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Techmeme
April 18, 2025, 4:55 PM
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Top News

The Verge:
Nintendo says Switch 2 preorders will start in the US on April 24, with the price staying at the initially announced $450; prices of accessories will go up  —  The company delayed its original preorder date in the US. … Nintendo has announced a new date for when Switch 2 preorders will kick off in the US; April 24th.
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: the EU planned to penalize Meta and Apple on Tuesday but delayed the announcement, avoiding a conflict with the Trump administration before trade talks  —  Officials postponed an announcement initially planned for this week  —  The European Union recently delayed penalizing Apple …
Erin Woo / The Information:
A look at Google's efforts to improve Search with AI; sources: its leaders have struggled to articulate a vision for how they want Search features to evolve  —  Next week, a federal judge will start the process of determining how to fix Google's search engine, which he ruled last summer was an illegal monopoly.
Steve Lohr / New York Times:
Experts say two federal judges declaring Google a monopoly within a year signals a judicial shift toward addressing anticompetitive behavior in digital markets  —  Within a year, two federal judges declared the tech giant a monopoly in search and ad technology.  The tide may be turning for antitrust.
Bloomberg:
In her ruling, Judge Brinkema says Google did not meet the monopoly definition for tools used to buy display ads, but did for ad exchanges and website ad tools
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
ChatGPT users are figuring out the location of photos using o3's image-analyzing capabilities paired with its web search functionality, raising privacy concerns  —  There's a somewhat concerning new trend going viral: people are using ChatGPT to figure out the location shown in pictures.
Douglas Gillison / Reuters:
A US judge temporarily halts mass firings at the US CFPB after the agency fired between 1,400 and 1,500 workers, eliminating as much as 90% of its workforce  —  A federal judge on Friday halted the mass firings carried out Thursday afternoon at the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau …
Stephen Nellis / Reuters:
Memo: CEO Lip-Bu Tan flattens Intel's leadership team, with important semiconductor groups reporting directly to him, and names Sachin Katti as CTO and AI chief  —  Intel's (INTC.O) new CEO, Lip-Bu Tan, is flattening the semiconductor giant's leadership team, with important chip groups reporting directly …
Vince Quill / Cointelegraph:
Oregon sues Coinbase, alleging it's selling unregistered securities; Coinbase's Chief Legal Officer says it's a “copycat case” of SEC's now-dropped lawsuit  —  Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield is planning a lawsuit against crypto exchange Coinbase, alleging the company …
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
US consumers are flocking to Chinese shopping apps DHgate and Taobao, which let them buy direct from manufacturers, as Shein and Temu prices rise amid tariffs  —  The Chinese e-commerce marketplace app DHgate, which is now the No. 2 free iPhone app in the U.S., isn't the only one that's oddly benefiting …
IDC:
China's Q1 2025 smartphone shipments grew 3.3% YoY to 71.6M units; Xiaomi led with 18.6% market share, Apple was the only foreign brand in top 5 with 13.7%  —  Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, China's smartphone market shipped 71.6 million units in 1Q25, a 3.3% year-on-year (YoY) increase.

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UiPath:
UiPath Unveils 10 Innovations that Will Shape the Agentic Future  —  Orchestration engine, API workflows and agentic testing among key features of new UiPath Platform™ for agentic automation, launched at UiPath DevCon 2025
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About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 4:55 PM ET, April 18, 2025.

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

Sara Fischer / Axios:
PBS and a public TV affiliate in Minnesota sue the Trump administration, saying his executive order to cut federal funding violated PBS' First Amendment rights

Max Tani / Semafor:
The California State Senate opens an inquiry into whether Paramount's reported $15M proposed settlement with Trump violated bribery and unfair competition laws

Chris Willman / Variety:
Taylor Swift acquires the rights to her first six albums from Shamrock Capital; sources say the deal was in the mid-$300M range

More News

The Information:
Sources: Meta asked Microsoft, Amazon, and others over the past year to fund Llama training costs in exchange for incentives, as part of a “Llama Consortium”
Filipe Espósito / 9to5Mac:
Apple Intelligence features, such as Writing Tools, are no longer available in Meta's iOS apps including Facebook, WhatsApp, and Threads

Earlier Picks

Ryan Whitwam / Ars Technica:
Google rolls out Gemini 2.5 Flash in preview, with support for Canvas for working on text or code; developers can disable thinking or set a token limit for it
Kyle Barr / Gizmodo:
Framework Laptop 13 review: it's modular and customizable, has a great keyboard and improved thermals, but it's pricey and the screen's brightness can be better
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge:
Google is offering its Google One AI Premium plan for free to US college students until spring 2026; students have until June 30, 2025, to sign up
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