Techmeme
July 29, 2020, 9:30 AM

Top News

The Amazon Blog:
Bezos statement to US House underscores Amazon's job creation, investments in social causes, and its role in supporting small and medium-sized businesses  —  Testimony before the Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial, and Administrative Law  —  Statement by Jeffrey P. Bezos Founder & Chief …
Jennifer Elias / CNBC:
Sundar Pichai will tell lawmakers that Google operates in a “highly competitive” market and that its free products benefit the “average American”  —  - Ahead of a Wednesday House Judiciary hearing, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai released opening remarks that show …
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Tim Cook will tell US lawmakers that App Store has opened the “gate wider” for developers, Apple isn't anticompetitive, and doesn't have “dominant market share”  —  Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook will tell U.S. lawmakers probing his company's market power …
Betsy Woodruff Swan / Politico:
New York Times:
Sam Shead / CNBC:
Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter work to pull versions of a video touting hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 cure, after it was shared by Trump and his allies  —  - A Breitbart video containing dangerous coronavirus misinformation went viral on Facebook before it was removed.
Andrew Griffin / The Independent:
Bloomberg:
Sources: Google and Samsung are in talks about giving Google products more prominence on Samsung phones, including more control over search  —  - Google Assistant, Play app store may gain more prominent roles  — Samsung seeks other revenue sources as handset demand drops
Reuters:
Sources: some US investors of ByteDance seeking to take over TikTok are valuing the social media app at ~$50B, 50 times its projected 2020 revenue of ~$1B  —  NEW YORK/HONG KONG (Reuters) - Some investors of TikTok's parent company ByteDance seeking to take over the popular social media app …
More: iMore
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
AMC and Universal agree to shorten the theatrical window for films to 17 days, or 3 weekends, before Universal can release them onto premium on-demand platforms  —  Films only have to be in theaters for three weekends now before going to digital platforms  —  AMC Theaters and Universal …
Sara Fischer / Axios:
TikTok's new CEO Kevin Mayer says it'll release code driving its content moderation algorithms, accuses Facebook of maligning attacks “disguised as patriotism”  —  In his first public statement as CEO of TikTok, f ormer Disney exec Kevin Mayer says the company will be releasing …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Spotify reports Q2 revenue of €1.89B, up 13% YoY, with MAUs up 29% YoY to 299M, premium users up 27% to 138M, and ad-supported MAUs up 31% to 170M  —  In addition, ad revenue fell 21% — which Spotify blamed on the coronavirus pandemic — but the drop wasn't quite as bad as forecast.
Ryan Browne / CNBC:
TransferWise announces a new $319M secondary share sale round led by Lone Pine Capital and D1 Capital Partners at a $5B valuation  —  - TransferWise employees and early investors sold some of their stakes in a $319 million secondary deal.  — The company's $5 billion valuation makes …
Joel Rosenblatt / Bloomberg:
US DOJ asks federal judge for permission to drop charges against two ex-Twitter employees and a Saudi national who allegedly helped Riyadh spy on dissidents  —  The U.S. filed a revised indictment against two former Twitter Inc. employees and a Saudi national, alleging the three spied …
Sarah Emerson / OneZero :
Former moderators at Pinterest say they had inadequate resources and minimal mental health support as they fought to keep child abuse imagery off the platform  —  Moderators reported seeing child pornography content ‘every couple hours’  —  a good day, Blake's job as a Pinterest moderator …
Thanks:@mvzelenks
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Toppr, an e-learning service in India covering 17 subjects and preparing students for five dozen competitive exams, raises $46M led by Foundation Holdings  —  Toppr, one of the largest online learning startups in India, has secured $46 million in a new financing round as it looks to scale its platform including a new product.
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
In a reversal, CES says its event planned for January 2021 will be going all-digital, using a virtual meeting format for vendors, attendees, and the press  —  CES 2021 will take place in January as an all-digital event since the organizers feel it's the only way they can protect attendees during the pandemic.
Nick Kolakowski / Dice Insights:
In July, a H-1B software engineers' median salary at Google, Microsoft, and Apple was at least $142K, a substantial increase from at least $120K in October 2019  —  How much are software engineers on the H-1B visa making at some of the nation's largest tech companies?  At first glance, the answer seems simple: quite a lot.
Marc Santora / New York Times:
Larry Dignan / ZDNet:
AMD reports Q2 revenue of $1.93B, up 26% YoY, Computing and Graphics segment revenue of $1.37B, up 45% YoY; stock up ~9% after-hours  —  AMD's results land as its primary rival Intel has been struggling with its 7nm roadmap delays.  —  AMD reported better-than-expected second quarter results …
Ashley Carman / The Verge:
Spotify debuts Group Session feature in beta, letting up to five premium users simultaneously listen to same content  —  Simultaneously stream music or podcasts  —  Spotify is now allowing its paying users to listen to music and podcasts with friends and family at the same time, even if they aren't in the same location.

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Jeffrey Dastin / Reuters:
Andrew J. Hawkins / The Verge:
BBC: