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Techmeme
February 6, 2024, 1:50 PM

Top News

Will Oremus / Washington Post:
Bluesky CEO Jay Graber says the social network, launched on iOS in February 2023, is now open to the public, has 3M+ users, and plans to add developer tools  —  The upstart social network has been by invitation only since its launch last year  —  When Jack Dorsey, then Twitter's CEO …
AJ Vicens / CyberScoop:
Google's TAG publishes a report on commercial spyware, detailing ~40 vendors, and says global governments should take more aggressive steps to combat spyware  —  The commercial spyware industry continues to supply highly advanced surveillance capabilities despite efforts to better regulate it.
Sam Sabin / Axios:
Ben Thompson / Stratechery:
Apple Vision Pro review: disappointing for productivity, a very narrow field of view, and the Guest User feature is bad, all making the device hard to recommend  —  No wireless.  Less space than a nomad.  Lame.  — CmdrTaco, Slashdot  —  My one small comfort in the cold Wisconsin winters …
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Apple tells Vision Pro users who forget their passcode to bring the device to a store or mail the device to AppleCare support to erase and reset the device  —  Buyers of Apple Inc.'s new Vision Pro headset are finding it can be a major hassle if they lose their passcode.
Nilay Patel / The Verge:
Mike Isaac / New York Times:
Meta proposes standards to identify AI content that its industry peers could use, and plans to label AI images posted on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads  —  The social network wants to promote standardized labels to help detect artificially created photo, video and audio material across its platforms.
Todd Spangler / Variety:
YouTube says YouTube TV now has 8M+ subscribers, up from 5M+ in mid-2022, and that the YouTube Partner Program has 3M+ channels receiving ad revenue share  —  CEO Neal Mohan also says more than 3 million channels now receive ad-revenue share, touts 1 billion hours viewed on TV daily
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
YouTube says Shorts averages 70B+ daily views and the number of channels uploading Shorts rose 50% YoY  —  YouTube CEO Neal Mohan today shared what the video service is focusing on in 2024.  At a high-level, it's AI, elevating creators, safety, and the “next frontier” of the living room and subscriptions.
Arjun Kharpal / CNBC:
Nintendo reports Q3 net sales down 6% YoY to ~$4B, net profit up 18% YoY to ~$919M, and forecasts 15.5M Switch sales in the current fiscal year, up from 15M YoY  —  - Nintendo said it now expects to sell 15.5 million of its flagship Switch consoles in its current fiscal year, upping a previous forecast.
Josh Ye / Reuters:
Sources: Tencent plans to adapt acclaimed role-playing console game Elden Ring into a mobile version, after acquiring licensing rights from FromSoftware in 2022  —  China's Tencent Holdings (0700.HK) has been working to adapt acclaimed action role-playing console game “Elden Ring” …
James Hunt / The Block:
Solana suffers a major outage, lasting for over two hours, and says validators should prepare for a network restart, the first big outage since February 2023  —  - Solana has confirmed an outage on its mainnet, with engineers across the ecosystem currently investigating.
Qianer Liu / Financial Times:
Sources: SMIC plans to use its stock of US and Dutch-made equipment to build 5nm Kirin chips designed by Huawei's HiSilicon for smartphones, despite US curbs  —  SMIC and Huawei plan to make new 5nm processor, supporting Beijing's goal for advanced semiconductors
Aisha Malik / TechCrunch:
Meta expands its Take It Down tool, which helps teens combat non-consensual sharing of intimate imagery, to 25 languages  —  Meta is introducing a few new updates and efforts to help teens on its platforms combat sextortion, the company announced on Tuesday.
Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:
Spotify reports Q4 revenue up 16% YoY to €3.7B, MAUs up 23% YoY to 602M, subscribers up 15% YoY to 236M, a €75M operating loss, and expects 618M MAUs in Q1 2024  —  - Spotify posts second-largest gain ever for the quarter  — Company has been cutting costs in drive to become profitable

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