Inside China's $16B virtual influencer industry, as motion capture actors complain of hard working conditions powering their avatars four to five hours per day — Hidden behind the perfect faces of China's $16 billion virtual celebrity industry is an angry, overworked labor force.
Cyberattack on Illuminate Education, exposing information on 1M+ students, highlights the dangers of stockpiling sensitive info on millions of school children — At a moment when education technology firms are stockpiling sensitive information on millions of school children, safeguards for student data have broken down.
How Tor is fighting Russia's efforts since December 2021 to block the anonymous browser, such as by using Telegram to share details of volunteer-run Tor bridges — Russia has been trying to block the anonymous browser since December—with mixed results. — For years, the anonymity service Tor …
A look at the GOP's escalating pressure campaign against Google over Gmail's filters allegedly marking fundraising emails from right-wing candidates as spam — As fundraising slows, the GOP is blaming Gmail's spam filter. The tech giant rejects claims of bias but is moving to placate Republicans, anyway.
A look at the supply chain resilience myth, as efforts to replicate the chipmaking process inside single countries or regions reveal and exacerbate bottlenecks — TAIPEI — In the sweltering Asia summertime of mid-June, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. urgently dispatched a team …
Salesforce, whose logo appeared on Helium's website, also says it is not a Helium partner; Helium has removed both Lime and Salesforce logos from its website — Helium listed the two companies as users on its homepage — On Friday, Mashable reported that Helium, a crypto project praised …
How Modi's government is increasingly skirting India's own internet rules to crack down on free speech and dissent on social media, under a “fake news” pretext — Sandeep Ravindranath, an Indian filmmaker, posted his latest work to YouTube in May. The video …
Sources: a Chinese government PR division asked to open a stealth account on TikTok, targeting Western audiences; TikTok declined the “sensitive” request — A Chinese government entity responsible for public relations attempted to open a stealth account on TikTok targeting Western audiences …
Sources: EU is considering creating a new directorate headed by two top antitrust officials, amid concerns EU competition watchdog may struggle to enforce DMA — The European Commission is considering creating a new directorate that may be headed by two top antitrust officials to enforce tough …
An interview with a Baidu robotaxi safety operator, who sits in the passenger seat and monitors how self-driving cars cope with Beijing's streets — We spoke to Liu Yang, who has one of the strangest jobs around: to sit in the passenger seat and monitor how self-driving cars cope with Beijing's streets.
Worldwide Mobile Pricing 2022 survey of mobile data prices: five of the world's 10 most expensive places are in sub-Saharan Africa; Israel is the cheapest — A new report detailing the cost of mobile data in different markets across the world, bears the evidence of why internet use …
Sources: Jack Ma plans to relinquish control of Alibaba's Ant Group, potentially pushing back Ant's IPO for a year or more; regulators approve of the change — The shift, long under consideration to reduce governance risks, comes as the Chinese fintech giant seeks to move on from a tough year
An interview with Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma on the company's $1B annual revenue goal, post-IPO stock price crash, giving investors more info, and more — Paytm was the poster boy for India's tech startups, only to lose two-thirds of its value since its IPO and become a symbol of the industry's crash.
Greater London Authority warns housing developers about a potential ban on new housing until 2035, citing a growing number of data centers consuming electricity — Greater London Authority warns developers that upgrade might take more than a decade — Developers in west London face …
Experts say it is not clear whether generative art made by AI systems trained on copyrighted data, like OpenAI's DALL-E 2, can be considered as fair use — In 1917, Marcel Duchamp submitted a sculpture to the Society of Independent Artists under a false name.
Spotify says it has “decided to stop further production of Car Thing units” and will take a €31M charge, citing demand and supply chain issues — Spotify's push to complement its music streaming with a big move into podcasting and related content appears to be paying off …
An illustrated look at the bipartisan American Innovation and Choice Act's impact on US tech giants, seeking to ban self-preferencing and improve competition — US lawmakers are eyeing votes before November's midterm elections on legislation that marks the first major effort by Congress …
Spotify reports Q2 revenue rose 23% YoY to €2.9B as its net loss widened to €125M; MAUs were up 19% YoY to 433M and Premium users reached to 188M, up 14% YoY — Spotify turned in strong numbers for the second quarter, beating expectations for total and paid subscriber adds and reporting 23% revenue growth.
Acronis, which offers enterprise cybersecurity and data protection tools, raised $250M at a $3.5B+ valuation, up from $2.5B in May 2021 after raising $250M — Cybersecurity provider Acronis raised $250 million in new funding from institutional investors earlier this year to expand its business …
Spotnana, which offers cloud-based enterprise tools for booking and managing travel, raised a $75M Series B, following a $34M Series A in September 2021 — Spotnana, a self-proclaimed “travel-as-a-service” platform that targets corporations, travel management firms, and other technology companies …
Lawyers in the Celsius bankruptcy are examining Tether recovering an $840M USDT loan, highlighting an uncertain area of bankruptcy law for crypto companies — Case is a major test of how US insolvency rules will apply in digital asset sector — Stablecoin issuer Tether faces scrutiny …
France's Eutelsat and UK satellite internet company OneWeb agree to merge in an all-stock deal valuing OneWeb at $3.4B, in a bid to compete with SpaceX — Eutelsat Communications SA and OneWeb Ltd. are set to combine in an all-share deal valuing the UK satellite operator at $3.4 billion …
Amazon's purchase of One Medical is likely cheaper than unionization would be, and could be used as a tool to fight against unionization of employees — I guess I should say something? … This episode of Out-Of-Pocket is brought to you by... Nabla creates SDKs and APIs …
UK CMA's publishes its report into music streaming services, saying the market is dominated by major players but this is not “currently causing consumers harm” — The music streaming market dominated by a handful of major players is giving consumers a fair shake …
New Zealand's internet safety group Netsafe says Meta, Google, Amazon, TikTok, and Twitter have agreed to self-regulate to reduce harmful content in the country — Big tech companies agreed on Monday to reduce harmful online content in New Zealand, making a move that critics said dodged the alternative of government regulation.
How Apple, Amazon, and Google are trying to secure live sports streaming rights, working to convince leagues to switch from traditional TV and cable networks — Competing for rights to broadcast games from the N.F.L. and other leagues could be hard for broadcast and cable companies that “aren't playing by the same financial rules.”
Bloomberg : Google says it plans to counter Japan's FTC over claims that it hobbles rivals in search; a source says Japan's FTC s...
