Techmeme
October 30, 2024, 9:55 AM

Top News

Jason Schreier / Bloomberg:
PlayStation closes Firewalk Studios, which debuted shooter game Concord in August 2024 before taking it offline, and mobile studio Neon Koi, impacting ~210 jobs  —  The company will also close the mobile game studio Neon Koi, which hasn't released a game, according to a blog post from Sony on Tuesday.
Alphabet:
Alphabet reports Q3 revenue up 15% YoY to $88.27B, Search revenue up 12%, net income up 34%, and traffic acquisition costs up 9%; GOOG jumps 5%+  —  MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - October 29, 2024 - Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG, GOOGL) today announced financial results for the quarter ended September 30, 2024.
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Sundar Pichai says “more than a quarter of all new code at Google is generated by AI, then reviewed and accepted by engineers”  —  Google is building a bunch of AI products, and it's using AI quite a bit as part of building those products, too.  “More than a quarter of all new code …
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google updates Chrome desktop to let users choose how aggressively it frees up inactive tab resources across three modes, and adds a Performance Detection tool  —  Last year, Chrome introduced Memory and Energy Saver modes, and Google is now updating its desktop browser with Performance issue alerts.
Katrina Manson / Bloomberg:
Microsoft says Russian hackers have sent “highly targeted spearphishing emails” to thousands of US officials, defense workers, and others during the past week  —  - Thousands targeted in spearphishing campaign during last week  — Hackers said to impersonate Microsoft employees in some emails
The GitHub Blog:
Contributions to generative AI projects on GitHub grew 59% YoY from October 2023 to September 2024 and Python overtook JavaScript as the most popular language  —  In this year's Octoverse report, we study how public and open source activity on GitHub shows how AI is expanding as the global developer community surges in size.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Rebekah Valentine / IGN:
Ubisoft quietly debuted its first blockchain game, Champions Tactics: Grimoria Chronicles, for free on PC last week; in-game figurines are listed for $7 to $63K  —  It's called Champions Tactics and it sure looks like...something.  —  Three years ago, Ubisoft promised it would start making its own blockchain games.
Jonathan Vanian / CNBC:
Reddit reports Q3 revenue up 68% YoY to $348.4M, vs. $312.8M est., DAUs up 47% YoY to 97.2M, vs. 96.5M est., ARPU of $3.58, vs. $3.24 est.; RDDT jumps 30%+  —  Reddit shares jumped 22% in extended trading Tuesday, topping $100 for the first time, after the social media company reported third-quarter results …
Chris Welch / The Verge:
Apple updates the Mac mini with a smaller design, five USB-C ports, and up to 64GB of RAM, shipping from November 8 for $599+ with M4 and $1,399+ with M4 Pro  —  As part of the company's week of Mac-focused announcements, Apple has just introduced a smaller, yet even more powerful Mac Mini.
Arsheeya Bajwa / Reuters:
AMD reports Q3 revenue up 18% YoY to $6.82B vs. $6.71B est., Data Center revenue up 122% to $3.5B, and Q4 revenue forecast below est.; AMD drops 7%+ pre-market  —  Advanced Micro Devices (AMD.O) on Tuesday forecast fourth-quarter revenue just shy of estimates as supply chain constraints hamper …
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: xAI is in the early stages of talks with investors to raise several billion dollars in a round that would value xAI at ~$40B, up from $24B in May 2024  —  New fundraising effort would substantially increase startup's valuation from spring  —  Elon Musk's xAI is in talks with investors …
Tess Owen / Wired:
TTP data: US anti-government militia activity has grown on Facebook, with the platform even auto-generating some group pages, despite users flagging the issue  —  Ahead of the election, anti-government militias are using Facebook to recruit, coordinate training, and promote ballot box stakeouts.
Paige Smith / Bloomberg:
Visa and Coinbase partner to let eligible US and EU users deposit funds into their Coinbase accounts, sometimes instantly; Visa powers the Coinbase debit card  —  - Access to crypto used to be challenging but is becoming easier … Coinbase already has millions of connections …

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Karissa Bell / Engadget:
Reuters:
Reuters:
Jason Koebler / 404 Media: