Open Links In New Tab
Mobile Archives Advertise Site News
Techmeme
March 17, 2025, 11:45 PM
Mediagazer memeorandum WeSmirch
Home River Leaderboards About Events Newsletter

Top News

Lauren Thomas / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Alphabet is in advanced talks to acquire cybersecurity startup Wiz for ~$30B; Alphabet was close to a $23B deal for Wiz last summer before talks ended  —  A deal worth some $30 billion could come together soon, after talks fizzled last summer  —  Google parent Alphabet …
Scharon Harding / Ars Technica:
Some owners of devices running Roku OS report seeing autoplaying video ads before they can access the home screen; Roku says it is just a test  —  Now, Roku is testing what it might look like if it took things a step further and forced people to watch a video ad play before getting to the Roku OS home screen.
Zhiye Liu / Tom's Hardware:
Qualcomm unveils the Snapdragon G3 Gen 3, G2 Gen 2, and G1 Gen 2 for gaming handhelds, saying the G3 Gen 3 offers a CPU 30% faster than the previous generation  —  Snapdragon G3 Gen 3, Snapdragon G2 Gen 2, and Snapdragon G1 Gen 2 enter the ring.  —  Qualcomm expanded its Snapdragon G series …
Qianer Liu / The Information:
Sources: Google plans to partner with Taiwanese chipmaker MediaTek to design and produce its next-gen TPUs, set for 2026, but will still work with Broadcom  —  Google plans to work with a new firm to help design and produce some of its artificial intelligence chips: MediaTek.
Andrew Liszewski / The Verge:
Snap updates Spectacles AR glasses to add GPS support for Lenses, improved hand tracking, an AR keyboard, and more  —  The augmented reality smart glasses can now point you in the right direction. … Lenses — what Snap calls the Spectacles' various AR effects …
Michael Nuñez / VentureBeat:
Mistral debuts Mistral Small 3.1, a 24B-parameter multimodal and multilingual open-source model it says outperforms Gemma 3 and GPT-4o-mini and runs on 32GB RAM  —  French artificial-intelligence startup Mistral AI unveiled a new open-source model today that the company says outperforms similar offerings …
Max A. Cherney / Reuters:
Sources: Intel's new CEO Lip-Bu Tan has considered restructuring Intel's AI approach and cutting staff to address a slow and bloated middle management layer  —  Intel's incoming CEO Lip-Bu Tan has considered significant changes to its chip manufacturing methods and artificial intelligence strategies ahead …
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Users report that Gemini 2.0 Flash is very good at removing watermarks from images; many models allow this but some, like Claude 3.7 Sonnet and GPT-4o, do not  —  Users on social media have discovered a controversial use case for Google's new Gemini AI model: removing watermarks from images …
Karen Freifeld / Reuters:
Sources: US Commerce Department bureaus informed staffers in recent weeks that DeepSeek is banned on their government devices  —  U.S. Commerce department bureaus informed staffers in recent weeks that Chinese artificial intelligence model DeepSeek is banned on their government devices …
More: Benzinga
Bloomberg:
Sources: Cognition, maker of AI coding assistant Devin, raised hundreds of millions led by 8VC at a ~$4B valuation, doubling its $2B valuation from April 2024  —  The new funding round is being led by 8VC, the Joe Lonsdale-backed venture capital firm, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing private information.
New York Times:
HR service Rippling sues Deel, accusing its rival of hiring a mole in its Dublin office to comb through trade secrets, uncovered via a “honeypot” Slack channel  —  A lawsuit by Rippling accuses a top competitor, Deel, of placing a mole in its ranks — which it uncovered via a “honeypot” trap on Slack.
Paige Smith / Bloomberg:
Robinhood partners with Kalshi to launch a prediction markets hub in the US for retail traders, starting with bets on the federal funds rate and March Madness  —  Prediction markets have grown in popularity among investors, spurred on by the surge of wagers ahead of the November US presidential race …
Sean Michael Kerner / VentureBeat:
Zoom unveils AI Companion 2.0, which adds agentic AI features, including calendar management, meeting tools, and document creation, rolling out by July 2025  —  Zoom became a household name during the pandemic as remote work became the norm nearly overnight.

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Shopify's new AI commerce stack  —  Their VP of Product digs into just-launched products to help entrepreneurs and developers build with the latest AI and tech.
Zoho:
Connecting, collaborating, and growing: Zoho Mail 2025 wrap-up  —  Your inbox has been home to a lot this year—quick updates, long threads, approvals, reminders, and the occasional late-night draft you weren't sure about.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.
Sponsor Techmeme

Featured Podcasts

BG2 Pod:
 AI Enterprise - Databricks & Glean
Open-source podcast on all things tech, markets, investing, and capitalism, hosted by Brad Gerstner.
Subscribe to BG2 Pod.
Great Chat:
 The stories we told ourselves in 2025
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
Grit:
 How Brands Stay Visible When AI Decides | Profound CEO James Cadwallader
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Lenny's Podcast:
 The coming AI security crisis (and what to do about it) | Sander Schulhoff
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Big Technology Podcast:
 OpenAI's Potential, Google's Speedy Model, Copilot Hits Turbulence
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.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
 Ted Sarandos: Netflix and how tech changed storytelling
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.
Add your podcast here
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 11:45 PM ET, March 17, 2025.

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

Sara Fischer / Axios:
Source: Bari Weiss is planning to create a masthead for CBS News as part of a broader overhaul of standards and procedures

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Comcast extends Mike Cavanagh's contract through January 1, 2029, and grants a ~$35M performance-based stock package; he's set to become co-CEO in January 2026

Winston Cho / The Hollywood Reporter:
A US judge denies WBD's bid to block Sling TV from selling short-term offerings that let users sign up for access to its bundles for as little as one day

More News

Daryna Antoniuk / The Record:
Telegram's Pavel Durov has left France, reportedly after a judge authorized him to leave the country for “several weeks”; the investigation is ongoing
Jason Koebler / 404 Media:
AI slop, shared by thousands of prolific accounts, is brute forcing virality, and platforms like Meta embrace it; some AI videos get 350M+ views
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Roblox open sources Cube 3D, the first version of its AI foundation model for generating 3D objects, trained on licensed and public datasets and its own data
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Discord launches a Social SDK to let developers offer friends lists, cross-platform messaging, voice, and more, with console and mobile support “coming soon”

Earlier Picks

Hugh Son / CNBC:
Walmart's OnePay says Klarna will replace Affirm to offer buy-now-pay-later to US shoppers later in 2025, and OnePay can buy a Klarna stake; AFRM drops 10%+
Stephen Morris / Financial Times:
Alphabet spins off laser-based internet company Taara from its X “moonshot” incubator; Taara, which raised new funding, has its origins in Loon, closed in 2021
Sidhartha Shukla / Bloomberg:
Crypto exchange OKX says it has “temporarily” suspended its DEX aggregator services, used to launder the $1.5B Bybit hack, after reported EU scrutiny under MiCA
Nick Robins-Early / The Guardian:
How Elon Musk targeted 18F, as former employees say the GSA group focused on increasing bureaucratic efficiency through tech, similar to what DOGE claims to do
Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:
Open letter: ~100 EU companies urge EU lawmakers to take “radical action” to shrink the reliance on foreign infrastructure by fostering a so-called “Euro stack”
Mediagazer memeorandum WeSmirch
Home River Leaderboards About Events Newsletter