Techmeme
December 27, 2018, 9:00 AM

Top News

Don Reisinger / Fortune:
Amazon announces a record-breaking holiday season with the number of voice-activated shopping orders placed using Alexa tripling YoY  —  Shoppers are increasingly using their voices to buy products online.  —  Amazon on Wednesday said that the number of voice-activated orders placed via …
Washington Post:
Reid Hoffman says he wasn't aware of disinformation campaign in Alabama race, apologizes for funding group linked to it; source says Hoffman invested $750K  —  Internet billionaire Reid Hoffman apologized on Wednesday for funding a group linked to a “highly disturbing” effort …
Wall Street Journal:
Analysis: SEC and state regulators brought 90+ crypto-related cases in the past two years, recovering just ~$36M; cases increased as the market crashed  —  SEC and state regulators have brought more than 90 crypto cases over the past two years, but tracing funds is hard because of the elusive nature of the currency
Wolfie Zhao / CoinDesk:
Crypto mining startup Bitmain confirms layoffs, which, source says, may affect half of its total head count, with some departments being laid off entirely  —  Months after it filed an application to go public on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, Beijing-based cryptocurrency mining giant Bitmain …
Aftab Ahmed / Reuters:
India tightens rules for e-commerce firms like Amazon, banning exclusive agreements with sellers and the sale of products from firms the platform has a stake in  —  Aftab Ahmed, Sankalp Phartiyal  —  NEW DELHI/MUMBAI (Reuters) - India will ban e-commerce companies such as Amazon.com …
Max Read / New York Magazine:
The internet now feels increasingly fake as trust declines and users begin to understand how bots fake page views, conversations, and more  —  In late November, the Justice Department unsealed indictments against eight people accused of fleecing advertisers of $36 million …
Taylor Lorenz / The Atlantic:
A look at Speakr, a social media influencer management platform that some influencers say has failed to pay them, with trouble starting in late 2017  —  After rising to MySpace fame in the mid-aughts, the singer-songwriter Kaila Yu amassed a following of nearly half a million fans on Facebook and 70,000 on Twitter and Instagram.
Nellie Bowles / New York Times:
As some prominent creators leave in protest after Patreon bans anti-feminist for hate speech, a look at its approach to policing speech with human moderators  —  Sam Harris, the polemical atheist neuroscientist known for his popular podcast “Waking Up,” was making tens of thousands of dollars …
Meng Jing / South China Morning Post:
China's Airbnb rival Xiaozhu says it will install facial recognition-enabled smart locks at 80% of listings in Chengdu, its second largest market by revenue  —  Home sharing site plans to introduce face scanning for check in at 80 per cent of its listings in southwest China's Chengdu city

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Earlier Picks

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