Techmeme
January 10, 2024, 5:25 AM

Top News

CoinDesk:
An X post from US SEC Chair Gary Gensler says that the @SECGov's “twitter account was compromised”, and that the agency has not approved spot bitcoin ETFs  —  The X account of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which is deciding whether to approve bitcoin ETFs, “was compromised,” the regulator told CoinDesk.
CNBC:
X confirms the @SECGov account was compromised and says “the compromise was not due to any breach of X's systems” and that the account didn't have 2FA enabled  —  - X said late Tuesday it has completed a preliminary probe into the compromised account of the U.S. Securities …
Cecilia D'Anastasio / Bloomberg:
Sources: Twitch could cut ~500 employees, or ~35% of its staff, as soon as January 10, after concerns over company losses and several top executives leaving  —  Move is designed to stem losses after two rounds of layoffs last year.  —  Amazon.com Inc.'s livestreaming site Twitch is poised …
Gene Maddaus / Variety:
SAG-AFTRA signs a deal with AI voiceover company Replica Studios, requiring consent to create voice replicas for use in video games and safe storage of assets  —  The union announced the deal with Replica Studios on Tuesday at CES in Las Vegas.  Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the union's executive director …
Jordan Novet / CNBC:
HPE plans to acquire networking gear maker Juniper Networks for about $14B, or $40 per share, in an all-cash deal; JNPR jumps 21%+  —  Hewlett Packard Enterprise said it's agreed to buy networking gear vendor Juniper Networks for about $14 billion, or $40 per share, in an all-cash deal.
Alex Heath / The Verge:
Source: Humane laid off 10 staff, or 4% of its workforce, to cut costs and plans to lower budgets in 2024, as the company reshuffles some executive positions  —  Humane laid off 4 percent of employees this week in a move that was described as a cost cutting measure to those who were impacted …
Nelson Aguilar / CNET:
Google and Samsung merge their respective Nearby Share and Quick Share features under the Quick Share name, for a more unified cross-Android sharing experience  —  Apple has AirDrop.  Android now has Quick Share.  —  At CES 2024 today, Google announced Quick Share, a collaboration …
Jason Koebler / 404 Media:
An investigation finds over 1,600 YouTube videos featuring celebrity deepfakes promoting Medicaid and Medicare scams; the videos have over 195M views in total  —  Joe Rogan, Taylor Swift, Andrew Tate, Steve Harvey, The Rock, and Oprah have been cloned by AI for scam ads that, in total …
Julian Chokkattu / Wired:
Startup Rabbit debuts the R1, a $199 handheld AI device meant to be a virtual assistant to complete tasks without a smartphone, shipping in late March 2024  —  The startup has developed a virtual assistant that learns whatever digital errands you teach it.  The interface is extra cute …
Julie Carr Smyth / Associated Press:
A US federal judge temporarily halts the enforcement of a pending Ohio law that would require children to get parental consent to use social media apps  —  A federal judge issued an order Tuesday temporarily halting enforcement of a pending Ohio law that would require children to get parental consent to use social media apps.
Maxwell Zeff / Gizmodo:
Pennsylvania becomes the first US state to use ChatGPT Enterprise in a pilot with OpenAI, in which state employees will use AI tools for daily operations  —  State employees in Pennsylvania will begin using ChatGPT to assist with their work in the coming weeks.
Adam D'Angelo / Quora:
Quora raised $75M from Andreessen Horowitz and plans to accelerate the growth of Poe and pay bot creators through its creator monetization program  —  We are excited to announce that we have raised $75M from Andreessen Horowitz.  This funding will be used to accelerate the growth of Poe …
Jane Lanhee Lee / Bloomberg:
TSMC reports December 2023 revenue down 8.4% YoY to ~$5.7B, Q4 revenue flat YoY to ~$20.1B, beating estimates, and 2023 revenue down 4.5% YoY to ~$69.56B  —  - Chipmaker's holiday period stopped bleeding of prior quarters  — TSMC has advised cautious optimism about semiconductor rebound
More: Reuters and TSMC
Carly Page / TechCrunch:
In a first, the US FTC bans data broker Outlogic, formerly X-Mode Social, from selling phone location data and orders the company to delete all collected data  —  The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has banned the data broker X-Mode Social from sharing or selling users' sensitive location data, the federal regulator said Tuesday.
Julie Jargon / Wall Street Journal:
Meta plans to start automatically restricting teen Instagram and Facebook accounts from harmful content, including posts about self-harm, in the coming weeks  —  Efforts to curb harmful material and reduce unwanted interactions with teen social-media accounts come as states sue parent company Meta
Sheila Chiang / CNBC:
Meituan's market cap fell ~60% from ~$138.2B to ~$56.4B since the start of 2023, weighed down by rising competition and a slowdown in its food delivery business  —  - Chinese food delivery giant Meituan lost about $82 billion in market cap in 2023 from its yearly high, according to CNBC calculations.
Bloomberg:
Magnitt: startups in Saudi Arabia raised $1.4B in 2023, up 33% YoY, for a 52% share of VC funding in the MENA region, beating the UAE for the first time  —  - Saudi Arabia dominates tech scene with 52% share of funding  — Overall regional funding drops 23% amid shifting landscape
Thomas Germain / Gizmodo:
X suspended several journalists and podcasters for hours with no explanation; Elon Musk says that sometimes real accounts get caught up in anti-spam/scam sweeps  —  Elon Musk's “free speech” social media platform banned a number of accounts recently critical of Israel.

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:
Passkeys Week for a passwordless future: Learn how Zoho is embracing passkeys  —  Passkeys are the modern-day alternative authentication method that was introduced to replace traditional passwords for enhanced security and convenience.
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:
(BNS) How To Know When To Kill Your Startup
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 5:25 AM ET, January 10, 2024.

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

The Economic Times:
Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:

Earlier Picks

Alex Konrad / Forbes:
Harry McCracken / Fast Company:
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg: