Techmeme
June 27, 2018, 2:35 PM

Top News

Richard Nieva / CNET:
Google opens its human-sounding Duplex AI to a small group of “trusted testers” and businesses that have opted in to receiving calls from Duplex  —  Google is moving ahead with Duplex, the stunningly human-sounding artificial intelligence software behind its new automated system …
Sridhar Ramaswamy / The Keyword:
Google rebrands AdWords as Google Ads, consolidates enterprise tools as Google Marketing Platform, and unifies publisher monetization tools as Google Ad Manager  —  We launched AdWords nearly 18 years ago with a simple goal—to make it easier for people to connect online with businesses.
Shara Tibken / CNET:
Qualcomm unveils Snapdragon Wear 2500 Platform for kids' smartwatches with a quad-core A7 processor, 4G LTE, and 5MP camera  —  Qualcomm is betting more kids will soon be sporting smartwatches.  —  The San Diego chipmaker on Tuesday in Shanghai (Wednesday, China time) …
Mario Tomás Serrafero / XDA Developers:
Shruthi Muraleedharan / Facebook:
Facebook adds a Keyword Snooze button to the News Feed which hides posts containing exact words or phrases for 30 days so users can avoid spoilers  —  Ever read a spoiler online before you've watched the last episode of the season?  Or maybe you waited years for a movie sequel only to have your favorite blogger reveal the ending?
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Microsoft launches Azure IoT Edge out of preview, to help users securely deploy Azure services, AI, and custom logic to IoT devices  —  Microsoft today announced a major update to Azure IoT Edge, its cloud solution for internet of things devices.  It's exiting preview and gaining support …
Tony Romm / Washington Post:
Sources: Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey dined with and consulted Ted Cruz, Mercedes Schlapp, Sean Hannity, and others to assuage complaints of liberal bias  —  Twitter and Facebook are scrambling to assuage conservative leaders who have sounded alarms — and sought to rile voters …
The Information:
Sources: Snap to launch a platform later this year to let outside developers create games that can be played in Snapchat  —  In the past few months, Snap has been lightly dipping its toe into the waters of gaming.  Later this year, it's going to take the plunge.
Mallory Locklear / Engadget:
Twitter adds support for login verification through physical USB security keys, such as YubiKey, as a part of two-factor authentication process  —  Twitter announced today that you can now use a USB security key, such as Yubikey, as part of the two-factor authentication process.
Selina Wang / Bloomberg:
Shannon Liao / The Verge:
Microsoft says it has improved its facial recognition tech to work better with all skin tones, reducing error rates by up to 20 times for people of darker skin  —  Microsoft still has a contract with ICE to use its facial recognition technology  —  Microsoft says its facial recognition tools …
Kia Kokalitcheva / Axios:
Lyft has raised $600M in new funding led by existing investor Fidelity at a post-money valuation of $15.1B  —  Lyft has raised $600 million in new funding led by existing investor Fidelity at a valuation of $15.1 billion post-money, up from $11.7 billion at the previous round.

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Earlier Picks

Rob Price / INSIDER:
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Kurt Wagner / Recode:
Josh Constine / TechCrunch: