Techmeme
January 12, 2022, 6:00 PM

Top News

Bloomberg:
Sony confirms PlayStation 4 production will continue in 2022, which sources claim will help the company offset some PlayStation 5 production pressure  —  Sony Group Corp. will continue producing PlayStation 4 consoles throughout 2022 as it navigates disruptions to the global supply chain …
Sam Reynolds / CoinDesk:
Jack Dorsey and others propose a legal defense fund for Bitcoin developers, citing “multi-front litigation” and “threats”  —  The main purpose of the fund will be to defend developers from from lawsuits regarding their activities in the Bitcoin ecosystem …
Ron Miller / TechCrunch:
Canalys: worldwide PC shipments grew 15% YoY in 2021 to 341M, the highest annual shipments since 2012; Apple's market share grew by 28.3%, Acer's by 21.8%  —  It would be easy to think PC sales dropped worldwide last year amid chip shortages, but that conventional thinking would be wrong.
Poynter:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
App Annie: consumers spent $170B on mobile apps globally in 2021, up 19% YoY, downloading 230B apps; the average American spent 4.1 hours in apps per day  —  Consumer spending on mobile apps reached $170 billion in 2021, according to App Annie's newly released “State of Mobile 2022″ report …
Bloomberg:
Sources: Microsoft has hired a veteran semiconductor designer from Apple, as it seeks to develop its own chips for Azure servers  —  Microsoft Corp. lured away a veteran semiconductor designer from Apple Inc. as it looks to expand its own server-chips efforts, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
Peter Rudegeair / Wall Street Journal:
London-based Checkout.com, which offers payment processing tools, raises $1B in a share sale at a $40B valuation  —  The $1 billion deal vaults the digital-payments processor past all but a handful of other startups  —  Checkout.com didn't raise money from outside investors until 2019.
Lucy Harley-Mckeown / The Block:
Coinbase says “nearly the entire company will shut down” across four separate “recharge weeks” for employees in 2022  —  Quick Take  — Coinbase is giving employees four ‘recharge weeks’ off in 2022 in order to counteract what it called an intense working environment.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Sensor Tower: Instagram became the world's most downloaded app in Q4 2021, its best quarter since 2014 with installs up 10% QoQ, followed by TikTok and Facebook  —  Instagram is benefiting from TikTok's ban in India, and has now reclaimed the top spot in terms of total global downloads as of the fourth quarter of 2021.
More: Sensor Tower BlogTweets: @kantrowitz
Martin Matishak / The Record:
US Cyber Command says malware group MuddyWater is tied to Iranian intelligence, the first time the US government has publicly linked the group to Iranian regime  —  U.S. Cyber Command on Wednesday revealed that a hacking group reputed for its cyberespionage campaigns is actually part of Iran's intelligence apparatus.
Justin Hendrix / Tech Policy Press:
Over 260 health professionals tell Spotify to implement a misinformation policy, after a Joe Rogan Experience episode featured a discredited scientist  —  More than 260 doctors, nurses, scientists, health professionals and others have signed an open letter calling on the streaming media platform Spotify to …
Ron Amadeo / Ars Technica:
Samsung, after announcing a Jan. 11 event for the Exynos 2200, didn't show up to the product's launch and says it will unveil the new chip with a new smartphone  —  The Exynos 2200 was supposed to launch on January 11.  It didn't.  —  So here's a crazy story.
Mitchell Clark / The Verge:
Wordle clones are starting to disappear from Apple's App Store, after reports surfaced about many capitalizing on the guessing game's popularity  —  It seems Apple has taken action  —  Has Apple taken action against apps that cloned the popular web game Wordle?
Bloomberg:
Alphabet Workers Union complains that contract workers receive COVID-19 testing that is inferior to the $949 Cue Health devices given to full-time WFH employees  —  - Full-time employees at home get instant results from Cue  — Contractors in office are offered cheaper mail-in tests
Russ Mitchell / Los Angeles Times:
California's DMV tells Tesla it is “revisiting” the company's “Full Self-Driving” beta, which it previously said didn't fall under its autonomous car rules  —  For years, Tesla has tested autonomous vehicle technology on public roads without reporting crashes …
Cat Zakrzewski / Washington Post:

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Shopify's new AI commerce stack  —  Their VP of Product digs into just-launched products to help entrepreneurs and developers build with the latest AI and tech.
Zoho:
Connecting, collaborating, and growing: Zoho Mail 2025 wrap-up  —  Your inbox has been home to a lot this year—quick updates, long threads, approvals, reminders, and the occasional late-night draft you weren't sure about.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Great Chat:
The stories we told ourselves in 2025
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
Grit:
How Brands Stay Visible When AI Decides | Profound CEO James Cadwallader
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Lenny's Podcast:
The coming AI security crisis (and what to do about it) | Sander Schulhoff
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.
Big Technology Podcast:
OpenAI's Potential, Google's Speedy Model, Copilot Hits Turbulence
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.
Hard Fork:
Why Roomba Died + Tech Predictions for 2026 + A Hard Forkin' Xmas Song
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.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ted Sarandos: Netflix and how tech changed storytelling
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 6:00 PM ET, January 12, 2022.

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

Earlier Picks

Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Talal Ansari / Wall Street Journal:
Chance Miller / 9to5Mac:
Meta: