Techmeme: Western Digital officially completes acquisition of SanDisk for around $16B (James Vincent/The Verge)

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May 12, 2016, 4:20 PM

Top News

Rajan Patel / Official Google Blog:

Google unveils GBoard in US, an iOS keyboard app that lets you search the web, find GIFs, emojis, places, and more from the keyboard — iPhone users—this one's for you. Meet Gboard, a new app for your iPhone that lets you search and send information, GIFs, emojis and more, right from your keyboard.

More: App Store, The Verge, iMore, The Verge, BuzzFeed, Daily Mail, PCWorld, 9to5Mac, The Daily Dot, Android Police, BetaNews, 9to5Google, Gizmodo, Macworld, USA Today, Tech Insider, TalkAndroid.com, Ars Technica UK, ZDNet, Mashable, iMore, TechCrunch, Search Engine Land, CNET, Digital Trends, SocialTimes, Wired, Softpedia News, Neowin, AndroidGuys, Socialnomics, Engadget, POPSUGAR, Laughing Squid, MacStories, TechSpot, Droid Life, PhoneDog.com, Phandroid, Pocketnow, SlashGear, iPhone in Canada Blog, Ubergizmo, Technology Personalized, O'Grady's PowerPage, Android Authority, Liliputing, AppleInsider, TIME, Fone Arena, TechnoBuffalo, BGR, Lifehacker, MacRumors, Business Insider, The Next Web, Recode, Refinery29 and The Mac Observer

Tweets: @marshallbock, @noah_weiss, @wsj, @mikeisaac, @vijayshekhar, @jw, @reckless, @deray, @blakeir, @rstephens and @drance

Sam Thielman / Guardian:

Leaked documents show human intervention at almost every stage of Facebook's news operation — Exclusive: Leaked internal guidelines show human intervention at almost every stage of its news operation, akin to a traditional media organization — Leaked documents show how Facebook …

Justin Oskofsky / Facebook:

Facebook explains how Trending Topics works, reiterates that it doesn't allow reviewers to discriminate against sources of any political origin — At Facebook, we stand for connecting every person — for a global community, for bringing people together, for giving all people a voice …

More: The Verge and CNNMoney. Tweets: @dannysullivan and @joshconstine

Casey Newton / The Verge:

Facebook director of product management for News Feed says Trending Topics team's priority is bug fixing, biased News Feed wouldn't serve 1B users well

Tweets: @joshconstine, @backlon, @joshconstine, @mathewi, @mathewi, @mathewi and @mathewi. See also Mediagazer

Alex Webb / Bloomberg:

Apple's average app review time has fallen from 8.8 days a year ago to 1.95 days in the past two weeks — Average approval times reduced to two days from about nine — Apple is trying to keep developers loyal to iOS projects — Apple Inc. has cut the approval time for new submissions …

More: Average App Store Review Times, Macworld, 9to5Mac, iMore, Fortune, AppAdvice.com Latest, iDownloadBlog.com, iPhone in Canada Blog, MacStories, Cult of Mac and AppleInsider

Tweets: @tapbot_paul, @adora, @tapbot_paul, @petrfodor, @danlev, @drbarnard and @zentraedi

Slav Petrov / Google Research Blog:

Google open sources SyntaxNet, a neural network framework for parsing natural language, and releases Parsey McParseface, a SyntaxNet-trained English parser — At Google, we spend a lot of time thinking about how computer systems can read and understand human language in order to process it in intelligent ways.

More: SiliconANGLE, The Next Web, VentureBeat, The Verge, GitHub, Wired and Mashable. Tweets: @djsnm

John Ribeiro / Computerworld:

Mozilla court filing asks government to turn over details of Tor browser flaw to protect Firefox users before making details of vulnerability public — Mozilla says it wants to check if the vulnerable code is found in Firefox code — Mozilla has asked a court that it should be provided information …

More: The Mozilla Blog, Engadget, Gizmodo, The Intercept, ZDNet, Help Net Security, SecurityWeek, Motherboard, The Next Web, VentureBeat, BetaNews and Gizmodo UK. Tweets: @astepanovich

James Vincent / The Verge:

Western Digital officially completes acquisition of SanDisk for around $16B — Western Digital has now officially purchased flash memory manufacturer SanDisk after regulator approval was passed earlier this week. The agreement between the two storage companies was originally announced last October in a deal worth nearly $19 billion.

More: Western Digital, iMore, Digital Trends, FierceCIO News, Seeking Alpha, pcgamer, insideHPC, Benzinga and Engadget

Kurt Wagner / Re/code:

A look at Snapchat's secretive culture and the controlling leadership style of CEO Evan Spiegel — It's Evan Spiegel's world — we're all just snapping in it — Before Evan Spiegel was Evan Spiegel, there were times he wanted to fit in. — Like in June 2012, when Spiegel walked across …

Tweets: @calexity, @edmundlee, @bbhlabs, @mylesudland and @hannahkuchler. Thanks:@waqasaday

Wall Street Journal:

Sources: Tencent-backed music-streaming service China Music Corp. plans US IPO as soon as this year, could raise $300M-$600M — China Music Corp. could raise $300 million to $600 million — HONG KONG—A music-streaming service backed by Chinese Internet giant Tencent Holdings Ltd …

More: hypebot, Digital Music News and Music Ally

Chris O'Brien / VentureBeat:

Kantar: Android marketshare in Q1 grew 7.3% YoY in US, 7.1% in top five European markets, and 6% in China; Galaxy S7 said to be selling well in the US — As if Apple wasn't facing enough headwind this year, now comes word that Android smartphones are making big market share gains around the world.

More: Kantar Worldpanel, Tech Insider, Phandroid, ZDNet, Pocketnow, SlashGear, PYMNTS.com, Windows Central, WinBeta, CNET, ZDNet, ITWire.com, MSPoweruser, PhoneArena, Neowin and Softpedia News

Neil Cybart / Above Avalon:

Apple's R&D spend is $10B+, 6.8% of revenue in 2016, up from 2.6% of revenue in 2013, hinting at major new products, pivot from iPhone-dependent business model — People are focusing on the wrong thing when analyzing Apple's path forward in the face of slowing iPhone sales.

More: iPhone in Canada Blog, ZDNet, Philip Elmer-DeWitt, iMore, iPhone Hacks, MacRumors, Fortune, Silicon Republic and BGR

Tweets: @stevesi, @gartenberg, @ldignan and @ericjackson

Jeff John Roberts / Fortune:

What's at stake in Google and Oracle's $9.3B fair use fight over Java APIs — Gather round tech folks, it's time for an epic rematch between two industry giants. At stake is not just billions of dollars in copyright claims, but also a controversial legal concept that could roil the entire software industry.

Jack Nicas / Wall Street Journal:

Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Schwartz and Andy Rubin testify at outset of second Oracle v. Google trial

More: Phandroid, Ars Technica, Courthouse News Service, Business Insider and Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check

Ross Miller / The Verge:

Vuze 360-degree 3D 4K VR camera available for pre-order for $799, ships in October — With few exceptions, the traditional camera market has a product for pretty much every price imaginable. Virtual reality cameras, on the other hand, tend to be either a few hundred dollars (e.g. …

More: Engadget, TechCrunch, Tech Insider, VentureBeat, SiliconANGLE, VRFocus, Tech Times and Digital Trends

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