Tuesday, August 15, 2023

Southeast Asian internet giant Sea reports Q2 revenue up 5.2% YoY to $3.1B, below $3.2B est., and Shopee revenue up 21% YoY, the slowest on record; SE drops 13% (Olivia Poh/Bloomberg)

Olivia Poh / Bloomberg:
Southeast Asian internet giant Sea reports Q2 revenue up 5.2% YoY to $3.1B, below $3.2B est., and Shopee revenue up 21% YoY, the slowest on record; SE drops 13%  —  - Online-retail arm Shopee posts slowest growth on record  — Tech firm's shares plunge about 13% in pre-market trading



A look at China's sweeping AI rules, taking effect on August 15 and governed by seven agencies, which soften an earlier draft and follow European regulators (Bloomberg)

Bloomberg:
A look at China's sweeping AI rules, taking effect on August 15 and governed by seven agencies, which soften an earlier draft and follow European regulators  —  - Europe has also delved into rules for protecting individuals  —  Beijing is poised to implement sweeping new regulations …



Substack now lets users follow individual writers without subscribing to their newsletter, a further expansion into social networking after Notes (Jay Peters/The Verge)

Jay Peters / The Verge:
Substack now lets users follow individual writers without subscribing to their newsletter, a further expansion into social networking after Notes  —  Substack now lets you follow writers, offering a way for you to keep tabs on what a writer is doing without having to subscribe to their newsletter.



Monday, August 14, 2023

Mobile phone shipments crossed 2B cumulative units under the "Make in India" initiative between 2014 and 2022, a 23% CAGR, for 98% of local shipments in 2022 (Prachir Singh/Counterpoint Research)

Prachir Singh / Counterpoint Research:
Mobile phone shipments crossed 2B cumulative units under the “Make in India” initiative between 2014 and 2022, a 23% CAGR, for 98% of local shipments in 2022  —  - India's mobile phone production grew at a CAGR of 23% during 2014-2022 to cross a cumulative 2bn units.



Voltas announce Independence Day offer: Deals and discounts on wide range of ACs

Voltas has launched an Independence Day offer providing up to 50% saving in exchange for old air conditioners. The company is also offering 'special cashback of up to 15%' on select debit and credit cards, 'easy EMI options through NBFCs', 'up to five year extended warranty worth Rs. 15,000' and 'free installation & uninstallation offer worth Rs. 2,250'. All these offers are available at Voltas retail outlets. The company had earlier introduced air conditioners providing complete air purification and AI-powered ventilation solutions. https://ift.tt/1mbUDdn

In Taiwan, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, and other lifestyle and shopping apps are increasingly becoming part of China's information war, aided by a shared language (Emma Graham-Harrison/The Guardian)

Emma Graham-Harrison / The Guardian:
In Taiwan, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, and other lifestyle and shopping apps are increasingly becoming part of China's information war, aided by a shared language  —  Lifestyle and shopping apps are the latest weapons in Beijing's information war against its neighbour  —  Emma Graham-Harrison and Chi-Hui Lin in Taichung



A look at the years of warnings about AI from researchers, including several women of color, who say we need to take the problems and risks seriously today (Lorena O'Neil/Rolling Stone)

Lorena O'Neil / Rolling Stone:
A look at the years of warnings about AI from researchers, including several women of color, who say we need to take the problems and risks seriously today  —  Today the risks of artificial intelligence are clear — but the warning signs have been there all along  —  T  —  IMNIT GEBRU DIDN'T set out to work in AI.



Tecno Pova 5 Pro, Pova 5 smartphones launched in India: Price, offers and more

Tecno has launched two new smartphones, Pova 5 and Pova 5 Pro, in India. Both the smartphones come with a 50MP main camera, Full HD+ display and run on Android 13 OS. The Pova 5 is priced at Rs 11,999 and the Pova 5 Pro's two variants are priced at Rs 14,999 and Rs 15,999 respectively. The smartphones will be available on Amazon.in from August 22, with offers such as Rs 1,000 off on exchange and 6 months no-cost EMI. Pova 5 Pro also boasts a 120Hz refresh rate, 5000mAh battery and 68W fast charging support. https://ift.tt/17UYAJx

How to add Tiranga to your profile picture on WhatsApp, Instagram and other social media platforms

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has urged citizens to take part in the "Har Ghar Tiranga" ("Flag in every home" in Hindi) campaign by displaying the national flag. Changing your social media profile picture is a common way to support the campaign, with Facebook offering a method to add the national flag using its Frames feature on mobile. You can then resize your picture to the specification of different social media platforms, including WhatsApp, Twitter and Instagram. Other apps are also available, such as Flagstickers for Picture, Flag Face and Google's Snapseed app. https://ift.tt/L4VGNka

Sunday, August 13, 2023

Generative AI could be a dud, so we shouldn't build around the premise that the tech is world-changing, which in hindsight may turn out to have been unrealistic (Gary Marcus/The Road to AI We Can Trust)

Gary Marcus / The Road to AI We Can Trust:
Generative AI could be a dud, so we shouldn't build around the premise that the tech is world-changing, which in hindsight may turn out to have been unrealistic  —  With the possible exception of the quick to rise and quick to fall alleged room-temperature superconductor LK-99 …



Q&A with an FBI agent on targeting and taking down DDoS-for-hire sites, why Christmas is the busiest DDoS time, how attacks have changed over 10 years, and more (Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai/TechCrunch)

Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai / TechCrunch:
Q&A with an FBI agent on targeting and taking down DDoS-for-hire sites, why Christmas is the busiest DDoS time, how attacks have changed over 10 years, and more  —  In an interview at Black Hat, FBI agents explain how they target and take down DDoS-for-hire sites



ShapesXR, which offers an XR app creation and collaboration platform to clients like Meta, Qualcomm, and ByteDance, raised an $8.6M seed led by Supernode Global (Duncan Riley/SiliconANGLE)

Duncan Riley / SiliconANGLE:
ShapesXR, which offers an XR app creation and collaboration platform to clients like Meta, Qualcomm, and ByteDance, raised an $8.6M seed led by Supernode Global  —  Spatial apps creation and collaboration platform startup ShapesXR today announced that it has raised $8.6 million in new funding …



Sources: Apple is planning a major "Watch X" redesign for the 10th anniversary; a look at the M3 roadmap, including a top M3 Ultra with 32 CPU and 80 GPU cores (Mark Gurman/Bloomberg)

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple is planning a major “Watch X” redesign for the 10th anniversary; a look at the M3 roadmap, including a top M3 Ultra with 32 CPU and 80 GPU cores  —  Apple's next line of smartwatches is expected to be a minor upgrade.  Behind the scenes, though …



Sources: SoftBank is in talks to acquire the 25% stake in Arm it does not directly own from Vision Fund 1, ahead of the chip designer's Nasdaq IPO next month (Reuters)

Reuters:
Sources: SoftBank is in talks to acquire the 25% stake in Arm it does not directly own from Vision Fund 1, ahead of the chip designer's Nasdaq IPO next month  —  SoftBank Group Corp (9984.T) is in talks to acquire the 25% stake in Arm Ltd it does not directly own from Vision Fund 1 (VF1) …



Inside the Black Hat network operations center, staffed by volunteers who built the network on the week of the event from scratch using their own equipment (Iain Thomson/The Register)

Iain Thomson / The Register:
Inside the Black Hat network operations center, staffed by volunteers who built the network on the week of the event from scratch using their own equipment  —  NOC, NOC ... Who's there?  —  BLACK HAT Every summer, pandemics permitting, a group of volunteers gather in a Las Vegas hotel …



Sources and documents detail OnlyFans' journey from an obscure, porn-free site to an adults-only platform fueled by erotic performers and celebrity influencers (Reuters)

Reuters : Sources and documents detail OnlyFans' journey from an obscure, porn-free site to an adults-only platform fueled by erotic ...