Techmeme
January 31, 2023, 8:25 PM

Top News

Casey Newton / Platformer:
Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger form a venture to explore next-gen social apps; the first is Artifact, a TikTok-like app for news articles  —  EXCLUSIVE: Meet Artifact, a kind of TikTok for text  —  Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger are back.
Jason Schreier / Bloomberg:
A look at Microsoft's prized 343 Industries, the studio behind Halo, after a leadership overhaul, layoffs, and more; sources detail a pivot to Unreal Engine  —  Microsoft Corp. says it's going to keep making new games in the popular Halo franchise at its prized 343 Industries studio — despite rumors to the contrary.
Ina Fried / Axios:
Jack Schickler / CoinDesk:
Independent examiner: Celsius misled its investors, sometimes used new customer funds to pay for withdrawals, CEO Alex Mashinsky made false claims, and more  —  Shoba Pillay was appointed by a New York bankruptcy court to look at whether the crypto lender operated as a Ponzi scheme
Ashley Capoot / CNBC:
The Verge:
Apple HomePod (second-gen) review: similarly good sound quality, useful sensors, and a responsive Siri, but pricey and the best experience is via a paired set  —  Apple's second take on the HomePod doesn't stray far from the original, but it's better all around.
Jonathan Vanian / CNBC:
Snap Q4: revenue flat YoY at $1.3B, vs. $1.31B est., DAUs up 17% YoY to 375M, vs. 375.3M est., and a $288M net loss, vs. $23M in net income YoY; stock down 13%+  —  - Snap missed on revenue for the fourth quarter but beat on earnings.  — Snap had a rough 2022, as a slowing economy led numerous companies …
Takashi Mochizuki / Bloomberg:
Sources: Sony halves its PlayStation VR2 shipment forecast to ~1M units in Q1 after early preorders disappointed; the headset is slated to launch on February 22  —  Sony Group Corp. reduced projections for the initial launch of its PlayStation VR2 headset dramatically after early pre-orders disappointed …
Anna Nicolaou / Financial Times:
Sylvia Varnham O'Regan / The Information:
Sources: Meta executives are debating whether to relax the company's long-standing opposition to sharing ad revenue with creators, as it seeks to boost Reels  —  When Wall Street analysts dial into an earnings call tomorrow with Mark Zuckerberg, they're likely to pepper the Meta Platforms CEO …
TJ Denzer / Shacknews:
EA Q3: revenue up 5% YoY to $1.88B, vs. $2.5B est., net income up 209% YoY to $204M, net bookings down 9% YoY to $2.34B, and lowers FY guidance; stock drops 5%+  —  The game publishing giant reduced its full year revenue expectations by about half a billion dollars in its latest quarter guidance.
Kif Leswing / CNBC:
AMD reports Q4 revenue up 16% YoY to $5.6B, vs. $5.5B est., net income down 98% YoY to $21M, and Client segment revenue down 51% YoY due to weak PC chip sales  —  - AMD reported fourth quarter earnings on Tuesday, beating Wall Street expectations for sales and profit, but guided analysts …
Brian Merchant / Los Angeles Times:
The goal of the Big Tech layoffs is to bring workers to heel and cultivate an insecure workforce, as an official recession hasn't hit the US or its tech sector  —  In Silicon Valley, the new year began as the last one ended — with tens of thousands of tech workers losing their jobs.
Reuters:
Samsung reports ~$1.38B in Q4 mobile profit, down from ~$2.15B in Q4 2021, and does not plan to slash chip investment from 2022 to 2023, in contrast to rivals  —  South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co Ltd (005930.KS) on Tuesday indicated it has no plan to cut investment in chips this year …

Sponsor Posts

Subquadratic:
SubQ Snap 1.1: the first long-context decision model for real enterprise work  —  Tied for #1 on the AA Decision Index, Snap is a multimodal model with a 384k-token context window for fast reasoning and agentic decisions.
Zoho:
Labels that build themselves: Simplified Label Automation in Zoho Writer  —  Anyone who ships every day knows this feeling.  Forty orders, each with a different number of items, and every item needs its own label.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.
WebBrain:
WebBrain: an open-source AI agent for your browser  —  Read pages, fill forms and automate tasks in Chrome or Firefox.  Use local models or your preferred AI provider.  Get started free.

Featured Podcasts

The Upstarts Podcast:
How Ramp Built A $60B AI Product Factory Off A Corporate Card | Co-CEO Eric Glyman
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
Subscribe to The Upstarts Podcast.
Great Chat:
Would you let a robot do it?
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.
Training Data:
A Model For Everyone: How Ronak From Trajectory Is Building Products For Continual Learning
Sequoia Capital partners host conversations with leading AI builders and researchers to develop a deeper understanding of the evolving technologies and their implications.
Subscribe to Training Data.
Big Technology Podcast:
Can AI Keep Going After The Democrats' Big Win? — With Teddy Schleifer
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.
Machine Gods:
Crypto's Biggest Heist Ever + The Spy Who Loved Nvidia + Hacktober's Unsolved Mysteries
The official podcast of the singularity, from Casey Newton and Kevin Roose. Twice-weekly news, analysis, and interviews with the people who are building the future.
Subscribe to Machine Gods.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
Barry Diller on Big Bets, AI, and Knowing When to Walk Away
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.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 8:25 PM ET, January 31, 2023.

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

Gerry Smith / Bloomberg:
Lauren Feiner / CNBC:
Mike Butcher / TechCrunch:
Amanda Silberling / TechCrunch:
Parmy Olson / Bloomberg:

Earlier Picks

Jillian Deutsch / Bloomberg:
John Herrman / New York Magazine: