Techmeme
January 8, 2020, 12:35 AM

Top News

New York Times:
Andrew Bosworth / Facebook:
Andrew Bosworth publicly releases his internal post on Facebook's role in 2016 election, Cambridge Analytica, polarization, algorithmic transparency, and more  —  The NYT recently obtained a copy of a post I made to the wall of my internal profile within Facebook.
New York Times:
Sonos sues Google, seeking financial damages and a ban on the sale of Google's speakers, smartphones, and laptops in US for allegedly infringing on five patents  —  The maker of home speakers said Google and Amazon stole its technology and abused their power, but it could only risk suing one.
Khari Johnson / VentureBeat:
Google says Assistant now has 500M users and announces upcoming features: Scheduled Actions, privacy-focused voice controls, longform reading, and Sticky Notes  —  Google Assistant is now used by 500 million monthly active users, and today Google is previewing features on the way in 2020 …
Natasha Mascarenhas / Crunchbase News:
Report: pizza-making robot startup Zume, which raised $375M from SoftBank Vision Fund in 2018, plans to lay off up to 400 staff, or about 80% of its employees  —  In a little over a year, pizza-making robot startup Zume has gone from getting $375 million from SoftBank, to pivoting …
Cory Weinberg / The Information:
Sources: Softbank-backed car-rental startup Getaround plans to lay off ~150 employees, or about a quarter of its staff, to mitigate rising costs  —  Car-rental startup Getaround plans to lay off roughly 150 employees, or about a quarter of its staff, in a bid to reduce rising costs, people familiar with the matter said.
Anna Baydakova / CoinDesk:
Telegram says it will not integrate TON Blockchain and a Gram cryptocurrency wallet into its messenger app for now  —  Telegram will not integrate a crypto wallet into its messaging app, at least until it gets the green light from U.S. regulators, the company said Monday on its official website.
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Uber open sources Manifold, a visual tool for debugging AI models that is used in analyzing Uber's Michelangelo ML platform  —  Debugging machine learning (ML) models isn't a walk in the woods.  Just ask the data scientists and engineers at Uber, some of whom have the unenviable task …
Sean Hollister / The Verge:
A look at Intel's NUC 9 Extreme modular desktop, building on previous efforts by combining a compact design with upgradeable parts, coming in March for $1,050+  —  It might change the way mini-PCs are built  —  Today, you can upgrade a desktop PC's gaming performance just by plugging in a new graphics card.
Washington Post:
Facebook bans deepfakes, but its new policy may not cover simpler forms of deception like with the distorted Pelosi video  —  Facebook has banned users from posting computer-generated, highly manipulated videos, known as deepfakes, seeking to stop the spread of a novel form of misinformation months …
Monika Bickert / About Facebook:

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Featured Podcasts

Sources:
Tobi Lütke on the AI agent revolution and future of Shopify
Candid conversations with the leaders shaping what's next in AI and the broader tech industry. Hosted by Alex Heath, who has covered Silicon Valley for more than a decade.
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European Defense Sovereignty Starts in the Factory: Stark's Uwe Horstmann and Johannes Schaback
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The airline CEO putting Starlink on every plane
Stripe cofounder John Collison interviews founders, builders, and leaders over a pint.
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