Techmeme
June 23, 2020, 7:45 PM

Top News

Ian Hamilton / UploadVR:
Facebook says it will stop selling Oculus Go, ending app submissions for it in December, and vows to no longer make headsets that only track head rotation  —  Facebook will stop selling Oculus Go this year as the company sharpens its focus on fully positionally tracked VR headsets like Oculus Quest.
Lucas Matney / TechCrunch:
Isaac McIntyre / Dexerto:
Twitch pledges to make platform “safer for everyone” in response to numerous sexual abuse allegations recently leveled at a handful of high-profile streamers  —  Twitch has pledged to make their streaming platform “safer for everyone” in a statement released in response …
New York Times:
Over 70 people, mostly women, have shared stories of discrimination, harassment, and sexual assault within the video game live-streaming industry since Friday  —  After more than 70 allegations surfaced on Twitter this weekend, gaming companies and streamers responded with action.
Janus Rose / VICE:
1,000+ technologists, including some from MIT, Facebook, Google, urge Springer to not publish a paper that describes a system to predict crime based on faces  —  Technologists from MIT, Harvard, and Google say research claiming to predict crime based on human faces creates a “tech-to-prison pipeline” that reinforces racist policing.
Kyle Daly / Axios:
Twitter flags a Trump tweet for breaking rules on abusive behavior; it threatened “serious force” against anyone who may try creating an “autonomous zone” in DC  —  Twitter on Monday opted not to take down or flag a tweet from President Trump that baselessly tied mail …
Mark Wilson / Fast Company:
Segway, the two-wheeled, self-balancing vehicle known for the hype it generated in the early 2000s, ends production as the company lays off most of its staff  —  Steve Jobs said it would be bigger than the PC.  Some dubbed it the most hyped product since the Apple Macintosh.
Dana Mattioli / Wall Street Journal:
Amazon unveils a Climate Pledge Fund, which will invest an initial $2B in startups building sustainable technologies  —  Tech giant plans to invest in transportation, energy, food and other industries  —  Amazon.  AMZN 2.36% com Inc. is launching a $2 billion internal venture-capital fund focused …
David Gelles / New York Times:
TaskRabbit says CEO Stacy Brown-Philpot is stepping down after four years; she is one of the few Black female tech CEOs in Silicon Valley  —  Stacy Brown-Philpot, one of the few prominent black women in the technology industry, has led the gig worker marketplace for four years, and oversaw its sale to Ikea.
Bloomberg:
Recent pledges by Google, Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft to diversify their workforce come after years of similar claims followed by little progress  —  Spurred by nationwide protests and calls to end systemic racism after the police killing of George Floyd, Google, Microsoft Corp …
Nathaniel Popper / New York Times:
Small businesses complain about Square withholding 20%-30% of their customers' payments, which it said it was doing to protect against risky transactions  —  Small businesses say the Twitter chief's other company is holding on to 30 percent of their customers' payments during the pandemic.
Karin Matussek / Bloomberg:
A previously suspended German antitrust order against Facebook gets reinstated amid pending lawsuit, after a judge says Facebook abuses its dominant position  —  - Social network giant is abusing its market power, judges say  — Antitrust order won't be suspended while suit is pending
Ian Walker / Kotaku:
A former Mixer employee who worked at Microsoft for two years before joining the Mixer team in 2018 accuses management of failing to address racism at Mixer  —  Over the weekend, former Mixer employee Milan Lee shared a blog describing his experiences with racism while working …
Joe Rossignol / MacRumors:
Apple is opening up the U1 chip found in iPhone 11 models to developers with a new Nearby Interaction framework for iOS 14  —  Introduced last year, the U1 chip in iPhone 11 models enables Ultra Wideband support for improved spatial awareness, but Apple has so far only used the technology …
Olaf Storbeck / Financial Times:
Former Wirecard CEO Markus Braun has been arrested on suspicion of false accounting and market manipulation  —  Prosecutors accuse him of inflating German fintech company's balance sheet and revenues  —  Wirecard's former chief executive Markus Braun has been arrested on suspicion …
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:
Microsoft releases the first public preview of its Defender antivirus Android app, as Microsoft Defender ATP for Linux becomes generally available for all users  —  UPDATE: Microsoft Defender ATP for Linux has also exited public preview and is now generally available for all users.

Sponsor Posts

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.
Zoho:
How you can grow your business with Zoho One  —  Zoho One is a comprehensive business suite, giving businesses the scalability, stability, security, and features they need for smooth operations.
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Techmeme Leaderboards:
Discover the top reporters on AI, VR, policy, and much more  —  We've analyzed Techmeme's news crawl to identify the most influential and prolific writers on 48 news topics.  Download reports immediately for just $100.
Techmeme Ride Home:
Thu. 11/14 - The FBI (!) Investigating Polymarket
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 7:45 PM ET, June 23, 2020.

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

Tracy Young / Tracy writes:
Don Clark / New York Times:
Nick Statt / The Verge:
BuzzFeed News: