A bill that could force a sale or outright ban on TikTok passed the House of Representatives just days after it was first introduced. It now goes to the senate.
The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (no, we're not calling it PAFACAA) is the latest attempt by the government to constrain TikTok. If it passes, it could have one of two outcomes: The parent company sells TikTok to a US-based owner, or it faces a ban from US app stores and web hosting services.
Of course, TikTok opposes the bill, saying it's unconstitutional. But they're not the only ones: Free speech and digital rights groups also object to the bill, with many noting that comprehensive privacy laws would be more effective at protecting Americans' user data rather than trying to single out one app.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Fight for the Future and the Center for Democracy and Technology argued the bill would "set an alarming global precedent" for government control of social media.
It earned $4.4 billion and gave its executives $2.5 billion.
A detailed Guardian report said 35 major US companies, including Tesla, T-Mobile, Netflix, Ford Motor and Match Group, paid their top five executives more than they paid in federal income taxes between 2018 and 2022. Tesla was the worst offender. It earned $4.4 billion in those five years and gave its executives $2.5 billion. Despite that, Tesla not only didn't pay any federal taxes, but it received $1 million in refunds from the government. Tesla boss Elon Musk is the second richest person in the world.
I'm sorry, more Musk. X has canceled a high-profile partnership with former CNN host Don Lemon to stream a video talk show on the platform. Lemon said the company canceled his contract hours after he interviewed X's billionaire owner Elon Musk for the first episode of The Don Lemon Show. "Elon Musk is mad at me," Lemon said in a video posted to X on Wednesday. "Apparently, free speech absolutism doesn't apply when it comes to questions about him from people like me." How's that "video first" push going, Linda?
The fifth edition of Summer Game Fest takes place this year on Friday, June 7 at 5PM ET. Expect a two-hour stream of trailers and hype with… around a 10 percent success rate. With E3 officially dead, SGF is poised to take the expo's place as the major gaming event of the year.
Join our NICE Talks to hear answers to questions you ask about AI for CX. In this session we will take a deep dive into the question: How should I do workforce management in the digital era? Industry analyst Donna Fluss, Founder and President at DMG Consulting, and Andrea Matsuda, Senior Product Marketing Manager at NICE, will discuss:
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Join us on Thursday, March 21st at 11 am EDT.
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Neil Young is back on Spotify after boycotting the platform over two years ago, he said in a new blog post. The Canadian singer ditched the platform over vaccine misinformation on the Joe Rogan podcast. He's returned because Rogan's podcast is no longer exclusive on Spotify. "My decision comes as music services Apple and Amazon have started serving the same disinformation podcast features I had opposed at Spotify," he said – which isn't really the stance he thinks it is.
When Young dropped his catalog from Spotify, he added he was fed up with Spotify's "shitty" sound quality. Nothing has particularly changed there.
Days after Apple started allowing iOS users in the EU to use third-party app stores, the company has announced more changes to how developers can distribute their apps. Most significantly, those who meet certain criteria can let users download apps from their websites. The Web Distribution option, available this spring, will effectively let developers bypass the app ecosystem entirely for their own apps. To be eligible, devs must opt in to new App Store rules and pay a fee for each user install after a certain threshold.
AI-powered visual search features arrived to Ray-Ban's Meta sunglasses last year with some impressive (and divisive) tricks — but a new one in the latest beta looks quite useful. It identifies landmarks and tells you more about them — a sort of tour guide for travelers. Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth explained in a (Meta-owned) Threads post with a couple of sample images explaining why the Golden Gate Bridge is orange (easier to see in fog), a history of the painted ladies houses in San Francisco and more.
Users can subscribe to third-party labeling services too.
Bluesky, the open-source Twitter alternative, is about to start testing one of its more ambitious ideas: allowing its users to run their own moderation services. The change will bring Bluesky users and developers together to work on custom labeling tools for the budding social media platform.
Bluesky is seeing a surge in growth after it removed its waitlist and opened to all users in February. The service has added about 2 million new users, bringing its total community to just over 5 million. It might need the extra moderation.
Airbnb has announced a complete ban on indoor cameras in host properties. Hosts were allowed to have cameras in communal spaces, but they were supposed to be banned from bedrooms and bathrooms. Hosts were also supposed to disclose any cameras in the rental, which may not always have happened. The company says it established the new rules "in consultation with our guests, hosts and privacy experts" and that it'll continue to seek feedback.
Hosts also have to disclose any outdoor cameras (that can't point indoors or be in areas with a "greater expectation of privacy" — think showers and saunas). Because humans can be monstrous. The new rules kick in April 30.
Any hosts that violate these new policies could face having their properties banned from Airbnb — and even get their entire account removed.
The FTC wants to compel companies to make cancellation processes easier but, during a hearing on the matter earlier this year, industry lobbyists argued that making things easier would be bad for business. So to make things worse for business (I joke), we've put together a guide with a few tips to help you find exactly what you're paying for and how to cancel things you no longer need. Or perhaps, things that have rocketed in price.
Microsoft is holding a digital event titled Advancing the new era of work with Copilot on March 21. We're expecting new Surface devices and — given the event's name — a lot more about dovetailing Microsoft's AI ambitions with its hardware and software. Rumors are all over the place: We could see a new Surface Pro with a brighter OLED screen, devices powered by either Intel Core Ultra or Snapdragon X Elite chips. And possibly even nothing for consumers and just a barrage of business- and commercial-focused devices. Boo! Engadget will cover all the notable announcements on March 21 at noon ET.
The company may have trained its NeMo AI on a controversial dataset.
The latest tech company immersing itself in AI and facing copyright troubles is NVIDIA. Several authors are suing the company over its AI platform NeMo, a language model that allows businesses to create and train their own chatbots. The authors claim NVIDIA trained it on a controversial dataset that illegally used their books without consent. They want a jury trial and are demanding NVIDIA pay damages and destroy all copies of the Books3 dataset used to power NeMo large language models (LLMs). They claim the dataset was copied from a shadow library called Bibliotek, consisting of 196,640 pirated books.
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