Techmeme
July 29, 2021, 10:45 PM

Top News

Nick Statt / Protocol:
A look at the fallout from the Activision Blizzard suit, as the company confirms it fired WoW lead for misconduct last year and hires “union-busting” law firm  —  An employee walkout, a tumbling stock price and damning new reports of misconduct.  —  Activision Blizzard is in crisis mode.
Maggie Fitzgerald / CNBC:
Robinhood closes down 8% on its first day of trading, after raising $2.1B in its IPO at a valuation of around $32B  —  - Stock trading app Robinhood fell more than 8% on its first day of trading on the Nasdaq.  — Robinhood's opening price was $38 per share.
Amazon.com, Inc.:
Amazon reports Q2 revenue of $113.08B vs. $115.2B est., net sales grew 27% YoY, net income of $7.8B, and AWS net sales of $14.8B, up 37% YoY; stock down 5%+  —  SEATTLE—(BUSINESS WIRE) July 29, 2021—Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) today announced financial results for its second quarter ended June 30, 2021.
Ryne Hager / Android Police:
Google updates Play Store policies to ban apps offering “compensated sexual relationships”, likely impacting sugar daddy dating apps, beginning September 1  —  Today, Google published a handful of changes to its Play policies, and nestled among precise legalese refinements …
Jonathan Greig / ZDNet:
Researchers detail a never-before-seen attack against Iran's train system and transport ministry from a new threat actor using a reusable wiper called Meteor  —  SentinelOne analysts were able to recreate the July 9 attack and identify the threat actor behind it.
Karen Hao / MIT Technology Review:
Profile of Sophie Zhang, a former Facebook data scientist who wrote an exit memo detailing Facebook's inadequate steps to address global election misinformation  —  Sophie Zhang, a former data scientist at Facebook, revealed that it enables global political manipulation and has done little to stop it.
Jing Yang / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Didi is considering going private to placate Chinese authorities and compensate investors for losses with money made during its IPO; Didi denies report  —  Ride-hailing giant has been contemplating delisting plan as crackdown widens and has obtained support from cybersecurity watchdog
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Neuralink, Elon Musk's brain-computer interface company, raises $205M Series C led by Vy Capital, with GV and others participating  —  In addition to SpaceX and Tesla, Neuralink is another Elon Musk company.  Focused on building a brain machine interface, Neuralink today announced …
Michail / GSMArena.com:
Motorola announces the Edge 20, 20 Pro, and 20 Lite for Europe, Latin America, and Asia, coming in August with prices starting from €349.99  —  A trio of new Motorola phones was announced with the Edge 20 Pro, Edge 20 and Edge 20 Lite.  The Pro model brings a flagship specs sheet …
Thomas Brewster / Forbes:
Profile of Israeli surveillance startup Paragon, funded with $5-10M from US-based Battery, which sources say allows police to hack encrypted messaging apps  —  Paragon Solutions doesn't have a website.  There's very little information at all about them online, even if the Tel Aviv-based …
Eric Newcomer / Newcomer:
Profile of Bessemer Venture Partners, an early investor in Twilio and Shopify, as its competition with Andreessen Horowitz, Tiger Global, and SoftBank ramps up  —  Bessemer Venture Partners is a thoughtful firm in a world of loose money.  —  4 hr ago  —  In 2009, Ethan Kurzweil …
Jordan Fabian / Bloomberg:
More than 90 CEOs, including Cook, Pichai, Jassy, and Zuckerberg, urge Congress to ensure citizenship for Dreamers, after a judge ruled against the program  —  - More than 90 executives seek legal status for Dreamers  — They say allowing citizenship would give U.S. economic boost
Kieran Leavitt / Toronto Star:
Canada proposes the creation of a digital safety commissioner role to oversee violations of new harmful online content rules and issue penalties to platforms  —  The Liberal government has proposed a vast new system that would be tailored to ensure illegal content, such as child pornography and hate-speech …
Salvador Rodriguez / CNBC:
Pinterest misses on user growth in Q2, with 454M MAUs vs. 482M est., as revenue beats, with $613M, up 125%+ YoY, vs. $562.1M est.; stock down ~14% after hours  —  - The company declined to provide third-quarter guidance on monthly active user due to the unknown impact of Covid-19 variants.
Karissa Bell / Engadget:
Twitter announces updates to Spaces which will let users tweet directly from the Space; iOS users will be able to search for live and upcoming Spaces  —  another update that makes the audio feature easier to share and discover.  Now, users will be able to compose a new tweet directly from the Space …
Danielle Kaye / Reuters:
LinkedIn will let most staff opt for full-time remote work, reversing a policy from last October that would have required in-office work half of the time  —  LinkedIn will allow most employees to opt for full-time remote work as offices gradually reopen, Chief People Officer Teuila Hanson told Reuters.
Harmeet Singh Walia / Counterpoint Research:
Global smartphone market grew 19% YoY in Q2 with 329M units shipped, led by Samsung with 58M units, Xiaomi with 53M, Apple with 49M, and Oppo with 34M  —  - Global smartphone market grew 19% YoY but declined by 7% QoQ as 329 million units were shipped, led by Samsung.

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