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August 13, 2019, 6:25 PM
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| Sarah Frier / Bloomberg: |
Sources: Facebook paid hundreds of contractors to transcribe user audio; FB says it's stopped the work, which affected users who wanted voice chats transcribed — - Social network says it paused human review of conversations — Apple, Amazon, Google have been scrutinized for similar work
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Engadget, TechCrunch, iMore, MacRumors, The Next Web, Telegraph, Gizmodo, The Verge, CNET, Business Insider, 9to5Mac, Lifehacker, Mashable, MSPoweruser, iDownloadBlog.com, CNBC, The Mac Observer, iPhone in Canada Blog, and Seeking Alpha
Tweets: @sarahfrier, @sarahjeong, @random_walker, @dseetharaman, @thedcd, @heathercampbell, @jason_kint, @mikeisaac, @rmac18, @staska, @can, @lfdodds, @kurtwagner8, @kurtwagner8, and @shiraovide
| Nitasha Tiku / Wired: |
Interviews with 47 former and current employees about the past three years at Google reveal fear of the far right, activist awakening, weaponized leaks, more — ON A BRIGHT Monday in January 2017, at 2:30 in the afternoon, about a thousand Google employees—horrified, alarmed, and a little giddy …
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Business Insider, Boing Boing, and MacDailyNews
Tweets: @nitashatiku, @nxthompson, @om, @wired, @reckless, @caitlin__kelly, @hypirlink, @joshsternberg, and @lizthegrey
| Casey Newton / The Verge: |
Snap announces Spectacles 3 with an updated design and a second HD camera to create depth perception, going on sale in November for $380 — They're $380 and go on sale in November — Snap today announced Spectacles 3, a redesigned version of its augmented reality sunglasses with a sleek …
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Vogue, Bloomberg, Engadget, TechCrunch, The Next Web, SiliconANGLE, iPhone in Canada Blog, Adweek, Fast Company, Bloomberg, iMore, The Daily Dot, CNET, Tom's Guide, SlashGear, Tubefilter, Business Insider, VentureBeat, Mashable, TechSpot, Cult of Mac, PYMNTS.com, 9to5Mac, CNBC, Thurrott, Geek.com, Pocket-lint, Gizmodo, Digital Trends, Firstpost Tech, iDownloadBlog.com, Neowin, and Seeking Alpha
Tweets: @alyssabereznak, @kurtwagner8, @davegershgorn, @nattgarun, @ow, @kerrymflynn, @dannysullivan, @db, @dcseifert, @shiraovide, and @kerrymflynn
| Ashley Carman / The Verge: |
Spotify for Podcasters comes out of beta, giving podcasters valuable listener data like age, gender, location, music taste, and episode listening duration — Spotify for Podcasters comes out of beta today — Spotify is going to give podcasters listener data they can't get anywhere else.
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Spotify, Candid.Technology, TechCrunch, and iPhone in Canada Blog
Tweets: @ashleyrcarman, @marcoarment, @mims, and @marcoarment
| Casey Newton / The Verge: |
Twitter to soon let users follow interests, starting with sports, and create separate timelines for different topics; topics will be curated by Twitter using AI — A new way to explore interests on Twitter — Twitter will begin letting users follow interests, the company said today …
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CNET. Tweets: @caseynewton, @anthony, @rakeshlobster, @caseynewton, @pt, @wongmjane, @chillmage, @living_marble, @geoffblaber, and @mattnavarra
| The Information: |
Sources: Spotify is discussing a plan with Apple to let iPhone users tell Siri to play songs, playlists, albums with voice commands, as anti-trust battle looms — An issue that has long vexed many iPhone users—the inability to play music from Spotify using Siri, Apple's voice assistant—may soon be a thing of the past.| Reuters: |
Trump delayed tariffs for some products like laptops and cellphones, sending Apple's stock up, but Airpods, Watches, and more were not included in the reprieve — WASHINGTON and SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Apple Inc's (AAPL.O) AirPods, Apple Watch and HomePod, which have helped the company …
More:
The Verge, CNET, TechSpot, iPhone Hacks, Cult of Mac, iPhone in Canada Blog, Seeking Alpha, and Reuters. Tweets: @backlon
| Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch: |
Nvidia says it has broken records for real-time conversational AI, training the industry-standard BERT model in 53 minutes and then inferring responses in ~2ms — Nvidia's GPU-powered platform for developing and running conversational AI that understands and responds to natural language requests …
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NVIDIA Developer Blog, VentureBeat, SiliconANGLE, Neowin, NVIDIA ADLR, ZDNet, and MIT Technology Review. Tweets: @ctnzr
| Kaya Yurieff / CNN: |
A look at Snapchat's community of about 100 official lens creators, who make custom AR lenses for people and brands, with Snap helping connect them to buyers — New York (CNN Business)Eighteen-year-old Ana Casciello couldn't find a filter she wanted for her Snapchat photo that matched her personal style.
Tweets: @andrewmendez19, @cnnbusiness, @basche42, and @kyurieff
| Taylor Lorenz / The Atlantic: |
Behind the rise of “twinfluencers” on social media, as content produced by twins continues to explode in popularity on YouTube and Instagram — You're not imagining it: Influencers really are multiplying. — There are the Dolan Twins, a pair of square-jawed 19-year-olds …
Tweets: @davezatz, @fordm, @venturetwins, @yappelbaum, and @katienotopoulos
| Reuters: |
23 job search websites in Europe allege anti-competitive behavior from Google in antitrust complaints to the European Union competition commissioner — BRUSSELS/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google's fast-growing tool for searching job listings has been a boon for employers and job boards starving …
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Engadget, Mercury News, Android Headlines, The Verge, VentureBeat, The Next Web, Telegraph, and Inquirer
| Hollywood Reporter: |
Netflix is quickly expanding its global property portfolio, which includes 30+ offices and studios, as it ramps up its global content production — From sizable investments in studio facilities to high-end office spaces in some of the world's priciest neighborhoods, the company is quickly building …
Tweets: @thrmattbelloni
| Todd Bishop / GeekWire: |
Cray, which is in the process of being bought by HPE, wins contract to make a $600M supercomputer for the US DoE, for 3D simulations, nuclear weapons research — Seattle-based supercomputer maker Cray has been tapped to develop a new $600 million system for the U.S. Department of Energy … | Janko Roettgers / Variety: |
Oculus co-founder Nate Mitchell is leaving Facebook, seven years after launching the first Oculus Rift headset via Kickstarter — Oculus co-founder Nate Mitchell is leaving Facebook 7 years after launching the first Oculus Rift headset with a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign.
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TechCrunch, VentureBeat, The Daily Dot, Business Insider, and Engadget
| Dan Goodin / Ars Technica: |
Database from hacker community Cracked.to posted at rival site Raidforums, leaking users' IPs, email addresses, and DMs, many of which shared software exploits — Fortnite cracks, software exploits among the topics discussed in almost 357,000 PMs. — Hackers from Raidforums recently breached … | Lucas Matney / TechCrunch: |
Facebook says it is opening up the closed beta of Spark AR on Instagram, letting any developer build and share AR filters on the platform — Not one to let Face App and Snapchat steal its spotlight, Facebook announced today that it's opening its closed beta of Spark AR on Instagram …
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The Verge, Telegraph, and iPhone in Canada Blog
| Angelica Krystle Donati / Forbes: |
OpenSpace, which uses AI to create navigable, 360-degree images of building sites using photos from cameras attached to builders' hats, raises $14M Series A — I write about proptech and innovation in real estate and construction. — “> As a testament to the increasing significance of the subsector … | Theodore Schleifer / Vox: |
A look at Jeff Bezos' radical approach of giving nonprofits millions from his Day One Fund to provide shelter for homeless families without any restrictions — Jeff Bezos is making a name for himself in the world of charity. Nicole Craine/WireImage — Is that good? Is that bad?| Liam Tung / ZDNet: |
Chrome 77 and Firefox 70, out in the fall, will move extended validation info, which displays the site owner's name, from the address bar to behind the padlock — Extended Validation certificates for websites pronounced ‘really dead’, after policy change by Google and Mozilla.
More:
Domain Name Wire and Techdows
| Andrew Liptak / The Verge: |
Researchers remotely install malware on a DSLR camera from Canon using the unauthenticated Picture Transfer Protocol, common in the industry; Canon issues patch — Canon has issued a security advisory and firmware patch for the vulnerability — Ransomware has become a major threat …
More:
ZDNet, HackRead, Digital Photography Review, SlashGear, PetaPixel, Gizmodo, and The Next Web
| Mike Wheatley / SiliconANGLE: |
Pavilion Data Systems, a data center storage company, raises $25M Series C led by Taiwania Capital and RPS Ventures — Data center hardware maker Pavilion Data Systems Inc. is gearing up for expansion after closing on a $25 million round of funding that brings its total amount raised to $58 million.
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FinSMEs, VentureBeat, Blocks and Files, and PE Hub Blog
| Emily Birnbaum / The Hill: |
Pentagon's internal watchdog says it is investigating misconduct allegations during the $10B JEDI cloud services contract acquisition process — The Pentagon's internal watchdog on Tuesday said that it is investigating potential ethics concerns around the $10 billion “war cloud” …
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Seeking Alpha
| Steven Sinofsky / Learning By Shipping: |
How Steve Jobs conceived the “bicycle for the mind” metaphor for the personal computer, which largely drove Apple's philosophy for decades — “When we invented the personal computer, we created a new kind of bicycle...a new man-machine partnership...a new generation of entrepreneurs."
Tweets: @stevesi and @waltmossberg
| Bloomberg: |
Sources: Amazon is in late-stage talks to acquire up to 10% of Future Retail, India's No. 2 retailer by turnover, which is seeking $281M for the stake — - Indian supermarket firm seeks 20 billion rupees for shares — U.S. giant gears up for fight with Walmart, Reliance in India
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PYMNTS.com, Business Insider, and Inc42 Media
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