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July 21, 2023, 6:35 PM
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Top News

Makena Kelly / The Verge:
OpenAI, Microsoft, Meta, Google, Amazon, Anthropic, and Inflection make voluntary AI promises to the White House, like cybersecurity investment and watermarking  —  The White House is bringing in AI's top seven companies Friday to make a series of voluntary promises to protect users.
Lindsey Choo / Wall Street Journal:
Sensor Tower: Threads' DAUs declined to 13M, down 70% from the July 7 peak; Similarweb: the average time spent in the app has decreased from 19 minutes to four  —  Data show user engagement has fallen 70% as executives focus on options such as a chronological feed
Anne Steele / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Spotify plans to raise its US ad-free premium tier's price for the first time, by $1 to $10.99/month, and increase prices globally in the coming months  —  Audio company had avoided raising prices, but faces investor pressure to increase profitability
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Reddit removes three moderators and takes charge of r/malefashionadvice, one of the biggest subreddits to close in protest of the platform's API pricing changes  —  Reddit is now in charge of r/malefashionadvice, which for a time was the biggest subreddit still closed in protest of the platform's API pricing changes.
Rich Stanton / PC Gamer:
Troy Hunt: the sensitive info of almost 4,000 Roblox Developer Conference attendees from 2017 to 2020 was leaked in 2021; Roblox disclosed the leak this week  —  This may cost the company a few Robux.  —  The major gaming platform Roblox has suffered a major data breach …
Kevin Collier / NBC News:
NYC's MTA used AI-powered surveillance software at seven subway stations in May 2023 to track fare evaders, and plans to expand to ~12 more by the end of 2023  —  An MTA spokesperson said the software doesn't flag fare evaders to New York police but declined to comment on whether that policy could change.
Julie Coleman / CNBC:
Digital World Acquisition Corp., which is seeking to take Truth Social public via a SPAC merger, settles fraud charges with the US SEC for $18M; DWAC is up 50%+  —  - Shares of Digital World Acquisition Corp. soared more than 50% on Friday after the company reached an $18 million dollar fraud settlement with the SEC.
Richard Lawler / The Verge:
OpenAI plans to release ChatGPT for Android next week, after launching an iOS app in May 2023  —  / OpenAI is releasing the Android version of the app for ChatGPT next week after launching on iOS in May. … Since launching in November, OpenAI's ChatGPT tool has reached a number of users …
Steve Dent / Engadget:
Telegram launches Stories, initially for its Premium subscribers, letting users control who can see their stories and how long they last before disappearing  —  You can display them forever or make them disappear at various times up to 48 hours.  —  Telegram's new Stories feature is here as promised …
Luc Cohen / Reuters:
Court filing: Heather “Razzlekhan” Morgan and Ilya Lichtenstein reach a plea deal over allegedly laundering billions in cryptocurrency from Bitfinex's 2016 hack  —  An American couple accused of laundering billions of dollars worth of cryptocurrency stolen from the 2016 hacking …

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This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 6:35 PM ET, July 21, 2023.

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From Mediagazer

Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Paramount offers $15M to settle with President Trump, whose team wants $25M+, is seeking an apology from CBS News, and threatened another lawsuit

Ben Johansen / Politico:
Sources: all 800 full-time VOA staff are expected to receive reduction-in-force notices this week, after ~600 VOA contractors were dismissed earlier in May

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Memo: Business Insider is cutting staff by 21% to “endure extreme traffic drops outside of our control” and “exiting the majority of our Commerce business”

More News

Zack Whittaker / TechCrunch:
How Vietnam-based 1Byte, which sells TheTruthSpy stalkerware, created networks of fake sellers with forged US passports to evade detection and funnel payments
Erin Woo / The Information:
Letter: the US SEC subpoenaed Bolt and sent a notice to former CEO Ryan Breslow in 2022 over their past misleading statements to current and potential investors
Dylan Tokar / Wall Street Journal:
The US DOJ merges its crypto enforcement team, formed in 2021, into the department investigating computer-related crimes, giving crypto crimes more resources

Earlier Picks

David Heaney / UploadVR:
Meta rolls out Quest v56, featuring Hand Tracking 2.2, which the company claims reduces latency by up to 40% in typical usage and up to 75% during fast movement
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: in recent months, Sergey Brin increased his Google visits to three to four days a week, working with researchers on Gemini, an AI model to rival GPT-4
Jonathan Stempel / Reuters:
FTX sues Sam Bankman-Fried, Caroline Ellison, Gary Wang, and Nishad Singh for the $1B+ they allegedly misappropriated for “pet projects” before FTX's bankruptcy
David Pierce / The Verge:
OpenAI adds opt-in “custom instructions”, or a user's details that ChatGPT should remember, in beta for ChatGPT Plus subscribers everywhere but the UK and EU
Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Amazon plans to roll out its Amazon One palm scanning payment tech to all 500+ US Whole Foods stores by the end of 2023; 200+ locations already have Amazon One
Hannah Lang / Reuters:
The US Federal Reserve launches FedNow, its long-awaited real-time payments system that will eventually let individuals and businesses transfer money in seconds
Nikkei Asia:
TSMC reports Q2 revenue down 10% YoY to ~$15.68B and net income down 23.3% YoY to ~$5.9B, the first quarterly decline since 2019, as all non-AI chip sales slump
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