Techmeme
December 21, 2016, 5:20 PM

Top News

Juli Clover / MacRumors:
After Apple accuses Nokia of collusion with two patent trolls in an anti-trust lawsuit, Nokia sues Apple for infringement on 32 patents  —  Nokia today announced that it has filed several complaints against Apple in Germany and the United States, accusing the Cupertino company of infringing on Nokia patents.
Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:
Nintendo says Super Mario Run was downloaded 40M+ times in its first 4 days of availability, breaking iOS App Store records  —  Nintendo has confirmed what we all knew was likely - Super Mario Run got a lot of downloads at launch.  The company says that the app was downloaded …
Andrew J / The Verge:
Uber debuts several Snapchat filters unlocked in-app which display travel time to destination, the company's logo, more  —  Uber's app just got a lot more snappy  —  Last month, Uber unveiled a totally redesigned and streamlined version of its app that featured a cleaner interface …
Russell Brandom / The Verge:
House Judiciary Committee's Encryption Working Group report says encryption backdoors pose a security threat, siding with tech experts  —  Today, the House Judiciary Committee's Encryption Working Group released its year-end report — and the result is good news for technology companies.
Steven Overly / Washington Post:
White House report: AI will lead to long-term growth in productivity and efficiency but will likely lead to millions of job losses in low-skill sectors  —  The growing popularity of artificial intelligence technology will likely lead to millions of lost jobs, especially among less-educated workers …
Spencer Woodman / The Verge:
Data mining firm Palantir, co-founded by Trump adviser Peter Thiel, has provided help tracking immigrants for US customs and border authorities  —  Training materials obtained by the Electronic Privacy Information Center show Palantir has played a role in a far-reaching customs system
Owen Bowcott / The Guardian:
EU's top court rules “general and indiscriminate retention” of electronic communications is illegal, possibly opening UK's Snoopers Charter to legal challenges  —  Indiscriminate collection of emails is illegal, court rules in response to challenge originally brought by David Davis
Matthew Lynley / TechCrunch:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
eMarketer cuts growth forecasts for US smartwatch market in 2016 from 60% to 25% YoY, citing lack of clear use case  —  Apple may still be claimingthat sales of its Apple Watch are “doing great,” but overall, the wearable device category is failing to grow at the rates forecasted earlier.
Farhad Manjoo / New York Times:
WhatsApp is being used by many immigrants and migrants to stay in touch with family members and friends back home, thanks to its security, simplicity, ubiquity  —  When Facebook bought WhatsApp for more than $19 billion in 2014, Jan Koum, a founder of the messaging company …
Russell Brandom / The Verge:
AT&T announces Call Protect, a new service for automated blocking of spam calls at network level; feature only available on postpaid iOS and Android devices  —  Today, AT&T introduced a new service for automated blocking of fraud or spam calls.  Dubbed AT&T Call Protect …
Ginny Marvin / Marketing Land:
Verizon “supercookie” partner Turn settles with FTC over privacy violations charges that it continued tracking consumers even after they opted out of tracking  —  The ad tech firm was found continuing to track users even after they opted-out.  —  Turn, which operates …
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Facebook partners with 17 universities, including MIT, Stanford, Harvard, and Johns Hopkins, to speed up collaboration on new projects  —  Facebook's shadowy Building 8 research team needs help from academia to invent futuristic hardware.  But today's pace of innovation doesn't allow …
More: USA Today and Fortune
Chris Welch / The Verge:
Sling TV website shows details for AirTV Player, a new Android-powered device with an interface that combines Sling TV with over-the-air broadcasts and Netflix  —  Putting streaming and antenna TV channels all in the same guide  —  Dish's Sling TV website has (perhaps prematurely) unveiled a new set-top box, the AirTV Player.
Matthew Lynley / TechCrunch:
GM will work with 500 Startups to give separate seed investments to five startups in each class, some of which will be outside of automotive tech  —  GM has made a number of big acquisitions and investments in the past few years.  It picked up self-driving company Cruise earlier this year …

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