Techmeme
May 27, 2021, 1:30 AM

Top News

Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Amazon says it will acquire MGM Studios for $8.45B, its second-largest acquisition since it paid $13.7B for Whole Foods in 2017  —  - Amazon is buying MGM Studios, the companies announced, marking Amazon's most ambitious move yet into the entertainment business.
Peter Kafka / Vox:
With its MGM acquisition, Amazon doesn't want to compete with streamers like Netflix but reduce Prime subscriber churn by providing enough blockbuster content  —  Amazon isn't competing with Netflix, but it is spending billions trying to figure out Hollywood.  Maybe 007 can help.
Kurt Wagner / Bloomberg:
Facebook says it will limit the distribution of all posts from personal accounts that routinely spread misinformation  —  Facebook Inc. will begin doling out harsher punishments for individual accounts that repeatedly share false or misleading posts, an expansion of the social network's efforts to crack down on misinformation.
Elizabeth Dwoskin / Washington Post:
Jeff John Roberts / Decrypt:
PayPal to add third-party wallet transfer support, allowing users to send bitcoin to PayPal and Venmo users as well as to Coinbase and outside crypto wallets  —  PayPal created a stir in the crypto markets last year when it announced its millions of users could buy and sell Bitcoin.
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Twitter says users can now join Spaces via desktop and mobile web browsers, but can't host rooms on the web just yet  —  You can't host rooms yourself on the web just yet, though  —  You'll be able to join Twitter's Clubhouse-like Spaces from desktop and mobile web browsers starting Wednesday …
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Nvidia beats with record Q1 revenue of $5.66B, up 84% YoY, with Gaming revenue of $2.76B, up 106% YoY, and Data Center revenue of $2.05B, up 79% YoY  —  Nvidia reported revenues of $5.66 billion for its first fiscal quarter ended May 2, up 84% from a year earlier.  Gaming revenue grew 106% to $2.76 billion.
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Facebook and Instagram now give users options to hide Like counts across all posts and to hide their own public Like counts from others  —  Facebook this week will begin to publicly roll out the option to hide Likes on posts across both Facebook and Instagram, following earlier tests beginning in 2019.
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Amazon says Andy Jassy will become CEO on July 5, which marks 27 years to the day that Amazon was incorporated  —  That's Amazon's 27th birthday  —  Andy Jassy will officially become the CEO of Amazon on July 5th, the company announced at a shareholder meeting on Wednesday.
Cristiano Lima / Politico:
Facebook says it will no longer take down posts that claim COVID-19 was man-made, following renewed debate about the origins of the virus  —  Facebook will no longer take down posts claiming that Covid-19 was man-made or manufactured, a company spokesperson told POLITICO on Wednesday …
Hartley Charlton / MacRumors:
Apple removes an app, discovered by a developer, that required at least a three-star review before people could use it  —  An app that demanded at least a three-star review to function got through the App Store review process, it has been found (via The Verge).
New York Times:
An overview of Russia's increasingly aggressive attempts to control Google, Facebook, and Twitter, ordering them to store data in Russia and imposing fines  —  Its campaign is part of a global wave of actions by governments that are testing how far they can go to control online speech.
Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:
Researcher details a WebKit flaw, which can lead to a RCE exploit, that remains unpatched by Apple despite the availability of an open source fix for 3 weeks  —  WebKit bug that was fixed upstream has yet to find its way into Apple products.  —  Apple has yet to patch a security bug found …
Source: TheoriMore: SlashGear, 9to5Mac, and AppleInsider
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Instagram launches a new shopping section called Drops, helping users find limited supply products, and will temporarily waive fees due to COVID-19  —  Instagram today announced it's adding a new feature to help connect online shoppers to product drops through its app.
Martin Tisne / MIT Technology Review:
Lawmakers focus on protecting individuals from Big Tech when they should develop laws focusing specifically on collective data rights to prevent harm to society  —  Protecting individual data is not enough when the harms are collective  —  Every person engaged with the networked world constantly creates rivers of data.
Scott Kirsner Globe / The Boston Globe:
Flywire, a Boston-based fintech focused on cross-border payments, closed up 46%+ in its Nasdaq debut after raising $250M in its IPO at a valuation of over $3B  —  The Boston-based digital payments company Flywire made its public market debut Wednesday on the Nasdaq exchange, after raising $250 million in an initial public offering.
Romain Dillet / TechCrunch:
France-based Agicap, creator of a SaaS tool that helps companies manage and forecast their cash flows, raises $100M led by Greenoaks, at a valuation of $500M+  —  French startup Agicap has raised a new $100 million funding round led by Greenoaks.  With today's funding round …
Patrick Sykes / Bloomberg:
Iran says it is banning cryptocurrency mining until September 22 after a series of power blackouts across major cities  —  - Iran blames crypto mining and drought for recent outages  — Government says 85% of mining activity is unlicensed  —  Follow us @crypto for our full coverage.
Brian Armstrong / The Coinbase Blog:
Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong announces Fact Check, a section of the Coinbase blog to combat misinformation and mischaracterizations about Coinbase or crypto  —  Every tech company should go direct to their audience, and become a media company.  —  As Coinbase and the cryptoeconomy grow …

Sponsor Posts

Airtable:
Meet Airtable ProductCentral  —  The unified solution for managing your entire product development process in the AI era.
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:
Zoho Forms for successful Black Friday sales  —  Black Friday is a retail frenzy that can significantly impact your bottom line.  To make the most of this shopping bonanza, you need a strategy that not only attracts customers …
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Techmeme Ride Home:
Tue 11/05 - Apple: Maybe Smartglasses Are The Way To Go
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 1:30 AM ET, May 27, 2021.

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

Madhumita Murgia / Financial Times:
DFRLab:

Earlier Picks

Fadeke Adegbuyi / Cybernaut - Every:
Lauren Hepler / San Francisco Chronicle:
Melanie Evans / Wall Street Journal:
Bloomberg: