Techmeme
August 27, 2014, 9:25 AM

Top News

Bloomberg:
Apple Said to Prepare New 12.9-Inch IPad for Early 2015  —  Apple Inc.'s suppliers are preparing to manufacture the company's largest-ever iPad, with production scheduled to commence by the first quarter of next year, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
Walt Mossberg / Re/code:
Tim Cook says the recent slump in iPad sales is just a “speed bump”  —  In Defense of Tablets  —  The tablet is doomed.  It was a fad.  Who needs one, anyway?  —  At least that's the conventional wisdom forming around the iPad and other tablets in the wake of some recent negative sales news.
Casey Newton / The Verge:
Documents and interviews reveal Uber's sophisticated, nationwide scheme to poach Lyft drivers  —  This is Uber's playbook for sabotaging Lyft  —  ‘Brand ambassadors’ with burner phones and credit cards attempt to #shavethestache  —  Uber is arming teams of independent contractors …
Claire Cain Miller / New York Times:
Pew study shows social media users are more reluctant than others to share their dissenting views, online or off  —  How Social Media Silences Debate  —  The Internet might be a useful tool for activists and organizers, in episodes as momentous as the Arab Spring or as trivial as the Ice Bucket Challenge.
Lizette Chapman / Wall Street Journal:
Jessica Alba's The Honest Co. Raises $70M, Preps for IPO … In preparation for an IPO, Jessica Alba's The Honest Co., a maker of eco-friendly baby products, has raised $70 million at a valuation just shy of $1 billion and is beginning partnership talks to expand to China, Dow Jones VentureWire has learned.
Wall Street Journal:
Kleiner Perkins investing up to $20M in Snapchat's next round at nearly $10B valuation; DST Global invested earlier this year at $7B valuation  —  Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers Agrees to Invest in Snapchat  —  Ephemeral Messaging Service Gets a Venture-Capital Shot in the Arm
Ari Levy / CNBC:
Square raising $200M, partly from Government of Singapore Investment Corporation, at $6B valuation  —  In raising cash, Square heads for $6B valuation: Sources  —  Square, the payments provider that turns any smartphone into a credit card terminal, is in the process of raising capital …
Winston Ross / MIT Technology Review:
Luth gathers metadata from smartphones, tablets and PC's, pays participants $100/month  —  How Much Is Your Privacy Worth?  —  Despite the outcry over government and corporate snooping, some people allow themselves be monitored for money or rewards.  —  Anyone paying attention knows …
Kevin C. Tofel / Gigaom:
Video and HD Voice over LTE on the way to Verizon in the “coming weeks”  —  Verizon is the last major U.S. carrier to get the VoLTE ball rolling but the wait is nearly over.  Soon, the company will introduce Advanced Calling 1.0 with video calls and HD Voice across its LTE network.
Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:
Netflix says 99 percent of its links with ISPs are unpaid  —  Netflix hates writing checks to Internet service providers—and luckily enough, it usually doesn't have to.Though the streaming video company has complained bitterly about having to pay Comcast, AT&T, Verizon …
More: DailyTech and BGR.  Tweets: @jbrodkin
Matthew Prince / CloudFlare Blog:
CloudFlare's global connectivity costs suggest telco consolidation increases bandwidth prices for companies  —  The Relative Cost of Bandwidth Around the World  —  Over the last few months, there's been increased attention on networks and how they interconnect.
Agam Shah / PC World:
HP recalls 6 million laptop power cords over fire, burn risk  —  Hewlett-Packard has recalled more than 6 million laptop power cords that could pose fire and burn hazards.  —  HP is recalling LS-15 AC power cords used with HP and Compaq branded laptops.  The company is recalling …
Cliff Kuang / Wired:
Instagram releases Hyperlapse iOS app for creating fast, smooth time-lapse videos  —  Hyperlapse, Instagram's New App, Is Like a $15,000 Video Setup in Your Hand  —  Today, Instagram is lifting the veil on Hyperlapse, the company's first-ever app outside of Instagram itself.

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.
Cloudflare:
Cloudflare Connect 2026: The Agentic Conference  —  Stop preparing for agents.  Start running them.  100+ sessions, workshops, and speakers from OpenAI, Arm, and Cloudflare across AI, security, and performance.
Zoho:
The 90-day recognition cliff: Why praise programs fade, and what keeps them alive  —  Recognition programs often start with enthusiasm.  Employees participate, managers share shoutouts, and teams have a new way to celebrate achievements.
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:
SAP CEO: AI Won't Kill Software, But It Will Change Your Job — With Christian Klein
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:
David Ellison's Paramount-Warner Empire & The Fight That Comes Next
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.
Sources:
Factory CEO on why AGI is already here
Candid conversations with the leaders shaping what's next in AI and the broader tech industry. Hosted by Alex Heath, who has covered Silicon Valley for more than a decade.
Subscribe to Sources.
Invest Like the Best:
Noah Shinn - Building Instinct: The Personal Agent
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
Lenny's Podcast:
The grief, loneliness, and burnout sweeping through the tech industry right now | Molly Graham
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.
Great Chat:
Doomers at Dreamforce
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.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 9:25 AM ET, August 27, 2014.

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

Earlier Picks

Barry Levine / VentureBeat: