Techmeme
October 20, 2021, 8:40 AM

Top News

Alex Heath / The Verge:
Source: Facebook is planning to change its company name to reflect its focus on the metaverse as soon as next week at Connect, its annual AR/VR conference  —  Mark Zuckerberg wants to be known for building the metaverse  —  Facebook is planning to change its company name next week to reflect …
More: Insider, Reuters, The Guardian, BBC, The Guardian, MacRumors, PCMag, Game Developer, CNN, XDA Developers, MarketWatch, BetaNews, The Economic Times, New York Post, MUO, phonearena.com, The Week, Fast Company, Gamereactor UK, BGR, Android Central, Android Headlines, SlashGear, Bloomberg, Wccftech, Telegraph, TechCircle, The Register, Gizmodo, The National, Forbes, Engadget, Neowin, GeekWire, TechSpot, Pocketnow, India Today, Shacknews, News18, Fortune, Washington Times, Sputnik International, 9to5Mac, CNET, cybernews.com, Boing Boing, Digital Trends, fossbytes.com, cryptonews.com, Daring Fireball, Benzinga, TechCrunch, HYPEBEAST, OneZero, Protocol, Mashable, Raw Story, AppleInsider, UploadVR, Insider, Reuters, and TechRadar
Dan Seifert / The Verge:
Google launches $599 Pixel 6, with 90Hz 6.4" display, and $899 Pixel 6 Pro, with 120Hz 6.7" display, both featuring an upgraded 50MP rear camera, coming Oct. 28  —  Google claims to finally be ready to take on Apple and Samsung  —  After many leaks, official teases, and months of waiting …
Ron Amadeo / Ars Technica:
Q&A with Google executives on the Pixel 6's new Tensor SoC, which has two big ARM Cortex-X1 cores, 2 medium cores, and 4 efficiency cores  —  Learn more about the Google Tensor from the people that designed it.  —  The Pixel 6 is official, with a wild new camera design, incredible pricing, and the new Android 12 OS.
Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge:
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Paul Thurrott / Thurrott:
Brave replaces Google with its own privacy-centric Brave Search as the default search engine in its browser  —  As part of its ongoing push to eliminate Google as much as possible from our daily web experiences, Brave is removing Google Search as its default search engine.
Michael Wursthorn / Wall Street Journal:
ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF gained nearly 5% in its NYSE debut, with ~$981M in trading volume, making it the second most traded ETF debut ever per FactSet  —  ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF advances nearly 5% following its closely watched launch  —  The first bitcoin-focused exchange-traded fund rose …
Naman Ramachandran / Variety:
UK's CMA fines Facebook £50.5M for breaching an order imposed during its ongoing Giphy acquisition investigation, saying Facebook refused to report information  —  Social media giant Facebook has been fined £50.5 million ($69.1 million) for breaching an order imposed …
Nikkei Asia:
Sources: China's Oppo is developing high-end mobile chips, using TSMC's 3nm tech, for its premium handsets due out in 2023 or 2024  —  China's top handset maker looks to use TSMC's cutting-edge 3-nm tech  —  TAIPEI — China's leading smartphone maker Oppo is developing high-end mobile chips …
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
Apple botched the notch on the MacBook Pros by leaving out Face ID; the bezels are smaller but not ultrathin like on Dell and HP rivals  —  All the downsides of the notch, without the Face ID benefits  —  The day that many have been dreading has finally arrived.  Apple has added a notch to its new MacBook Pros.
Cecilia Kang / New York Times:
District of Columbia AG Karl Racine plans to add Mark Zuckerberg to an ongoing privacy lawsuit, which began in 2018 following the Cambridge Analytica scandal  —  The District of Columbia case, which grew out of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, could expose the chief executive to financial and other penalties.
Jessica Bursztynsky / CNBC:
Netflix reports Q3 revenue of $7.48B, up 16% YoY, operating income of $1.76B, up 33% YoY, and 214M paid subs, adding 4.4M YoY and beating estimates of 3.84M  —  - Netflix is set to report earnings after the bell Tuesday.  —  Netflix shares were up more than 2% after-the-bell Tuesday after the company posted third quarter results.
Keith Zhai / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Jack Ma has left China for the first time since Alibaba came under regulatory pressure last November, traveling to Europe to see friends  —  The Alibaba co-founder's trip to Europe suggests he hasn't been banned from leaving the country by Chinese authorities
Bloomberg:
Draft EU document: finalization of the Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act has been pushed back further into next year from an initial spring 2022 goal  —  European Union countries will delay a key target of finalizing new rules hitting tech platforms by the spring of next year …
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
HR Acuity, which develops employee relations and investigations management software, raises $47M from K1 Investment Management  —  HR Acuity, a platform built for employee relations and investigations management, today announced that it raised $47 million in a minority investment from K1 Investment Management.
More: WEAU-TV
Eli Tan / CoinDesk:
Animoca Brands, which lets players own in-game items as NFTs, raises $65M at a $2.2B valuation, up from $1B in May  —  Animoca Brands, a prominent investor in non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and decentralized gaming, has completed a capital raise of $65 million at a $2.2 billion valuation, the company announced Wednesday.

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Lauren Feiner / CNBC:
Nikhilesh De / CoinDesk: