Glamour, gripes as celebs head to Venice for exclusive Bezos wedding
By Lisa Duso and Ella Ide
Celebrities in superyachts sail into Venice this week for the three-day wedding party of Amazon tycoon Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez, despite irate locals who say the UNESCO city is no billionaire's playground.
The tech magnate and journalist have reportedly invited about 200 guests to their multi-million dollar nuptials in the Italian city, which are expected to kick off Thursday and end Saturday with a ceremony at a secret location.
The security details are under tight wraps amid rumors the rite may take place at the historic Church of the Abbey of Misericordia, or at the Arsenale, a vast shipyard complex dating back to when the city was a naval powerhouse.
Bezos, 61, and former news anchor and entertainment reporter Sanchez, 55, are said to have booked out the city's finest hotels for a star-studded guest list rumored to include Leonardo DiCaprio, Mick Jagger, Kim Kardashian, Oprah Winfrey, Orlando Bloom and Ivanka Trump.
At least 95 private planes have requested permission to land at Venice's Marco Polo airport, the Corriere della Sera said.
And Bezos' mega-yacht, Koru, is likely to moor off the iconic San Giorgio Maggiore island, which sits just opposite St Mark's Square and has reportedly been booked in its entirety for the period.
The lavish celebration has sparked much soul-searching in Venice, where some fear so many A-list guests and their entourages will make life worse in a city already drowning under the weight of holidaymakers.
Around 100,000 tourists overnight in peak periods, while tens of thousands descend just for the day, many hopping off cruise ships for a quick Bellini cocktail, while the city steadily depopulates.
Venice happily hosted the star-studded nuptials of Hollywood actor George Clooney 11 years ago but protesters say Bezos -- one of the world's richest men and founder of a company regularly scrutinised for how it treats its workers -- is different.
As environmentalists questioned the guests' carbon footprint, Greenpeace slammed billions spent on hedonistic partying while the fragile city is "sinking under the weight of the climate crisis".
Sanchez has also been criticized for saying more must be done to tackle climate change while also taking part in a space flight in April on a rocket developed by Bezos's space company Blue Origin.
Activists unfurled a giant banner in St Mark's on Monday, with a picture of Bezos laughing and a sign reading: "If you can rent Venice for your wedding, you can pay more tax".
Built on islands in a lagoon, the city has imposed a controversial ticket policy for day-trippers but locals say more must be done to protect local businesses and tackle the housing crisis.
Tommaso Cacciari, 47, who heads the No Space for Bezos movement, said the protesters object to "the use of Venice as if it were a very private ballroom, rather than a real city with inhabitants, with frailties, with problems".
He told AFP such events were "condemning Venice to a definitive death" by driving out remaining residents, but protesters were ready to kill the romance by throwing "our bodies, our boats and inflatable animals" into canals as guests pass.
The couple's Sicilian wedding planner Lanza & Baucina said they have been instructed to minimize any disruption to the city.
And Simone Venturini, Venice's tourism city councillor, denied it would disrupt daily life, telling AFP it was just "one of many events that the city hosts on a daily basis. It is also relatively small in terms of the number of people involved".
The couple, both divorced, have made charity donations to support the city and are employing historic Venetian artisans.
Venice's oldest pastry maker Rosa Salva is baking 19th-century "fishermen's biscuits" for party bags also expected to contain something by Laguna B, renowned for its handblown Murano glass.
While disgruntled citizens hoping to make a splash ready their swimming costumes, others flattered by Bezos's decision to celebrate here have set up a counter-group called "Yes Venice Can".
"It's a fragile city, that's clear, it's not like you can do everything all the time, no matter what -- but events like this don't create any problems at all", said 50-year-old local Michele Serafini.
The wedding "brings money to the city of Venice", and that can only be a good thing, he said.
© 2025 AFP
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Japan Today
14 hours ago
- Japan Today
U.S. judge allows using pirated books to train AI
A ruling by a US judge that Anthropic, led by CEO Dario Amodei, did not violate copyright law by training its artificial intelligence on pirated books could be cited by other firms defending themselves in similar lawsuits filed by authors A federal judge has sided with the AI company Anthropic in its practice of training a chatbot on copyrighted books without permission from the authors. In a decision with the potential to set legal precedent, District Court Judge William Asup ruled on Monday that Anthropic's training of its artificial intelligence creation Claude with millions of pirated books was allowed under a "fair use" doctrine in a law called the Copyright Act. "Use of the books at issue to train Claude and its precursors was exceedingly transformative and was a fair use," Alsup wrote in his decision. Tremendous amounts of data are needed to train large language models powering generative AI. Musicians, book authors, visual artists and news publications have sued AI companies that used their data without permission or payment. Alsup's decision in favor of Anthropic is a first in the United States and could be sited in other cases as a legal precedent by AI firms defending themselves in court. AI companies generally defend their practices by claiming fair use, arguing that training AI on large data sets fundamentally changes the original content and is necessary for innovation. Though most of these lawsuits are still in early stages, their outcomes could have a profound effect on the shape of the AI industry. Along with downloading for free millions of books from websites offering pirated works, Anthropic bought copyrighted books, scanned the pages and stored them in digital format, according to court documents. Anthropic's aim was to amass a library of "all the books in the world", training AI models on content as deemed fit, the judge said in his ruling. "Anthropic had no entitlement to use pirated copies for its central library," Alsup ruled, ordering a trial on that portion of the copyright lawsuit filed by authors to determine damages. Anthropic, valued at $61.5 billion and heavily backed by Amazon, was founded in 2021 by former executives from OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT. The company, known for its Claude chatbot and AI models, bills itself as focused on AI safety and responsible development. Anthropic did not immediately reply to a request for comment. © 2025 AFP
Japan Today
14 hours ago
- Japan Today
Glamour, gripes as celebs head to Venice for exclusive Bezos wedding
By Lisa Duso and Ella Ide Celebrities in superyachts sail into Venice this week for the three-day wedding party of Amazon tycoon Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez, despite irate locals who say the UNESCO city is no billionaire's playground. The tech magnate and journalist have reportedly invited about 200 guests to their multi-million dollar nuptials in the Italian city, which are expected to kick off Thursday and end Saturday with a ceremony at a secret location. The security details are under tight wraps amid rumors the rite may take place at the historic Church of the Abbey of Misericordia, or at the Arsenale, a vast shipyard complex dating back to when the city was a naval powerhouse. Bezos, 61, and former news anchor and entertainment reporter Sanchez, 55, are said to have booked out the city's finest hotels for a star-studded guest list rumored to include Leonardo DiCaprio, Mick Jagger, Kim Kardashian, Oprah Winfrey, Orlando Bloom and Ivanka Trump. At least 95 private planes have requested permission to land at Venice's Marco Polo airport, the Corriere della Sera said. And Bezos' mega-yacht, Koru, is likely to moor off the iconic San Giorgio Maggiore island, which sits just opposite St Mark's Square and has reportedly been booked in its entirety for the period. The lavish celebration has sparked much soul-searching in Venice, where some fear so many A-list guests and their entourages will make life worse in a city already drowning under the weight of holidaymakers. Around 100,000 tourists overnight in peak periods, while tens of thousands descend just for the day, many hopping off cruise ships for a quick Bellini cocktail, while the city steadily depopulates. Venice happily hosted the star-studded nuptials of Hollywood actor George Clooney 11 years ago but protesters say Bezos -- one of the world's richest men and founder of a company regularly scrutinised for how it treats its workers -- is different. As environmentalists questioned the guests' carbon footprint, Greenpeace slammed billions spent on hedonistic partying while the fragile city is "sinking under the weight of the climate crisis". Sanchez has also been criticized for saying more must be done to tackle climate change while also taking part in a space flight in April on a rocket developed by Bezos's space company Blue Origin. Activists unfurled a giant banner in St Mark's on Monday, with a picture of Bezos laughing and a sign reading: "If you can rent Venice for your wedding, you can pay more tax". Built on islands in a lagoon, the city has imposed a controversial ticket policy for day-trippers but locals say more must be done to protect local businesses and tackle the housing crisis. Tommaso Cacciari, 47, who heads the No Space for Bezos movement, said the protesters object to "the use of Venice as if it were a very private ballroom, rather than a real city with inhabitants, with frailties, with problems". He told AFP such events were "condemning Venice to a definitive death" by driving out remaining residents, but protesters were ready to kill the romance by throwing "our bodies, our boats and inflatable animals" into canals as guests pass. The couple's Sicilian wedding planner Lanza & Baucina said they have been instructed to minimize any disruption to the city. And Simone Venturini, Venice's tourism city councillor, denied it would disrupt daily life, telling AFP it was just "one of many events that the city hosts on a daily basis. It is also relatively small in terms of the number of people involved". The couple, both divorced, have made charity donations to support the city and are employing historic Venetian artisans. Venice's oldest pastry maker Rosa Salva is baking 19th-century "fishermen's biscuits" for party bags also expected to contain something by Laguna B, renowned for its handblown Murano glass. While disgruntled citizens hoping to make a splash ready their swimming costumes, others flattered by Bezos's decision to celebrate here have set up a counter-group called "Yes Venice Can". "It's a fragile city, that's clear, it's not like you can do everything all the time, no matter what -- but events like this don't create any problems at all", said 50-year-old local Michele Serafini. The wedding "brings money to the city of Venice", and that can only be a good thing, he said. © 2025 AFP
