Techmeme
March 21, 2024, 10:30 AM

Top News

CNBC:
Reddit priced its IPO at $34 per share, the top of its expected $31-$34 range, raising $519M and valuing the company at nearly $6.5B, ahead of its market debut  —  In this photo illustration a Reddit logo is seen displayed on a smartphone.  —  Reddit, the 19-year-old website that hosts millions …
Kevin Roose / New York Times:
How Reddit, one of the last online spaces where real people gather, went from one of the darkest parts of the internet to a content moderation success story  —  The site's journey from toxic cesspool to trusted news source illustrates the business value of keeping bad actors at bay.
Bloomberg:
Sources: the US DOJ plans to sue Apple as soon as Thursday, accusing the company of violating antitrust laws by blocking rivals from accessing iPhone features  —  - Lawsuit to be filed in federal court as soon as Thursday  — Case comes as iPhone maker also faces scrutiny in Europe
Ben Schoon / 9to5Google:
Epic plans to release its Epic Games Store on iOS and Android later in 2024, offering “the same fair terms” as its PC store, including a 12% commission on sales  —  With plans to launch its own game store on iOS, it's now been announced that the Epic Games Store is coming to Android.
Wall Street Journal:
Meta, Microsoft, X, and Match Group file an amicus briefing in Epic v. Apple protesting Apple's plan to charge a commission for payments outside the App Store  —  Four tech companies object to Apple's new app store policies related to payment for services  —  Meta Platforms , Microsoft …
Emily Mullin / Wired:
Neuralink shows its first brain implant patient, a 29-year-old man paralyzed from the shoulders down, playing online chess using the Neuralink device  —  In a livestream on X, the paralyzed 29-year-old man used his Neuralink brain implant to control a computer.
Financial Times:
Chinese state media: during his visit to Shanghai, Tim Cook says “there's no supply chain in the world that's more critical to us than China”  —  Apple chief Tim Cook has said China is “critical” to its business in comments made during a visit to the country …
Kate Knibbs / Wired:
Fairly Trained certifies KL3M, an LLM claimed to be built without the permissionless use of copyrighted materials by legal tech consultancy startup 273 Ventures  —  OpenAI claimed it's “impossible” to build good AI models without using copyrighted data.  An “ethically created” …
Sidhartha Shukla / Bloomberg:
In a letter to Judge Kaplan, FTX CEO John Ray says SBF's claims of “zero” harm to users are “demonstrably false” and FTX had only 105 bitcoin when Ray took over  —  - Ray called the claims ‘callously’ and ‘demonstrably’ false  — SBF had claimed customers on the exchange suffered no harm
Krisztian Sandor / CoinDesk:
BlackRock unveils its first tokenized asset fund, BUIDL, built on the Ethereum network and fully backed by cash, US Treasury bills, and repurchase agreements  —  The asset management giant also made a strategic investment in asset tokenization company Securitize.
Ashley Gold / Axios:
After a classified briefing on TikTok, the Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell says “the next steps might be something more public, like a hearing”  —  - But Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has not committed to putting the bill on the floor anytime soon.
Zephyr Teachout / The Atlantic:
Bloomberg:
A UK jury finds Jian Wen guilty of laundering bitcoin for a Chinese fugitive allegedly behind a ~$6B fraud in China; police had seized BTC worth $2.2B+ in 2018  —  - Jury finds Jian Wen guilty on one count of money laundering  — Jian helped Chinese fugitive Zhimin Qian launder Bitcoin
Anna Tong / Reuters:
Tokyo-based Sakana AI, founded by two Google researchers, releases three Japanese language models using “model merging”, which combines existing models  —  Sakana AI, a Tokyo-based artificial intelligence startup founded by two prominent former Google (GOOGL.O) researchers …
Matt Burgess / Wired:
An analysis of cookie pop-ups on the 10,000 most popular websites: dozens share data with 1,000+ companies, and thousands share data with 100+ companies  —  Cookie pop-ups now show the number of “partners” that websites may share data with.  Here's how many of these third-party companies …
More: WinBuzzer
Yossi Matias / The Keyword:
In a research paper, Google Research details how AI helped to provide accurate flood forecasting in over 80 countries up to seven days in advance of the flood  —  A paper published in Nature today shows how Google Research uses AI to accurately predict riverine flooding and help protect livelihoods …
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
GitHub releases code scanning autofix, powered by Copilot and CodeQL, in public beta for GitHub Advanced Security customers, to help them fix vulnerabilities  —  It's a bad day for bugs.  Earlier today, Sentry announced its AI Autofix feature for debugging production code and now …
Wired:
As “censorship free” social network Parler returns to the iOS App Store, CEO Ryan Rhodes talks new features, moderation, and building “a true open platform”  —  The “free speech” social media alternative is back on Apple's App Store ahead of its official relaunch.
Alfred Ng / Politico:
The US House passes a bill to prevent data brokers from selling personal data to China, Russia, or other “foreign adversaries”; the bill now heads to the Senate  —  The first major Capitol Hill action on tech in years passes the House with broad support — and steers straight …

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More News

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Earlier Picks

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