Apple's new 'Liquid Glass' design, introduced at WWDC, is receiving mixed reviews. Some users and designers find the interface elements hard to read, particularly notifications and the Control Center, especially with brighter wallpapers. Issues include light gray fonts on translucent bars making artist names difficult to discern in Apple Music and glassy notifications requiring squinting.

Despite the criticisms, the design showcases beautiful icons and impressive morphing button effects. Liquid Glass overlays blur and stretch Home Screen icons, creating a glass-like effect. The 'Customize' button also reflects wallpaper colors, demonstrating attention to detail.

Nothing CEO Carl Pei expressed admiration for Liquid Glass. Apple suggests that hardware and silicon advancements should mitigate battery concerns, and users can toggle off power-hungry effects. The company's last major design overhaul, iOS 7, faced similar initial criticism, which was addressed over time.

Google has released Android 16 for Pixel phones, featuring iOS-style live notifications, Material 3 Expressive design, and improved security features. The update includes Bluetooth LE audio support and desktop-style windowing for tablets. Google Messages now supports RCS group chats with customizable icons and notification controls.

Pixel phones receive feature upgrades, including a 'Pixel VIPs' widget for contact interactions and detailed captions for video content. Custom stickers can be created via Gboard, and AI-powered summaries are added to the Recorder app. Battery health indicators are introduced for newer Pixel devices, and Magnifier app accessibility is enhanced.

Enterprise users gain corporate badge storage in Google Wallet and Gemini chatbot integration in Google Docs, along with improved PDF handling in Chrome.

Linear, a competitor to Atlassian, has raised $82 million in a Series C funding round led by Accel, valuing the company at $1.25 billion. The funding will be used to expand its product portfolio and attract larger enterprise clients. Linear's products focus on helping developers manage software bugs, feature requests, and product development, leveraging AI for coding assistance. The company boasts over 15,000 customers, including OpenAI and Scale AI, with a 280% profit growth last year.

Snap plans to release its Specs, augmented reality smart glasses, to consumers in 2026. CEO Evan Spiegel announced the new glasses at the Augmented World Expo. The Specs will feature AR and AI capabilities similar to Spectacles 5 but in a smaller, lighter form factor.

The glasses will include see-through lenses for displaying graphics and an AI assistant for processing audio and video. Snap hopes its SnapOS developer ecosystem and existing AR Lenses will give it an advantage against competitors like Meta and Google.

Snap also announced developer updates, including multimodal AI model support from OpenAI and Google DeepMind, and a Depth Module API. Snap will partner with Niantic Spatial to develop AI-powered maps of the world.

Apple's latest AI models for Apple Intelligence show improvements but underperform compared to rival tech firms like OpenAI, according to the company's benchmarks.

The 'Apple On-Device' model, designed for offline use, is rated comparably to similarly-sized Google and Alibaba models in text generation quality, while the more powerful 'Apple Server' model trails behind OpenAI's GPT-4o.

In image analysis, Meta's Llama 4 Scout model outperformed Apple Server. These results highlight challenges in Apple's AI research division, with previous underwhelming AI capabilities and a delayed Siri upgrade.

The new models, including Apple On-Device, which is accessible to third-party developers, feature improved tool use, efficiency, and multilingual support.

Enterprise AI company Glean has secured $150 million in a Series F funding round led by Wellington Management, achieving a valuation of $7.2 billion. This follows a previous $260 million Series E round in September, which had already doubled the valuation from February 2024. In just over a year, Glean has raised $610 million, significantly increasing its valuation from $2.2 billion. The company's ARR surpassed $100 million in its last fiscal year, only three years after its launch. Glean provides AI-powered search and agent tools for enterprise employees, integrating with platforms like Salesforce, Microsoft Teams, and Zendesk. The funding round also included investments from Khosla Ventures, Bicycle Capital, and other prominent investors.

Wayve and Uber are planning to launch a fully driverless robotaxi service in London, following the U.K.'s accelerated framework for self-driving commercial pilots. The U.K. government is fast-tracking pilots to spring 2026 to incentivize investment in autonomy. Wayve and Uber have not yet shared specific details.

Wayve's AI tech is slated for Nissan vehicles, building on Uber's strategic investment in Wayve in 2024. The companies aim to start in London and expand to greater London and beyond, pending regulatory approval.

Wayve is conducting an 'AI-500 Roadshow' to demonstrate its technology's adaptability across 500 cities globally. Uber's extensive mobility network makes the partnership significant for scaling autonomous capabilities.

Google's AI Overviews and AI-powered tools are significantly reducing traffic to news publishers, as reported by the Wall Street Journal. The shift towards chatbots providing answers directly impacts the need for users to click on traditional blue links, leading to a decline in referrals to news sites.

The New York Times, for example, experienced a drop in traffic from organic search, falling from 44% three years ago to 36.5% in April 2025. Publishers are exploring alternative business models, including content-sharing deals with AI companies like Amazon and OpenAI, to generate revenue.

Perplexity is also planning to share advertising revenue with news publishers when their content is used in chatbot responses. The industry is adapting to combat the threat to journalism posed by AI-driven search results.