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December 15, 2023, 12:05 PM
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Top News

Forbes:
Google confirms that it will no longer respond to geofence warrants after making changes to the way Maps stores users' location data  —  “Geofence warrants,” which allow law enforcement to get location data across a wide area, have become commonplace in recent years.
Lily Hay Newman / Wired:
How Microsoft's 10-year-old Digital Crime Unit uses unique legal tactics and the company's technical reach to disrupt global cybercrime and state-backed actors  —  Ten years in, Microsoft's DCU has honed its strategy of using both unique legal tactics and the company's technical reach …
Joseph Cox / 404 Media:
Cox Media Group claims it can listen to conversations of consumers through microphones in smartphones, smart TVs, and other devices and use it to target ads  —  A marketing team within media giant Cox Media Group (CMG) claims it has the capability to listen to ambient conversations …
David Gilbert / Wired:
Researchers: Microsoft Copilot is responding to some political queries in the US and other countries with conspiracies, information, and out-of-date information  —  Research shared exclusively with WIRED shows that Copilot, Microsoft's AI chatbot, often responds to questions about elections with lies and conspiracy theories.
Stacy Elliott / Decrypt:
Crypto wallet maker Ledger updates Connect Kit, saying a former employee “fell victim to a phishing attack” that let a hacker insert malicious code  —  Crypto wallet manufacturer Ledger has confirmed an exploit that led it to warn users to “stop using dapps” started because a former employee fell for a phishing scam.
Nikkei Asia:
Sources: Apple plans to deploy advanced OLED screens in high-end iPads in 2024 and in a MacBook model in H2 2025, and is also considering making foldable iPads  —  Display industry in for disruption as investment pours into newer technology  —  Apple is the leader in the global tablet computer market thanks …
Ben Horowitz / Andreessen Horowitz:
Andreessen Horowitz says “we will, for the first time, get involved with politics by supporting candidates who align with our vision and values” for technology  —  As software has eaten the world, it has become integral to every industry and nearly every endeavor in our society.
Glenn Fleishman / Retool:
A look back at Yahoo Pipes, launched in 2007 to let users make custom data feeds by dragging elements in a web browser, influencing a generation of UI designers  —  Want to know whether the latest logged earthquakes were near you?  Aggregate 100 top news sites, but only see items that mention cats?
Paul Alcorn / Tom's Hardware:
Intel 5th-Gen Xeon Platinum 8592+ review: the $11,600 64-core chip outperforms AMD's 64-core EPYC Genoa in several benchmarks, particularly in AI workloads  —  The sun shines brighter for Intel. … Why you can trust Tom's Hardware Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products …
Andrew E. Freedman / Tom's Hardware:
At Intel's NYC event, Pat Gelsinger claimed that for AI, inference will become more important than training, and the industry wants to “eliminate” Nvidia's CUDA
Financial Times:
Sources: Musk gave verbal guarantees to some US banks that they would not lose money on the Twitter deal; banks face serious losses on the “uninvestable” debt  —  Banks are facing serious losses on the debt as social media platform's business deteriorates
Wall Street Journal:
Some publishers estimate that Google's Search Generative Experience could cut referral traffic by 20% to 40% if the final version resembles recent iterations  —  Tech giant's AI-powered search product is being tested on roughly 10 million users; publishers rely on Google for traffic and see a gathering storm
Nicholas Sutrich / Android Central:
Microsoft launches the basic Office suite on the Meta Quest store for free; all three apps run in a MR environment and all Quest headsets are supported  —  Now you can tweak spreadsheets while playing Xbox, all in VR.  —  What you need to know  — Meta Quest users can now use Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint in VR.
Taylor Lorenz / Washington Post:
Toy startup Curio launches three AI-powered plush toys, including a $99 one called Grok, that use OpenAI's tech to converse with kids and are voiced by Grimes  —  Grok is the first in a line of toys from start-up Curio intended to allow kids to converse with an AI chatbot

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About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 12:05 PM ET, December 15, 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.

From Mediagazer

Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
As Democrats take the House and the Senate, David Ellison and other media executives are likely to face inquiries and hearings over their deals and Trump ties

The New York Times Company:
NYT reports Q3 revenue up 9.7% YoY to $768.5M, digital-only subscription revenue up 14.6% to $421.3M, and operating profit up 16.4% to $121.9M; NYT jumps 4%+

Alyssa Ray / The Wrap:
Trump appeals a district court judge's dismissal of his $10B defamation suit against the WSJ over a story claiming his signature was on an Epstein birthday card

More News

Jesse Hamilton / CoinDesk:
The SEC rejects a Coinbase petition for formal rules for digital assets, arguing the “existing securities regime appropriately governs crypto asset securities”
Timmy Shen / The Block:
SafeMoon filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection on December 14 after the US SEC charged the company on November 1 for selling unregistered crypto securities

Earlier Picks

Will Knight / Wired:
OpenAI details how its Superalignment research team is exploring ways to control stronger AI models like GPT-4 using weaker supervisor models like GPT-2
Rohan Goswami / CNBC:
The US DOJ announces an indictment for four people, two of whom have been arrested, in an alleged international pig butchering crypto scam costing victims $80M+
Simon Willison / Simon Willison's Weblog:
The confusion around Dropbox's AI toggle highlights an AI trust crisis where many users don't believe OpenAI's claims that their data won't be used for training
Will Douglas Heaven / MIT Technology Review:
Google DeepMind's FunSearch model cracks the unsolved cap set problem in pure mathematics, the first time an LLM has solved a long-standing scientific puzzle
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google launches a Pixel Diagnostic App and repair manuals in English in the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, and European countries where Pixel devices are sold
Aria Alamalhodaei / TechCrunch:
Amazon validates Project Kuiper's optical inter-satellite links, which use infrared lasers to move data around 30% faster than terrestrial fiber optical cables
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Instagram launches a generative AI background editing tool in the US, letting users change the background for their Stories using text prompts
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