Techmeme: Workday is cutting about 1,750 workers, or 8.5% of its workforce, as it plans to hire in areas such as AI and take on more people overseas; WDAY closed up 6.33% (Brody Ford/Bloomberg)

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February 6, 2025, 4:30 AM

Top News

Miles Kruppa / Wall Street Journal:

Email: Google eliminates its goal of hiring more employees from historically underrepresented groups and is reviewing some DEI programs after Donald Trump's EOs — Search giant is eliminating goals to hire more minority employees and reviewing DEI programs, part of a pullback across Silicon Valley

More: The Verge, New York Times, The Guardian, CNBC, Moneycontrol, Proactive, BBC, Mashable, Werd I/O, New York Post, The Gateway Pundit, TipRanks Financial, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, HotAir, TechCrunch, National Review, NBC News, Engadget, Forbes, The Daily Wire, Financial Express, The Information, ZeroHedge News, Mediaite, Seeking Alpha, Blaze Media, KRON4, Washington Examiner, Business Insider, Quartz, Axios, Bloomberg, Reuters, Benzinga, Fox Business, The Hill, and Tennessee Star

X: @jeffreyatucker, @parissathena, @meridithmcgraw, @joshuaogundu, @alexeheath, and @tjmoe28

LinkedIn: Alex Heath and Lisa Haley

Forums: Hacker News, r/technology, r/politics, and r/womenintech

Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch:

AI researchers at Stanford and the University of Washington claim they trained an AI reasoning model, called s1, for under $50 in cloud compute credits — AI researchers at Stanford and the University of Washington were able to train an AI “reasoning” model for under $50 in cloud compute credits …

More: simplescaling on GitHub, arXiv, Yahoo Finance, AIwire, and Simon Willison's Weblog

Bluesky: @gcampax.com, @khunger, and @edzitron.com

X: @arankomatsuzaki, @omarsar0, @simonw, and @muennighoff. Forums: Beehaw

Greg Bensinger / Reuters:

Amazon announces an Alexa-focused event on February 26 in New York; sources say the company will preview its long-delayed Alexa generative AI revamp — Amazon (AMZN.O) is set to release its long-awaited - and delayed - Alexa generative artificial intelligence voice service …

Politico:

The Senate Commerce Committee approves the Kids Off Social Media Act to ban under-13s from social media, clearing the way for consideration by the Senate — The Senate Commerce Committee approved legislation Wednesday to ban children under 13 from social media.

Bill Toulas / BleepingComputer:

Kaspersky researchers found apps in Google's Play Store and Apple's App Store that use OCR to steal crypto wallet recovery phrases from images on users' devices — Android and iOS apps on the Google Play Store and Apple App Store contain a malicious software development kit (SDK) …

More: Securelist, The Verge, MacRumors, PhoneArena, Gizchina.com, Lifehacker, Engadget, Decrypt, 9to5Mac, Android Police, FinanceFeeds, AppleInsider, crypto.news, and Security Affairs

Mastodon: @Gte@mastodon.social. X: @bleepincomputer. Forums: r/ios, r/apple, r/technology, r/technews, and Slashdot

Max A. Cherney / Reuters:

Arm reports Q3 revenue up 19% YoY to $983M, vs. $946.7M est., royalty revenue up 23% YoY to $580M, and lowers is FY revenue guidance; ARM drops 5%+ — Chip tech provider Arm Holdings (O9Ty.F), said on Wednesday it will no longer meet the top end of its previous full-year guidance …

More: Euronews, Reuters, Benzinga, Financial Times, The Times, More Than Moore, Yahoo Finance, Bloomberg, and Arm Newsroom

X: @beth_kindig, @thetranscript_, @beth_kindig, and @arm

Karissa Bell / Engadget:

Reddit banned r/WhitePeopleTwitter for 72 hours due to “a prevalence of violent content”, after Elon Musk said on February 3 that its users had “broken the law” — The company said it was due to a “prevalence of violent content.” — Reddit has temporarily banned …

More: BBC, The Verge, Android Police, The Daily Dot, Times of India, The Daily Beast, The Daily Caller, and The Federalist

Bluesky: @esqueer.net, @cachiporra, @robinsonmeyer, @youranona, @goldengateblond, and @walmsley

X: @elonmusk, @reddit_lies, @reddit_lies, @kfile, @xdaily, @reddit_lies, and @reddit_lies

Forums: r/WayOfTheBern, r/stupidpol, r/onguardforthee, r/RedditSafety, r/nottheonion, r/FreeSpeech, r/NewLondonCounty, r/ConservativeKiwi, r/hungary, r/InternationalNews, and r/GlobalNews

Kif Leswing / CNBC:

Qualcomm reports Q1 revenue up 17% YoY to $11.67B, vs. $10.93B est., handsets revenue up 13% to $7.57B, net income up 15% to $3.18B, issues a strong Q2 guidance — Qualcomm reported better-than-expected fiscal first-quarter results on Wednesday and issued strong guidance for the current period.

More: PhoneArena, Thurrott, SiliconANGLE, Wall Street Pit, Android Central, Benzinga, Proactive, Yahoo Finance, Reuters, Bloomberg, Sherwood News, and Associated Press. X: @mytechmusings

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:

Sonos lays off ~200 employees, or 12% of its staff, as it reorganizes to make its product teams “flatter, smaller, and more focused”, weeks after losing its CEO — Sonos Inc. said it's cutting about 12% of its staff, or 200 workers, in a bid to make its product teams “flatter, smaller and more focused.”

More: Sonos, The Verge, Thurrott, Engadget, Android Police, MacRumors, Digital Music News, TechCrunch, iPhone in Canada Blog, and The Streamable. Forums: MacRumors Forums

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About This Page

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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.

From Mediagazer

Axios:

Sources: G/O Media sold business news brand Quartz and commerce site The Inventory to software firm Redbrick, the fourth Quartz ownership change in seven years

Katie Campione / Deadline:

WGA members “overwhelmingly” ratify a new three-year deal with CBS News that includes AI protections and is modeled after a recent ABC News contract

Ella Creamer / The Guardian:

A judicial panel consolidates 12 copyright cases against OpenAI and Microsoft in New York, including cases from Ta-Nehisi Coates, John Grisham, and the NYT

More News

Brent Crane / Bloomberg:

A profile of Joseph Firmage, who founded USWeb, which went public with a $2.5B market cap in 1997, and is now being sued by “antigravity-machine” investors

X: @bradstone and @bw

Henry Stockdale / UploadVR:

Interviews with nearly two dozen VR studios on shipping games on Quest, Meta's increased focus on Horizon Worlds, concerns over declining game sales, and more

Bluesky: @jamesoloughlin, @qualbert.com, @jamesoloughlin, and @jamesoloughlin

X: @karrisaarinen, @id_aa_carmack, @lunayian, @boztank, @id_aa_carmack, and @cixliv. Forums: r/PSVR

Sohee Kim / Bloomberg:

China's “mini-drama” industry grew 35% YoY to ~$6.91B in 2024, surpassing the country's box office and forcing iQiyi and Tencent to embrace short-form dramas

Bluesky: @lauridonahue. LinkedIn: Sohee Kim

Laura Dubois / Financial Times:

Documents: EU prosecutors are probing how Atos' Moscow office helped build the EU's border system, which will establish the EU's largest personal info database

Suhasini Srinivasaragavan / Silicon Republic:

Dublin-based Protex AI, whose AI-powered platform plugs into CCTV devices to spot risks and enhance workplace safety, raised a $36M Series B led by Hedosophia

More: Forbes, Business Post, Protex AI, and Irish Independent. LinkedIn: Protex AI

Jon Victor / The Information:

John Schulman, who co-founded OpenAI and has been credited as one of ChatGPT's leading architects, leaves Anthropic, after joining the startup in August 2024

More: Digit, Reuters, Business Insider, and Bloomberg. X: @shiringhaffary

Chris Metinko / Crunchbase News:

Semgrep, which offers an autonomous code security platform for developers, raised a $100M Series D led by Menlo Ventures, bringing its total funding to $204M

More: FinSMEs, SiliconANGLE, and Pulse 2.0

Stephen Nellis / Reuters:

Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon says Arm has withdrawn its breach claims against the company and now Arm has no plans to end its license agreement with Qualcomm

More: The Register and Thurrott. Bluesky: @anshelsag

Earlier Picks

Jason Shubnell / The Block:

MicroStrategy rebrands as Strategy; its new logo has a stylized “B” for its BTC strategy and orange is its primary color for “energy, intelligence, and Bitcoin”

Brody Ford / Bloomberg:

Workday is cutting about 1,750 workers, or 8.5% of its workforce, as it plans to hire in areas such as AI and take on more people overseas; WDAY closed up 6.33%

Chainalysis:

In 2024, ransomware attackers received ~$813.55M in payments from victims, down 35% on 2023's record $1.25B, as more victims refused to pay

More: Cybersecurity Dive, CoinDesk, CryptoSlate, SC Media, CyberScoop, BleepingComputer, DeviceSecurity.io, TechCrunch, Tech.co, UPI, TechRadar, Gizmodo, crypto.news, Metacurity, The Block, and The Record

Bluesky: @campuscodi.risky.biz. X: @jburnskoven

Daniel Cooper / Engadget:

Oura Ring 4 review: comfortable, better data collection, and gorgeous, clean app, but requires a paid subscription to use basic features and colors cost more

More: Patently Apple

Belle Lin / Wall Street Journal:

AWS aims to use “automated reasoning”, which uses mathematical logic to encode knowledge in AI systems in a structured way, to prevent AI models' hallucinations

More: Semafor. Bluesky: @quinnypig.com. LinkedIn: Curtis Langlotz

Annie Palmer / CNBC:

The USPS resumes accepting China and Hong Kong mail hours after suspension due to Trump's EO, disrupting e-commerce, and is implementing “the new China tariffs”

More: USPS Newsroom, Ars Technica, RTÉ, New York Times, The Verge, Bloomberg, Business Insider, The Hill, Reuters, Chain Store Age, Axios, Tom's Hardware, Modern Retail, Taipei Times, CNN, Washington Examiner, Inc.com, BBC, NPR, Engadget, TechRadar, Supply Chain Dive, Android Authority, Quartz, San Diego Union-Tribune, Raw Story, The Loadstar, TechSpot, Hackaday, Fortune, Financial Times, New York Times, New York Times, Proactive, Daily Sabah, Forbes, Washington Post, The Indian Express, Yahoo Finance, NBC News, FreightWaves, ZeroHedge News, WTTG-TV, RTÉ, Business Insider, Reuters, Wired, and Politico

Bluesky: @marypcbuk, @wildebees, @grantstern, @lmatsakis, @zeyiyang, @jasonkoebler, and @lauridonahue

X: @playasia, @mikeisaac, @lmatsakis, @lmatsakis, @lmatsakis, @josephpolitano, @samuelstolton, @butleriano, @skchheda, @typesfast, @silvermanjacob, @tomlikestocode, @mikeisaac, and @jengriffinfnc

LinkedIn: Andrea Kennedy, Marianne Rowden, and Deborah Elms

Rafe Uddin / Financial Times:

Uber reports Q4 revenue up 20% YoY to $12B, Gross Bookings up 18% to a record $44.2B, operating profit up 18% to $770M, and trips up 18% to 3.1B; UBER drops 5%+

More: Benzinga, Uber, Capital Brief, The Information, PYMNTS.com, The Times, Constellation Research, Motley Fool, Proactive, RTÉ, City A.M., Yahoo Finance, Sherwood News, CNBC, Bloomberg, and Bloomberg

X: @economyapp and @deitaone

Wall Street Journal:

Robinhood withdraws its plans to offer betting contracts on the Super Bowl, in partnership with online prediction market Kalshi, after pushback from the CFTC

More: CFTC, Robinhood Newsroom, WTOP News, CoinDesk, Blockhead, The Daily Hodl, CryptoPotato, Sportico, and Reuters