Techmeme
March 5, 2021, 3:30 PM

Top News

Cecilia Kang / New York Times:
Tim Wu, an outspoken critic of Big Tech, is joining the National Economic Council as a special assistant to President Biden for tech and competition policy  —  Tim Wu's appointment to the National Economic Council would signal a confrontational approach by the Biden administration.
Adam Klasfeld / Law & Crime:
US indicts John McAfee for fraud and money laundering over an alleged $13M cryptocurrency “pump-and-dump” scheme  —  Antivirus software mogul John McAfee, who has been awaiting extradition from Spain on tax evasion charges since late last year, just had his legal woes compounded …
Jon Porter / The Verge:
Leaked interface shows that Twitter's “undo send” feature may be a button that also doubles as a progress bar showing how much time a user has to undo  —  A work-in-progress interface has been unearthed  —  A potential animation for Twitter's long-rumored “undo send” …
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: India threatened to jail Facebook, WhatsApp, and Twitter employees if the companies don't comply with takedown requests related to farmer protests  —  Country flexes new powers over big platforms while companies are counting on world's second-largest population for growth
New York Times:
Research: low-wage workers at businesses in the areas where Amazon operates have seen significant wage growth since the company raised minimum pay to $15/hour  —  New research suggests that when big companies increase wages, they drive up pay in the places where they operate — without a notable loss in jobs.
Katherine Rosman / New York Times:
Square acquires a majority stake in Jay-Z's streaming service Tidal for $297M; Jay-Z will join Square's board  —  What did Jay-Z and Jack Dorsey talk about when they went yachting around the Hamptons together last summer?  Perhaps only Beyoncé knows.  —  Maybe now we do, too.
Sujeong Lim / Counterpoint Research:
Global smartwatch shipments rose 1.5% YoY in 2020, with Apple Watch shipments up 19% YoY, Huawei's up 26% YoY, and Fitbit shipments down 4% YoY  —  - In Q4 2020, the shipments decreased slightly YoY due to a fresh wave of COVID-19.  — However, Apple managed to expand its market share and remains firmly at the forefront.
Mike Isaac / New York Times:
Reddit hires Drew Vollero as its first chief financial officer to prepare the company for an eventual IPO  —  The addition of Drew Vollero, formerly of Mattel and Snap, is a move toward developing operations more like publicly traded social networks.  —  SAN FRANCISCO — The world's …
Robert Hackett / Fortune:
Eco, a personal finance app that offers yields of 2.5% to 5% and cash-backs for shopping at Amazon, Uber, and Doordash, raises $26M led by a16z crypto  —  Our mission to make business better is fueled by readers like you.  To enjoy unlimited access to our journalism, subscribe today.
Bennett Cyphers / Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Google's FLoC, which helps advertisers perform behavioral targeting, avoids privacy risks of 3rd-party cookies, but creates new privacy issues in the process  —  The third-party cookie is dying, and Google is trying to create its replacement.  —  No one should mourn the death of the cookie as we know it.
Varun Mishra / Counterpoint Research:
Oppo becomes the top smartphone brand in China, reaching a market share of 21% in January, followed by Vivo at 20% and Huawei, Apple, and Xiaomi at 16% each  —  Beijing, London, San Diego, Buenos Aires, New Delhi, Seoul, Hong Kong - March 5, 2021  —  OPPO has risen through the ranks to become …
Javier Espinoza / Financial Times:
Sources: EU is set to press antitrust charges against Apple over App Store rules for competing music streaming services, following a complaint by Spotify  —  Brussels set to formally press charges alleging tech company used its dominance to squeeze out App Store rivals
Bloomberg:
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Google says it is speeding up the Chrome release cycle and will ship a new milestone every four weeks instead of the current six weeks  —  Google today announced that its Chrome browser is moving to a faster release cycle by shipping a new milestone every four weeks instead of the current six-week cycle …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft rolls out new features for Edge, including vertical tabs and a feature that it says can improve startup times by 29% to 41% after a device reboots  —  Microsoft Edge gets some new features for March  —  Microsoft is rolling out some new improvements to its Edge browser this month.

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