Techmeme
May 2, 2024, 4:00 PM

Top News

Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:
Apple adds carveouts to its EU core tech fee, exempting free app developers and giving those with annual global revenue under €10M a three-year “free on-ramp”  —  Apple is tweaking how it applies a new fee that can apply to iOS developers in the European Union as it continues …
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge:
Google says 400M+ Google Accounts have used passkeys since the rollout, logging 1B+ authentications, and expands passkeys to its Advanced Protection Program  —  Google is kicking off World Password Day by updating us on its efforts toward replacing the often hacked, guessed, and stolen form of authentication with passkeys.
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Microsoft rolls out passkey support for all consumer accounts; Microsoft account owners can generate passkeys across Windows, Android, and iOS  —  Microsoft is fully rolling out passkey support for all consumer accounts today.  After enabling them in Windows 11 last year …
Jem Aswad / Variety:
Universal Music Group and TikTok strike a new music licensing deal to bring UMG music back to the platform, including “improved remuneration” and AI protections  —  The months-long standoff between Universal Music Group and TikTok over royalty payments and AI policies is finally over …
Leah Nylen / Bloomberg:
Senator Scott Wiener / @scott_wiener:
[Thread] California State Senator Scott Wiener defends his AI safety bill, SB 1047, after criticism that it will “crush OpenAI's competitors” and open-source AI  —  AI policy is a new & fast-moving field & it's healthy & important to have a diversity of perspectives. However, this thread contains some extreme inaccuracies — indeed outright fear-mongering — about our AI safety legislation (SB 1047) that need to be corrected: 🧵
Molly White / Citation Needed:
As people yearn for the web's “good old days”, bringing those days back is possible with new tech, the possibility of new protocols, and more internet users  —  Listen to a voiceover of this post, download the recording for later, or subscribe to the feed in your podcast app.
The Verge:
Peloton CEO Barry McCarthy steps down, as the company lays off ~15% of its workforce, or ~400 people, its fifth cut since its 2021 peak, when it had 8,600 staff  —  Peloton's CEO Barry McCarthy is stepping down after announcing yet another round of layoffs, this time affecting about 15 percent …
Saritha Rai / Bloomberg:
Microsoft announces plans to invest $2.2B in cloud and AI services infrastructure in Malaysia over four years and train 200K people in AI skills in the country  —  - Nadella announces plan for more AI infrastructure in Malaysia  — Tech companies are targeting Southeast Asia as new growth area
Vittoria Elliott / Wired:
Ethan Zuckerman sues to stop Meta from blocking his planned Unfollow Everything 2.0 extension that would let Facebook users tune or even turn off their Feed  —  Academic Ethan Zuckerman is suing Meta to win protections for add-ons that help researchers study the platform and give users more control over their feeds.
Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer:
Microsoft confirms the April 2024 Windows security updates break VPN connections across client and server platforms on Windows 11, 10, and Server 2008 or later  —  Microsoft has confirmed that the April 2024 Windows security updates break VPN connections across client and server platforms.
Tess Owen / Wired:
Tech Transparency Project: US extremist militias are quietly coordinating across ~200 Facebook groups and profiles, after lying low since the January 6 riot  —  After lying low for years in the aftermath of January 6, exclusive reporting shows, militia extremist groups and profiles …
Rebecca Bellan / TechCrunch:
Hyundai invests $475M in self-driving startup Motional and will spend another $448M to buy 11% of Aptiv's common equity interest in Motional  —  Hyundai has agreed to spend nearly $1 billion on Motional, an investment that will give the automaker a majority stake while providing …
Dan Goodin / Ars Technica:
Trend Micro: cybercriminals and nation-state spies are coexisting inside the same compromised name-brand routers, using the devices to disguise their attacks  —  How and why nation-state hackers and cybercriminals coexist in the same router botnet.  —  Cybercriminals and spies working …
Kalley Huang / The Information:
Some developers are releasing longer context windows for Llama 3 thanks to Meta's open-source approach; Llama 3 has a short context window of 8,000+ tokens  —  Developers have been praising Meta Platforms' Llama 3, the latest version of its flagship large language model.
Katie Roof / Bloomberg:
LA-based wealth management startup Altruist, whose software and app help with trading and more, raised a $169M Series E led by Iconiq at a $1.5B valuation  —  - Iconiq Growth led investment in competitor to Schwab, Fidelity  — Altruist provides software for registered investment advisers

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Google:
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Earlier Picks

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Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat: