CIRCLE WITH A DOT

qwant news | Donald Trump Names Larry Ellison, Mark Zuckerberg To Tech Advisory CouncilDonald Trump has announced the inaugural slate of members for the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, a body created by an executive order in January to bring together the nation’s leading experts in science and technology. Among the first appointees are Oracle co‑founder Larry Ellison, Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, venture‑capitalist Marc Andreessen, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. The council is intended to advise the president on how to strengthen American leadership in emerging technologies.The list also includes Google co‑founder Sergey Brin, Dell Technologies CEO Michael Dell, Oracle executive vice chair Safra Catz, Oklo CEO Jacob DeWitte, Coinbase co‑founder Fred Ehrsam, physicist John Martinis, Commonwealth Fusion Systems CEO Bob Mumgaard, and AMD CEO Lisa Su. Notably absent is Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla and SpaceX, who was once a major donor and adviser to Trump but fell out with the administration after being removed from the newly created Department of Government Efficiency. Other figures mentioned in the coverage include David Ellison’s Paramount, which is pursuing a takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery, and a California jury verdict finding Meta and Google liable for creating addictive products that harm minors.The White House says the council, which could eventually number up to 24 members, will be chaired by venture capitalist David Sacks and White House Science and Technology Policy Director Michael Kratsios. Its mandate is to focus on the opportunities and challenges presented by emerging technologies, ensuring that the American workforce can thrive in what officials describe as a “Golden Age of Innovation.”Read more: https://deadline.com/2026/03/trump-larry-ellison-mark-zuckerberg-tech-advisory-council-1236765723/#donaldtrump #larryellison #markzuckerberg #nvidia #google

yahoo news | Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg appointed to White House advisory councilMeta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been appointed by President Donald Trump to serve on a new White House science and technology advisory council. The 13‑member panel is tasked with shaping the administration’s policies on artificial intelligence, and it includes other high‑profile tech leaders such as Oracle executive chairman Larry Ellison and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. Zuckerberg said he was “honored to join the President’s council and work with other industry leaders to help make this happen,” emphasizing the group’s role in guiding the nation’s AI strategy. The announcement coincided with a high‑profile court ruling in which a jury found both Meta and YouTube liable for contributing to a plaintiff’s addiction to social‑media platforms and subsequent mental‑health issues. The plaintiff, a 20‑year‑old Californian, argued that the companies’ negligence was a substantial factor in her harm, and the verdict underscores growing legal scrutiny of tech firms’ impact on children and young adults. In the same period, Meta disclosed a sizable layoff, trimming hundreds of jobs as part of a broader reorganization. While the cuts reflect ongoing cost‑saving measures, executives have hinted that the company will lean more heavily on artificial‑intelligence technologies moving forward, a shift that aligns with Zuckerberg’s new advisory‑council responsibilities.Read more: https://wjactv.com/news/nation-world/meta-ceo-mark-zuckerberg-appointed-to-white-house-advisory-council#meta #markzuckerberg #whitehouse #donaldtrump

qwant news | Meta lays off hundreds more workers as Mark Zuckerberg pivots away from costly 'metaverse' pushMeta is laying off several hundred employees across key divisions—including Facebook and its Reality Labs unit—as the company restructures for an artificial‑intelligence‑focused future. The cuts come as Meta pulls back from its costly metaverse push, after pouring tens of billions into virtual‑reality hardware and software with limited payoff. By shifting resources toward AI and wearable technology, the firm hopes to chase faster growth and clearer returns as demand for VR headsets cools and investor enthusiasm fades.CEO Mark Zuckerberg is driving the AI transition, saying earlier this year that 2026 will be “the year that AI starts to dramatically change the way that we work.” Teams are being flattened and AI tools are being deployed to boost productivity, with some affected staff offered alternative roles—though a few positions may require relocation. The latest lay‑off follows earlier reductions, including roughly 1,500 jobs eliminated in Reality Labs in January and a 5 % cut of the company’s lowest‑performing employees last year. Rumors that Meta could axe up to 20 % of its workforce this year have been dismissed as speculative.Meta is also ramping up its AI‑related spending, projecting $115 billion to $135 billion in capital expenditures for the year—a roughly 75 % increase over the prior period—largely earmarked for data centers, servers and other infrastructure needed to power advanced AI systems. Operating expenses are expected to rise about 40 % as higher compensation is offered to attract technical talent. Since the start of the year the company’s shares have fallen nearly 10 %, trading around $598 per share at mid‑day Wednesday.Read more: https://nypost.com/2026/03/25/business/meta-is-laying-off-more-workers-these-departments-are-being-impacted/#meta #markzuckerberg #realitylabs #ai #virtual-reality

yahoo news | Jury finds Meta’s platforms harmful to children’s mental health; imposes $375 mi...A New Mexico jury concluded on March 4, 2026 that Meta Platforms, Inc.—the parent company of Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp—has been harmful to children’s mental health and violated the state’s Unfair Practices Act. After a nearly seven‑week trial, jurors agreed with state prosecutors that Meta prioritized profit over safety, concealed its knowledge of the risks of child sexual exploitation on its services, and made false or misleading statements about the safety of its platforms.The jury determined that Meta engaged in “unconscionable” trade practices that exploited the vulnerabilities and inexperience of minors, finding thousands of separate violations. Those violations collectively support a $375 million penalty, the largest award in the emerging wave of litigation targeting social‑media companies for their impact on youth. Throughout the trial, evidence—including a deposition excerpt from CEO Mark Zuckerberg—highlighted the company’s alleged failures to adequately protect children and to disclose known harms.Meta’s attorneys responded by emphasizing the company’s disclosures of risks, its ongoing efforts to remove harmful content, and the fact that some material inevitably slips through its safety systems. The case follows earlier suits, such as the 2024 lawsuit against Meta and Snap, and marks one of the first trials to reach a verdict in the broader national push to hold social‑media platforms accountable for the mental‑health effects on children.Read more: https://www.knopnews2.com/2026/03/24/jury-finds-metas-platforms-harmful-childrens-mental-health-imposes-375-million-penalty/#metaplatforms #markzuckerberg #unfairpracticesact #childsexualexploitation

@TechDesk I'll place my bet on as many appeals as it takes to get to SCrOTUS.

yahoo news | Mark Zuckerberg is building an AI co-CEO as part of his continuing mission to...Mark Zuckerberg, the Meta founder who spent billions on a failed metaverse, is now turning to artificial intelligence to eliminate the one task he still dislikes most: interacting with other people. According to reporting from The Wall Street Journal, Meta is developing an AI “co‑CEO” that will handle information‑retrieval and other routine duties that would otherwise require the CEO to speak with his staff. The internal agent is being built as part of Zuckerberg’s broader vision of making AI the primary medium through which Meta operates, effectively giving the billionaire a digital surrogate for everyday decision‑making.During Meta’s January earnings call, Zuckerberg said the company is “investing in AI‑native tooling so individuals at Meta can get more done, elevating individual contributors and flattening teams.” To support this, Meta has created a new AI engineering division where up to 50 employees report to a single manager, under the assumption that a swarm of AI agents will keep the organization from devolving into chaos. Employees are already using a suite of internal tools such as “My Claw,” which can communicate with coworkers and reference employee files, and “Second Brain,” an AI‑powered chief‑of‑staff that parses project documentation and keeps track of work‑streams.The AI‑first strategy extends to Meta’s acquisitions, most recently the purchase of Moltbook—an almost entirely AI‑populated social‑media platform whose founders were brought on board. Within Meta’s internal messaging system, AI agents now have a dedicated group where they can interact with one another, effectively creating an AI‑only social network. As the company leans further into automation, reports indicate that Meta may cut up to 20 % of its human workforce, replacing those roles with the very agents it is designing to reduce the need for human-to‑human communication.Read more: https://www.pcgamer.com/software/ai/mark-zuckerberg-is-building-an-ai-co-ceo-as-part-of-his-continuing-mission-to-free-himself-from-the-burden-of-human-interaction/#markzuckerberg #meta #ai #secondbrain #aico-ceo

yahoo news | What Mark Zuckerberg’s AI sidekick could teach CEOs about leading by example | F...Mark Zuckerberg has always positioned himself as a hands‑on champion of Meta’s biggest bets, from the early‑stage metaverse experiments—where he appeared in awkward VR avatars and hosted meetings inside virtual offices—to the company’s current AI push. According to the Wall Street Journal, Zuckerberg is now working with a still‑in‑development AI agent that delivers information faster and streamlines tasks that would normally require multiple queries, signaling that the CEO is “walking the walk” on Meta’s AI imperative.Meta is pouring tens of billions into “superintelligent” models and the data centers that run them, and it is actively encouraging staff‑wide AI adoption. Employees are rewarded for token consumption, AI‑driven impact is baked into performance reviews, and internal leaderboards rank workers by their AI usage. Research shows a credibility gap: almost 70 % of CEOs and senior executives use AI less than an hour a week, with 28 % not using it at all, which can blind leaders to the real workload pressures and cognitive overload their teams experience.Studies from Gallup and Stanford economist Nicholas Bloom reveal that strong managerial support for AI dramatically increases employee adoption and perceived usefulness. Meta’s experiment‑heavy culture—featuring hackathons and personal AI agents—appears to be paying off, fostering an environment where AI is woven into daily workflows. Whether every CEO needs a “Zuckerberg‑style” AI sidekick remains uncertain, but leaders who expect organization‑wide AI adoption must become active users themselves to maintain credibility and drive genuine uptake.Read more: https://fortune.com/2026/03/24/ai-meta-mark-zuckerbergs-leadership-ceo/#markzuckerberg #meta #ai #ceos

@sotolf @paul Lord that's bad. Modern day colonialism!

Monthly #emissions summary for 2026/2 #CO2emissions #markzuckerberg #marcbenioff #timcook #google

A #gulfstream G650ER (Reg: N68885) reportedly used by #markzuckerberg has just been detected in flight at Sat Feb 28 2026 23:24:51 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time).

A #gulfstream G650ER (Reg: N68885) reportedly used by #markzuckerberg has been detected in flight since Sat Feb 28 2026 20:28:01 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time). Since then it has emitted an estimated 2585 kg of #CO2. If this was flown commercial, the predicted average #emissions would have been 134 kg. #CO2emissions