Techmeme
August 30, 2023, 11:05 PM

Top News

Emma Roth / The Verge:
Sony plans to raise PlayStation Plus annual subscription prices on September 6: Essential from $60 to $80, Extra from $100 to $135, Premium from $120 to $160  —  Sony is raising the price of its PlayStation Plus subscription next month.  The service's annual Essential plan will go from $60 to $80 …
Zac Hall / 9to5Mac:
Microsoft retires Visual Studio for Mac, saying the IDE will get “servicing updates for security issues and updated platforms from Apple” until August 31, 2024  —  Microsoft has announced plans to discontinue Visual Studio for Mac.  The latest version of the company's IDE …
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple is testing 3D printing the stainless steel Apple Watch Series 9's chassis to speed up production, boost sustainability, and lower costs over time  —  - New approach will use less material and be more eco-friendly  — Company is trying out the process with steel Apple Watches
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft plans to address a Windows 11 “unintended behavior” that for months has caused malware-like notification pop-ups promoting Bing search to Chrome users  —  I thought I had malware on my main Windows 11 machine this weekend.  There I was minding my own business in Chrome …
Jon Gambrell / Associated Press:
A Saudi court sentences a man to death over his X posts and YouTube activity, part of a growing dissent crackdown; his brother is a well-known government critic  —  A Saudi court has sentenced a man to death over his posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, and his activity on YouTube …
Ashley Belanger / Ars Technica:
OpenAI files a motion to dismiss two similar lawsuits from book authors alleging copyright infringement, saying the authors “misconceive the scope of copyright”  —  Authors claim generative AI is just a “grift” that repackages original works.  —  This week, OpenAI finally responded …
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google announces a hardware event on October 4 at 10am ET in New York City, where the company is expected to unveil the Pixel 8, Pixel 8 Pro, and Pixel Watch 2  —  Google this morning announced that it will be hosting its annual Pixel hardware event on Wednesday, October 4.
Richard Lawler / The Verge:
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
Instagram is internally testing letting users create Reels up to 10 minutes long, after TikTok increased its maximum video length to 10 minutes in February 2022  —  Instagram is internally testing the ability to create Reels that are up to 10 minutes in the length, the company confirmed to TechCrunch on Wednesday.
Josh Taylor / The Guardian:
Australia abandons its plans to mandate age verification tech for porn sites, citing privacy and security concerns, and will instead focus on educating parents  —  The eSafety commissioner is to work with industry on a new code to educate parents about how to access filtering software and limit children's access
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Tel Aviv-based AI21 Labs, which develops generative AI tools for text use cases, raised a $155M Series C at a $1.4B valuation, taking its total funding to $283M  —  AI21 Labs, a Tel Aviv-based startup developing a range of text-generating AI tools, has raised $155 million in a Series C funding round led …
Todd Bishop / GeekWire:
Amazon announces the Buy with Prime app for Shopify, which will let US-based Shopify merchants natively integrate Amazon's program into their Shopify stores  —  In-depth Amazon coverage from the tech giant's hometown, including e-commerce, AWS, Amazon Prime, Alexa, logistics, devices, and more.
Steve Dent / Engadget:
Samsung launches Food, an AI-powered food and recipe app in eight languages and 104 countries, with 160K+ recipes based on a database by Whisk, acquired in 2019  —  It builds on Whisk, an app it acquired a few years back.  —  As it promised last week, Samsung has launched Food, a …
Joe Rossignol / MacRumors:
Sources: Apple plans to eliminate social media support adviser roles across X, YouTube, and the Apple Support Community website starting later this year  —  Apple is planning to eliminate social media support advisor roles across Twitter, YouTube, and the Apple Support Community website starting later …
Financial Times:
Document: the UK plans to increase use of AI-based facial recognition tech by the police, potentially deploying new biometric systems over the next 12-18 months  —  Move comes after privacy campaigners and independent academics criticised technology for being inaccurate
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google launches its Search Generative Experience in India and Japan via Search Labs opt-in, following the US launch of the AI search feature in May 2023  —  Following the May launch in the US, Google is giving the Search Generative Experience (SGE) an international launch in India and Japan …
Wallace Witkowski / MarketWatch:
Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge:
JBL announces the $330 Authentics 200, $700 Authentics 500, and portable $430 Authentics 300, the first smart speakers featuring both Alexa and Google Assistant  —  Three new JBL smart speakers from Harman will be the first to offer simultaneous voice assistants, so you can ask Alexa to start the music and then ask Google to stop it.
Reuters:
Huawei quietly launches the ~$960 Mate 60 Pro, without any advance notice or ads; some investors speculate that the Mate 60 Pro uses a Huawei-produced 5G chip  —  Chinese chip stocks rallied on Wednesday following Huawei Technologies' (HWT.UL) launch of its new Mate 60 Pro phone …

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