Techmeme
February 28, 2024, 11:10 PM

Top News

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Tim Cook says Apple will “break new ground” on generative AI this year; Apple shareholders reject a request for report into whether Apple is using AI ethically  —  - Shareholders approve recommendations for board, executive pay  — Longtime directors Al Gore and James Bell officially step down
New York Times:
Sources detail Apple's $10B+ car project: years of disagreements on whether it should be a self-driving car or just an EV, talks with Musk on buying Tesla, more  —  Internal disagreements over the direction of the Apple car led the effort to sputter for years before it was canceled this week.
Alex Koller / CNBC:
EA plans to cut 5% of its workforce, part of a plan that includes reducing office space and sunsetting some games; EA employed 13,400 workers as of March 2023  —  - EA announced Wednesday that it will cut 5% of its workforce.  — The video game company employed 13,400 workers as of the end …
Reuters:
Coinbase says all services on its website have been restored after an issue on February 28 caused some users to see a zero balance in their accounts  —  Coinbase Global (COIN.O) said on Wednesday that all services on its website have been restored after an issue earlier in the day caused …
Mehtab Ansari / Smartprix:
Alleged renders of Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 6 show a boxy frame, flat sides, and dimensions that make it slightly shorter and wider than its predecessor  —  The Galaxy Z Fold 6, leaks and rumors about the device have been floating around for a while now and yesterday we reported …
Leo Schwartz / Fortune:
Gemini agrees to return over $1B to customers and pay a $37M fine in a settlement with the New York Department of Financial Services related to Gemini Earn  —  The New York Department of Financial Services on Wednesday announced a settlement with Gemini, the crypto firm founded by the Winklevoss twins …
Ben Lovejoy / 9to5Mac:
Kuo: Vision Pro demand is higher than Apple originally expected, with US shipments expected to hit 200-250k units this year; return rates are now below 1%  —  Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo believes that Vision Pro demand is higher than Apple originally expected, with US shipments expected to hit 200-250k units this year.
Karissa Bell / Engadget:
President Biden signs an EO that aims to limit the mass-sale of Americans' personal data like geolocation to “countries of concern”, including China and Russia  —  The bulk sale of geolocation, genomic, financial and health data will be off-limits to “countries of concern.”
Dara Kerr / NPR:
Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff tells a reporter, who is looking into his Hawaii land acquisition, that he knows where she is staying and her personal details  —  WAIMEA, Hawaii — A life-size bronze statue of a cowboy sits at the center of Waimea.  The cowboy is riding a horse, lasso in hand, pursuing a wild bull.
Reuters:
FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel proposes subjecting carmakers to the Safe Connections Act to protect domestic abuse survivors from misuse of internet car systems  —  The chairwoman of the Federal Communications Commission on Wednesday proposed a potential new rule that would subject automakers …
Reed Albergotti / Semafor:
Memo: Google CEO Sundar Pichai calls Gemini's problematic responses around race “completely unacceptable” and vows to make structural changes to fix the problem  —  The Scoop  —  Google CEO Sundar Pichai addressed the company's Gemini controversy Tuesday evening …
Jonathan Vanian / CNBC:
Snowflake says that CEO Frank Slootman is retiring, and reports Q4 revenue up 32% YoY to $774.7M and Q1 product revenue guidance below est.; SNOW drops 20%+  —  - Snowflake said CEO Frank Slootman, who took the company public in 2020, is retiring.  — The stock dropped in extended trading.
Jon Swartz / MarketWatch:
Salesforce reports Q4 revenue up 11% YoY to $9.29B, vs. $9.2B est., FY 2025 revenue guidance below est., and announces a $10B increase in its share buyback plan  —  Software giant also announces dividend, share buyback  —  Salesforce Inc.'s stock initially slipped 4% in after-hours trading Wednesday …
Reuters:
Sources: cloud storage service Egnyte has hired underwriters for a US IPO as early as this year that could value it at $3B+; Egnyte was valued at $460M in 2018  —  Cloud storage service Egnyte has hired underwriters for an initial public offering (IPO) in New York that could value it at more than $3 billion …
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
Adobe unveils Project Music GenAI Control, a platform that can generate audio from text descriptions or a reference melody and let users customize the results  —  There's plenty of GenAI-powered music editing and creation tools out there, but Adobe wants to put its own spin on the concept.
The Information:
Sources: Meta plans to launch Llama 3 in July, as the company tries to overcome a perceived problem that Llama 2's answers for contentious topics are too “safe”  —  As Google grapples with the backlash over the historically inaccurate responses on its Gemini chatbot, Meta Platforms is dealing with a related issue.
Hannah Miao / Wall Street Journal:
Webull plans to go public via a SPAC merger with SK Growth Opportunities around September 2024 and expects to raise ~$100M, valuing the online brokerage at $7B+  —  The brokerage, which surged in popularity during the GameStop mania, had previously considered an IPO

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Gemini 2.5 Pro: Our most intelligent AI model  —  Gemini 2.5 Pro (experimental) is now available, with thinking capabilities, enhanced performance, and improved accuracy.  Try it at no cost in the Gemini app.
UiPath:
UiPath Unveils 10 Innovations that Will Shape the Agentic Future  —  Orchestration engine, API workflows and agentic testing among key features of new UiPath Platform™ for agentic automation, launched at UiPath DevCon 2025
Zoho:
Recruiters, be that zeroth candidate  —  Welcome again!  Earlier, we looked at how personality assessments are evaluation tools that help look at candidates beyond resumes.  Let's look at how to use …
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

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Earlier Picks

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