Worse than flying near a crying baby is sitting on a red eye surrounded by a group of nerds discussing the existential risk of AI. Some air passengers might’ve suffered that predicament as Anthropic dispatched senior staff to DC this week to meet with government officials. The company is hoping to convince the administration to reverse a ban issued Friday on foreigners using its powerful Fable 5 model, which prompted Anthropic to cut off all access to the model.

Anthropic debuted Fable 5 last week, claiming it was a safer version of its unreleased Mythos model—which it says has potent cybersecurity capabilities that can be weaponized by hackers. But it took Fable down on Friday after the Trump administration restricted its use to Americans only, citing national security and findings that its safeguards could be bypassed by bad actors.

Now, Anthropic is negotiating with administration officials to bring Fable back online. “Both parties are working quickly to get this resolved,” an Anthropic spokesperson told the WSJ yesterday. “This is part of our ongoing commitment to working alongside the administration toward our shared goal of protecting US critical infrastructure and the US lead in cyber defense.”

Fabled dispute

The Trump administration’s decision came after Amazon (an Anthropic investor) reportedly told officials that it had found ways to jailbreak Fable to make it a potential asset for hackers:

• Officials told Politico they restricted Fable after Anthropic failed to address safety concerns in a timely manner.
• An Anthropic insider countered that it was given a 90-minute deadline to voluntarily take the model offline “with no details on the actual threat,” per Politico. The company claims that the jailbreaking threat applies only in narrow cases and that the risk is about the same as similarly powerful tools from rival OpenAI and some Chinese models.

Meanwhile, a group of cybersecurity pros signed an open letter to the government yesterday supporting Anthropic, claiming that it’s important for security experts to have access to models like Fable 5 to help them fortify systems against attacks.

It’s not Anthropic’s only DC business…the company is also currently suing the Defense Department seeking a reversal of its designation as a supply chain risk.

The issue is bigger than Anthropic: Critics said that the government’s decision to ban Fable didn’t follow a transparent procedure and could have a chilling effect on other AI labs. However, some commentators said it was natural that the government was regulating the model after Anthropic spent weeks touting how dangerously powerful its AI can be.—SK

Gas prices fell below $4 for the first time since April amid Iran deal optimism. As oil prices dropped following the news of a preliminary peace deal between the US and Iran, US national average retail gasoline prices fell to $3.997 a gallon on Sunday, according to data from GasBuddy, though Reuters reports prices are still up nearly 91 cents from a year ago. The details of the deal remained largely unknown yesterday, even after President Trump said it was “all signed.” And difficult issues, including the status of Iran’s nuclear program, have been left to future negotiations. There also seem to be disagreements about the deal’s impact on Israel’s fight with Hezbollah in Lebanon. Plus, getting oil traveling through the Strait of Hormuz at pre-war levels could still take weeks or even months, per AP.

Fox to buy Roku for $22 billion to reach streaming customers. Roku City will soon have a new sheriff in town: Fox Corp. has agreed to purchase Roku in a cash-and-stock deal for $160 per share that would give it access to the 100 million global households with purple buttons on their remotes. The deal, expected to close next year, combines Fox’s sports, news, and entertainment content (and the streaming company it already bought, Tubi) with Roku’s popular platform, marking a big move into streaming for Fox as traditional TV’s popularity wanes. “This is a defining moment for Fox,” Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch said, calling it a “natural extension” of the company’s strategy.

World Cup’s hydration breaks stir up controversy. FIFA is mandating three-minute hydration breaks, pausing about 22 minutes into each half of the game for players to drink, and not since someone’s mom forgot to cut up oranges have water breaks at soccer games been so divisive. The justification for the change to the usually continuous game is to protect athletes playing in extreme heat, but FIFA has also allowed broadcasters to cut to commercials during these breaks—something Fox, the English-language US broadcaster, is taking advantage of. That could add up to more than 800 additional advertising slots during the tournament, per Bloomberg. But the extra pause has drawn complaints from some players and fans, who say it disrupts the game’s flow.—AR

UK teens will need to go back to reviewing their beans and toast by passing notes in class. Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced yesterday that Britain will ban anyone under 16 from using social media sites, including Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube (though not YouTube Kids), X, Facebook, and Instagram.

The ban is wildly popular in the UK: A December YouGov poll reported 74% of people surveyed in the country support it.

The UK’s move comes amid a flood of blanket bans aimed at protecting youth mental health by keeping kids off social media that was kicked off by Australia last December. Other countries like Spain, France, Canada, Brazil, Malaysia, and South Korea have either passed or are exploring similar legislation.

Do these bans work? Um…maybe! Most of them are too recent to make a definitive call yet.

• In Australia, surveys suggest that seven in 10 kids under 16 who used social media before the country’s ban still have their accounts. This is mostly because age verification is extremely difficult to enforce.
• YouTube, Snapchat, and Meta have all separately argued that blanket bans can push children into less safe, unregulated spaces online. TikTok and X didn’t immediately respond to the UK’s announcement.

It’s not just social media companies that oppose the bans. Critics claim the bans compromise free speech and privacy, and that they remove pressure from companies to address addictive algorithms.—MM

And the Kendall Jenner Pepsi Award for Insensitive Marketing Campaign goes to Starbucks Korea: After launching a promotion that was widely criticized for making light of an infamous massacre, the coffee giant’s South Korean stores will close early next Monday for mandatory history and sensitivity training, Starbucks Korea announced yesterday.

What happened: To celebrate its new steel “Tank” coffee tumblers, Starbucks Korea declared “Tank Day” on May 18…the anniversary of the country’s 1980 military crackdown that killed hundreds of pro-democracy protesters in Gwangju. It gets worse: The campaign’s slogan, “Thwack it on the table!” mirrored a false statement police gave after killing a pro-democracy student years later. Marketers reportedly chose it after asking AI for suggestions.

Starbucks Korea canceled the campaign and fired its CEO within hours, but the damage was done:

• Videos of South Koreans smashing the “Tank” tumblers were all over social media.
• Police booked the CEO and the billionaire chairman of Starbucks Korea’s parent company as criminal suspects, accused of insulting the Gwangju victims and their relatives.
• Card payment volumes at South Korea’s Starbucks locations dropped by 26% in one week, according to market data.

“We are deeply sorry for an unacceptable marketing incident,” Starbucks Corporation said. The coffee giant licenses its brand in South Korea (its third-largest market), but doesn’t hold equity there.—ML

On Tuesdays, the Brew’s Matty Merritt brings you the news you need to make life a little easier during your 9-5, 5-9, or OOO.

Taking a long lunch and clocking in for a few hours after dinner finally has a name: microshifting.

Working in shorter, more focused bursts throughout the day instead of adhering to a strict eight-hour schedule is trending, according to the WSJ. The less rigid schedule informally popped up when Covid pushed people to work from home and the temptation of doing laundry while on the clock was too strong. But it has remained popular as employees and managers alike discovered that a nontraditional schedule can reduce burnout, increase productivity, and make a huge difference for workers with caregiving responsibilities.

Not everyone can make their own schedule, of course, and the flexibility comes with a lot of trust from your boss. But you don’t have to go full microshift to get the benefits: You can take steps as simple as blocking off time for focus and ignoring busy work like responding to emails during that time.—MM