Techmeme
April 21, 2017, 10:50 AM

Top News

Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet:
Microsoft says it will now roll out twice yearly updates for Windows and Office in March and September, starting with “Redstone 3”  —  IT Pros, mark your calendars.  Starting in September 2017 with Windows 10 ‘Redstone 3,’ Microsoft will begin rolling out new feature updates …
Chris Welch / The Verge:
Google Home now supports up to six users and can distinguish voice of speaker to provide personalized results, available in US, expanding to UK within months  —  Up to six people can train Home to recognize their voice  —  Google Home can now be trained to identify the different voices of people you live with.
Rolfe Winkler / Wall Street Journal:
Elon Musk reveals plans for his startup Neuralink, says initial focus is on developing neural implants for treating brain injuries, to explore telepathy later  —  Startup Neuralink aims to treat disabled and ultimately create a new language of ‘consensual telepathy’
Michael Nunez / Gizmodo:
Plastc, the all-in-one smart payment card that raised $9M+ in preorders and failed to ship any product, says it will file for bankruptcy  —  There are dozens of ways to pay for things, but apparently, the world was not ready for one more.  Plastc, the company that promised to put …
Greg Barbosa / 9to5Mac:
Apple releases a JavaScript API for Live Photos, allowing playback on the web  —  Following up on Tumblr's own implementation of Live Photos for the web, Apple has released an official Live Photos JavaScript API.  Developers will be able to use the new API to share Live Photos playback on iOS, macOS, and the web.
George Slefo / Ad Age:
Google, Microsoft, major ad buyers and publishers coordinating on ad blocking plan, says Coalition for Better Ads' counsel, who expects a rollout by end-of-year  —  The biggest players in advertising and tech are mapping out a strategy to kill off the digital ads that have been deemed as the absolute worst by consumers.
Yaniv Feldman / Geektime:
Sources: Snapchat acquired geofilter patent from defunct Instagram competitor Mobli for $7.7M  —  After 6 years, 86 Million Dollars in funding, a peak of 23 Million users and 4 different products, today marked the what seems to be the final chapter for Mobli, with the sale of one of its patents to Snap Inc.
Peter Kafka / Recode:
Source: Oracle will pay more than $850M for digital ad tracking company Moat  —  A big bet on ad tech.  —  Oracle will pay more than $850 million to acquire Moat, a company that tracks digital ads, according to a person familiar with the deal.  —  Oracle announced its planned acquisition earlier …
Matthew Nussbaum / Politico:
Trump misses 90-day deadline to publish cybersecurity plan after alleged Russian hacking in 2016 election, and there is no evidence of anyone working on it  —  He pledged in January to quickly develop a program for countering hackers, but no one seems to know who's in charge of developing it or where it is.

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:
Zoho Books introduces the Landlords edition in the UK  —  Managing rental properties in the UK has long involved a messy mix of spread-out receipts, manual spreadsheets, and end-of-year tax scrambles.
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

Channels with Peter Kafka:
Lucas Shaw on Warner Bros' Limbo, Netflix's Anxiety, and Hollywood's Sort-of Comeback [7:09 PM]
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.
Big Technology Podcast:
How China Caught U.S. AI — With Grace Shao
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.
Training Data:
Building the Automated AGI Lab: Core Automation's Jerry Tworek and Rohan Anil
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.
Uncapped with Jack Altman:
Tony Xu from DoorDash
Conversations with people I admire about things I'm genuinely interested in.
Subscribe to Uncapped with Jack Altman.
Invest Like the Best:
Sam Altman - How to Make an Abundant Future
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 10:50 AM ET, April 21, 2017.

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

Jem Aswad / Variety:

Earlier Picks

Tony Romm / Recode:
Joshua Goldman / CNET:
Kurt Wagner / Recode:
Cherlynn Low / Engadget:
Larry Dignan / ZDNet:
Ian Murphy / Enterprise Times: