Techmeme
November 4, 2023, 4:05 AM

Top News

Andrew Hayward / Decrypt:
OpenSea lays off ~50% of staff and is moving to “OpenSea 2.0”; after laying off 20% of its workforce in July 2022, the NFT marketplace said 230 staff remained  —  A company representative told Decrypt that approximately 50% of employees were impacted across the company.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
An interview with Mozilla Senior Director of Content Carolyn O'Hara about joining the fediverse, technical hurdles when onboarding users, moderation, and more  —  Consumers are hungry for a new way of social networking, where trust and safety are paramount and power isn't centralized …
Paresh Dave / Wired:
Ad blockers saw record uninstalls in October after YouTube expanded its crackdown on ad blockers, while those unaffected by the clampdown saw record installs  —  YouTube expanded a “test” that threatens to cut off users who don't turn off their ad blocker.  Developers of the tools are scrambling to respond.
Thomas Claburn / The Register:
As the EU prepared to designate Apple as a gatekeeper under the DMA, Apple argued that it has three distinct browsers: Safari for iOS, iPadOS, and macOS  —  And with a straight face, too.  Brussels didn't buy it  —  Apple tried to avoid regulation in the European Union by making a surprising claim …
Alex Konrad / Forbes:
Emails: X has begun work on an account handle marketplace for purchasing handles left unused, requesting a flat fee of $50K from potential buyers in some cases  —  Rumored to be in the works for the past year, the initiative appears to have begun rolling out recently, with email solicitations being sent to potential buyers.
Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:
A security researcher says that a Flipper Zero device can carry out DoS attacks on iPhones running iOS 17 by continuously sending Bluetooth pairing requests  —  No cure yet for a popular iPhone attack, except for turning off Bluetooth.  —  One morning two weeks ago, security researcher Jeroen van der Ham …
New York Times:
Sources: GM spent an average of $588M a quarter on Cruise in the past year, up 42% YoY, and staff intervened to assist Cruise's vehicles every 2.5 to five miles  —  Cruise has hired a law firm to investigate how it responded to regulators, as its cars sit idle and questions grow about its C.E.O.'s expansion plans.
Akash Sriram / Reuters:
Elon Musk says xAI will release its AI model called Grok to a select group on November 4 and to all X Premium+ subscribers once it's out of early beta  —  Elon Musk's artificial intelligence startup xAI will release its first AI model to a select group on Saturday, the billionaire and Tesla (TSLA.O) CEO said on Friday.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft employees will keep free access to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate after Phil Spencer stepped in to reverse the company's plans to remove the benefit  —  Microsoft was planning to remove a free Xbox Game Pass Ultimate benefit for most of its 238,000 employees in January …
NBC News:
On Instagram, journalists and creators inside Gaza see a surge in followers as they document the Israel-Hamas war, even as Meta has broadly moved away from news  —  One journalist has added more than 12 million followers.  The work highlights some of the challenges and dangers of covering the conflict.
More: SPJ NewsThreads: @jasonabbruzzese and @jasonabbruzzeseBluesky: @mattnavarra.comX: @jasonabbruzzeseLinkedIn: Marc Owen Jones
Lora Kelley / The Atlantic:
Sam Bankman-Fried, who is unkempt, pedigreed, and awkward, replicated what VCs believe a founder should look like, and the door remains open for others like him  —  The tech industry is designed for people like Sam Bankman-Fried.  —  Over and over during Sam Bankman-Fried's trial …
Jonathan Randles / Bloomberg:
Jacquelyn Melinek / TechCrunch:
More: Reuters, US Department of Justice, The Verge, BBC, New York Times, Cointelegraph, CNBC, Ars Technica, US Department of Justice, Blockonomi, NBC News, CoinDesk, Reuters, CNN, Wired, Forbes, Bitcoin Insider, Bloomberg, PYMNTS.com, The Ringer, New York Times, Crunchbase News, Molly White, Coinpedia Fintech News, The Information, Fortune, PC Gamer, HealthcareInfoSecurity.com, Coinspeaker, Ghacks, NPR, DL News, TechStartups, New York Times, crypto.news, Finextra, NBC 7 San Diego, CCN.com, ChinaTechNews.com, Bloomberg, Decrypt, UPROXX, Blockworks, The Verge, ABC News, Decrypt, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Engadget, New York Times, Wired, Reuters, Washington Post, Reuters, Variety, New York Post, Sky News, Reuters, Courthouse News Service, MarketWatch, Insider, The Messenger, Axios, Fortune, and The Daily Beast

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More News

Steven Vaughan-Nichols / ZDNet:
More: The Register and OpenELA
X: @tguemes, @lionswaycontent, @suse, @_prbh, and @openelaorgLinkedIn: Matt ShelleyForums: Slashdot
Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer:
Kevin Purdy / Ars Technica:
Mariella Moon / Engadget:
Joseph Hoppe / Wall Street Journal:

Earlier Picks

Brian Krebs / Krebs on Security:
Bloomberg:
Apple:
Emily Bary / MarketWatch: