Amazon CEO Andy Jassy says advancements in AI will “reduce” the company’s corporate headcount over the next few years. In a memo to employees on Tuesday, Jassy writes that Amazon expects the change due to “efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company,” without specifying how many employees would be affected.
“As we roll out more Generative AI and agents, it should change the way our work is done,” Jassy says. “We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today, and more people doing other types of jobs.”
He notes that workers should also “be curious about AI” and how to use it to “get more done with scrappier teams:
Those who embrace this change, become conversant in AI, help us build and improve our AI capabilities internally and deliver for customers, will be well-positioned to have high impact and help us reinvent the company.
Other companies have shared statements about how they expect AI to impact their workforce as well. In April, Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke told employees asking for more headcount or resources that they should explain why they “cannot get what they want done using AI.” Duolingo CEO Luis von Ahn also stated that the company plans on replacing contract workers with AI as part of a new “AI-first” approach.
PHILADELPHIA — Pep Guardiola has left the door open for Jack Grealish to return to Manchester City, but suggested the ideal solution would be for the England midfielder to find a new club and have “butterflies in his stomach” again after two years on the sidelines.
Grealish has been omitted from the City squad for the FIFA Club World Cup and has been granted permission to speak to other clubs about a move away from the Etihad Stadium this summer.
Guardiola said the decision was taken after “honest” talks between Grealish and the club. And although he stopped short of saying Grealish’s City career is over, Guardiola hinted that he needs to find a new club and rediscover his love of football.
“He had a conversation between him and the club and they decided it was best [to stay behind],” said Guardiola.
“Jack is an exceptional player. The only reason why he didn’t play last season is of course my decisions. We decide that he has to play. The club was honest, he was honest.
“We decide the best is to stay [behind] and have a place that he can feel like he can come back to be the player like he was in the year of the treble or all his career in Aston Villa.
“The fact is in the last two seasons he didn’t play much minutes. He has to come back to play and have the butterflies in his stomach that he can play every three days, every three days and show again the quality he has.”
Asked whether Grealish — who has two years left on his contract — is certain to leave this summer, Guardiola said: “I don’t know. Now we decide don’t come here and what happens I don’t know in the end. If we don’t find, he’s a player for Man City and he will be back.”
It includes Jurgen Klopp’s former assistant at Liverpool, Pep Lijnders.
Guardiola revealed he asked permission from Klopp before approaching Lijnders and said he hopes to soak up the Dutchman’s knowledge after his successful spell at Anfield.
“As always, a long conversation,” said Guardiola.
“In certain moments I suggested I was thinking about Pep, and he gave me his opinion, that was, of course, so highly was his right hand, one of the most successful periods of Liverpool in the last years, and after I took the time to decide.
“I asked permission to Jurgen, of course, because I didn’t want to interfere much. I said to him it would be a problem, you know, to talk to him, and he said absolutely not.
“Pep will help me because at the end, it’s a question of back and forth, so his knowledge, I drink from his knowledge, and every day since we met together, and we talk a lot about tactics, about football, about training sessions, and many things, he’s been so inspiring for me.
“I’m really pleased for that, and, yeah, we’ll see what happens in the future.”
After his wife Kayte Walsh, 46, debuted her baby bump while stepping out alongside him in London June 14, multipleoutlets confirmed that the Frasieralum, 70, is set to become a dad for the eighth time.
In photos obtained by People, Kayte—who already shares kids Faith, 12, Gabriel, 10, and James, 8, with Kelsey—strolled around the sunny English city sporting a black sundress that accented her growing belly.
For his part, the Cheers star—who is also dad to daughter Spencer, 41, whom he shares with ex-wife Doreen Alderman, and daughter Greer, 33, with ex Barrie Buckner; as well as daughter Mason, 23, and son Jude, 20, with ex Camille Grammer—walked alongside Kayte donning a navy polo shirt, white shorts and aviator sunglasses.
Since becoming a dad for the first time in 1983, Kelsey has enjoyed his role as a patriarch, sharing that his work as an actor has even allowed him to excel at parenthood.
Unlicensed practitioners giving cosmetic injections are putting people’s lives at risk, officials say
Cosmetic procedures such as fillers, Botox and Brazilian butt lifts are taking place in public toilets, hotel rooms and other “shocking locations” in Britain, officials have warned.
People’s lives “are being put at risk every single day” by the lack of regulation in the industry, the Chartered Trading Standards Institute (CTSI) says, as it called for urgent action to set up a licensing scheme.
It has also uncovered unsafe fillers and fat-dissolving injections being sold online.
The Department for Health and Social Care says the government is looking into new regulations to protect people.
Getty Images
There is currently no legislation in the UK to protect consumers from unlicensed practitioners
Kerry Nicol, external affairs manager at the CTSI, said she was “genuinely shocked by the scale of potential harm facing the public due to the alarming lack of regulation in the aesthetic industry”.
She added that “action is urgently needed” to crack down on “bad players operating in this sector” and a cross-government approach was required.
The priority is giving the public a clear indication of who is qualified to carry out these procedures, Ms Nicol said.
Trading standards officials said they were particularly worried about young people getting injections, because finding practitioners who checked for the minimum age of 18 was a “postcode lottery”.
Their advice is always to:
check the qualifications of those advertising cosmetic procedures
be wary of practitioners who advertise and operate through social media
do not buy products to inject at home
Trading standards officials are also concerned about fillers being sold online for as little as £20 and fat loss injections, such as Lemon Bottle, which have no “regulatory oversight” in the UK.
Earlier this month, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) reported a number of people had suffered adverse side-effects after being injected with suspected counterfeit botox.
Officials are also worried about consumers undergoing fat injections, such as liquid BBLs (Brazilian butt lifts), which involve injecting filler into the buttocks to lift them and make them look bigger or more rounded.
The procedure is very risky and can cause serious side-effects such as blood clots and sepsis.
In September last year, 33-year-old Alice Webb is believed to have died after suffering complications from having a liquid BBL in Gloucestershire.
As it stands, you do not need a licence to perform cosmetic procedures in England, but this could change if an amendment brought forward in 2022 is passed by parliament.
The government has previously suggested making changes to the Health and Care Act, which would bring in a scheme to protect consumers from unlicensed practitioners.
A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Care said: “People’s lives are being put at risk by inadequately trained operators in the cosmetic sector, which is why the government is looking into new regulations to protect people.
“The safety of patients is paramount and we urge anyone considering cosmetic procedures to consider the possible health impacts and find a reputable, insured and qualified practitioner.”
To improve safety for consumers, the Scottish government announced plans in May to regulate aesthetic treatments.
There are currently no plans to do the same in Northern Ireland and Wales.
Ashton Collins, director at Save Face, which provides a register of accredited practitioners, said her organisation had been campaigning “to ban liquid BBLs from the high street”.
She added: “We are focused on reinforcing existing legislation that has long failed to protect patients from unscrupulous practitioners who continue to flaunt the law with impunity.
“For too long, regulations intended to safeguard patients have been inadequately policed and enforced.”
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The Big Story
AI moratorium sparks GOP battle over states’ rights
A push to ban state regulation of artificial intelligence for 10 years is setting off a debate among Republicans, further complicating its path towards passage in President Trump’s “one, big, beautiful bill.”
The AI provision has divided Republicans into two camps: one touting the party’s traditional support of states’ rights, and another concerned with overbearing regulation.
As the Senate works out its own changes to the larger tax and spending package, an increasing number of Republicans from both chambers are coming out against the AI provision, which calls for a 10-year moratorium on state laws regulating AI models and systems.
Republicans opposed to the measure differ in their opinions of AI and how beneficial it could be, but share concerns with the federal government stifling the ability of states to set their own rules for it.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), one of the most vocal GOP critics of Trump’s broader bill, said Tuesday he is “not a real fan of the federal government” and is against the provision.
“I personally don’t think we should be setting a federal standard right now and prohibiting the states from doing what we should be doing in a federated republic. Let the states experiment,” Johnson said.
While Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) has expressed concerns about the economic impact of AI, he said he is willing to introduce an amendment to eliminate the provision during the Senate’s marathon vote-a-rama if it is not taken out earlier.
“I’m only for AI if it’s good for the people,” he told reporters, citing AI’s potential disruptive impact on the job market. “I think we’ve got to come up with a way to put people first.”
Even some House Republicans who already voted to pass the bill in the lower chamber are speaking out against the provision.
A group of hardline conservatives argued in a letter last week to Senate Republicans that Congress is still “actively investigating” AI and “does not fully understand the implications” of the technology.
This was shortly after Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) confirmed she would be a “no” on the bill if it comes back to the House with the provision included.
“I am 100 percent opposed and I will not vote for any bill that destroys federalism and takes away states’ rights, ability to regulate and make laws when it regards humans and AI,” the Georgia Republican said.
Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) declined to say whether he would support the moratorium but noted he “likes states’ rights.”
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), the chair of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, rejected concerns the moratorium could encroach on states’ rights, pointing to the Commerce Clause in the Constitution.
“The Constitution,” Cruz said, “gives Congress the authority to regulate commerce between the states and AI is quintessentially commerce between the states and having a patchwork of 50 different standards crippling the development of AI.”
The battle comes just over a month after OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and other tech leaders appeared before Cruz’s committee and voiced their opposition to state-by-state regulation of AI.
Read more in a full report Wednesday morning at TheHill.com.
Welcome to The Hill’s Technology newsletter, we’re Miranda Nazzaro and Julia Shapero — tracking the latest moves from Capitol Hill to Silicon Valley.
President Trump will sign another executive order this week extending the deadline for TikTok’s parent company to divest the video sharing app, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Tuesday. “As he has said many times, President Trump does not want TikTok to go dark,” Leavitt said in a statement shared with The Hill. “This extension will last 90 days, which the Administration will spend working …
President Trump is taking fire over his posture toward Iran from an unlikely critic in the media: Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. Trump attacked Carlson directly late Monday, marking a major departure from what has for months been a rosy relationship between the pundit and president. The rift is underscoring GOP divisions on how the U.S. should respond to the escalating crisis in the Middle East and highlighting …
Tech billionaire Elon Musk shared drug test results on Tuesday showing that he tested negative for ketamine after The New York Times reported he was using drugs on the 2024 campaign trail. The Tesla CEO shared a picture of the test results, which showed negative results for several other drugs, on the social platform X, simply captioning the post, “lol.” Musk continued his criticism of the Times and The Wall Street …
A coalition of Democratic lawmakers are asking tech giant Palantir to turn over details of their contracts with the Trump administration amid reports the data company has been given lucrative contracts that could allow it to assemble a database on Americans. The New York Times reported last month that Palantir is in discussions with numerous government agencies for use of its technology that analyzes data, including …
Welcome to Crypto Corner, a daily feature focused on digital currency and its outlook in Washington.
The Senate on Tuesday passed legislation creating a regulatory framework for payment stablecoins in a major milestone for the crypto industry.
Lawmakers voted 68-30 to pass the GENIUS Act, which seeks to establish rules of the road for the dollar-backed cryptocurrencies.
It marks the first time that major crypto legislation has cleared the upper chamber. The bill now heads to the House.
“With the GENIUS Act, we’re bringing clarity to a sector that’s been clouded by uncertainty and proving that bipartisan, principled leadership can still deliver real results for the American people,” Senate Banking Chair Tim Scott (R-S.C.) said in a statement.
“This did not happen by accident,” he continued. “It happened because we led – across the aisle and with purpose.”
Eighteen Democrats joined with most Republicans to pass the legislation, which has trudged forward through a series of procedural hurdles on the Senate floor over the past four weeks.
Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), who was a lead negotiator for Democrats on the GENIUS Act, touted its passage as “proof of what can be achieved through honest negations and a willingness to work across the aisle.”
ICYMI: Stand with Crypto, a nonprofit grassroots crypto movement, surveyed 1,000 New Jersey Democratic primary voters last week.
57 percent of voters say they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who supports pro-crypto policies.
62 percent of voters said each candidate’s position on cryptocurrency influenced their voice choice at least “a little.”
One in four of New Jersey’s Democratic primary voters said they own cryptocurrency and 22 percent said they previously owned crypto.
In Other News
Branch out with other reads on The Hill:
NAACP planning to sue Musk AI company over supercomputer pollution
The NAACP and an environmental group are planning to sue Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company xAI, amid concerns that its supercomputer facility is prompting air pollution in Memphis, the groups announced Tuesday. The Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC), on behalf of the NAACP, sent a letter to xAI and its affiliates on Tuesday notifying the company of their intent to sue over its alleged continued use of …
President Trump is becoming ever more emphatic in his backing of Israel’s attack on Iran, with the chances rising by the hour that he will green-light … Read more
The U.S. military is positioning itself to potentially join Israel’s assault on Iran, as President Trump weighs direct action against Tehran … Read more
This week, WhatsApp did something its founders said it would never do: it’s putting advertisements inside the app. It ends WhatsApp’s decade-plus run of offering an ad-free messaging and calling experience.
Meta, which acquired WhatsApp in 2014, attempted to justify the decision by saying ads will be sequestered to its “Updates” tab, where you’ll see some sponsored status updates. WhatsApp’s status feature allows users to share photos, videos, and text messages that disappear after 24 hours — but now you’ll see ones from businesses, too. “If you only use WhatsApp to chat with friends and loved ones there is no change to your experience at all,” Meta writes in its announcement.
But the rollout of ads in its status feature could be just the beginning for Meta, which raked in more than $160 billion in ad revenue from across Facebook and Instagram in 2024. Meta says its ads are built with “privacy in mind” and won’t draw from your personal messages, calls, and statuses, which will remain encrypted. Instead, WhatsApp is limiting ad targeting to elements like your city, country, language, the channels you’re following, and the way you interact with the ads. Still, bringing targeted ads to the platform at all is at odds with its identity as a “secure” messaging app — a principle its founders aimed to uphold.
WhatsApp co-founders Jan Koum and Brian Acton have made their stance on advertising very clear. “Remember, when advertising is involved you the user are the product,” a 2012 WhatsApp blog post reads. Koum also kept a note from Acton taped to his desk that read, “No Ads! No Games! No Gimmicks!” as a reminder of what kind of app they should be building.
Just two years following Meta’s acquisition of WhatsApp, the app transitioned from charging 99 cents per year to a completely free model. At the time, WhatsApp said it would still offer an experience “without third-party ads and spam.”
Behind the scenes, Meta and Mark Zuckerberg’s continued push for targeted advertising drove Koum and Acton out of the company. “Targeted advertising is what makes me unhappy,” Acton said during a 2018 interview with Forbes in which he explained his departure. In the years since, Meta has waffled on bringing ads to WhatsApp. It pulled the plug on its idea in 2020 but later brought up the possibility in 2023 before rolling ads out to users now. WhatsApp is also rolling out the ability to subscribe to channels, and for businesses to pay for top spots on its “Explore” page for channels.
“It’s been thirteen years since our founders wrote about an early version of WhatsApp,” WhatsApp spokesperson Anaik von der Weid says in an emailed statement to The Verge. “All this time later, the experience we’re building still won’t interrupt your chats.” Von der Weid adds that the company believes the Updates tab is the “right place” for ads and Meta’s other new features.
The reality is, Meta’s businesses are built on advertising. It couldn’t help but launch ads on Threads earlier this year, and is planning to launch AI ad tools to help companies make more ads. Meta also brought its AI chatbot to WhatsApp, where users can interact with the bot in group messages, ask questions, and generate images. The company says it can read messages that “mention @Meta AI, or that people choose to share with Meta AI,” raising privacy concerns that WhatsApp aims to fix with private AI chats.
“This is another betrayal of the privacy protections that once distinguished WhatsApp.”
Launching targeted advertising only adds to these concerns. “This is another betrayal of the privacy protections that once distinguished WhatsApp and attracted many of its users to the platform,” John Davisson, the director of litigation at the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), says in a statement to The Verge. “Meta has taken a service that promised no ads and minimal data collection and warped it into one more tentacle of its surveillance advertising empire.”
Many aren’t happy about the addition of ads, with some users on Reddit saying that they plan to switch to Signal’s ad-free app due to the change. “Friendly reminder to people. Signal is a superior product built for good,” one user writes. Another comment, upvoted more than 3,500 times, says: “The moral of the story: Never trust the Zuck. Meta/Facebook promised to never add advertising to WhatsApp when they acquired the app for $19bln.” There are still some users indifferent to the change because it affects a tab they use less frequently.
“The online advertising ecosystem has been shown time and again to fuel widespread privacy and security violations,” Bill Budington, the senior staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, tells The Verge. “While it is not a surprising move for Meta, it is putting WhatsApp’s 3 billion users at unnecessary risk, all for the sake of a monetization strategy no one asked for and no one wanted.”
Update, June 17th: Added a statement from WhatsApp.
Wirtz, who is currently on holiday following the UEFA Nations League finals, is set to soon complete his transfer to Liverpool, after ESPN reported last week that the Premier League champions had agreed a deal that could rise to €136 million.
The German champions had their sights set on the playmaker but suffered a setback when Wirtz told the club that he’d rather join Liverpool.
Director of sport Max Eberl and sporting director Christoph Freund, who are currently with the team at the FIFA Club World Cup, have a variety of alternative names on their list.
The German champions know that they need to add at least one difference-maker to the squad and that signing a respected Bundesliga winger such as Freiburg’s Ritsu Doan, who has attracted Bayern’s interest as a backup option for the attack, wouldn’t be enough, sources added.
Kingsley Coman could also depart if Bayern receive a lucrative offer, sources said. The France winger was seemingly on his way out but, having shown no interest in a move to Saudi Arabia, there are currently no potential destinations on the horizon.
“Of course, you get the feeling that we should do something,” midfielder Joshua Kimmich said on Saturday. “Because Flo [Wirtz] does not come. Because Leroy [Sané] will be gone. Because Thomas [Müller] will be gone.”
For some time, it looked like Bayern could seriously pursue Rafael Leão but AC Milan’s high demands have cooled the Bavarians’ interest, sources said. The club were ready to pay a fee upwards of €100 million for Wirtz, but they appear to be more hesitant to invest that kind of money for another midfielder or winger.
Somewhat cheaper than Leão could be Athletic Club winger Nico Williams, who has a release clause of roughly €60 million in his contract. Williams has been seriously linked with Barcelona, and Bayern are aware of Williams’ apparent desire to join the LaLiga champions, but remain interested in case a deal falls through.
Another candidate where Bayern are in a disadvantageous position is Barcola. The 22-year-old has just won the UEFA Champions League with Paris Saint-Germain and is seemingly valued highly by manager Luis Enrique. Regardless, Eberl has contacted Barcola’s agent again in recent days to inquire whether the player could potentially be interested in leaving Paris for Bayern, sources said.
Eberl tried to acquire Barcola’s services in 2023, when Barcola was still under contract at Lyon and Eberl was director of sport at RB Leipzig. At the time, Eberl was in direct contact with the player.
But even if Barcola could imagine leaving Paris for Bayern this summer, negotiations could become difficult, and a potential deal might exceed what the German champions are willing to pay.
Eze, meanwhile is in demand after his performances with Crystal Palace and England, with ESPN reporting that he could also be a target for Manchester United.
Eberl is under increasing pressure following the events of the past few months, including the lengthy contract negotiations with Alphonso Davies and Kimmich and the failed attempt to sign Wirtz. While he is not solely responsible for Wirtz’s decision, Eberl knows that he must deliver during the transfer window.
“The transfer window is open until September 1. Plenty of water will go down the Isar — or the Ohio River,” Eberl said while in Cincinnati for Bayern’s opening Club World Cup game.
Will the real Frank Dremon please stand up?
Jax Taylor's online alter ego was hilariously exposed by his estranged wife Brittany Cartwright amid the former couple's bitter divorce during The…
