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Techmeme
July 11, 2019, 7:50 PM
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The Keyword:
Google admits one of its language reviewers leaked confidential Dutch audio data and says it is investigating the issue  —  We're focused on building products that work for everyone, and as part of this, we invest significant resources to ensure that our speech technology works for a wide variety of languages, accents and dialects.
Tom Simonite / Wired:
Belgian broadcaster obtains 1,000+ Google Assistant audio clips from a Google contractor, some of which seem to be recorded inadvertently and may violate GDPR
The Information:
Sources: Bird lost about $100M in the first quarter, with revenue shrinking to about $15M, and the company told people that it has about $100M in cash left  —  The wintertime was bleak for Bird.  In this year's first quarter, the electric scooter operator lost nearly $100 million …
Tom Simonite / Wired:
Facebook says its AI bot Pluribus, developed in collaboration with Carnegie Mellon, is the first such bot to beat top pros at six-player No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em  —  The 32-year-old is the only person to have won four World Poker Tour titles and has earned more than $7 million at tournaments.
Matthew Panzarino / TechCrunch:
Apple says it has temporarily disabled the Apple Watch Walkie Talkie app, due to a vulnerability that could allow iPhone eavesdropping, while it works on a fix  —  Apple has disabled the Apple Watch Walkie Talkie app due to an unspecified vulnerability that could allow a person to listen …
Katie Notopoulos / BuzzFeed News:
Facebook is starting to show users which marketing and data companies have your data, how an ad was targeted, and how to opt-out  —  The new tool tells you how an ad was targeted and which third-party agency or data broker was used.  It also links to pages to opt out.
Casey Newton / The Verge:
Twitter was down globally for just over an hour today as the White House “social media summit” kicked off  —  When in doubt, ban yourself  —  Twitter appeared to be down for a large number of users across the United States on Thursday.  The company confirmed the issue to The Verge …
Todd Bishop / GeekWire:
Amazon says it will spend $700M to retrain 100K, or about a third, of its US employees by 2025, acknowledging the impact of technology and automation on jobs  —  Amazon is embarking on a $700 million effort to retrain its U.S. workforce, in a high-profile acknowledgment of the impact …
The Daily Beast:
WH doesn't seem to have invited anyone banned from major social media platforms to the “social media summit”, organized to lament alleged bias behind such bans  —  No one who is invited to the summit has actually been banned from social platforms.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft says its Slack competitor, Teams, now has 13M+ daily active users and 19M+ weekly active users; in a filing in April, Slack said it has 10M DAUs  —  Microsoft's first set of user numbers  —  Microsoft is finally revealing exactly how many people are using its Slack competitor Microsoft Teams.
Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:
Twitter says it will test a feature to let users hide replies to their tweets starting next week in Canada  —  Twitter users are getting more control over which comments are visible in the conversations they start.  —  The company has been testing and talking about this feature since earlier this year …
Anna Nicolaou / Financial Times:
Sources: Amazon Music Unlimited's subscribers grew ~70% in the past year, compared to ~25% for Spotify; in April Amazon had 32M+ music subscribers in total  —  Amazon is adding subscribers to its music-streaming service at a faster rate than rivals such as Spotify, Apple and Google …
Sam Rutherford / Gizmodo:
Google is testing Shoelace, a hyper-local social networking iOS and Android app, based on shared interests around events and activities, starting in NYC  —  Google has never made a successful social network, but you have to give the company some credit for never giving up.
Ashley Carman / The Verge:
Nielsen says it will start surveying podcast listeners about their consumption habits, including genre preferences and how long they listen to shows  —  More data on listeners  —  Nielsen, a company best known for tracking TV shows' popularity, is getting into the podcast data collection business.
Ryan Gallagher / The Intercept:
A US nonprofit org founded by Google and IBM is working with a company helping China's government secretly monitor phone and internet activity of 200M people  —  An American organization founded by tech giants Google and IBM is working with a company that is helping China's authoritarian …
Alex Fang / Nikkei Asian Review:
Beijing-based Geek+, which makes autonomous robots that can sort and transport goods at warehouses, raises $150M Series C1 led by GGV Capital  —  Tech unicorn eager to expand automation services but faces stiff competition  —  NEW YORK — Beijing-based logistics robotics startup Geek …

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About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 7:50 PM ET, July 11, 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

Barbara Moens / Financial Times:
Sources: the EU is set to approve Paramount's $111B WBD takeover provided the company accepts certain remedies, the details of which are still being worked out

Ethan Millman / The Hollywood Reporter:
Court docs: Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino spoke with President Trump in the weeks before the company settled with the DOJ in its monopoly lawsuit

Thomas Buckley / Bloomberg:
Sony Pictures Entertainment invests $100M in Cosm, a startup specializing in immersive, large-screen theaters, which has partnerships with NBCUniversal and WBD

More News

E. Tammy Kim / New Yorker:
A look at the practice of personalized learning, an individual-comes-first approach usually aided by tech, and how it is applied in many Rhode Island schools

Earlier Picks

Frank Chaparro / The Block:
SEC approves the first-ever regulated token offering, letting blockchain startup Blockstack offer $28M in tokens under Regulation A+, an alternative to IPOs
Mikey Campbell / AppleInsider:
Kuo: Apple's 2020 iPhone will include a smaller TrueDepth camera, reducing the size of the notch, and a rear-facing camera with a seven-piece lens system
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