Techmeme
October 31, 2022, 2:30 PM

Top News

Alex Heath / The Verge:
Sources: Twitter could make Twitter Blue a $20/month subscription that verifies users; staff have until November 7 to build the feature or face being fired  —  Now that he owns Twitter, Elon Musk has given employees their first ultimatum: Meet his deadline to introduce paid verification on Twitter or pack up and leave.
More: BBC, Moneycontrol, Garbage Day, Associated Press, Bloomberg, Financial Times, VICE, PYMNTS.com, CNN, Insider, ZDNet, TechCrunch, Ars Technica, The Hill, Reuters, TIME, PCMag, Fortune, WRAL TechWire, Tubefilter, Techdirt, MobileSyrup, SlashGear, Droid Life, CryptoPotato, PLYR1NE Newsletter, Variety, New York Post, AppleInsider, iPhone Hacks, CoinGape, Engadget, Neowin, TechSpot, Android Headlines, The Economic Times, Watcher Guru, BGR, iMore, Deadline, MSPoweruser, TechRadar, KnowTechie, iPhone in Canada Blog, City A.M., Tech Advisor, MediaNama, TechCircle, ExchangeWire.com, TheGamer, Firstpost Tech, and iThinkDifferent
Casey Newton / Platformer:
Sources: Twitter is strongly considering taking away its verified users' badges if they don't subscribe to Twitter Blue  —  Under pressure to generate revenue quickly, Twitter's new CEO considers ending free verification  —  Twitter is strongly considering making its users pay to remain verified …
Washington Post:
Source: Elon Musk plans to lay off 25% of Twitter's 7,000+ staff in the coming days, focusing on sales, product, engineering, legal, and trust and safety  —  The first round of layoffs, led by his lawyer Alex Spiro, will target 25 percent of the workforce  —  SAN FRANCISCO …
Lauren Hirsch / New York Times:
Twitter faces ~$1B per year in interest expenses after Elon Musk's deal added ~$13B in debt, up from ~$50M in 2021 when operations generated ~$633M in cash flow  —  Mr. Musk faces financial challenges in owning Twitter.  The site frequently loses money and took on $13 billion in debt for the blockbuster deal.
Financial Times:
Sources detail the twists and turns in Elon Musk's $44B Twitter takeover, starting in late March 2022, falling apart in July, and closing late on October 27  —  Even as his $44bn buyout came down to the wire, Elon Musk kept Twitter guessing.  —  Normally, lawyers and advisers on each side …
Alex Heath / The Verge:
Alyssa Lukpat / Wall Street Journal:
The world's top 20 tech billionaires have lost $480B+ on paper in 2022; Mark Zuckerberg's wealth dropped by $87B+, and Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos lost $58B+ each  —  Moguls including Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos have collectively lost more on paper than the market values of most S&P 500 companies
Selina Cheng / Wall Street Journal:
Inside Foxconn's Zhengzhou iPhone plant as the company uses harsh lockdown measures to try to contain a weekslong COVID-19 outbreak in a crucial ordering period  —  As it adheres to Beijing's strict epidemic controls, Apple's biggest smartphone assembler scrambles to keep production lines moving
Natasha Singer / New York Times:
The FTC accuses homework help app Chegg of security lapses, such as ~40M users' personal info and passwords stolen in 2018; Chegg agrees to boost data security  —  Chegg, a homework help app, exposed the data of 40 million users, including details about some students' sexual orientation and religion …
Amanda Hoover / Wired:
Some Twitter users, concerned about Elon Musk's ownership, are moving to alternative platforms, including Mastodon, which has seen sign-ups surge, and Discord  —  Discord, Mastodon and other services are bustling as Twitter fans make backup plans for their online social lives.
The Intercept:
An investigation details the US DHS' ongoing plans to police misinformation on COVID-19, Afghanistan, Ukraine, and more; Meta built a portal to flag content  —  The Department of Homeland Security is quietly broadening its efforts to curb speech it considers dangerous, an investigation by The Intercept has found.
Benjamin Parkin / Financial Times:
India's ban on Chinese video games has boosted its domestic industry, but the heavy-handed approach has made foreign publishers afraid to invest in the country  —  Heavy-handed approach drives domestic success, but executives worry foreign publishers now afraid to invest in country  —  It is the year 2500.

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Reimagine your photos with a prompt  —  Our new native image generation and editing is state-of-the-art, and ranked #1 in the world.  Try it for free in the Gemini app.
F5:
Securing AI models and agents in the enterprise  —  The new AI stack creates a highly dynamic attack surface, and traditional controls aren't keeping up.  F5's recent acquisition will bring advanced AI guardrails to enterprise apps.
Zoho:
Uncover what's new in Zoho Solo with iOS 26 and iPadOS 26  —  It's that time of the year again when we get to bring you exciting new updates in Zoho Solo, all built to complement the latest from Apple.
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

Big Technology Podcast:
How People Use ChatGPT, Meta's New AI Glasses, Can Jimmy Kimmel Be Canceled?
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:
Charlie Kirk and Online Rage + Inside Trump's Chip Flip + This Week in A.I.
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.
Decoder with Nilay Patel:
How chatbots — and their makers — are enabling AI psychosis
A show from the Verge about big ideas - and other problems.
Subscribe to Decoder with Nilay Patel.
Lenny's Podcast:
Why experts writing AI evals is creating the fastest-growing companies in history | Brendan Foody (CEO of Mercor)
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.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
I tried Zuckerberg's $800 Ray-Bans. Are they the future? With Alex Heath
Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
[trading places]:
sim desai hiive🐝 • emily zheng pitchbook⚾️📓 • vlad voroninski helm.ai 🤖🚙 • bytedance 🫦🕺🏻
a very bad podcast about broken unicorns & busted carry hosted by dave mcclure and aman verjee
Subscribe to [trading places].
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 2:30 PM ET, October 31, 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

Dan Milmo / The Guardian: