Techmeme
February 1, 2024, 12:15 PM

Top News

Nick Bilton / Vanity Fair:
An interview with Tim Cook, Greg Joswiak, James Cameron, Jon Favreau, and others on the Apple Vision Pro, using the device, developing the headset, and more  —  Inside Apple Park, the tech giant's CEO talks about the genesis of a “mind-blowing” new device that could change the way we live and work.
Zack Whittaker / TechCrunch:
Apple releases visionOS 1.0.2, fixing a WebKit vulnerability that, if exploited, allowed malicious code execution; Apple included a patch in iOS 17.3 last week  —  A day after reporters published their first hands-on review of Apple's Vision Pro, the technology giant released its first security patch …
Joe Rossignol / MacRumors:
Apple says developers have optimized 600+ apps for the Vision Pro in time for its February 2 launch, including Airmail, Box, MUBI, Night Sky, Parcel, and PCalc  —  Apple today announced that over 600 apps with native support for visionOS will be available on the Vision Pro when the headset launches in the U.S. this Friday.
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
An interview with Unity Create President Marc Whitten, as the company launches support for building spatial apps for Apple's visionOS to all its subscribers  —  Unity has unveiled its support for spatial experiences including support for the Apple Vision Pro that launches on February 2.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:
UMG begins pulling its artists' music from TikTok after negotiations failed; videos featuring UMG-owned songs will be muted, and users can pick a new soundtrack  —  - Publisher behind Drake and Taylor Swift pushes for better pay  — Videos featuring Universal Music-owned songs will be muted
Dexter Thomas / Wired:
Q&A with TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew on the company's music festival in Arizona, his background, TikTok and music, US scrutiny, music labels, moderation, and more  —  A few weeks ago, Shou Zi Chew sat down with WIRED to tell us how he's trying to make TikTok better.
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Google launches ImageFX, an AI image generator underpinned by Imagen 2, with “expressive chips”, or keyword suggestions; Google will bring Imagen 2 to Bard  —  Taylor Swift deepfakes be damned, Google is releasing a new AI-powered tool, TextFX, for image creation.
Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge:
After Amazon ended its acquisition, iRobot, whose robot vacuum market share has steadily eroded since 2014, could become an also-ran as Chinese companies gain  —  By abandoning its deal to buy iRobot, Amazon has left the robot vacuum maker stuck under the couch.
Jesse Hamilton / CoinDesk:
Celsius emerges from bankruptcy and plans to distribute $3B+ to its creditors, who will also get a stake in the company's new Ionic Digital mining operation  —  The distribution will be made through PayPal and Coinbase.  —  Register Now  —  Celsius will be shipping out more than $3 billion …
Andrew Webster / The Verge:
Microsoft says Pocket Pair's Palworld, still technically in early access, is the biggest third-party Xbox Game Pass launch in history, reaching 7M players  —  Surprise viral gaming hit Palworld continues to reach new player milestones.  Today, developer Pocketpair announced that the game …
Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer:
CISA orders US federal agencies to disconnect all Ivanti VPN appliances vulnerable to multiple actively exploited bugs before Saturday, February 3  —  CISA has ordered U.S. federal agencies to disconnect all Ivanti Connect Secure or Policy Secure VPN appliances vulnerable to multiple actively exploited bugs …
Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
Email to subscribers: Hulu changed its agreement to ban sharing accounts outside of the user's household “unless otherwise permitted by your Service Tier”  —  The Disney-owned streaming service changed its subscriber agreement to ban sharing of accounts outside of individual households.
Jeffrey Gottfried / Pew Research Center:
US adults survey: 83% use YouTube, 68% use Facebook, 47% use Instagram; 27% to 35% use Snapchat, WhatsApp, LinkedIn, TikTok, and Pinterest; 22% use X and Reddit  —  YouTube and Facebook are by far the most used online platforms among U.S. adults; TikTok's user base has grown since 2021
Sean Hollister / The Verge:
The US CPSC says Snap will recall all 71,000 Pixy selfie camera drones as their batteries pose a fire risk, and users should “immediately stop” using the drone  —  Snap gave up on its Pixy flying selfie camera drone after just four months, but it turns out the company sold 71,000 drones …
Bluesky: @rlux.nyc
Reuters:
Meta plans to deploy its second-gen in-house chips, referred to internally as Artemis, to its data centers in 2024, alongside “commercially available GPUs”  —  Facebook owner Meta Platforms (META.O) plans to deploy into its data centers this year a new version of a custom chip aimed …

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Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Mary Ann Azevedo / TechCrunch:
Kif Leswing / CNBC:
Rachel Metz / Bloomberg:
MK Manoylov / The Block: