Tokens As The New Currency?

Tokens As The New Currency?

Author: Morning Brew August 20, 2026 Duration: 20:56
Stripe made the OpenRouter deal official at $7.5B. Unitree's Shanghai debut popped 460% past a $50B market cap, YouTube dangled millions to keep creators off Netflix, Slack launched Slack Code, and Binance turned AI agents loose on trading. Links Stripe agrees to acquire NYC-based OpenRouter; a source says Stripe is paying $7.5B, with $1.5B going to the startup's founders and $6B to its investors (The New York Times) Collison frames tokens as the central currency for companies building with AI, capping two years of Stripe buying the plumbing under AI spending, from Metronome to Bridge (SiliconANGLE) Hangzhou-based humanoid robot maker Unitree's stock surges 460% in its Shanghai trading debut, giving it a $50B+ market cap, after it raised ~$904M in its IPO (Bloomberg) Unitree says its new "Superman" humanoid can hit 12.66 meters per second, faster than Usain Bolt's top speed, and leap two meters, ahead of the World Humanoid Robot Games (Futurism) The 30-second video of Unitree's "Superman" robot jumping and sprinting down a track (Unitree Robotics on X) Sources: YouTube is offering top creators millions to post videos exclusively on YouTube for a period and will penalize those that post to Netflix concurrently (Bloomberg) Slack launches Slack Code, adding dedicated, project-specific channels that let teams collaborate with AI coding agents "like teammates" across all Slack plans (The Verge) Binance launches Agent OS, a platform that lets AI agents analyze markets and execute trades on users' behalf; users set limits on AI agents' access and trades (TechCrunch) Subscribe to the ad-free feed. Download Cash App Today: ⁠https://cash.app/⁠ #CashAppPartner. Terms apply. Bitcoin services by Block, Inc. See the Bitcoin disclosures at cash.app/legal/podcast

Ever feel like the tech world moves too fast to keep up? Tech Brew Ride Home is that concise, insightful conversation you wish you had caught by the office coffee machine, delivered straight to your headphones. Produced by the team at Morning Brew, this daily podcast distills the essential news from Silicon Valley and beyond into a focused, fifteen-minute session designed for your commute or a short walk. Instead of drowning in headlines, you get a clear summary of what actually matters-the major deals, the intriguing controversies, and the subtle shifts that define the industry. Think of it as your audio debrief, cutting through the noise with context and a bit of wit. Each episode of this news-focused podcast ensures you’re not just informed but prepared, turning the flood of information into a manageable stream. It’s the efficient, engaging way to stay current without dedicating your entire afternoon to research, making that ride home a little smarter.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 50

Tech Brew Ride Home
Podcast Episodes
Hey, Want Some Models? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:26
Anthropic shipped Claude Fable and Mythos 5.1 with a 75% cache-price cut, Google countered with Gemini 3.8 Flash, OpenAI teased Astra's public release, a judge spared Google's ad exchange from a sale, and the FBI probed…
An... AI Toothbrush??!! [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:30
Tim Cook sent Apple staff a farewell memo on his last day as CEO, the FTC sued Amazon over $20B in hidden ad surcharges, Starman Optical bought GoPro for $285M, Waymo hit three cities, and Dyson made an AI toothbrush. On…
50% Toward AI Takeover? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:51
OpenClaw shipped 2.0 with shared sessions that aren't a security boundary. OpenAI's ads hit a $1B run rate, outcome-based AI pricing spread from Salesforce to OpenAI, and the Hugging Face postmortems landed, one calling…
Anthropic Is Street Legal Again [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:20
A judge blocked the Pentagon from blacklisting Anthropic, calling the retaliation illegal. OpenAI, Anthropic and 100+ companies warned the AI cyberattack window is closing, Apple TV got pricier again, Stripe walked from…
The Agentic Era [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:25
Nvidia posted $96B in quarterly revenue and guided to 70% growth next year, then agreed to buy Hugging Face for $12.9B. Trump weighed sweeping chip tariffs, cybersecurity stocks ripped on AI threats, and Instinct raised…
Meta Settles [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:38
Meta agreed to pay up to $16.68B to settle state claims it hooked kids on Facebook and Instagram, with teen time limits attached. Z.ai unmasked Ox Alpha, Amazon killed Mechanical Turk, and Reuters detailed Zuckerberg's a…
New Macs [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:21
Apple refreshed the Mac Studio with M5 Max and M5 Ultra and gave the Mac mini M6 silicon, at higher prices. OpenAI's Jalapeño chip beat Nvidia on efficiency, Perplexity went fully local, WhatsApp toughened logins, and Ub…
Hugging Face Next? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 20:26
Hugging Face explored a sale at $13B+, keeping the AI M&A wave rolling. Trump scolded towns that reject data centers while Abbott said the industry dug its own grave, Fable 5 spending plateaued, and Apple cut 200+ jobs.…
(Portfolio Profile) Onix [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:08:18
In this episode, we explore Onix, a platform that enables experts to train their own AI models to help millions with health, wellness, and personal development. Founders Nicholas Nadeau and David Bennahum discuss how the…
Anthropic Doing 2x OpenAI? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 19:40
OpenAI paused training and rewrote its Preparedness Framework after Astra flirted with a critical cyber threshold. Leaked numbers showed Anthropic out-earning OpenAI nearly two to one, Anthropic prepped supervoting share…