Techmeme
January 22, 2021, 2:50 PM

Top News

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple is working on a thinner and lighter 13-inch high-end MacBook Air with MagSafe charging and next-gen processors to launch as soon as this year  —  Apple Inc. is working on a thinner and lighter version of the MacBook Air, the company's mass-market laptop, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
Steven Levy / Wired:
Alphabet says that it is shutting down Loon, its internet balloon project, calling it “a successful experiment” but not a viable one  —  Plus: The moonshot's launch, health care for the mask-less, and a new era's inaugural meme.  —  DO you detect something missing?
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft is increasing the prices of Xbox Live Gold subscriptions, up $1 to $10.99 per month and up $5 to $29.99 for a three-month membership  —  Xbox Live Gold prices are going up for monthly subscribers  —  Microsoft is increasing the prices of its Xbox Live Gold subscription soon.
Josh Taylor / The Guardian:
In an Australian Senate hearing, a Google executive said that a law forcing Google to pay news outlets for links could prompt it to stop offering Search  —  As Google and Facebook face Senate committee, poll finds three in five Australians agree social media companies should prioritise news in feeds
Bloomberg:
Sources: Samsung is considering building a $10B chipmaking plant in Texas, a major investment it hopes will help it catch up with industry leader TSMC  —  - It's looking to build a cutting-edge wafer fab in the U.S.  — It would follow TSMC's decision to build a new site in Arizona
Nick Clegg / About Facebook:
Evelyn Douek / Lawfare:
Kif Leswing / CNBC:
Tom Krazit / Protocol:
AWS will maintain an open source fork of Elasticsearch and Kibana, after criticism from Elastic which changed its licensing terms to monetize cloud-service use  —  Fed up with what he sees as unfair competition from AWS, Elastic CEO Shay Banon felt he had no choice but to restrict …
Matt Day / Bloomberg:
Despite the pandemic, Amazon wants Alabama warehouse workers to vote in person on a proposal to form a union, objecting to NLRB's decision to allow vote by mail  —  - Company says labor regulator erred in ordering mail vote  — Yes vote would be first union win at a U.S. Amazon facility
Foo Yun Chee / Reuters:
European Parliament invites CEOs of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Alphabet to a Feb. 1 hearing in Brussels on EU Commission's tech regulation proposals  —  BRUSSELS (Reuters) - EU lawmakers have invited the chief executives of Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Alphabet to a Feb. 1 hearing in Brussels …

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More News

Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:
Kate Clark / The Information:
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Earlier Picks

Kim-Mai Cutler / Initialized:
Russell Brandom / The Verge:
April Glaser / NBC News:
Josh Eidelson / Bloomberg: