Techmeme: As Amazon's ad revenue passes YouTube's and US pay TV subscriptions drop, ad budgets will shift further to targetable spots and other customer-acquisition tools (Benedict Evans)

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March 21, 2022, 9:55 AM

Top News

New York Times:

Brazil's Supreme Court reverses its decision to ban Telegram, which it had ordered on Friday, after Telegram suddenly worked to comply with the court's orders — Brazil's Supreme Court blocked Telegram on Friday. The messaging app then responded with measures to fight misinformation, and the court quickly lifted its ban.

More: The Verge, 9to5Mac, Engadget, Fortune, Agence France-Presse, Reuters, Durov's Channel, Decisive Liberty Newsletter, Mashable, Android Police, and Associated Press

Tweets: @jacknicas, @arturpericles, @brazilbrian, @afp, @joshelman, @campuscodi, and @arturpericles

See also Mediagazer

Financial Times:

The CEO of lithography machine maker ASML says chipmakers' expansion plans will be constrained by a shortage of its critical equipment over the next two years — Intel admits expansion to be restricted as it works with ASML to boost capacity — Chipmakers' multibillion-dollar expansion plans …

More: 9to5Mac and Benzinga

Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:

Ramp, which helps companies automate expense reporting, raises $200M in equity and $550M in debt at an $8.1B post-money valuation led by Founders Fund — Businesses of a certain size have to contend with challenges around T&E (travel and expenses), an abbreviation for a category of expenses …

More: TechCrunch, Payments Dive, and Finextra

Alex Sherman / CNBC:

A look at the fallout between Bob Chapek and Bob Iger as Disney restructures for a world where streaming dominates and legacy distribution models fade away — Bob Iger, left, and Bob Chapek of Disney — April 12, 2020. That's the day former Disney CEO Bob Iger's relationship …

More: The Rebooting and New York Post

Tweets: @ropedropchris, @tommyhawkins, @lucas_shaw, @somestuffisaid, @madnesskingdom, @kairyssdal, @cardiffgarcia, @mrepcot, @anthony, @dsnynewscast, @wdwnt, @orangegrove55, @nbj914, @tsoh_investing, @francoolivera, @sherman4949, @loudmouthjulia, and @cnbci. Thanks:@mattrosoff

See also Mediagazer

Sebastian Sinclair / Blockworks:

FTX launches crypto exchange services in Australia, including crypto derivatives and spot market offerings, operating out of a Sydney headquarters — FTX is hoping to get ahead of the regulatory curve by appeasing policymakers and working “proactively” with regulators

More: PR Newswire, ZDNet, CoinDesk, The Block, Ethereum World News, CoinJournal, Coinspeaker, and Forkast

Hartley Charlton / MacRumors:

A researcher shows Apple's Studio Display has 64GB of onboard storage and uses only 2GB; the storage might be related to Apple's A13 Bionic chip — Apple's Studio Display contains 64GB of onboard storage, but only 2GB are actually used by the display, a developer has discovered.

Source: @khaost. More: AppleInsider, TechRadar, iPhone in Canada Blog, and iMore

Tweets: @bzamayo, @jasoncross00, @ecormany, and @hartleycharlton

Yueqi Yang / Bloomberg:

Goldman Sachs says it is the first major US bank to trade an over-the-counter crypto transaction in partnership with crypto merchant bank Galaxy Digital — Goldman Sachs Group Inc. executed its first over-the-counter crypto options trade, a further step in its expansion of digital-asset offerings to Wall Street investors.

More: CNBC, CoinDesk, Canada NewsWire Group, Cointelegraph, Crypto Briefing, and Cryptonews

CBS San Francisco:

A former Apple employee faces federal charges for allegedly defrauding the company out of $10M+, taking kickbacks, stealing parts, evading taxes, and more — CUPERTINO (CBS SF) - A former Apple employee is facing federal charges after he allegedly defrauded the tech giant out of millions …

More: Tom's Hardware, Reuters, PCMag, MacRumors, Associated Press, 9to5Mac, Insider, Mercury News, PhoneArena, The Mac Observer, Washington Examiner, New York Post, iPhone in Canada Blog, Philip Elmer‑DeWitt, AppleInsider, The Daily Beast, Newser, MacDailyNews, and Patently Apple

Miriam Gottfried / Wall Street Journal:

Thoma Bravo has agreed to buy Anaplan for $10.7B or $66/share, after the maker of cloud-based business planning software closed at $50.59 on Friday — Anaplan shareholders are to receive $66 a share in cash — Private-equity firm Thoma Bravo LP has struck a deal to buy Anaplan Inc. for $10.7 billion …

More: TechCrunch, CIO.com, Axios, Reuters, SiliconANGLE, Financial Times, PitchBook, and Barron's Online

Tweets: @jimcramer, @tanayj, @wsjmarkets, and @buccocapital

Javier Espinoza / Financial Times:

As EU lawmakers finalize the Digital Markets Act, big US tech companies have failed to lobby for substantial changes and are now focused on compliance — Brussels is set to finalise stringent new legislation targeting Silicon Valley giants, whose desperate lobbying has fallen on deaf ears

Tweets: @javierespft, @javierespft, @marcoscialdone, @javierespft, @javierespft, @javierespft, @livingstone_s, @johnc1912, @mxsba, and @a_maehl

Coco Liu / Bloomberg:

Chinese e-commerce company Pinduoduo misses with ~$4.3B in Q4 revenue, up 3% YoY, as Beijing's crackdown and a delisting threat from the US worry investors — Pinduoduo Inc. reported revenue that missed estimates, the third straight quarter it's disappointed investors after China's economic slowdown sapped online consumption.

More: Reuters

Heather Somerville / Wall Street Journal:

Ukrainian tech startups are now mapping escape routes for refugees, finding them rides, shelter, and food, and paying workers to fight with the army — Tech leaders with operations in Ukraine are mapping escape routes and paying workers to fight with the army; ‘our plan is winning this war’

Tweets: @wsj and @heathersomervil

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From Mediagazer

David Ellison / @ellisonskydance:

David Ellison announces that the combined Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery will be called Skydance “to preserve what has made each of these studios iconic”

New York Times:

Sources: Trump personally told his budget director to use taxpayer money for TV ads praising his presidency; at least four spots have run at a cost of ~$5.5M

Lauren Harper / The Intercept:

Eugene, Oregon, claims processing a public records request filed by local news outlet Double Sided Media concerning a police officer would cost ~$2.5M

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More News

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Glia, an AI-based omnichannel customer service tool that supports text, phone, video, and more, raises a $45M Series D at a $1B+ valuation led by Insight

Christine Hall / TechCrunch:

CommerceIQ, which develops management tools for brands to automate e-commerce tasks, raises a $115M Series D led by SoftBank Vision 2 at a $1B+

More: The Economic Times and Tech in Asia

Paul Sawers / VentureBeat:

Cascade, which offers a single tool to centralize project management, KPIs, and outcome tracking, raises a $29M Series A led by Telescope Partners

Benedict Evans:

As Amazon's ad revenue passes YouTube's and US pay TV subscriptions drop, ad budgets will shift further to targetable spots and other customer-acquisition tools

Tweets: @tomroach, @hkanji, @mrstephendeng, @durgaraghunath, @jeffjarvis, @nairsameer, @rahulwelde, and @damianburns

See also Mediagazer

Nathan Baschez / Every:

How Substack is trying to balance the constraints of its own ideology of putting authors and readers first with its commitment to growth via its new mobile app

Tweets: @nbashaw, @shortformernie, @navalang, @faris, @marshallk, @sifter, and @noahchestnut

Brian Steinberg / Variety:

Media-measurement giant Nielsen says it has turned down a bid by a private equity consortium, after reports of a potential acquisition caused its stock to soar

More: Deadline and Hollywood Reporter

See also Mediagazer

Adi Robertson / The Verge:

Q&A with Margrethe Vestager on EU's cases against Apple, Google, Meta, and Amazon, how the planned Digital Markets Act may help with antitrust enforcement, more

More: 9to5Mac. Tweets: @reckless, @igorletina, @nicholashirst_, and @thedextriarchy

Earlier Picks

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:

Now that Apple is making monitors again, the company should develop a mesh network version of the AirPort Extreme to compete with Google and Amazon routers

More: MacRumors, 9to5Mac, AppleInsider, Laptop Mag, Tom's Guide, Philip Elmer‑DeWitt, iPhone in Canada Blog, BGR India, Ubergizmo, t3.com, AppleTrack, Gizchina, and Appleosophy

Tweets: @reneritchie, @parkerortolani, @pwthornton, @dmoren, @chrismessina, @mgsiegler, @mikeelgan, and @dmoren

Charlie Warzel / The Atlantic:

Q&A with Second Life journalist Wagner James Au, on crypto-based metaverses, companies such as Meta struggling to foster healthy metaverse communities, and more

More: Engadget. Tweets: @_maargentino, @doctorow, @arnicas, @cwarzel, @cwarzel, @rajit_h, @arainert, @annehelen, @cwarzel, @theatlantic, @scottnover, @mathewi, @adrianhon, @cwarzel, and @transmutablenew

Katie Palmer / STAT:

Doctors often use Google Translate to talk with non-English speaking patients, but researchers say inaccurate results are common and can lead to serious errors

Tweets: @epro, @karimccneo, @berkeleydatasci, and @rickberke

Kevin Williams / Washington Post:

Limestone, Tennessee residents were promised economic benefits from a bitcoin mine, but now face constant noise pollution from its computers and cooling fans

More: Cryptocracy. Tweets: @kamatlabnd, @mestizoleftist, @jimmcwilliams5, @sesmith, and @peterwsinger

Washington Post:

Mykhailo Fedorov says Starlink's quality is excellent, as Ukrainians use the terminals to stay online; a source says there are 5,000+ terminals in the country

More: Insider, Slashdot, and The Guardian

Tweets: @richgel999, @timothymeade, @edithhonan, @mayemusk, @davidshipley, @westcoastbill, @kimzetter, @stanphylcap, @josephmenn, @chris_maag, @gbrumfiel, @pstasiatech, and @kbandersen

Jay Peters / The Verge:

Google begins rolling out a feature that lets users delete the last 15 minutes of their search history on Android, after rolling it out for iOS in July 2021

Christopher Mims / Wall Street Journal:

How researchers are using self-supervised learning, a branch of AI that has proven effective for handling human language, to better understand animal sounds

Tweets: @julespolonetsky, @julespolonetsky, @etzioni, @drescotet, @2morrowknight, @mims, and @mims