Microsoft wants to own AI’s foundation

Today, we’re looking at Google’s most contentious AI move using publisher and YouTube content to power AI summaries without clear consent or compensation. It’s a high-stakes gamble that could redefine who profits from information, and who gets left behind. We' are also looking at Microsoft’s most aggressive AI expansion yet: a $23 billion investment across India and Canada to dominate infrastructure.

In today’s post:

• Microsoft drops $23B to dominate AI

• Anthropic hands over MCP to the Linux Foundation

• EU probes Google over AI summaries

What’s Trending Today

INVESTMENT

Microsoft just made its biggest AI bet yet

Microsoft is going all in on artificial intelligence, and it’s chosen India as its launchpad. A $23 billion investment package just landed and it’s more than just a PR play.

Here’s everything you need to know:

• Microsoft will invest $17.5 billion in India to expand AI and cloud infrastructure starting in 2026.

• This move gives Microsoft the largest cloud presence in India ahead of rivals like Google and Amazon.

• Canada is getting $5.42 billion as part of the broader push, including a major expansion of Azure and a partnership with AI startup Cohere.

• India’s booming internet population and engineering talent are turning it into a global AI infrastructure hub.

• The AI arms race is intensifying: Google also pledged $15 billion for a data center in India earlier this year.

• Microsoft’s new Hyderabad data center will be its largest in the country expected online by mid-2026.

• Nadella says this push will “build sovereign capabilities” for India and upskill 20 million people by 2030.

Microsoft is betting that the next AI frontier won’t be in Silicon Valley, it’ll be where scale, talent, and political will collide. India fits that bill. But this isn’t just about infrastructure. It’s about shaping the global AI narrative and locking in strategic ground before regulation and competition catch up.

The Future of Shopping? AI + Actual Humans.

AI has changed how consumers shop by speeding up research. But one thing hasn’t changed: shoppers still trust people more than AI.

Levanta’s new Affiliate 3.0 Consumer Report reveals a major shift in how shoppers blend AI tools with human influence. Consumers use AI to explore options, but when it comes time to buy, they still turn to creators, communities, and real experiences to validate their decisions.

The data shows:

• Only 10% of shoppers buy through AI-recommended links

• 87% discover products through creators, blogs, or communities they trust

• Human sources like reviews and creators rank higher in trust than AI recommendations

The most effective brands are combining AI discovery with authentic human influence to drive measurable conversions.

Affiliate marketing isn’t being replaced by AI, it’s being amplified by it.

Download the full report to see what this means for your brand.

BREAKTHROUGH

A big open-source win for AI infrastructure

Anthropic is donating the Model Context Protocol (MCP) to a new foundation housed under the Linux Foundation, a major step toward building open, agentic AI at scale.

Here’s everything you need to know:

• MCP, launched last year, is now a foundational standard for connecting AI apps to external tools and data.

• It’s already powering AI integrations in ChatGPT, Gemini, Cursor, Microsoft Copilot, and VS Code.

• Over 10,000 active MCP servers are live today, with support from AWS, Azure, Cloudflare, and Google Cloud.

• The donation creates the Agentic AI Foundation (AAIF), co-founded by Anthropic, OpenAI, and Block, with backing from major cloud providers.

• MCP’s open governance will continue under the AAIF, maintaining transparency and vendor neutrality.

• New features like asynchronous operations and stateless workflows are making MCP even more production-ready.

• SDKs across Python and TypeScript now see over 97 million downloads a month, signaling wide developer adoption.

Open standards are how infrastructure scales and survives. By handing MCP to a neutral steward like the Linux Foundation, Anthropic and its partners are making a long bet on interoperability. It’s the kind of quiet move that could define how agentic AI systems actually get built and who gets to shape them.

PROFITS

Google’s AI just triggered another regulatory firestorm

The European Commission has launched an investigation into Google’s AI-generated summaries, citing concerns over unlicensed use of publisher content and YouTube data.

Here’s everything you need to know:

• At issue is whether Google used web and YouTube content to train its AI tools without offering fair compensation or opt-outs.

• The investigation focuses on Google’s “AI Overview” feature, which shows AI-generated answers above traditional search results.

• Critics say this cuts off traffic to original sources with some publishers reporting a 50% drop in clicks.

• Creators are also concerned: videos may have been used to train AI without consent or compensation.

• Google argues the investigation could “stifle innovation” in an already competitive AI market.

• Ed Newton-Rex of Fairly Trained says creators are forced into a system where their work fuels tools that compete with them.

• The EU says it’s about protecting democratic access to information, not blocking AI progress.

This isn’t just about Google or Europe, it’s about power. Who controls information? Who profits from creativity? The AI era is reshaping those questions fast. And unless transparency and consent are built into the system, regulators won’t be the only ones asking them.

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