Techmeme
April 22, 2021, 1:40 PM

Top News

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 to include upgrades to notifications, Lock Screen, and iMessage, a redesigned iPad Home Screen, and more privacy protections  —  - New privacy tools, updates to iMessage app also planned  — Company to show software updates at June developer conference
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Apple AirTags hands-on: work very well with a thoughtfully designed system, beautiful with a plastic body that serves as a speaker, but get scuffed easily  —  They work super well, and they're one more thing keeping you on the iPhone  —  I was starting to get really worried that I wouldn't find my friend.
Michael Grothaus / Fast Company:
Apple executives detail privacy and anti-stalking protections built into AirTags and insist they are designed just to track items, not people or pets  —  Apple's “Spring Loaded” event on Tuesday offered a bonanza of new hardware announcements, including some unexpected ones.
Financial Times:
Sources: Apple plans to expand its ad business and add a second ad slot in the App Store search page even as it introduces privacy rules crippling ads by rivals  —  New privacy rules deal a huge blow to how the mobile advertising industry works  —  Apple will expand its advertising business …
Catherine Shu / TechCrunch:
AfterShip, which lets online sellers track packages across different carriers, raises $66M Series B led by Tiger Global, following a $1M Series A in 2014  —  AfterShip launched in 2012 to help online sellers track packages across different carriers, but since then it has built a suite …
More: FinSMEs
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Productboard, which helps product managers prioritize what to build next, raises $72M Series C led by Tiger Global, bringing its total raised to $137M+  —  Join Transform 2021 this July 12-16.  Register fo r the AI event of the year.  —  Productboard, a startup developing a DevOps orchestration system …
More: Insider
Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai / VICE:
Signal's CEO says he analyzed a Cellebrite device, used to extract data from phones, that fell off a truck, and it is full of easily exploitable security flaws  —  One of the biggest encrypted chat apps in the world just showed how a device used to decrypt messages can be hacked and tampered with.
Jabari Young / CNBC:
Overtime, which distributes original sports content on social media platforms like Snapchat, raises $80M Series C from Bezos Expeditions, Drake, and others  —  - Overtime raised $80 million in a Series C with investors including Bezos Expeditions, Drake and NBA stars including Devin Booker, Trae Young and Klay Thompson.
Juli Clover / MacRumors:
Files from REvil, which is extorting Apple supplier Quanta, appear to confirm new MacBook Pros with MagSafe, USB-C, HDMI, SD card slot, and no Touch Bar  —  Schematics stolen from Apple supplier Quanta Computer outline Apple's plans for the next-generation MacBook Pro models that are expected in 2021 …
Greg Stohr / Bloomberg:
SCOTUS slashes FTC's power to seek monetary awards in court, banning a tool that it used to fine tech and other companies engaged in unfair business practices  —  - Ruling eliminates tool agency had used to collect billions  — Unanimous decision is a triumph for business trade groups
Ron Miller / TechCrunch:
Kandji, which offers automated tools for onboarding and updating Apple devices remotely, raises $60M Series B led by Felicis Ventures  —  During the pandemic, having an automated solution for onboarding and updating Apple devices remotely has been essential, and today Kandji …
Michael Potuck / 9to5Mac:
Tile said Apple holds third-party products hostage by restricting their use of Find My; Apple lawyer confirmed Tile can't disclose Find My agreement under NDA  —  The latest antitrust hearing looking into concerns about Apple and Google's market power is underway.
Bloomberg:
Senate Judiciary Subcommittee:
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
Twitter rolls out the option to upload and view 4K images on Android and iOS to all users, after testing the feature earlier this year  —  Twitter finally fixes its low-res picture problem  —  Get ready for Twitter to start looking a whole lot crisper — starting today …
Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:
Outlier.org, which offers affordable intro-level college courses online, raises $30M Series B led by GV, bringing its total raised to $46M  —  Outlier.org — a startup offering intro-level college courses online and at a relatively affordable price — is announcing that it has raised $30 million in Series B funding.
BuzzFeed News:
An internal Facebook report found it failed to take appropriate action against Stop the Steal groups before Capitol riot, saying it should “do better next time”  —  Last month, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of a House of Representatives committee that his company …

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:
Generate Sample Data the Way You Want It Using AI, for Free  —  Finding good sample data is harder than it should be.If you've ever tried to test a dashboard, build a demo, or train a team on an analytics tool, you know the drill.
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 1:40 PM ET, April 22, 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

Cody Godwin / BBC:
Nic Fildes / Financial Times:

Earlier Picks

Ryan Tracy / Wall Street Journal:
Ben Thompson / Stratechery:
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Jason Snell / Macworld:
Wall Street Journal: