Techmeme
April 18, 2025, 2:40 PM

Top News

The Verge:
Nintendo says Switch 2 preorders will start in the US on April 24, with the price staying at the initially announced $450; prices of accessories will go up  —  The company delayed its original preorder date in the US. … Nintendo has announced a new date for when Switch 2 preorders will kick off in the US; April 24th.
Douglas Gillison / Reuters:
A US judge temporarily halts mass firings at the US CFPB after the agency fired between 1,400 and 1,500 workers, eliminating as much as 90% of its workforce  —  A federal judge on Friday halted the mass firings carried out Thursday afternoon at the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau …
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
ChatGPT users are figuring out the location of photos using o3's image-analyzing capabilities paired with its web search functionality, raising privacy concerns  —  There's a somewhat concerning new trend going viral: people are using ChatGPT to figure out the location shown in pictures.
Erin Woo / The Information:
A look at Google's efforts to improve Search with AI; sources: its leaders have struggled to articulate a vision for how they want Search features to evolve  —  Next week, a federal judge will start the process of determining how to fix Google's search engine, which he ruled last summer was an illegal monopoly.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
US consumers are flocking to Chinese shopping apps DHgate and Taobao, which let them buy direct from manufacturers, as Shein and Temu prices rise amid tariffs  —  The Chinese e-commerce marketplace app DHgate, which is now the No. 2 free iPhone app in the U.S., isn't the only one that's oddly benefiting …
IDC:
China's Q1 2025 smartphone shipments grew 3.3% YoY to 71.6M units; Xiaomi led with 18.6% market share, Apple was the only foreign brand in top 5 with 13.7%  —  Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, China's smartphone market shipped 71.6 million units in 1Q25, a 3.3% year-on-year (YoY) increase.
Stephen Nellis / Reuters:
Memo: CEO Lip-Bu Tan flattens Intel's leadership team, with important semiconductor groups reporting directly to him, and names Sachin Katti as CTO and AI chief  —  Intel's (INTC.O) new CEO, Lip-Bu Tan, is flattening the semiconductor giant's leadership team, with important chip groups reporting directly …
Ryan Whitwam / Ars Technica:
Google rolls out Gemini 2.5 Flash in preview, with support for Canvas for working on text or code; developers can disable thinking or set a token limit for it  —  Google's Gemini AI may have had a slow start, but it has been anything but in 2025.  Barely a week goes by that another model …
Financial Times:
Insiders, including tech execs, say President Trump's trade war may hinder the US computing industry by raising costs for building chip fabs and AI data centers  —  Tariffs and threat of new duties on chips and computing infrastructure could frustrate American ambitions to lead artificial intelligence race
Todd Spangler / Variety:

Sponsor Posts

Airtable:
Deep analysis for deep questions  —  Introducing Superagent.  A new research product from Airtable: Subagents deeply interrogate your topic and turn it into boardroom-ready reports, slides, docs, or websites.
Intel:
5G's most deployed platform  —  Powering live networks with built-in Inference across Core and RAN.  That's the power of Intel Inside®
Zoho:
Turn financial data into better business decisions  —  This is a guest blog by ScaleXP.For CEOs and CFOs of growing small and mid-sized businesses, financial data is everywhere.  Invoices, expenses, subscriptions …
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

Lenny's Podcast:
The design process is dead. Here's what's replacing it. | Jenny Wen (head of design at Claude)
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.
The Talk Show With John Gruber:
'Bad Dates', With Jason Snell
The director's commentary track for Daring Fireball. Long digressions on Apple, technology, design, movies, and more.
Subscribe to The Talk Show With John Gruber.
Hard Fork:
At the Pentagon, OpenAI is In and Anthropic Is Out
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.
Big Technology Podcast:
Anthropic vs. The Pentagon, Bloodbath at Block, The Citrini Selloff
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.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
Netflix Walks, Paramount Wins, and the Ellisons Take Hollywood
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.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
His Excellency Khaldoon Al Mubarak: Investing in an AI-Driven World
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 2:40 PM ET, April 18, 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

The Information:
Filipe Espósito / 9to5Mac:

Earlier Picks

Kyle Barr / Gizmodo:
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge:
Bloomberg: