TikTok faces the hammer, Sam Altman returns to OpenAI’s board, and Waymo’s driverless taxis come to Los Angeles

We’re at the end of the week, which means we’re serving up another episode of Marketplace Tech Bytes: Week in Review.

Autonomous vehicle company Waymo has launched its driverless taxi service in Los Angeles, now the fourth big city to host the Waymo One fleet. We’ll look at how the company, owned by Google parent Alphabet, has managed to keep expanding while a major competitor has faltered.

Plus, OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, has given CEO Sam Altman his board seat back. We’ll look at who’s cheering that development, and who’s not.

But first, the big headline of the week is all about TikTok. On Wednesday, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. The bill would force TikTok’s Chinese parent, ByteDance, to sell its stake in the U.S. version of the popular social media platform or be banned from app stores.

Paresh Dave, senior writer at Wired, joined Marketplace’s Lily Jamali to discuss why policymakers have been pushing for action on TikTok for years.

More on what we talked about

“TikTok bill, racing toward House passage, faces a minefield in the Senate” from The Washington Post

“U.S. House passes bill to force ByteDance to divest TikTok or face ban” from Reuters

“TikTok ban timeline: Congress’ yearslong case against ByteDance” from Axios

“Sam Altman Back on OpenAI’s Board After He Is Cleared by Investigation” from Wired

“Elon Musk takes another swing at OpenAI, makes xAI’s Grok chatbot open-source” from Reuters

“Waymo to launch robotaxi service in Los Angeles, but no freeway driving — for now” from the Los Angeles Times

“GM’s bet on Cruise autonomous vehicles sees major roadblocks” from “Marketplace Morning Report”

“Can Reddit—the Internet’s Greatest Authenticity Machine—Survive Its Own IPO?” from Wired