Techmeme
December 1, 2020, 3:05 PM

Top News

Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Amazon launches EC2 Mac instances, bringing Intel-based Mac minis to its cloud for $1.083 per hour billed by the second  —  AWS today opened its re:Invent conference with a surprise announcement: the company is bringing the Mac mini to its cloud.  These new EC2 Mac instances, as AWS calls them, are now available in preview.
Natalie Gagliordi / ZDNet:
Reuters:
Sources: Samsung may discontinue Galaxy Note next year, reflecting the sharp drop in demand for high-end smartphones due to the pandemic  —  SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co Ltd may discontinue its premium Galaxy Note phone next year, sources with knowledge of the matter said …
BBC:
Facebook's Oversight Board takes up first cases for review, all involving decisions to remove user content, says users have submitted 20K cases since Oct. 2020  —  Facebook's Oversight Board has chosen its first batch of cases to review.  —  All involve decisions originally made by the platform to remove user content.
Shara Tibken / CNET:
Nikhilesh De / CoinDesk:
Libra Association is rebranding to Diem, distancing itself from the initial Facebook-led vision debuted last year, ahead of its expected 2021 stablecoin launch  —  The Libra Association put together by Facebook last year is rebranding in further efforts to distance itself from the original Facebook-led vision rolled out last year.
CNBC:
Amazon says 2020's holiday shopping season has been its biggest ever, with independent sellers reaching $4.8B+ in worldwide sales over the weekend, up 60% YoY  —  - Amazon has announced that this year's holiday shopping season has been the biggest in its history.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft Teams adds support for answering calls via Apple CarPlay, transferring calls between mobile and desktop, and adding call recordings to OneDrive  —  Microsoft Teams will soon let you transfer calls easily between desktop and mobile  —  Microsoft is overhauling its calling features inside Microsoft Teams today.
Jordan Novet / CNBC:
Scale, which helps companies label data for use in artificial intelligence models, raises $155M led by Tiger Global at a $3.5B+ valuation  —  - Start-up Scale helps companies label data for use in artificial intelligence models.  — It has had trouble keeping up with one of its customers …
Eric Geller / Politico:
SCOTUS worries about CFAA's sweeping nature, with Justice Gorsuch saying that the US government's view of the law risks “making a federal criminal of us all”  —  The Supreme Court on Monday indicated serious reservations about the ambiguity and scope of the nation's only major cybercrime law …
Jim Waterson / The Guardian:
Facebook to launch Facebook News in the UK in Jan. 2021, says it will pay publishers for news not already on its platform; most big UK publishers have signed up  —  Facebook is to pay mainstream UK news outlets millions of pounds a year to license their articles, as the social network faces …
John Cook / GeekWire:
Tanium, a cybersecurity company valued at $9B+, is moving its HQ from just outside Oakland, CA to Kirkland, WA near Seattle, after going remote first in June  —  Orion Hindawi was born in the San Francisco Bay Area, and helped build two successful companies there.
Jonathan Shieber / TechCrunch:
AWS adds natural language search capabilities, now in preview as QuickSight Q, to its business intelligence service QuickSight  —  When Amazon Web Services launched QuickSight, its business intelligence service, back in 2016 the company wanted to provide product information and customer information …
Steve O'Hear / TechCrunch:
Voi, the Stockholm-headquartered micromobility company known for e-scooter rentals, raises $160M in new funding, about two thirds equity and one third debt  —  Voi, the Stockholm-headquartered micro mobility company known for its e-scooter rentals, has raised $160 million in new funding.
More: Forbes and Bloomberg
Cade Metz / New York Times:
Alphabet's DeepMind says it has solved the key “protein folding problem”, cutting the job down from months to hours, which could speed up drug discovery  —  Researchers at DeepMind say they have solved “the protein folding problem,” a task that has bedeviled scientists for more than 50 years.

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Wall Street Journal:
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Tim Hardwick / MacRumors: