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December 17, 2019, 3:35 PM
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memeorandum
WeSmirchTop News
| Wall Street Journal: |
Sources describe Peter Thiel's expanding influence at Facebook, where he advises Zuckerberg on White House dynamics and holding firm on the political ads policy — Billionaire investor thinks political-ad policy shouldn't change; some directors and executives disagree
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Business Insider, Mercury News, CNBC, and Seeking Alpha
| Daniel Cooper / Engadget: |
Googler says she was fired for sending pop-ups on labor rights via modified internal browser plugin; Google: she “abused privileged access” in altering the tool — Google stands accused of firing a fifth employee who was suspected of attempting to organize a labor union at the search giant.
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The Verge, Kathryn Spiers, NBC News, The Guardian, Bloomberg, Telegraph, Mercury News, Ars Technica, The Guardian, Forbes, CNET, Axios, Input, and VICE
Tweets: @aprilaser, @jbu3, @juliacarriew, @hankchizljaw, @worldwise001, @briannawu, @troyceratops, @mer__edith, @aaschapiro, @moonalice, @reckless, @ericajoy, @film_girl, and @aprilaser
| Bret Kinsella / Voicebot.ai: |
Report: Amazon had revenue of $1.4M from Alexa's in-skill purchases in the first ten months of 2019, which was well short of its target of $5.5M — The Information published (N.B. paywall) an article this morning saying that Amazon earned $1.4 million Alexa skill revenue through the first 10 months …
Source:
The Information. More:
Daring Fireball, Variety, and Seeking Alpha
Tweets: @priyasideas, @nickbastone, @mcwm, @mcclure111, @zerohedge, @nachkari, @mattmday, @mathewi, @nickwingfield, @mathewi, @kantrowitz, and @amir
| iFixit News: |
Mac Pro needs little to no tooling for basic fixes and upgrades, scores a 9/10 on repairability; components are modular but some are proprietary, like SSD cards — Teardown of the reinvented 2019 Mac Pro, which returns to a properly repairable design that happens to not grate cheese very well.
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The Verge, Daring Fireball, The Register, Yahoo Finance, Cult of Mac, CNET, iPhone in Canada Blog, AppleInsider, MacDailyNews, iDownloadBlog.com, SlashGear, 9to5Mac, MacRumors, iPhone Hacks, and MSPoweruser. Tweets: @ifixit
| The Information: |
Sources: early last year, Alphabet and Google's leadership set a timeline for its cloud group to best its rivals by 2023, and considered leaving the market — Google's cloud unit, which sells computing services to big companies, is under pressure from top management to pass Microsoft or Amazon …
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CNBC, MSPoweruser, and Seeking Alpha
Tweets: @kmclaughlinsf, @traskjd, @krishnan, @nickwingfield, @jny, @mhbergen, @ryan, @amir, @petebray, and @jessicalessin
| Danny Palmer / ZDNet: |
WhatsApp fixes bug that allowed a rogue group member to render the app unusable, forcing a reinstall and loss of group chat content — Researchers detail security flaw that allowed hackers to crash WhatsApp and permanently delete contents of group chats - and urge users to update the app to protect against attacks.| Paul Ziobro / Wall Street Journal: |
Amazon blocks marketplace sellers from using FedEx Ground for Prime shipments indefinitely over FedEx's “delivery performance” — Amazon cites a decline in FedEx performance heading into the final holiday push — Amazon.com Inc. AMZN .47% is blocking its third-party sellers …
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International Business Times, TechCrunch, The Digital Reader, Input, New York Post, KnowTechie, CNBC, TheStreet, Reuters, Gizmodo, TechCrunch, CNBC, SlashGear, TechSpot, Ars Technica, The Verge, CNN, Associated Press, CNET, PYMNTS.com, Bloomberg, Adweek, GeekWire, Seeking Alpha, Business Insider, and Politico
Tweets: @halsinger, @avajoyewjz, @wsakaren, @mcwm, @matthewkeyslive, @oliviabvoz, @alex, and @harrymccracken
| LogMeIn, Inc.: |
LogMeIn to be acquired by affiliates of PE firm Francisco Partners and Elliott Management for $86.05/share in cash, valuing the company at ~$4.3B — All-Cash Transaction Valued at Approximately $4.3 Billion — LogMeIn, Inc. (NASDAQ: LOGM), a leading provider of cloud-based connectivity …
| Luke Jones / WinBuzzer: |
Microsoft opens the Microsoft Edge Addons store for submissions ahead of Chromium-based Edge launch — Developers can now submit to the Microsoft Edge Addons Store, with existing Chromium extensions migrated automatically. — Microsoft has today announced the Microsoft Edge Addons store is now fully open.
More:
Windows Blog, ZDNet, Thurrott, AskWoody, Input, Ausdroid, Redmond, Neowin, Windows Central, MSPoweruser, and OnMSFT.com
Tweets: @qmatteoq and @msedgedev
| Mayank Parmar / Windows Latest: |
More:
BleepingComputer, Microsoft Docs, Lifehacker, Thurrott, OnMSFT.com, WinBuzzer, The Next Web, MSPoweruser, and gHacks Technology News. Thanks:@windowslatest
| Sara Fischer / Axios: |
Facebook is funding a free 45-minute online Reuters course for journalists on spotting and handling manipulated media, now in English, French, Spanish, Arabic — Facebook is spending six figures to fund a course on manipulated media and deepfakes for newsrooms, executives tell Axios.| Jon Porter / The Verge: |
Lime launches LimePass, a $5/week subscription service that waves the scooter and bike unlock fees; users still pay the per-minute charge for rides — LimePass waves the unlock fee on your rentals — Lime just announced LimePass, a weekly subscription service that waves the unlock fee … | Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch: |
Skyryse demos its Skyryse Flight Stack, which enables existing helicopters to be flown autonomously, says it has raised a total of $38M in funding to date — Skyryse is a three-year old transportation startup that is approaching the future of aviation from a different angle when compared to most.| Paul Sawers / VentureBeat: |
Online training startup Springboard raises $11M led by Reach Capital, partners with Microsoft to train ~5,000 students in three years for data analytics roles — Springboard, an education technology startup that provides training courses for people looking for in-demand technical roles …
More:
EdSurge
| Josh Constine / TechCrunch: |
Instagram expands its fact checking efforts by hiding false content behind warnings, except for politicians, and removing it from Explore and hashtag pages — Instagram is giving politicians the same free reign to spread misinformation as its parent company Facebook.
More:
About Facebook, Washington Post, Engadget, Input, Quartz, Geek.com, Inc42 Media, The Mac Observer, iPhone in Canada Blog, Adweek, Mashable, 9to5Mac, Social Media Today, and The Daily Dot
Tweets: @blakersdozen, @alexeheath, @b52malmet, @joshconstine, @joshconstine, and @jasonabbruzzese
| Sarah Perez / TechCrunch: |
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About Facebook, International Business Times, Geek.com, iMore, Business Insider, Thurrott, Social Media Today, SiliconANGLE, Adweek, Pocket-lint, SlashGear, Firstpost Tech, Wccftech, iPhone Hacks, Cult of Mac, The Next Web, CNET, Neowin, Digital Trends, Gizmodo, infosecurity-magazine.com, WebProNews, and BBC
Tweets: @adibhidayat, @enellaxxx, and @mosseri
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