Techmeme
September 19, 2014, 11:20 AM

Top News

iFixit:
iPhone 6 Plus Teardown  —  Over the years, we've seen the iPhone evolve—and grow.  It began as just the iPhone.  Soon it learned how to 3G, it gained an S (it would lose and gain this every other year), and it even learned to read fingerprints.  Years of hard work and dedication …
Craig Timberg / Washington Post:
Newest Androids will join iPhones in offering default encryption, blocking police  —  The next generation of Google's Android operating system, due for release next month, will encrypt data by default for the first time, the company said Thursday, raising yet another barrier to police gaining access …
Andrew Cunningham / Ars Technica:
iOS 8 on iPhone 4S: cramped screen and 50% more time to do the same tasks compared to iOS 7  —  iOS 8 on the iPhone 4S: Performance isn't the (only) problem  —  The iPhone 4S.  I remember when this was the one that made my old phone feel slow.  —  iPhones have about a year to be top-of-the-line.
Bloomberg:
Larry Ellison steps down as Oracle CEO, appointed CTO, chairman; Mark Hurd and Safra Catz now co-CEOs  —  Oracle's Ellison Steps Down as CEO, Replaced by Hurd and Catz  —  Oracle Corp.'s Larry Ellison stepped down as chief executive officer of the software maker he founded …
Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:
Apple's iPhone 6 And 6 Plus Go On Sale To Long Lines Of Fans  —  Apple started selling its iPhone 6 and 6 Plus today, with sales in-store kicking off at Apple Store retail locations beginning at 8 AM local time.  The lines this year are longer than they have been in recent memory …
Andrew Cunningham / Ars Technica:
iCloud for Windows update means PCs can use iCloud Drive before Macs can  —  iCloud Drive is now available on Windows, but not OS X.  —  Apple officially released iCloud Drive yesterday as part of the iOS 8 update, but it came with a caveat: turning it on disables the “old” way of iCloud syncing …
Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet:
Microsoft cuts 747 employees in Washington state, 2,100 worldwide; closing Silicon Valley research lab  —  Microsoft to close Microsoft Research lab in Silicon Valley  —  Summary: Microsoft Research's Silicon Valley, with about 50 employees, is one of the casualties of Microsoft's latest round of 2,100 job cuts.
Catherine Mayer / TIME:
Bono says U2 and Apple working on new digital music format  —  Exclusive: U2 and Apple Have Another Surprise for You  —  The four members of the legendary Irish band tell TIME about another new album in the works—and its secret Apple project that might just save the music industry
Sean Buckley / Engadget:
Nvidia unveils new flagship GeForce GTX 980 and 970 desktop GPUs based on Maxwell architecture  —  NVIDIA's latest GPU crams 4K images on 1080p displays  —  Back in February, NVIDIA trotted out the very first desktop GPUs to feature its new Maxwell architecture: the GeForce GTX 750 and 750i.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft's next version of Office includes a Clippy-like helper and a very dark theme  —  Microsoft is busy preparing a “Windows Technical Preview” for later this month, but the software maker is also privately testing an “Office Technical Preview” for the next version of its popular Office suite.
Liam Boogar / Rude Baguette:
France's new anti-Uber law gives Taxis an unfair advantage  —  Yesterday evening, the France's National Assembly voted definitively in favor of the pro-taxi “Thévenoud law,” which imposed a certain number of restrictions and regulations on both Taxis and VTC (licensed professional drivers …
More: PandoDaily and EngadgetTweets: @daveg
Peter Kafka / Re/code:
YouTube will spend millions to fund and promote new shows from popular creators  —  YouTube Takes Out Checkbook Again, Pays Its Stars to Make Videos  —  The world's biggest video site is paying people to make videos.  Again.  —  YouTube is planning to invest millions in some of its biggest stars …
Dennis Fisher / Threatpost:
Google, Dropbox, and others launch open source security organization Simply Secure  —  NEW INITIATIVE SIMPLY SECURE AIMS TO MAKE SECURITY TOOLS EASIER TO USE  —  The dramatic revelations of large-scale government surveillance and deep penetration of the Internet by intelligence services …
Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security:
Home Depot: 56M Cards Impacted, Malware Contained  —  Home Depot said today that cyber criminals armed with custom-built malware stole an estimated 56 million debit and credit card numbers from its customers between April and September 2014.  That disclosure officially makes the incident the largest retail card breach on record.
Andrew Allemann / Domain Name Wire:
Amazon pays $4.6M for top level domain name “.buy”, outbidding Google  —  Wow: Amazon.com buys .Buy for $4.6 million, .Tech sells for $6.8 million  —  Amazon.com paid $4.6 million to win rights to .buy top level domain name, but that wasn't the most expensive TLD auction on Wednesday.

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.
Cape:
Most carriers track everything.  Cape doesn't.  —  Unlimited talk, text & data, 24-hr metadata deletion, network ID rotation, SIM-attack defense, and more.  Switch today and get 29% off for life.
Zoho:
App Spotlight: MessageWhiz SMS for Zoho CRM  —  App Spotlight brings you hand-picked solutions that enhance your Zoho apps and tools.  Visit Zoho Marketplace to explore all of our apps, integrations …
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:
Big Tech's Insane Hidden AI Spending, Ranking Anthropic vs. OpenAI, AI For Travel Debate
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:
OpenAI's Two-Week Pause + Jill Lepore on the Threat of the "Artificial State" + Train of Thought
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.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
The $12.5 Billion Lakers, the NFL's TV Fight, and Sports Media's Big Split
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.
Training Data:
Rich Sutton and Khurram Javed: Why AI Models Stop Learning, and How to Start It Again
Sequoia Capital partners host conversations with leading AI builders and researchers to develop a deeper understanding of the evolving technologies and their implications.
Subscribe to Training Data.
Invest Like the Best:
Ben Thompson on Big Tech, China, and the AI Boom Running Out of Money
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Connecting the Unconnected: Doreen Bogdan-Martin
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 11:20 AM ET, September 19, 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

Carmel DeAmicis / Gigaom:
John Cook / GeekWire: