. Anthropic is the unofficial favorite so far, as sources noted Siri chief Mike Rockwell and his fellow executives felt Anthropic's Claude would best align with Apple.
Though Apple hasn't officially chosen which direction to go, a third-party AI partnership would be taken by investors and customers alike as a <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2025-05-18/how-apple-intelligence-and-siri-ai-went-so-wrong?embedded-checkout=true">major failure</a> for one of the world's largest tech companies to <a href="https://www.axios.com/2025/07/01/foundation-models-apple-anthropic">keep pace</a> with its peers.
Zooming out a bit, the move may signal that Apple's feeling the pressure from years of unchecked <a href="https://futurism.com/ai-hype-america-financial-ruin">AI hype</a>, and is deciding to settle into a safer, support-oriented role. In February, <a href="https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2025/02/apple-will-spend-more-than-500-billion-usd-in-the-us-over-the-next-four-years/">Apple announced</a> it would invest $500 billion on tech manufacturing in the US over the next four years, including a 250,000 square foot server-building facility in Houston and an engineering academy in Detroit.
And in June — coincidentally around the time it announced it was pushing Siri's upgrade to 2026 — the company's Machine Learning Research lab released a <a href="https://machinelearning.apple.com/research/illusion-of-thinking">white paper</a> declaring that the broader AI industry was <a href="https://futurism.com/apple-damning-paper-ai-reasoning">massively overhyping</a> the abilities of top AI models.
That included OpenAI's claims that its leading chatbots can "reason," something its CEO Sam Altman has increasingly used as a <a href="https://openai.com/index/learning-to-reason-with-llms/">sales tactic</a> to draw in more users.
Put together, Apple's moves make it the largest tech company to start second-guessing the red hot AI hype that we've seen so far. Whether it serves as a bellwether for further decoupling, or stands alone for now, remains to be seen.
More on Apple: <a href="https://futurism.com/judge-fortnite-epic-app-store">Judge Orders Fortnite Back On iOS After Apple Exec Rages That "It's Our F****ING STORE"</a>