Techmeme
February 17, 2016, 6:00 PM

Top News

Tim Cook / Apple:
Apple opposes court order over shooter's iPhone, says US government is asking it to build a backdoor to the iPhone, calls it a “dangerous precedent”  —  A Message to Our Customers  —  The United States government has demanded that Apple take an unprecedented step which threatens the security of our customers.
More: Politico, Internet Society, Fight for the Future, Reuters, Wall Street Journal, Electronic Frontier Foundation, ReadWrite, TechCrunch, New York Times, Quartz, CircleID, Guardian, The Verge, The Next Web, Ars Technica, CSO, NPR, BGR, Washington Post, The Register, The Register, Forbes, iMore, BuzzFeed, Vox, Macworld, Fortune, AVC, CNN, SiliconValley.com, New York Times, AppleInsider, The Verge, Adweek, CNET, Marco.org, Michael Geist, The Intercept, Freedom to Tinker, CNNMoney, BBC, eWeek, International Business Times, Digital Trends, Guardian, 9to5Mac, Daring Fireball, Business Insider, BetaNews, Techvibes Global News, Bloomberg Business, Tech Trader Daily, MacNN, Mashable, Christian Science Monitor, POPSUGAR, NPR, Wired, Shadowproof, FierceCIO News, Re/code, Tech Insider, Associated Press, Hit & Run, Patently Apple, Forrester Blogs, Gizmodo, The San Diego Union …, The Tech Report, Boing Boing, DSLreports, Slate, PhoneArena, Nextgov, Guardian, The Daily Dot, Investor's Business Daily, American Enterprise Institute, Fusion, Very Biased Reviews, MacRumors, Salon, The Tech Portal, iPhone Hacks, Refinery29, Neowin, InvestorPlace, Schneier on Security, PCWorld, WindowsITPro, TIME, Naked Security, Six Colors, SiliconBeat, MacRumors, iLounge, GamePolitics, New York Magazine, The Loop, US News, BostonGlobe.com, Tech Times, and USA Today
Dan Guido / Trail of Bits Blog:
iPhone 5C lacks Secure Enclave, makes it technically feasible for Apple to comply with court order over San Bernadino shooter  —  Apple can comply with the FBI court order  —  Earlier today, a federal judge ordered Apple to comply with the FBI's request for technical assistance in the recovery of the San Bernadino gunmen's iPhone 5C.
Romain Dillet / TechCrunch:
White House Plays With Words, Says Department Of Justice Isn't Asking Apple To Create A Backdoor  —  Following Tim Cook's letter, the White House has reacted to Apple's strong stance against backdoors.  According to Reuters, the White House has said that the Department of Justice isn't asking …
Ellen Nakashima / Washington Post:
Court orders Apple to disable 10-tries-and-wipe feature on San Bernadino shooter's iPhone to allow government to crack password through brute force  —  U.S. wants Apple to help unlock iPhone used by San Bernardino shooter  —  A federal judge has ordered Apple to help the government unlock …
Ken Yeung / VentureBeat:
Twitter rolling out a new GIF button for iOS, Android, and Twitter.com over coming weeks, in partnership with Giphy and Riffsy  —  Twitter rolls out native GIF support in partnership with Giphy and Riffsy  —  Twitter has added native support for GIFs, thanks to its partnership with Giphy and Riffsy.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Google launches Gmailify to let users of non-Gmail accounts take of advantage of Gmail's best features like spam detection, Google Now integrations, more  —  Google Launches “Gmailify” - A Way To Use Gmail's Best Features With Non-Gmail Accounts  —  Since early 2015, Google's Gmail Android app …
Kara Swisher / Re/code:
Yahoo Tech Editor in Chief Dan Tynan is out; Yahoo's tech site will be integrated into its larger news site; David Pogue will stay with the company  —  If It's Wednesday, It's Layoffs Day at Yahoo: Today, Digital Magazines Get Hit  —  According to sources close to the situation …
Office Blogs:
Outlook.com exits preview, gets major update including @mentions in emails, side-by-side doc and email editing, Giphy integrations  —  Outlook.com—out of preview and better than ever  —  The Outlook team is on a mission to bring you the best email and calendar experience—at work, at home—across all your favorite devices.
Lukas I. Alpert / Wall Street Journal:
Facebook announces that all publishers and bloggers worldwide can adopt Instant Articles beginning April 12  —  Facebook Will Make Instant Articles Available to All Publishers  —  As of April 12, almost a year after launch, any publisher can host content directly on the social media site
Larry Dignan / ZDNet:
NetApp to cut 12 percent of its workforce amid weaker sales  —  NetApp said it will restructure so it can invest in key areas like all-flash arrays.  The third quarter sales and outlook for the company missed the mark.  —  NetApp's will lay off 12 percent of its workforce following a rough third quarter and outlook.
More: Reuters
Astro Teller / Backchannel:
Plenty of Google X moonshot ideas are ditched, with 100 investigations killed last year, including vertical farming and variable buoyancy cargo ship projects  —  The Secret to Moonshots?  Killing Our Projects  —  At X, I see up close every day how messy innovation is
Adi Robertson / The Verge:
Leap Motion demos Orion, a motion tracking system and sensor for VR headsets  —  Leap Motion's revamped hand tracking is getting built straight into VR headsets  —  When Leap Motion was announced in 2012, it seemed like a solution looking for a problem.  A little black box that plugged …
Anthony D'Alessandro / Deadline:
NBCUniversal's Fandango buys Rotten Tomatoes and Flixster; Warner Bros. will take minority stake in Fandango  —  Fandango Acquires Rotten Tomatoes & Flixster From Warner Bros Entertainment  —  BREAKING: Fandango is set to acquire Flixster and Rotten Tomatoes, which includes …
Jordan Novet / VentureBeat:
GitHub launches templates for new issues and pull requests  —  GitHub today announced the availability of templates that repository maintainers can add to forms for new issues and pull requests.  The move might sound like a small thing, but it could result in more civil discussion among GitHub users.
More: GitHub and The Next Web
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Google launches TensorFlow Serving, an open source project for taking machine learning models into production  —  Google Makes It Easier To Take Machine Learning Models Into Production  —  Google launched TensorFlow Serving today, a new open source project that aims to help developers …

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