Japan Times
a day ago
- Japan Times
DeepSeek aids China's military and evaded export controls, U.S. official says
AI firm DeepSeek is aiding China's military and intelligence operations, a senior U.S. official said, adding that the Chinese tech startup sought to use Southeast Asian shell companies to access high-end semiconductors that cannot be shipped to China under U.S. rules. The U.S. conclusions reflect a growing conviction in Washington that the capabilities behind the rapid rise of one of China's flagship AI enterprises may have been exaggerated and relied heavily on U.S. technology. Hangzhou-based DeepSeek sent shockwaves through the technology world in January, saying its artificial intelligence reasoning models were on par with or better than U.S. industry-leading models at a fraction of the cost. "We understand that DeepSeek has willingly provided and will likely continue to provide support to China's military and intelligence operations," a senior State Department official said in an interview. "This effort goes above and beyond open-source access to DeepSeek's AI models," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity in order to speak about U.S. government information. The U.S. government's assessment of DeepSeek's activities and links to the Chinese government come amid a wide-scale U.S.-China trade war. Among the allegations, the official said DeepSeek is sharing user information and statistics with Beijing's surveillance apparatus. The big three U.S. cloud providers Amazon, Microsoft and Alphabet's Google offer DeepSeek to customers. Chinese law requires companies operating in China to provide data to the government when requested. But the suggestion that DeepSeek is already doing so is likely to raise privacy and other concerns for the firm's tens of millions of daily global users. The U.S. also maintains restrictions on companies it believes are linked to China's military-industrial complex. U.S. lawmakers have previously said that DeepSeek, based on its privacy disclosure statements, transmits American users' data to China through "backend infrastructure" connected to China Mobile, a Chinese state-owned telecommunications giant. DeepSeek did not respond to questions about its privacy practices. The company is also referenced more than 150 times in procurement records for China's People's Liberation Army and other entities affiliated with the Chinese defense industrial base, said the official, adding that DeepSeek had provided technology services to PLA research institutions. The official also said the company was employing workarounds to U.S. export controls to gain access to advanced U.S.-made chips. DeepSeek has access to "large volumes" of U.S. firm Nvidia's high-end H100 chips, said the official. Since 2022 those chips have been under U.S. export restrictions due to Washington's concerns that China could use them to advance its military capabilities or jump ahead in the AI race. "DeepSeek sought to use shell companies in Southeast Asia to evade export controls, and DeepSeek is seeking to access data centers in Southeast Asia to remotely access U.S. chips," the official said. The official declined to say if DeepSeek had successfully evaded export controls or offer further details about the shell companies. DeepSeek also did not respond to questions about its acquisition of Nvidia chips or the alleged use of shell companies. When asked if the U.S. would implement further export controls or sanctions against DeepSeek, the official said the department had "nothing to announce at this time." China's foreign ministry and commerce ministry did not respond to a request for comment. "We do not support parties that have violated U.S. export controls or are on the U.S. entity lists," an Nvidia spokesman said in a prepared statement, adding that "with the current export controls, we are effectively out of the China data center market, which is now served only by competitors such as Huawei." DeepSeek has said two of its AI models that Silicon Valley executives and U.S. tech company engineers have showered with praise — DeepSeek-V3 and DeepSeek-R1 — are on par with OpenAI and Meta's most advanced models. AI experts, however, have expressed skepticism, arguing the true costs of training the models were likely much higher than the $5.58 million the startup said was spent on computing power. DeepSeek has H100 chips that it procured after the U.S. banned Nvidia from selling those chips to China, three sources familiar with the matter said, adding that the number was far smaller than the 50,000 H100s that the CEO of another AI startup had claimed DeepSeek possesses in a January interview with CNBC. "Our review indicates that DeepSeek used lawfully acquired H800 products, not H100," an Nvidia spokesman said, responding to a query about DeepSeek's alleged usage of H100 chips. In February, Singapore charged three men with fraud in a case domestic media have linked to the movement of Nvidia's advanced chips from the city state to DeepSeek. China has also been suspected of finding ways to use advanced U.S. chips remotely. While importing advanced Nvidia chips into China without a license violates U.S. export rules, Chinese companies are still allowed to access those same chips remotely in data centers in non-restricted countries. The exceptions are when a Chinese company is on a U.S. trade blacklist or the chip exporter has knowledge that the Chinese firm is using its chips to help develop weapons of mass destruction. U.S. officials have not placed DeepSeek on any U.S. trade blacklists yet and have not alleged that Nvidia had any knowledge of DeepSeek's work with the Chinese military. Malaysia's trade ministry said last week that it was investigating whether an unnamed Chinese company in the country was using servers equipped with Nvidia chips for large language model training and that it was examining whether any domestic law or regulation had been breached.
