Techmeme
April 8, 2025, 10:30 PM

Top News

Elisabeth Buchwald / CNN:
The White House says that tariffs on China are set to rise to 104% at 12:01am ET on April 9 after China missed Trump's deadline to remove its reciprocal tariffs  —  President Donald Trump is set to impose an astounding 104% in levies across all Chinese imports on Wednesday …
Chance Miller / 9to5Mac:
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt says that President Trump believes the US has the resources and workforce to build iPhones in the US  —  Trump's massive 104% tariffs on China are set to go into effect at midnight tonight, a move that will have a major impact on Apple and its supply chain.
Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge:
Razer pauses direct sales of its upcoming Blade 16 and other laptops in the US as new tariffs loom, leaving only skins and accessories available for purchase  —  With tariffs set to kick in tonight, Razer's new Blade 16 and other laptops are no longer available to purchase directly.
Reuters:
Ben Weiss / Fortune:
Internal memo: the US DOJ disbands the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Unit, established by Biden in 2021, as the agency is “not a digital assets regulator”  —  The U.S. Department of Justice notified staff on Monday evening that the agency was disbanding a unit dedicated to crypto-related investigations.
The Information:
Source: Instagram is working on an iPad app, and Adam Mosseri told staff to be willing to assume more “risk” to take advantage of a TikTok US ban or disruption  —  Meta Platforms has put the turmoil around TikTok to good use.  Amid a barrage of headlines about the White House's efforts …
Reuters:
Sources: US officials say DOGE is using AI to surveil at least one federal agency's communications for anti-Trump talk; a source says DOGE is also using Signal  —  Trump administration officials have told some U.S. government employees that Elon Musk's DOGE team of technologists …
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google says Gemini Advanced subscribers can now use Deep Research with Gemini 2.5 Pro Experimental, vs. Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking Experimental at March launch  —  Gemini Advanced subscribers can now perform Deep Research with Google's most intelligent 2.5 Pro (experimental) model.
Bradly Shankar / MobileSyrup:
Nintendo says Switch 2 pre-orders in Canada “will not start on April 9, 2025 in order to align with the timing of pre-orders to be determined in the US”  —  The pre-orders were originally set to go live on April 9  —  Nintendo has confirmed that pre-orders for the Nintendo Switch 2 …
Darryn Bonthuys / GameSpot:
Bloomberg:
Sources: hackers accessed 150K+ emails from ~103 bank regulators from May 2023 to early 2025 at the US Treasury's OCC, which on February 26 disclosed a breach  —  - Attackers lurked within OCC email accounts since 2023  — Chinese state hackers previously targeted Treasury files
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
Meta rolls out Teen Accounts to Facebook and Messenger, automatically enrolling users and adding built-in protections, in the US, the UK, Australia, and Canada  —  Meta is introducing Teen Accounts to Facebook and Messenger.  The feature, which automatically enrolls young users …
Cecilia Kang / New York Times:
Tech CEOs who spent big on Trump's inauguration have yet to see the investment pay off; Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, and Microsoft are down 22% since January 20  —  With inauguration donations and Mar-a-Lago visits, leaders of the biggest tech companies sought favor with the president …
Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch:
Amazon launches Nova Sonic, which can generate natural-sounding speech and that it claims is “the most cost-efficient” AI voice model on the market, via Bedrock  —  On Tuesday, Amazon debuted a new generative AI model, Nova Sonic, capable of natively processing voice and generating natural-sounding speech.
The Verge:
A look at the rise of “Frankenstein” laptops in India, made by salvaging parts from multiple brands and sold to students, gig workers, and small businesses  —  In a dimly lit, cluttered workshop in Delhi's Nehru Place, the air hums with the sound of whirring drills and the crackle of soldering irons.
David Prosser / Forbes:
London-based NexGen Cloud, which offers GPU-as-a-service for customers that need flexible access to train AI, raised a $45M Series A at a $354M valuation  —  As the artificial intelligence (AI) boom has swept round the world over the past two years, the space has largely been dominated by US technology businesses.

Sponsor Posts

ElevenLabs:
ElevenAgents by ElevenLabs  —  You know us for voice.  Now meet ElevenAgents — featuring Expressive Mode, our most human-sounding AI voice technology in 70+ languages with ultra-low latency.  Hear it for yourself.
Niantic Spatial:
World models need real-world data  —  Scaniverse is the gateway to spatial services — self-serve and built for AI and robotics.  Large-area 3D reconstruction from 360° cameras and precise localization, anywhere machines operate.
Zoho:
Introducing the sandbox environment: Safely test and optimize e-signature workflows  —  Changes are an inevitable part of any workflow.  The average agreement workflow involves recipients across organizations …
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

Big Technology Podcast:
Anthropic's Mythos Dilemma, Violence Against AI, Tokenmaxxing at Meta
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:
Anthropic's Cybersecurity Shock Wave + Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz on Their Sam Altman Investigation + One Good Thing
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:
Decagon's Jesse Zhang: Closing Customer Service Doom Loops With AI Concierges
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.
Access:
OpenClaw for normies is here
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
The Nick, Dick and Paul Show:
When AI Kills
Nick Bilton, Dick Costolo, and Paul Kedrosky pull back the curtain on AI, startups, and the future rushing toward us, all with healthy dose of irreverence.
Subscribe to The Nick, Dick and Paul Show.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ryan Roslansky: Turning AI Anxiety into Skills for the Future of Work
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 10:30 PM ET, April 8, 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.

More News

Mishaal Rahman / Android Authority:
Katie Roof / Bloomberg:

Earlier Picks

Umar Shakir / The Verge:
Eliza Strickland / IEEE Spectrum:
More: The Decoder, Stanford HAI, and Wired
Bluesky: @erikbryn and @smcgrath.phd
LinkedIn: Xiaopeng Li and Jon AdamsForums: r/technews
Rebecca Szkutak / TechCrunch: