Techmeme
March 20, 2020, 3:55 PM

Top News

Foo Yun Chee / Reuters:
Netflix, YouTube, and Amazon Prime Video say they will reduce their streaming quality in EU to reduce traffic on the network, as millions are confined at home  —  BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Alphabet Inc's (GOOGL.O) YouTube said on Friday it will reduce its streaming quality in the European Union …
Financial Times:
Amber Neely / AppleInsider:
Study: using touch on Apple CarPlay or Android Auto impairs driver reaction times by 50%+, vs. 35% for texting-while-driving and 46% for hand-held phone calls  —  U.K. based road safety charity IAM RoadSmart has released a study showing how in-vehicle infotainment systems …
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
After canceling Google I/O's in-person event in early March, Google now says it will “not be holding an I/O event in any capacity this year”  —  Google earlier this month announced that it was not hosting a physical developer conference in light of coronavirus.
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Instagram says it is internally testing a Snapchat-like ephemeral feature that clears chat messages after all members have viewed the thread and closed it  —  Instagram is finally preparing to copy Snapchat's most popular feature, and one of the few it hasn't already cloned.
Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple's supply chain still disrupted by COVID-19-related shutdowns in countries like Malaysia; 5G iPhones still expected to launch by fall  —  - Virus responses in Malaysia, U.S., Europe disrupt suppliers  — 5G iPhone currently still on schedule, but timeline could slip
Alex Hern / The Guardian:
Twitter broadens its definition of harm to address content with deceptive language around COVID-19, including “denial of established scientific facts”  —  Site changes rules to ban content aimed at making people act against official advice  —  Twitter will remove tweets that run …
NBC News:
Subreddit /r/coronavirus has become one of the most authoritative and up-to-date sites on COVID-19, with 1.2M+ members, 1M+ of which signed up in past two weeks  —  The Reddit message board /r/coronavirus has grown to more than 1.2 million members — almost a million of whom signed up in the last two weeks.
More: KnowTechie
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Ola suspends Ola Share, its pool rides option, in India  —  Ride-hailing giant Ola said on Friday evening that it is temporarily suspending pool rides on its platform, called Ola Share, in India in a bid to slow the coronavirus pandemic by encouraging social distancing.
More: India TV
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

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