Tag: News

• Elon Musk says he's still open to fighting Mark Zuckerberg.
• "I've offered to fight him any place, any time, any rules, but all I hear is crickets," Musk said.
• The mercurial billionaire brought up the fight a day after Zuckerberg's 40th birthday on Tuesday. 

Forget regular birthday presents like socks or a fun mug. Turns out, if you're Elon Musk, the biggest birthday present you can gift to a tech world nemesis may just be yourself.

All of this is to say that one day after Mark Zuckerberg's 40th birthday, Elon Musk is back on their old beef, bringing up that fight he challenged Zuckerberg to last year.

"If only Zuckerberg were as tough (sigh). I've offered to fight him any place, any time, any rules, but all I hear is crickets," Musk said in an X post on Wednesday.

Musk was responding to a satirical news story about a hypothetical face-off between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump when he mentioned his own proposed battle with Zuckerberg.

Musk challenged Zuckerberg to a fight in June amid speculation that Meta would launch a rival to his social media platform, previously known as Twitter. Zuckerberg would eventually launch his text-based social media platform, Threads in July.

"I'm up for a cage match if he is lol," Musk said in an X post on June 20, 2023.

"Send Me Location," Zuckerberg responded via an Instagram story the next day.

But despite all the trash-talk and bluster, little would materialize from the banter between the two billionaires.

At one point, Musk claimed that the fight would be live-streamed on their respective social media platforms and that it would take place at an "epic location" in "ancient Rome."

Zuckerberg, however, said Musk never made it clear when they were scheduled to glove up and face off in the ring.

"I've been ready to fight since the day Elon challenged me. If he ever agrees on an actual date, you'll hear it from me," Zuckerberg said in a Threads post on August 11. "Until then, please assume anything he says has not been agreed on."

On the other hand, Musk seemed to see Zuckerberg's reluctance as a sign of cowardice.

"Zuck is a chicken," he wrote in an X post on August 13.

"He can't eat at chic fil a because that would be cannibalism," he wrote in a separate post on the same day, referencing the fast food chain famous for its chicken sandwiches.

To be sure, Musk also suggested that whatever fight he and Zuckerberg were gearing up for wouldn't have happened as quickly as he'd hoped. That was because he first needed to recover from some older injuries he had, Musk said.

"There is a problem with my right shoulder blade rubbing against my ribs, which requires minor surgery. Recovery will only take a few months," Musk said in an X post published on August 11.

In November, Zuckerberg also said that he tore his ACL while sparring and had surgery to fix it. This meant that he wouldn't be able to participate in a "competitive MMA fight" he planned for earlier this year.

Meta isn't the only tech company Musk has problems with. In fact, the mercurial billionaire has been picking fights with most of his peers in Silicon Valley.

On February 22, Musk went after Google after users claimed that the company's Gemini chatbot was "woke" and generating pictures of people of color in accurate historical contexts.

"I'm glad that Google overplayed their hand with their AI image generation, as it made their insane racist, anti-civilizational programming clear to all," Musk said in an X post.

Just a week later, on February 29, Musk filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, the AI company he cofounded with Sam Altman. In his lawsuit, Musk accused the ChatGPT maker of violating its nonprofit mission when it partnered with Microsoft.

"OpenAI should be renamed 'super closed source for maximum profit AI,' because this is what it actually is," Musk told journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin at last year's The New York Times' DealBook Summit.

Representatives for Musk and Zuckerberg didn't immediately respond to requests for comment from BI sent outside regular business hours.

• When I took a substitute position at the same school my husband teaches at, I was worried.
• But seeing him at work has allowed me to see him in a new, professional light.
• It also brought us closer together physically.

I've heard horror stories about working with your significant other, so I was admittedly a little worried about what it would be like to work with my husband now that we're married.

We had actually met during my first teaching job — where he had already been a teacher for a couple of years. I know now that we had each been attracted to one another the whole time but didn't want to make the first move at work. We didn't begin dating until I was at a different school, which made the possibility of asking him out and being shot down less awkward.

Fast forward a few years, we're now married, and I find myself out of the classroom and substitute teaching part-time. I thought returning to my first school — where my husband still works — would be a seamless transition for my new, slightly different role as a substitute. But I worried what it would be like to have my husband at work.

I'm happy to report that working together hasn't been uncomfortable at all; it's actually been quite romantic.

Working in the same environment has some surprising benefits

There's something about working in the same environment we first met that reminds us of why we liked each other initially. Seeing each other in the same place and in similar roles rekindles our initial feelings of attraction. Working together again is like taking a step back in time and getting the opportunity to remember why we liked each other to begin with.

It also helps that we get to be separate individuals at work. I see him working in the library, and he sees me subbing in different classrooms. Seeing each other in our respective professional roles and as separate from one another reminds us how much respect we have for one another because being a teacher and working with young people is hard work. Witnessing how hard he's working at school makes me feel so grateful that he's working that hard for his family. Plus, I get to see how loved he is by his coworkers and students, and I just feel so lucky to be his wife.

It's also great because we have a common ground now. When we've worked at different schools, it could become tedious trying to share tidbits from our days. So much can happen in one school day that we would either not want to talk about our days at all or have to be highly selective with our stories around the dinner table. Now that we work in the same school, we are able to apply faces to names and contribute our own experiences with those same people and situations.

While I thought it might be boring to have the same workplace and know the same coworkers and students, it's actually really nice that he is able to understand my work tidbits more fully just because he knows exactly where, who, or what I'm talking about.

Working closely together makes me want him even more

My husband and I are very affectionate, and it's difficult not to be ourselves in that way in a professional environment. We're not going to kiss or hug each other at work or even say, "I love you," in passing.

There are two benefits to this, though. For starters, it creates the same feelings I had when I saw him at work before we were even dating, so that when we get home, sometimes it feels like getting to kiss him for the very first time. The other benefit is that it's very romantic. It definitely makes me want to pull him in for a hug as soon as he gets home.

While I was worried that working with my husband might cause friction, it has actually strengthened our relationship. In addition to having a great deal of respect for each other, seeing him at work reminds me of seeing him at work for the very first time. Now, when I come home to him after work, I just feel so grateful that I got to marry him.

Working with him reminds me of our whole love story — from the very beginning until where we are today.

• Google's new AI products may be making some start-ups nervous.
• An AI-enhanced Google Search and email assistant could threaten smaller AI companies.
• Web creators are also nervous that a widely used AI-search engine may disrupt web traffic.

Google has new AI products — and they might be making some start-ups nervous.

The company unveiled several of its AI efforts at its I/O conference on Tuesday, including a flashy AI-enhanced Google Search and an assistant that can summarize and sort through Gmail.

The announcements were followed by social media chatter claiming Google's new launches would "kill" email and browser-based agents, including Perplexity AI.

Founded by former Google and OpenAI employees, Perplexity's product is an AI chatbot search engine that provides conversational answers.

Google's new AI-enhanced search promises to do pretty much the same thing — but already benefits from a loyal user base. This could allow users to abandon tools like Perplexity AI and go straight to Google for their AI needs instead.

It's not the first time Big Tech has wreaked havoc on smaller players.

Last year, a minor update to ChatGPT that allowed it to interact with PDFs threatened to make startups building "wrappers" for AI chatbots redundant. As Business Insider's Hasan Chowdhury noted at the time, startups without a moat to make them significantly different from competitors are at risk of being plundered.

Google's new AI search is also making creators nervous that web traffic could be disrupted.

The company's new vision for search could transform how the internet has worked for decades. Instead of displaying a list of links to answer queries, it could send users automated answers and disrupt the flow of traffic around the web.

A lot of internet creators rely on SEO to drive clicks, bring traffic, and advertising revenue.

Google appears to be aware of some of the hand-wringing. In a blog post, search chief Liz Reid addressed concerns that the changes could result in fewer website visits.

"We see that the links included in AI Overviews get more clicks than if the page had appeared as a traditional web listing for that query," she wrote. "As we expand this experience, we'll continue to focus on sending valuable traffic to publishers and creators."

Google did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Google has been working on AI for more than two decades. 
• Now, Google is betting on its Gemini LLM as it seeks to be an "AI-first" company.
• Here's what you need to know about Gemini, from where to access it to how it compares to ChatGPT.

For over two decades, Google has made strides to insert AI into its suite of products. The tech giant is now making moves to establish itself as a leader in the emergent generative AI space.

Google is no stranger to the technology. Back in the 2000s, the company said it applied machine learning techniques to Google Search to correct users' spelling and used them to create services like Google Translate.

Then, in the following decade, Google acquired DeepMind, at the time a little-known AI research company. It also introduced TensorFlow, an open-source machine learning framework that developers have used to build models with capabilities like image and speech recognition, natural language processing, and predictive analytics.

The company doubled down on its strategy in 2016 when CEO Sundar Pichai declared that Google would be an "AI-first company." Years later, that's set Google up for the generative AI wars, where it's now duking it out with competitors like OpenAI and Microsoft to make the best products in the sector.

It released Bard, its first AI chatbot, in early 2022, though it later folded that into its family of large language models that it calls Gemini.

"Every technology shift is an opportunity to advance scientific discovery, accelerate human progress, and improve lives," Google's CEO wrote in December 2023. "I believe the transition we are seeing right now with AI will be the most profound in our lifetimes, far bigger than the shift to mobile or to the web before it."

But what, exactly, do Google's latest AI tools do? And how do they compare to rivals like ChatGPT? Business Insider compiled a Q&A that answers everything you may wonder about Google's generative AI efforts.

Google didn't respond to a request for comment from BI before publication.

What is Google's Gemini?

Gemini is the name of Google's family of large language models. The search giant claims they are more powerful than GPT-4, which underlies OpenAI's ChatGPT.

Launched in December 2023, Gemini is multimodal, meaning it can recognize and understand text, image, audio, video, and code to generate human-like responses. Google claims the model can help with writing, brainstorming, and learning, among other tasks. That's because Gemini is trained on troves of public data, including "publicly available" Google Docs, and, soon, Reddit posts.

The model comes in three sizes that vary based on the amount of data used to train them. From smallest to largest, they include Nano, Pro, and Ultra. Gemini 1.5 Pro, Google's most advanced model to date, is now available on Vertex AI, the company's platform for developers to build machine learning software, according to the company.

CEO Pichai says it's "one of the biggest science and engineering efforts we've undertaken as a company."

How do I access Gemini?

Users are required to make a Gmail account and be at least 18 years old to access Gemini.

Web users can access the generative AI tool at gemini.google.com. Smartphone users can download the Google Gemini app for Android or the Google app with built-in AI capabilities for the iPhone. Those who own the tech company's Pixel 8 can expect to see Gemini Nano, the smallest version of the model, on their phones after the next feature drop that could arrive in June 2024.

Users can interact with Gemini's 1.0 Pro model for free. But for $19.99 a month, users can access Gemini Advanced, a version the company claims is "far more capable at reasoning, following, instructions, coding, and creative inspiration" than the free one.

Paid users can access Gemini in Google's workspace apps like Gmail, Google Docs, and Google Sheets.

Users can also incorporate Gemini Advanced into Google Meet calls and use it to create background images or use translated captions for calls involving a language barrier.

How do I use Gemini?

Using Gemini is relatively straightforward.

Simply type in text prompts like "Brainstorm ways to make a dish more delicious" or "Generate an image of a solar eclipse" in the dialogue box, and the model will respond accordingly within seconds. You can also talk directly to Gemini using your voice.

Another way to use it is to insert images and have the AI identify specific objects and locations.

But don't expect the chatbot's outputs to be perfect. In February 2024, Google paused Gemini's image generation tool after people criticized it for spitting out historically inaccurate photos of US presidents. The company also restricted its AI chatbot from answering questions about the 2024 US presidential election to curb the spread of fake news and misinformation. And, in general, Gemini has guardrails that prevent it from answering questions it deems unsafe.

Google Gemini vs ChatGPT — which is better?

The question of whether Gemini is actually more capable than ChatGPT is up for debate.

Overall, it appears to perform better than GPT-4, the LLM behind ChatGPT, according to Hugging Face's chatbot arena board, which AI researchers use to gauge the model's capabilities, as of the spring of 2024.

One possible reason: ChatGPT's knowledge cut-off date is April 2023, whereas Gemini draws from the most recent information on Google in real time.

A chatbot test Business Insider did in 2023 illustrates Gemini's seemingly superior capabilities. When comparing ChatGPT's responses with Gemini's, BI found that Google's model had an edge at responding to queries regarding current events, identifying AI-generated images, and meal planning. ChatGPT, however, spat out more conversational responses, making interacting with the AI feel more enjoyable and human-like.

What happened to Bard?

Bard was the name of Google's first AI chatbot, which the company folded into Gemini. Its reason: to "reflect the advanced tech at its core."

After all, Bard's rollout in 2023 wasn't smooth sailing. Google employees criticized its public release for being "rushed" — an issue that doomed the discontinued Google Glass — and "botched" after the AI chatbot spit out incorrect information during its inaugural demo. John Hennessy, the chairman of Alphabet, Google's parent company, agreed, saying that the AI wasn't "really ready" yet.

• Tesla's Supercharger team was decimated after charging chief Rebecca Tinucci said no to more layoffs.
• Elon Musk wanted more job cuts after Tinucci had already laid off around 15% to 20% of her team.
• Musk has since backtracked on his decision and rehired some members of the charging team.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk made the snap decision to fire the entire Supercharger team after its division chief refused to make further layoffs happen, Reuters reported on Wednesday.

The billionaire said in an email to staff on April 29 that he was dissolving the entire team behind Tesla's charging infrastructure, per The Information. Musk has since walked back this decision and rehired some of the workers, per Bloomberg.

Musk did a one-on-one meeting with Supercharger chief Rebecca Tinucci the day before the email went out, Reuters reported, citing four individuals familiar with the matter.

According to the outlet, Musk axed Tinucci's entire team because she didn't want to lay off more employees. Tinucci had already laid off around 15% to 20% of her team before meeting Musk, per Reuters.

Representatives for Tesla, Musk, and Tinucci didn't respond to Reuters' request for comment.

Last month, Musk announced Tesla's first round of mass layoffs for the year, telling staff in a memo that he was laying off more than 10% of employees. Tesla employed more than 140,000 staff before the layoffs.

The widespread job cuts came as the company grapples with poor sales and increased competition from Chinese automakers like BYD.

At one point, Musk was considering culling Tesla's workforce by 20% to match the most recent reduction in quarterly vehicle deliveries, Bloomberg reported on April 21, citing a person familiar with the matter.

When Musk announced the Supercharger team's dissolution last month, he added that he would start asking Tesla executives who retain "more than three people who don't obviously pass the excellent, necessary and trustworthy test" to resign, per an email obtained by The Information.

"Hopefully these actions are making it clear that we need to be absolutely hard core about headcount and cost reduction," Musk wrote.

But that "hard core" move resulted in some immediate problems.

Major automakers who adopted Tesla's charging tech, such as General Motors, Ford, and Mercedes Benz, were left hanging with the sudden elimination of the Supercharger division.

Tesla's investors and partners also criticized the sudden move, upset with the company's radio silence following the Supercharger team's dismissal.

"There's no one remaining from the team that we worked with. In terms of formal communication from Tesla, we haven't received anything," Aaron Luque, the CEO EnviroSpark, which installs Tesla chargers, told BI.

The ensuing backlash might have been crucial in changing Musk's mind. The Tesla chief moved quickly to assuage concerns, and assured investors that Tesla's Supercharger network isn't going anywhere.

"Tesla still plans to grow the Supercharger network, just at a slower pace for new locations and more focus on 100% uptime and expansion of existing locations," he wrote in an X post on April 30.

Musk's about-turn could also have been influenced by Tesla's commitments to the US government.

The company won almost 13% of all EV charging awards from President Joe Biden's bipartisan infrastructure law, Politico reported in February, citing data it reviewed. A slowdown in the rollout of Tesla's charging infrastructure would thus be a setback for Biden's clean-energy agenda.

"Just to reiterate: Tesla will spend well over $500M expanding our Supercharger network to create thousands of NEW chargers this year," Musk said in an X post on Friday.

Representatives for Tesla didn't immediately respond to a request for comment from BI sent outside regular business hours.

• Russian President Vladimir Putin is visiting China, seeking support amid Western sanctions.
• Russia's economy now relies on wartime activities and trade with China.
• Putin is looking to rebalance Russia's relationship with China. But time is on Beijing's side.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is on a two-day visit to China, and he's bringing along a large trade delegation. It's his first official trip overseas following his reelection for a fifth term, and it comes days after he appointed a civilian economist to helm Russia's defense ministry, showing his country's wartime economy is here to stay.

But while China is Russia's most important market, Putin is not just courting his Xi — who has called Putin his "old friend" — for economic support. The Russian leader is also forging a strategic relationship.

"The two states are allies not because they share any particular cultural or ideological affinity; rather, they have come together on account of the old adage that the 'enemy of my enemy is my friend,'" Chels Michta, a non-resident fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, or CEPA, wrote on Wednesday.

"Their partnership is largely practical — anchored in hard power principles bereft of ideological pretense or posturing," added Michta.

It's realpolitik — "both parties believe they have more to gain from continuing to work together than they risk losing," wrote Michta.

Putin needs to balance out China's hold over Russia's economy

Russia's economy has remained resilient in the face of more than two years of Western sanctions, partly thanks to boosts from state subsidies and wartime production.

An economist went as far as to say that Russia's economy is so driven by the war that it cannot afford to win or lose in the conflict.

But Russia has also become increasingly reliant on China since it started the war in Ukraine. Bilateral trade reached a record level of $240 billion last year — a 26% jump from $190 billion a year earlier.

"It is fair to say that without China's economic support, Russia would not have been able to brave the economic sanctions imposed on it by the West in the wake of Putin's all-out invasion of Ukraine," wrote Michta.

However, the boom in trade has served China's interests more than Russia's, putting Moscow in an increasingly subordinate position. For instance, Russia is now "exporting raw materials to China while China sends finished goods, especially cars, to Russia — the latter at the expense of Russia's indigenous auto industry," she added.

So, a key item on Putin's agenda in China would be to get the Chinese to endorse a proposed new natural gas pipeline from Siberia to China, since Russia has lost its market to Europe — previously its single largest market — due to sanctions.

"By selling large volumes of cheap gas to China, Russia can potentially tie Beijing into a closer geopolitical alliance," analysts at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University wrote on Wednesday.

"Convincing China to commit to such a large project during the war would be a geopolitical coup for Moscow, demonstrating to the West and the Global South that it is able to deepen its energy relationship with China despite the war," the energy analysts added.

But China doesn't actually need more gas before the mid-2030s, so time is on Beijing's side.

China says it wants peace, but has more to gain from continued war

Beijing has called for peace in Ukraine and put forth a proposal — which some analysts say is vague — to that end last year.

However, some analysts say China has more to gain from a continuing war.

"America's continued support for Kyiv — and hence Russia's inability to secure its gains in short order — is actually in Beijing's interest," wrote CEPA's Michta.

"The termination of US aid would work against China since the implosion of Ukraine would halt — or at least slow — Moscow's slide toward vassal-like dependency on Beijing," she added.

Beijing appears to have decided that backing Russia is worth any retaliation from the West, added Michta, who is also a military intelligence officer serving in the US Army.  

This is because an increasingly dependent Russia may be able to offer Beijing key military technology it has developed in the post-Soviet era, thus helping China make huge strides in the sector.

Moscow and Beijing want to upend the West's dominance in the global order

Despite their attempts to one-up each other, Russia and China's ever-closer relationship is a problem for the West.

"Currently, a unity of purpose between the autocratic powers has created the closest relationship in decades. China and Russia are forging a partnership increasingly reminiscent of a great power alliance," wrote Michta.

In particular, Beijing has set its sights further than Russia — which is more interested in changing power relationships in Europe.

"Beijing is pursuing a far more ambitious project aimed at changing the foundations of the global order, ending once and for all the era of worldwide Western dominion," she added.

• Frank McCourt is organizing a group to acquire TikTok's US business through Project Liberty.
• US lawmakers voted to ban the Chinese-owned app unless the US arm sold within a year.
• McCourt's group aims to change TikTok's infrastructure and reclaim digital identities and data.

Real estate mogul Frank McCourt is the latest person to raise his hand to try to acquire TikTok's US business.

McCourt said on Wednesday that he is assembling a group of specialists, including investment bank Guggenheim Securities and law firm Kirkland & Ellis, as well as technology experts, academics, and parents, to consult on buying the US division of the viral social media app.

The announcement follows a decision by US lawmakers last month to ban Chinese-owned TikTok from US app stores unless it is sold within a year. TikTok's parent company ByteDance, sued the federal government over the ban last week. TikTok has already said it has no plans to sell the platform.

"We thought this was a really fantastic opportunity to accelerate the creation of an alternative internet," McCourt told the Associated Press. The 70-year-old is worth $1.4 billion, per Forbes, and made his wealth through real estate and sports investments.

The potential purchase would be made through Project Liberty, an internet advocacy group founded by McCourt in 2021 that focuses on data privacy, among other issues. Several high-profile technologists support the bid, including Tim Berners-Lee, according to the project's website.

McCourt wants to change TikTok's basic business to an open-source model that allows users and creators more control over their data.

The announcement did not share details of how much money is being raised or whether the group is in already in talks with TikTok.

McCourt, who previously owned the Los Angeles Dodgers, is on the short list of investors who have shown interest in buying the platform. Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt said he thought about buying the platform but decided against it. Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he's eyeing a purchase, but he may not have the funds to do it. Big Tech companies are almost sure to face antitrust concerns if they want in.

There is very little consensus on the app's price tag — one valuation pegs the US business at $100 billion, but another says it is immaterial to ByteDance's revenue. The platform may also be less attractive if it is sold without its "For You Page" algorithm, which has been credited for its success.

McCourt told the New York Times that he doesn't want the algorithm.

"We doubt very much that China would sell TikTok with the algorithm," McCourt told the Times. "We're the one bidder that doesn't want the algorithm because we're talking about a different architecture, a different way of thinking about the internet and how it operates."

TikTok and representatives for McCourt did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

• Antony Blinken gave Ukrainians a performance of "Rockin' in the Free World" at a bar on Tuesday.
• But his jam session wasn't well-received by all, with some local politicians slamming Blinken.
• The performance comes as the northeastern Kharkiv comes under renewed attack from Russia.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken cut loose after a series of meetings with Ukrainian officials on Tuesday by performing Neil Young's "Rockin' in the Free World" at a bar in Kyiv.

The four-and-a-half-minute performance received mixed reviews in Ukraine, with several local politicians panning Blinken's guitar rock-out as insensitive amid a renewed Russian offensive in Kharkiv.

Blinken sat among an entourage of officials in the Barman Dictat, a hot spot in the capital, before the Ukrainian band 19.99 invited him onstage as a "biggest friend of Ukraine."

Slinging a crimson electric guitar onto his shoulder, Blinken told the crowd he knew they were facing a "really, really difficult time."

"Your soldiers, your citizens, particularly in the northeast, in Kharkiv, are suffering tremendously," he said. "But they need to know, you need to know. The United States is with you. So much of the world is with you and they're fighting not just for a free Ukraine, but for the free world. And the free world is with you, too."

The US top official strummed slowly as the band joined him. They launched into song, with Blinken occasionally leaning into his mic to sing the chorus of Young's rock hit.

This performance may have been part of Blinken's push to bring music into official foreign affairs. In September, the US State Department under Blinken launched the Global Music Diplomacy Initiative, which he commemorated with a performance of "I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man" by Muddy Waters.

'Tactless and inappropriate'

The war-time guitar diplomacy was soon met with social media backlash from Ukrainian observers and politicians, who questioned the timing of the performance as Kyiv's troops struggled to hold off Russia's advance in the northeast.

"The message is easy to understand. But it doesn't resonate," Ukrainian parliamentarian Bohdan Yaremenko wrote on Facebook,

Yaremenko pointed to US support for Ukraine no longer being guaranteed, with a monthslong delay of aid that crippled Ukraine on the battlefield and Trump hinting he may tell Kyiv to negotiate with Russia if he's elected.

"For ten years, we've been explaining to the free world that we are defending it too," he wrote.

Oleg Simoroz, a Ukrainian veteran who lost both of his legs in the war, criticized the performance as "simply tactless and inappropriate."

"So many people die every day because we don't have enough weapons and enough support from our allies," he wrote.

Valeriy Chaly, a former Ukrainian ambassador to the US, told the AFP: "With all due respect, it's a mistake. The message is wrong."

"Kharkiv region is wiped off the face of the earth, people are leaving their homes," wrote Svitlana Matviyenko, head of the Ukrainian NGO Agency for Legislative Analysis. "Kharkiv is under constant blows of KABs, Sumy region is preparing, and a top US official sings songs in a Kyiv bar."

Russia launched a ground assault on Kharkiv over the weekend, capturing several settlements and forcing Ukrainian troops to retreat from other villages. Ukrainian defenses are said to have been lacking in the area, with Ukrainian Armed Forces chief Oleksandr Syrskyi saying on Monday that the situation had "significantly worsened."

'Russia wants us to stop living'

Some Ukrainians supported Blinken's performance. One Kyiv resident, Polina, 26, told The Guardian that it signified that Ukrainians are defying Russia's war and enjoying nightlife.

"Russia wants us to stop living and stop having fun," she said. "The war is everywhere, but it doesn't mean you can't go to a bar. I feel thankful he even came to Kyiv and I thought it was great."

Mariia Lobyntseva, 27, an artist in Kyiv, told the Los Angeles Times: "Young people can't stop going out and letting off steam at bars. It's necessary for us."

Ukrainian journalist Illia Ponomarenko wrote on X that Blinken's performance may have taken place "at a bad time" but defended the US official as one of the top administrators for US support of Ukraine.

"Seriously — secretary Blinken is currently the last person we need to focus our bitterness and anger on," he wrote.

The lyrics of "Rockin' in the Free World" are often seen as a criticism of American patriotism and George H.W. Bush's administration. Some of its lines parody the former president's well-known phrases like "a thousand points of light," which Bush popularized in a push for volunteerism during his inauguration.

But its title also became known for how it was coined — when Young's guitarist uttered the phrase after the Soviet Union canceled one of his concerts.

The song's traditional interpretation seems to have waned, given its use in multiple presidential campaigns, including former President Donald Trump and Sen. Bernie Sanders.

The US State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent outside regular business hours by Business Insider.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian officials have been reportedly pleading with the Biden administration to allow them to use US weapons to hit targets on Russian soil, saying they knew Moscow's troops were massing on the border near Kharkiv but couldn't respond.

Ukraine has relied heavily on US artillery but struggled to keep its weapons in action last year when ammunition supplies dwindled amid a delay in Congress for billions in aid.

In late April, after months of political roadblocks, the US approved a new $61 billion package for Ukraine, including about $25.7 billion of military equipment.

• South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem was hit by a deluge of criticism after she said she shot her own dog.
• But former President Donald Trump says he isn't too bothered by the bad press. 
• "She had a bad week. We all have bad weeks," Trump said.

Former President Donald Trump doesn't appear to be too bothered by the criticism surrounding South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem's decision to shoot her dog.

"I think she's terrific. A couple of rough stories, there's no question about it," Trump said in an interview on "The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show" that aired Tuesday.

"The dog story, people hear that, and people from different parts of the country probably feel a bit differently, but that's a tough story. She had a bad week. We all have bad weeks," he continued.

Noem was hit with a deluge of criticism after she revealed in her memoir that she shot her 14-month-old dog, Cricket. In her book, Noem described the dog as "untrainable" and "dangerous."

The anecdote provoked bipartisan outrage, with some Republicans saying that Trump shouldn't pick Noem as his running mate.

Trump, meanwhile, was more forgiving in his assessment of Noem. On the podcast, he speculated that Noem might just have had a team of bad ghostwriters.

"Sometimes you do books, and you have some guy writing a book, and you maybe don't read it as carefully. You have ghostwriters, too. They help you, and they, in this case, didn't help too much," Trump said.

Trump has worked with ghostwriters himself — he hired journalist Tony Schwartz to ghostwrite his bestselling 1987 book, "The Art of the Deal."

Trump's defense of Noem this week suggests that despite the maelstrom of bad press, she may still stand a chance of being tapped to be his running mate.

The former president has a long list of contenders to choose from, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, and Ohio Sen. JD Vance. Trump, however, has remained coy about who his final pick is thus far.

Trump's choice of a running mate could have huge implications on his campaign's fundraising capabilities as he heads into the final stretch of the electoral race. His campaign team said it raised more than $76 million in April, Politico reported on May 4, citing a person familiar with the matter.

GOP megadonor Ken Griffin said on Tuesday at the Qatar Economic Forum that he's "going to see" who Trump's running mate is before he decides on whether to give money to the GOP campaign. The hedge fund billionaire declined to state who his preferred vice presidential candidate is, per Bloomberg.

Representatives for Trump and Noem didn't immediately respond to requests for comment from BI sent outside regular business hours.

• Samsung released a 43-second response to Apple's lambasted "crush" advertisement.
• Apple's advertisement for its new iPad Pro received swift backlash last week.
• Samsung's ad seems to pick up where Apple's left off amid crushed creative tools and a hydraulic press.

"Creativity cannot be crushed."

That's Samsung's message in a new spot that trolls Apple's iPad Pro "crush" ad, which caused an internet meltdown last week.

In Apple's ad, creative tools — paint, instruments, etc. — are crushed in a hydraulic press, and out comes the ultra-thin and powerful new iPad Pro. As my colleague Katie Notopoulos pointed out, the meaning was likely simple: Look at this upgraded gadget that can do so many things, and it's so thin.

That's not how the internet read it. Instead, the overwhelming reaction was that the ad encompassed much of the collective existential dread about technology replacing humans — especially creatives. The backlash was so intense that Apple apologized, pulled the ad's TV run, and admitted to Ad Age that it "missed the mark."

A week later, on Wednesday, Samsung released its response.

The ad, which was made by BBH USA and will run on social media according to Ad Age, appears to pick up in what could well be described as the aftermath of Apple's spot. In a dimly lit room strewn with crushed instruments and debris, with a paint-splattered hydraulic press in the background, a young woman comes and picks up a partially smushed guitar and begins playing.

She's reading music off a tablet — a Galaxy Tab S9. The S9 has been on the market since August, so while the spot is partially a tablet ad, it's really primarily a timely kiss-off to Apple.

Despite the fact that sales recently slumped for both companies, Apple and Samsung are the leaders in tablet sales. In Q1, Apple shipped 9.9 million units, according to IDC. Samsung shipped 6.7 million in that same quarter.