UK regulator is expected to block Meta's proposed acquisition of Giphy in the coming days.
The UK Competition and Markets Authority is set to reverse the $315M deal, in what would be the first time the CMA has unwound a Big Tech deal. They say it's due to competition concerns, arguing that Facebook parent company Meta could cut off its rivals' access to gifs, and demand platforms like TikTok or Snapchat hand over more of their data in order to access gifs, consolidating power in Meta's hands. Link

Update: the CMA has has officially ruled that Meta's acquisition of Giphy should be unwound, a year and a half after the acquisition Link

Confirmed: Jack Dorsey stepped down as Twitter's CEO. CTO Parag Agrawal will replace him.
The change is effective immediately. Dorsey will remain a member of the board until his term expires in 2022. Salesforce President and COO Bret Taylor will become the chairman of the board. "I’ve decided to leave Twitter because I believe the company is ready to move on from its founders" Dorsey said in a statement, though he didn't provide any additional detail on why he decided to resign. Dorsey co-founded Twitter in 2006 served as CEO until 2008 and was pushed out of the role. He returned to lead Twitter in 2015 after then CEO Dick Costolo stepped down. Shares of Twitter closed down 2.74%. Twitter shares have jumped 85% since Dorsey took over as CEO on Oct 5. 2015. Square stock has surged 1,566% since its IPO on Nov. 19, 2015. Link

Photo credit: Twitter

Photo credit: NTD YouTube

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is expected to step down.
Dorsey is currently both CEO of Twitter and Square, his digital payments company. Twitter stakeholder Elliott Management had sought to replace Jack Dorsey as CEO in 2020 before the investment firm reached a deal with the company’s management. If true, it's unclear who's set to succeed Dorsey. Twitter stock jumped more than 11% on the news. Link

Update: Confirmed: Jack Dorsey stepped down as Twitter's CEO.

Photo credit: Ryan Lash / TED

Apple AR headset to launch in late 2022 with no tethering to a Mac or an iPhone.
Reliable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says the long awaited AR headset will have 2 processors (the main one will be like the M1 chip) and be able to support VR thanks to a pair of 4K Micro OLED displays from Sony. It will be able to operate independently without needing a Mac or iPhone and Apple wants to replace the ‌iPhone‌ with AR within 10 years. Link

Photo credit: Antonio De Rosa

China asked Didi Global to delist from the NYSE citing concerns about leaking sensitive data.
The Cyberspace Administration of China, the agency responsible for data security in the country, has directed Didi's top executives to work out precise details, subject to government approval, because of "security concerns". Proposals under consideration include privatization or listing in Hong Kong. If privatization, the proposal will likely be at least the $14 IPO price and if listing in Hong Kong, the IPO price would probably be a discount to the current US share price (current $8.11). The company may also have to give up control of its data to a third-party. Link

Update: Didi Global plans to delist from the NYSE and trade in Hong Kong. Link

Samsung is expected to start production of $17BB chip factory in Texas in 2024.
The announced factory is Samsung's largest ever investment in the US. The plant will focus on advanced chips for mobile, 5G, high-performance computing (HPC) and AI and will create over 2,000 high-tech jobs directly and thousands of related jobs once the new facility is in full operation. Link

Photo credit: Samsung

Apple sues NSO Group alleging NSO illegally targeted Apple users with surveillance tools.
Apple says that Pegasus, NSO's spyware product, allows monitoring of iPhone activities, emails, texts, and browsing history, and gives access to the camera and microphone. They're seeking damages of $75K and to ban NSO from using Apple products. Apple said it has patched the flaws that allowed NSO's software to access private data. Link

Tile acquired by family location sharing service Life360 for $205M.
The Tile brand will continue to operate under Tile's CEO, CJ Prober. The acquisition will help Life360 expand beyond family tracking to letting people track people, pets, and things they love. Life360's 33M smartphone users will increase the reach of Tile's Finding Network (similar to Apple's Find My network) by around 10x. Life360 will get access to consumers in 27,000 retail stores where Tile trackers are sold and they will also acquire Tile's subscribers, boosting their total paid subscribers by 45% to 1.6M users. Link

