Techmeme
July 24, 2019, 2:20 AM

Top News

Brent Kendall / Wall Street Journal:
DOJ is opening an antitrust review of whether tech giants are unlawfully stifling competition, examining search, social media, and retail services platforms  —  Inquiry signals Barr's deep interest in tech sector, poses threat to companies such as Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple
Tony Romm / Washington Post:
Sources: FTC will allege that Facebook misled users on how it used phone numbers and poorly informed them about facial recognition; FB won't have to admit guilt  —  The Federal Trade Commission plans to allege that Facebook misled users' about its handling of their phone numbers as part …
Alex Kantrowitz / BuzzFeed News:
Interviews, including with the dev who led the team that built the retweet button, discuss the power of retweets and shares and ways to limit their virality  —  Developer Chris Wetherell built Twitter's retweet button.  And he regrets what he did to this day.
Bloomberg:
Filings: Apple has asked the Trump administration for exclusion from import tariffs of 25% for components of a computer that is likely to be the new Mac Pro  —  - Trump has promised relief for companies in certain cases  — High-end computer was only major Apple product made in U.S.
Bijan Stephen / The Verge:
As streaming offerings get more expensive and convoluted, people are setting up their own platforms via Plex servers to share media, including pirated content  —  Have you heard about the best new streaming platform on the internet?  It's totally customizable, works on any device, and, best of all, is basically free.
Tripp Mickle / Wall Street Journal:
Analysis: Apple's own apps rank first in 60%+ of App Store test searches; Podcasts, which had a 1.7-star rating before its reviews were removed, ranks #1 in US  —  Searches for ‘music,’ ‘audiobooks’ and other categories rank company apps first, a process some developers find unfair …
Patrick Klepek / VICE:
Nintendo memo tells customer service to fix a Joy-Con in-game “drift” issue for free, even out of warranty, following a Kotaku report and a class-action lawsuit  —  The company will repair devices free of charge, even outside of the warranty period.  —  IMAGE COURTESY OF NINTENDO
Kellen / Droid Life:
Google Store page updates the availability of the Google Nest Hub Max, its $229 10-inch smart display, from 9/9 in the US, UK, and Australia to “coming soon”  —  Google's new Nest Hub Max arrives on September 9, folks.  That date has now been confirmed by the Google Store …
Salvador Rodriguez / CNBC:
Snap reports Q2 revenue of $388M, up 48% YoY, vs. $359.7M est., DAUs of 203M, up 8% YoY, and that its net loss shrunk from $353M to $255M YoY; stock jumps 9%+  —  KEY POINTS  — Snap, the maker of Snapchat, posted a loss of 6 cents per share, vs. an expected loss of 10 cents per share.
Richard Lawler / Engadget:
DoorDash CEO to change tipping policy “in the coming days”, says it will add all customer tips to driver's earnings, after a renewed backlash  —  Earlier this year, news reports exposed that not only did DoorDash (and others, like Instacart) sometimes lower its payout to delivery workers …
Jessica Dolcourt / CNET:
Profile of Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, who has donated $100M+ to charities and who champions “vigorous, trustworthy journalism” and women in tech  —  Craig Newmark is a man of quiet contradiction.  Wrapped in a sweater the color of hot chocolate, the 66-year-old founder …
Guilherme Rambo / 9to5Mac:
Sources: Apple to release three “iPhone 11” models this fall, each with an A13 chip, Lightning port, and a new Taptic Engine, as 3D Touch goes away  —  Similar to last year's introduction of the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR, Apple will release three new ‘iPhone 11’ models this fall.
Facebook AI:
Facebook details Map With AI, a set of tools that maps previously unmapped places, many in the developing world, using commercially available satellite imagery  —  Creating accurate maps today is a painstaking, time-consuming manual process, even with access to satellite imagery and mapping software.
Charlie Osborne / ZDNet:
CERT-Bund discovers a serious vulnerability in VLC for Windows, Unix, and Linux that allows for remote code execution and hasn't been patched yet  —  The bug is present in VLC's latest release.  —  A serious vulnerability has been uncovered in the latest release of the VLC media player and no patch is available.
Dustin Volz / Wall Street Journal:
NSA will create a cybersecurity directorate led by Anne Neuberger starting October 1, to help align offensive and defensive operations more closely  —  Anne Neuberger, tapped as head, warns against ‘not engaging in the fight’  —  The National Security Agency will create a cybersecurity directorate later …
David Canellis / The Next Web:
Federal judge refuses to dismiss $224M lawsuit against AT&T for allegedly letting a customer be SIM-swapped twice, leading to the loss of $24M in cryptocurrency  —  THIS INVESTOR LOST $24M IN CRYPTOCURRENCY AFTER HE WAS SIM-SWAPPED, TWICE  —  A US federal judge has rejected AT&T's request …
Joshua Rivera / Kotaku:
Video game industry is coming under increased pressure from static triple-A prices, a turn towards the cloud, developer burnout, and slower release schedules  —  At about this time next year, we'll have a pretty good idea of what the next generation of video games will look like.

Sponsor Posts

Meta:
Open Source AI: Available to all, not just the few  —  Meta's open source AI enables small businesses, start-ups, students, researchers and more to download and build with our models at no cost.
Zoho:
Introducing AI Forms: Create optimized forms with AI in Zoho Forms  —  The future of form creation isn't coming, it's here.  Forget everything you thought you knew about building online forms.
Genesys:
Executive Insights: The Era of Contact Center AI Copilots  —  How AI copilots are transforming customer experience and agent performance.
Tribe AI:
Build AI products that matter  —  Tribe AI helps organizations rapidly deploy AI solutions that have real business impact.  We bring together world class AI talent and tooling to drive differentiated results.
Techmeme Ride Home:
Mon. 12/23 - The Revenge Of Google Glass?
The day's tech news, every day at 5pm ET. Fifteen minutes and you're up to date.
Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or RSS.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 2:20 AM ET, July 24, 2019.

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.

More News

Earlier Picks

Jay Greene / Washington Post:
Stacy Cowley / New York Times: