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January 8, 2019, 3:25 PM
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Top News

Joseph Cox / Motherboard:
Investigation shows how easy and affordable obtaining cellphone customers' real-time location data can be, as T-Mobile, Sprint, and AT&T peddle it to middlemen  —  T-Mobile, Sprint, and AT&T are selling access to their customers' location data, and that data is ending up in the hands …
Lauren Goode / Wired:
Google debuts Interpreter Mode in Google Assistant for smart displays and speakers, to translate languages in real-time for people in the same physical space  —  OVER THE PAST year Google has been making its virtual assistant, the eponymous Google Assistant, more capable of handling …
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Google is evolving Assistant to combat Alexa by adding flight check-ins, helping developers integrate services via a new Assistant Connect platform, and more  —  Today, Google is showing off auto-translation on smart display speakers, letting you naturally talk to each other with the speaker acting as the translator automatically.
Ben Thompson / Stratechery:
Apple erred on China and “S” cycles, XR, and growth strategies, but reasons for optimism remain as headwinds, like cheap battery swaps, will fade  —  As rare as last week's Apple revenue warning from CEO Tim Cook may have been — the company last issued a revenue warning in June 2002 …
Sam Kim / Bloomberg:
Samsung forecasts decline in Q4 operating profit to ~$9.65B, below analyst estimates of ~$12.4B, due to weak memory chip demand and competition in smartphones  —  Samsung Electronics Co. posted fourth-quarter profit below estimates as demand for memory chips slumps amid deteriorating relations between the U.S. and China.
Axios:
Amazon is quietly piloting a program for brands like Folgers to pay to send free samples to Amazon users, who are likely to enjoy them based on order history  —  Amazon is quietly piloting a program to let brands like Maybelline and Folgers pay to send free samples to consumers …
Mark Zuckerberg:
Mark Zuckerberg says his challenge for 2019 is to host a series of public discussions about the future of technology in society  —  Every year I take on a personal challenge to learn something new.  I've built an AI for my home, run 365 miles, visited every US state, read 25 books, and learned Mandarin.
Salvador Rodriguez / CNBC:
Over a dozen ex-Facebook employees detail how the company's leaders and stacked ranking performance reviews foster a culture where any dissent is discouraged  —  - More than a dozen former Facebook employees detailed how the company's leadership and its performance review system has created a culture where any dissent is discouraged.
Andrew Ross Sorkin / New York Times:
Lambda School, which trains students online to be software engineers in exchange for a share of future income, raises $30M Series B from Bedrock, GV, YC, others  —  Income Sharing Agreements are gaining the attention of higher education and Wall Street.  One early success story is getting a boost from venture capital.
Melissa Eddy / New York Times:
Twenty-year-old German man admits to stealing and publishing data on hundreds of lawmakers, journalists, and other figures from every party except far-right AfD  —  BERLIN — A 20-year-old German student took advantage of passwords as weak as “Iloveyou” and “1234” to hack into online accounts …
Ron Amadeo / Ars Technica:
AT&T has rolled out software updates to some Android phones changing its branding of 4G LTE to “5G E”, says that 5G with mmWave technology will be branded “5G+”  —  AT&T starts swapping out “4G” status bar icons with “5GE.”  —  There's a new cellular network technology …
Washington Post:
Facebook is investigating whether News for Democracy, a left-leaning organization backed by Reid Hoffman, violated its community standards and ad policies
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Hulu says it passed 25M subscribers at the end of 2018, a ~47% YoY increase, with avg. daily watch time up 20% for the year; ad revenue rose 45%+ YoY to ~$1.5B  —  Hulu is keeping its pedal to metal in the streaming TV race: The company said it ended 2018 with more than 25 million total subscribers …

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This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 3:25 PM ET, January 8, 2019.

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.

From Mediagazer

CNN:
Sources: Pete Hegseth pushed for two F-15 crew members rescued from Iran to join a 60 Minutes story; Bari Weiss lobbied Hegseth to give CBS exclusive access

Jack Dunn / Variety:
Leaked report: Paramount leaving California “would result in losses of 2,750 and 5,550 job-years”, and economic losses between $1.01B-$2.03B for the state

Michael Donohoe / News Product Alliance:
Rest of World's chief product officer, Michael Donohoe, explains how the outlet tested a registration wall and plans to move beyond registration to membership

More News

Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
Alienware unveils the Area-51m, an ultra-powerful gaming laptop with a 17.3" 1080p display that's designed to let users swap out parts, starting at $2,549
Taylor Lorenz / The Atlantic:
Instagram accounts were allegedly coordinating sharing of child porn using hashtags, then a viral campaign spotlighted it, and finally Instagram banned the tags

Earlier Picks

Tom Warren / The Verge:
Intel demos its first 10nm Ice Lake chip, which is based on its Sunny Cove architecture, says PCs with the processor will ship by the end of 2019
CoinDesk:
Coinbase says it's halted Ethereum Classic transactions, withdrawals, and deposits, after a 51% attack on the cryptocurrency led to coin double-spending
Financial Times:
Sources: SoftBank has radically scaled back plans for fresh investment in WeWork, is now planning a $2B investment, down from $16B considered late last year
Paul Sawers / VentureBeat:
Kroger partners with Microsoft, rolls out a pilot project in two stores with digital shelves, guided shopping, personalized ads, and “pick-to-light” shelf tech
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