Techmeme
February 7, 2021, 3:15 PM

Top News

New York Times:
Leaked cellphone data from the siege at the Capitol demonstrates how advertising IDs can be used to identify and track the movement of specific individuals  —  Times Opinion was able to identify individuals from a trove of leaked smartphone location data.  —  Mr. Warzel and Mr. Thompson are writers in Opinion.
Julian Chokkattu / Wired:
A look at Metalenz, which aims to replace multiple lens elements in smartphone cameras with a single lens system that utilizes optical metasurfaces technology  —  The optics in your smartphone have been pretty much the same for more than a decade.  That's about to change.
Will Oremus / OneZero :
Unlike established social media platforms, Clubhouse is built to replicate real world social structures, norms, and status hierarchies rather than collapse them  —  The hot new social app has found success by replicating real-world social structures rather than exploding them
Mark Stenberg / Medialyte:
Karen Hao / MIT Technology Review:
Study of 130+ facial recognition data sets compiled over 43 years: driven by ML's data needs, researchers gradually abandoned asking for people's consent  —  The largest ever study of facial-recognition data shows how much the rise of deep learning has fueled a loss of privacy.  —  hide
Carolina Milanesi / Fast Company:
Interview with Samsung VP Jaeyeon Jung on the new Galaxy SmartTag and how it fits into the SmartThings ecosystem, which as of December had 66M active users  —  While the Apple world waits patiently for an “AirTags” announcement, Samsung is already shipping its remote location device, the Galaxy SmartTag.
Jon Fingas / Engadget:
As protests grow in Myanmar, NetBlocks says the country's internet connectivity fell to 16% of ordinary levels, indicating a near-total internet shutdown  —  Myanmar's military leaders are extending their  —  internet restrictions in a bid to limit protests against their coup.
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Washington Post:
Jody Williams, the owner of TheDonald's domain name, explains why he pulled the plug on the pro-Trump forum that became a staging ground for the Capitol attack  —  The Army veteran, a site moderator who owned its domain, watched with growing alarm as racism, threats and QAnon references flourished on the pro-Trump site.
Ashley Gold / Axios:
Microsoft suspends contributions for the rest of the 2022 election cycle to all members of Congress who voted to object to the presidential election results  —  Microsoft announced Friday it will suspend contributions for the rest of the 2022 election cycle to all members of Congress who voted …
Adam Ciralsky / Vanity Fair:
Profile of BitMEX cofounder Arthur Hayes, who remains at large after the CFTC filed a suit against BitMEX for allegedly running an unregistered trading platform  —  The BitMEX cofounder created a cryptocurrency exchange that has traded trillions.  Now he's wanted by U.S. authorities …
Christopher Mims / Wall Street Journal:
Andy Jassy is said to be “warmer and fuzzier” than Bezos, but as Amazon's next CEO, he faces many hurdles if he wants its tech to manage workers more humanely  —  One secret of Amazon's ability to grow rapidly: software and algorithms that manage its millions of employees and marketplace sellers …

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Featured Podcasts

The Talk Show With John Gruber:
'You're Going to Have the Niggles', With Christina Warren
The director's commentary track for Daring Fireball. Long digressions on Apple, technology, design, movies, and more.
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Big Technology Podcast:
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Hard Fork:
The Ezra Klein Show: How Fast Will A.I. Agents Rip Through the Economy?
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.
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Everybody Goes Home: How technology is helping prevent wildfires from spreading
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
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More News

Wall Street Journal:
Kaveh Waddell / Consumer Reports:
Andy Greenberg / Wired:

Earlier Picks

Emily Birnbaum / Protocol:
Ben Gilbert / Insider: