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For a growing number of businesses, less is more when it comes to internal AI use.

Companies are reassessing previous decisions to equate higher AI usage with productivity, a move known more commonly as “tokenmaxxing.”

Latest example. Earlier this month, Walmart reportedly put caps on internal AI use after previously allowing employees access to unlimited tokens, as reported by Bloomberg. During a press briefing at Associates Week 2026, Walmart Global CTO and Chief Development Officer Suresh Kumar said the decision came after usage of Code Puppy, the company’s vibe coding platform, “skyrocketed,” adding that the retailer wants to get the “maximum benefits” from AI in its signature low-cost fashion.

“This is now an opportunity for us to take a step back and start saying, ‘Hey, if you are doing the same thing again and again, you don’t need to keep asking Code Puppy the exact same question again.’”

And Walmart isn’t the only one.—BM

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CLOUD

Green day

Brittany Holloway-Brown, Photos: Adobe Stock

Like a beloved ’90s boy band that just secured a Las Vegas residency, green IT is making a comeback.

IDC’s Global Sustainability Research Lead Bjoern Stengel told IT Brew that AI is triggering a “revival” of green IT discussions as concerns around the “sustainability footprint of IT infrastructure for AI” grows among businesses.

“That’s due to the carbon emissions [and] the water that’s needed for cooling AI infrastructure…There’s [also] a concern around the refresh cycles and what to do with all the existing equipment,” Stengel said in an April interview at IDC Directions.

Sustainable energy. Stengel isn’t the only professional who feels AI is giving the green IT movement some new momentum. Michael Gale, CMO at sovereign AI and data company EDB, said AI is causing a “radical shift” in green IT conversations. Previously, he said, green IT was a “transient subject” that companies engaged with voluntarily. Now those conversations are becoming more top-of-mind for businesses because of costs related to building out data centers and AI infrastructure, which can quickly spiral if they don’t make sustainable choices.

How to get your green thumb on.—BM

CYBERSECURITY

(Don’t) fake it ’til you make it

Getty Images

Midterm election season is underway, meaning it’s game time for campaign staffers—as well as cybercriminals and hacktivists.

Bobby Ford, chief strategy and experience officer at Doppel, a social engineering defense platform powered by AI, told IT Brew that political campaigns will oftentimes hire a third-party IT vendor to help maintain operations and defend against cyberattacks.

“Being an IT professional is hard, being a third-party IT professional is probably harder, and I would suggest being a third-party IT professional to one of these campaigns has got to be extraordinarily hard,” Ford said. “They’re under this constant attack, which is growing, evolving, and maturing on a minute basis—not daily, not weekly, but every minute it’s becoming more sophisticated.”

What IT pros protecting campaigns are up against.—CN

☕ Maxxed out?