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Europe may have weeks of paid vacation, quaint walkable cities and incredible, affordable local wines. But there's something the continent lacks (besides ice cubes and AC): shiny, new Big Tech products. Take Apple's revamped Siri, Meta's Muse or OpenAI's competing AI assistant dots. They've all launched in the U.S., and in some cases other markets. But largely, not in the EU, which has a network of tech regulations targeting data protection, interoperability and AI. Max von Thun, director of the antitrust think tank Open Markets Institute Europe, explains more on this. More on this: “A Continent Without A.I. Agents: Europe Has to Wait for Dots, Muse and Siri AI” — from Trending Topics EU “Europe’s AI Blues: US Companies Slow Deployment” — from Center for European Policy Analysis

New AI features are quickly rolling out in the apps we use every day — from Google’s AI-generated search summaries to Meta’s Muse agent. But there's a big gap between what these tools can do and what most consumers find useful. The vast majority use free versions of chatbots, for searching the web, not running swarms of agents to manage their lives. Kate Moran, a user experience researcher at Gibbons and Moran, joins us to unpack the AI adoption gap. More on this The Top 100 Gen AI Consumer Apps from Andreessen Horowitz Not quite mAInstream: A consumer AI profile from Bank of America Americans and AI 2026: Chatbots, Smart Devices and Views on Impact from Pew Research Center

An increasing number of schools are offering classes and even majors and minors in the art of influencing. Charlie Randall is a senior pursuing a double major in theater and content creation at Arkansas Tech University, which launched their digital content creation degree about three years ago. He hopes to use the degrees to break into voice acting.

There's a growing market for AI models that promise to recreate the experience of interacting with a lost loved one. They're sometimes called generative ghosts, and they're the topic for today's “Uncanny AI,” our series about sometimes-unsettling experiences with this technology. Jack Manning, a Ph.D. candidate studying information science at the University of Colorado Boulder, has been looking into this. He recently published a study on how people experience talking to generative ghosts. More on this: “Designing Conversations with the Dead: How People Engage with Generative Ghosts” from Association for Computing Machinery “When AI is used to immortalize the dead, what are the ethical implications?” from Marketplace Tech

President Donald Trump named a new superhero-sounding AI task force this week dubbed the “Super Intelligence Force.” It's led by Jay Clayton, the new AI Czar and also director of national intelligence. Plus, Democrats in the Senate blocked a bill to address data center energy costs ahead of the midterm elections, and a new poll shows Americans are not feeling too great about how our leaders in government are dealing with the risks from AI. Cristiano Lima-Strong, senior AI and government reporter at Bloomberg Government, joins Marketplace’s Meghan McCarty Carino to break down these stories on this week’s “Tech Bytes: Week in Review.”

It started when Kalie Robins posted an Instagram video with her kid. Meta's built in AI chatbot, Muse, started prompting her to ask questions about her daughters and personal life, which sent her down a social-media-privacy rabbit hole. Robins took to her feed — at the time, with only a few hundred followers — to share her experience. “It starts pulling completely separate information for each of my kids: their names, birth information, pictures and videos of them. And then it says, ‘pinpointing Kalie Robbins' location,’” she said in her now viral video. Meta responded to the incident saying it “missed the mark” and has fixed the issue that prompted those questions. But Robins says she's now been catapulted into the AI privacy discourse. And it's pretty uncomfortable. More on this: Mother Horrified When Meta’s AI Scours Instagram and Facebook for Invasive Information About Her Young Daughters — from Futurism Meta’s Muse AI Agent Is Building a Dossier On You — from Time

OpenAI President Greg Brockman and his wife recently backed out of a planned $25 million donation to Leading the Future, an artificial intelligence-focused political action committee. Brockman said the PAC had become a “distraction” at OpenAI. But only after the executive had already given an initial $25 million. AI-focused PACs are spending big to shape competing visions for AI policy in the midterm elections. Brendan Glavin, Director of Insights at OpenSecrets, explains how these PACS are looking to influence elections this year.

The AI industry appears to be getting more serious about safety. Leaders of top companies signed a non-binding agreement at the White House Sept. 30, laying out standards and best practices for responsible development of advanced AI. OpenAI delayed the release of its latest model due to safety concerns. And Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei called on the sector to slow things down and "pace the frontier." Wall Street initially wasn't too happy about that push and stocks related to the AI buildout took a momentary tumble. But Jordan Nanos, at the chip research and consulting firm SemiAnalysis, argues that greater investment in AI security could actually drive more demand for computing power.

We've been hearing a lot about the threat of out-of-control of AI in recent weeks; mostly, from the people making the technology. There was the Anthropic employee Jacob Coxon, who publicly quit and kicked off the whole discussion. Others, including that company’s CEO Dario Amodei, chimed in with alarming appraisals of AI's existential risk. Making sense of all this as an outsider can sometimes feel like decoding an unfamiliar civilization. So, we called Spencer Kaplan, a Ph.D. candidate at Yale, who studies anthropology and researches AI workers.

While the White House hosted tech luminaries this week to sign a voluntary agreement on AI safety standards, the Federal Trade Commission opened a broad investigation into AI labs over potential safety risks their products may pose to consumers. Plus, a nearly four-hour documentary on Elon Musk is stirring up controversy over whether social media platforms will run ads for it. We’ll get into it on today’s “Bytes: Week in Review.” Check out our YouTube page to watch more episodes of Tech Bytes.

Over the last 25 years, the U.S. government has spent billions of dollars to build a "virtual wall" of video surveillance at the southern border. The network can signal Border Patrol to respond when it detects suspicious activity. And officials have touted the benefit of providing aid to migrants in distress. But a recent investigation by MIT Technology Review and the Times of San Diego found more than 1,000 migrants have died over the last decade within range of one of these cameras. Eileen Guo co-reported the series, “Dying on Camera.” More on this: “The US spent billions on border surveillance. Why can’t it catch people before they die?” from MIT Technology Review “A congressional representative just proposed killing America’s border tower program” from MIT Technology Review

Further proof — in case you need it — that AI data centers aren't very popular: A new survey from the Pew Research Center shows 60% of Americans aren't comfortable welcoming one to the neighborhood. And concerns have grown since the beginning of the year across every demographic group, making the backlash a key issue in the midterm elections. Scott Brennen, director of NYU's Center on Technology Policy, recently published a report on how data centers could better work with communities. More on this: “Americans’ views of data centers have turned more negative” from Pew Research Center “Collective Goods but Local Harms: How Data Centers Can Earn Community Support” from Center on Technology Policy “Residents voice concerns as Hobart City Council approves Amazon data center” from WGN9 “More Americans concerned about AI, even as it drives economy” from Marketplace

Content creator Manny Marotta has gone viral in recent weeks for his X feed recounting the news of 25 years ago as if it's happening now. His minute-by-minute account of the events of Sept. 11, 2001, attracted hundreds of thousands of new followers. And the 27-year old is posting day-by-day accounts from 50 and 100 years ago, as well. Marotta says it's become a time-consuming hobby alongside his job as a law clerk for a non-profit.

The AI smart speaker market is getting crowded. This year, Amazon, which is a Marketplace underwriter, rolled out a large language model-powered version of its classic voice assistant. You can still talk to Alexa+ using Amazon echo devices, but it also operates as a text chatbot, replacing the old Rufus AI. It's capable of conversational searches, managing to-do lists and even generating podcasts. Daniel Rausch, Amazon’s vice president of Alexa and Echo, broke down what's new with Alexa+. More on this: “I’ve Been Testing Alexa for a Decade. Here’s My Take on How Alexa+ Compares.” from Wirecutter “Amazon's Alexa+” from Amazon

Meta's new Muse AI assistant is having a moment — and it's kind of adorable. Meta announced a slew of new integrations for its AI assistant at a company event this week, including a customizable furry lil’ avatar and a Tamogatchi-like wearable device for interacting with it. Plus, Wall Street is betting billions on growing demand for cybersecurity in the age of AI and social media platform Discord enters its age-gating era. Anita Ramaswamy at The Information is here to help us unpack the week in tech. More on this: I Gave My Life Over to Meta’s A.I. Agent and Was Blown Away — New York Times Meta Tests Muse AI Agent Calls That Are Actually Made By Humans in a Call Center — 404 Media CrowdStrike and Okta Trade at Big Premiums Despite Unproven AI Payoff — The Information Discord’s age-verification era is upon us, despite community backlash — Tech Crunch