Techmeme
September 28, 2023, 5:45 PM

Top News

Ash Parrish / The Verge:
Epic Games lays off 16% of its workforce, or ~830 employees, divests from music storefront Bandcamp, and intends to spin off “kid-tech” company SuperAwesome  —  Bloomberg reports that Fortnite developer Epic Games is expected to lay off 16 percent of its workforce.
Songtradr:
Music licensing marketplace Songtradr acquires Bandcamp and plans to keep operating Bandcamp as a marketplace and community with an artist-first revenue share  —  Los Angeles) - Songtradr, a music licensing platform and marketplace company supporting artists, labels and publishers …
Financial Times:
Emma Roth / The Verge:
Raspberry Pi 5 launches with a 64-bit quad-core ARM Cortex-A76 chip, up to 8GB of RAM, two 4K HDMI ports with HDR, available in October for $60 for a 4GB model  —  Despite doubts that the Raspberry Pi 5 would launch this year, the latest version of the microcomputer has arrived with some notable upgrades at a $60 starting price.
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Reddit removes the ability to opt out of ad personalization based on Reddit activity but says that users will still have opt-out controls in “select countries”  —  Reddit said Wednesday that the platform is revamping its privacy settings with an aim to make ad personalization and account visibility toggles consistent.
Abner Li / 9to5Google:
Google rolls out ChromeOS 117 with a Material You redesign, adaptive charging, a new camera and microphone privacy indicator, an improved clipboard, and more  —  Google is rolling out ChromeOS 117, and it's a very big update for Chromebooks that adds Material You, as well as other usability enhancements.
RT Watson / The Block:
Coinbase says the crypto exchange has gained approval from the Bermuda Monetary Authority to offer non-US retail users perpetual futures trading  —  - Coinbase has gained approval to offer non-U.S. retail users perpetual futures trading from the Bermuda Monetary Authority.
Malathi Nayak / Bloomberg:
Apple asks SCOTUS to revisit the 2021 Epic Games ruling regarding alternative IAP payment options, a day after Epic separately asked SCOTUS to take up the case  —  - IPhone maker wants to avoid allowing an end run around store  — Fortnite maker has separately asked high court to take up case
Jason Koebler / 404 Media:
Email: Serve Robotics, used by Uber Eats in Los Angeles, shared video filmed by one of its food delivery robots to the LAPD as part of a criminal investigation  —  This article was primarily reported using public records requests.  We are making it available to all readers as a public service.
Carly Page / TechCrunch:
Google patches a Chrome zero-day that was exploited by a commercial spyware vendor, just two days after Google's Threat Analysis Group informed the Chrome team  —  Google has rushed to patch a zero-day vulnerability in Chrome that was exploited by a commercial spyware vendor.
Umar Shakir / The Verge:
Google plans to stop supporting its $5K, 55" Jamboard meeting room display on September 30, 2024 and phase out its collaborative Jamboard app on October 1, 2024  —  It's never a dull day at the Google graveyard — the company has blogged a Workspace update today announcing the end of its collaborative Jamboard whiteboarding software.
Victoria Song / The Verge:
Google unveils the Fitbit Charge 6, with a haptic side button, integration with Google services like YouTube Music, and more, available on October 12 for $160  —  Fitbit is back with the Charge 6 — and on paper, this one feels like the most Fitbit-y Fitbit since Google actively began folding the company into its ecosystem.
Camomile Shumba / CoinDesk:
Report: the Bank for International Settlements and French, Swiss, and Singaporean central banks successfully tested cross-border trading of wholesale CBDCs  —  The Bank for International Settlements alongside the central banks of France, Singapore and Switzerland tested out using wholesale CBDC to conduct cross border trading.
Bloomberg:
An analysis of 115 warrants in five US states shows that investigators are increasingly using Google's location and search data to try to solve nonviolent cases  —  Investigators increasingly use warrants to obtain location and search data from Google, even for nonviolent cases—and even for people who had nothing to do with the crime.
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Meta's celebrity AIs are generated AI animations built from filming the 28 people they represent; Meta would not comment on how the celebrities were compensated  —  Actors are in the middle of a major, protracted battle with Hollywood over what role AI will be playing in the future of entertainment …
Mia Sato / The Verge:
Erin Woo / The Information:
Sources: X is cutting ~50% of its election integrity team, including its Dublin-based head, less than a month after saying the company would expand the team  —  Elon Musk's X, formerly known as Twitter, is cutting around half of the global team devoted to limiting disinformation and election fraud …
Benjamin Mayo / 9to5Mac:
Apple launches an iOS Wallet feature in the UK using the country's Open Banking API, showing users their current account balances, deposits, and payment history  —  Apple is soft launching a new iPhone Wallet app integration today that is powered by the United Kingdom's Open Banking API.
Yogita Khatri / The Block:
NYC-based IYK, which lets brands, musicians, and creators build “digi-physical experiences”, including through NFTs, raised a $16.8M seed led by A16z Crypto  —  - IYK has raised $16.8 million in seed funding led by A16z Crypto.  — The startup helps brands …

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 5:45 PM ET, September 28, 2023.

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

CNBC:

Earlier Picks

Amanda Silberling / TechCrunch:
Anthony Capaccio / Bloomberg:
More: CNBC, VICE, Gizmodo, The Verge, PCMag, and Forbes
Bluesky: @wattle.bsky.socialLinkedIn: Jesse KlekampForums: Hacker News, r/army, and r/elonmusk