Techmeme
March 2, 2021, 10:23 PM

Top News

Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft unveils Microsoft Mesh, a mixed-reality platform on Azure, and demos a meeting service to let users join virtual rooms using devices like HoloLens 2  —  Mesh is Microsoft's vision for the future of mixed reality  —  Last week, Microsoft's Alex Kipman, the inventor of Kinect and HoloLens …
Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet:
Microsoft to add end-to-end encryption for one-to-one calls, channel sharing, and webinar and presentation features to Teams  —  Microsoft has a bunch of new Teams features coming and is introducing a new category of Teams Intelligent Speaker devices at Ignite this week.
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Microsoft launches Azure Percept, a hardware and software platform to implement its Azure AI services for use cases, including object detection, at the edge  —  Microsoft today announced Azure Percept, its new hardware and software platform for bringing more of its Azure AI services to the edge.
Zack Whittaker / TechCrunch:
Microsoft warns users a new Chinese state-sponsored threat actor is exploiting 4 previously undisclosed security flaws in Exchange Server; patches are available  —  Microsoft is warning customers that a new China state-sponsored threat actor is exploiting four previously undisclosed security flaws …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Sony says the PlayStation Store will stop offering movie and TV show purchases and rentals on Aug. 31, citing users' preference for video streaming services  —  As of Aug. 31, 2021, the PlayStation Store will stop offering movie and TV show purchases and rentals.
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
Amazon quietly updated its app icon, changing the appearance of the ripped packaging tape after some drew comparisons of it to Adolf Hitler's mustache  —  The company's icon gets a less problematic new look  —  Amazon has quietly rolled out a slight update to its new app icon that it debuted …
Bloomberg:
Intel ordered to pay $2.18B after a federal court jury in TX found it infringed two patents once owned by NXP Semiconductors and now owned by VLSI Technology  —  - Intel had claimed royalty demands of VLSI were ‘outrageous’  — NXP would get a share of any damage award, Intel lawyer said
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
eMarketer: Spotify is on track to reach US monthly podcast listenership of 28.2M by the end of this year and surpass Apple's Podcasts for the first time  —  Investors have been waiting for Spotify's multimillion-dollar bet on podcasting to pay off, in terms of increased paid subscriptions or improved revenues.
CNBC:
Instacart raises $265M in a round valuing the company at $39B, after raising $200M at a $17.7B valuation in October  —  - Instacart is valued at $39 billion in a new funding round.  — It's the second time the company's valuation has doubled since the start of the Covid pandemic.
Vjeran Pavic / The Verge:
DJI launches a $1,299 first person view drone bundle, which includes FPV Goggles V2 with crisp 810p resolution, controller, and a drone with ~20-min flight time  —  Cinematic first-person view or FPV drones have been a growing trend in the drone industry for a few years.
Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:
TikTok launches a Safety Advisory Council for Europe to help it with content moderation, bringing external experts in fields like child safety and extremism  —  TikTok is bringing in external experts in Europe in fields such as child safety, young people's mental health and extremism to form …
Patrick Howell O'Neill / MIT Technology Review:
Researchers point out that Apple's walled garden approach on iOS makes it virtually impossible to detect the presence of malware on iPhones, which still exists  —  The iPhone's locked-down approach to security is spreading, but advanced hackers have found that higher barriers are great for avoiding capture.
Dell Cameron / Gizmodo:
Facebook Oversight Board member told UK Parliament that the panel feels constrained when reviewing decisions on a case-by-case basis, may seek algorithm access  —  Facebook's so-called “Supreme Court” is reportedly seeking the company's permission to examine the underlying machine-learning models …
Kim Lyons / The Verge:
Twitter users on Android can now join and talk in its Clubhouse-like live audio Spaces and will be able to create their own Spaces in an upcoming update  —  The platform introduced its audio chat rooms for iOS in December  —  Twitter has opened its audio chat room, Spaces, to Android users, the company tweeted Tuesday.

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.
Equals:
Stop vibe coding analytics  —  Equals AI turns questions about your business into auditable spreadsheet models and dashboards.  Build once, iterate for years.
Zoho:
App Spotlight: Grow Payments for Zoho CRM  —  App Spotlight brings you hand-picked solutions that enhance your Zoho apps and tools.  Visit Zoho Marketplace to explore all of our apps, integrations …
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.

Featured Podcasts

Big Technology Podcast:
OpenAI Finally Ships Its Superapp, Meta's AI Price War, ChatGPT Cheating At Brown
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.
The Upstarts Podcast:
Radical AI's Joseph Krause: The Scientist Building The 'Waymo' Lab For New Materials
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
Subscribe to The Upstarts Podcast.
Hard Fork:
Do Social Media Bans Work? + A Conversation About A.I. Consciousness + Tool Time
The future is already here. Each week, journalists Kevin Roose and Casey Newton explore and make sense of the latest in the rapidly changing world of tech.
Subscribe to Hard Fork.
Access:
The AI writing app fighting AI slop
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
Lenny's Podcast:
Adam Mosseri: AI is a tailwind for authenticity
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.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Connecting the Unconnected: Doreen Bogdan-Martin
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 10:23 PM ET, March 2, 2021.

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

Alex Konrad / Forbes:

Earlier Picks

Hannah Beech / New York Times:
Bloomberg:
Ashley Gold / Axios: