Techmeme
March 3, 2021, 8:05 PM

Top News

Mitchell Clark / The Verge:
Google promises it will not build alternate identifiers to track users after phasing out third-party tracking cookies  —  Google says it wants a ‘privacy-first web’  —  Google is slowly phasing out third-party tracking cookies, and today, it's making it clear that it won't just replace …
Alex Konrad / Forbes:
Publicly traded identity management company Okta says it is acquiring Auth0, one of its biggest challengers, in an all-stock deal valued at $6.5B  —  Covering venture capital, software and startups  —  Publicly-traded identity management company Okta is acquiring one of its leading challengers …
Nick Statt / The Verge:
Arizona House passes bill HB2005, which would force Apple and Google to let apps in its app stores use alternative payment methods; bill now heads to AZ Senate  —  The bill, HB2005, opens the door for alternative payment systems on iOS and Android  —  The Arizona House of Representatives …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Netflix launches Fast Laughs, a TikTok-like feed in its mobile apps that presents a string of comedy clips from its stand-up specials, TV series, and movies  —  Netflix just made its iPhone app a little more funny-looking.  —  The streaming giant Wednesday launched Fast Laughs …
Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:
Brave acquires Tailcat, an open source search engine made by the team behind the Cliqz anti-tracking browser, and shares plans to launch Brave Search  —  Brave, the privacy-focused browser co-founded by ex-Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich, is getting ready to launch an own-brand search engine for desktop and mobile.
Juli Clover / MacRumors:
Apple debuts a service to let users transfer iCloud photos and videos to “another participating service” like Google Photos, initially in US and select markets  —  Apple this week introduced a new service that's designed to make it quick and easy for iCloud users to transfer their stored photos and videos to Google Photos.
Axios:
Indie.vc, a six-year-old effort by O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures to invest small amounts in bootstrapped businesses, shuts down after results left LPs unimpressed  —  Indie.vc, an effort launched six years ago to invest small amounts in bootstrapped businesses, announced on Tuesday that it's winding down.
Zack Whittaker / TechCrunch:
Microsoft warns users a new Chinese state-sponsored threat actor is exploiting four previously undisclosed zero days in Exchange Server; patches are available  —  Microsoft is warning customers that a new China state-sponsored threat actor is exploiting four previously undisclosed security flaws …
Sara Fischer / Axios:
Facebook says that on Thursday it will lift the ban on political and social issue ads in the US, imposed after the November election  —  Facebook will finally allow advertisers to resume running political and social issue ads in the U.S. on Thursday, according to a company update.
Joseph Cox / VICE:
Emails show US surveillance company Flock has rolled out a nationwide network of cameras with AI-powered license plate reading tech via 500+ police departments  —  Hundreds of pages of emails obtained by Motherboard show how little-known company Flock has expanded from surveilling individual neighborhoods …
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Twitter says it is testing a new style of displaying tweets that link to e-commerce product pages, after it was spotted by a Twitter for Android user in Qatar  —  Twitter confirmed it's testing a new way to display tweets that link out to e-commerce product pages — like products on a Shopify store, for example.
More: 9to5MacTweets: @yoda
Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Five senators, including Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, ask Amazon about its use of AI-equipped cameras to monitor delivery drivers, after a Feb. report  —  - Five senators wrote a letter to CEO Jeff Bezos on Wednesday, demanding more context around the company's recent deployment …
More: The Hill and CNET
Russell Brandom / The Verge:
After dropping a federal antitrust lawsuit against Amazon, Parler sues in WA state court alleging defamation and breach of contract for AWS account termination  —  The service sued to force Amazon Web Services to restore its account  —  Parler has withdrawn its antitrust lawsuit against Amazon …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft unveils Microsoft Mesh, a mixed-reality platform on Azure, and demos a meeting service to let users join virtual rooms using devices like HoloLens 2  —  Mesh is Microsoft's vision for the future of mixed reality  —  Last week, Microsoft's Alex Kipman, the inventor of Kinect and HoloLens …
Dave Gershgorn / OneZero:
A look at “Sharp Eyes”, a computerized video surveillance program that aims to surveil 100% of Chinese public spaces and relies largely on reports from citizens  —  The program turns neighbors into agents of the surveillance state  —  One of China's largest …

Sponsor Posts

Subquadratic:
Subquadratic: the LLM built for 12M-token reasoning  —  SubQ can reason across entire codebases and document sets in one pass with no RAG workarounds.  Read how SubQ 1.1 Small holds near-perfect retrieval out to 12M tokens.
Cloudflare:
Cloudflare Connect 2026: The Agentic Conference  —  Stop preparing for agents.  Start running them.  100+ sessions, workshops, and speakers from OpenAI, Arm, and Cloudflare across AI, security, and performance.
Zoho:
Now supported: Moving your Docusign templates to Zoho Sign without setting them up from scratch  —  Are you switching from Docusign to Zoho Sign?  Is the thought of losing all your custom templates and having to rebuild them from scratch worrying you?
IDrive:
IDrive Autonomy: low-cost L2+ driver assistance with AI  —  L2+ driver assistance with a scalable AI stack built for automotive companies and laying the foundation for the autonomous future.

Featured Podcasts

Big Technology Podcast:
Cloudflare CEO: We're Ready To Block Millions of Websites From AI — With Matthew Prince
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.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
Data Centers, Elon Musk, and the New Politics of Tech, with David Weigel
Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
Access:
Sam Altman on OpenAI's next model and the AI backlash
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
Uncapped with Jack Altman:
Brian Singerman from GPx
Conversations with people I admire about things I'm genuinely interested in.
Subscribe to Uncapped with Jack Altman.
Training Data:
Making Cities Awesome: Peregrine's Nick Noone & Ben Rudolph
Sequoia Capital partners host conversations with leading AI builders and researchers to develop a deeper understanding of the evolving technologies and their implications.
Subscribe to Training Data.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Connecting the Unconnected: Doreen Bogdan-Martin
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.
Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 8:05 PM ET, March 3, 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

Earlier Picks

New York Times:
LPE Project:
Dell Cameron / Gizmodo:
Bloomberg: