Steven Levy

People sometimes tell me they've fallen off the Plaintext newsletter list, through no fault of their own. If you're a WIRED subscriber and want my newsletter, you can follow this link and give it every week. wired.com/newsletter/pla…

@Ugo_alves "Became"? Please use present tense. It's a longer conversation, but I am proud of the publication I work for.

@StevenLevy Hi Steven, not related to this specific piece but what do you make of what Wired became?

Yes, Sarah Wynn-Williams did seem to break her non-disparagement clause when she wrote Careless People. But Meta's bonkers campaign to silence her shows that her criticism of Zuck & Co is well grounded. wired.com/story/metas-pu…

@JeremyNguyenPhD @paulg If coaching worked, the test was arguably invalid because some people paid to prep and others didn't have that advantage. The amazing is that now it's well known that coaching works, and no one cares about the disparity.

@StevenLevy @paulg What was their motivation for hiding the evidence?

I took an SAT English practice test. I got two questions wrong, which meant my score was 760. One was a grammar mistake I might have caught if I'd checked my answers. The other was about a fictional character's state of mind and there were two answers that seemed reasonable.

Hi, looking for a great reader question that I will answer with wit and wisdom in my Backchannel/WIRED newsletter/column. Ask me anything!

Paris' big Vivatech conference was all about "sovereignty." Speaker after speaker griped about U.S. dominance, some offering plans to change things. Europe has a long way to go to compete in AI, but it has no choice--especially because of Trump. wired.com/story/europe-i…

Looking for a great reader question for my WIRED newsletter. Ask me anything!

Officially welcoming the great @laurengoode.bsky.social to Backchannel. She'll be doing the newsletter once a month, writing great essays like this one. The other three weeks you're stuck with me. wired.com/story/silicon-…

@stewartbrand @Ryanphelan6 I was first on Mirene in 1984 helping plan the first Hackers Conference--42 years later I finally got to be a passenger sailing underneath the GG bridge, chatting w Stewart as we cruised. Whoever buys this tug will have a treasure.

@StevenLevy @Ryanphelan6 Steven includes photos of our 1912 tugboat "Mirene" and mentions she is for sale. He was on board in this photo, amid a herd of harbor porpoises. This link has sale details; compass.com/homedetails/13…

Wired's @StevenLevy rocks in this piece about how @Ryanphelan6 and I are prepping my decline and demise.

Yes, @stewartbrand is one of my heroes, a visionary rooted in pragmatism who has made his mark on the world. He and his wife @Ryanphelan6 expressed these values in a home they built for his later years. wired.com/story/stewart-…

The $1 M auction for the secrets of the CIA Kryptos sculpture was months ago--now we learn that Paradigm, a crypto-centric VC firm won. Here are their plans--and the line they didn't cross. wired.com/story/crypto-g…

@Dagk @WIRED Thanks, Dag,but what's the question?

The Siri launch made it clear that consumer AI consumption will migrate to the easier path for iPhone users via the Siri button, and the deep context use cases which are underrated. The real story is that Siri will soon handle ~ 90% of consumer (iPhone ) queries using billions of data centers already in your pocket. Free tokens, low latency responses with the ability to delegate complex queries to more powerful models. This will suck the air (and revenue) out of previous winners in the consumer stack like OAI. The frontier will migrate to incredible leaps towards accelerating research, drug discovery, material sciences… etc. Plenty of room for everyone. Bit Siri will become the main on-ramp for consumer AI consumption.

Seeking a great reader question for my WIRED/Backchannel newsletter. Just imagine how happy you will be to see me address your question with wit and candor, and maybe even a subtle eyeroll. Ask me anything!

Wow, the week went by fast. Now it's time to ask you folks for a great reader question that I will answer in the Backchannel/WIRED newsletter. Ask me anything!

Here's an exclusive inside look at Flourish, a startup full of neuroscientists and AI researchers working together to make discoveries about the brain and use them to create a more efficient form of AI that learns like people do. wired.com/story/jeff-bez…

@simba_mudonzvo ok will take a look

@StevenLevy Thanks. Just wanted to share with you an article i had published to read for your own enjoyment.

Hi @StevenLevy can I interest you in my article about AI agents, Shopping and the future of marketing? x.com/simba_mudonzvo…

I need a great reader question for this week's Backchannel/WIRED newsletter. Ask me anything!

The recent AI agent breakthrough is just as big a bang as ChatGPT. Only techies realize this now but eventually no one will be able to ignore it. My report from inside this huge shift. wired.com/story/how-ai-a…