Techmeme
May 17, 2022, 6:45 PM

Top News

Edwin Chan / Bloomberg:
Elon Musk says his Twitter takeover “cannot move forward” until the CEO proves bots are <5% of users, since his offer was based on “SEC filings being accurate”  —  Elon Musk said he'll proceed with his $44 billion takeover of Twitter Inc. only if the social media giant …
Matt Levine / Bloomberg:
Elon Musk, who wanted to “defeat the spam bots”, is lying when he says bots are why he's backing away from buying Twitter at $54.20/share, amid stocks' downturn  —  Programming note: Money Stuff will be off tomorrow, back on Thursday.  Unless.  You know.  —  Oh Elon
Bloomberg:
Twitter loses more execs amid Musk's takeover bid: Twitter Service VP Katrina Lane, head of data science Max Schmeiser, and VP of product management Ilya Brown  —  Twitter Inc. is losing three more senior employees, including two vice presidents, a reflection of the uncertainty inside …
PR Newswire:
In a preliminary SEC proxy statement, Twitter says it is “committed to completing the transaction on the agreed price and terms as promptly as practicable”  —  Twitter, Inc. (NYSE: TWTR) today announced that it has filed its preliminary proxy statement with the U.S. Securities …
Corin Faife / The Verge:
Despite continuing to tweet on other topics, Elon Musk has remained silent on the Buffalo shooting livestream, a content moderation issue for Twitter and others  —  The free speech advocate had no comment on Twitter's scramble to block videos of the mass shooting
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Memo: Apple delays its three-day-a-week return to the office indefinitely, citing rising COVID-19 cases; the company still expects attendance two days per week  —  Apple Inc. delayed a plan to require workers to come back to the office three days a week, citing a resurgence in Covid-19 cases …
Devin Coldewey / TechCrunch:
Apple announces new accessibility features, including mirroring Watch apps to an iPhone, and a live captioning tool for iOS, iPadOS, and macOS coming in 2022  —  Apple has released a bevy of new accessibility features for iPhone, Apple Watch, and Mac, including a universal live captioning tool …
Michael Potuck / 9to5Mac:
A report details the challenges that delayed Apple's mixed reality headset launch by years and the initial pushback from Jony Ive's team on a VR headset concept  —  Rendering by Antonia De Rosa.  Edited by 9to5Mac.  —  Since beginning its efforts in 2015, Apple's work on a mixed reality headset …
Bill Toulas / BleepingComputer:
Researchers detail a BLE relay attack to unlock and operate a Tesla outside its BLE range; when told in April, Tesla said relay attacks are a “known limitation”  —  Security researchers at the NCC Group have developed a tool to carry out a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) …
Heather Somerville / Wall Street Journal:
As startups face potential drops in valuation and VCs demand lower spending and higher margins, some companies turn to cutting staff, marketing, and projects  —  Funding is suddenly scarce as venture capital firms grow stingy, forcing young companies to get frugal and focus on breaking even
Ryan Weeks / The Block:
Coinbase plans to “slow hiring and reassess our headcount needs” given “current market conditions”, after initially planning to triple its workforce in 2022  —  Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has reined in a plan to triple its headcount this year in response to turbulent market conditions.
Michael Bellusci / CoinDesk:
Coinbase plans to let a “small set” of users of its mobile app access Ethereum-based dapps to purchase NFTs, trade on exchanges, use DeFi platforms, and more  —  The move will let Coinbase users purchase NFTs, trade on decentralized exchanges and borrow and lend on various DeFi platforms.
Washington Post:
A look at political advocacy group American Edge, founded by Meta, as the company tries to create the appearance of grassroots opposition to antitrust reform  —  Records show Facebook-funded American Edge backed minority interest groups, conservative think tanks and small business groups …
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Linz-based Storyblok, which offers a headless CMS, raises a $47M Series B led by Mubadala Capital and HV Capital, and says ~74K companies use its tools  —  The world of web development continues to become increasingly more democratized — and more creative — thanks to innovations in …
More: FinSMEsThanks:@ingridlunden
Frederic Lardinois / TechCrunch:
Google Cloud launches new software supply chain and zero trust tools, including one that gives governments and enterprises access to vetted open-source packages  —  Google Cloud is holding its annual Security Summit this week and unsurprisingly, the company used the event to launch a few new security features.
Mariella Moon / Engadget:
Google opens its first self-designed employee campus, Bay View, with a “dragonscale skin” roof featuring 90K solar panels that can generate almost 7MW of energy  —  Google has finally opened its Bay View campus to employees almost 10 years after revealing its initial plans for the new facility back in 2013.
Ezra Marcus / New York Times:
An in-depth look at OnlyFans agencies, which manage hundreds of models' accounts and use teams of ghostwriters to privately message subscribers who pay to chat  —  Clever marketers have figured out how easy it is to simulate online intimacy at scale, ventriloquizing alluring models with cheap, offshore labor.

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