Techmeme
May 6, 2021, 9:10 PM

Top News

Esther Crawford / Twitter:
Twitter introduces Tip Jar, allowing everyone using Twitter in English to send tips, and a limited group, including journalists and experts, to accept tips  —  We $ee you - sharing your PayPal link after your Tweet goes viral, adding your $Cashtag to your profile so people can support your work …
Makena Kelly / The Verge:
NY AG's office says fake comments, including 8.5M funded by largest US ISPs, accounted for ~18M of the 22M+ net neutrality comments received by the FCC in 2017  —  The New York attorney general's office released a new report detailing the effort  —  The New York attorney general's office issued …
Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai / VICE:
Google says it will start verifying users with 2FA enabled using a prompt on their phones, and will soon start automatically enabling 2FA for all users  —  The company is making some changes to encourage more people to adopt a key digital security mechanism.  —  Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai
The Information:
Inside Zuckerberg's plan to repair Facebook's image, including whimsical jokes on his Page, more media appearances, and discussing product more than policy  —  During a companywide Q&A with Facebook employees last Thursday, CEO Mark Zuckerberg turned to a question about a recent uptick …
Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:
Manufacturers are rolling out a patch for a vulnerability in Qualcomm chips that affects high-end Android devices from Google, Samsung, LG, Xiaomi, and OnePlus  —  Higher-end devices made by Google, Samsung, LG, Xiaomi, and OnePlus are affected.  —  Makers of high-end Android devices …
Patrick Howell O'Neill / MIT Technology Review:
Sources: US quietly informed Apple that a Qihoo 360 researcher's iPhone 0-day, which won China's 2018 top hacking contest, was used by China to spy on Uyghurs  —  An attack that targeted Apple devices was used to spy on China's Muslim minority—and US officials claim it was developed at the country's top hacking competition.
Liam Tung / ZDNet:
Microsoft announces a new pledge for EU commercial users of Azure, Microsoft 365, and Dynamics 365, allowing them to store most of their data in the EU by 2022  —  EU business data stored in Microsoft cloud can almost stop flowing to the US by 2022, but customers might need to pay more for the capability.
Jon Porter / The Verge:
Google Play will add an App Store-like safety section starting next year, requiring apps to show details about the data they collect and other privacy info  —  In a new safety section  —  Starting next year, apps on Google Play will show details about what data they collect …
Lauren Kaori Gurley / VICE:
Drivers say Amazon's US delivery companies are ordering them to turn off an app called Mentor that is designed to prevent accidents by monitoring speed  —  Drivers say they're being asked to quietly disable a driver safety system partway through their shifts.  —  Lauren Kaori Gurley
Juli Clover / MacRumors:
Court docs show Apple offered Hulu and some other “whitelisted developers” special access to App Store APIs, like the cancel/refund API  —  Today is the fourth day of the Epic Games v. Apple legal battle, and documents shared in the trial continue to give us insight into the App Store and Apple's business practices.
Issie Lapowsky / Protocol:
Q&A: Facebook Oversight Board director Thomas Hughes on upholding Trump's ban, why the Board isn't a PR stunt, Facebook refusing to answer its questions, more  —  Following months of speculation, Facebook's Oversight Board issued a quasi-decision Wednesday in the case of former President Donald Trump's account.
Oversight Board:
Tom Simonite / Wired:
How AI Dungeon, a text adventure game that uses the GPT-3 text generator, can create sex scenes involving children, and why attempts to stop it aren't working  —  The game touted its use of the GPT-3 text generator.  Then the algorithm started to generate disturbing stories, including sex scenes involving children.
James Batchelor / GamesIndustry.biz:
Nintendo reports record full-year profits of $6.2B, up 88% YoY, on net sales of $16.1B, up 34% YoY, and sold 28.2M Switch units in 2020, up 37.1% YoY  —  And, despite forecasting decline, the platform holder expects console to beat Wii's 101 million lifetime sales this year
Protocol:
Netflix is surveying users about their interest in features such as podcasts and user-generated playlists of shows and music, for a project called N-Plus  —  In a survey, Netflix is asking users how they would feel about a “future online space” called N-Plus.  —  Custom TV show playlists?
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Roku beats estimates, with a Q1 net income of $76.3M on revenue of $574.2M, up 79% YoY; new active accounts grew 2.4M, reaching 53.6M, up 35% YoY; stock up ~7%  —  Roku gained 2.4 million new active accounts for the first quarter of 2021, showing that the pandemic-driven streaming momentum …
MacKenzie Sigalos / CNBC:
Square beats in Q1 with revenue of $5.06B, up 266% YoY, with $3.5B in bitcoin revenue, up 11x YoY, gross profit of $964M, up 79% YoY, with $495M from Cash App  —  - The company reported a profit per share of 41 cents vs. 16 cents per share expected in a Refinitiv survey of analysts.

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Clara Hill / Yahoo News:
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