Fri. 05/24 - iFixit Tears Down the MacBook Keyboard Tweaks

Apple and Alphabet suffer setbacks in court. More hardware moves in the great Metaverse realignment of the tech landscape. Unity buys Weta Digital. No word on if Andy Serkis is part of the package. And Twitter Blue is finally live. A reminder of what that actually is. Sponsors: Masterworks.io/ride Oracle.com/ride Links: Judge orders Apple to allow external payment options for App Store by December 9th, denying stay (The Verge) Google Loses Appeal of $2.8 Billion EU Shopping-Ads Fine (WSJ) Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Spaces try to make it easier to get apps ready for augmented reality (The Verge) Unity is buying Peter Jackson’s Weta Digital for over $1.6B (TechCrunch) Meta plans to remove thousands of sensitive ad-targeting categories. (NYTimes) Twitter will now let you pay to undo tweets and read ad-free news in the US (The Verge) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

10 Nov 202116min

Robinhood has been compromised by some true brigands. If you’ve got a Robinhood account, double down on being wary of phishing attacks. Netflix takes a page out of the TikTok playbook. And whole bunch of announces about new DRAM chips, new AMD chips, new custom voicebot toolkits from Nvidia, and Niantic doesn’t want to get left behind in the Metaverse race it arguably helped set off. Sponsors: Enterprise.Spectrum.com/techmeme Napjitsu.com/techmeme Links: Robinhood says millions of customer names and email addresses taken in data breach (TechCrunch) US seizes $6 million in ransom payments and charges Ukrainian over major cyberattack (CNN) Netflix to Roll Out TikTok-Like Short Clip Feature Aimed at Kids (Bloomberg) Samsung’s new LPDDR5X DRAM is 1.3x faster and consumes 20% less power than LPDDR5 DRAM (XDA Developers) AMD lands Meta as customer and takes on Nvidia, sending shares up 11% (Reuters) Nvidia’s Riva Custom Voice lets companies create custom voices powered by AI (VentureBeat) Niantic launches platform to build ‘real-world metaverse’ apps (The Verge) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

9 Nov 202116min

McAfee is taken private. The recently passed Infrastructure Bill complicates the tax picture for crypto. Also, playing NFT games could seriously complicate your tax bill. The latest installment of Today In Elon Musk, and since we’re hitting old features today, let’s check in with how Masa Son is doing. Sponsors: OurCrowd.com/ride Overland.com/techmeme Links: McAfee to Be Taken Private in $14 Billion Deal Including Debt (Bloomberg) House Sends Infrastructure Bill With Crypto Tax Provision to US President (CoinDesk) NFT games are fun. Filing taxes afterward is a nightmare. (Protocol) Elon Musk’s Twitter Poll Results Favor Tesla Stock Sale (WSJ) A Drone Tried to Disrupt the Power Grid. It Won't Be the Last (Wired) SoftBank Vision Fund Posts a Record Loss on Coupang’s Plunge (Bloomberg) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

8 Nov 202117min

Poking some holes in the Metaverse hype and also examining the financial realities of the Creator Economy. Simon Owen's Media Newsletter Zealous.app The Charlie Warzel leaving substack essay we discuss. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

6 Nov 20211h 19min

Is Meta going to open actual physical retail stores to try to sell folks on the promise of the Metaverse? More tangible signs Apple’s silicon is leaving everyone, but especially Intel in the dust. The new Mavic 3 drone from DJI. And of course, the weekend longreads suggestions. Sponsors: GoTeleport.com/techmeme Links: To Build the Metaverse, Meta First Wants to Build Stores (NYTimes) Apple’s Road Map for Mac Chips Shows Likely Advantage Over Intel (The Information) DJI Launches New Mavic 3 Drone With Longer Flight Time, Improved Cameras and New Safety Features (MacRumors) Weekend Longreads Suggestions: Hackers are stealing data today so quantum computers can crack it in a decade (TechnologyReview.com) The Booming Underground Market for Bots That Steal Your 2FA Codes (Motherboard) Farewell Offshoring, Outsourcing. Pandemic Rewrites CEO Playbook. (WSJ) Silicon Valley wants to power the U.S. war machine (Fast Company) The Metaverse Takes Manhattan (NYTimes) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

5 Nov 202119min

Instagram is playing nice with Twitter all of the sudden. But Meta has some new creator tools that try once again to shiv the App Stores. That South Korean law is actively cracking open the App Stores in that country. Google might be back in the defense contract business. And why it MIGHT be worth paying $30 for a keyboard with only 3 keys. Sponsors: FindYourFidelity.com Dataiku.com Links: Instagram brings back Twitter Card preview support for posts (TechCrunch) Facebook skirts Apple’s App Store fees with custom subscription links for creators (The Verge) Facebook is backing away from facial recognition. Meta isn’t. (Recode) Google Allows Alternate In-App Payment Options in South Korea, Though Familiar Fees Remain (WSJ) Google Wants to Work With the Pentagon Again, Despite Employee Concerns (NYTimes) STACK OVERFLOW’S COPY / PASTE KEYBOARD IS NO JOKE (The Verge) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

4 Nov 202117min

Facebook shuts down its decade-old face scanning and photo tagging feature. Zillow shuts down its house flipping business entirely. Netflix’s foray into games officially launches widely. And Microsoft says hey Zuckerberg, if you think the Metaverse is going to be about work meetings with cartoonish avatars and virtual whiteboards? Hold our beer! Sponsors: Tovala.com/ride TinyCapital.com Links: Facebook, Citing Societal Concerns, Plans to Shut Down Facial Recognition System (NYTimes) Zillow to shutter home buying business and lay off 2,000 employees as its big real estate bet falters (GeekWire) CISA creates catalog of known exploited vulnerabilities, orders agencies to patch (The Record) Netflix games are coming to all members on Android, starting this week (TechCrunch) Microsoft Teams enters the metaverse race with 3D avatars and immersive meetings (The Verge) Loop app from Microsoft keeps projects in sync across Microsoft 365 (VentureBeat) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

3 Nov 202117min

Apple is cutting iPad production in order to allocate more components to iPhone production. The Biden administration is getting serious about stablecoins. Zoom is going to start showing you ads unless you pay up. Zillow misjudged the housing market. And a security flaw has been found, inside, of all things: Unicode. Sponsors: BoxOfAwesome.com code "techmeme" for 20% off your first box Arm Viewpoints Podcast Links: Apple trims iPad production to feed chips to iPhone 13 (Nikkei Asia) Nintendo to make 20% fewer Switch consoles due to chip crunch (Nikkei Asia) Biden Administration to Congress: Put Stablecoins Under Federal Supervision – Or We Will (CoinDesk) Zoom is testing showing ads to free users (The Verge) ‘Trojan Source’ Bug Threatens the Security of All Code (KrebsonSecurity) Zillow Seeks to Sell 7,000 Homes for $2.8 Billion After Flipping Halt (Bloomberg) Yahoo Pulls Out of China, Ending Tumultuous Two-Decade Relationship (WSJ) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

2 Nov 202118min