Techmeme
December 21, 2021, 8:25 PM

Top News

Vlad Savov / Bloomberg:
The Cloudflare Blog:
TikTok.com was the most popular domain globally between August and December 2021, after passing Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, and Amazon this year  —  Loading...  Sofia Cardita  —  The years come and go, Internet traffic continues to grow (at least so far and with some ‘help’ from the pandemic) …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
AT&T plans to sell its Xandr programmatic advertising marketplace to Microsoft; the deal would not include the ad sales business supporting DirecTV  —  Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed; the transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory reviews.
Lucas Shaw / Bloomberg:
OnlyFans founder Tim Stokely steps down as CEO, naming head of communications and marketing Ami Gan as his replacement; Stokely will remain as an adviser  —  OnlyFans named spokesperson Ami Gan as its new chief executive officer, replacing Tim Stokely, who founded and built the media company …
Mehul Srivastava / Financial Times:
Sources: how a 2019 NSO deal to sell Pegasus to Uganda, followed by an unknown actor using Pegasus to try to hack the US embassy in Uganda, led to NSO's decline  —  For years, the Israeli spyware maker thrived through scandal.  Then, US diplomats in Uganda got hacked by Pegasus
Jamie Crawley / CoinDesk:
Kraken acquires non-custodial staking platform Staked and claims it's “one of the largest crypto industry acquisitions to date”, but doesn't disclose a price  —  The crypto exchange referred to the deal as “one of the largest crypto industry acquisitions to date” but did not disclose the amount paid.
Kimberly Chin / Wall Street Journal:
McDonald's is selling Dynamic Yield, a startup it acquired for $300M+ in 2019 that helps retailers offer personalized digital promotions, to Mastercard  —  Burger chain acquired startup in 2019 for more than $300 million, which was then its largest acquisition in decades
Mathew Olson / The Information:
Meta says it acquired ImagineOptix, a North Carolina-based startup specializing in liquid crystal lenses, which could help reduce the size of VR headsets  —  It's time to add another company to the list of Meta's acquisitions in the AR/VR industry.  Meta has acquired ImagineOptix …
Stephanie Chan / Sensor Tower Blog:
In 2021, 906 developers are projected to pass $1M annual revenue for the first time on Apple's App Store and Google Play, vs. 475 in 2016 and 1,003 in 2020  —  As global consumer spending in mobile apps is projected to again reach new heights in 2021, Sensor Tower Store Intelligence data reveals …
The Information:
Sources: Bolt, which offers a one-click checkout service, is seeking to raise ~$400M at a $14B valuation, after raising $393M at an $11B valuation in October  —  With the ink barely dry on one fundraising effort by Bolt, a firm that makes e-commerce checkout software, the startup is already pitching investors on a new round.
New York Times:
Crypto and blockchain startups raised $28B+ in 2021, up 4x YoY, according to PitchBook, as large tech companies lose execs and engineers to crypto companies  —  Tech executives and engineers are quitting Google, Meta, Amazon and other large companies for what they say is a once-in-generation opportunity with crypto.
Isla McKetta / Speedtest Stories & Analysis:
A look at US satellite internet speeds, with Starlink median download/upload speeds of 87.3 Mbps and 13.5 Mbps, followed by HughesNet at 19.3 Mbps and 2.5 Mbps  —  Satellite internet is making headlines across the globe as Starlink continues to launch service in new countries and Viasat plans to acquire Inmarsat.
Politico:
Sources detail Amazon's increasingly close relationship with the DOJ and FBI, as it tips off the agencies to investigate its employees and third-party sellers  —  Amazon has increasingly tipped off the Justice Department and FBI to investigate its own employees and the sellers using its platform …

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:
The crossroads of AI and SaaS  —  Enabling businesses of all sizes to build products in-house and disqualifying SaaS tools that are not AI-powered.  In a span of just two years, AI has made a name for itself as the key driver for innovation.
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:
Fri. 12/20 - Gemini Flash Thinking
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 8:25 PM ET, December 21, 2021.

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

Sahar Massachi / MIT Technology Review:
Mario Gabriele / The Generalist:

Earlier Picks

Saritha Rai / Bloomberg:
Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer:
Catalin Cimpanu / The Record:
Catalin Cimpanu / The Record:
Brian Sozzi / Yahoo Finance:
Jessica Bursztynsky / CNBC: