Techmeme
September 21, 2025, 12:35 PM

Top News

Karoline Leavitt / @presssec:
White House Press Secretary says the $100K H-1B fee is not an annual fee and it is a “one-time fee that applies only to the petition” in the upcoming lottery  —  To be clear: 1.) This is NOT an annual fee. It's a one-time fee that applies only to the petition. 2.) Those who already hold H-1B visas and are currently outside of the country right now will NOT be charged $100,000 to re-enter. H-1B visa holders can leave and re-enter the
Taylor Soper / GeekWire:
VCs and founders warn that the $100K fee will make H-1B sponsorship prohibitively expensive for startups, not Big Tech, and drive talent outside the US  —  Longtime entrepreneurs and venture capitalists are sounding the alarm over President Trump's new H-1B fee that would impact tech companies and the workers they hire from abroad.
Yun Li / CNBC:
Ben Berkowitz / Axios:
Elizabeth Chamberlain / iFixit News:
iPhone Air teardown: clever use of space by placing the logic board above the 12.26 Wh battery, the same cell used in Apple's MagSafe Battery pack, and more  —  iPhone Air Teardown  —  To be honest, we were holding our breath for the iPhone Air.  Thinner usually means flimsier, harder to fix, and more glued-down parts.
Erin Doherty / CNBC:
Trump says Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch “is involved” in the ownership group for TikTok US and “Rupert is probably going to be in the group” along with Michael Dell  —  President Donald Trump said in an interview that aired Sunday that conservative media baron Rupert Murdoch …
Ben Berkowitz / Axios:
Karoline Leavitt confirms Oracle will handle TikTok's data and security, and says the US is “100% confident” a deal is done and it “just needs to be signed”  —  - Congress passed a ban last year with bipartisan support, but President Trump has repeatedly ordered …
Rest of World:
An inside look at Léon Thévenin, the only undersea internet cable repair ship permanently stationed in Africa, operated by the French telecom company Orange  —  Undersea internet cables are critical in today's hyperconnected world.  The crew of the Léon Thévenin maintains one stretch of this global network.
More: RTÉForums: Slashdot
John Thornhill / Financial Times:
A review of Tim Berners-Lee's new book This is for Everyone, while his startup Inrupt, which aims to commercialize the Solid web protocol, struggles to scale  —  The World Wide Web inventor criticises the ‘rage bait’ of algorithms and social media — and advocates tighter user control of personal data
Forums: r/technology
Katie Tarasov / CNBC:
Interviews with Apple's Tim Millet, Arun Mathias, and Kaiann Drance on the new neural accelerators in A19 Pro GPU cores, C1X modem, N1 wireless chip, and more  —  iPhone Air is the big newcomer among Apple's latest lineup that went on sale Friday, but inside the slim phone's raised plateau …
More: Cult of Mac
Phoebe Liu / Forbes:
A profile of Edwin Chen, the CEO of Surge AI, a Scale AI rival that had $1.2B revenue in 2024, is profitable, and is reportedly raising $1B at a $30B valuation  —  This story appears in the October/November 2025 issue of Forbes Magazine.  Subscribe  —  An alum of Google, Facebook and Twitter …

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Featured Podcasts

The Upstarts Podcast:
Mutiny's Jaleh Rezaei: Walking Away From Millions In Software To Grow Even Faster With Sales AI
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
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The billionaire paying AI researchers to stay out of Big Tech
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Nick Bilton, Dick Costolo, and Paul Kedrosky pull back the curtain on AI, startups, and the future rushing toward us, all with healthy dose of irreverence.
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A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
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Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
AI's Mythos Moment: Rishi Sunak on preparing governments for AI
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.
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