Category: Artificial intelligence
Nazi SpongeBob, erotic chatbots: Steve Bannon and allies DEMAND copyright enforcement against AI
United States Attorney General Pam Bondi was asked by a group of conservatives to defend intellectual property and copyright laws against artificial intelligence.
A letter was directed to Bondi, as well as the the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, Michael Kratsios, from a group of self-described conservative and America First advocates including former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, journalist Jack Posobiec, and members of nationalist and populist organizations like the Bull Moose Project and Citizens for Renewing America.
‘It is absurd to suggest that licensing copyrighted content is a financial hindrance to a $20 trillion industry.’
The letter primarily focused on the economic impact of unfettered use of IP by imaginative and generative AI programs, which are consistently churning out parody videos to mass audiences.
“Core copyright industries account for over $2 trillion in U.S. GDP, 11.6 million workers, and an average annual wage of over $140,000 per year — far above the average American wage,” the letter argued. That argument also extended to revenue generated overseas, where copyright holders sell over an alleged $270 billion worth of content.
This is in conjunction with massive losses already coming through IP theft and copyright infringement, an estimated total of up to $600 billion annually, according to the FBI.
“Granting U.S. AI companies a blanket license to steal would bless our adversaries to do the same — and undermine decades of work to combat China’s economic warfare,” the letter claimed.
RELATED: ‘Transhumanist goals’: Sen. Josh Hawley reveals shocking statistic about LLM data scraping
Letters to the administration debating the economic impact of AI are increasing. The Chamber of Progress wrote to Kratsios in October, stating that in more than 50 pending federal cases, many are accused of direct and indirect copyright infringement based on the “automated large-scale acquisition of unlicensed training data from the internet.”
The letter cited the president on “winning the AI race,” quoting remarks from July in which he said, “When a person reads a book or an article, you’ve gained great knowledge. That does not mean that you’re violating copyright laws.”
The conservative letter aggressively countered the idea that AI boosts valuable knowledge without abusing intellectual property, however, claiming that large corporations such as NVIDIA, Microsoft, Apple, Google, and more are well equipped to follow proper copyright rules.
“It is absurd to suggest that licensing copyrighted content is a financial hindrance to a $20 trillion industry spending hundreds of billions of dollars per year,” the letter read. “AI companies enjoy virtually unlimited access to financing. In a free market, businesses pay for the inputs they need.”
The conservative group further noted examples of IP theft across the web, including unlicensed productions of “SpongeBob Squarepants” and Pokemon. These include materials showcasing the beloved SpongeBob as a Nazi or Pokemon’s Pikachu committing crimes.
IP will also soon be under threat from erotic content, the letter added, citing ChatGPT’s recent announcement that it would start to “treat adult users like adults.”
RELATED: Silicon Valley’s new gold rush is built on stolen work
Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
The letter argued further that degrading American IP rights would enable China to run amok under “the same dubious ‘fair use’ theories” used by the Chinese to steal content and use proprietary U.S. AI models and algorithms.
AI developers, the writers insisted, should focus on applications with broad-based benefits, such as leveraging data like satellite imagery and weather reports, instead of “churning out AI slop meant to addict young users and sell their attention to advertisers.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Guillermo del Toro stops awards show music to drop ‘F**k AI’ bomb
Three-time Oscar winner Guillermo del Toro had strong words about using humans in the production of his latest film.
Del Toro, a writer and director behind films like “Pacific Rim,” “Pan’s Labyrinth,” and “The Hobbit” movies, was honored with a tribute award recently at the 2025 Gotham Film Awards.
‘Every single frame of this film that was willfully made by humans for humans.’
Del Toro accepted the award alongside actors Oscar Isaac and Jacob Elordi for their work on the 2025 film “Frankenstein.”
Del Toro made several emotional comments dating back to when he first read the book that inspired his movie at age 11, before Isaac attempted to turn the acceptance speech into one about diversity and immigration.
“I am proud to be standing here tonight. … Immigrants, baby. We get the job done,” Isaac exclaimed. He is Guatemalan, Elordi is Australian, and del Toro is Mexican.
Elordi then spoke, but neither he nor del Toro added to Isaac’s remarks. Soon, music started to play, and the production looked to the next award. That was until del Toro interrupted, deciding that he wanted to add opinionated remarks of his own.
“No, no, no, wait!” del Toro interrupted. “I would like to tell to the rest of our extraordinary cast and our crew that the artistry of all of them shines on every single frame of this film that was willfully made by humans for humans.”
“The designers, builders, makeup, wardrobe team, cinematographers, composers, editors,” he continued. “This tribute belongs to all of them. And I would like to extend our gratitude and say —” del Toro then paused, seemingly wondering if he should continue.
“F**k AI,” he added with a smile.
RELATED: Almost half of Gen Z wants AI to run the government. You should be terrified.
During his acceptance speech, del Toro spoke on the inspiration he drew from Mary Shelley, the original author of “Frankenstein.”
“Mary Shelley, who made the book her biography, she was 18 years old when she wrote the book and posed the urgent questions: Who am I? What am I? Where did I come from? And where am I going?” del Toro explained. “She presented them with such urgency that they are alive 200 years later through this incredible parable that shaped my life since I first read it in childhood at age 11.”
Much of del Toro’s appeal comes from his ability to explore complex emotional topics from a unique viewpoints, and those unique thoughts typically come across whenever he is given the chance to speak. Del Toro told the award-show audience that even at a young age, he knew he “did not belong in the world the way my parents, the way the world expected me to fit.”
“My place was in a faraway land inhabited only by monsters and misfits.”
RELATED: Trump admin leaves Elon Musk’s Grok, xAI off massive list of AI tech partners
This outlook definitely falls in line with his recent work, including when he appeared in the recent video game series Death Stranding.
Working alongside iconic game developer Hideo Kojima, del Toro delivered storylines about life, death, and emotional connection, but this time as an actor.
Speaking on the games, del Toro said he believes in the importance of “paradoxical creation” and said it is “essential to art.”
The beauty of the game, he added, was that Kojima had both “the weirdest mind and the most wholesome mind,” which shaped his storytelling.
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
‘Humans Get Tired’: It May Not Be People Reading Your College Applications Anymore At Top Schools
‘The AI does not get tired’
Trump admin leaves Elon Musk’s Grok, xAI off massive list of AI tech partners
Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence platform has seemingly been left out of a government program to launch the technology forward.
On Monday, the White House announced a new project aimed at accelerating innovation and discovery to “solve the most challenging problems of this century.”
‘The Genesis Mission will bring together our Nation’s research and development resources.’
The new Genesis Mission is described by the Department of Energy as “a national initiative to build the world’s most powerful scientific platform.”
An executive order from the president titled “Launching the Genesis Mission” explained plans to integrate federal scientific datasets to train AI to test new hypotheses, automate research, and speed up the occurrence of scientific breakthroughs.
“The Genesis Mission will bring together our Nation’s research and development resources — combining the efforts of brilliant American scientists, including those at our national laboratories, with pioneering American businesses; world-renowned universities; and existing research infrastructure, data repositories, production plants, and national security sites — to achieve dramatic acceleration in AI development and utilization.”
With Elon Musk making strides in 2025 with both the advancement of his Grok chatbot and its video generation model, Imagine, tech enthusiasts were shocked to find out that Musk’s xAI was not on a list of partners for the project.
RELATED: Big Tech’s AI boom hits voters hard — and Democrats pounce
The Department of Energy includes 55 companies on its lists of collaborators for Genesis, with xAI and Grok nowhere to be found.
Aside from the fact that Musk was a special government employee under the Trump administration, his exclusion is even more surprising given both the length and generic nature of the companies that are involved. Amazon Web Services, Google, and Microsoft were announced as partners, as were AI companies like OpenAI and Scale AI.
It should be noted that company xLight, which is listed by the DOE, is not affiliated with Musk.
RELATED: Log into this Gmail clone to read all the Jeffrey Epstein emails as if you were Epstein himself
“For [xAI] to not be a part of the Genesis Mission, it is not just an oversight, it would have to be an intentional omission,” AI engineer Brian Roemmele wrote on X. “I spoke to someone on this project who asked for my input today, and it is the first thing I brought up. I am certain they will see the error made.”
Blaze News contacted xAI for comment but did not receive an immediate reply. This article will be updated with any applicable response.
Whether a rift exists between Musk and the Trump administration is unclear, but the government seems steadfast in believing its mission is monumental in terms of importance, likening it to the World War II nuclear arms race.
“The world’s most powerful scientific platform to ever be built has launched,” the DOE claimed on its X account. “This Manhattan-Project-level leap will fundamentally transform the future of American science and innovation.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
‘As a machine thinketh, so he becomes’: New study reveals AI gets brain rot from consuming digital junk
For the majority of modern Americans, scrolling, computer work, streaming, and other forms of screen time have largely, if not completely, replaced reading, introspection, and deep conversation.
We are very quickly becoming “stupid slugs,” Glenn Beck says.
And he means stupid quite literally. Studies have proven time and again that our ability to concentrate and stay focused has become almost laughable. Recent reports indicate that Netflix and other digital entertainment companies are considering adapting content strategies — simplifying narratives, dialogue, and visuals — to accommodate viewers’ shortened attention spans and inability to follow complex plotlines.
“Everything that we’re doing online is fracturing attention, memory, and sustained reasoning,” Glenn says. “So, at what point does this become an epidemic? At what point are our minds starving for any kind of nutrition as we just feed them calories of noise?”
But our own rapid cognitive erosion isn’t even the wildest story. A new study has revealed that AI also experiences brain rot from consuming the same virtual junk that’s making humans dumber.
Large language models like Grok, ChatGPT, and Gemini “are trained on junk web content — so viral, shallow, high-engagement stuff,” Glenn says.
Just like a chronically online person, AI bots are experiencing a decline in “reasoning ability” and “long-context memory.” Further, “dark personality traits (psychopathic tendencies and narcissism)” begin to emerge the longer the bot feeds on digital junk — eerily similar to the terminally online rage-goblin hunched in a dark basement, marinating in memes and manufactured outrage.
But that’s not even the most disturbing part of the study. When researchers began replacing junk content with “clean, high-quality data,” the AI model was unable to recover to baseline capacity.
“The rot remains. As a man — or now as a machine — thinketh, so he becomes,” Glenn says ominously.
This study is a lesson every person living in the digital age needs to hear, and yet, it’s garnered little attention.
But even if it did attract the eye of the public, would it ultimately make a difference? Glenn is concerned we’ll be “too apathetic to wean ourselves off the digital heroin,” even if the consequences are staring us right in the face.
And then there’s this reality to contend with: Even if people reverse course, the study suggests that it might be too late anyway. The AI bot that fed on junk never could fully recover. Will we be the same?
If that’s our bleak reality, then we must also face the possibility that our children will inherit our shallowness — and most disturbingly, that at some point, our inability to think critically will culminate in the collective loss of human agency.
But even still, Glenn isn’t ready to give up. “Can we get people to actually listen to this and then engage again in thoughtful reading and conversation and meaningful silence?” he asks.
So much is at stake — time, freedom, connection, purpose.
Glenn warns: “It’s up to us, America.”
Want more from Glenn Beck?
To enjoy more of Glenn’s masterful storytelling, thought-provoking analysis, and uncanny ability to make sense of the chaos, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.
AI-enabled teddy bear pulled off market after reportedly making sexual and violent suggestions
A teddy bear with artificial intelligence integration was pulled from an online store after a report said it was capable of making sexual suggestions as well as plans for violence.
The “Kumma” bear sold by FoloToy cost only $99 online, but a report from the Public Interest Research Groups said the toy didn’t have proper safeguards against access to harmful content. FoloToy is based in Singapore.
‘Kumma discussed even more graphic sexual topics in detail, such as explaining different sex positions, giving step-by-step instructions on a common “knot for beginners” for tying up a partner and describing roleplay dynamics involving teachers and students.’
“We were surprised to find how quickly Kumma would take a single sexual topic we introduced into the conversation and run with it, simultaneously escalating in graphic detail while introducing new sexual topics of its own,” the group said.
The topics included spanking, role-playing, and BDSM.
“Kumma discussed even more graphic sexual topics in detail,” the group added, “such as explaining different sex positions, giving step-by-step instructions on a common ‘knot for beginners’ for tying up a partner and describing roleplay dynamics involving teachers and students, and parents and children — scenarios it disturbingly brought up itself.”
FoloToy CEO Larry Wang told CNN that the company pulled the bear as well as other AI-enabled toys and that the company was “conducting an internal safety audit.”
The website had marketed the bear to children as well as adults.
“Kumma, our adorable bear, combines advanced artificial intelligence with friendly, interactive features, making it the perfect friend for both kids and adults,” the company said.
RELATED: AI chatbot encouraged autistic boy to harm himself — and his parents, lawsuit says
“From lively conversations to educational storytelling, FoloToy adapts to your personality and needs, bringing warmth, fun, and a little extra curiosity to your day,” the website read.
Open AI told PIRG that it had suspended the developer for abusing its policies.
R.J. Cross, co-author of the report, told CNN that more efforts were necessary to prevent the harm from AI-enabled products.
“It’s great to see these companies taking action on problems we’ve identified. But AI toys are still practically unregulated, and there are plenty you can still buy today,” Cross said. “Removing one problematic product from the market is a good step but far from a systemic fix.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Karp’s Quest to Save the Shire
“You’re killing my family in Palestine!” a protester screamed at Palantir CEO Alex Karp while he was addressing a Silicon Valley conference last April. “The primary source of death in Palestine,” Karp, the Jewish, half-black, progressive, tai chi practitioner shot back, without missing a beat, “is the fact that Hamas has realized there are millions and millions of useful idiots.”
The post Karp’s Quest to Save the Shire appeared first on .
Google boss compares replacing humans with AI to getting a fridge for the first time
The head of Google’s parent company says welcoming artificial intelligence into daily life is akin to buying a refrigerator.
Alphabet’s chief executive, Indian-born Sundar Pichai, gave a revealing interview to the BBC this week in which he asked the general population to get on board with automation through AI.
‘Our first refrigerator …. radically changed my mom’s life.’
The BBC’s Faisal Islam, whose parents are from India, asked the Indian-American executive if the purpose of his AI products were to automate human tasks and essentially replace jobs with programming.
Pichai claimed that AI should be welcomed because humans are “overloaded” and “juggling many things.”
He then compared using AI to welcoming the technology that a dishwasher or fridge once brought to the average home.
“I remember growing up, you know, when we got our first refrigerator in the home — how much it radically changed my mom’s life, right? And so you can view this as automating some, but you know, freed her up to do other things, right?”
Islam fired back, citing the common complaints heard from the middle class who are concerned with job loss in fields like creative design, accounting, and even “journalism too.”
“Do you know which jobs are going to be safer?” he posited to Pichai.
RELATED: Here’s how to get the most annoying new update off of your iPhone
The Alphabet chief was steadfast in his touting of AI’s “extraordinary benefits” that will “create new opportunities.”
At the same time, he said the general population will “have to work through societal disruptions” as certain jobs “evolve” and transition.
“People need to adapt,” he continued. “Then there would be areas where it will impact some jobs, so society — I mean, we need to be having those conversations. And part of it is, how do you develop this technology responsibly and give society time to adapt as we absorb these technologies?”
Despite branding Google Gemini as a force for good that should be embraced, Pichai strangely admitted at the same time that chatbots are not foolproof by any means.
RELATED: ‘You’re robbing me’: Morgan Freeman slams Tilly Norwood, AI voice clones
– YouTube
“This is why people also use Google search,” Pichai said in regard to AI’s proclivity to present inaccurate information. “We have other products that are more grounded in providing accurate information.”
The 53-year-old told the BBC that it was up to the user to learn how to use AI tools for “what they’re good at” and not “blindly trust everything they say.”
The answer seems at odds with the wonder of AI he championed throughout the interview, especially when considering his additional commentary about the technology being prone to mistakes.
“We take pride in the amount of work we put in to give us as accurate information as possible, but the current state-of-the-art AI technology is prone to some errors.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
‘You’re robbing me’: Morgan Freeman slams Tilly Norwood, AI voice clones
The use of celebrity likeness for AI videos is spiraling out of control, and one of Hollywood’s biggest stars is not having it.
Despite the use of AI in online videos being fairly new, it has already become a trope to use an artificial version of a celebrity’s voice for content relating to news, violence, or history.
‘I don’t appreciate it, and I get paid for doing stuff like that.’
This is particularly true when it comes to satirical videos that are meant to sound like documentaries. Creators love to use recognizable voices, like David Attenborough’s and, of course, Morgan Freeman’s, whose voice has become so recognizable that others have labeled him as “the voice of God.”
However, the 88-year-old Freeman is not pleased about his voice being replicated. In an interview with the Guardian, he said that while some actors like James Earl Jones (who played Darth Vader) have consented to his voice being imitated with computers, he has not.
“I’m a little PO’d, you know,” Freeman told the outlet. “I’m like any other actor: Don’t mimic me with falseness. I don’t appreciate it, and I get paid for doing stuff like that, so if you’re gonna do it without me, you’re robbing me.”
Freeman explained that his lawyers have been “very, very busy” in pursuing “many … quite a few” cases in which his voice was replicated without his consent.
In the same interview, the Memphis native was also not shy about criticizing the concept of AI actors.
RELATED: Hollywood’s newest star isn’t human — and why that’s ‘disturbing’
Photo by Chris Haston/WBTV via Getty Images
Freeman was asked about Tilly Norwood, the AI character introduced by Dutch actress Eline Van der Velden in 2025. The pretend-world character is meant to be an avatar mimicking celebrity status, while also cutting costs in the casting room.
“Nobody likes her because she’s not real and that takes the part of a real person,” Freeman jabbed. “So it’s not going to work out very well in the movies or in television. … The union’s job is to keep actors acting, so there’s going to be that conflict.”
Freeman spoke out about the use of his voice in 2024, as well. According to a report by 4 News Now, a TikTok creator posted a video claiming to be Freeman’s niece and used an artificial version of his voice to narrate the video.
In response, Freeman wrote on X, “Thank you to my incredible fans for your vigilance and support in calling out the unauthorized use of an A.I. voice imitating me.”
He added, “Your dedication helps authenticity and integrity remain paramount. Grateful.”
RELATED: Meet AI ‘actress’ Tilly Norwood. Is she really the future of entertainment?
Norwood is not the first attempt at taking an avatar mainstream. In 2022, Capitol Records flirted with an AI rapper named FN Meka; the very idea that the rapper was even signed to a label was historic in the first place.
The rapper, or more likely its representatives, were later dropped from the label after activists claimed the character reinforced racial stereotypes.
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
Middle school boy faces 10 felonies in AI nude scandal. But expulsion of girl, 13 — an alleged victim — sparks firestorm.
A Louisiana middle school boy is facing 10 felony counts for using AI to create fake nude photos of female classmates and sharing them with other students, according to multiple reports. However, one alleged female victim has been expelled following her reported reaction to the scandal.
On Aug. 26, detectives with the Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s Office launched an investigation into reports that male students had shared fake nude photos of female classmates at the Sixth Ward Middle School in Choctaw.
‘What’s going on here, I’ll be quite frank, is nothing more than disgusting.’
Benjamin Comeaux, an attorney representing the alleged female victim, said the images used real photos of the girls, including selfies, with AI-generated nude bodies, the Washington Post reported.
Comeaux said administrators reported the incident to the school resource officer, according to the Post.
The Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s Office said in a statement that the incident “led to an altercation on a school bus involving one of the male students and one of the female students.”
Comeaux said during a bus ride, several boys shared AI-made nude images of a 13-year-old girl, and the girl in question struck one of the students sharing the images, the Post reported.
However, school administrators expelled the 13-year-old girl over the physical altercation.
Meanwhile, police said that a male suspect on Sept. 15 was charged with 10 counts of unlawful dissemination of images created by artificial intelligence.
The sheriff’s office noted that the investigation is ongoing, and there is a possibility of additional arrests and charges.
Sheriff Craig Webre noted that the female student involved in the alleged bus fight will not face criminal charges “given the totality of the circumstances.”
Webre added that the investigation involves technology and social media platforms, which could take several weeks and even months to “attain and investigate digital evidence.”
The alarming incident was brought back to life during a fiery Nov. 5 school board meeting during which attorneys for the expelled female student slammed school administrators.
According to WWL-TV, an attorney said, “She had enough, what is she supposed to do?”
“She reported it to the people who are supposed to protect her, but she was victimized, and finally she tried to knock the phone out of his hand and swat at him,” the same attorney added.
One attorney also noted, “This was not a random act of violence … this was a reasonable response to what this kid endured, and there were so many options less than expulsion that could’ve been done. Had she not been a victim, we’re not here, and none of this happens.”
Her representatives also warned, “You are setting a dangerous precedent by doing anything other than putting her back in school,” according to WWL.
Matthew Ory, one of the attorneys representing the female student, declared, “What’s going on here, I’ll be quite frank, is nothing more than disgusting. Her image was taken by artificial intelligence and manipulated and manufactured to be child pornography.”
School board member Valerie Bourgeois pushed back by saying, “Yes, she is a victim, I agree with that, but if she had not hit the young man, we wouldn’t be here today, it wouldn’t have come to an expulsion hearing.”
Tina Babin, another school board member, added, “I found the video on the bus to be sickening, the whole thing, everything about it, but the fact that this child went through this all day long does weigh heavy on me.”
Lafourche Parish Public Schools Superintendent Jarod Martin explained, “Sometimes in life, we can be both victims and perpetrators. Sometimes in life, horrible things happen to us, and we get angry and do things.”
Ultimately, the school board allowed the girl to return to school, but she will be on probation until January.
Attorneys for the girl’s family, Greg Miller and Morgyn Young, told WWL that they intend to file a lawsuit.
“Nobody took any action to confiscate cell phones, to put an end to this,” Miller claimed. “It’s pure negligence on the part of the school board.”
Martin defended the district in a statement that read:
Any and all allegations of criminal misconduct on our campuses are immediately reported to the Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s Office. After reviewing this case, the evidence suggests that the school did, in fact, follow all of our protocols and procedures for reporting such instances.
Sheriff Webre warned, “While the ability to alter images has been available for decades, the rise of AI has made it easier for anyone to alter or create such images with little to no training or experience.”
Webre also said, “This incident highlights a serious concern that all parents should address with their children.”
Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!
