Techmeme
January 1, 2024, 6:30 PM

Top News

Mohar Chatterjee / Politico:
A look at AI chatbots modeled on real experts, like US psychologist Martin Seligman, that are often created without permission, highlighting a policy gray area  —  New AI-generated digital replicas of real experts expose an unnerving policy gray zone.  Washington wants to fix it, but it's not clear how.
Ash Parrish / The Verge:
The scale of layoffs in the gaming industry in 2023 was far beyond a typical year, with an estimated 9,000+ workers losing their jobs globally  —  Layoffs are an unfortunate reality of any industry, but the scope and scale of video game layoffs in 2023 are far beyond a typical year.
John Kruzel / Reuters:
In his year-end report, US Chief Justice John Roberts says AI is a mixed blessing for the legal field and urges “caution and humility” as the tech is adopted  —  Artificial intelligence represents a mixed blessing for the legal field, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts …
Tim Bradshaw / Financial Times:
Counterpoint: ~16M foldable phones were sold in 2023, just 1.3% of all 1.2B smartphones, as foldables start to gain traction in markets like the US and China  —  Samsung, Motorola and Huawei continue to invest in high-priced flip devices despite weak sales  —  Every large smartphone maker …
Nikkei Asia:
Nikon, Sony, and Canon are developing camera tech that embeds digital signatures in images so that they can be distinguished from realistic AI-generated fakes  —  Digital signatures to provide way to tell real photos from  —  Sony will release a firmware for professional-grade cameras to embed digital signatures to photos.
More: PCMag and TechLifeWeb
Mastodon: @carnage4life@mas.to.  X: @anastasiabekt, @stevesi, and @mikecane.  LinkedIn: Tariq Krim
Keza MacDonald / The Guardian:
A profile of Mario and Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto, who joined Nintendo in 1977 and says he has no plans to retire as representative director at the company  —  Few people have influenced global pop culture as much as the creator of Mario and Zelda, widely considered the father of modern gaming.
Cristina Criddle / Financial Times:
A look at the rise of AI-generated virtual influencers, with some charging thousands of dollars to promote products, leading to concerns from human influencers  —  Hyper-realistic ‘virtual influencers’ are being used to promote leading brands — drawing ire from human content creators
Justin Garrison / Justin Garrison:
An AWS developer claims Amazon is “silently sacking” staff by pushing them to take a different role that they would quit later, to avoid the need for severance  —  Amazon has a stock problem.  It's not only Amazon, but they have more to lose.  If you're a customer, that's going to be bad for your business too.
Aaron Tilley / Wall Street Journal:
A profile of Joe Kiani, whose company Masimo spent ~$100M suing Apple, as some say his aggressive use of the US patent system stymies the innovation of others  —  Joe Kiani has taken on Apple in a patent dispute that has cost his company millions of dollars to pursue.  So far he is winning, but the fight isn't over.

Sponsor Posts

Command Line:
We can build it.  Can we judge it?  —  As agentic AI shortens the path from idea to shipped code, journey evaluation becomes a critical design skill.
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Zoho:
Zoho Backstage 4.0: Introducing the most powerful event experience platform from Zoho, ever  —  Every year, we observe Event Organizers Day on October 23 to celebrate the hard work and creativity event planners bring to every event.
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.

Featured Podcasts

Machine Gods:
Fired OpenAI Safety Researchers Speak Out + We Look Inside Pandora's Box
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.
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The Upstarts Podcast:
The Parking Startup That Swallowed A 100-Year-Old Giant | Metropolis CEO Alex Israel
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.
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Great Chat:
AI's Spooky Season
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
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Sources:
Sundar Pichai on Gemini 4 and the AI compute crunch
Candid conversations with the leaders shaping what's next in AI and the broader tech industry. Hosted by Alex Heath, who has covered Silicon Valley for more than a decade.
Subscribe to Sources.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
Netflix in Turmoil + Derek Thompson on AI & The Antisocial Century
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.
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Big Technology Podcast:
Google CEO Sundar Pichai: AI's Infinite Possibilities, Compute Scarcity Dilemmas, Future AI Products
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.
 

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More News

J. Edward Moreno / New York Times:
Joan Westenberg:

Earlier Picks

Brendan Bordelon / Politico:
Anil Dash / Rolling Stone:
The Information: