Techmeme
September 20, 2023, 8:50 PM

Top News

The Verge:
Everything Amazon announced at its product event: Alexa Emergency Assist for $6/month, the Alexa Eye Gaze accessibility feature, the $50 Echo Pop Kids, and more  —  Amazon is kicking off its annual fall product announcements at its HQ2 campus in Arlington, Virginia.
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Amazon unveils new generative AI features aimed at making Alexa more conversational and personalized, available as a free preview on all Echo devices in the US  —  During a press event this morning at its HQ2 headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, Amazon announced that it'll soon use …
Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge:
Amazon unveils the $180 Echo Hub, a wall-mountable smart home controller with an 8" touchscreen, and Map View, an Alexa app interface for the user's floor plan  —  Designed specifically as a smart home controller, the Echo Hub is a slimline version of an Echo Show 8 or a shrunken version of a Show 15.
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Amazon refreshes its Alexa-powered Echo Frames glasses: enhanced speech processing, better noise isolation, 15% thinner, and a six-hour battery life for $270  —  Amazon today unveiled a new generation of Echo Frames, its Alexa-powered glasses, with enhanced speech processing, better noise isolation and a $269.99 price tag.
Brian Heater / TechCrunch:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Ina Fried / Axios:
CNBC:
Sources: as equities soared in 2020, Apple and Goldman were working on an iPhone stock trading feature but shelved the project when markets turned south in 2022  —  - Apple was exploring the launch of an iPhone feature that would let users buy and sell stocks, according to three sources familiar with the plans.
Allison Johnson / The Verge:
Apple's FineWoven accessories and iPhone cases are really bad: they're expensive, quickly show wear, and scratch very easily, leaving seemingly permanent marks  —  Apple's new FineWoven iPhone cases and accessories are bad.  Like, really bad.  I've been puzzling over them for the past week, looking at them from different angles.
Dana Mattioli / Wall Street Journal:
In its Prime lawsuit, the FTC alleges three Amazon executives played key roles in enrolling customers unwittingly and making it hard to cancel subscriptions  —  Federal agency alleges Amazon executives were aware of enrolling customers unwittingly and erecting intentional hurdles to cancellation
BBC:
After Meta criticized the UK's potential E2EE rules, the UK says Meta “failed to provide assurances” over keeping its platforms “safe from sickening abusers”  —  Facebook's owner Meta has hit back at a new government campaign strongly critical of its plans to encrypt messages.
Victoria Song / The Verge:
Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 review: Double Tap is great, but Precision Finding requires an iPhone 15, and the Siri and brightness improvements feel minor  —  Iterative updates aren't flashy, but these smartwatches are mainly for folks who don't have Apple Watches yet.
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
GitHub expands Copilot Chat beta in Visual Studio and VS Code to individual subscribers, after launching the tool for business users in July 2023  —  Three months ago, GitHub launched Copilot Chat, its ChatGPT-like programming-centric chatbot, out of private preview by making it available …
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Meta expands its Meta Verified program to businesses on Facebook and Instagram in select markets, for $21.99/month/page for each or $34.99/month/page for both  —  Meta announced today that it is expanding Meta Verified to businesses after first launching it for creators in March.
Financial Times:
Bloomberg:
Klaviyo closes up 9.2% in its New York Stock Exchange debut, valuing the Shopify-backed e-commerce marketing company at $9.9B on a fully diluted basis  —  - Email software firm closes debut at $9.9 billion valuation  — Founder Bialecki's fortune rises to $3.4 billion with IPO
Qianer Liu / Financial Times:
Sources: the Kirin 9000S SoC has four CPUs that use Arm designs, the other four use Huawei-modified Arm designs, HiSilicon developed the GPU and NPU, and more  —  Facing US sanctions, Chinese company emulates Apple by using its own designs in chips for Mate 60 Pro
Andrew J. Hawkins / The Verge:
Uber plans to accept the US food stamps EBT card and health insurance-issued FSA and flex cards for Uber Eats grocery delivery orders, starting in 2024  —  Uber Eats will start accepting food stamps and healthcare benefits as payment for grocery delivery orders, the company announced Wednesday.
WABetaInfo:
WhatsApp releases a beta for iOS via Apple's TestFlight with a companion mode for iPadOS, built using Mac Catalyst, after years of user requests for an iPad app  —  WhatsApp has just submitted a new update through the TestFlight beta Program, bringing the version up to 23.19.1.71.

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Earlier Picks

Nikkei Asia:
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Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Mariam Sunny / Reuters: