Snap settles a social media addiction suit days before trial set to begin in Los Angeles, OpenAI begins global age verification roll out ahead of a planned “adult mode” feature, and Adobe Acrobat Studio adds the ability to generate an AI podcast from documents.
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Show Notes
Snap, parent company of Snapchat, reached a settlement with a 19 year old plaintiff in a social media addiction lawsuit, days before this trial would begin in Los Angeles, though the terms have not been disclosed. The suit claims the algorithmic design of social media platforms led to addiction and deteriorating mental health. Other parties in the suit, including Meta, TikTok, and YouTube, have not announced any pending settlements with the jury selection for the trial set for January 27th. Snap remains a defendant in other consolidated social media addiction cases.
Source: BBC
On Tuesday, OpenAI announced the start of the roll out of global age prediction for ChatGPT to detect minors ahead of preparations for the debut of an “adult mode”. OpenAI CEO of applications Fidji Simo said in December she expects “adult mode” to go live in the first quarter of 2026. Users erroneously categorized as a minor can appeal by submitting data to identity verification service Persona, also used by Reddit and Roblox.
Source: Reuters
Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters said the company’s advertising business doubled revenue to $1.5 billion USD from 2024 to 2025, and expects 2026 to “roughly double again” to $3 billion. The ad-supported Netflix tier, which costs $7.99/month, had over 94 million subscribers as of May 2025. In the Q4 2025 earnings report Netflix reported 325 million subscribers with revenue of $12.05 billion.
Source: The Verge
In YouTube’s annual letter to the community, CEO Neal Mohan pledged to “reduce the spread of low quality AI content” alongside strengthening safeguards for minors. Mohan also stated later this year users will be able to use YouTube’s AI creation tools to “create a Short using your own likeness”, and that Shorts currently average 200 billion daily views. The future AI tool improvements will also able to produce games with a text prompt and experiment with music.
Sources: The Hollywood Reporter and YouTube
The Federal Trade Commission is appealing a November 2025 ruling in the antitrust case against Meta regarding the Instagram and WhatsApp deals. The FTC looked to force Meta to restructure or sell Instagram and WhatsApp in order to restore competition eliminated by the acquisitions, but US District Judge James Boasberg in Washington ruled Meta does not have a monopoly due to competition from TikTok. Facebook purchased Instagram in 2012, then WhatsApp in 2014, and the FTC did not block the deals at the time, instead suing in 2020 alleging a US monopoly on platforms for sharing content with friends and family.
Source: Reuters
In August 2025 Adobe added some AI features to Acrobat Studio, including PDF Spaces, which supported the ability to add up to 100 documents to be AI summarized. Documents added to PDF Spaces can now use Adobe’s AI assistant to generate a presentation from uploads, with options for editing without needing to generate new slides and can be shared with co-workers for further edits. Another new feature in PDF Spaces enables the creation of an AI podcast from a document, similar to a NotebookLM feature. The default podcast creation option has two AI hosts discuss the material.
Source: Engadget
One week after the Federal Communications Commission waived the requirement for Verizon to unlock phones 60 days post network activation, Verizon enacted a 365-day lock period for phones purchased through the TracPhone division. The previous 60 day unlock requirement was part of a merger condition to gain approval for the Verizon purchase of TracPhone. The new policy states cellphones activated on or after January 20th can be unlocked only upon request and only after 365 days of paid and active service.
Source: Ars Technica
According to Sensor Tower’s annual State of Mobile report, consumers globally spent more on non-gaming apps than games in 2025, a trend previously noted only in select markets. The report shares approximately $85 billion was spent on apps in 2025, a 21% increase from 2024, and almost 3x the amount from five years ago. Downloads of AI apps doubled to hit 3.8 billion, with the top 10 apps dominated by AI assistants, led by OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and DeepSeek. And, for social media, users spent an average of 90min/day scrolling, totaling approximately 2.5 trillion hours, up 5% year-over-year.
Source: TechCrunch
Realme’s P4 Power smartphone touts a whopping 10,001mAh battery capable of more than three days on a charge, and Andy Beach tells us why we shouldn’t call things “AI”.
OpenAI releases ChatGPT Translate, its version of Google Translate. How does it compare and can it successfully compete against the search giant? Social news aggregation and discussion platform Digg has officially relaunched. What’s it look like? Is an LLM’s output protected by the US Constitution’s first amendment? And are we witnessing a growth in independent media?