Techmeme
January 6, 2021, 9:10 AM

Top News

Alexandra Alper / Reuters:
Trump signs an executive order banning transactions with Ant Group's Alipay, Tencent's WeChat Pay and QQ, and five other Chinese payment apps  —  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed an executive order banning transactions with eight Chinese software applications, including Ant Group's Alipay.
Will Heaven / MIT Technology Review:
OpenAI introduces two new GPT-3 models: CLIP, which classifies images into categories from arbitrary text, and DALL·E, which can generate images from text  —  With GPT-3, OpenAI showed that a single deep-learning model could be trained to use language in a variety of ways simply by throwing it vast amounts of text.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Google plans to add privacy labels across its iOS app catalog this week or next, after a report claimed none of Google's iOS apps have been updated since Dec. 7  —  Contrary to reports, Google is not delaying updates to its iOS apps because it doesn't want to comply with Apple's recently announced App Store Privacy Labels policy.
Bloomberg:
Sources: after NYSE said it wouldn't delist China Mobile, China Telecom, and China Unicom, it now mulls reverting to original plan following Mnuchin criticism  —  - Possible reversal follows Mnuchin call to NYSE's Cunningham  — Exchange's surprise announcement caught White House off guard
Pranob Mehrotra / XDA Developers:
WhatsApp updates its Terms and Privacy Policy to mandate data sharing with Facebook, including transaction data, mobile device information, IP address, and more  —  WhatsApp users are receiving an in-app notice today regarding the service's new terms and privacy policy.
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
FBI, CISA, and ODNI, with support from NSA, say an APT “likely Russian in origin” is responsible for all or most of the recently discovered hacks of US agencies  —  Joint statement from the FBI, CISA, ODNI, and NSA says SolarWinds hack was “likely Russian in origin.”
Mike Dano / Light Reading:
Verizon says that it will indefinitely delay the shutdown of its 3G network, after pushing the shutdown from the end of 2019 to the end of 2020  —  Verizon has backtracked on its plan to turn off its 3G network by the end of 2020.  —  In response to questions from Light Reading …
Chance Miller / 9to5Mac:
CIRP: iPhone 12 mini made up 6% of total iPhone sales in US during Oct. and Nov., while the 6.1" iPhone 12 garnered 27% and 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max each took ~20%  —  A new report from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners (CIRP) today seen by 9to5Mac highlights the continued success of the iPhone 12 lineup.
Matt Grossman / Wall Street Journal:
IBM names Gary Cohn, former Goldman Sachs executive and economic adviser to Trump, as its vice chairman and member of its executive leadership team  —  Past Goldman Sachs president named vice chairman as tech icon develops stronger growth strategy  —  International Business Machines Corp …
Lingling Wei / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: China's regulators aim to force Ant Group, which owns Alipay, to share its consumer-credit data with China's central bank or an entity controlled by it  —  Request is part of Beijing's crackdown on what it believes is Ant's unfair advantage over other lenders
Corin Faife / The Markup:
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Veo Technologies, which makes cameras that use AI to record and analyze football and other team sports, raises €20M Series B, source says at a $100M+ valuation  —  Sports have been among some of the most popular and lucrative media plays in the world, luring broadcasters …
Gabriel Geiger / VICE:
Italian court rules a “reliability index” algorithm used by food delivery app Deliveroo to rank riders was discriminatory, ordering €50K paid to suing parties  —  An Italian court determined that companies can be held liable even if an algorithm unintentionally discriminates against a protected group.
Matt Day / Bloomberg:
Amazon says it is buying 11 used Boeing 767-300 planes from Delta and WestJet, the first time the company has purchased aircraft for its air cargo operation  —  - Retailer will buy 11 767-300 planes from Delta, WestJet  — Amazon expects fleet to have more than 85 jets by end of 2022
Eugene Kim / Business Insider:
Sources: Amazon is working on a contactless Alexa-enabled device that can track and monitor sleep apnea, primarily using millimeter-wave radar  —  - Amazon is working on a new Alexa-enabled device that can track and monitor sleep apnea, Business Insider has learned.
More: The Verge
Catherine Shu / TechCrunch:
Indonesian digital investment service Bibit raises $30M led by Sequoia Capital India, bringing its total funding to $45M  —  Bibit, a robo-advisor app that wants to make investing more accessible in Indonesia, has raised $30 million from Sequoia Capital India.
More: Tech in Asia and KrASIA

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Transform ML Experimentation with Tangle  —  Save months of compute time with Tangle, built by Shopify.  Try this open-source platform to simplify ML workflows, ensure reproducibility, and seamlessly share with collaborators.
Zoho:
Contract Signed.  Project Ready.  Tasks Created.  —  Every project begins with a promise; a contract that outlines the deliverables, the timelines, and the terms.  But for most businesses …
Bitrix24:
Bitrix24 powers the next generation of high-performing businesses  —  Chat, projects, CRM, and automation — all in one place.  Replace dozens of tools so your team moves faster, collaborates smarter, and grows effortlessly.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Hard Fork:
OpenAI Calls a 'Code Red' + Which Model Should I Use? + The Hard Fork Review of Slop
The future is already here. Each week, journalists Kevin Roose and Casey Newton explore and make sense of the latest in the rapidly changing world of tech.
Subscribe to Hard Fork.
Access:
Is Roblox making the internet better or worse? We asked the CEO
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
Lenny's Podcast:
Why LinkedIn is turning PMs into AI-powered "full stack builders" | Tomer Cohen (LinkedIn CPO)
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Great Chat:
Code red: our favorite tech rivalries
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
Big Technology Podcast:
How An AI Model Learned To Be Bad — With Evan Hubinger And Monte MacDiarmid
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 9:10 AM ET, January 6, 2021.

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.

More News

Nat Friedman / The GitHub Blog:

Earlier Picks

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Sara Fischer / Axios:
Yang Jie / Wall Street Journal:
Aislinn Keely / The Block: