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May 20, 2025, 10:55 AM
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Top News

Bloomberg:
Sources: Nintendo picked Samsung to produce the Switch 2's main chips, aiming to sell 20M+ units by March 2026, a key win for Samsung as it competes with TSMC  —  Securing a contract for one of the summer's hottest new gadgets will likely help lift utilization or boost business for the Korean conglomerate's chip foundries.
Wall Street Journal:
Analysis: four of the world's top 50 tech companies are European, and none of the top 10 quantum companies are in Europe, as the continent lags the US and China  —  A risk-averse business culture and complex regulations have stifled innovation on the continent, weighing on its future
Clare Duffy / CNN:
The US House Budget Committee advances a budget bill that would ban US states from enforcing any law regulating AI for 10 years; the bill now goes to the House  —  New York CNN —  —  More than 100 organizations are raising alarms about a provision in the House's sweeping tax …
Steven T. Dennis / Bloomberg:
The US Senate advances the GENIUS Act, a stablecoin bill, after a group of Democrats dropped their opposition on May 19, a major victory for the crypto industry  —  Stablecoin legislation overcame a procedural blockade in the US Senate, marking a major victory for the crypto industry …
Emma Roth / The Verge:
GitHub debuts an AI coding agent for GitHub Copilot that can fix bugs, add features, improve documentation, and more, and open sources GitHub Copilot in VS Code  —  The AI coding agent will start working once a developer assigns it a task. … GitHub is launching an AI coding agent …
Lawrence Abrams / BleepingComputer:
Microsoft open sources the Windows Subsystem for Linux, launched in August 2016, and releases its code on GitHub, except for a few Windows-specific components
Nilay Patel / The Verge:
Q&A with Microsoft CTO Kevin Scott on AI agents, MCP, web search, NLWeb, the relationship with OpenAI, how new hardware and optimizations benefit AI, and more
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Microsoft launches NLWeb, an open project that lets developers add a “conversational interface” to their website with a few lines of code, an AI model, and data
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Sam Altman had sought to delegate more responsibility for months before hiring Fidji Simo, an adept and detail-oriented manager, in contrast to Altman  —  Fidji Simo is leaving Instacart for a newly created role at Sam Altman's startup as it prepares for a potential public offering
Lauren Feiner / The Verge:
Trump signs the Take It Down Act, criminalizing the distribution of nonconsensual intimate images and requiring platforms to promptly remove them when notified  —  The bill sailed through Congress with a focus on deepfakes and other nonconsensual intimate images.
Bloomberg:
Malaysia downplays its deal to use 3,000 Huawei chips to build a first-of-its-kind AI system by 2026, underscoring its delicate position in the US-China AI race  —  Malaysia declared it'll build a first-of-its-kind AI system powered by Huawei Technologies Co. chips, only to distance itself …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
SAG-AFTRA files an NLRB unfair labor practice charge against Epic's Llama Productions for using AI to recreate James Earl Jones' Darth Vader voice in Fortnite  —  The actors union said Epic-owned Llama Productions “chose to replace the work of human performers with AI technology” …
Emma Roth / The Verge:
Spotify says Apple approved an update that lets US users buy individual audiobooks and see audiobook prices inside its iOS app, after the Epic v. Apple ruling  —  You'll see a ‘Buy’ button alongside an audiobook's price. … It's finally possible to purchase an audiobook from Spotify's iPhone app with just a few taps.
Washington Post:
Investigation: for two years, New Orleans police secretly scanned city streets using 200+ facial recognition cameras, seemingly violating a 2022 city ordinance  —  Following records requests from The Post, officials paused the first known, widespread live facial recognition program used by police in the United States.
Pradeep Viswanathan / Neowin:
Microsoft unveils Microsoft Discovery, an enterprise agentic platform with a graph-based knowledge engine meant to help scientists and engineers accelerate R&D  —  At Build 2025, Microsoft announced a new enterprise agentic platform called Microsoft Discovery that will help enterprises …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft adds xAI's Grok 3 and Grok 3 mini to its Azure AI Foundry service, risking further OpenAI tensions; sources say Satya Nadella had pushed to host Grok  —  Grok 3 and Grok 3 mini are both coming to Microsoft's Azure AI Foundry service. … I reported in my Notepad newsletter earlier …

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This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 10:55 AM ET, May 20, 2025.

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From Mediagazer

Variety:
Sources: the legal team for Paramount President Jeff Shell has engaged in preliminary talks about a possible exit from the company, where he was hired in 2024

Katie Deighton / Wall Street Journal:
WME is selling sports marketing agency 160over90 to Publicis Groupe for, sources say, $500M+; WME bought the agency in 2018 for about $200M

Philip Oltermann / The Guardian:
Penguin Random House sued OpenAI for copyright infringement, alleging its LLM “memorized” a popular German children's book series and can reproduce the content

More News

Bloomberg:
Huawei launches its first laptops running on HarmonyOS, including the 18-inch foldable MateBook Fold, and is working to make the OS compatible with 2,000+ apps

Earlier Picks

Luisa Beltran / Fortune:
Sources: Circle recently engaged in informal talks to sell itself to Coinbase or Ripple, seeking at least $5B, the valuation it is targeting in a potential IPO
CNBC:
Jamie Dimon says that JPMorgan will soon let clients buy bitcoin, adding that “we're not going to custody it. We're going to put it in statements for clients.”
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google debuts NotebookLM for Android and iOS, letting users listen to Audio Overviews offline and in the background, question the “hosts”, add sources, and more
Ryan Gallagher / Bloomberg:
The UK says hackers breached its Legal Aid Agency to steal a “significant amount of personal data” from people who received legal aid across England and Wales
Dean Seal / Wall Street Journal:
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals says it will acquire 23andMe's assets, including its Personal Genome Service, for $256M, set to close in Q3, in the bankruptcy auction
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