Connect with us

News

Elon Musk talks AI, birth rates and more at Italian conference

Credit: Atreju | X

Published

on

Tesla CEO Elon Musk appeared at the Italian “Atreju” political conference over the weekend, discussing a handful of themes such as artificial intelligence (AI), falling birth rates, immigration and more.

Musk was interviewed by il Giornale deputy editor Nicola Porro on Saturday after his appearance at the Brothers Party-hosted festival was confirmed earlier this week. The interview, as posted on X, touched on the potential risks and benefits of the emerging AI sector, as well as Musk’s hopes that the world will fix falling birth rates. Along with these themes, Porro asked about immigration and a handful of other subjects in the roughly 45-minute interview.

Appearing at first on the stage with his son X Æ A-12, or X, Musk later handed his son off to be taken backstage during the interview. The interview begins with a question about demographics, to which Musk responds emphasizing the importance of having children to create the next generation of humans, which he says poses a civilizational risk if not done.

Roughly halfway through the interview, Porro asks Musk some questions about AI, and while Musk briefly talks about the potential risks, he notes first and foremost the potential benefits of AI. According to Musk, the use of AI will ring in an age of abundance, though it will require some regulatory oversight to ensure that kind of outcome.

“I think we need to be careful with the advent of AI,” Musk said. “But it’s very much a double-edged sword. You can think of AI as a magic genie. Digital superintelligence will be capable of doing anything.”

Musk also said that he’s strongly in favor of having regulatory oversight on AI, just as we need that with anything that can be considered dangerous to humanity.

Advertisement
-

Despite being potentially dangerous, Musk emphasized his confidence that AI will be beneficial to humanity in the long run, explaining that it

“The good part of AI is that we’re headed for a future of abundance,” Musk added. “AI and robotics will mean there are no shortage of goods and services. If you can think of it, you can have it, basically.”

Musk went on to call the potential for AI “quite profound,” continuing comparisons to the sector as a magic genie. He notes that, in many stories with a magic genie, users must still be careful about what they wish for, even if it’s for additional wishes.

In addition to AI, Porro asked Musk about the issue of immigration, to which Musk said that he was a strong supporter of legal immigration and making it more accessible for people coming into countries who plan to add value to that country. When asked if he thought Italy would be a good place to invest, Musk said that it would, but he reiterated that the country needed to work on having kids so that its next generation would have people to work in its factories.

Musk later responded “Yes” to a post of showing his statement that, if civilization doesn’t grow, nothing else matters.

The interview is just the latest of Musk’s discussions on themes like AI, birth rates and immigration in a series of meetings with world leaders. In September, Musk spoke with Hungary President Katalin Novák about the world’s population collapse being one of today’s most important problems. He has also spoken about a range of related topics with world leaders, including Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Thailand Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin and others this year alone.

You can watch the full interview between Niccola Porro and Elon Musk at the Italian Atreju conference below.

What are your thoughts? Let me know at zach@teslarati.com, find me on X at @zacharyvisconti, or send your tips to us at tips@teslarati.com.

Advertisement
-

Zach is a renewable energy reporter who has been covering electric vehicles since 2020. He grew up in Fremont, California, and he currently lives in Colorado. His work has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, KRON4 San Francisco, FOX31 Denver, InsideEVs, CleanTechnica, and many other publications. When he isn't covering Tesla or other EV companies, you can find him writing and performing music, drinking a good cup of coffee, or hanging out with his cats, Banks and Freddie. Reach out at zach@teslarati.com, find him on X at @zacharyvisconti, or send us tips at tips@teslarati.com.

Advertisement
Comments

News

Starlink launches Communities Program for passive income through internet sharing

Published

on

(Credit: Starlink | X)

Starlink is launching a new beta path for ordinary property owners and local operators to turn a single Starlink kit into a small shared-access business for passive income.

Under the Starlink for Communities program, a host installs one dish and router setup in a location with nearby demand: an apartment complex, campground, rural crossroads, or event site. Neighbors or local users can buy short-term passes rather than full individual subscriptions, giving the Starlink provider a potential path to passive income.

Hour, day, and week passes cover one device. A month pass covers up to four. Starlink handles account creation, payments, access controls, and the satellite link itself. The host’s role is mainly placement, power, and basic upkeep, with earnings tied to each paid connection.

Advertisement
-

The model echoes the passive-income vision long attached to Tesla’s Robotaxi plans, and it seems like it’s something Musk has hinted toward in the past as he believes AI will make the need to work relatively optional. In both cases, the platform owns the hard parts of matching, billing, and network management, while an individual supplies a physical asset that sits idle much of the time.

A Starlink host’s dish can serve multiple nearby users without each household buying and installing its own terminal. A Tesla owner, under the stated Robotaxi concept, would leave a vehicle enrolled in the fleet during unused hours so the car generates rides while the owner is at work or asleep.

