In Apple’s new iPad Pro and MacBook Air, competing ways to get to work | NYT

Final sentence: "A decade ago when Apple co-founder Steve Jobs first introduced the Air by pulling it out of a manila envelope, he redefined the design of portable computers. If you want Apple’s vision today, look to the iPad Pro." For an overview of the product updates, see The biggest news from Apple's iPad and Mac event | Engadget along with Apple press releases for the new iPad Pro, MacBook Air, and Mac mini

"Two slabs of glass and metal, two different tales.

Apple shared its vision for the future of portable computers on Tuesday: A super-powerful redesigned iPad Pro you operate with fingers and a stylus. But in case you’re dubious a tablet can replace a laptop, Apple also unveiled a refresh of its classic MacBook Air.

That was the mixed message from the consumer tech giant’s product event in New York City, a follow-up to its September launch of new iPhones and Apple Watches. I had a chance to try both the $800 iPad Pro and $1,200 MacBook Air after Apple’s presentation. Each was given a beautiful new design, renewed purpose — and a 20 percent price hike."

In Apple’s new iPad Pro and MacBook Air, competing ways to get to work | NYT

I Thought the Web Would Stop Hate, Not Spread It | NYT

From Kara Swisher's latest NYT column; on a related note, see The Internet Will Be the Death of Us | NYT

"So where are we now? Far too much of the money social media companies are using to host thugs like Mr. Sayoc and Mr. Bowers was paid for by thugs like Prince Mohammed. And, other than some tut-tutting about the horror of it all, there are no signs that the industry that considers itself the most woke on the planet is thinking of giving the money back or talking about not taking it in the future.

I cannot tell you how sad that is to write, because when I first saw the internet way back when, I hoped that it would help eliminate the attitudes that had fueled those horrible letters to me. I naïvely thought a lone man sending a reporter a missive of malevolence could not find such refuge on the wide-open internet, where his hate would be seen for what it was and denounced and exorcised.

I was obviously very wrong. Instead, the internet gave people like him the space to grow and thrive. Tech made no real rules, claiming the freedom from any strictures would be O.K. in what is the greatest experiment in human communications ever."

I Thought the Web Would Stop Hate, Not Spread It | NYT

Facebook expects rising costs to combat scandals to moderate after 2019 | Reuters

For more details on Facebook's latest quarter, see Mark Zuckerberg's overview

"Facebook Inc (FB.O) on Tuesday relieved investors by forecasting that margins would stop shrinking after 2019 as costs from scandals ease up, sending shares up despite a second-straight quarter with record-low user growth.

Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg repeated the company’s warning that growing user interest in private messaging, video and safer content would cause costs to rise faster than revenue for “some time.” But he said he was focused on bringing them in line."

Facebook expects rising costs to combat scandals to moderate after 2019 | Reuters

Ian Small, former head of TokBox, takes over as Evernote CEO from Chris O'Neill | TechCrunch

Also see Inventing the Future: Greetings from Our New CEO | Evernote blog

"O”Neill had been Evernote’s CEO since 2015, when he took over the position from co-founder Phil Libin. Small previously served as CEO of TokBox, which operates the OpenTok video calling platform, from 2009 to 2014, and then as its chairman from 2014 to July of this year.

O’Neill’s departure as CEO is the latest significant leadership shift for Evernote, which has withstood several key executive departures over the last few months. In early September, we reported that the company had lost several senior executives, including CTO Anirban Kundu, CFO Vincent Toolan, CPO Erik Wrobel, and head of HR Michelle Wagner, as it sought funding in a potential down-round from the unicorn valuation it hit in 2012. According to TechCrunch’s sources, Evernote had struggled to grow its base of paid users and active users, as well as enterprise clients, for the last six years."

Ian Small, former head of TokBox, takes over as Evernote CEO from Chris O'Neill | TechCrunch

Billionaires Chase ‘SpaceX Moment’ for the Holy Grail of Energy | Bloomberg

Cash in fusion

"One of the most ambitious ventures is Commonwealth Fusion Systems, a company founded last year by six MIT professors. Backed by some of the biggest names in business, they’re confident they’ll be able to produce a prototype of a so-called net energy reactor by 2025.

The startup raised $50 million in March from a group led by Italy’s Eni SpA, one of several oil producers preparing for a carbon-neutral world. And last month it secured an unspecified sum from Breakthrough Energy Ventures, a fund seeded by Gates, Bezos and fellow tycoons including Richard Branson, Ray Dalio and Michael Bloomberg, the majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News.

“The greater danger is not having anybody succeed than having everybody,” Commonwealth Fusion CEO Bob Mumgaard said by phone from Cambridge, Massachusetts. “We need more smart people driving very hard to crack this.”"

Billionaires Chase ‘SpaceX Moment’ for the Holy Grail of Energy | Bloomberg

China’s King of Internet Fluff Wants to Conquer the World | NYT

Might want to carefully read the end user license agreement, especially on data sharing

"A Chinese internet company that serves up homemade break-dancing videos, dishy news bites and goofy hashtag challenges has become one of the planet’s most richly valued start-ups, with a roughly $75 billion price tag. And it has big plans for storming phone screens across the rest of the globe, too.

You may not have heard of the company, Bytedance. You may never have used any of its breezy, colorful apps. But your nearest teenager is probably already obsessed with Musical.ly, the video-sharing platform that Bytedance bought for around $1 billion last year and folded into its own video service, TikTok."

China’s King of Internet Fluff Wants to Conquer the World | NYT

Twitter’s rumored killing of the “like” button highlights its misplaced priorities | Vox

What's not to like? Also see Twitter Should Kill the Retweet | The Atlantic and On Social Media, No Answers for Hate | NYT

"To be fair to Twitter, it has made changes designed to weed out hate speech. Its most sweeping action against bad actors on the site, an algorithmic change designed to remove them from public feeds, caused so much outrage from conservatives that Dorsey was not only pressured into to undoing the change but also had to testify before Congress in a bizarre day of political grandstanding. Yet because Twitter’s overall record has been one of inconsistency and waffling, it’s received little credit for the changes it has made.

All of this has impacted the way Twitter users reacted to the news about the potential removal of the “like” button. In that context, the idea of Twitter responding to the many problems plaguing it at the moment by removing the “like” — one of the few consistently positive forms of interaction on the site — might be the most bizarre example yet of Twitter zigging when its users are begging for a giant zag."

Twitter’s rumored killing of the “like” button highlights its misplaced priorities | Vox

IBM’s Old Playbook | Stratechery

I'm surprised IBM's stock is only down ~3% as I type this -- from a timely Stratechery reality check:

"The best thing going for this strategy is its pragmatism: IBM gave up its potential to compete in the public cloud a decade ago, faked it for the last five years, and now is finally admitting its best option is to build on top of everyone else’s clouds. That, though, gets at the strategy’s weakness: it seems more attuned to IBM’s needs than potential customers. After all, if an enterprise is concerned about lock-in, is IBM really a better option? And if the answer is that “Red Hat is open”, at what point do increasingly sophisticated businesses build it themselves?

The problem for IBM is that they are not building solutions for clueless IT departments bewildered by a dizzying array of open technologies: instead they are building on top of three cloud providers, one of which (Microsoft) is specializing in precisely the sort of hybrid solutions that IBM is targeting. The difference is that because Microsoft has actually spent the money on infrastructure their ability to extract money from the value chain is correspondingly higher; IBM has to pay rent"

IBM’s Old Playbook | Stratechery

This Is How We Radicalized The World | BuzzFeed News

Also see Social Media Is a Weapon of War. How We Use It Is Up to Us | Motherboard

"The way the world is using their phones is almost completely dominated by a few Silicon Valley companies. The abuse that is happening is due to their inability to manage that responsibility. All of this has become so normalized in the three years since it first began to manifest that we just assume now that platforms like Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp, and Twitter will exacerbate political and social instability. We expect they will be abused by ultranationalist trolls. We know they will be exploited by data firms. We wait for them to help launch the careers of populist leaders.

To be sure, populism, nationalism, and information warfare existed long before the internet. The arc of history doesn’t always bend toward what I think of as progress. Societies regress. The difference now is that all of this is being hosted almost entirely by a handful of corporations. Why is an American company like Facebook placing ads in newspapers in countries like India, Italy, Mexico, and Brazil, explaining to local internet users how to look out for abuse and misinformation? Because our lives, societies, and governments have been tied to invisible feedback loops, online and off. And there’s no clear way to untangle ourselves.

The worst part of all of this is that, in retrospect, there’s no real big secret about how we got here."

This Is How We Radicalized The World | BuzzFeed News

Clean energy is catching up to natural gas | Vox

From an extensive and encouraging clean energy market dynamics reality check

"The cost of natural gas power is tethered to the commodity price of natural gas, which is inherently volatile. The price of controllable, storable renewable energy is tethered only to technology costs, which are going down, down, down. Recent forecasts suggest that it may be cheaper to build new renewables+storage than to continue operating existing natural gas plants by 2035.

That means natural gas plants built today could be rendered uncompetitive well before their rated lifespan. They could become “stranded assets,” saddling utility ratepayers and investors with the costs of premature decommissioning."

Clean energy is catching up to natural gas | Vox

IBM to Buy Red Hat, the Top Linux Distributor, for $34 Billion | NYT

I'm guessing IBM's stock price isn't going up today; also see IBM Buying Open Source Specialist Red Hat for $34 Billion (Wired)

"The IBM cloud strategy is to supply both hardware and software for companies to build their own private clouds, and it also has a third-party public cloud offering.

IBM, analysts say, cannot really compete broadly with so-called hyperscale cloud companies — Amazon, Microsoft and Google — which tap their deep coffers to spend many billions of dollars a year to build more giant data centers.

But IBM and Red Hat say they are well placed to be leaders in helping corporations make the transition to cloud computing without getting locked into the technology of an internet giant."

IBM to Buy Red Hat, the Top Linux Distributor, for $34 Billion | NYT

Bytedance Is Said to Secure Funding at Record $75 Billion Value | Bloomberg

Funding secured; future tbd (later in the article: "Bytedance’s biggest potential risk may be China’s notoriously sensitive censors.")

"Six-year-old Bytedance, owner of news aggregator Toutiao and video sensation Tik Tok, has surpassed Uber Technologies Inc. to become the world’s most valuable startup, according to CB Insights, which values Uber at $72 billion. Having become a major player in China’s internet scene, it’s now planning to use its influx of cash to take on Western rivals. Its biggest overseas hit is a video service called Douyin -- known as Tik Tok beyond China -- that’s siphoning attention from the likes of Tencent Holdings Ltd. and Facebook Inc.
Bytedance is said to have earned $2.5 billion in revenue last year and had initially targeted 50 billion yuan ($7.2 billion) for 2018, but has yet to turn a profit. It started life as a producer of apps for sharing crass jokes before moving to its signature news aggregation service Jinri Toutiao, which means “Today’s Headlines.” It then spent years building up its user base and perfecting its recommendation systems. Toutiao’s now a hit among users who spend almost as much time on Toutiao as they do on WeChat, the Tencent super-app that acts as phone, social media and digital wallet for over a billion users."

Bytedance Is Said to Secure Funding at Record $75 Billion Value | Bloomberg

Can’t Get Enough Fox News? ‘Superfans’ Can Pay $65 a Year for More | NYT

Might be more profitable to go with a VHS option...

"In a first-of-its-kind test for the cable news market, Fox News said on Thursday that its stand-alone streaming service will debut next month, with subscribers paying about $65 a year.

The product, called Fox Nation and set to become available on Nov. 27, is a bid to bring the channel’s programming into the digital realm that has increasingly lured audiences away from traditional TV.

Whether Fox News devotees come along is an open question. The median age in the Fox News audience is roughly 65, according to Nielsen, a demographic that is more likely than younger viewers to stick with meat-and-potatoes cable and satellite packages."

Can’t Get Enough Fox News? ‘Superfans’ Can Pay $65 a Year for More | NYT

Christie’s sells its first AI portrait for $432,500, beating estimates of $10,000 | The Verge

The art of open source AI

"The artwork was created by a collective named Obvious. The three members of Obvious, a trio of 25-year-old French students, used a type of machine learning algorithm known as a GAN (generative adversarial network) to create the picture. The network was trained on a dataset of historical portraits, and then it tried to create one of its own. Obvious printed the image, framed it, and signed it with part of the GAN’s algorithm.
However, as The Verge reported earlier this week, the Belamy print has been the subject of controversy within the AI art world. Obvious admitted to using code from another AI artist, 19-year-old Robbie Barrat, to create the print. It’s not clear how much was borrowed, but experts say the amount was probably substantial. It’s also not clear if Barrat can make a claim for ownership of the artwork as his code was shared under an open-source license."

Christie’s sells its first AI portrait for $432,500, beating estimates of $10,000 | The Verge

The Amazon Selling Machine | The Atlantic

Just getting started...

"On Thursday, Amazon reported that the category of its business devoted to advertising and “sales related to our other service offerings” made nearly $2.5 billion in net sales in just the third quarter of 2018. In the third quarter of 2017, it made less than half that, $1.12 billion. A September report from eMarketer estimated that Amazon is now the number three digital-ad seller in the country, behind Facebook and Google. Brands will spend $4.61 billion advertising on the Amazon platform this year, the report estimated. Mike Olson, an analyst with PiperJaffray, anticipates that Amazon advertising revenue will reach $8 billion this year, a number that will double to $16 billion by 2020, and that will soon overtake in profitability Amazon’s big moneymaker, Amazon Web Services, which sells cloud-computing services.
Amazon is catnip to advertisers for the simple reason that it is already an integral part of the way we buy. About half of online shoppers start their product searches on Amazon. But the company also owns Whole Foods, Twitch, Zappos, Audible, and IMDb, and sells TVs, tablets, Kindles, Echos—what Helen Lin, the chief digital officer at Publicis Media, calls “this whole canvas of properties that allow brands to go broader.”"

The Amazon Selling Machine | The Atlantic

Amazon, Alphabet's Growth Engines Sputter, Spending Surges | Bloomberg

Could be worse; e.g., see Snap Continues to Struggle to Gain Users | NYT

"The growth engines of Amazon.com Inc. and Alphabet Inc., the world’s largest internet companies, sputtered last quarter, and after weeks of stock market jitters, investors were in no mood to give them a pass.
Amazon, the biggest online retailer, reported a second consecutive quarter of sales that fell short of estimates -- the first back-to-back revenue miss in almost four years. The company on Thursday also gave a disappointing revenue and profit forecast for the busy holiday period, sending shares down as much as 9.4 percent in extended trading. Even its highly profitable cloud-computing business, Amazon Web Services, didn’t grow as fast as it had in the previous three months.
Alphabet’s third-quarter sales missed analysts’ expectations and revenue growth from its main Google sites, including Search and YouTube, came in at 22 percent, slower than the prior period."

Amazon, Alphabet's Growth Engines Sputter, Spending Surges | Bloomberg

The Problem with Facebook and Virtual Reality | Stratechery

From an extensive Oculus reality check

"To that end, it is hard to not feel optimistic about Apple’s chances at eventually surpassing Oculus and everyone else. The best way to think about Apple has always been as a personal computer company; the only difference over time is that computers have grown ever more personal, moving from the desk to the lap to the pocket and today to the wrist (and ears). The face is a logical next step, and no company has proven itself better at the sort of hardware engineering necessary to make it happen.

Critically, Apple also has the right business model: it can sell barely good-enough devices at a premium to a userbase that will buy simply because they are from Apple, and from there figure out a use case without the need to reach everyone. I was very critical of this approach with the Apple Watch — it was clear from the launch keynote that Apple had no idea what this cool piece of hardware engineering would be used for — but, as the Apple Watch has settled into its niche as a health and fitness device and slowly expanded from there, I am more appreciative of the value of simply shipping a great piece of hardware and letting the real world figure it out."

The Problem with Facebook and Virtual Reality | Stratechery

Microsoft posts a record $29.1 billion Q1. Same old, same old | Ars Technica

Also see Grumbling about wobbly Windows 10? Microsoft can't hear you over the clanging cash register | The Register

"The numbers grow a bit bigger, but the story remains familiar: cloud services are growing, on-premises Office customers are adopting Office 365, and the corporate PC refresh cycle is bolstering some Windows revenue, partially offset by the continuing decline of the consumer PC market. Surface should start to reach new markets with the availability of the Surface Go, but thus far the revenue impact appears limited, leaving Microsoft's hardware division in this weird position: it's humming along steadily but still stuck at around that $1.1 billion-per-quarter mark, not shifting even when Microsoft adds new systems and price points to the mix."

Microsoft posts a record $29.1 billion Q1. Same old, same old | Ars Technica

Apple’s Radical Approach to News: Humans Over Machines | NYT

Curate different

"There are ambitious plans for the product. Apple lets publishers run ads in its app and it helps some sign up new subscribers, taking a 30 percent cut of the revenue. Soon, the company aims to bundle access to dozens of magazines in its app for a flat monthly fee, sort of like Netflix for news, according to people familiar with the plans, who declined to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. Apple also hopes to package access to a few daily-news publications, like The Times, The Post and The Wall Street Journal, into the app, the people said.

Apple’s executives grandly proclaim that they want to help save journalism. “There is this deep understanding that a thriving free press is critical for an informed public, and an informed public is critical for a functioning democracy, and that Apple News can play a part in that,” Ms. Kern said."

Apple’s Radical Approach to News: Humans Over Machines | NYT

Tesla turns a profit in what Musk calls ‘a historic quarter’ | The Washington Post

That profit level is more than six times the recent SEC fines for Elon Musk's "funding secured" tweet...

"The electric-car giant’s deliveries of its Model 3 sedan grew to 56,000 as America’s most valuable automaker surmounted production delays, delivery woes and a federal regulator’s lawsuit over Musk’s tweets.

Tesla logged a record $312 million in profit, swinging into the black for the first time since late 2016. It had $6.8 billion in revenue, compared with analysts' estimates of roughly $6.3 billion, and more than doubled its revenue compared with the same quarter last year. Tesla’s share price jumped 12 percent in after-hours trading."

Tesla turns a profit in what Musk calls ‘a historic quarter’ | The Washington Post

When Trump Phones Friends, the Chinese and the Russians Listen and Learn | NYT

Later in the article: "Foreign governments are well aware of the risk, and so leaders like Mr. Xi and Mr. Putin avoid using cellphones when possible." Also see China Mocks Report It Tapped Trump’s iPhone (and Plugs Its Own Competitor) | NYT

"When President Trump calls old friends on one of his iPhones to gossip, gripe or solicit their latest take on how he is doing, American intelligence reports indicate that Chinese spies are often listening — and putting to use invaluable insights into how to best work the president and affect administration policy, current and former American officials said.

Mr. Trump’s aides have repeatedly warned him that his cellphone calls are not secure, and they have told him that Russian spies are routinely eavesdropping on the calls, as well. But aides say the voluble president, who has been pressured into using his secure White House landline more often these days, has still refused to give up his iPhones. White House officials say they can only hope he refrains from discussing classified information when he is on them."

When Trump Phones Friends, the Chinese and the Russians Listen and Learn | NYT

The AI Cold War That Could Doom Us All | Wired

Final paragraphs:

"It is at least conceivable that Trump’s aggressive policies could, counterintuitively, lead to a rapprochement with Beijing. If Trump threatens to take something off the table that China truly cannot afford to lose, that could pressure Beijing to dial back its global tech ambitions and open its domestic market to US firms. But there is another way to influence China, one more likely to succeed: The US could try to wrap Beijing in a technology embrace. Work with China to develop rules and norms for the development of AI. Establish international standards to ensure that the algorithms governing people’s lives and livelihoods are transparent and accountable. Both countries could, as Tim Hwang suggests, commit to developing more shared, open databases for researchers.

But for now, at least, conflicting goals, mutual suspicion, and a growing conviction that AI and other advanced technologies are a winner-take-all game are pushing the two countries’ tech sectors further apart. A permanent cleavage will come at a steep cost and will only give techno-authoritarianism more room to grow."

The AI Cold War That Could Doom Us All | Wired

The Problem With Fixing WhatsApp? Human Nature Might Get in the Way | NYT

From a timely WhatsApp reality check

"Unlike Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, WhatsApp isn’t a social network. It is mostly a bare-bones texting app in which most conversations are private and unmediated by any kind of algorithm meant to amp up engagement. This design means WhatsApp has little control over what content takes off and what doesn’t; in most cases, the company cannot even see what is happening on WhatsApp, because the service encrypts messages automatically.

That means the real problem may be not so much WhatsApp the company or WhatsApp the product but something more fundamental — WhatsApp the idea.

When you offer everyone access to free and private communication, lots of wonderful things may happen — and WhatsApp has been a godsend to vulnerable populations like migrants, dissidents and political activists. But a lot of terrible things are bound to happen, too — and it might be impossible to eliminate the bad without muzzling the good."

The Problem With Fixing WhatsApp? Human Nature Might Get in the Way | NYT

Apple’s Tim Cook delivers searing critique of Silicon Valley | The Washington Post

Also see Tim Cook warns of ‘data-industrial complex’ in call for comprehensive US privacy laws | The Verge

"Apple chief executive Tim Cook on Wednesday warned the world’s most powerful regulators that the poor privacy practices of some tech companies, the ills of social media and the erosion of trust in his own industry threaten to undermine “technology’s awesome potential” to address challenges like disease and climate change.

In a searing critique of Silicon Valley — delivered from the well of European Parliament in Brussels — Cook began by stressing he remains optimistic that “new technologies are driving breakthroughs in humanity’s greatest common projects.”

But the Apple leader expressed alarm about divisive political rhetoric that proliferates on social media platforms, and rogue actors and governments that seize on algorithms to “deepen divisions, incite violence, and even undermine our shared sense of what is true and what is false.”"

Apple’s Tim Cook delivers searing critique of Silicon Valley | The Washington Post

Y Combinator plans to back carbon removal ventures | MIT Technology Review

See Carbon Removal Technologies | YC Request for Startups for more details

"Background: A growing amount of research concludes it will be nearly impossible for the world to avoid a dangerous 2˚C rise in global temperatures merely by cutting greenhouse gas emissions, given the concentrations already in the atmosphere and the slow pace at which nations are shifting to clean energy. At this stage, the UN’s climate change panel and other institutions have said various methods of capturing and storing carbon dioxide will be required as well.

The problem is that scientists and companies haven’t yet figured out a way to do so economically at anywhere near the scale required.

“It's time to invest and avidly pursue a new wave of technological solutions to this problem—including those that are risky, unproven, even unlikely to work," Y Combinator said in an announcement on Tuesday. "It's time to take big swings at this.”"

Y Combinator plans to back carbon removal ventures | MIT Technology Review

Wikipedia chief’s news website axes all its journalists | The Times

Also see Letter from Jimmy and Orit: What we have learned so far | WikiTribune

"Signs that the original approach was failing emerged in May when Mr Wales admitted that the site “didn’t get much work done”. He compared it to Nupedia, a Wikipedia predecessor he founded in 1999 but which closed in 2003, and which is seen to have failed because its rigorous quality standards discouraged public involvement.

“I listened to advice that we had to be very controlled. We had to have a complex review process. We basically ended up building Nupedia again. Doh! It was beautiful and what we published was of high quality, but we didn’t really have genuine community control, and we didn’t get very much work done,” he wrote."

Wikipedia chief’s news website axes all its journalists | The Times

Apple iPhone XR Review: Better than Good Enough | The Verge

Also see iPhone XR: The best $250 you ever saved on a new phone | The Washington Post, which starts "Lately, Apple has made shopping for an iPhone complicated. So let me simplify: If you’re in the market for an upgrade, buy the iPhone XR."

"If one thing is clear about the iPhone XR, it’s that Apple is going to sell tons of these. They’re huge upgrades from the iPhone 6 era of Apple phones, with the latest processors and cameras, a big screen in an updated design, and a competitive opening price of $750 for the 64GB model. That’s $50 less than the smaller Pixel 3. It’s priced to move.

When I first picked up the iPhone XR, it felt like the big questions would be about what the XR was missing compared to the XS. But now that I’ve used this thing for a while, that seem like the wrong way to think about it. The real question for iPhone buyers is whether the high-res OLED display on the XS is worth $250 more than the XR. Because otherwise, the XR offers almost everything you’d want in a 2018 phone."

Apple iPhone XR Review: Better than Good Enough | The Verge

Oculus Co-Founder’s Departure Could Mean Bad Things for Facebook VR | Gizmodo

Facebook senior exec exit of the week

"Facebook made a splashy entrance into VR when it purchased fledgling startup Oculus back in 2014 for $2.3 billion. However, even after putting out the first consumer-ready Oculus Rift in 2016, which was followed up by this year’s Oculus Go and the upcoming Oculus Quest, today’s departure of Oculus co-founder and former CEO Brendan Iribe casts doubts on the future of Facebook’s VR efforts.
[...]
Where things start to get spicy is that, according to TechCrunch, one of Iribe’s main projects was overseeing work on a second-gen Oculus Rift, an effort that reportedly was canceled last week after some “internal shake-ups.” Sources who spoke to TechCrunch claim that Iribe and the Facebook team had “fundamentally different views on the future of Oculus that grew deeper over time,” with Iribe apparently not wanting to participate in a VR “race to the bottom.”"

Oculus Co-Founder’s Departure Could Mean Bad Things for Facebook VR | Gizmodo

Amazon exec and Super Micro CEO call for retraction of spy chip story | The Verge

Perhaps it wasn't the best topic domain for a cover story... Also see Your move, Bloomberg | The Washington Post

"Last week, Apple CEO Tim Cook called for Bloomberg to retract a report claiming that Chinese spies smuggled malicious microchips into a company server. In an unprecedented move, Cook sat down for an interview with BuzzFeed News last week in order to address the allegations proposed in the Bloomberg report. Cook said, “This did not happen. There’s no truth to this,” eventually calling for the publication to retract the story which he said Apple had been denying in conversations with reporters for months.

The other two companies named in the story, Amazon and Super Micro, decided to follow in Apple’s footsteps today, offering their own statements condemning the allegations."

Amazon exec and Super Micro CEO call for retraction of spy chip story | The Verge

Dyson Picks Singapore to Build Electric Cars Rivaling Tesla | Bloomberg

Later in the article: "Exactly what type of cars Dyson will be producing remains to be revealed. Construction is still ongoing at its test facility at Hullavington, England, which includes a now 400-strong automotive team, a handling track and an off-road route."

"The country also has a free trade agreement with China, the world’s largest market for electric cars. While Tesla last week took a step toward building an auto plant in Shanghai, Dyson’s founder, James Dyson, has complained about IP theft in China.
China will remain the top electric-vehicle market at least until 2040, when more than half of all new car sales and a third of the planet’s fleet -- equal to 559 million automobiles -- will be electric, according to a forecast by Bloomberg NEF. James Dyson said the company’s “center of gravity” has tilted toward Asia, which last year generated almost three quarters of revenue growth."

Dyson Picks Singapore to Build Electric Cars Rivaling Tesla | Bloomberg

Google Home Hub review: the smart display to buy | The Guardian

Also see Google Home Hub review: the best digital photo frame | The Verge

"The Google Home Hub is arguably the best smart display on the market. It’s much smaller than you might expect, with a really good-looking 7in screen that appears to be mounted into a small fabric cushion that’s only visible at the bottom.

It’s a simple, understated design that blends in well with furnishings, and would be as at home on a book case or mantle piece as on a table or work surface side. The lack of a camera is probably a plus point for those, like me, who will never video call anyone, and you can still do things on the touchscreen with the mic muted."

Google Home Hub review: the smart display to buy | The Guardian

Tech lobby outlines its own set of privacy regulations | Axios

See this ITI press release for details

"A leading tech lobbying group in Washington Monday introduced a plan for regulations to protect user privacy online, becoming the latest player to try to shape new legislation that the industry sees as increasingly likely.

The big picture: Lawmakers in Washington — spurred on by new rules enacted in Europe and California — are trying to craft their own privacy legislation. Industry groups are laying out their own guidelines for policymakers as they look to shape the debate.

Details: The framework from ITI, whose members include Google and Facebook, is designed to guide policymakers in the United States and around the world as they weigh concerns about data privacy online, said ITI president Dean Garfield."

Tech lobby outlines its own set of privacy regulations | Axios

Republicans Find a Facebook Workaround: Their Own Apps | NYT

Later in the article: "“It’s creating a safe space for people who share a viewpoint, who feel like the open social networks are not fun places for them.”" On a related note, see To Curb Terrorist Propaganda Online, Look to YouTube. No, Really. | Wired

"The apps deliver curated partisan news feeds on what are effectively private social media platforms, free from the strictures and content guidelines imposed by Silicon Valley giants. Some allow supporters to comment on posts or contribute their own, with less risk that their posts will be flagged as offensive or abusive.

Many apps have video-game-like features where users can earn points for making campaign donations or contacting their legislators. Amass enough points and a supporter can attain increasing status levels — like “BigLeague” or “Patriot” — or even gain a spot on the app’s leader board.

Crucially, these mini-platforms harness the powerful reach of platforms like Facebook and Twitter even while competing with them. Some apps give users the option of posting on Twitter or Facebook messages that are scripted by the campaigns, combining the seeming authenticity of organic social media posts with the message discipline of paid advertising."

Republicans Find a Facebook Workaround: Their Own Apps | NYT

Elon Musk says first tunnel for proposed underground transportation network will open in December | LA Times

Also see Elon Musk’s Boring Company announces completion and launch of first tunnel by December | Electrek

"Elon Musk announced Sunday that the first tunnel of a proposed underground transportation network across Los Angeles County would open Dec. 10.
“The first tunnel is almost done,” Musk wrote to his 23.1 million followers shortly after 5 p.m.
Musk’s Boring Co. is building the tunnel beneath the city of Hawthorne, part of his grand vision for a transportation network that whisks commuters across the county.
The company has said its technology could move drivers, as well as pods carrying passengers and bicyclists, through tunnels at speeds of up to 130 mph."

Elon Musk says first tunnel for proposed underground transportation network will open in December | LA Times

Facebook hires former deputy PM Sir Nick Clegg | BBC

Later in the article: "The BBC understands Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg were personally involved in the recruitment."

"Facebook has hired former deputy prime minister Sir Nick Clegg as head of its global affairs and communications team.
The 51-year-old politician was leader of the Liberal Democrats and formed a coalition government with David Cameron and the Conservatives in 2010."

Facebook hires former deputy PM Sir Nick Clegg | BBC

Exclusive: Twitter pulls down bot network that pushed pro-Saudi talking points about disappeared journalist | NBC News

Also see Conservatives mount a whisper campaign smearing Khashoggi in defense of Trump | The Washington Post

"Twitter suspended a network of suspected Twitter bots on Thursday that pushed pro-Saudi Arabia talking points about the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the past week.

Twitter became aware of some of the bots on Thursday when NBC News presented the company with a spreadsheet of hundreds of accounts that tweeted and retweeted the same pro-Saudi government tweets at the same time.

The list was compiled by Josh Russell, an Indiana-based information technology professional who has previously identified foreign influence campaigns on Twitter and Reddit."

Exclusive: Twitter pulls down bot network that pushed pro-Saudi talking points about disappeared journalist | NBC News

Facebook has a fake news 'war room' – but is it really working? | The Guardian

Also see Inside Facebook's Plan to Safeguard the 2018 Election | Wired and Fighting Election Interference in Real Time | Facebook Newsroom

"The stakes are high as the US approaches critical midterm elections in November and the 2020 presidential race. WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned messaging service, has also been linked to widespread false news stories that have led to violence and mob lynchings in India. The platform has further struggled to mitigate harms it is causing in Myanmar, where an explosion of social media hate speech has contributed to violence and genocide. American hate groups and far-right activists have also weaponized the site.

On Wednesday morning, a group of journalists crowded outside a windowless room, snapping iPhone photos of a closed door with a small sign stuck to it that said “WAR ROOM” in red letters. Inside, digital dashboards displayed real-time information about activity on the platform. CNN played in the background, and the wall displayed a large American flag and motivational posters saying “Focus on impact” and “Bring the world closer together”."

Facebook has a fake news 'war room' – but is it really working? | The Guardian

Apple announces iPad Pro and Mac event for October 30th | The Verge

10/30 10:00 Eastern

"Apple isn’t done with product events for 2018. Today the company issued media invites for an October 30th event in Brooklyn, New York where it’s widely expected we’ll see new iPad Pro tablets and potentially several updates to the Mac lineup. The event’s tagline is “there’s more in the making,” and its location is a bit of a surprise. It was reasonable to believe Apple would again present its new products in the Steve Jobs Theater at Apple Park after last month’s iPhone event.
[...]
The new iPad Pro is rumored to have slim bezels and Face ID, expanding Apple’s your-face-is-your-passcode technology beyond the iPhone for the first time. It’s also been reported that this year’s iPad Pro will switch over from Lightning to USB-C and be available in 11- and 12.9-inch display sizes.

The October event is where Apple will likely announce its long-awaited successor to the MacBook Air laptop. In August, Bloomberg reported that the laptop will have slimmer bezels than the Air and have a high-resolution Retina display. It’s expected to slot in beneath the 12-inch MacBook as the company’s new low-cost laptop option."

 Apple announces iPad Pro and Mac event for October 30th | The Verge

Tesla chief Elon Musk unveils a $35,000 Model 3 (that actually costs a bit more) | The Washington Post

New Musk math; on a related note, see 5 Automakers Closest To Losing The Federal Tax Credit (Inside EVs)

"Musk said on Twitter that the sedan, with its “mid-range” battery pack, would cost $35,000, bringing it in line with the mass-market model he had promised for years would revolutionize the availability of electric cars.

But that price takes into account federal and state tax rebates. Before the discounts, it will sell for $45,000 — though the company says buyers should think of the car as far cheaper, because of the money they’ll save on gas.

Musk sparked a frenzy of customer reservations in 2016 when he said the Model 3 would cost $35,000 before incentives, such as a $7,500 federal tax credit — a price point that would help Tesla expand beyond its traditional range of well-heeled buyers. That model, however, remains delayed until 2019, the company said Thursday."

Tesla chief Elon Musk unveils a $35,000 Model 3 (that actually costs a bit more) | The Washington Post

Facebook tentatively concludes spammers were behind recent data breach: WSJ | Reuters

Back to business as usual?...

"Facebook Inc. has tentatively concluded that spammers looking to make money, and not a nation-state, were behind the largest-ever data theft at the social media company, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.

The people behind the attack were a group of Facebook and Instagram spammers that present themselves as a digital marketing company, and whose activities were previously known to Facebook’s security team, the Journal reported, citing people familiar with the company's internal investigation."

Facebook tentatively concludes spammers were behind recent data breach: WSJ | Reuters

Are Consumers Worried Enough to Buy a Personal Computer Server? | Bloomberg

Perhaps a less cloudy future for personal information management?

"Servers make the modern internet possible. Millions of these workhorse computers hum away in remote data centers of Alphabet Inc.’s Google, Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. running websites, sending information to smartphone apps and crunching data for cloud-based software programs.

Privacy Labs Inc., a startup based near Microsoft headquarters just outside Seattle, wants to upend all this in the name of digital security. On Wednesday, it began selling a server that runs email, contacts and calendar services through a personal web domain. The Helm Personal Server is an angular gadget, about the size of an open paperback book, that sits on a side table or desk rather than in a data center. Information is stored and encrypted on the device, not in the cloud."

Are Consumers Worried Enough to Buy a Personal Computer Server? | Bloomberg

Watch Out Workers, Algorithms Are Coming to Replace You — Maybe -- NYT

From a timely AI reality check, part of a NYT AI special report

"Over the past five years, the Israeli author and historian Yuval Noah Harari has quietly emerged as a bona fide pop-intellectual. His 2014 book “Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind” is a sprawling account of human history from the Stone Age to the 21st century; Ridley Scott, who directed “Alien,” is co-leading its screen adaptation. Mr. Harari’s latest book, “21 Lessons for the 21st Century,” is an equally ambitious look at key issues shaping contemporary global conversations — from immigration to nationalism, climate change to artificial intelligence. Mr. Harari recently spoke about the benefits and dangers of A.I. and its potential to upend the ways we live, learn and work. The conversation has been edited and condensed."

Watch Out Workers, Algorithms Are Coming to Replace You — Maybe -- NYT

Craig Newmark, Newspaper Villain, Is Working to Save Journalism -- NYT

From a profile of Craig's to-do list

"Craigslist was fast, free and popular, which means you could be pretty sure of getting what you wanted or getting rid of what you didn’t want.

Newspaper income from classifieds, which had provided up to 40 percent of the industry’s revenue, immediately plummeted. Researchers eventually estimated that Craigslist had drained $5 billion from American newspapers over a seven-year period. In the Bay Area, the media was especially hard hit

Mr. Newmark is trying to stop the bleeding — although not here. He is among a gaggle of West Coast technology moguls who are riding to the rescue of the beleaguered East Coast media."

Craig Newmark, Newspaper Villain, Is Working to Save Journalism -- NYT

Computer Stories: A.I. Is Beginning to Assist Novelists -- NYT

Author different

"Unlike Mr. French a quarter-century ago, Mr. Sloan probably will not use his computer collaborator as a selling point for the finished book. He’s restricting the A.I. writing in the novel to an A.I. computer that is a significant character, which means the majority of the story will be his own inspiration. But while he has no urge to commercialize the software, he is intrigued by the possibilities. Megasellers like John Grisham and Stephen King could relatively easily market programs that used their many published works to assist fans in producing authorized imitations.

As for the more distant prospects, another San Francisco Bay Area science fiction writer long ago anticipated a time when novelists would turn over the composing to computerized “wordmills.” In Fritz Leiber’s “The Silver Eggheads,” published in 1961, the human “novelists” spend their time polishing the machines and their reputations. When they try to rebel and crush the wordmills, they find they have forgotten how to write."

Computer Stories: A.I. Is Beginning to Assist Novelists -- NYT

Scribd partners with The New York Times for a cheaper joint subscription -- The Verge

For anyone looking for a lot more to read... (Note: the offer is for new subscribers only, but I assume current NYT subscribers can cancel their existing subscriptions and sign up for the bundle)

"If you already have or are looking into a subscription for The New York Times, then Scribd has a bundle for you that’s a great deal: for $12.99 a month, you can subscribe to both NYT and Scribd.

Scribd is an unlimited reading subscription service that enables you to read books, newspapers, and magazines, as well as listen to audiobooks. The new plan extends beyond just Scribd — which is $8.99 monthly — and includes the entirety of The New York Times website. As part of the bundle, you also get access to The New York Times Digital Archive, and The New York Times app via their Basic Digital Access plan. Usually, a full NYT subscription costs $14.99 monthly."

Scribd partners with The New York Times for a cheaper joint subscription -- The Verge

Facebook is reportedly working on a TV camera that can stream video -- The Verge

In other Facebook news, see It turns out that Facebook could in fact use data collected from its Portal in-home video device to target you with ads (Recode)

"Earlier this month, Facebook announced Portal, a camera-equipped smart device that’s meant to compete with Amazon’s Echo Show. But the company’s hardware ambitions apparently go far beyond that: Cheddar is reporting that Facebook is working on a TV camera that would offer Portal-like video chatting on a bigger screen and allow users to stream content from Facebook Watch.

If the device — said to be codenamed “Ripley” — makes it to market, Facebook would enter into another massive smart home battleground, facing off against Amazon, Apple, Google, and Roku for valuable set-top box space. Facebook’s addition of a camera, which essentially turns your entire TV into a massive Facebook Portal, would be a differentiator for the current marketplace. (Microsoft already tried this exact thing with Skype for the Xbox One’s Kinect camera, down to the in-room tracking.)"

Facebook is reportedly working on a TV camera that can stream video -- The Verge

Civil’s token sale has failed. Now what? Refunds, for one thing — and then another sale -- NiemanLab

Also see What's Next for Civil (Civil founder Matthew Iles)

"It was clear — definitely by midnight last night, but also in the days and weeks leading up to yesterday — that journalism blockchain platform Civil’s initial coin offering, in which it aimed to raise $8 million, was not going to work. Civil ended up raising about $1.4 million, and around three-quarters of that was acquired by ConsenSys, Civil’s seed investor.

Some of the things that went wrong are clear. It was very hard to buy into Civil, though in the last couple of weeks the company had started letting people buy tokens with cash and was also, up to the last minute, asking possible contributors to email Civil customer service for help buying tokens.

“The biggest things to know are that a) we’re going to try this again in the near future, under more reasonable terms; and b) this doesn’t impact the grant funding for any of Civil’s initial, ‘First Fleet’ newsrooms, which will continue publishing per the terms of their respective agreements,” Civil cofounder Matt Coolidge told me in an email."

Civil’s token sale has failed. Now what? Refunds, for one thing — and then another sale -- NiemanLab

'Swipe right to sue’: Now you can file lawsuits the same way you find hookups on Tinder -- The Washington Post

Sue different

"Exorbitant legal fees, seemingly endless bureaucracy and an uncertain time investment mean that the decision to pursue legal action against a company or an individual is often fraught with hesitation.

But the founder of a legal-services app says his product now allows users to sue someone with their smartphones and claim awards from class-action lawsuits the same way they’d select a match on Tinder -- with a quick “swipe right to sue.”

Since those new services launched Wednesday, the app, known as DoNotPay, has been downloaded more than 10,000 times, according to its founder, Joshua Browder, a 21-year-old senior at Stanford University who has been labeled the “Robin Hood of the Internet.” As an 18-year-old, Browder created a bot that helped people fight parking tickets in New York, London and Seattle, and he later created another bot to help people sue Equifax after a data breach left 143 million American consumers vulnerable to identity theft last year."

'Swipe right to sue’: Now you can file lawsuits the same way you find hookups on Tinder -- The Washington Post

Facebook’s former security chief warns of tech’s ‘negative impacts’ — and has a plan to help solve them -- The Washington Post

Also see Facebook’s ex-security chief will start a new center to bring Washington and Silicon Valley together (The Verge)

"“There aren’t processes to thoughtfully think through these trade-offs,” he said in an interview ahead of his talk at the university’s Center for International Security and Cooperation. “You end up with these for-profit, very powerful organizations that are not democratically accountable, making decisions that are in their best and often short-term interest … without there being a much more open and democratic discussion of what these issues are.”

He hopes the new initiative, called the Stanford Internet Observatory, will help unite “sometimes warring factions” of academia, tech companies and Washington policymakers to work together to help solve “the negative impacts technology can have on society,” he said."

Facebook’s former security chief warns of tech’s ‘negative impacts’ — and has a plan to help solve them -- The Washington Post

As the Internet Splinters, the World Suffers -- NYT

Final paragraphs:

"What this future will bring for Europe and the United States is not clear. Mr. Gomes’s leaked speech from inside Google sounded almost dystopian at times. “This is a world none of us have ever lived in before,” Mr. Gomes told employees. “All I am saying, we have built a set of hacks, and we have kept them.” He seemed to hint at scenarios the tech sector had never imagined before. The world may be a very different place since the election of Donald Trump, but it’s still hard to imagine that what’s deployed in China will ever be deployed at home. Yet even the best possible version of the disaggregated web has serious — though still uncertain — implications for a global future: What sorts of ideas and speech will become bounded by borders? What will an increasingly disconnected world do to the spread of innovation and to scientific progress? What will consumer protections around privacy and security look like as the internets diverge? And would the partitioning of the internet precipitate a slowing, or even a reversal, of globalization?

A chillier relationship with Europe and increasing hostilities with China spur on the trend toward Balkanization — and vice versa, creating a feedback loop. If things continue along this path, the next decade may see the internet relegated to little more than just another front on the new cold war."

As the Internet Splinters, the World Suffers -- NYT

Fidelity just made it easier for hedge funds and other pros to invest in cryptocurrencies -- CNBC

Highlights below; for more details, see Fidelity Digital Assets: The Journey From Idea To Market (Fidelity Digital Assets on Medium):

• "Fidelity Investments, which administers more than $7.2 trillion in client assets, announced a new and separate company called Fidelity Digital Asset Services on Monday.

• The firm will handle custody for cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and will execute trades on multiple exchanges for investors such as hedge funds and family offices. 

• Other crypto companies have debuted similar products, but Fidelity is the first Wall Street incumbent to officially provide cryptocurrency solutions such as custody. 

• “Our goal is to make digitally native assets, such as bitcoin, more accessible to investors,” Fidelity Investments Chairman and CEO Abigail Johnson says."

Fidelity just made it easier for hedge funds and other pros to invest in cryptocurrencies -- CNBC

M.I.T. Plans College for Artificial Intelligence, Backed by $1 Billion -- NYT

For more details, see MIT reshapes itself to shape the future (MIT News)

"Every major university is wrestling with how to adapt to the technology wave of artificial intelligence — how to prepare students not only to harness the powerful tools of A.I., but also to thoughtfully weigh its ethical and social implications. A.I. courses, conferences and joint majors have proliferated in the last few years.

But the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is taking a particularly ambitious step, creating a new college backed by a planned investment of $1 billion. Two-thirds of the funds have already been raised, M.I.T. said, in announcing the initiative on Monday.
[...]
The goal of the college, said L. Rafael Reif, the president of M.I.T., is to “educate the bilinguals of the future.” He defines bilinguals as people in fields like biology, chemistry, politics, history and linguistics who are also skilled in the techniques of modern computing that can be applied to them."

M.I.T. Plans College for Artificial Intelligence, Backed by $1 Billion -- NYT

Did Uber Steal Google's Intellectual Property? -- The New Yorker

Final paragraphs from an approximately 9.7K-word profile:

"Levandowski is upset that some people have cast him as the bad guy. “I reject the notion that I did something unethical,” he said. “Was I trying to compete with them? Sure.” But, he added, “I’m not a thief, and I’m not dishonest.” Other parents sometimes shun him when he drops his kids off at school, and he has grown tired of people taking photographs of him when he walks through airports. But he is confident that his notoriety will subside. Although he no longer owns the technology that he brought to Google and Uber, plenty of valuable information remains inside his head, and he has a lot of new ideas. An investment fund recently started due diligence on one of his proposals: a new self-driving-truck company. He anticipates that some of the funding for it will come from overseas, including from Chinese investors. It is ironic, given that federal trade-secret laws were written to prevent intellectual property from travelling abroad, that a trade-secret prosecution may push Levandowski into foreign hands. But he’s fine with it; what he cares about is having a next act. There are work-arounds, it seems, for everything, even for an unsavory past.

“The only thing that matters is the future,” he told me after the civil trial was settled. “I don’t even know why we study history. It’s entertaining, I guess—the dinosaurs and the Neanderthals and the Industrial Revolution, and stuff like that. But what already happened doesn’t really matter. You don’t need to know that history to build on what they made. In technology, all that matters is tomorrow.”"

Did Uber Steal Google's Intellectual Property? -- The New Yorker

How Sears Was the Amazon of Its Day -- NYT

Excerpts:

"High up in the Sears Tower, management couldn’t see that the retail landscape was changing. Sears couldn’t compete effectively with Walmart and the growth of big box merchandisers such as Toys “R” Us. But more important, the company could not summon the vision to anticipate the internet. By 1993, Sears had closed its national network of warehouses and exited the catalog business — which is basically e-retailing without the “e.” Amazon shipped its first book in 1995.
[...]
Certainly, Amazon looks unassailable in its current form. So did every retailer that became the biggest dog on retail’s porch. They were all innovative. They all pushed the boundaries on pricing, sourcing, marketing, regulation, employment, expansion and tax breaks. They all ultimately lost their way. Sears is the latest chapter in that story. And probably not the last."

How Sears Was the Amazon of Its Day -- NYT

Expanding Our Policies on Voter Suppression -- Facebook Newsroom

No, Brad Parscale, the post subject is not about new Facebook service offerings for political campaigns; also see Exclusive: Facebook to ban misinformation on voting in upcoming U.S. elections (Reuters)

"As part of our ongoing efforts to prevent people from misusing Facebook during elections, we’re broadening our policies against voter suppression — action that is designed to deter or prevent people from voting. These updates were designed to address new types of abuse that we’re seeing online.

We already prohibit offers to buy or sell votes as well as misrepresentations about the dates, locations, times and qualifications for casting a ballot. We have been removing this type of content since 2016. Here is an example:

Last month, we extended this policy further and are now banning misrepresentations about how to vote, such as claims that you can vote by text message, and statements about whether a vote will be counted. (e.g. “If you voted in the primary, your vote in the general election won’t count.”) We’ve also recently introduced a new reporting option on Facebook so that people can let us know if they see voting information that may be incorrect, and have set up dedicated reporting channels for state election authorities so that they can do the same."

Expanding Our Policies on Voter Suppression -- Facebook Newsroom

The new Palm is a tiny phone to keep you away from your phone -- The Verge

A new candidate for the future-collector's-item domain

"There’s a new phone with the word “Palm” on it that’s tiny, intriguing, and has very little to do with Palm beyond that word printed on the back. It comes from a startup in San Francisco, which purchased the rights for the name from TCL last year. It costs $349.99 and will be available in November, but you can’t go out and buy it on its own. It’s only available as an add-on to a current line. Also, Steph Curry is somehow involved.

It is a weird little thing.

The Palm phone is a device that you can add on to your Verizon plan, which shares your phone number. It’s a phone designed for you to use on the weekends, when you’re going out for the evening, or just generally when you want to be a little less distracted by your big phone with all its apps. That said, it runs a full version of Android 8.1 and all the apps from the Google Play Store."

The new Palm is a tiny phone to keep you away from your phone -- The Verge

The Big Blockchain Lie -- Project Syndicate

From a timely blockchain reality check; on a related note, see The Prophets of Cryptocurrency Survey the Boom and Bust (The New Yorker)

"In practice, blockchain is nothing more than a glorified spreadsheet. But it has also become the byword for a libertarian ideology that treats all governments, central banks, traditional financial institutions, and real-world currencies as evil concentrations of power that must be destroyed. Blockchain fundamentalists’ ideal world is one in which all economic activity and human interactions are subject to anarchist or libertarian decentralization. They would like the entirety of social and political life to end up on public ledgers that are supposedly “permissionless” (accessible to everyone) and “trustless” (not reliant on a credible intermediary such as a bank).
Yet far from ushering in a utopia, blockchain has given rise to a familiar form of economic hell. A few self-serving white men (there are hardly any women or minorities in the blockchain universe) pretending to be messiahs for the world’s impoverished, marginalized, and unbanked masses claim to have created billions of dollars of wealth out of nothing. But one need only consider the massive centralization of power among cryptocurrency “miners,” exchanges, developers, and wealth holders to see that blockchain is not about decentralization and democracy; it is about greed."

The Big Blockchain Lie -- Project Syndicate

How an Unlikely Family History Website Transformed Cold Case Investigations -- NYT

Solve different

"Aesthetically, GEDmatch.com resembles an internal company wiki in need of an update. But what it offers to researchers and criminal investigators is tremendous flexibility. There are now more than 17 million DNA profiles in genealogical databases, but most of the bigger sites restrict what can be uploaded, banning not only crime scene evidence but anything processed by an external lab. GEDmatch will take it all — blood processed by an obscure lab, spit processed by 23andMe — for free, so long as it’s in the right format.

The site is also useful for people building an extensive family history. The average person can find any number of cousins on existing genealogy sites. But the key, for a genetic sleuth, is figuring out precisely how those cousins are related to a person of interest, and to each other. The tools that Mr. Olson created — primarily because he found the math intriguing — enable users to see the precise genetic segments where cousins overlap. From the site’s one million or so profiles, a skilled genetic detective can often puzzle out an individual’s identity from a single third cousin match.

“There’s nothing else like it,” said Barbara Rae-Venter, a genetic genealogist who used the site to help crack the Golden State Killer case."

How an Unlikely Family History Website Transformed Cold Case Investigations -- NYT

Jeff Hawkins Is Finally Ready to Explain His Brain Research -- NYT

A major milestone for Numenta

"Mr. Hawkins says that before the world can build artificial intelligence, it must explain human intelligence so it can create machines that genuinely work like the brain. “You do not have to emulate the entire brain,” he said. “But you do have to understand how the brain works and emulate the important parts.”

At his company, called Numenta, that is what he hopes to do. Mr. Hawkins, 61, began his career as an engineer, created two classic mobile computer companies, Palm and Handspring, and taught himself neuroscience along the way.

Now, after more than a decade of quiet work at Numenta, he thinks he and a handful of researchers working with him are well on their way to cracking the problem. On Monday, at a conference in the Netherlands, he is expected to unveil their latest research, which he says explains the inner workings of cortical columns, a basic building block of brain function."

Jeff Hawkins Is Finally Ready to Explain His Brain Research -- NYT

Most White Americans’ DNA Can Be Identified Through Genealogy Databases -- NYT

Also see So many people have had their DNA sequenced that they've put other people's privacy in jeopardy (LA Times), which notes "The authors said the same process would work for about 60% of Americans of European descent, who are the people most likely to use genealogical websites, Erlich said. Though the odds of success would be lower for people from other backgrounds, it would still be expected to work for more than half of all Americans, they said."

"The genetic genealogy industry is booming. In recent years, more than 15 million people have offered up their DNA — a cheek swab, some saliva in a test-tube — to services such as 23andMe and Ancestry.com in pursuit of answers about their heritage. In exchange for a genetic fingerprint, individuals may find a birth parent, long-lost cousins, perhaps even a link to Oprah or Alexander the Great.

But as these registries of genetic identity grow, it’s becoming harder for individuals to retain any anonymity. Already, 60 percent of Americans of Northern European descent — the primary group using these sites — can be identified through such databases whether or not they’ve joined one themselves, according to a study published today in the journal Science.

Within two or three years, 90 percent of Americans of European descent will be identifiable from their DNA, researchers found. The science-fiction future, in which everyone is known whether or not they want to be, is nigh."

Most White Americans’ DNA Can Be Identified Through Genealogy Databases -- NYT

Peeling back the curtain: How the Economist is opening the data behind our reporting (The Economist)

Starting with the Big Mac index

"While we take care to identify our sources, we have not often published the data behind them. Sometimes, this is for good reason: some data are proprietary or otherwise not ours to publish. Often, we have simply not made the time to do it. This is a shame: releasing data can give our readers extra confidence in our work, and allows researchers and other journalists to check — and to build upon — our work. So we’re looking to change this, and publish more of our data on GitHub.
Why now?
Years ago, “data” generally meant a table in Excel, or possibly even a line or bar chart to trace in a graphics program. Today, data often take the form of large CSV files, and we frequently do analysis, transformation, and plotting in R or Python to produce our stories. We assemble more data ourselves, by compiling publicly available datasets or scraping data from websites, than we used to. We are also making more use of statistical modelling. All this means we have a lot more data that we can share — and a lot more data worth sharing."

Peeling back the curtain: How the Economist is opening the data behind our reporting (The Economist)

Facebook purged over 800 U.S. accounts and pages for pushing political spam -- The Washington Post

See Removing Additional Inauthentic Activity from Facebook (Facebook Newsroom) for more details; also see Made and Distributed in the U.S.A.: Online Disinformation (NYT)

"Facebook said on Thursday it purged more than 800 U.S. publishers and accounts for flooding users with politically-oriented spam, reigniting accusations of political censorship and arbitrary decision-making.

In doing so, Facebook demonstrated its increased willingness to wade into the thorny territory of policing domestic political activity. Some of the accounts had been in existence for years, had amassed millions of followers, and professed support for conservative or liberal ideas, such as one page that billed itself as “the first publication to endorse President Donald J. Trump.” Facebook’s ability to monitor manipulation of users is under an intense spotlight in the weeks ahead of the U.S. midterm elections."

Facebook purged over 800 U.S. accounts and pages for pushing political spam -- The Washington Post

After 10 million miles, Waymo's cars are on another level -- CNET

Also ~7 billion miles on simulated roads; see this John Krafcik post for more details on the milestone

"Whenever I talk to John Krafcik, CEO of Waymo (the former Google Self-Driving Car Project), I'm always left with one overriding feeling: sadness for his competition. I've been lucky to ride in many an ostensibly self-driving car. Some were very impressive indeed. Others left me giving thanks the moment I stepped out. But none of the dozens of companies out there working to develop autonomy systems has ever given me the impression that they're anywhere close to what Waymo is doing.

That feeling was reinforced by the announcement today that Waymo's cars have crossed their 10 millionth driverless mile on public roads. 10 million miles. No other company is as transparent as Waymo when it comes to sharing information about testing, and so it's impossible to know for sure, but I don't think any of its rivals come close.

Really, though, numbers don't matter. It's more about lessons learned, and Waymo has evolved to the point where its technology is now having to solve the kind of minutiae that wasn't even on the radar back when this whole thing was still called the Google Self-Driving Car Project."

After 10 million miles, Waymo's cars are on another level -- CNET

Google’s Waze is making a big, nationwide bet on carpooling -- The Verge

See this post by Waze founder Noam Bardin for more details

"For many drivers, Waze is the go-to app for circumnavigating pesky traffic jams. Now, the Alphabet-owned company is making a risky move into ride-hailing — or, more specifically, carpooling. On Wednesday, Waze announced the nationwide rollout of Waze Carpool, a dedicated app that lets drivers offer rides to people who are traveling on a similar route.

First launched in the Bay Area in 2016, Waze Carpool has since expanded to five additional states in the US as well as Waze’s country of origin, Israel. The company says it wants to leverage its “superior routing technology” to help commuters fill empty seats in their cars and, in the process, hopefully reduce the number of cars on the road. And with a community of 100 million active monthly users worldwide, Waze Carpool has big ambitions about its impact on daily transportation habits."

Google’s Waze is making a big, nationwide bet on carpooling -- The Verge

The Battle for the Home -- Stratechery

Final paragraphs from a Stratechery review of Amazon, Google, Apple, and Facebook competition for the next wave of home devices/services

"There is one final question that overshadows all-of-this: while the home may be the current battleground in consumer technology, is it actually a distinct product area — a new epoch if you will? When it came to mobile, it didn’t matter who had won in PCs; Microsoft ended up being an also-ran.

The fortunes of Apple, in particular, depend on whether or not this is the case. If it is a truly new paradigm, then it is hard to see Apple succeeding. It has a very nice speaker, but everything else about its product is worse. On the other hand, the HomePod’s close connection to the iPhone and Apple’s overall ecosystem may be its saving grace: perhaps the smartphone is still what matters.

More broadly, it may be the case that we are entering an era where there are new battles, the scale of which are closer to skirmishes than all-out wars a la smartphones. What made the smartphone more important than the PC was the fact they were with you all the time. Sure, we spend a lot of time at home, but we also spend time outside (AR?), entertaining ourselves (TV and VR), or on the go (self-driving cars); the one constant is the smartphone, and we may never see anything the scale of the smartphone wars again."

The Battle for the Home -- Stratechery

Bitcoin Tumbles as Cryptocurrencies Join Global Asset Selloff -- Bloomberg

A timely *coin reality check

"Cryptocurrencies have wiped out more than $600 billion in value from a January peak as the boom in initial coin offerings last year fades further into memory. Mainstream adoption of digital currencies has failed to materialize this year amid a series of exchange hacks and increased regulatory scrutiny.

“It is clear by now that Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies represent the mother of all bubbles,” Nouriel Roubini, chairman at Roubini Macro Associates and a professor at NYU Stern School of Business, said in prepared testimony for a U.S. Senate Banking Committee hearing on cryptocurrencies and blockchain scheduled Thursday in Washington. “No asset class in human history has ever experienced such a rapid boom and total utter bust and implosion.”"

Bitcoin Tumbles as Cryptocurrencies Join Global Asset Selloff -- Bloomberg

The battle in your ear buds: The bros of political podcasting and their quest to reinvent punditry -- The Washington Post

Later in the article: "Since its January 2017 debut, “Pod Save America” has been downloaded more than 320 million times. What began as a hobby for Obama alumni has morphed into a thriving business that is also a crusade to save a teetering republic." Pod Save America's HBO series special starts Friday.

"Each is “emblematic of an astounding level of political polarization in the United States right now,” says Dannagal G. Young, an associate professor of communication at the University of Delaware. They are united, though, by the ingratiating powers of their increasingly popular medium. The percentage of Americans listening to a podcast every week has more than doubled in the past five years, according to Edison Research.

“Podcasts have become this really viable and popular form of intimate, discursive experience,” Young says. “People are in their cars or at the gym, and listening, and you feel like it’s them talking to you.”"

The battle in your ear buds: The bros of political podcasting and their quest to reinvent punditry -- The Washington Post

A Future Where Everything Becomes a Computer Is as Creepy as You Feared -- NYT

From a timely Internet of Things reality check

"The trouble, though, is that business models for these device don’t often allow for the kind of continuing security maintenance that we are used to with more traditional computing devices. Apple has an incentive to keep writing security updates to keep your iPhone secure; it does so because iPhones sell for a lot of money, and Apple’s brand depends on keeping you safe from digital terrors.

But manufacturers of low-margin home appliances have little such expertise, and less incentive. That’s why the internet of things has so far been synonymous with terrible security — why the F.B.I. had to warn parents last year about the dangers of “smart toys,” and why Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, has identified smart devices as a growing threat to national security."

A Future Where Everything Becomes a Computer Is as Creepy as You Feared -- NYT

New Pixel Phones and Other Gadgets Keep Google in the Hardware Hunt -- NYT

See this Google post for more details; also see Stop and Ask: Why Does Google Need Hardware? (Bloomberg), which notes "It would be generous to call Google a niche seller of smartphones"

"The gadgets are Google’s third wave since it started making consumer devices in 2016. The internet company has pushed these products as a way to showcase its prowess in areas like artificial intelligence and image processing.

Yet the efforts have not had a meaningful impact on Google’s sales or market share. For a company that makes most of its money selling advertising next to search results, the hardware increasingly appears to be an expensive hobby. One of its biggest hits thus far is a Google-branded wireless router, which is too much of a niche product to serve as the foundation of a hardware strategy."

New Pixel Phones and Other Gadgets Keep Google in the Hardware Hunt -- NYT

Google Drops Out of Pentagon's $10 Billion Cloud Competition -- Bloomberg

Later in the article: "“Had the JEDI contract been open to multiple vendors, we would have submitted a compelling solution for portions of it,” the Google spokesman said. “Google Cloud believes that a multi-cloud approach is in the best interest of government agencies, because it allows them to choose the right cloud for the right workload.”"

"Google’s announcement on Monday came just months after the company decided not to renew its contract with a Pentagon artificial intelligence program, after extensive protests from employees of the internet giant about working with the military. The company then released a set of principles designed to evaluate what kind of artificial intelligence projects it would pursue.

“We are not bidding on the JEDI contract because first, we couldn’t be assured that it would align with our AI Principles," a Google spokesman said in a statement. "And second, we determined that there were portions of the contract that were out of scope with our current government certifications.”

The spokesman added that Google is “working to support the U.S. government with our cloud in many ways.”"

Google Drops Out of Pentagon's $10 Billion Cloud Competition -- Bloomberg

Facebook unveils the Portal, a video chat camera for the people who still trust Facebook -- The Washington Post

See this Facebook page for details

"On Monday, Facebook unveiled the $200 Portal, the first-ever consumer hardware from the world’s largest social network. The toaster-size gadget, along with a larger $350 version called Portal+, is a cross between a smart speaker, video camera and digital photo frame. But at a time when CEO Zuckerberg’s privacy and security decisions are a matter of congressional inquiry, how many people will trust one in their living room?

I had a chance to spend a little time with the long-rumored Portal ahead of its launch. As a camera, it offers a nice upgrade to the Skype or FaceTime video chat experience many of us have on a phone or computer. The Portal sits on a shelf or kitchen counter and lets your voice do the dialing. Call out, “Portal, call Geoffrey,” and it’ll ring my home Portal or the Facebook Messenger app on my phone. Facebook’s advantage over other video chat services: Chances are, almost everyone you might want to call already has an account."

Facebook unveils the Portal, a video chat camera for the people who still trust Facebook -- The Washington Post

Google for months kept secret a bug that imperiled the personal data of Google+ users -- The Washington Post

-(consumer(Google+)); see Project Strobe: Protecting your data, improving our third-party APIs, and sunsetting consumer Google+ (Google Keyword blog) for details

"Google discovered the Google+ security bug in the same month that Silicon Valley rival Facebook was facing massive scrutiny over its role in allowing people affiliated with political consultancy Cambridge Analytica to collect data on 87 million users — an incident that led to demands that Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg testify on Capitol Hill. He did so in April.

Google announced in its blog post Monday that it will mostly discontinue Google+, its failing social media offering, limiting it to only business and other enterprise customers. The company also announced new curbs on the information, such as call logs and contact lists, that outside developers can gather on Android, the Google operating system used by most of the world’s smartphones. And it will impose new limits on the data shared about users of its popular email service, Gmail."

Google for months kept secret a bug that imperiled the personal data of Google+ users -- The Washington Post

Introducing the Internet Bill of Rights -- NYT

From Kara Swisher's latest column

"Mr. Berners-Lee, who is widely known as the inventor of the World Wide Web and who advised Mr. Khanna on the creation of his list, agrees. “If the internet is to live up to its potential as a force for good in the world, we need safeguards that ensure fairness, openness and human dignity,” he said in an email. “This Bill of Rights provides a set of principles that are about giving users more control of their online lives while creating a healthier internet economy.”

Ms. Pelosi said that national legislation does not have to be hostile, noting that tech companies know that public sentiment is turning against them. She said that more and more people are “aware that there is some vulnerability with the status quo” and that she believes that “legislation would get public support.”

It already has in Europe — which has become the leader in stopping tech’s aggressive march — and in Ms. Pelosi’s home state, California, which has passed many of the kinds of laws that Congress should be considering."

Introducing the Internet Bill of Rights -- NYT