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This episode is brought to you by PayPal. PayPal helps you make the most of your money. You can earn 20% cash back when you pay in four with PayPal from now through December 8th. No fees, no interest. Act now to get this limited time offer. Save the offer in the app to get 20% cash back when you pay in 4 from now through December 8th. PayPal expires12.8 see paypal.com promoterms subject to approval. Learn more at paypal.com payin4, PayPal Inc. And MLS910457. Welcome to the Tech Brew Ride home for Thursday, November 20, 2025. I'm Brian McCullough today, are we about to have a battle over who gets to regulate AI? Now there's Nano Banana Pro. The creator ecosystem is exploding for advertisers. Battlefield did exactly what EA needed it to do. And I'm telling you, the consumer robots for your home, they're actually starting to arrive. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech, Foreign. Business online can feel a little scary these days, especially with AI creating new opportunities for fraud. In fact, salent estimates that AI was behind roughly 20% of the fraud perpetrated in 2024. Spotting bad agentic AI while allowing good agents to continue with their tasks isn't easy. Thankfully, Mimoto Continuous Captcha can spot malicious agents pretending to be people at the point of account creation or reg. Unlike past Captcha solutions, it runs behind the scenes with no puzzles for users. Write Home listeners can get early access to Mimoto's Continuous Captcha. Right now you can purchase a year of Momoto continuous captcha for $5,000, a 20% discount on their lowest price plan. To learn more, head to Momoto AI Ridehome. That's Momoto AI Ridehome. Interesting new push and pull surrounding AI. There is apparently a draft executive order out there wherein President Trump plans to grant the U.S. government the sole power to regulate AI and create an AI litigation task force overseen by the U.S. attorney General. Quoting the Verge, President Donald Trump is considering signing an executive order as soon as Friday that would give the federal government unilateral power over regulating artificial intelligence, including the creation of an AI litigation task force overseen by the Attorney General, quote, whose sole responsibility shall be to challenge state AI laws. According to a draft of the order obtained by the Verge, the task force would be able to sue states whose laws are deemed to obstruct the growth of the AI industry, citing California's recent laws on AI safety and catastrophic risk and a Colorado law that prevents algorithmic discrimination. The task force will occasionally consult with a group of White House special advisors, including David Sachs, billionaire venture capitalist and the special advisor for AI and crypto. In recent days, Trump has repeatedly posted his desire to have a state AI law moratorium and reiterated it on Wednesday during his appearance at the U.S. saudi Investment Forum, couching it as a way to fight, quote, woke ideology. You can't go through 50 states, you have to get one approval. 50 is a disaster because you'll have one woke state and you'll have to do all woke. You'll be back in the woke business. We don't have woke anymore in this country. It's virtually illegal. You'll have a couple of wokesters, end quote. As part of the AI Action Plan released earlier this year, Trump had directed several federal agencies, including the fcc, to explore ways that they could circumvent onerous state and local regulations in order to promote the industry's growth and innovation. The full executive order lays out a 90 day roadmap for several key agencies to implement that plan, along with the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Commerce and the Federal communications commission. Within 90 days of the order being signed, the Secretary of Commerce will be directed to publish a report identifying which states are in violation of Trump's AI policy directives, as well as research which states may become ineligible for broadband equity access and deployment programs. The BEAD program, which funds rural broadband access for several states. The ftc, meanwhile, will be directed to issue a statement on whether states that require AI companies to change their algorithms would be in violation of laws prohibiting unfair and deceptive practices. During an appearance at POLITICO's AI and Tech Summit in September, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr floated one potential interpretation of the Communications act that would allow them to override state law. Quote, effectively if a state or local law is effectively prohibiting the deployment of this modern infrastructure, then the FCC has authorities to step in there, he told POLITICO's Alex Burns, end quote. But here's the thing. Josh Hawley, Ron DeSantis, Sarah Huckabee Sanders and other Republicans have come out publicly in opposition to this, quoting the ft. Trump's backing of a federal framework, a priority for Silicon Valley lobbyists who fear restrictions on AI from some states, came two weeks after a group backed by venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and an OpenAI co founder was formed in Washington in part to fight state led legislation. Build American AIs leader Nathan Leamer visited the White House just hours before Trump announced his decision to back the move that had already ignited outrage among some Republicans shows what money can do. US Senator Josh Hawley, who helped derail an effort to restrict state led AI regulation earlier this year, wrote of the similar proposals revival earlier this week. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said the plan supported by Trump was, quote, an insult to voters. The proposal would prevent states from protecting against online censorship of political speech, predatory applications that target children, violations of intellectual property rights and data center intrusions on power water resources. End quote. An attempt to stop states from making their own AI rules for a decade failed in the summer after a revolt from Republicans in Congress, Trump allies such as Steve Bannon and child safety campaigners. The measure to restrict the states was defeated by 99 votes to 1 in the Senate. Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who served as Trump's White House press secretary in his first term, came out strongly against the move. Quote, now isn't the time to backtrack, she wrote. Drop the preemption plan now and protect our kids and communities. Conservative lawyer Mike Davis, who led the backlash against the moratorium in the summer, claimed the industry wanted, quote, a license to steal and profit from copyright owners across America. He said the move would, quote, harm conservatives, children, communities and creators. Build American AIs Lean Lemur told the Financial Times that while there are real consternations from a number of different constituencies, the measure could now get through with support from Democrats. It's based on the coalitional way we did crypto. It's truly about having a balanced policy, lemur added. You need the accelerationists and the people who are concerned about protecting consumers to work together to make sure they are putting this framework together. Some Republicans in Congress have warned that Trump's embrace of lighter touch AI regulation could hurt them electorally, according to a person close to the party leadership. Amid concerns about job losses, high energy prices or child child safety due to AI. A survey carried out by YouGov in June for the Institute for Family Studies, which campaigns for tighter AI regulations, found that just 18% of voters supported the effort to stop states regulating the tech, end quote. I listened to an interesting odd lots episode just this week suggesting that AI opposition is potentially a growing electoral issue. I guess they wanted to spread things out a little bit to make sure things didn't get lost in the shuffle. This morning Google launched Gemini 3 Pro Image aka Nano Banana Pro with more control, improved text rendering and enhanced world knowledge for free in the Gemini app. Quoting 9to5Google the original model Gemini 2.5 flash image was announced at the end of August. Nanobanana Pro is based on Gemini 3 Pro. It uses the base model's state of the art reasoning and real world knowledge to visualize information better than ever before, says Google. Nanobananapro can create more accurate and legible text in images across multiple languages with the latter made possible by Gemini 3 Pro's enhanced multilingual reasoning. Stylistically, you can leverage a wider variety of textures, fonts and calligraphy. Things like translate all the English text on the three yellow and blue cans into Korean while keeping everything else the same. Or make eight minimalistic logos. Each is an expression expressive word and make letters convey a message or sound visually to express the meaning of this word in a dramatic way, and then the composition would have flat vector rendering of all logos in black on a single white background, et cetera. Similarly, this model lets you adjust camera angles, change the focus, apply sophisticated color grading and transform scene lighting like changing from day to night or creating a bokea effect. It also offers improved localized editing. To quote, select, refine and transform any part of an image. Various aspect ratios are available, along with 2K and 4K resolutions. Nanobanana Pro lets you blend up to 14 images while quote maintaining the consistency and resemblance of up to five people. One place where the model's reasoning, world knowledge and real time information comes together is when generating infographics and diagrams. Nanobanana Pro is rolling out globally to the Gemini app today. Once you're using the Thinking Gemini 3 Pro model, select Create images. Free users have a limited quota before returning to the original nanobanana. Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers get higher usage limits. Meanwhile, Google is dropping the watermark for AI Ultra subscribers who are often using it for professional work. It remains in place for everyone else though. While Google now has an Synth ID extension in the Gemini app, this lets you upload images to check if they are AI generated with video and audio support Coming soon. End quote. We've all been there. Too many SaaS tools, not enough visibility at all, and way too much access for you to keep track of. It's the stuff security nightmares are made of. That's where Trelica by1Password comes in. They inventory every app your company uses and create apps profiles to help you easily assess risks, manage access, and make sure your password security is locked down tight. 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The Pure Storage platform unifies storage into a single intelligent layer that can turn data into a governed, virtualized cloud of data with guaranteed outcomes. Learn more@PureStorage.com Morning Brew that's PureStorage.com MorningBrew Nvidia yesterday reported Q3 revenue up 62% year on year to 57.01 billion above the $54.92 billion estimate. Data center revenue was up 66% year on year and they're forecasting Q4 revenue above estimates, so they did fine. Nvidia's stock opened up, the general market opened up as sort of a relief rally, I guess so. Not really much to say about that, but I did want to note it. What I want to talk about right here is something else vaguely economy related. According to the IAB, ad spend in the creator ecosystem in 2025 is expected to rise 26% year on year to $37 billion, vastly outperforming ad spend in media overall, which is only set to grow 5.7% year on year. Quoting the wrap. Additionally, ad spend in the creator economy more than doubled from 2021 to 2024, jumping from $13.9 billion to 29.5 billion. The report also found that nearly half 48% of surveyed ad spenders now consider creators a must buy, only ranking them behind social media and paid search. Those surveyed also revealed that their top goals when partnering with creators is building brand awareness as the top campaign goal, with 43% of those surveyed companies listing it as a priority. That was followed by reaching new audiences 41%, enhancing a brand's reputation or trust in the brand and driving online sales 32%. More than half of brands, 58% listed creator reputation as their top criteria when partnering with a creator, followed by audience alignment at 56%, leveraging the creator economy to connect with audiences is no longer experimental. For marketers, it's essential, said David Cohen, CEO of iab. The significant growth we're seeing reflects a deepening commitment from brands to invest in creator driven strategies. The study also highlighted that brands are calling for more consistent and universal measurement when it comes to creators. Though subscriber and view counts are public knowledge metrics like engagement rates, an increasingly more important gauge than follower and view totals aren't third party companies like Creator IQ often track these stats for creators and channels, but measuring the performance of specific campaigns is far more difficult. Overall, IAB found that brands want better attribution, more consistent reporting, and better operational tools to measure business outcomes tied to creator campaigns. Follow up to something we discussed previously. According to EA's Battlefield 6 became 2025's best selling US game less than a month after its October 10 debut. Pokemon is 2025's fastest selling physical game, quoting Bloomberg, alongside Nintendo's Pokemon Legends Za, which is the fastest selling physical game of the year. The EA title helped boost video game content sales in October by 1% from a year earlier, Serkana said in a statement Thursday. Total industry sales in the US grew 3% last month to 4.9 billion, fueled by Nintendo's Switch 2 console, which is selling at a faster rate than Sony's record setting PlayStation 4, Circana's figures showed. Released on October 10, Battlefield 6 received favorable reviews and extends the trends of sequels bringing in more revenue than original games. Of the 20 highest grossing games across platforms in the US this year, 19 are are either sequels, annual updates to sports games, or extensions of a known fantasy franchise such as Silent Hill F and Sonic Cross Worlds. Sony's Ghost of Yotai also notched a successful month building on the company's 2020 hit Ghost of Tsushima with another well designed cinematic adventure. It was the third best selling title in October, according to Serkana. Spending on mobile platforms rose 10% and subscriptions drew 9% more revenue in October compared to a year ago. Finally, today, these are increasingly actually starting to trickle out. Whether they're any good remains to be seen, but this is the first time in my career that I've started to see things like this actually seeming like they're going to hit the market. A startup called Sunday Robotics has unveiled Mimo, a fully autonomous home robot capable of tasks like making espresso and loading dishwasher washers, set to launch in beta in 2026. I wonder if CES is going to be wild this year, Quoting Wired Mimo looks like something out of Wall E with a gleaming white body, two arms, a friendly cartoonish face and a red baseball cap. Rather than using legs as a fully humanoid robot would, Mimo moves around using a wheeled platform and changes its height by sliding up and down a central column atop that platform. The robot responded to a request for an espresso by rolling over to a countertop and then using two pincer like hands to slow through each step required to operate an espresso machine. It filled the portafilter with coffee grounds, tamped them down, slotted the portafilter into place and put a coffee cup below, pressed the buttons needed to start the machine, and finally retrieved the hot drink. We want to build robots that free people from laundry, from the dishes, from all chores, tony Zhao, co founder and CEO of Sunday Robotics, told me as the robot brought the coffee over to the person who requested it. Making a cup of espresso might not seem spectacular, but the feat is ridiculously hard for a robot to do in a real messy kitchen. It requires the ability to identify different objects, figure out how to grasp them reliably, and use those objects properly. Sundae is not only building its own hardware, but also training the models that allow its systems to learn. We think the way to make a home robot is to be full stack and to vertically integrate, zhao says. And that's a very ambitious thing to do. Of course, robot demos are not always a good indicator of how useful a robot will be. The real question is how well Mimo can perform tasks in a wide variety of homes without Sunday's engineers nearby. Even so, the robot has some skills besides making coffee. I watched Mimo clear glasses from a table and load them into a dishwasher. This feat was especially impressive because it involved figuring out how to grasp two glasses in the same hand. Mimo held one glass between its thumb and pointer finger and used the rest of its hand to grab the second. Sunday plans to give Mimo two beta testers next year. The pilot program will show how people respond to having a home robot that can do certain chores, albeit slowly and perhaps not perfectly every time. A key question will be how reliably and efficiently Mimo is able to do chores in real homes, where kids, pets and mess are guaranteed to complicate the challenge. After beta testing, Zhao says, Sunday will roll Mimo out to the first users. Just as early home computers were complicated and appealed mostly to enthusiasts, he believes Mimo might initially be popular with those who want to live in a robotic future and are willing to tolerate Some rough edges. This might even involve users showing their robots how to do something new. I do think that people should be able to teach their own robots, Zhao says. I'm going to update you on some of my AI experiments more tomorrow. But for now, the final link in the show notes today is to a YouTube video of the Rad History podcast episode I did this week on Bo Jackson. It's the bottom link in the show notes. If I did the link right, it should start at around the two minute mark. Okay, so see that AI avatar of me? It's pretty good, right? But not great. We're not there yet. I was able to train an avatar in about 5 minutes, upload my podcast recording and it got the lip syncing. Okay, but it's not beating the uncanny Valley level of good there isn't. It's close. We're getting there, but it's not there yet. Yet, but keep watching. Another 15 seconds or so. This is what I want to show you. See those animated cartoon segments? That is what you're able to do. Now, you can string together multiple AI generated animations. You have to do them 10 to 20 seconds at a time, but you can string them together with consistent characters and stuff like that. Now, to do that for a full 20 minute video is extremely time consuming and would cost you maybe a hundred bucks based on on my experiments. But it is possible. So that's interesting if you keep watching more of the video. Yeah, I saved time by not having to put myself in front of a camera the whole time to record that, but putting the actual photos of Bo Jackson and Ken Burns affecting it and all that into the video, that's still the painstaking, time consuming work. Apps like Riverside have made some strides at putting AI generated image B roll in there, but again, we're not there yet. Even if I have a script or a fully recorded episode on the career of Bo Jackson, say it's not push button, boom, you're done yet. If I need, say, a picture of Bear Bryant, I have to go find it myself. I have to put it in there. I have to Ken Burns it. Anyway, as I said, tomorrow I'll update you on the AI workflow that I have gotten to work for me. Talk to you then.