Ericsson to acquire cloud communications firm Vonage for $6.2B.
The all cash deal is the Swedish telecom equipment maker's largest acquisition to date. The $6.2B price is a 28% premium on Vonage's Friday close (the stock has now gone up after the acquisition was announced). Link

Meta is delaying adding end-to-end encryption to messages on Messenger and Instagram until 2023.
The current plan is about a year later than originally announced. Meta said the delay will give them more time "to get this right" and attributed the delays to concerns about user safety and the need to assist with public safety efforts, including child abuse investigations. Personal messages on WhatsApp are already end-to-end encrypted and they're working on making it the default across all of their apps. They already have encrypted voice and video calls on Messenger. Link

Adele asked Spotify to remove the shuffle button off album pages and they did for all albums.
Spotify removed the shuffle button from all album pages so that tracks play in the order artists intended. Spotify users can still choose to shuffle an album, but the default is to play tracks in the order chosen by the artist. Link

Starbucks and Amazon partner to open cashierless coffee shop in Manhattan.
Starbucks is opening a pick-up cafe in midtown Manhattan with Amazon Go that uses Amazon's Just Walk Out tech, with two more planned over the next year. Starbucks customers order on mobile and pick up as they usually would, but they can also buy salads, sandwiches, items from local favorites like Dominique Ansel, and many other items like protein bars and packs of gum, from the Amazon Go market section of the store. Customers have to scan the Amazon app, insert their credit card, or use Amazon One, the palm scanning technology, to enter the Amazon Go section. Then scales, cameras and shelf sensors tally up customers' totals and charge them automatically when they leave the store. Link

Photo credit: Starbucks

Apple is accelerating the development of a fully autonomous electric car with plans to debut by 2025.
For the past several years, Apple explored two car options: building a model with limited self-driving capabilities or a version with full self-driving that doesn't require human intervention. They decided on the latter, under the new head of Apple Car, Kevin Lynch. Reports say the Apple Car could lack pedals and a steering wheel and have passengers sitting along the sides, facing each other like in a limousine. Link

Illustration by RN in TECH

Apple announce Self Service Repair, a program that will give customers repair manuals and let them buy parts and tools.
Apple will publish repair manuals and allow everyday customers to buy the same parts and tools certified technicians and repair shops use (at the same prices). The program will begin next year with more than 200 parts and tools that let people "complete the most common repairs" on iPhone 12 and iPhone 13 (screens, batteries, and cameras). Apple plans to expand to Mac computers with M1 chips. Link

Photo credit: Ali Abdul Rahman

Meta reveals a haptic glove prototype that uses air pockets to simulate touching objects in VR.
The glove has been in development for seven years and today they showed it for the first time (here's a video of it in action and a video of Mark Zuckerberg playing with it). The haptic glove reproduces sensations like grasping an object or running your hand along a surface and Meta sees it as the future of VR and AR interaction. The glove, which also acts as a VR controller, is lined with 15 ridged and inflatable plastic pads known as actuators. Link

Photo credit: Meta Reality Labs

Taproot, the first major upgrade to Bitcoin's code since 2017, goes live.
The long-anticipated code upgrade with a focus on enhancing the network's privacy and security, has been activated. It is the first major upgrade to the network's code since the introduction of Segregated Witness in 2017. Link

Photo credit: Executium

Apple quietly buying Google ads for high-value subscription apps to get users to use App Store's payments systems.
Several app developers have reported that Apple is secretly buying Google ads for their apps, without the app developers' consent, and Google won't delete them, they say. It costs the developers potentially millions of dollars in lost revenue and increases the advertising costs for their own campaigns. Apple can make more money if they push people to the App Store to purchase, vs a web flow. The ads don't disclose they're from Apple and simply look like ads from the brands themselves that happen to go right to the App Store. Among the businesses are dating apps like Tinder, Plenty of Fish, and Bumble, HBO, Masterclass, and Babbel. Link

