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November 20, 2019, 10:35 PM
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Scott Spencer / The Keyword:
Google announces new political ad rules, limits microtargeting to age, gender, and general location categories, will start enforcing them in UK within a week  —  We're proud that people around the world use Google to find relevant information about elections and that candidates use Google …
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
PayPal to acquire Honey, a comparison shopping and rewards platform that has 17M MAUs, for ~$4B  —  PayPal announced today it has agreed to acquire Honey Science Corporation, the makers of a deal-finding browser add-on and mobile application, for $4 billion, mostly cash.
New York Times:
Google has hired IRI Consultants, an anti-union consulting company, signaling the feud between some activist employees and management has escalated  —  After nearly two years of unrest, the company appears to be cracking down on employee activism.  —  Google has hired an anti-union consulting firm …
Faiz Siddiqui / Washington Post:
Uber plans to test letting riders and drivers in the US record audio of their trips “soon”, as a similar pilot program debuts next month in Brazil and Mexico  —  Uber plans to record audio during rides in the United States as part of a new security feature, its latest push …
Kate Conger / New York Times:
Uber has been testing video recording of some trips in Texas, Florida, and Tennessee since July; riders, drivers can send video to Uber after safety incidents  —  The company says it is increasing the recording of rides to settle disputes between drivers and passengers and to improve safety.
Janko Roettgers / Variety:
Sonos has acquired voice assistant startup Snips for $37M, says it has sold 6.1M speakers in 2019, reports fiscal Q4 revenue of $294.2M, up 8% YoY  —  The company grew its 2019 revenue by 11%, but saw losses rise in Q4 due to increased R&D spending  —  Smart speaker maker Sonos is getting ready …
Nathaniel Popper / New York Times:
On-demand transcription service Rev faces backlash from its contractors after cutting their take to 30 cents for each dollar spent on some jobs, from 45 cents  —  Rev was just a small start-up offering online transcriptions.  Now it's the latest symbol of a gig-economy company whose workers are fed up.
Ben Lovejoy / 9to5Mac:
Apple says it has begun construction of its $1B Austin, Texas campus, opening in 2022, as Trump tours the nearby Mac Pro production plant  —  Apple has announced that it has begun construction of its new Austin, Texas, campus, on the day that President Trump is due to tour the Mac Pro production line a short distance away.
Lawrence Abrams / BleepingComputer:
Researchers find bugs in Google and Samsung camera apps from before July 2019 that could record video, take pictures, and extract GPS data without permission  —  A new vulnerability has been found in the Camera apps for millions, if not hundreds of millions, of Android devices that could allow …
Jake Bright / TechCrunch:
After converting to a for-profit status, Samasource raises $14.8M Series A for its AI data annotation service used by companies like Google and Walmart  —  AI training data provider Samasource has raised a $14.8 million Series A funding round led by Ridge Ventures.
Joel Marcey / Facebook Developers:
Facebook makes Visual Studio Code its default internal development environment, partners with Microsoft on tools to let devs do remote development at scale  —  History  —  Facebook engineers have written millions of lines of code.  There is no mandated development environment.  Some developers use vim.
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Google launches Google Earth tools that let users create and present virtual tours, with attached text, images, and videos, for specific places  —  It's like a homemade guided tour  —  Today, Google is adding new tools to Google Earth on the web that let you build your own tour of a place right on top of the Google Earth map.
Benjamin Mayo / 9to5Mac:
Apple launches Apple Music for Business, letting businesses play music in retail locations with Apple providing human-curated playlists and recommendations  —  Apple Music is now partnering with businesses to play music at retail stores.  In a partnership with PlayNetwork …
Crystal Tse / Bloomberg:
Canaan, the China-based maker of Bitcoin mining machines, prices its US IPO at the bottom of the range at $9 per share, raising $90M  —  Canaan Inc., a maker of Bitcoin mining machines, raised $90 million after pricing its U.S. initial public offering at the bottom of its marketed range.
Angelica Mari / ZDNet:
WhatsApp says it has banned more than 400,000 accounts between August 15 and October 28, 2018, during Brazil's general election  —  The information was submitted by the messaging app as part of ongoing investigations into the spread of fake news.  —  Messaging app WhatsApp reported banning …
More: Engadget
Juli Clover / MacRumors:
Apple launches $129 Smart Battery Cases for the iPhone 11, 11 Pro, and 11 Pro Max, now with a physical button that launches the camera app  —  Apple today launched new battery cases for the iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhone 11 Pro Max, with the new cases available for $129.

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About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 10:35 PM ET, November 20, 2019.

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.

From Mediagazer

Washington Post:
Internal email: 60 Minutes correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi told staffers Bari Weiss pulled the CECOT segment after the Trump administration refused an interview

CNN:
A list of times the Trump administration tested the limits of the First Amendment during his second term, stoking alarm among civil rights experts and critics

Robert D. McFadden / New York Times:
Lou Cannon, a veteran Washington Post reporter who wrote several influential biographies of Ronald Reagan, has died at 92

More News

Earlier Picks

Bloomberg:
Alibaba has raised ~$11.2B in its Hong Kong share sale, after pricing 500M new shares at HK$176, in one of the largest equity offerings this year
Brad Templeton / Forbes:
NTSB finds Uber's safety driver the primary cause of fatal Tempe crash, also blames lack of “safety culture” at Uber; AI not detecting jaywalkers played no role
Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer:
Malware that steals cryptocurrency found embedded in some versions of Monero's official client app available on its site; Monero team says it is investigating
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Google announces Your News Update, an Assistant-powered audio feature that chooses stories based on interests, location, and more, available first in the US
Jordan Novet / CNBC:
Microsoft claims 20M DAUs for Teams, up from 13M in July, extending its lead over Slack, which in October said it had 12M; Slack closes down 8.35%
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