Techmeme: Court filing: Tim Cook, Phil Schiller, Craig Federighi, Eddy Cue, and ex-iOS software chief Scott Forstall are among witnesses to testify in Epic vs Apple trial (Juli Clover/MacRumors)

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March 21, 2021, 5:00 PM

Top News

Bloomberg:

Texas jury finds Apple infringed a DRM patent held by Personalized Media, and orders Apple to pay $308.5M to the company — Apple must pay $308.5 million to closely held Personalized Media Communications after a federal jury in Marshall, Texas, decided on Friday that the tech giant infringed …

More: Engadget, The Verge, iTnews, Reuters, MSPoweruser, iPhone Hacks, FOSS Patents, FOSS Patents, 9to5Mac, iMore, MacRumors, and AppleInsider. Tweets: @brianfagioli

Juli Clover / MacRumors:

Court filing: Tim Cook, Phil Schiller, Craig Federighi, Eddy Cue, and ex-iOS software chief Scott Forstall are among witnesses to testify in Epic vs Apple trial — Apple today submitted its witness list for its upcoming bench trial with Epic Games, and several Apple executives will be testifying …

More: Bloomberg, Insider, The Verge, Engadget, TechCrunch, iMore, Reuters, Gizchina, CNET, iPhone in Canada Blog, HotHardware.com News, 9to5Mac, AppleInsider, and Scribd

Tweets: @keleftheriou, @dylanmcd8, @iconredesign, and @markgurman

Nikhilesh De / CoinDesk:

Coinbase will pay a $6.5M fine to settle with the CFTC, over allegations that it self-traded cryptocurrencies between 2015 and 2018 — Coinbase will pay a $6.5 million fine to settle allegations it self-traded cryptocurrencies between 2015 and 2018. — Crypto exchange Coinbase …

More: CFTC, Engadget, Wall Street Journal, NewsBTC, The Verge, Cointelegraph, Decrypt, BitcoinExchangeGuide, Ethereum World News, and Reuters

Tweets: @edanyago, @cipher_blade, @ann_arcana, @evan_lorenz, @jeffjohnroberts, @davidshares, @sbf_alameda, and @ahcastor

Gilad Edelman / Wired:

Google's plan to remove third-party cookies from Chrome does little to change the underlying dynamics of the surveillance-based behavioral advertising industry — The demise of surveillance capitalism has been greatly exaggerated. — GOOGLE GOT SOME good press a few weeks ago when it announced …

More: Forbes. Tweets: @tariqkrim, @emergtechethics, @jason_kint, @chrismessina, @julie17usc, @dsilverman, @wired, @judyshapiro, @judyshapiro, @brave, and @oliverdarcy

See also Mediagazer

Hürriyet Daily News:

Twitter says it will set up a legal entity in Turkey to comply with the country's social media law that took effect in October 2020 — Twitter accepted a requirement to appoint a local representative in Turkey as part of a new social media law that took effect in October 2020, according to a top Turkish official.

More: Twitter, The Verge, Engadget, Associated Press, Twitter to establish …, Daily Sabah, and The Hill

Tweets: @davidakaye and @ezralevant

Trefor Moss / Wall Street Journal:

How Pinduoduo leads China's adoption of social e-commerce by putting social media first, and gamifying the shopping experience so people win deals and discounts — Five-year-old company is first challenger to loosen Alibaba and JD.com's stranglehold over online consumption in the country

Tweets: @juokaz, @mdudas, @jchengwsj, and @wsj

Catalin Cimpanu / The Record:

REvil ransomware gang says it had breached Acer, sharing leaked images of internal docs on the dark web, and is demanding $50M; Acer says it is investigating — Taiwanese computer maker Acer has suffered a ransomware attack over the past weekend at the hands of the REvil ransomware gang …

More: BleepingComputer, PCMag, Forbes, Engadget, MUO, CRN, and SearchSecurity

Tweets: @hackinggavin and @lisagshort

Stephen Warwick / iMore:

Brazilian state of São Paulo fines Apple $2M for selling iPhones without a charger, allegedly misleading customers about the water resistance of iPhones, more — “Apple needs to understand that in Brazil there are solid consumer protection laws and institutions.

More: 9to5Mac, Engadget, AppleInsider, MacRumors, The Verge, and Gizmodo. Tweets: @winterskiis

Yumiko Sato / Slate:

Misinformation and historical revisionism are widespread on some non-English editions of Wikipedia, such as Japanese, which is the most visited after English — During World War II, Unit 731 of the Japanese military undertook horrific medical experimentation in Manchukuo (Northeast China).

Tweets: @edfrench, @yumikosatomtbc, @slate, @yumikosatomtbc, @yumikosatomtbc, @cambskeptics, and @martinsfp

Issie Lapowsky / Protocol:

Facebook's decision to crack down on NYU's Ad Observer highlights the increasingly fraught dynamic between tech companies and academics — Laura Edelson was in a state of panic, and I knew I was a little bit to blame for her freakout. — “If this is true,” Edelson told me this week during …

Sean Keane / CNET:

Twitter confirms it's testing an “Undo Tweet” feature, first discovered by Jane Manchun Wong, who suggests it could be part of Twitter's planned subscriptions — An app researcher's screenshot shows that among the options for subscribers of an unrevealed service.

More: The Verge, The Next Web, TechRadar, Mashable, MUO, 9to5Mac, BGR India, Neowin, and Gizmodo

Tweets: @wongmjane, @smashdawg, @jangles, @threddyrex, @quinnypig, @kellyrippin, @stephanieyeboah, @cnet, @wongmjane, and @mattnavarra

Ann-Marie Alcántara / Wall Street Journal:

After Citigroup erroneously sent $900M to lenders using Oracle's Flexcube, some are calling for simplified business software UX to match consumer-facing design — Citi's accidental payment makes a strong case for upgrading back-end technology to match consumer-facing design

More: Bloomberg. Tweets: @ajitpai, @kptkutero, @hkanji, @jrichlive, @hhorsley, @ldignan, @bergmayer, @batteryventures, @pendoio, and @jchernov

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From Mediagazer

Daniel Thomas / Financial Times:

Sky agrees to acquire ITV's TV business for £1.6B, uniting the UK's two largest commercial broadcasters; ITV says shareholders will receive £950M from the deal

Alex Ritman / Variety:

AI-focused studio Particle 6 plans a full-length feature film to be led by the AI “actor” Tilly Norwood, as a hybrid production using film and TV professionals

Lucas Shaw / Bloomberg:

Sources: Netflix is studying its data to see why viewers quit its shows after S1, with some shows seeing a 30%-70% S2 drop, as it faces a quarter without hits

More News

Joe Williams / Protocol:

Interview with CEO of DocuSign, whose sales grew 57% YoY to $431M in Q4, on its plans to expand beyond e-signatures as the market heated up during the pandemic

Tweets: @martinsfp, @protocol, @joepwilliams31, @owenthomas, @joepwilliams31, @protocol, and @protocol

Just Security:

A list of questions that experts think CEOs of Facebook, Twitter, and Google should be asked during the March 25 House committee hearing on misinformation

Tweets: @justinhendrix, @jason_kint, and @yaeleisenstat

Anna Kramer / Protocol:

Profile of Yubo, a social media app for teens to connect with strangers, which saw engagement increase nearly 400% in the last year and has at least 40M users

Tweets: @protocol

Lily Hay Newman / Wired:

A look at Facebook's “Red Team X”, an internal hacking team founded in 2020, which probes 3rd-party tech Facebook uses for hardware and software vulnerabilities

Tweets: @johnjhacking, @gadgetlab, @lilyhnewman, and @ajxchapman

Cat Ferguson / MIT Technology Review:

Experts discuss challenges of building government tech, including legacy systems, regulatory complexity, lack of data sharing between departments, and more

Tweets: @shashashasha, @camcritt, @mattbernius, @annelies_goger, and @techreview

Earlier Picks

Gita Jackson / VICE:

As videos from court hearings on Zoom go viral, a look at the debate over privacy of citizens in those videos and judicial transparency on the internet

Tweets: @kari_paul, @jason_koebler, @digiphile, @misupremecourt, and @motherboard

Bobby Allyn / NPR:

Interview with CEO of SkySilk, the hosting company that helped bring Parler online, who says he did it to spite tech giants like Amazon who abuse their might

Tweets: @davetroy, @jimstinnett, @tompalmsprings, @gelliebeans1, @rojawi, @davidfolkenflik, @npr, @bobbyallyn, and @tundrawolfqueen

Bloomberg:

Weee!, an online grocer specializing in Hispanic and Asian foods, has raised $315M Series D led by DST Global, source says at a $2.8B valuation

More: Insider. Tweets: @post_market, @sonjalee, @cristinagberta, @davelu, @joshelman, and @joshelman

Financial Times:

Sources: UK's CMA is preparing an antitrust investigation into the way Facebook allegedly uses customer data to squash rivals in social media and online ads

More: PYMNTS.com, SiliconANGLE, Reuters, and Engadget

Tweets: @tallseller, @tallseller, @tallseller, @jayveensho, @bigblackjacobin, @c1aranmurray, @mshannahmurphy, and @javierespft