Techmeme: Y Combinator says its online Startup School course will begin running multiple times a year, not just once, and will move to a shorter eight-week format (Greg Kumparak/TechCrunch)

Top News

Shaun Nichols / The Register:

Apple sues former chief architect of the iPhone and iPad microprocessors, who quit in February to start data center chip startup Nuvia, for breach of contract — CEO accused of breaching contract with Cupertino, fires back in court — Apple is suing the former chief architect of its iPhone …

More: Axios, Bloomberg, AppleInsider, Yahoo Finance, The Mac Observer, Business Insider, CNBC, Cult of Mac, iPhone Hacks, 9to5Mac, iPhone in Canada Blog, iMore, Firstpost Tech, and MacDailyNews

Tweets: @rozzie, @baxiabhishek, @patrickmoorhead, and @carnage4life

Juli Clover / MacRumors:

Apple releases more pricing details for Mac Pro, now available to order: maxed-out 4TB model costs $50K+ and wheels are $400, delivering between December 19-27 — Apple's new Mac Pro became available for purchase today, giving us our first look at all of the available upgrade options and pricing tiers.

More: 9to5Mac, The Verge, The Verge, Engadget, AppleInsider, VentureBeat, Computerworld, Digital Trends, 9to5Mac, CNET, MacRumors, MacRumors, MacRumors, Engadget, 9to5Mac, MacRumors, and The Verge

Tweets: @tapbot_paul, @viticci, @flyosity, @katienotopoulos, @joshdickson40, and @wongmjane

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Apple Card's interest-free iPhone installment plan goes live, now with 6% back on Apple purchases through December 31 — Apple is today launching a new feature for Apple Card which allows cardholders to purchase a new iPhone then pay it back over 24 months with no interest.

More: Apple Support, CNET, iMore, MacRumors, VentureBeat, 9to5Mac, iDownloadBlog.com, WebProNews, The Mac Observer, Cult of Mac, Wccftech, and iPhone Hacks. Tweets: @benedictevans

Ryan Mac / BuzzFeed News:

Facebook says it will not weaken end-to-end encryption across its messaging apps, in response to a letter from US AG Bill Barr and UK, Australian officials — Facebook said it would not weaken end-to-end encryption across its messaging apps, despite pressure from world governments …

More: New York Times, The Verge, CyberScoop, Reuters, MIT Technology Review, CNN, About Facebook, CNBC, and BGR

Tweets: @lam_barrett, @mosharrafzaidi, @nytimesbusiness, @rmac18, @roi, @zackwhittaker, and @martinsfp

Ben Thompson / Stratechery:

The differences between “platforms” and “aggregators” show that lawmakers must take different and opposing approaches when attempting to regulate the two — A prompt for writing this piece is a conference I will be participating in tomorrow entitled Antitrust in Times of Upheaval …

More: Boing Boing and Radar

Tweets: @stratechery and @carnage4life

Emil Protalinski / VentureBeat:

Microsoft is bringing its first Office app to Linux with Microsoft Teams, now in public preview — Microsoft today launched Microsoft Teams for Linux in public preview. No, that's not a typo — Microsoft Teams is indeed the first Office app that the company has ported to Linux.

More: TECHCOMMUNITY.MICROSOFT.COM, Thurrott, The Verge, ZDNet, Petri, and Softpedia News

Tweets: @microsoftteams, @lanceulanoff, and @epro

Kate Clark / TechCrunch:

VSCO acquires video editing startup Rylo, which had raised ~$38M, reached a valuation of ~$120.25M, and was backed by Sequoia Capital, among others — The photo-sharing app behind the 2019 meme craze “VSCO girls” has acquired Rylo, a video editing startup founded by the original developer of Instagram's Hyperlapse.

More: VSCO Press and Engadget

Tweets: @joeldflory, @kateclarktweets, @byjoshg, and @kateclarktweets

Paul Sawers / VentureBeat:

North stops selling its Focals smart AR glasses 14 months after debuting them, says it plans to launch a sleeker version with 10x higher resolution in 2020 — North, an augmented reality (AR) wearables company backed by Amazon and Intel, has announced that it's pulling its current Focals smart glasses off …

More: BetaKit, Tom's Hardware, In Focus - North, The Next Web, The Verge, 9to5Mac, 9to5Google, and TechCrunch

Tweets: @focalsbynorth and @paulg

Chance Miller / 9to5Mac:

Apple releases watchOS 6.1.1 and version 13.3 for iOS, iPadOS, and tvOS, with updates to Screen Time, Apple News, support for physical security keys, and more — As expected, Apple today has released iOS 13.3, iPadOS 13.3, tvOS 13.3, and watchOS 6.1.1 to the public.

More: MacRumors, MacRumors.com, The Verge, VentureBeat, Softpedia News, and MacStories. Tweets: @rstephens

Michael Potuck / 9to5Mac:

Report: since Apple debuted Intelligent Tracking Prevention, the cost for advertisers to reach Safari users has dropped 60%+, as such ads are less desirable — In the two years since Apple released Safari's Intelligent Tracking Prevention feature that keeps websites from tracking users around the web …

More: The Information, AppleInsider, iMore, The Overspill, Seeking Alpha, Daring Fireball, Cult of Mac, iPhone Hacks, and The Mac Observer

Tweets: @carnage4life and @jbenton

See also Mediagazer

Adi Robertson / The Verge:

Magic Leap is renaming its AR headset from the Magic Leap One Creator Edition to the Magic Leap 1, as it pivots from consumers to business customers — The same headset, aimed at a different market — Magic Leap is pitching its headset to businesses with a new name.

More: Financial Times, Light Reading, and The Overspill

Tweets: @reckless, @alexeheath, @yoda, @mcwm, @adamjanofsky, @glenngabe, @jessicalessin, and @kentbye

Gregory Barber / Wired:

Analysis shows five cities, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, San Diego, and Boston, gained the lion's share of “innovation industry” US jobs from 2005 to 2017 — Five coastal cities—San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, San Diego, and Boston—gained the lion's share of lucrative “innovation industry” jobs from 2005 to 2017.

More: New York Times, Vox, Brookings, Washington Post, GeekWire, and Axios

Tweets: @brookingsinst, @brookingsmetro, @laurengoode, @theamrc, @brookingsmetro, @ezraklein, @caldbeckj, @michaelcrow, @alecmacgillis, @sdregionaledc, @brookingsinst, and @stevecase

Yuan Yang / Financial Times:

GitHub COO says the company is considering a China-based branch as Chinese developers worry about losing access to open-source software amid US sanctions — GitHub, the world's biggest software development platform, is looking to open a subsidiary in China, as the Chinese government tries …

More: Tom's Hardware, The Guardian, Softpedia News, Gizmodo, SiliconANGLE, KnowTechie, TechCrunch, Neowin, The Hill, Windows Central, Business Insider, Security Affairs, Daring Fireball, and CNET

Tweets: @yuanfenyang and @yuanfenyang

Miles Kruppa / Financial Times:

Dog walking startup Wag says SoftBank no longer has board seats; source: SoftBank has sold its stake back to Wag at a loss after investing $300M in January 2018 — SoftBank Group agreed to sell its nearly 50 per cent stake in Wag back to the dog walking company, ending a disappointing investment …

More: Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, New York Times, Business Insider, Fortune, Silicon Republic, PYMNTS.com, CNN, Seeking Alpha, Bloomberg, socalTECH.com, and CNBC

Tweets: @financialtimes and @aawayne

Greg Kumparak / TechCrunch:

Y Combinator says its online Startup School course will begin running multiple times a year, not just once, and will move to a shorter eight-week format — Back in 2017, Y Combinator began offering a 10 week, once-a-year online course called Startup School.

Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:

Lenovo's Smart Clock gets a Google-powered feature that creates alarm tones with machine learning that are based on the time and weather — Coming first to the Lenovo Smart Clock — Google has an update that might make you hate your alarm a little bit less: a new feature lets …

More: Digital Trends, 9to5Google, VentureBeat, Android Police, Engadget, and TechCrunch

Manish Singh / TechCrunch:

India proposes new data protection bill requiring companies to garner consent from citizens before collecting and processing users' personal data — India has proposed groundbreaking new rules that would require companies to garner consent from citizens in the country before collecting and processing their personal data.

More: MediaNama, The Economic Times, and Firstpost Tech

New York Times:

The UK general election provides new insights into how disinformation spreads online, showing many in the ruling Conservative Party have joined in the practice — Foreign meddling was once the most feared source of online deception before critical elections. Now, some candidates themselves are turning to such manipulative tactics.

More: BBC, International Business Times, and Gizmodo

Tweets: @nytimesbusiness, @lukewsavage, @janebsinger, @dpatrikarakos, @obornetweets, and @karaswisher

Mike Butcher / TechCrunch:

FintechOS, which develops personalized automated financial technology for use by banks and insurers, raises $14M Series A — Over the last few years, we've seen the rise of FinTech startups like N26 and Monzo to challenge the incumbents with new products like challenger banks.

More: PR Newswire, Emerging Europe, Red Herring, FinSMEs, and IBS Intelligence Market News

Mishaal Rahman / XDA Developers:

Google begins rolling out Chrome 79 with new password protections, including notifications for data breaches, and improved phishing prevention tools — Google Chrome 79 is rolling out in the stable channel on all platforms this week, and as always, there are loads of new browser features.

More: Google Online Security Blog, BleepingComputer, 9to5Google, and The Keyword

Ben Gilbert / Business Insider:

Google's virtual assistant-powered robocall screening feature is coming to Pixel 4 this month and to all Pixel devices with Android 10 over the coming weeks — - Google's journey to end automated telemarketing — also known as “robocalls” — is taking another step forward this week …

More: 9to5Google, Android Police, and Android Central

Danny Crichton / TechCrunch:

Popular stock photo service Shutterstock's censoring of content to appease the Chinese government shows that some US companies choose to forget about US values — It's among the most iconic images of the last few decades — a picture of an unknown man standing before a line of tanks during …

More: PCMag. Tweets: @greatfirechina

Thomas Brewster / Forbes:

Avast explains how it has been monetizing browsing habits of its users since 2013, after Mozilla and Opera removed some Avast tools from their add-on stores — Avast, the multibillion-dollar Czech security company, doesn't just make money from protecting its 400 million users' information.

More: Chrome Unboxed. Tweets: @lorenzofb, @forbes, and @iblametom

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