|
January 29, 2024, 1:15 PM
|
Mediagazer
memeorandum
WeSmirchTop News
| Bloomberg: |
Amazon drops its $1.4B acquisition of Roomba maker iRobot after clashing with EU regulators and will pay a $94M fee; iRobot has ~$500M in net losses since 2021 — - IRobot CEO steps down and company cuts workforce by 31% — Tech giant to pay $94 million to iRobot over deal termination
More: The Verge, About Amazon, The Messenger, Thurrott, The Information, NBC News, TechCrunch, Engadget, TechSpot, MobileSyrup, TechRadar, Chain Store Age, TechStartups, Associated Press, New York Times, Axios, Financial Times, Associated Press, Wall Street Journal, and Android Headlines
Threads: @firstadopter. X: @mattturck, @pitdesi, @ttoboyle, @progresschamber, @theo_wayt, @linakhanftc, @visu, @jamestitcomb, @bongcapital, @marketsneil, @pat_hedger, @jcbcp, @sarthakgh, @adamkovac, @edludlow, @matthewstoller, @laz_radic, @lewis_crofts, @diane_alter, and @bhalligan. LinkedIn: Emil Protalinski
| Rohan Goswami / CNBC: |
After Amazon ended its acquisition, iRobot plans to lay off 31% of its staff, or ~350 people, and says chair and CEO Colin Angle would step down; IRBT drops 5%+ — - Amazon and iRobot mutually agreed to call off their planned acquisition, writing that there was “no path” to regulatory approval and sending iRobot shares down 15%.
More: The Guardian, eeNews Europe, Fortune, Seattle Business Journal, Ars Technica, Tech Monitor, TechCrunch, SiliconANGLE, PCMag, GeekWire, PYMNTS.com, The Register, Reuters, The Boston Globe, Investor's Business Daily, TechHive, New York Post, Tech Xplore, Techaeris, Neowin, The Robot Report, and NBC Bay Area
| Emanuel Maiberg / 404 Media: |
Microsoft adds safeguards to its AI text-to-image tool Designer, after fake AI images of Taylor Swift went viral and a report of 4chan users misusing the tool — Following 404 Media's reporting, Microsoft has made changes to a tool people were using to make AI nudes of celebrities.
More: VentureBeat, Ars Technica, New York Post, NBC News, Gizmodo, NBC News on YouTube, Engadget, Neowin, Fortune, and Variety
| Allison Johnson / The Verge: |
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra review: bright screen, anti-glare, Circle to Search, great camera, and seven years of updates, but pricey, heavy, and AI is a mixed bag — The Galaxy S24 Ultra is packed with top-tier hardware, but its highly touted AI features are hit-or-miss — and the price is higher than ever.
More: MacRumors, XDA Developers, IGN, Forbes, CNET, PCMag, MakeUseOf, Tom's Guide, GSMArena.com, TechSpot, and The Shortcut
| Suzanne Vranica / Wall Street Journal: |
Presentation: Amazon says Prime Video's ad load per hour will be two to 3.5 minutes, below traditional TV and most streamers, and expects 195M monthly viewers — Move prompts longtime subscribers to cancel Prime altogether, forgoing free shipping; ‘There is only one way to show them that this is not OK’
More: PCMag, Thurrott, Fast Company, 9to5Mac, Gizmochina, TechRadar, KnowTechie, The Streamable, TweakTown, GameSpot, Trak.in, Gizmodo, TechHive, Bloomberg, The Verge, BGR, and Making Television Easy Again!. Forums: Hacker News
| Dawn Lim / Bloomberg: |
How Blackstone is building a $25B US data center empire via its QTS acquisition, using an estimated 6 GW of electricity when complete, equal to ~5M homes' needs — The private equity giant says landlord QTS could be one of its best investments ever — but the resources needed for growth are vast.| New York Times: |
How Google, Meta, Microsoft, and others balance developing specialized AI chips with their relationship with Nvidia, which has an estimated 70% of AI chip sales — In September, Amazon said it would invest up to $4 billion in Anthropic, a San Francisco start-up working on artificial intelligence.| Amanda Silberling / TechCrunch: |
Meta partners with the Center for Open Science to share data for researching online well-being, before Wednesday's Congressional hearing on kids' online safety — Ahead of a major Congressional hearing about children's online safety, Meta has announced a collaboration with the Center for Open Science … | Oliver Haslam / iMore: |
Apple updates Shazam to add support for identifying songs from other apps while listening via wired or Bluetooth headphones — Apple's Shazam is now better than ever. — Shazam has long been the go-to app for people who want to know what song they're listening to but now it's better than ever thanks to a new version 17.3 update.
More: MacRumors, MobileSyrup, and iClarified
| Josh Ye / Reuters: |
Chinese state media: China has approved more than 40 LLMs for public use since authorities began the approval process in August 2023; 14 were approved last week — China has approved more than 40 artificial intelligence (AI) models for public use in the first six months since authorities began …
More: ITPro, Neowin, The Decoder, Computerworld, and South China Morning Post
| Priya Anand / Bloomberg: |
Sema4.ai, a three-month-old startup led by ex-Cloudera CEO Rob Bearden aiming to automate business tasks with AI, raised $30.5M and acquires AI startup Robocorp — Investors in Sema4.ai's funding round included Benchmark and Mayfield. — Sema4.ai, a startup that makes artificial intelligence tools … | David Pierce / The Verge: |
The Browser Company releases Arc Search, a new iOS app that takes a user's search query, browses the web, and builds a custom webpage to answer the query — A few minutes ago, I opened the new Arc Search app and typed, “What happened in the Chiefs game.” That game, the AFC Championship, had just wrapped up.
More: TechCrunch, Arc from The Browser Company, Inc.com, ZDNet, Thurrott, Engadget, App Store, TechRadar, Spyglass, MacStories, MacRumors, 9to5Mac, The Dent, and iPhone in Canada Blog
Threads: @crumbler, @shanselman, @anildash, @gruber, and @imdavidpierce. Mastodon: @matt@worldkey.io
Forums: r/ArcBrowser and MacRumors Forums
Sponsor Posts
Subquadratic:
Subquadratic: the LLM built for 12M-token reasoning — SubQ can reason across entire codebases and document sets in one pass with no RAG workarounds. Read how SubQ 1.1 Small holds near-perfect retrieval out to 12M tokens.
Subquadratic: the LLM built for 12M-token reasoning — SubQ can reason across entire codebases and document sets in one pass with no RAG workarounds. Read how SubQ 1.1 Small holds near-perfect retrieval out to 12M tokens.
Equals:
Stop vibe coding analytics — Equals AI turns questions about your business into auditable spreadsheet models and dashboards. Build once, iterate for years.
Stop vibe coding analytics — Equals AI turns questions about your business into auditable spreadsheet models and dashboards. Build once, iterate for years.
Zoho:
From MCP to billing: Updates that accelerate hiring — TL;DRConnect your favorite AI tools to Zoho Recruit with Zoho Recruit MCP.Catch up on conversations faster with Zia email summaries.Review candidate context instantly …
From MCP to billing: Updates that accelerate hiring — TL;DRConnect your favorite AI tools to Zoho Recruit with Zoho Recruit MCP.Catch up on conversations faster with Zia email summaries.Review candidate context instantly …
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.
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
Training Data:
Inside Zipline's Autonomous System: 140M Miles, Zero Incidents
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.
Invest Like the Best:
Jeremy Giffon - The Billion Dollar PDF
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
Big Technology Podcast:
Who Wins The AI Superapp Battle?, Apple's Consumer AI Victory, World Cup Automation Mistake
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.
Hard Fork:
Fable Ban Reversed + Dr. Dana Suskind on Parenting With A.I. + Prediction Market Drama
The future is already here. Each week, journalists Kevin Roose and Casey Newton explore and make sense of the latest in the rapidly changing world of tech.
Subscribe to Hard Fork.
The Upstarts Podcast:
Blitzy's Brian Elliott: Cursor And Claude Code Are Looking At Your Enterprise Code 'Through A Straw'
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.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Connecting the Unconnected: Doreen Bogdan-Martin
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.
About This Page
This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 1:15 PM ET, January 29, 2024.
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
Financial Times:Scott Nover / Washington Post:
Deborah Cole / The Guardian:
Upcoming Tech Events
Earlier Picks
| Jennifer Maas / Variety: |
More: PC Games Insider. Mastodon: @BeAware@social.beaware.live. X: @benjisales, @benjisales, @captaingalxy, and @variety
| Salvador Rodriguez / Wall Street Journal: |
More: Apple on YouTube, Axios, TechCrunch, Livemint, MacRumors, MIXED Reality News, TechRadar, Wccftech, Notebookcheck, and 9to5Mac
Threads: @kbode. X: @amaldorai, @lunayian, @benz145, @benz145, @edzitron, @arian_ghashghai, @iamdcinvestor, @iamdcinvestor, @zgftech, @cixliv, and @benz145. Forums: MacRumors Forums
| Steven Sinofsky / Hardcore Software: |
More: MacStories, The Verge, Six Colors, and Livemint
Threads: @alexheath, @theromit, @benedictevans, and @sixonedude
Mastodon: @ppatel@mstdn.social, @romaindillet@mastodon.social, and @slightlyoff@toot.cafe
X: @albertwenger, @gruber, @snazzylabs, @ostynhyss, @snazzylabs, @timsweeneyepic, @counternotions, @stevesi, @gruber, @stevesi, @stevesi, and @pencoyd. Forums: Lobsters