Techmeme
April 28, 2020, 11:35 PM

Top News

Alphabet:
Alphabet reports revenue of $41.2B, up 13% YoY, net income of $6.8B, up from $6.7B YoY, Other Bets operating loss grew to $1.1B; headcount grew to 123K, up ~20K  —  MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - April 28, 2020 - Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG, GOOGL) today announced financial results for the quarter ended March 31, 2020.
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Google's teleconferencing service, Meet, is adding 3M new users per day, up from 2M earlier this month, with 100M DAUs compared to Zoom's 300M  —  That's up from two million per day earlier this month  —  Google's Meet teleconferencing service is now adding about 3 million users per day …
More: Pocketnow
Jennifer Elias / CNBC:
In an email to staff, Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the company will allow employees to return to offices no earlier than June 1 and take a “staggered” approach  —  - Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the company will allow employees to return to offices no earlier than June 1 …
Jon Swartz / MarketWatch:
Alphabet Q1 earnings show the pandemic is responsible for “a significant slowdown in ad revenues”, with $33.8B revenue from ads; stock up ~9% after hours  —  Earnings come in lower than diminished expectations, but sales growth tops projections despite COVID-19 effects  —  Referenced Symbols
Amir Efrati / The Information:
Source: Uber executives discuss cutting ~20% of its 27,000 headcount in the coming weeks; company veteran CTO Thuan Pham has resigned  —  Executives at Uber are discussing plans to cut around 20% of the company's employees, as it copes with a sharp decline in its ride-hailing business due …
Matt Stroud / OneZero:
The CEO of Banjo, a SoftBank-backed surveillance firm that's raised nearly $223M, was once a neo-Nazi and was involved in the drive-by shooting of a synagogue  —  magazine profiles and on conference stages, Damien Patton, the 47-year-old co-founder and CEO of the surveillance startup Banjo, often recounts a colorful autobiography.
Casey Newton / The Verge:
YouTube adds fact-check info boxes to some searches, above the search results, in the US, after launching in Brazil and India last year  —  The program launched in Brazil and India last year  —  YouTube will begin adding informational panels containing information from its network …
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Zuckerberg more actively in charge of Facebook after five departures from board of directors since 2019, as he attempts to consolidate decision-making  —  The 35-year-old tycoon has recast the company's board of directors and sought a high-profile role for the social-media giant in the Covid-19 pandemic
Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:
Apple adds COVID-19 testing site information to Apple Maps across the US and makes improvements to its Mobility Trends site  —  Apple has now added COVID-19 testing sites to its Apple Maps app across the U.S., covering all 50 states and Puerto Rico.  The update provides testing locations …
Andy Greenberg / Wired:
Kaspersky researchers detail a targeted espionage campaign via Play Store spyware apps, aimed at a few hundred users in Vietnam, Bangladesh, Indonesia, India  —  Malicious Android apps from the so-called PhantomLance campaign targeted hundreds of users, and at least two slipped past Google's defenses.
David Gelles / New York Times:
A look at efforts by the tech industry to procure PPE for frontline workers, including one led by Salesforce's Marc Benioff to secure 50M pieces of PPE for $25M  —  A call from a university chancellor set in motion a private sector effort to procure 50 million masks, gowns and swabs for American medical facilities.
Christina Farr / CNBC:
How a handful of employees at Apple quickly pushed forward the development of a contract tracing API and collaboration with Google in less than a month  —  - Apple and Google announced a partnership to bring contact tracing to smartphones on April 10th.  Their software toolkit will be released on Friday.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Spotify's Anchor launches a tool that turns video chats into podcast-ready audio; works with a range of videochat products including FaceTime and Instagram Live  —  Spotify is tapping into the increased usage of video conferencing during the coronavirus quarantine to grow its own podcast business.
Taylor Lorenz / New York Times:
Instagram has been overrun with cash giveaways, which are often framed as charity, but are part of growth schemes run by social media marketing firms  —  As the coronavirus continues to disrupt lives and livelihoods, influencers are offering free money to followers — and gaining a lot more in return.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Instagram launches a way for users to fundraise for nonprofits while livestreaming, showing streamers a breakdown of donors, so they can give them a shout-out  —  Instagram is today launching a new way for users to fundraise for nonprofits via Instagram Live, amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Ryan Kovatch / 9to5Google:
Google is shutting down Shoelace, a hyper-local social networking app it had launched in New York City in July 2019  —  In July 2019, Google's experimental project incubator Area 120 launched a new local meetup app that would connect users in New York City.
Ryan Browne / CNBC:
British payments firm Checkout.com joins the Libra Association, the first payments processor to do so since Visa, Mastercard, and Stripe pulled out in October  —  - Checkout.com is the first payments firm to join the Libra Association after Visa, Mastercard and Stripe pulled out over regulatory concerns.

Sponsor Posts

Meta:
Open Source AI: Available to all, not just the few  —  Meta's open source AI enables small businesses, start-ups, students, researchers and more to download and build with our models at no cost.
Tribe AI:
Build AI products that matter  —  Tribe AI helps organizations rapidly deploy AI solutions that have real business impact.  We bring together world class AI talent and tooling to drive differentiated results.
Zoho:
5 common accounting mistakes  —  This is a guest post by Yaali Bizappln Solutions.  A lot of businesses manage their customers and finances on separate platforms.  This disconnect often leads to missed invoices …
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Techmeme Ride Home:
(BNS) Brian's Appearance On Daily Detroit
The day's tech news, every day at 5pm ET. Fifteen minutes and you're up to date.
Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or RSS.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 11:35 PM ET, April 28, 2020.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.

More News

Natalie Gagliordi / ZDNet:
New York Times:
Bloomberg:

Earlier Picks

Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:
Washington Post:
Gizmodo:
Marne Levine / About Facebook: