Techmeme
May 21, 2015, 2:10 PM

Top News

CBC News:
US, Canada, UK, Australia, and New Zealand planned to hijack Google and Samsung app stores to implant spyware on smartphones  —  Spy agencies target mobile phones, app stores to implant spyware  —  Users of millions of smartphones put at risk by certain mobile browser gaps, Snowden file shows
Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac:
Apple readies Transit subway, train + bus guides for iOS 9 Maps, deploys robots for indoor mapping  —  Having originally planned to add a new transit directions feature to Maps last year, only to pull the feature before WWDC 2014, Apple now hopes to launch its Transit service with iOS 9, according to sources.
Amir Efrati / The Information:
Google developing Internet of Things OS called Brillo, designed to run on devices with perhaps as little as 32MB RAM  —  Google Developing ‘Brillo’ Software for Internet of Things  —  Google wants its software to power any electronic device that connects to the Internet, whether or not it has a digital screen.
Pew Internet:
Pew Report: 69% of US adults are not confident social networks will keep their data private and secure  —  Americans' Attitudes About Privacy, Security and Surveillance  —  The cascade of reports following the June 2013 government surveillance revelations by NSA contractor Edward Snowden …
Marco Arment / Marco.org:
Apple's new MacBook, with its shallow keyboard and Force Touch trackpad, makes major usability compromises for thinness  —  Mistake One  —  MacBook “One”, 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro, and Hops for scale.  —  I've had mixed luck with impulse buys.  —  As a kid, I impulse-bought Marble Madness for my Sega Genesis.
Joseph Menn / Reuters:
US proposes tighter export controls limiting sales of zero-day flaw information outside US without special license  —  U.S. aims to limit exports of undisclosed software flaws  —  The U.S. Commerce Department proposed new export controls Wednesday that would treat unknown software flaws …
Chris O'Brien / VentureBeat:
Amazon's Prime Now service will start delivering from local stores in Manhattan  —  Amazon announced today that its Prime Now service will now start delivering goods from local stores in Manhattan, with plans to expand soon to other communities later this year.
Emil Protalinski / VentureBeat:
YouTube live streams now support HTML5 playback and 60fps video  —  YouTube today announced it is enabling HTML5 playback for live streams.  At the same time, live streams can now be viewed at 60 frames per second (fps).  —  A few puzzle pieces had to come together to make this possible.
Gabe Rivera / Techmeme News:
Techmeme adds an author leaderboard, introduces a linking-based metric to rank by “Leadership”  —  Today we've expanded our Leaderboard page to offer four lists instead of one.  In addition to ranking publications, we now rank authors.  On top of that, we've introduced a second ranking method …
Alexander Martin / Wall Street Journal:
Nikesh Arora to replace Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son as Yahoo Japan Chairman  —  Arora to Replace Softbank CEO Son as Yahoo Japan Chairman  —  SoftBank Corp. chief executive Masayoshi Son will step down as chairman of Yahoo Japan Corp.'s board of directors to be replaced by Nikesh Arora …
More: SiliconBeat and Reuters
Wall Street Journal:
H-P to Sell 51% of Chinese Data-Networking Unit to Tsinghua Holdings  —  Buyer is expected to pay $2.3 billion for majority control of H3C Technologies  —  Hewlett-Packard Co. plans to unveil sweeping changes to its business in China, including the sale of a majority stake …
Robin Sidel / Wall Street Journal:
FICO: theft of debit card data from bank ATMs is up 174% YoY, up 317% at nonbank machines  —  Theft of Debit-Card Data From ATMs Soars  —  Thieves are stealing information to make counterfeit plastic  —  Criminals are stealing card data from U.S. automated teller machines at the highest rate …
More: Fortune, Fortune and TIME
Samuel Gibbs / Guardian:
Troll uses Twitter adverts to urge transgender people to kill themselves  —  Promoted tweet from fake account purporting to be that of Australian feminist campaigner inserts transphobic content into Twitter users' timelines  —  Twitter users have expressed outrage at a troll's use …

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Transform ML Experimentation with Tangle  —  Save months of compute time with Tangle, built by Shopify.  Try this open-source platform to simplify ML workflows, ensure reproducibility, and seamlessly share with collaborators.
Zoho:
Top shortcuts to work your way through Zoho Cliq  —  The debate between mouse and keyboard users has been around for years.  Whether it's about efficiency, speed, or productivity, there's always this question …
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Grit:
The Pull to Build: Joubin Mirzadegan on Grit and Starting Roadrunner
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Lenny's Podcast:
The 100-person AI lab that became Anthropic and Google's secret weapon | Edwin Chen (Surge AI)
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Big Technology Podcast:
AI Device Wars Heat Up, RIP Metaverse?, Netflix Acquires Warner Brothers
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
"Hollywood is Truly Freaked Out." Inside the Netflix/WBD Deal with Lucas Shaw
Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
Hard Fork:
OpenAI Calls a 'Code Red' + Which Model Should I Use? + The Hard Fork Review of Slop
The future is already here. Each week, journalists Kevin Roose and Casey Newton explore and make sense of the latest in the rapidly changing world of tech.
Subscribe to Hard Fork.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 2:10 PM ET, May 21, 2015.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.

More News

Steve Dent / Engadget:

Earlier Picks

Kristen V. Brown / San Francisco Chronicle:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Mark Gurman / 9to5Mac: