Techmeme
December 9, 2021, 2:35 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 …
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 …
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.
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.
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.
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.
C-SPAN.org:
Video of Adam Mosseri's testimony before a Senate Commerce subcommittee examining Instagram's negative effects on teen mental health  —  Instagram CEO testifies on impact of platform on young users before a Senate Commerce subcommittee.
Karissa Bell / Engadget:
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.
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.
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
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google confirms a permanent fix is coming for a bug that prevents some Android users from calling 911 if Microsoft Teams is installed but they are not logged in  —  Last week, a user reported that their Pixel 3 was not able to dial 911 (emergency services in the US).
South China Morning Post:
China orders another 106 smartphone apps, including popular social network Douban and karaoke app Changba, to be removed from app stores, citing data practices  —  Authorities say more than a hundred apps, including Douban, have failed to rectify data privacy and security violations Douban …
More: Protocol

Sponsor Posts

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:
How to choose the right live chat software for your business  —  In a world where instant communication is the norm, live chat software enables businesses to meet customer expectations with real-time assistance.
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Techmeme Leaderboards:
Discover the top reporters on AI, VR, policy, and much more  —  We've analyzed Techmeme's news crawl to identify the most influential and prolific writers on 48 news topics.  Download reports immediately for just $100.
Techmeme Ride Home:
Wed. 11/13 - Amazon Haul
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 2:35 PM ET, December 9, 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

Earlier Picks

Bloomberg:
Russell Brandom / The Verge: