Tech Meme

Chris Vallance / BBC: Sama CEO Wendy Gonzalez says the company will no longer take on harmful content moderation work from Meta and she regrets the work, after staff sue the company  —  A firm which was contracted to moderate Facebook posts in East Africa has said with hindsight it should not have taken on the job. Lees verder op Tech Meme

Jay Peters / The Verge: Epic Games expands its Epic Online Services crossplay tools from PC to PlayStation, Xbox, and Switch, helping developers more easily add crossplay multiplayer  —  The change could mean that developers will be able to more easily bring crossplay multiplayer to their games. Lees verder op Tech Meme

Ryan Weeks / The Block: Layer 1 blockchain startup ZetaChain raised $27M from Blockchain.com and others and plans to launch its mainnet soon; the project has 27K+ dApps deployed  —  – Several crypto and trading heavyweights, including Blockchain.com and Jane Street Capital, participated in the fundraise. Lees verder op Tech Meme

Bloomberg: Sources: as part of a long-running DOJ investigation into Visa, officials are looking at how the company charges merchants for using its “tokenization” service  —  – Merchants get charged more if they shun Visa’s tokens  — Long-running probe is now scrutinizing those price differences Lees verder op Tech Meme

Alexandra Alter / New York Times: The Authors Guild, American Booksellers Association, and Open Markets Institute urge the DOJ and the FTC to investigate Amazon’s “monopoly” in the book market  —  The online retailer’s size and sway affects the free exchange of ideas, the groups argue. Lees verder op Tech Meme

Bloomberg: Filing: Samsung Electronics sold ~3.55M ASML shares from April-June 2023, lowering its holding from 1.6% to 0.7%, or 2.75M shares, and reportedly raising ~$2.2B  —  – Firm lowered its holding to 0.7% from 1.6% in the period  — Sale raised about $2.2 billion, Korea Economic Daily reported Lees verder op Tech Meme

Bloomberg: Intel ends its $5.4B deal to buy Israeli company Tower Semiconductor after failing to win Chinese regulatory approval; Intel announced the deal in February 2022  —  – Deal for Tower Semiconductor needed Chinese antitrust approval  —  Intel Corp. walked away from its attempt … Lees verder op Tech Meme

Sankalp Phartiyal / Bloomberg: Sources: Foxconn’s Tamil Nadu plant in India plans to deliver new iPhone 15s only weeks after Chinese factories; previously, output lagged China by 6-9 months  —  – Apple is diversifying iPhone supply chain away from China  — India’s push to become a manufacturing hub is bearing fruit Lees verder op Tech Meme

Nico Grant / New York Times: Documents: Google DeepMind has been working with generative AI to perform at least 21 different types of personal and professional tasks, including life advice  —  The tech giant is evaluating tools that would use artificial intelligence to perform tasks that some of its researchers have said should be avoided. Lees verder op Tech Meme

Yuvraj Malik / Reuters: JD.com reports Q2 revenue up 7.6% YoY to ~$39.7B, beating ~$38.27B est., as retail sales rose just 2.5% YoY, below analyst estimates of 4.5% YoY; JD drops 4.5%+  —  Chinese e-commerce firm JD.com (9618.HK), beat Wall Street estimates for second-quarter revenue on Wednesday … Lees verder op Tech Meme