Techmeme
December 18, 2018, 8:05 PM

Top News

Ina Fried / Axios:
AT&T to launch 5G mobile service on December 21 across 12 US cities via a $499 mobile hotspot device and $70/month data plan  —  The 5G era has arrived.  AT&T is launching 5G mobile service in a dozen U.S. cities beginning this Friday, becoming the first carrier to do so.
Casey Newton / The Verge:
Twitter is relaunching the reverse-chronological feed as an option for all users starting today on iOS and other platforms in the coming weeks  —  Just hit that sparkle, fam  —  Twitter is offering users another escape hatch from its ranked timeline.  The company said today that it will introduce …
Kirsten Korosec / TechCrunch:
Anthony Levandowski's Pronto.ai plans to ship level 2 automated driving systems for trucks in 2019  —  Anthony Levandowski, the former Google engineer and serial entrepreneur who was at the center of a trade secrets lawsuit between Uber and Waymo, has taken his newest autonomous vehicle technology company …
Guru Gowrappan / Verizon:
On January 8, Oath, which was created from Verizon's acquisitions of Yahoo and AOL, will be rebranded as Verizon Media Group  —  Verizon Media Group will replace the Oath brand, representing our strong alignment as a core pillar of Verizon's business.  —  I'm excited today to share …
New York Times:
Senate report on Russia's disinformation campaign accuses Google, Facebook, and Twitter of being evasive and withholding data about Russian activity  —  SAN FRANCISCO — When lawmakers asked YouTube, a unit of Google, to provide information about Russian manipulation efforts …
Bloomberg:
Ina Fried / Axios:
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
Spectrum's parent Charter reaches $174.2M settlement in New York AG's speed fraud lawsuit, which alleged that the ISP's speeds were 80% slower than advertised  —  The lawsuit, filed last year, alleged that Charter's speeds were 80 percent slower than advertised
Wall Street Journal:
iPhone prices are unpalatable in India, where reports say its marketshare has shrunk to ~1%, and a source says it's taking in <50% of the revenue once hoped for  —  With global smartphone sales flattening, Apple has looked to India for new growth, with little success so far
Mallory Locklear / Engadget:
Facebook posts a six-month update on its civil rights audit: 2018 changes included voting encouragement and banning voting disinformation  —  In May, Facebook agreed to conduct a civil rights audit, and now the company has released an update of its progress.
Taylor Lorenz / The Atlantic:
As shilling products has become a sign of success for influencers, up-and-comers on Instagram are posting fake sponsored content to boost their credibility  —  Tapping through Palak Joshi's Instagram Stories recently, you might have come across a photo that looked like standard sponsored content …
Aaron Tilley / The Information:
Lighthouse, a startup backed by Andy Rubin that was building AI-enabled security cameras, is shutting down; Lighthouse had raised $20M  —  A startup building an advanced artificial intelligence-enabled security camera, called Lighthouse, is shutting down.  Founded in 2015 …
More: Lighthouse and TechCrunch.  Thanks:@aatilley
Manish Singh / VentureBeat:
Truecaller report: worldwide spam calls increased 300% YoY, reaching 17.7B in 2018; Brazil led with more than 37 spam calls per user per month  —  According to the yearly report published by Stockholm-based phone number-identification service Truecaller, spam calls grew by 300 percent year-over-year in 2018.
Mathew Ingram / Columbia Journalism Review:
NPR's podcast measurement technology RAD has sparked debate within the industry, with Overcast's Marco Arment expressing concerns about tracking and privacy  —  Until recently, it hasn't been easy to measure the success of podcasts, beyond how many people download them …
Emily Dreyfuss / Wired:
Amnesty International calls Twitter a “toxic place for women” in a study of 288,000 tweets aimed at 778 female journalists and politicians from the US and UK  —  FOR MANY WOMEN, especially journalists, politicians, and other public figures, Twitter is something to endure.
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:

Sponsor Posts

Subquadratic:
Subquadratic: the LLM built for 12M-token reasoning  —  SubQ can reason across entire codebases and document sets in one pass with no RAG workarounds.  Read how SubQ 1.1 Small holds near-perfect retrieval out to 12M tokens.
Zoho:
Single-folder archival in Zoho Mail: What you need to know  —  Email archival is the practice of moving emails from your active inbox or folders to a separate space.  It helps keep your mailbox clutter-free …
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.
Soxton:
Fast, affordable law for startups  —  Soxton automates startup legal so founders can move faster and sleep better.  We handle incorporation, advisor, employment and commercial contracts.  Join the waitlist for early access!

Featured Podcasts

Training Data:
Google's AI Infrastructure Chief, Amin Vahdat, on the Physics & Economics of Frontier AI
Sequoia Capital partners host conversations with leading AI builders and researchers to develop a deeper understanding of the evolving technologies and their implications.
Subscribe to Training Data.
Invest Like the Best:
Andrew Huberman - The Frontier of Neurotechnology
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
Big Technology Podcast:
Who Wins The AI Assistant Wars? + Why Didn't Google Build Muse?
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.
Sources:
Reflection's founders on building a DeepSeek of the West
Candid conversations with the leaders shaping what's next in AI and the broader tech industry. Hosted by Alex Heath, who has covered Silicon Valley for more than a decade.
Subscribe to Sources.
Grit:
How Vercel Is Rethinking Go-to-Market With AI | COO Jeanne Grosser
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Lenny's Podcast:
OpenAI's Head of ChatGPT: We're entering a new era of AI (again) | Tibo Sottiaux
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.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 8:05 PM ET, December 18, 2018.

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

Matthew Leising / Bloomberg:
Ry Crist / CNET:

Earlier Picks

Kelly Weill / The Daily Beast:
Nikhilesh De / CoinDesk:
Aliya Ram / Financial Times: