~techmeme | Bookmarks (1028)

Michael H. Keller / New York Times: An investigation finds 80+ livestreaming apps, like Bigo Live, on Apple's App Store and the Google Play Store that advertised child sexual abuse or bestiality  —  Smartphone apps downloaded from Apple and Google can allow parents and other abusers to connect with pedophiles who pay to watch — and direct — criminal behavior.

Matteo Wong / The Atlantic: OpenAI's o1 is a notable departure from older models, representing the AI industry's shift to reasoning models to overcome the limits of prediction-based LLMs  —  This week, openai launched what its chief executive, Sam Altman, called “the smartest model in the world”—a generative-AI program …

Manish Singh / TechCrunch: Paytm sells its stake in Japanese payments firm PayPay to SoftBank for $279.2M, ending Paytm's ties with SoftBank, which sold its remaining Paytm shares in June  —  Paytm has agreed to sell its stake in Japanese payments firm PayPay to SoftBank for $279.2 million, as the Indian firm sheds …

John Thornhill / Financial Times: In a recent discussion, YC partners said the incubator was deluged with applications from startups looking to develop AI agents, which could become the new SaaS  —  Big companies are trumpeting the value of consumer-facing personal digital helpers to make our lives easier

Che Pan / South China Morning Post: Sources: the US spared China's top DRAM producer CXMT from its latest round of chip curbs because of Japan's opposition; Tokyo Electron is a major CXMT supplier  —  The US spared China's top producer of dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) from its latest round of chip export restrictions …

Ben Schoon / 9to5Google: Samsung releases One UI 7 beta for Galaxy S24, with a huge visual overhaul, a “Now Bar”, a vertically scrolling app drawer, new security and AI tools, and more  —  Months later than expected, Samsung has officially unveiled its Android 15 update, One UI 7, and the company …

M.G. Siegler / Spyglass: Pat Gelsinger was dealt a bad hand by Intel's board, which gave him just three years to execute a turnaround despite challenging timing and circumstances  —  Dealt a bad hand by a board who wouldn't give him enough time, Intel's next leader needs full control to think different

Shaurya Malwa / CoinDesk: Popular NFT project Pudgy Penguins plans to launch a Solana-based token called PENGU within this year, with 23.5% of the 88B tokens reserved for its NFT holders  —  Pudgy Penguins is among the most popular NFT collections, and its comic penguins have a big presence on X, YouTube and Instagram.

Filipe Espósito / 9to5Mac: A Brazilian judge overturns an injunction that would have forced Apple to enable iOS sideloading in 20 days, calling the regulator's decision “disproportionate”  —  Following a report earlier today about Apple appealing a Brazilian antitrust regulator's ruling on the App Store …

Reuters: The US FCC proposes rules for carriers to submit an annual certification attesting they have a plan to protect against cyberattacks, after the Salt Typhoon hack  —  U.S. Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel is proposing that communications service providers …

Rebecca Bellan / TechCrunch: California says ride-hail drivers need to pass a fingerprint background check to transport unaccompanied minors; Uber launched Uber for Teens in CA in February  —  Uber has 30 days to require certain drivers to get fingerprinted if the ride-hail giant intends to continue transporting unaccompanied teens in California.

Bloomberg: Trump says David Sacks will be the “White House AI and crypto czar” to “work on a legal framework so the crypto industry has the clarity it has been asking for”  —  - New post will help Trump put imprint on developing industries  — Venture capitalist Sacks helped Trump make inroads with tech

Paul Ziobro / MarketWatch: GitLab co-founder Sid Sijbrandij steps down as CEO to focus on his health, transitions to executive chair, and names former New Relic CEO Bill Staples as CEO  —  Gitlab co-founder Sid Sijbrandij is stepping down as chief executive due to focus on his health, including treatment for cancer.

Aisha Malik / TechCrunch: Meta tests letting Threads users see metrics for their individual posts, including views, likes, and replies, as part of changes to Threads' Insights feature  —  Threads is testing the ability for users to see how well their individual posts performed on the social network.

Victoria Song / The Verge: Oura rolls out Symptom Radar, a feature for detecting early signs of a respiratory illness using metrics like heart rate variability, to Oura Ring Gen 3 and 4  —  At the height of the covid-19 pandemic, many wearable companies rushed to see if their devices could detect early signs of the disease.

Greg Otto / CyberScoop: US intelligence reports: online terrorist network 764 is using techniques normally used for financial crimes, such as SIM swapping, to commit child sextortion  —  The child sextortion group 764 and the global collective of loosely associated groups known as “The Com” are using tools …

Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch: US SEC filing: xAI raised $6B from 97 participants, taking its total funding to $12B; xAI was reportedly aiming for a $50B valuation, double from six months ago  —  xAI, Elon Musk's AI company, has raised $6 billion, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday.

Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter: Meta teams up with James Cameron's Lightstorm Vision to bring “live sports and concerts, feature films, and TV series featuring big-name IP” to Quest headsets  —  The multiyear deal will make Meta Quest the exclusive mixed reality headset of Lightstorm, and is meant to turbocharge 3D content development.