Techmeme
March 17, 2021, 10:15 PM

Top News

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: faster iPad Pros may come as early as April with better cameras; Apple aims to use MiniLED on at least the 12.9" model and has tested using Thunderbolt  —  - Company plans updated iPad Pro line with faster processor  — Apple's iPad sales have jumped in work-from-home environment
Allison Johnson / The Verge:
Samsung updates its mid-range Galaxy lineup: 6.5" A52 and A52 5G, from ~$415, and 6.7" A72, from ~$535, with 90Hz or 120Hz displays, better cameras, and more  —  The A-series phones will also include IP67 ratings, brighter screens, and expandable microSD storage
Sohee Kim / Bloomberg:
Samsung says it is considering skipping launch of a new Note this year to streamline its lineup and warns of a “serious imbalance” in semiconductors globally  —  - It's seeing a ‘serious imbalance’ in global semiconductors  — The warning suggests shortages may spread beyond autos
Bloomberg:
A profile of Clubhouse co-founder Paul Davison, who previously had built social apps like Highlight and Shorts that nudged people to share more by default  —  “He's got more momentum than force,” says a former colleague.  “Paul is just always moving forward.”
Shaan Puri / @shaanvp:
[Thread] Why Clubhouse will fail: most of the content is “meh” and users will struggle to find interesting live content, leading to low user retention  —  So... everyone seems to think clubhouse is the “next big thing” - but I think it's going to fail. Here's how I think it all goes down..
Ashley Carman / The Verge:
Facebook outlines multiple changes for Groups: probation for rule-breaking users, limiting civic and political groups' reach, and requiring more moderation  —  Ultimately culminating in a ban  —  Facebook is trying to clean up its Groups experience and limit the reach of potentially problematic users and communities.
Jonty Wareing / @jonty:
[Thread] Most NFTs' JSON metadata files point to normal URLs or IPFS gateway URLs run by an NFT startup; if the startups shutter, those NFTs will likely break  —  Out of curiosity I dug into how NFT's actually reference the media you're “buying” and my eyebrows are now orbiting the moon
Matt Day / Bloomberg:
Amazon says it will expand Amazon Care, a telehealth service piloted on its employees in Seattle, to other companies and the rest of its US employees this year  —  Amazon.com Inc. is expanding digital medical consultations to its employees across the U.S. and says it will start offering the service to other companies later this year.
Sam Altman:
AI will drive a new tech revolution, applying Moore's law to everything; to rebalance the newly created wealth, society should favor taxing capital over labor  —  My work at OpenAI reminds me every day about the magnitude of the socioeconomic change that is coming sooner than most people believe.
Substack Blog:
Substack shares details on its Pro program after criticism, saying 30+ writers with a “diverse set of viewpoints” have signed up, none of whom are anti-trans  —  In recent days, we've heard from some people who are concerned that we might have been using Substack Pro …
Kishan Vyas / XDA Developers:
Google Chrome adds Live Caption as an accessibility feature in Chrome 89, to transcribe speech in videos  —  Google first showcased its amazing Live Caption accessibility feature at Google I/0 2019.  The feature was first rolled out to the Pixel phones with Android 10 update and subsequently arrived …
Lauren Feiner / CNBC:
AT&T says it will no longer exempt HBO Max from mobile data caps starting March 25, after a US court upheld CA's net neutrality law; change will apply beyond CA  —  - AT&T will no longer exempt viewing of its HBO Max streaming service from data caps after a federal court upheld California's …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Intel hires Justin Long, who played the “I'm a Mac” role in Apple's Mac vs PC ads, to pitch Intel-based PCs and tout touchscreens and convertible form factors  —  Intel is reviving the Mac vs. PC ads  —  Intel has hired Apple's former “I'm a Mac” actor Justin Long to create new ads praising PCs.
Mary Ann Azevedo / TechCrunch:
Invstr, an 8-year-old startup with 1M+ app installs that's focused on financial education, raises $20M Series A and adds trading and banking services in the US  —  One of the biggest gripes about investing apps is that they are not acting responsibly by not educating users properly and allegedly letting them fend for themselves.
Sam Schechner / Wall Street Journal:
France says Apple's upcoming IDFA ad privacy changes are not abusive but will investigate if Apple has stricter rules for third-party apps than for its own apps  —  French competition authority says Apple's changes 'don't appear to be abusive'  —  France's competition regulator rejected …
Joseph Cox / VICE:
Document: surveillance contractor Ulysses Group marketed a tool that tracks 15B car locations using data from automakers and third parties to the US military  —  15 billion car locations.  Nearly any country on Earth.  ‘The Ulysses Group’ is pitching a powerful surveillance technology to the U.S. government.
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Stack Overflow says it will add a free tier to its Teams service, limited to 50 users, and it added 1,500 Teams customers in 2020, including Microsoft and Box  —  Stack Overflow is the default Q&A site for programmers (though the overall Stack Exchange network goes well beyond helping you answer your basic PHP questions).
Will Bedingfield / WIRED UK:
For the first time, Netflix details its carbon footprint using DIMPACT tool, claiming one hour of streaming equates to a 75W ceiling fan running for four hours  —  Streaming platforms finally have a tool to evaluate the size of their carbon footprint.  Now they need to take action and go green
Financial Times:
How Stripe became Silicon Valley's most valuable private company by being capital efficient at scale and having a self-sustaining core payments business  —  Underpinning $95bn valuation is investors' belief that payments digitisation still has some way to run
Jeff Stone / CyberScoop:
FBI says $4.2B in losses as a result of cybercrime and internet fraud were reported to its Internet Crime Complaint Center in 2020, up about 20% YoY  —  American victims reported $4.2 billion in losses as a result of cybercrime and internet fraud to the FBI in 2020, a roughly 20% uptick …
More: The Record

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