Techmeme
June 27, 2023, 12:30 PM

Top News

Ron Amadeo / Ars Technica:
A Pixel Fold reviewer says the device's flexible OLED screen died after four days of light use, starting at the bottom and moving upwards, likely due to debris  —  The closed display halves almost touch, and that can smash debris into the screen.  —  A flame that burns twice as bright burns half as long.
Wall Street Journal:
How routine drug use by Silicon Valley executives moved from an after-hours activity squarely into corporate culture, causing issues for boards and tech leaders  —  Entrepreneurs including Elon Musk and Sergey Brin are part of a drug movement that proponents hope will expand minds, enhance lives and produce business breakthroughs
James Vincent / The Verge:
AI is killing the web with spam sites, mass article producing “AI editors”, AI-generated junk on Etsy, Reddit, and Wikipedia that exhausts moderators, and more  —  In recent months, the signs and portents have been accumulating with increasing speed.  Google is trying to kill the 10 blue links.
NewsGuard:
Monica Chin / The Verge:
A survey of 20+ professionals finds all but one do not plan to buy the Mac Pro with M2 Ultra, citing Apple's cheaper and similarly powerful laptops and desktops  —  Apple's latest Mac Pro targets professionals with highly demanding computing workloads.  But we talked to those professionals …
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Meta launches new parental controls and other safety features for Messenger and Instagram in the US, the UK, and Canada, including letting parents view contacts  —  Meta announced new parental control tools across Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger today.  This includes a new parental supervision hub …
Chris Vallance / BBC:
Apple says the UK's Online Safety Bill, which would mandate scanning messages for CSAM, should be amended to protect encryption, joining WhatsApp and Signal  —  Apple has criticised powers in the Online Safety Bill that could be used to force encrypted messaging tools like iMessage …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
A 2019 email by Xbox Game Studios' Matt Booty encouraged buying content to “spend Sony out of business”; Microsoft argues the company didn't pursue the strategy  —  Microsoft's Xbox Game Studios chief, Matt Booty, was encouraging Xbox CFO Tim Stuart to spend big money …
Zheping Huang / Bloomberg:
Baidu claims Ernie 3.5, the latest version of its LLM, has surpassed ChatGPT in general abilities and outperformed GPT-4 on many Chinese-language capabilities  —  Baidu Inc.'s ChatGPT-style service has outperformed OpenAI's seminal product on several measures, China's search leader said on Tuesday.
Steve Lohr / New York Times:
Some doctors say that their current best use for generative AI is to ease the heavy burden of documentation, which takes hours a day and contributes to burnout  —  The best use for generative A.I. in health care, doctors say, is to ease the heavy burden of documentation that takes them hours a day and contributes to burnout.
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Meta says WhatsApp Business crossed 200M MAUs, up from 50M in 2020, adds a tool to let users create “click-to-WhatsApp” ads without a Facebook account, and more  —  Meta announced today that WhatsApp Business, its app designed specifically for small businesses …
Robert D. McFadden / New York Times:
John B. Goodenough, who shared the 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his role in developing the lithium-ion battery used in mobile devices and EVs, dies at 100  —  An unassuming professor who remained active into his 90s, he is credited with the breakthrough that gave rise to the batteries powering today's electronic devices.
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
Decentralized social media app Damus says Apple rejected an app update and told the company to remove its tipping feature or use Apple's in-app purchase system  —  Damus, a decentralized social networking app backed by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, will be removed from the App Store due to Apple's strict payment rules.
Jane Lee / Reuters:
Snowflake partners with Nvidia to let customers build generative AI models using their own data; Nvidia plans to embed NeMo Framework into Snowflake Data Cloud  —  Snowflake (SNOW.N) a cloud data analytics company, is partnering with computing company Nvidia (NVDA.O) to allow customers ranging …
Ben Lovejoy / 9to5Mac:
Apple Vision Pro documentation: the device has a “system boundary”, defined as a 1.5-meter radius from the headset, when in a “fully immersive VR experience”  —  Apple has limited a Vision Pro safe area to 10 feet by 10 feet, when using fully immersive VR experiences.
Aaron Holmes / The Information:

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Shopify's new AI commerce stack  —  Their VP of Product digs into just-launched products to help entrepreneurs and developers build with the latest AI and tech.
Zoho:
Connecting, collaborating, and growing: Zoho Mail 2025 wrap-up  —  Your inbox has been home to a lot this year—quick updates, long threads, approvals, reminders, and the occasional late-night draft you weren't sure about.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Great Chat:
The stories we told ourselves in 2025
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
The Social Radars:
Jessica & Carolynn Announce Season 5!
Come be a fly on the wall as Y Combinator's Jessica Livingston and Carolynn Levy talk to some of the most successful founders in Silicon Valley about how they did it.
Subscribe to The Social Radars.
Grit:
How Brands Stay Visible When AI Decides | Profound CEO James Cadwallader
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Lenny's Podcast:
The coming AI security crisis (and what to do about it) | Sander Schulhoff
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Big Technology Podcast:
OpenAI's Potential, Google's Speedy Model, Copilot Hits Turbulence
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.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ted Sarandos: Netflix and how tech changed storytelling
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 12:30 PM ET, June 27, 2023.

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:
David Meyer / Fortune:
Jesse Hamilton / CoinDesk: