Techmeme
March 15, 2022, 5:15 PM

Top News

Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft says a Windows 11 File Explorer ad “was not intended to be published externally and was turned off” after a Microsoft MVP found it in the latest build  —  We may still see File Explorer ads in the future  —  Microsoft appears to be testing a new type of ad inside File Explorer on Windows 11.
Sean Hollister / The Verge:
Google details Stadia plans, including letting developers offer trials, port Unreal Engine and Unity games more easily, and white label cloud gaming services  —  Less friction, more white-labeling  —  Google's Stadia cloud gaming service didn't stick the landing, and it's been a rough ride since.
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google says Steam launched in Alpha “on select Chromebooks for users to try”; code changes showed earlier that it will work only on high-performance Chromebooks  —  The long-awaited availability of Steam on Chromebooks was just more or less announced (in alpha) at the 2022 Google for Games Developer Summit.
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
Chaim Gartenberg / The Verge:
AMD plans to release the Ryzen 7 5800X3D, the “world's fastest gaming processor”, on April 20 for $449, marking the debut of the company's 3D-stacking V-Cache  —  Along with a new slate of more affordable processors coming April 4th  —  AMD's latest desktop processor …
Ian Allison / CoinDesk:
ConsenSys, which develops and invests in Ethereum projects, announces a $450M Series D led by ParaFi Capital at a $7B valuation and says MetaMask has 30M+ MAUs  —  The hefty Series D more than doubles the firm's previous valuation from November 2021.  —  Ethereum application …
Mia Sato / The Verge:
Several Patreon creators say Vimeo is forcing them to pay thousands of dollars per year for a custom plan, as Vimeo shifts its focus to large corporate clients  —  Popular Patreon creators are being hit with unexpected Vimeo price hikes as Vimeo shifts corporate strategy
TechCrunch:
Aptos, a Layer 1 blockchain built by ex-Meta employees who worked on Diem, raises $200M at a $1B+ valuation led by a16z  —  Facebook's audacious attempt at creating a crypto payments network met an unceremonious end earlier this year when Silvergate Capital acquired the Diem technology assets for $182 million.
Kate Kaye / Protocol:
The FTC, which has long struggled to combat deceptive data practices, is increasingly forcing companies to delete algorithmic systems built with ill-gotten data  —  The Federal Trade Commission has struggled over the years to find ways to combat deceptive digital data practices using its limited set of enforcement options.
Kim Mackrael / Wall Street Journal:
The EU approves Amazon's $6.5B MGM acquisition, saying the deal won't reduce competition as their production doesn't overlap and MGM content is not a must-have  —  Regulators conclude deal wouldn't significantly harm competition in Europe  —  European Union antitrust officials gave …
Ian King / Bloomberg:
Internal memo: Arm to cut up to 1,000 jobs, or 15% of its workforce in the UK and the US, before its IPO; a source says most of the cuts won't affect engineers  —  Arm Ltd., the SoftBank Group Corp. unit preparing for an initial public offering, will cut as much as 15% of its workforce …
Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:
The Irish DPC fines Meta €17M for GDPR violations related to 12 personal data breaches that Meta disclosed to the regulator between June 2018 and December 2018  —  Facebook's parent company, Meta, has been fined €17 million (~$18.6M) by the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) over a string of historical data breaches.
Bloomberg:
Analysis: TV shows make up ~75% of Netflix's top 10 lists, the average hit fades after two weeks or less, and Asian hits overlap the least with other markets  —  Nobody in Hollywood knows for sure what works on Netflix.  —  The company releases statistics like “26 million people watched this show in the first 28 days.”
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Pakistan-based Bazaar, which operates a B2B marketplace for merchants and helps them digitize their bookkeeping, raises a $70M Series B  —  Dragoneer Investment and Tiger Global are backing Bazaar, a startup that is attempting to digitize Pakistan's retail with e-commerce …

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