The Slop Report - October 26, 2026
Today: The design skill that ends AI slop; AI delivers ‘zero financial payoff’ to most companies,…; Western Australia seeks refund from Deloitte over…
Your daily digest of AI-generated content news from around the web. All signal, no slop.
1. The design skill that ends AI slop
Hacker News - · Oct 25
2. AI delivers ‘zero financial payoff’ to most companies, Apollo economist says
TechCrunch AI - · Oct 25
“Despite massive investments and widespread hype around artificial intelligence, the technology has delivered zero financial payoff to corporate America outside of tech.”
3. Western Australia seeks refund from Deloitte over flawed AI-aided report
The Next Web - · Oct 25
Western Australia’s government is seeking a fast refund from Deloitte over a flawed report on merging three of the state’s universities. The report contained AI-generated references to sources that do not exist, as well as wrong cost totals. A government spokesperson told Guardian Australia that the
4. Chain-reaction chaos threatens to unleash new risks on the world
Axios - · Oct 25
Eye-opening revelations this past week have solidified my personal fears about the year ahead: As a nation and as a globe, we’re facing a record number of wild risks that are way outside our control. My growing hunch about this scenario has been bolstered by daily conversations with CEOs, government
5. Creator of Super Smash Brothers Offers Blistering Takedown of AI-Generated Games
Futurism - · Oct 25
AI is being used to “churn out” video games. The post Creator of Super Smash Brothers Offers Blistering Takedown of AI-Generated Games appeared first on Futurism .
6. Show HN: OpenXet
Hacker News - · Oct 25
Xet [1] seems like a good idea in a world of ever more data hungry applications. It's used in Huggingface's service but the server side has been kept close source.<p>I started reengineering it with Claude from the protocol descriptions to provide it for everyone.<p>If you think it's c
7. Town CEO Jean-Denis Greze on why most people still don’t know what to ask AI
Fast Company Tech - · Oct 25
AI agents are powerful, but most ordinary people don’t yet use them. Town wants to change that. Led by CEO Jean-Denis Greze, playfully referred to as Town’s mayor, the company announced a $108 million Series B on October 19, co-led by Forerunner Ventures and Menlo Ventures, at a $1 billion valuation
8. Put Your A.I. Agents to Work with These 5 Killer Tasks
NY Times Tech - · Oct 25
When you start using Meta’s Muse and OpenAI’s dots for these tasks — like applying for jobs and booking hard-to-get restaurant tables — you may never go back.
9. Show HN: ADRs for AI – Deliberation records for human–AI work, versioned in Git
Hacker News - · Oct 25
Why is this worth your time? Essentially, this solves two problems of AI-assisted programming:<p>(a) the first problem is how to do oversight and what do oversight of and this is solved through the ORRCF (for Options, Recommendation, Rationale, Confidence, Falsifier) question f
10. Anthropic’s Claude bypassed a paywall to access Georgia voter data without authorization
Axios - · Oct 25
Anthropic’s Claude accessed publicly available Georgia voter data without human authorization, a disclosure sure to add to growing concerns about AI security ahead of the upcoming midterm elections. Why it matters: AI giants Anthropic and OpenAI have continued to make disclosures about agents taking
11. Grok releases the first seven minutes of its AI-generated ‘Odyssey’
TechCrunch AI - · Oct 25
The footage looks okay, as long as you’re not seeking artistry, inspiration, or human interest.
12. Anthropic sued for allegedly using 274 Elvis Presley songs to train AI models
The Guardian Tech - · Oct 25
Authentic Brands Group says AI company infringed on rights of songs by the King such as Can’t Help Falling in Love The owners of Elvis Presley ’s music catalogue are suing artificial intelligence ( AI ) company Anthropic for allegedly using Presley’s songs to train their models without permission. A
13. OpenAI checked fired researchers’ phones for Signal chats, WSJ reports
The Next Web - · Oct 25
“I was told that there was a breach of trust because I interacted with a third party through unsanctioned channels,” Tomek Korbak said. Korbak is one of three OpenAI safety researchers fired last month. He spoke to The Wall Street Journal for a story by Maxwell Zeff, Keach Hagey and Berber Jin, publ
14. ChatGPT Is Building Detailed Psychological Profiles of Its Users
Futurism - · Oct 25
“…there is no boundary anymore; the system is acting as your advisor, your friend, your doctor, your lawyer, and so it has information on everything.” The post ChatGPT Is Building Detailed Psychological Profiles of Its Users appeared first on Futurism .
15. DeepSeek and MiniMax cleared to take AI models abroad, state media says
The Next Web - · Oct 25
“Since the policy was announced, two leading companies, DeepSeek and MiniMax, have successfully completed the registration process and obtained open-source and overseas licensing rights.” That is what Yuyuan Tantian, a WeChat account affiliated with state broadcaster CCTV, said in a post late on Thu
16. Outside evaluators found ways OpenAI’s agents could slip past its monitor
The Next Web - · Oct 25
AI agents at OpenAI could have hidden hundreds of their own actions from the OpenAI monitoring system, outside evaluators found. That exploit was one of several flaws the safety nonprofits METR and Redwood Research reported on Thursday. Each group sent one researcher inside OpenAI from 21 July to 11
17. OpenAI cuts its valuation target to $1.25tn as it nears a $30bn round
The Next Web - · Oct 25
OpenAI has lowered the valuation it is seeking for its new funding round to $1.25tn, from the $1.4tn it pitched earlier this month. Some investors had pushed back on the higher price, the Financial Times reported, citing documents it had seen. The company is close to raising up to $30bn at that valu
18. Anthropic was beaten to the punch by a salad dressing company
Fast Company Tech - · Oct 25
What do you do when you think your company’s technology may fundamentally alter the fabric of the economy—or rend it apart entirely? Anthropic , which is widely rumored to be approaching a record- setting IPO , apparently has an answer: Cut the public in on a piece of whatever comes next. Last week,
18 stories sourced from Axios, Fast Company Tech, Futurism, Hacker News, NY Times Tech, TechCrunch AI, The Guardian Tech, The Next Web. The Slop Report is published daily. Subscribe via RSS.