Techmeme
December 9, 2021, 5:35 PM

Top News

WABetaInfo:
WhatsApp begins a limited test of Meta's Novi digital wallet in the US, letting users send and receive USDP within a chat  —  Like Love Haha Wow Sad Angry  —  Today, WhatsApp is finally announcing a small pilot program to some people in the US, that can finally use the Novi digital wallet within WhatsApp!
Alex Heath / The Verge:
Meta opens its VR social platform Horizon Worlds to all adult users in the US and Canada, after announcing a private beta in September 2019  —  Facebook's first stab at the metaverse is Roblox meets the OASIS  —  More than two years and a company rebrand later, Meta is finally opening …
Politico:
Italy's competition authority fines Amazon €1.13B for abusing its market position and harming competitors in e-commerce logistics; Amazon plans to appeal  —  Italy's competition authority announced Thursday it was slapping a €1.13 billion fine on Amazon for abusing its dominant position …
Jonathan Bell / Wallpaper*:
A look at the working processes at Apple's design team, led by VP of industrial design Evans Hankey and VP of human interface design Alan Dye  —  Global exclusive!  Led by Evans Hankey and Alan Dye, the Apple Design Team holds enormous sway over our evolving relationship with technology.
Bloomberg:
Sources: as Ben Horowitz and Marc Andreessen buy Las Vegas properties, they are less involved in a16z's daily operations and are on fewer corporate boards  —  Recently, the Bay Area-based venture capitalist Ben Horowitz took part in a popular pandemic-era pastime: updating the location on his LinkedIn profile.
MacRumors:
Kuo: Apple's AR headset will include four sets of 3D sensors to offer a user interface with hand gesture controls and object detection  —  Apple's long rumored AR headset is predicted to include multiple highly sensitive 3D sensing modules in order to offer an innovative hand gesture …
New York Times:
EU Commission proposes rules to turn gig workers into employees, affecting up to 4.1M workers; the EU estimates 28M work via digital labor platforms in the bloc  —  A proposal with widespread political support would entitle drivers and couriers for companies like Uber to a minimum wage and legal protections.
Elizabeth M. Renieris / CIGI:
A look at Cardano, a controversial blockchain project led by Ethereum cofounder Charles Hoskinson that aims to build a national ID system for Ethiopia  —  There are countless examples of the dangers posed by national ID schemes, including from Kenya, Uganda, Pakistan, India and elsewhere.
Frank Chaparro / The Block:
Crypto derivates market Paradigm, which focuses on large trades, raises a $35M Series A at a $400M valuation led by Jump Capital and Alameda Research  —  Quick Take  — Paradigm is raising $35 million in a fundraise led by Jump Capital and Alameda Research.
Bloomberg:
Coinbase launches a DeFi yield product for non-US customers in over 70 countries, after US regulators effectively killed plans for its Lend program in September  —  - U.S. regulators effectively shut down Lend program earlier  — Holdings to be deposited into the Compound Finance protocol
Will Douglas Heaven / MIT Technology Review:
DeepMind claims its language model RETRO matches the performance of neural networks 25 times its size, cutting the time and cost to train large language models  —  RETRO uses an external memory to look up passages of text on the fly, avoiding some of the costs of training a vast neural network
Kollen Post / The Block:
At a congressional hearing with six crypto executives, committee members voiced concerns about stablecoins and exchanges but showed a warming up to crypto  —  Quick Take  — Today's hearing before the House Financial Services Committee confirmed: Congress is warming up to crypto.
Mayank Parmar / BleepingComputer:
Amazon says it will shut down its global website ranking system Alexa.com on May 1, 2022, after 26 years of operation  —  Amazon announced on Wednesday plans to shut down its global website ranking system and competitor analysis tool “Alexa.com”, which has been available for 25 years.
South China Morning Post:
China orders app stores to remove 106 more smartphone apps, including social network Douban and karaoke app Changba, citing data privacy and security violations  —  Authorities say more than a hundred apps, including Douban, have failed to rectify data privacy and security violations Douban …
More: Protocol
Bloomberg:
A look at the ethical minefield of VCs making personal startup bets ahead of follow-up investments from their VC firms, like at GV, BlackRock, DST, and others  —  Making personal investments in startups is common for VCs but can be an ethical minefield.  —  Consider this scenario …

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