Both arrangements convert under-utilized hardware into a revenue stream. They also let the company scale coverage or capacity without owning every endpoint.

Differences are practical. A Starlink kit is a fixed, relatively low-cost terminal whose main constraint is local congestion and line-of-sight. A Tesla Robotaxi is a mobile, high-value vehicle whose earnings depend on demand density, utilization rates, insurance, cleaning, and charging.

Starlink’s program is already accepting host applications in multiple countries and describes the revenue split as ongoing. Tesla’s owner-network version remains more aspirational.

The company currently operates a limited company-controlled robotaxi service in select areas and has solicited interest from fleet buyers for Cybercab vehicles, while private Full Self-Driving owners have not yet been able to dispatch their own cars for paid rides at scale.

Advertisement
-

Tesla primes Cybercabs for 4K streaming and high bandwidth gaming with Starlink integration

Starlink is a satellite broadband service operated by SpaceX that uses a constellation of low-Earth-orbit satellites to deliver internet to locations where terrestrial broadband is slow, expensive, or absent. It has grown to millions of subscribers worldwide by selling direct residential, mobile, and enterprise terminals, and have become widely available at a wide array at retail locations like Target and Best Buy.

The Communities program extends that reach by letting hosts resell short bursts of capacity to people nearby, while also providing high-speed internet access to those who are simply around a Starlink user.

Continue Reading

News

Tesla just made its headlights even better through a software update

Published

on

Credit: @jojje167 on X

Tesla just upgraded its headlights through a software update, making them even better without any physical or hardware upgrade.

Tesla’s latest software update is quietly improving nighttime driving for a small number of owners. Version 2026.38 includes a new capability called Dynamic Headlight Leveling.

The feature automatically adjusts the aim of the low beams in response to driving conditions and nearby traffic, with the goal of giving the driver more usable light on the road while reducing glare for oncoming vehicles and traffic ahead.

Unlike Tesla’s matrix high-beam system, which selectively dims individual LED segments to create shadows around other cars, Dynamic Headlight Leveling physically tilts the low-beam projectors. Internal motors respond to changes in vehicle pitch.

When the car accelerates hard, climbs a steep grade, or carries extra weight in the rear, the headlights can otherwise point higher than intended. The software counters that movement in real time so the beam stays aimed at the road surface rather than into the eyes of other drivers.

Early indications reveal the update is reaching a limited set of vehicles, including certain Model 3 and Cybertruck examples in the United States and the United Arab Emirates. The rollout does not appear tied to a single hardware revision, and Tesla has not published a broader schedule. It is simply a common waiting game until your car receives it.

The change arrives against a backdrop of wider complaints about headlight glare. Some earlier Model 3 and Model Y vehicles were the subject of an NHTSA recall related to excessive low-beam glare; the software adjustment offers a potential mitigation for cars equipped with the necessary leveling hardware. It does not replace adaptive high beams where those are already available, nor does it alter the basic low-beam pattern itself.

Instead, it keeps an existing beam pointed where it is most useful.

Advertisement
-

For drivers who have received the update, the system requires no new settings or user input. The headlights simply respond as road conditions and traffic change. As the feature reaches more vehicles, it adds another example of Tesla using over-the-air software to refine existing hardware rather than waiting for a new model year. Nighttime visibility and reduced glare for others are the practical results owners are expected to notice first.

Continue Reading

Lifestyle

Tesla teases “Halloween Mode” update with Optimus rising from a graveyard

Tesla’s Halloween teaser hides a covered vehicle and an Optimus hand rising from the ground.

Published

on

By

Tesla has started teasing a Halloween software update for its vehicles, with  a short clip on X that reads, “Halloween is coming.” The clip opens on a glowing pumpkin before pulling back to the car’s center touchscreen, where the usual parked visualization has been replaced by a graveyard scene, and the vehicle draped with a white sheet so it reads as a cartoon ghost.

The second detail is a robotic hand clawing its way out of the dirt like a zombie, which looks to be the hand of Tesla’s latest Optimus V3 humanoid robot. While Tesla still has not formally shown Optimus Gen 3 walking around in service, renders pulled from Tesla’s Android app last month gave the clearest look yet, including far more refined hands that Tesla has said carry 22 degrees of freedom. The hand has been the hardest part of the program. Musk has called it the majority of the robot’s engineering difficulty, and Tesla’s patents describe a design driven by tendons with the actuators moved into the forearm.

Tesla Optimus V3 hand and arm details revealed in new patents

Optimus also has a Halloween track record. Last October the robot handed out candy in Times Square, and a costumed “zombie” Optimus shuffled around the Tesla Diner in Los Angeles on Halloween night.

Advertisement
-

On the software side, Tesla’s 2025 Holiday Update expanded Santa Mode with a Santa sleigh, snowmen, snow effects, and a festive lock chime, so it wouldn’t be too far fetched if we saw something similar but themed for a  Halloween Mode.

Continue Reading