South African telecom regulator to charge operators for emergency spectrum

South Africa's telecoms regulator ICASA said on Friday all licensees wishing to use until March 31 temporary spectrum granted during lockdown will be required to pay the prescribed license fees. https://ift.tt/3mxCV77

Google, Temasek, and Bain & Company report: investments in Indonesia's tech sector in the first half of 2020 totaled $2.8B, up 55% from the same period in 2019 (Mercedes Ruehl/Financial Times)

Mercedes Ruehl / Financial Times:
Google, Temasek, and Bain & Company report: investments in Indonesia's tech sector in the first half of 2020 totaled $2.8B, up 55% from the same period in 2019  —  Sharp spike in investment in south-east Asia's largest economy after New Delhi closes its doors

Report: China accounted for 23% of cross-border data flows in 2019, nearly twice the share of the US, which ranked second with 12%, followed by the UK and India (Nikkei Asia)

Nikkei Asia:
Report: China accounted for 23% of cross-border data flows in 2019, nearly twice the share of the US, which ranked second with 12%, followed by the UK and India  —  Asian ‘data sphere’ gives the country twice the information flows of the US  —  People view laptop computers from Chinese tech firm Huawei at an expo in Beijing.

Pandemic has deepened the digital education divide in India, where ~38% of households with students had no smartphone in the house, according to a recent survey (Wall Street Journal)

Wall Street Journal:
Pandemic has deepened the digital education divide in India, where ~38% of households with students had no smartphone in the house, according to a recent survey  —  Children across India are struggling to keep up because they don't have the tech tools for online classes

Reliance JioPages browser updated with new tools, here’s how to use them

Reliance updated its JioPages web browser to version 2.0.1 which brings a host of new features to the browser like new search engine support, short video support and user interface improvements. Jio has mentioned that these three features are added based on users’ demand. https://ift.tt/2HMCExJ

Profile of Christine Su, Twitter's senior PM for conversational safety, who is a queer Asian-American "activist-entrepreneur" with an MBA and MA in agriculture (Anna Kramer/Protocol)

Anna Kramer / Protocol:
Profile of Christine Su, Twitter's senior PM for conversational safety, who is a queer Asian-American “activist-entrepreneur” with an MBA and MA in agriculture  —  About six months ago, Twitter quietly hired someone to become the head of product for conversational safety on the platform.

A report on student grades from Virginia reveals that online learning has led to a sharp drop in students' academic performance (Hannah Natanson/Washington Post)

Hannah Natanson / Washington Post:
A report on student grades from Virginia reveals that online learning has led to a sharp drop in students' academic performance  —  A report on student grades from one of the nation's largest school districts offers some of the first concrete evidence that online learning is forcing …

As Facebook and Google continue to ban political ads, Republican super PACs are spending millions on other platforms that offer no advertiser transparency (Issie Lapowsky/Protocol)

Issie Lapowsky / Protocol:
As Facebook and Google continue to ban political ads, Republican super PACs are spending millions on other platforms that offer no advertiser transparency  —  Facebook and Google are still banning political ads on their platforms, but that hasn't stopped Republican super PACs from spending millions …

Reliance Jio-exclusive 4G smartphone to launch 'soon': 7 things to know

https://ift.tt/3qb24GU

New Nokia and Garmin gadgets; PUBG comeback; Android SMS app removed and other top tech news of the week

https://ift.tt/36hAj7C

From Tenet to Durgamati, What to Watch in December

Tenet, Durgamati, Coolie No. 1, Wonder Woman 1984, Mulan, Bhaag Beanie Bhaag, Bombay Rose, Torbaaz, The Stand, Pixar's Soul, Mank, The Prom, Bridgerton - the biggest movies and TV series coming to... https://ift.tt/3qd5SHp

How Reach Vet, an AI-based system used in clinical practice by the US Department of Veterans Affairs, helps identify veterans at high risk of suicide (Benedict Carey/New York Times)

Benedict Carey / New York Times:
How Reach Vet, an AI-based system used in clinical practice by the US Department of Veterans Affairs, helps identify veterans at high risk of suicide  —  The Department of Veterans Affairs has turned to machine-learning to help identify vets at risk of taking their own lives.

HMBradley, a Santa Monica-based banking startup which offers up to 3% interest on savings accounts, raises $18.25M Series A led by Acrew Capital (Christine Hall/Crunchbase News)

Christine Hall / Crunchbase News:
HMBradley, a Santa Monica-based banking startup which offers up to 3% interest on savings accounts, raises $18.25M Series A led by Acrew Capital  —  As consumers look for ways to make their money earn more money, digital banking platform HMBradley is developing programs to reward savers.

Interviews with tech leaders on Tony Hsieh's legacy, his student life at Harvard, his unconventional business approach, and the culture he built at Zappos (Alex Konrad/Forbes)

Alex Konrad / Forbes:
Interviews with tech leaders on Tony Hsieh's legacy, his student life at Harvard, his unconventional business approach, and the culture he built at Zappos  —  Tony Hsieh, bestselling author and longtime former CEO of ecommerce pioneer Zappos.com, died at age 46 on Friday.

Big Tech threatens democracy and one solution may be to take away their role as gatekeepers of content and let users choose the information presented to them (Foreign Affairs)

Foreign Affairs:
Big Tech threatens democracy and one solution may be to take away their role as gatekeepers of content and let users choose the information presented to them  —  Among the many transformations taking place in the U.S. economy, none is more salient than the growth of gigantic Internet platforms.