Photo credit: James Yarema

Meta made over 21 acquisitions in the past three years, including at least four VR startups in 2021.
Facebook has quietly been buying AR/VR companies in an effort to boost their metaverse initiative. They recently bought Within, the company that makes the VR workout app Supernatural, for a reported $500M. Other notable deals have included: Unit 2 Games, which makes a "collaborative game creation platform" called Crayta, Bigbox VR which makes the popular battle royale game POPULATION: ONE, and Downpour Interactive, another VR game-maker (the maker of Onward). Link

Patreon is building a video hosting solution so creators can build subscription businesses without relying on YouTube.
Along with video hosting, Patreon is building a native player. CEO Jack Conte disclosed the initiative and said they're already hosting podcasts and video is next so any creator, no matter their medium will be able to build a business around their work. Link

Toshiba plans to split into three separate companies in response to shareholder pressure.
Responding to pressure from activists after years of scandal and mismanagement, the three companies will be: a public company focused on tech devices, a public company for infrastructure services, and a private company with stakes in memory chipmaker Kioxia as well as other assets. The Japanese firm said they spinoff plan should be completed by the second half of 2023, and will improve shareholder value. Link

Instagram is paying creators huge cash bonuses for posting Reels that get a lot of views.
In an attempt to compete with TikTok, Instagram Reels is getting aggressive in luring in good creators offering bonuses that can be over $10K. But creators are confused about what determines how big a bonus they can get, and the platform isn't helping clear up their concerns. Various creator have shared their numbers and there doesn't seem to be any understandable logic behind the bonuses. YouTube also established a $100M creator fund for Shorts and Snapchat is offering cash prizes for submissions to Spotlight challenges. Link

Photo credit: Instagram

YouTube will hide public dislike counts on videos, only the creator will still be able to see how many dislikes they got.
Following a test in March, the company says the change is to keep smaller creators from being targeted by dislike attacks or harassment, and to promote "respectful interactions between viewers and creators". The dislike button will still be there, but it'll be for private feedback, rather than public shaming. The good thing about the dislike counts was that it couldn't be deleted, now companies can just delete negative comments and there will be no public metric to rely on. Link

Photo credit: Youtube

Meta will remove ad targeting options around health, race, politics, religion, and sexual orientation.
The change, starting on January 19, will be for all of Meta's platforms including Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp as well as its network of other websites and apps using Facebook’s ad-targeting tools. Meta will no longer allow advertisers to target users by "sensitive identifying traits" like race, political affiliation, sexual orientation, religion or health. The company says they want to "better match people's evolving expectations of how advertisers may reach them on our platform". Link

Photo credit: Will Francis

Twitter Blue rolls out for $2.99/month with ad-free news articles, an undo button, and more.
Other features include a reader mode for tweet threads, bookmarks folders, and the ability to theme your Twitter app and app icon. Twitter's subscription service first launched in June in Canada and Australia on iOS, but now it's available in the US and New Zealand and on Android and the web. Subscribers can also read ad-free news articles from 300+ participating US sites (based on Twitter's acquisition of Scroll). Surprisingly, you'll still see ads on Twitter even when you subscribe to Twitter Blue, and according to Twitter they are "not currently considering an ads-free product". Link

Photo credit: Twitter

Sony and TSMC announced plans to build a $7B chip plant in Japan by 2024.
Sony will invest $500M for a 20% stake in the new Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) subsidiary, called Japan Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing. It will fill a gap in demand for less-advanced chips that are commonly used in smartphones and cars, in order to ease the strained global supply chain for semiconductors. Link

Uber looking into dispatching yellow cabs
Uber has lobbied the Taxi & Limousine Commission in New York City to run a program where Uber users would hail yellow cabs via the Uber app. This is due to a shortage in Uber drivers and a decrease in riders recently. The new "e-hail" program would appear for in the app users in New York City as another option alongside "UberX". Link

Robinhood says the personal info of more than 7 million accounts was accessed during a data breach.
The company said hackers obtained customers' emails, fullnames, and other personal details, but no financial information was leaked. Link

Google parent Alphabet launched Isomorphic Labs that will use AI to discover new drugs.
The venture plans to build off the research and protein structure work Alphabet's DeepMind AI subsidiary and share the same CEO. It could build AI models that predict how drugs interact with the human body and sell them to support new drug development. Link

Meta will open physical stores to showcase virtual reality headsets and let people try them in person.
The upcoming stores will give customers a chance to see the company's metaverse vision and try the VR headsets and teleconferencing gadgets. They're planning to open the first flagship store in California, near the Reality Labs office (no opening date yet). Meta is also renaming Facebook Portal to Meta Portal. Link

Photo credit: Vanessa Loring

Facebook will let users create recurring subscription links and accept payments via their platform, to go against Apple's tax.
Meta/Facebook will not take any fees and were very clear they're doing this to let people circumvent Apple's 30% tax on in-app transactions (since app makers are now able to contact users about third-party payment options). Facebook will also pay a bonus of $5-20 for each new subscriber users get until the end of 2021, in order to lure people to use their payment mechanisms (capped at $10k). Link

The US has blacklisted American companies from working with NSO Group, saying they engage in "malicious cyber activities".
The US sanctioned four companies that sell spyware/hacking tools: NSO Group, Candiru, Positive Technologies, and Computer Security Initiative Consultancy. The US said these tools were abused by foreign governments to conduct trans-national repression of dissidents, journalists, and activists outside of those governments' sovereign borders. Link

Netflix rolling out mobile games to Android users globally through its app, included in a Netflix subscription.
Available on the Netflix phone/tablet app under "N Games" or "Games On Mobile", the 5 first games are "Stranger Things: 1984", "Stranger Things 3: The Game", "Card Blast", "Shooting Hoops", and "Teeter Up". They started with a limited test in August for subscribers in Poland, Italy, and Spain, and are now available globally. It will be coming out on Apple iOS in the coming months. Link

Photo credit: Netflix

Apple planning "crash detection" for iPhones and Apple Watches detect car accidents and auto-dial 911.
Starting next year, iPhones and Apple watches will use sensors to automatically detect car accidents and call 911 when needed. Apple has been testing the crash-detection feature by collecting data shared anonymously from iPhone and Apple Watch users. Link

Leaked image of 17-inch Lenovo ThinkBook Plus with a second screen next to the keyboard for drawing and taking notes.
Well-known leaker Evan Blass tweeted a picture of the 17-inch ThinkBook Plus showing an additional display to the right of the keyboard, and a stylus. Lenovo is rumored to launch it at CES 2022, which is Jan. 5-8. Link

Photo credit: Evan Blass

Meta-Facebook is shutting down their face-recognition system and deleting faceprint data of more than 1 billion people.
After using face detection for more than a decade, the company said they're trying to weigh the positive use cases for the technology "against growing societal concerns, especially as regulators have yet to provide clear rules". And that "Facial recognition can be valuable when the technology operates privately on a person’s own devices...requiring no communication of face data with an external server", as is used in Apple's FaceID. Link

Photo credit: Glen Carrie

Adobe Photoshop is adding a "prepare as NFT" feature.
Called Content Credentials, it will help prove that the person selling an NFT is the person who made it. NFT sellers will be able to link their Adobe ID with their crypto wallet, and compatible NFT marketplaces will be able to show a certificate proving the art's source is authentic and combat art theft. Link

Apple's iOS App Tracking Transparency (ATT) has cost Facebook, Twitter, Snap, and YouTube nearly $10B in combined ad revenue in the second half of 2021.
Facebook, Twitter, Snap, and YouTube revenues are expected to be down 12% on average in the third and fourth quarters. Apple's ATT privacy feature started in April with the release of iOS 14.5, and allows users to opt out of app data tracking. Most users opt out so advertisers have been looking elsewhere, including Apple's own search. Snap has been hit the worst since most of its business is via smartphone advertising. Link

Zendesk to acquire Momentive, the parent company of SurveyMonkey, for ~$4B.
Zendesk ($14.3B market cap) announced they will buy experience management firm Momentive ($3.7B market cap) for $4B in stock, in its largest acquisition ever. They expect the deal to close in the first half of next year. Both companies' stock prices dropped following the news. Link