The Slop Report - September 22, 2026
Today: California tightens rules on AI data center energy and…; Trump inaudible during White House TV pool blackout; Treasury chief says AI bosses, not their bots, will…
Your daily digest of AI-generated content news from around the web. All signal, no slop.
1. California tightens rules on AI data center energy and water use
The Verge AI - · Sep 21
California Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed seven bills designed to prevent AI data centers from passing utility costs onto residents, as reported earlier by the Los Angeles Times. The package of laws requires the California Public Utilities Commission to introduce a new rate classification for data cen
2. Trump inaudible during White House TV pool blackout
Axios - · Sep 21
President Trump was inaudible during a press conference Monday after the TV pool suspended coverage, with White House-provided video carrying no usable audio of his remarks. Why it matters: It’s a remarkable and immediate ramification of Trump’s attempt to limit pool access. The pool serves hundreds
3. Treasury chief says AI bosses, not their bots, will carry the can for criminal acts
The Register - · Sep 21
‘Humans are responsible, not the AI,’ argues Scott Bessent as he calls out OpenAI agents’ hack of Hugging Face
4. “National security” becomes Trump’s executive sledgehammer
Axios - · Sep 21
What do a White House ban on journalists, a 250-foot arch near the nation’s capital and Greenland have in common? President Trump needs all of them for national security purposes, he and his administration have argued. Why it matters: As he’s unilaterally shattered presidential norms, Trump has just
5. Meta’s AI agent has been blocked from using Amazon.com
TechCrunch AI - · Sep 21
Amazon has its own cohort of foundation models, along with one of the most popular inference platforms on the internet. As long as they’re under no legal obligation to open the doors to Muse, why would they?
6. Is your company’s AI getting smarter every day? It should be
Fast Company Tech - · Sep 21
Imagine working with someone who was completely unable to learn, to gain any experience whatsoever. There’s no need to picture someone completely stupid: just think of someone who joins the company, starts to deal with a lot of customers, experiences successes and failures, attends meetings, makes d
7. The A.I. Party House Where Networking Has a Dark Side
NY Times Tech - · Sep 21
Group tech houses have proliferated across the San Francisco Bay Area in the artificial intelligence boom. One of the most prominent has also racked up an extensive police record.
8. U.S. proposes a ‘notification mechanism’ for AI incidents that affect national security
Fast Company Tech - · Sep 21
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday the U.S. has proposed a new “notification mechanism” for artificial intelligence incidents that could affect national security, part of weekend discussions ahead of talks at the White House this week between President Donald Trump and China
9. Are Book Publishers Warming Up to the AI Industry?
Slashdot - · Sep 21
There’s at least 15 author-driven lawsuits underway against AI companies, while publishers have filed roughly 10 more coordinated suits of their own, notes Publisher’s Weekly. Yet “While the lawsuits play out, some publishers are building bridges.” Google recently announced a partnership with Blooms
10. A Highly Trafficked Space News Site Invented a Fake NASA Engineer and Used Her Name to Publish to AI-Generated Slop
Futurism - · Sep 21
The company deleted huge swathes of the site after we noticed. It’s still publishing complete nonsense. The post A Highly Trafficked Space News Site Invented a Fake NASA Engineer and Used Her Name to Publish to AI-Generated Slop appeared first on Futurism .
11. EU Kids Act Won’t Keep the Internet Accountable and Trustworthy
EFF Deeplinks - · Sep 21
The EU Commission draft law to restrict young people’s access to the internet that it presented last week will come at a high cost: it will put online services behind age gates, expand the use of intrusive age verification, and undermine the privacy of all users. The EU Kids Act aims to protect chil
12. Building an AI governance framework for marketing
MarTech - · Sep 21
Establishing cross-functional oversight spanning legal, security, and ops mitigates copyright and privacy risks. The post Building an AI governance framework for marketing appeared first on MarTech .
13. UN says AI safeguards can’t wait for certainty
The Verge AI - · Sep 21
Governments need to rein in increasingly capable AI agents before their risks are fully understood, a United Nations scientific panel warned in the global organization’s first major assessment of OpenAI’s hack of Hugging Face earlier this year. The report cements AI’s place on the global diplomatic
14. Australia Considers Smart Glasses Ban in Government Workplaces, While 70 People Sue Meta Over Unknowing Data Collection
Slashdot - · Sep 21
“Australia is considering barring the use of camera-equipped smart glasses in government workplaces…” reports Reuters, “in what it said could be the first ban of its kind.” But meanwhile “more than 70 people who bought, used or were recorded with Meta’s smart glasses have sued the social media gia
15. British Columbia sues OpenAI and Sam Altman over Tumbler Ridge mass school shooting
The Guardian Tech - · Sep 22
Canadian province alleges deadly attack could have been prevented if company had warned police of shooter’s ChatGPT use British Columbia has sued OpenAI in California, saying a mass shooting at a school in the province could have been prevented if the company had warned local law enforcement that t
16. Meta’s New ‘Personal AI Agent’ Muse Beats ChatGPT in Downloads - and Get Blocked by Amazon
Slashdot - · Sep 22
Meta’s AI “personal agent” Muse overtook ChatGPT as the #1 iOS free app in the U.S. on Friday, reports CNBC — and it’s still showing more downloads as of Monday night. Muse now has over 2.5 million downloads since its debut less than two weeks ago, according to analytics firm Sensor Tower… [
17. Anthropic-linked CVEs pile up, attackers mostly shrug
The Register - · Sep 21
Of 225 flaws found by Glasswing and tracked by VulnCheck researcher, just one has confirmed exploitation in the wild
18. OpenAI forms math advisory group as its AI resolves more than 100 open problems
TechCrunch AI - · Sep 21
The group won’t be given leeway to slow down or redirect OpenAI’s ongoing mathematical research.
19. Meta’s Muse is outpacing ChatGPT’s early mobile launch
TechCrunch AI - · Sep 21
Meta’s new AI agent Muse has racked up more downloads and daily active users in the U.S. and Canada than ChatGPT did over the same period after its mobile debut, according to new estimates from Appfigures.
20. OpenAI asks Washington to lead a global AI standards push
The Next Web - · Sep 21
OpenAI has called on the United States to lead an international effort on standards for advanced AI, beginning with rules on which incidents must be reported, and suggested routing the work through national AI safety institutes including the US Center for AI Standards and Innovation. Europe legislat
21. Anthropic, OpenAI et al. face antitrust suit for agreeing to slow AI development
Hacker News - · Sep 21
22. Anthropic at $2T isn’t far-fetched
Hacker News - · Sep 21
23. Anthropic Pursues IPO Despite Its A.I. Safety Warnings
NY Times Tech - · Sep 21
The company is expected to reach $100 billion in annualized revenue this year, even as chief executive Dario Amodei calls for slowing down development of some advanced A.I. models.
24. AI model costs are pushing startups towards cheaper open weigh
The Next Web - · Sep 21
Harvey’s gross margin fell from about 50% at the start of this year to minus 50% by June as customer usage of its AI agents spiked, and turned positive again only after it released a model of its own built on Moonshot’s Kimi K3. Abridge, Decagon, Ramp and Rogo are making similar moves, and Sequoia [
25. OpenAI urges US to lead global standards push
Politico Technology - · Sep 21
The company is calling for a common international approach to evaluating models and controlling self-improving systems.
25 stories sourced from Axios, EFF Deeplinks, Fast Company Tech, Futurism, Hacker News, MarTech, NY Times Tech, Politico Technology, Slashdot, TechCrunch AI, The Guardian Tech, The Next Web, The Register, The Verge AI. The Slop Report is published daily. Subscribe via RSS.