Palantir CEO Alex Karp on Monday once again warned that AI frontier labs are too untrustworthy for enterprises.

The CEO, who famously studied philosophy and earned a PhD in social theory, implied in Palantir’s quarterly shareholder letter that these were the kinds of capitalists who gave rise to Marxist socialism.

“There are Marxist overtones and undertones to our business,” he wrote in a letter to shareholders about Palantir’s outstanding quarter he wrote. “Others, including many of those building large language models, intend, knowingly or otherwise, to capture the means of production of their purported partners.”

To be clear, AI labs have hardly cornered Palantir out of the market. Quite the opposite. The skyrocketing use of AI helped Palantir achieve record-breaking results. For its second quarter, the company reported $1.9 billion in revenue, up 93% over the year-ago quarter, and $1.1 billion in profit, “more profit in a single quarter than we did in total revenue in the same period the year before,” he wrote.

During the quarterly conference call with Wall Street analysts, he explained his analogy further, relying heavily on a sort of “tech bro patriot” jargon common among defense tech companies. (Palantir’s senior leadership is entirely male.)

He asked on the call, if companies are going “to buy into a future” where your job helps your “adversaries win, and everybody who does win is a small, tiny group of people living in a tiny place that somehow believe because they eat vegetables and they don’t support war fighters that they deserve to have the total means of production of this country? And the rest of us should just sit by it back and absorb the cost of that revolution, which we’re paying for.”

Palantir, in contrast, serves model-agnostic AI and analysis software to governments and enterprises, and allows organizations to control their data as well as their AI “exhaust,” aka, their prompts, orchestration, context.

“How are we paying for it? In the enterprise context, people sign up for token self pleasurings… at real cost like other forms of self pleasure,” he said. “You are paying for the right for them to migrate your IP, your know-how, your expertise to their model, so that they can build a competitive business that doesn’t require your business or people. And why are they doing it? It’s actually being done for what they believe are moral reasons. They are superior to you. They deserve to colonize your enterprise.”

Jarring language aside, he is making an underlying point that is increasingly being repeated elsewhere, including from the likes of Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

This theory points to the significant list of companies that partnered or paid for Anthropic and OpenAI while the AI labs launched similar businesses ranging from design tools to, healthcare operations, legal, even drug discovery.

The truth is, none of these companies are economic villains or heroes — anymore than other for-profit companies are. AI is growing so quickly, the market changing so rapidly, there is clearly room for all, Palantir’s results show.

Snap CEO Evan Spiegel sidestepped investors’ questions about pre-order demand for the company’s long-awaited Specs smart glasses during Monday’s earnings call, just weeks before the device’s September launch event.

“What we’re hearing from folks is really that they want to try Specs,” Spiegel told investors. “It’s obviously a high consideration purchase at $2,195. Obviously, developers and folks who are familiar with the platform really understand it and understand the technical leaps we’ve made with with this generation. I think for the broader public and consumers, it’s going to be really important for folks to go hands-on. Our upcoming launch event will be an important sort of starting point for that consumer-oriented journey.”

The company unveiled Specs in June after spending more than a decade developing the device. The wearable’s $2,195 price tag is significantly higher than most Meta Ray-Ban smart glasses, which start at around $350, but lower than Apple’s Vision Pro, which starts at $3,500.

Investors also pressed Spiegel on why he believes Snap’s strategy is financially viable for a company of its size, why it chose to go it alone rather than partner with another company, and what gives him confidence that the company can compete with Apple, Meta, and Alphabet.

Spiegel responded that Snap believes the long-term opportunity to develop the next computing platform is “enormous.”

“I think what what some folks maybe don’t understand yet, especially because Specs are so new and we’re really the first mover in this this category, is how difficult the product is to to execute from a technical perspective,” Spiegel said. “When we started innovating in the social space, we were a late entrant. So, most of the the apps at the time, whether it was Facebook or Instagram or Twitter, were already in existence, and we had to really innovate to continue to grow. What’s so unique about this opportunity for us is really that we’re a first mover, and that really plays to our strengths as an innovator.”

When asked about product-market fit, Spiegel said it will likely be closer to the end of the decade before the company sees mass-market consumer adoption.

“I think things, for example, like weight and cost are going to have to come down to see you know unit volumes really meaningfully pick up.” But we do have, I think, a real advantage here in that developers have been building on the Specs platform now for several years.”

Eight gigabytes of RAM is making a comeback, and Windows 11 may finally be ready to slim down for it.

Microsoft is working to reduce Windows 11’s memory footprint to make PCs with 8GB of RAM or more feel faster and more responsive. The work is expected to continue through the end of 2026, potentially helping budget laptops, older systems, and business fleets handle everyday tasks without immediately running into memory limits.

Rising memory costs are pushing manufacturers and buyers toward lower-capacity configurations. Microsoft has also sold Surface devices with 8GB of RAM, even as many PC builders have treated 16GB as the practical baseline for a smoother Windows 11 experience.

Microsoft is putting Windows 11 on a memory diet

Windows Latest reported that Pavan Davuluri, Microsoft’s president of Windows and Devices, outlined four Windows 11 priorities through the end of 2026 in a post on X.

“Memory optimization for 8GB and above. Reducing Windows memory footprint to deliver a fast and responsive Windows experience across the PCs customers use every day,” Davuluri wrote, according to Windows Latest.

Microsoft has not explained exactly how it plans to reduce Windows 11’s memory use. Windows Latest linked the effort to the company’s broader work on Windows components, including a shift toward WinUI for some interfaces, but the publication noted that no detailed technical plan has been released.

Tom’s Hardware said that the optimization is part of a wider Windows 11 improvement push. Other planned changes include a faster setup experience, simpler parental controls, improved voice interactions, a more reliable File Explorer, and additional customization for Search, Start, and the Taskbar.

Several of those changes remain in preview, so general users may need to wait weeks or months before seeing them.

Windows Central framed the announcement as a welcome but overdue move. The publication noted that Microsoft had already sold Surface models with 8GB of RAM before completing the operating system optimizations those devices could benefit from.

More Microsoft news

An 8GB Windows 11 PC still has limits

Windows 11 can already run on 8GB of RAM, but the experience depends heavily on workload.

Email, web browsing, streaming, and basic office applications may remain manageable, while heavy multitasking, dozens of browser tabs, gaming, creative software, and local AI tools can require considerably more memory.

Windows Central noted that users can still complete everyday tasks on an 8GB Windows 11 PC. However, the publication questioned why Microsoft sold 8GB Surface models before optimizing the operating system for lower-memory devices.

Microsoft’s announcement suggests Windows 11 still needs improvement on those systems.

For IT buyers, Microsoft’s announcement is a reason to monitor performance rather than immediately lowering purchasing standards. An 8GB device may suit tightly controlled, lightweight workloads, but 16GB still provides more room for multitasking, future software demands, and longer replacement cycles.

Rollout could begin soon, but details remain limited

Windows Latest expects the optimizations to appear first in Windows Insider builds before reaching general users gradually. Microsoft has not provided a firm release date or specific performance targets.

Independent testing will ultimately show how much memory Windows 11 saves and which devices benefit most. A leaner operating system could extend the useful life of existing PCs, but it will not turn every 8GB laptop into a machine built for demanding workloads.

Read the Windows 11 Security Cheat Sheet to learn how BitLocker, passkeys, Microsoft Defender, and other built-in features help protect your data, accounts, apps, and devices.