The Senate passed two bills yesterday that would change how minors can interact with the internet for the first time since Creed released “Higher.” The Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) and the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA 2.0) passed the upper chamber 91–3 and will now head to the House, where their prospects are uncertain.

What’s in the bills? First introduced in 2022 by a bipartisan pair of senators, KOSA aims to push the responsibility for protecting children on social media platforms onto the tech companies that own them. The legislation, championed by parents of children who died by suicide after cyberbullying, requires tech companies to take “reasonable” measures on their platforms to mitigate danger for kids by reducing cyberbullying, harm related to mental health disorders, and drug promotion.

• Platforms would have to add restrictions on users exchanging messages with minors and on features that encourage kids to use apps longer, like autoplay. In some cases, platforms like TikTok may be forced to redesign their entire experience for children.
• COPPA 2.0 is an update on its 1998 predecessor that would ban targeted advertising to minors and allow parents or kids to delete their info from sites.

Opposition intensifies

Microsoft and Snap endorse KOSA, as do various child welfare advocacy organizations. Meta said it supports standards but prefers legislation requiring kids to get approval from parents before downloading apps. But opponents worry the bill gives too much power (even after revisions) to state attorneys general to decide what content is harmful to children. The ACLU, privacy experts, and free-speech advocates worry the bill could not only be unconstitutional, but could also empower government officials to torch anything on the internet they dislike.

• One of the bill’s sponsors, Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn from Tennessee, believes the bill would “protect minor children from the transgender in this culture and that influence.”
• The Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank that is also behind Project 2025, has promised to use KOSA to limit online content about sexual and gender identity.

What’s next? The House has its version of the bill headed to committee, but it’s on recess until September. In the meantime, expect more tech companies to weigh in.—MM

The renewable energy market is about to get real in 2024: Infinity Fuel is inviting private investors like you to participate in their first capital raise.

Why invest in Infinity? The company is pioneering fuel cells that work underwater and in space, and has over $50m+ in grants and contracts to date working with names like NASA, US Navy, and Air Force. Plus, they just made history by launching their tech on Blue Origin’s New Shepard NS-23 and NS-24 flight (yes, Jeff Bezos’ spacecraft).

Not to mention, William Shatner* joined as Infinity’s brand ambassador and advisory committee member, thanks to their shared goal of a future fueled by clean power.

Don’t miss your chance to join their webinar tomorrow featuring William Shatner! Learn more and become one of Infinity’s earliest shareholders while you can.

Hamas’s political leader was assassinated in Iran. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard said Hamas’s political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, was killed in Tehran after attending the inauguration ceremony of the country’s new president. Israel did not comment on his death, but it has pledged to kill Hamas leaders following the Oct. 7 attack and has carried out assassinations of top targets in Iran in recent years. Hours before Haniyeh’s assassination, the Israeli military claimed it killed a senior Hezbollah commander in a “targeted strike” in a Beirut suburb. Going forward, the focus will be on how Hamas and Hezbollah respond to these strikes and their impact on ongoing Gaza cease-fire negotiations.

The US women’s gymnastics team won gold. Led by Simone Biles and Suni Lee, Team USA dominated Italy and Brazil to take home their first gold medal in team all-around since 2016. The win avenged their runner-up finish in 2021 to Russia, which was barred from competing this year due to the country’s invasion of Ukraine. With the victory, Biles likely cemented herself as the greatest US gymnast of all time, passing Shannon Miller for the most Olympic medals, with eight. Biles will look to further entrench herself as the GOAT with the women’s individual all-around final this afternoon. Check here for more of yesterday’s highlights from Paris.

Starbucks had a bad day. The coffee giant’s Tuesday got off to an inauspicious start when its mobile ordering system went down in the morning, though service was mostly restored by the afternoon. Things got worse after Sbux reported deeply underwhelming fiscal third-quarter earnings, missing on revenue estimates while posting a decline in same-store sales for the second straight quarter. Starbucks is grinding to emerge from its sales slump amid inflation, increased competition, and pressure from activist investors.

In the same sheepish way you check your bank account after a hedonistic vacation, investors are eyeing Big Tech earnings to see if their spending spree on AI is paying off.

Yesterday, it was Microsoft’s turn to go under the microscope:

• The software giant reported pouring $19 billion into business investments last quarter, a 78% jump from a year ago, largely due to spending on AI infrastructure.
• Meanwhile, AI spending by Microsoft’s customers helped it grow its Azure cloud business by 29% over the past quarter, less than analysts predicted.

FOMO spending

Even though explosive AI-driven revenue growth hasn’t happened yet, Big Tech execs want to keep the money flowing. Last week, Alphabet stock tumbled 5% after its earnings report made investors wonder if its AI spending will eat away at profit. CEO Sundar Pichai admitted that the company may overspend on AI, but he claims that the risks of not spending enough are higher. Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg made a similar confession, saying that the alternative could be falling behind on the most important tech “for the next 10 to 15 years.”

Looking ahead: Further AI judgment lies ahead as Meta reports earnings today and Apple shares its financials tomorrow.—SK

Wear have you been all my life? The Apollo wearable is the award-winning touch therapy band that can help train your body to feel less stress and to snooze more deeply. Tested across thousands of peeps, users can experience 40% less stress and anxiety and up to 25% more focus. Try it on for size.

Elizabeth Holmes may have retreated from your mind as little more than a fraud played by Amanda Seyfried in a Hulu miniseries. But now the health industry may finally be on the verge of delivering what Holmes and her company, Theranos, promised.

Nixing the needle: Theranos burst onto the health-tech scene after claiming it found a way to conduct hundreds of medical tests with a single drop of blood, negating the need for painful venous blood draws that take longer and require more blood. Holmes now sits in prison after Theranos’s tech was deemed to be a sham. But five years after Theranos went dark, a couple of startups have managed to develop the futuristic tech, according to the Wall Street Journal.

• Becton Dickinson developed a finger-prick device to collect drops of blood.
• Babson Diagnostics made a machine that analyzes blood obtained through Becton’s device. It runs routine tests that you’d get at the doctor with one-tenth of the amount of blood that a traditional vein collection requires.

Zoom out: There’s lasting optimism that a simple, reliable, and relatively painless method for testing blood is possible, despite the Theranos disaster. That solution could first come out of Texas, where Austin-based Babson said clinical studies have shown its finger prick draws are clinically equivalent to intravenous blood tests.—CC

I feel bad for our planet, but this is tremendous HVAC content. The global market for air conditioning has grown 7% annually in the last decade, the Washington Post reported. By 2050, the International Energy Agency expects there to be 5.6 billion AC units in buildings, up from 1.6 billion in 2018. All that means more demand for HVAC manufacturers and more work for contractors, who are reportedly seeing a hefty uptick in repairs this summer as US temps continue to break records that climate scientists and anyone who’d prefer not to live in The Day After Tomorrow do not want to see broken. One HVAC specialist told WaPo that 70% of his company’s recent repair jobs were for emergencies.