Techmeme
February 1, 2022, 7:55 AM

Top News

Brendan Sinclair / GamesIndustry.biz:
Sony Interactive Entertainment announces it is buying Bungie, which makes Destiny and other games, for $3.6B; Bungie will become an independent subsidiary  —  Destiny studio will remain multiplatform, able “to self-publish and reach players wherever they choose to play”
The New York Times Company:
The New York Times acquires Wordle, the simple word game that has amassed “millions of daily players”, for “an undisclosed price in the low-seven figures”  —  Wordle, Josh Wardle's stimulating and wildly popular daily word game, is joining The New York Times's portfolio of original …
David McLaughlin / Bloomberg:
Source: the FTC, not the DOJ, is reviewing Microsoft's Activision Blizzard acquisition and will focus on potential harm to rivals  —  The U.S. antitrust review of Microsoft Corp.'s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard Inc. will be handled by the Federal Trade Commission …
John Hendel / Politico:
Nonprofit suicide chat service Crisis Text Line ends its data sharing relationship with for-profit spinoff Loris.ai and asks the company to delete existing data  —  The nonprofit mental-health hotline Crisis Text Line ended its data-sharing relationship with a for-profit spinoff Monday …
Connie Loizos / TechCrunch:
Ryan Breslow, co-founder of one-click checkout startup Bolt, steps down as CEO and becomes executive chairman, after his tweets bashing YC and Stripe went viral  —  Ryan Breslow, who founded the “one-click” checkout tech company Bolt as a Stanford student and dropped out of college to build it …
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
India proposes a 30% tax on income from the transfer of crypto, NFTs, and other digital assets and will launch a digital rupee in the next financial year  —  India on Tuesday proposed launching digital rupee in within a year and a 30% tax on income from transfer of virtual digital assets …
Maximiliano Firtman / firt.dev:
iOS 15.4 beta code shows Apple is working on support for Safari push notifications for web-based apps  —  iOS 15.4 beta has finally added icon support in the manifest, Web Push, AR, and VR experiments.  —  Twitter @firt About Newsletter  —  About 8 min reading time
Nikhilesh De / CoinDesk:
Silvergate Bank confirms it is purchasing the Diem Association's tech and other assets by issuing $132M in stock and paying $50M in cash; Diem is shutting down  —  The Diem Association is shutting down.  —  Silvergate Bank confirmed Monday that it's purchasing the technology and other assets from Diem …
Taylor Lyles / IGN:
Discord starts letting US PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 4 users link their PSN accounts and display game activity; support for more countries is coming soon  —  Support will roll out first to US users, though.  —  PlayStation owners will able to connect their accounts to Discord starting today …
Kim Lyons / The Verge:
Meta rolls out updated 3D avatars across Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram Stories in the US, Canada, and Mexico  —  It's a step toward the company's concept of the metaverse  —  Facebook parent company Meta is introducing 3D avatars to Instagram Stories and direct messages and updating …
Wall Street Journal:
Antenna: Apple TV+, Disney+, HBO Max, and others struggle to retain US subscribers who joined to watch a hit show; some subscribers only stay for a few months  —  Roughly half of U.S. viewers who joined right after ‘Hamilton’ and ‘Wonder Woman 1984’ were gone in six months, data show
Ed Dixon / SportsPro:
Report: crypto-based sports fan platform Iqoniq, which partnered with Spain's LaLiga and others, has entered liquidation; Iqoniq raised €100M in July 2020  —  Fan engagement platform Iqoniq has gone into liquidation, leaving multiple sporting organisations potentially out of pocket.
Faseeh Mangi / Bloomberg:
Riyadh-based Retailo, which aims to digitize mom-and-pop stores in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and the UAE, raises a $36M Series A led by Graphene Ventures  —  The e-commerce platform Retailo has raised $36 million to help fund its effort to digitize mom-and-pop stores in Pakistan, U.A.E. and its home country of Saudi Arabia.
More: FinSMEs
Sam Byford / The Verge:
Joe Rogan posts a video to Instagram defending booking contentious guests, apologizes to Spotify for the backlash, and says he may book more “experts”  —  'I'm very sorry that this is happening to them.'  —  Joe Rogan has issued a response to the ongoing controversy …
Daniel Ek / Spotify:

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Samuel Stolton / Politico:
Ryan Weeks / The Block: