Techmeme
August 10, 2022, 2:35 PM

Top News

Rebecca Elliott / Wall Street Journal:
Filings: Elon Musk sold ~7.9M Tesla shares, worth ~$7B, between August 5 and 9, Musk says to avoid “an emergency sale” if a judge forces his Twitter acquisition  —  The billionaire suggested stock sales were aimed at avoiding a fire sale if forced to buy the social-media company
Allison Johnson / The Verge:
Samsung debuts the $1,800 Galaxy Z Fold 4 with 6.2" and 7.6" displays, Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1, 12GB of RAM, 256GB+ storage, and a 50MP camera; preorders now open  —  Minor camera and software improvements, big $1,799 price tag  —  Samsung, purveyor of the only serious foldables available on a global scale …
Nirave Gondhia / XDA Developers:
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Spotify quietly tests Spotify Tickets, directly selling live music tickets to users in the US, instead of redirecting buyers to Ticketmaster or Eventbrite  —  Spotify has launched a new site to sell fans tickets to live gigs directly from its platform instead of redirecting users to partners like Ticketmaster and Eventbrite.
Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:
Cloudflare says three employees fell for an SMS phishing scam, but the company's hardware MFA keys stopped the hackers from accessing its internal network  —  Unusually resourced threat actor has targeted multiple companies in recent days.  —  At least two security-sensitive companies …
Debby Wu / Bloomberg:
Foxconn reports Q2 revenue up 12% YoY to ~$50B and ~$1.1B net income, as cloud product sales helped weather supply chain issues and sluggish smartphone demand  —  Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., the maker of most of the world's iPhones, posted a profit that beat estimates as demand …
Meta:
Meta says the warrants in the Nebraska case didn't mention abortion, only the burning and burial of a stillborn, came before Roe's reversal, and had a gag order  —  Much of the reporting about Meta's role in a criminal case against a mother and daughter in Nebraska is plain wrong.
Jason Koebler / VICE:
Pew Research Center:
An in-depth look at US teenagers and social media in 2022: 95% say they use YouTube, 67% use TikTok, 62% use Instagram, 59% use Snapchat, and 32% use Facebook  —  TikTok has established itself as one of the top online platforms for U.S. teens, while the share of teens who use Facebook has fallen sharply
Reuters:
Iran's Tasnim agency says the country made its first official import order paying with cryptocurrency this week, worth $10M, helping circumvent US sanctions  —  Iran made its first official import order using cryptocurrency this week, the semi-official Tasnim agency reported on Tuesday …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft makes its 1,538 3D emoji library available in open source on GitHub and Figma, allowing creators to remix and customize them for free  —  Get ready for lots of custom 3D emoji  —  Microsoft is open sourcing more than 1,500 of its 3D emoji, making them free for creators to remix and build upon.
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google launches Get The Message, a campaign to pressure Apple to support RCS over SMS/MMS, highlighting low-resolution photos and videos, no e2ee, and more  —  For the past year, Google has been increasingly calling out Apple for not adopting RCS (Rich Communication Services) on the iPhone.
Jon Fingas / Engadget:
Samsung announces the Galaxy Z Flip 4, featuring the same 1.9" and 6.7" displays alongside battery and camera upgrades and Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1, starting at $999  —  As expected, Samsung has unveiled the Galaxy Z Flip 4 — but the phone's greatest improvements might come through upgrades to software, not specs.
Mat Smith / Engadget:
Florence Ion / Gizmodo:
Samsung announces $230 Galaxy Buds 2 Pro with a smaller form factor, improved active noise cancellation, 24-bit Hi-Fi audio, and more; pre-orders start today  —  New buds alert!  Samsung has announced the second-generation Galaxy Buds 2 Pro in tandem with its latest batch of foldables.
Victoria Song / The Verge:
Samsung debuts the $280 Galaxy Watch 5 and $450 Galaxy Watch 5 Pro, with a touch bezel and better BioActive sensor, mapping features for Pro; preorders now open  —  It's also aiming for the Garmin crowd with the Watch 5 Pro  —  After weeks of leaks and rumors, Samsung finally announced …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
NFT startup Dapper Labs hires Nick Grudin, formerly Meta's Head of Content Partnerships for 12 years, as chief business officer  —  After nearly 12 years at Meta and Facebook, Nick Grudin is leaving the social-media giant.  Grudin next month will join NFT digital-collectibles company Dapper Labs as chief business officer.
Tiyashi Datta / Reuters:
Meta says it raised $10B in its first-ever bond offering, as it looks to fund share buybacks and investments to revamp its business  —  Facebook-parent Meta Platforms Inc (META.O) said on Tuesday it had raised $10 billion in its first-ever bond offering, as it looks to fund share buybacks and investments to revamp its business.
Harri Weber / TechCrunch:
Vancouver-based Hootsuite plans to lay off 30% of its workforce, an estimated 400 people; PitchBook says the social media marketing company has raised $300M+  —  Social media marketing firm Hootsuite says it has slashed its workforce by 30%.  —  “We need to refocus our strategies to drive efficiency …
Bloomberg:
A jury finds former Twitter employee Ahmad Abouammo guilty of spying for Saudi Arabia by turning over Saudi dissidents' account data in exchange for bribes  —  A former Twitter Inc. employee was convicted of spying for Saudi Arabia by turning over personal information of platform users …
Vincent Manancourt / Politico:
Ireland's data regulator says it has received objections from several EU regulators to its plan to block Meta's EU-US data sharing, a reprieve for the company  —  Europeans have been saved from a summer shutdown of social media sites Facebook and Instagram by ... European Union bureaucracy.
Kosaku Narioka / Wall Street Journal:
After suffering huge losses, SoftBank plans to reduce its Alibaba stake from 23.7% as of June 30 to 14.6%, raising around $34B in the current quarter  —  Japanese tech investor has been reducing its ties to the Chinese e-commerce company and using holdings to raise cash

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Earlier Picks

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