Techmeme
September 27, 2017, 4:30 PM

Top News

Casey Newton / The Verge:
Amazon unveils new Echo with smaller design, cloth surface and multiple color options, improved speakers, multi-room audio, for $99.99 or $250 for three  —  A smaller, more powerful voice device  —  Amazon introduced a second-generation version of the Echo today with a dedicated bass tweeter and a modified, shorter design.
Matt Weinberger / Business Insider:
Amazon debuts $35 Echo Connect, which plugs into a landline and allows phone calls on Echo, available to preorder today  —  Over the next few days, Amazon's Echo smart speakers will get the ability to make phone calls to any number — matching a feature that Google added to its Home speaker several months ago.
Dieter Bohn / The Verge:
Greg Bensinger / Wall Street Journal:
Uber shuts down its US auto-leasing business, affecting ~500 jobs, to find “a less capital-intensive approach” after it underestimated the loss per vehicle  —  Decision to close down Xchange Leasing will affect some 500 jobs  —  Uber Technologies Inc. on Wednesday confirmed …
Russell Brandom / The Verge:
Apple publishes updated privacy page and white paper on Face ID, detailing security measures  —  A new technical paper sheds light on Apple's facial recognition system  —  Today, Apple published a newly refreshed privacy page.  With it came the most new information the company has released …
Tony Romm / Recode:
In tweets, President Trump accuses Facebook of always being “anti-Trump” and questions whether it colluded with newspapers and TV networks  —  President Donald Trump charged on Wednesday that Facebook was “always” opposed to him, suggesting it is part of a network of “collusion” …
Mike Isaac / New York Times:
Ford and Lyft announce partnership to develop and test autonomous vehicle designs and tech, with aim of putting Ford's self-driving vehicles on Lyft's network  —  SAN FRANCISCO — For Lyft, winning the race to create the first fully self-driving vehicles on the road is a far from lonely pursuit.
Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Facebook on efforts to defend German election: deleted tens of thousands of fake accounts in preceding month, Related Articles for different views, Election Hub  —  Facebook may have dropped the ball with the U.S. presidential election, but it was much better prepared for last weekend's federal election in Germany.
Natalie Gagliordi / ZDNet:
AWS Pinpoint, which lets developers send and manage push notifications, introduces two-way SMS messaging  —  Apparently the two-way texting feature was launched last week, but hadn't been properly announced by AWS.  —  Amazon Web Service's Pinpoint tool is now offering global SMS two-way text messaging.

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Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:
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