Techmeme
January 1, 2021, 2:35 PM

Top News

Nicole Perlroth / New York Times:
Microsoft says SolarWinds hackers were able to view some of its source code by hacking into an employee account but were unable to modify code or access emails  —  The hackers gained more access than the company previously revealed, though the attackers were unable to modify code or access emails.
T.C. Sottek / The Verge:
Adobe ends support for Flash and will start blocking Flash content from January 12; major browsers will block Flash content from Jan. 1  —  It's the end of the line  —  Adobe scheduled its famous Flash software to end on December 31st, 2020, and today is the day.
@larsiusprime:
[Thread] As a promised replacement for Flash, HTML5/JS is still in the stone age as a newbie-friendly animation/graphics-first authoring toolset  —  To this day, I am super mad at all the people who put for the codswallop that HTML5 was this perfect replacement for Flash. It's been 10 years since “Thoughts on Flash” was published and HTML5 STILL doesn't (in actual practice) replicate what mattered about Flash.
Daniel Victor / New York Times:
Obituary of FarmVille, which closed on Thursday but lives on in its growth-hacking techniques that are being imitated by everything from Instagram to QAnon  —  The game, a phenomenon a decade ago, is shutting down on Thursday.  But its legacy — for better and for worse — carries beyond gaming.
Siva Vaidhyanathan / New Republic:
Criticism of Facebook must move beyond content moderation issues; the effort to invent and invest in public cultural institutions should be our focus instead  —  Every day, a Twitter account run by Kevin Roose, a technology reporter for The New York Times, posts a list of the top 10 sources …
Max Zimmerman / Bloomberg:
NYSE says it will delist three Chinese companies, China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom, on January 7 to comply with a US EO imposing restrictions  —  The New York Stock Exchange said it will delist three Chinese companies to comply with a U.S. executive order that imposed restrictions …
Adi Robertson / The Verge:
Ticketmaster agrees to pay a $10M fine after admitting to hiring an ex-CrowdSurge staffer and using his credentials to access the rival ticket seller's systems  —  It used stolen login credentials at a company summit  —  Ticketmaster has agreed to pay $10 million for breaking into a competitors' network.
Reuters:
Huawei removes and then reinstates Tencent games on its app stores after a dispute over revenue sharing; source: Huawei insisted on receiving a 50% cut  —  HONG KONG/BEIJING (Reuters) - Tencent's online games were removed and then reinstated on Huawei's app store on Friday in a dispute over revenue sharing by the Chinese companies.
Wall Street Journal:
Top nine streaming services to end 2020 with combined US subscribers up 50%+ YoY; US households now subscribe to 3.1 services on average, up from 2.7 in 2019  —  From Hulu to Disney+, largest streaming services are expected to end the year with 50% more U.S. subscribers
Lauren Hirsch / New York Times:
Source: Amazon's acquisition of Wondery values the podcasting company, which began in 2016, at roughly $300M  —  The deal, valued at $300 million, is the latest in a string of acquisitions as streaming platforms expand beyond music and video.  —  Amazon is acquiring Wondery …
Amazon:
Ben Lovejoy / 9to5Mac:
Report: 10 ex-members of Apple's supplier responsibility team say it avoids or delays removing suppliers guilty of labor violations when doing so hurts business  —  A new report today claims that Apple is reluctant to ban suppliers found guilty of labor violations, and can take years to do so, even in the most serious of cases.

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