Techmeme
September 29, 2023, 1:30 AM

Top News

Ash Parrish / The Verge:
Epic Games lays off 16% of its workforce, or ~830 employees, divests from music storefront Bandcamp, and intends to spin off “kid-tech” company SuperAwesome  —  Bloomberg reports that Fortnite developer Epic Games is expected to lay off 16 percent of its workforce.
Songtradr:
Bloomberg:
Sources: Microsoft discussed selling Bing to Apple around 2020, a deal that would have replaced Google as the default search engine on Apple's devices  —  - Microsoft executives pitched Apple's Cue on a deal around 2020  — Apple ultimately stuck with Google as default search engine
Emma Roth / The Verge:
Google lets publishers use a robots.txt flag to opt out of the company using their data to train its AI models, while remaining accessible through Google Search  —  Google just announced it's giving website publishers a way to opt out of having their data used to train the company's AI models …
Wall Street Journal:
France's competition authority raided a “graphics cards sector” company this week as part of a cloud-computing inquiry; sources say the target was Nvidia  —  France's competition authority has expressed concerns that established companies in the sector could exclude smaller ones
Umar Shakir / The Verge:
Google plans to stop supporting its $5K, 55" Jamboard meeting room display on September 30, 2024 and phase out its collaborative Jamboard app on October 1, 2024  —  It's never a dull day at the Google graveyard — the company has blogged a Workspace update today announcing the end of its collaborative Jamboard whiteboarding software.
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google rolls out ChromeOS 117 with a Material You redesign, adaptive charging, a new camera and microphone privacy indicator, an improved clipboard, and more  —  Google is rolling out ChromeOS 117, and it's a very big update for Chromebooks that adds Material You, as well as other usability enhancements.
Carly Page / TechCrunch:
Google patches a Chrome zero-day that was exploited by a commercial spyware vendor, just two days after Google's Threat Analysis Group informed the Chrome team  —  Google has rushed to patch a zero-day vulnerability in Chrome that was exploited by a commercial spyware vendor.
Lex Fridman / Lex Fridman Podcast:
In an interview using Meta's photorealistic Codec Avatars, Mark Zuckerberg talks about the metaverse, Quest 3, the nature of reality, AI, and humanity's future  —  - Watch the full YouTube version of the podcast  —  Table of Contents  —  Here are the loose “chapters” in the conversation.
Victoria Song / The Verge:
Google unveils the Fitbit Charge 6, with a haptic side button, integration with Google services like YouTube Music, and more, available on October 12 for $160  —  Fitbit is back with the Charge 6 — and on paper, this one feels like the most Fitbit-y Fitbit since Google actively began folding the company into its ecosystem.
Malathi Nayak / Bloomberg:
Apple asks SCOTUS to revisit the 2021 Epic Games ruling regarding alternative IAP payment options, a day after Epic separately asked SCOTUS to take up the case  —  - IPhone maker wants to avoid allowing an end run around store  — Fortnite maker has separately asked high court to take up case
Jason Koebler / 404 Media:
Email: Serve Robotics, used by Uber Eats in Los Angeles, shared video filmed by one of its food delivery robots to the LAPD as part of a criminal investigation  —  This article was primarily reported using public records requests.  We are making it available to all readers as a public service.
RT Watson / The Block:
Coinbase says the crypto exchange has gained approval from the Bermuda Monetary Authority to offer non-US retail users perpetual futures trading  —  - Coinbase has gained approval to offer non-U.S. retail users perpetual futures trading from the Bermuda Monetary Authority.
Ryan McMorrow / Financial Times:
The Cyberspace Administration of China unveils rules to relax some cross-border data controls, in a bid to reassure businesses worried about US-China relations  —  Draft rules from cyber regulator aim to stem concerns over transfer of foreign business data  —  China has moved to water …
More: Bloomberg
Financial Times:
Sources: on October 5, Linda Yaccarino plans to meet with the seven banks that helped fund Elon Musk's takeover of X to lay out her plans to revive the company  —  Linda Yaccarino is next week planning to meet the seven banks that helped bankroll Elon Musk's takeover of X, formerly known as Twitter …
Financial Times:
Sources: the UK is pushing Google, OpenAI, and Anthropic for unprecedented access to examine the internal workings of their LLMs, ahead of its global AI summit  —  Government officials keen to understand fast-evolving technology ahead of a global summit  —  The UK is pushing companies …

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More News

Yogita Khatri / The Block:
Bloomberg:
Benjamin Mayo / 9to5Mac:

Earlier Picks

Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Camomile Shumba / CoinDesk:
CNBC:
Financial Times:
Emma Roth / The Verge:
Amanda Silberling / TechCrunch:
Mia Sato / The Verge: