Samsung's bill to take on Apple's Siri topped $200 million

Ina Fried
Mar 1

Featured

Samsung's bill to take on Apple's Siri topped $200 million

Samsung spent 238.9 billion Korean Won ($209 million) for last year's acquisition of Viv Labs, a 30-person voice AI startup from the creators of Apple's Siri. The figure was confirmed in a regulatory filing this week.

Viv's technology, or at least a version of it, is expected to show up in the Galaxy S8, due to be unveiled in New York next month.

Why it matters: While it relies on Google for the Android OS, Samsung isn't willing to defer to the search giant when it comes to the increasingly high stakes area of an AI-powered assistant.

Erica Pandey
19 mins ago

Featured

The legal fallout from Charlottesville

Lazaro Gamio / Axios

The clashes between far-right hate groups and counter protesters in Charlottesville have spurred national conversations about the First Amendment and its limits. What was initially publicized as a lawful protest of the removal of Confederate General Robert E. Lee's statue quickly turned violent when a man drove his car into a crowd of counter protesters and took Heather Heyer's life. The aftermath of the violence has pushed lawyers and investigators into largely uncharted territory.

The legal cases ... words

The cases

Charlottesville began with a court case.

The ACLU of Virginia defended the "Unite the Right" organizers right to assemble.
The organization's original statement said, "The ACLU of Virginia stands for the right to free expression for all, not just those whose opinions are in the mainstream or with whom the government agrees."

Two sisters are suing.

They're going after rally organizer Jason Kessler, driver James Alex Fields Jr. and 28 other defendants for $3 million in damages.
Fields Jr. hit Tadrint and Micah Washington's car when he accelerated to mow down a crowd of people last Saturday.
One of the sisters' attorneys told the Washington Post that they will use what white nationalists have said in the media to demonstrate that rally organizers conspired to "inspire mayhem, homicide and violence."

A man misidentified as the driver plans to sue.

His lawsuit is against the far-right websites which publicized a false story — first reported by GotNews — that he was behind the wheel of the car that killed Heyer.
Joel Vangheluwe was not in Virginia at the time, and far-right news sites said he committed the crime because he is a critic of Donald Trump.
His attorney told CNN that Vangheluwe and his family had been harassed as result of the false accusation.
"My message to those outlets is that if your words can cause great harm, and has caused great harm, you must suffer the consequences of the law as a result," the attorney said.

The precedent

One existing case points to the same issues that are being discussed after Charlottesville.
In April, the Southern Poverty Law Center filed a lawsuit against Andrew Anglin, the publisher of the Daily Stormer, for launching a "terror campaign" against Tanya Gersh, a Jewish woman.
Anglin published Gersh's contact information online and encouraged Daily Stormer readers to "take action" against her, per NYT.
"While Gersh isn't the first person to sue for online harassment, hers is the first lawsuit to go after someone for inciting a troll storm, in which an individual purposefully mobilizes an online mob," Vice reports.
Troll storms have "become a new weapon of hate, and we want to eventually remove this weapon from the arsenal," one of Gersh's attorneys told Vice.
Her case along with the cases following Charlottesville will break new legal ground.

Uncharted territory

The ACLU updated its position on defending "Unite the Right" protesters on Friday, releasing a statement that they will no longer defend the rights of protesters who plan to march with firearms. "The First Amendment absolutely does not protect white supremacists seeking to incite or engage in violence," they said.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions used the words "domestic terrorism" when describing the Charlottesville violence on Good Morning America. Days later, Sessions said the case against Fields could also be prosecuted as a hate crime.
"Still, it may be difficult to prove that [Fields Jr.] was motivated by one of the characteristics protected by the hate crimes statute, like race," Charlie Savage of the New York Times writes. "[H]atred of people because of their political views is not specifically mentioned in the law. Although several of the surviving victims are black, [Heyer] was white."

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Shannon Vavra
13 hrs ago

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Where you can't get fired for political speech

Steve Helber / AP

Federal employment law doesn't ban discrimination based on political affiliation. A minority of states ban discrimination based on political activity:

Some states ban firing based on "political activity," including California, Colorado, Louisiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, South Carolina, Utah, and West Virginia. Seattle and Madison fall in this list, too.
Montana also bans firing absent good cause, which would protect political activity.
New Mexico bans firing based on "political opinions."
Statutes protect belonging to a political party in D.C., Iowa, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. This also includes Broward County (Fl.) and Urbana (Il.).
Colorado and North Dakota ban firing based on off-duty lawful activity (including speech), while Connecticut protects employees from retaliation for speech broadly.
Illinois, New York, and Washington have laws that apply to election-related activities.
Hawaii, Idaho, Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia, Wyoming, and Guam ban retaliation for petitions or voting.

Why it matters ... words

The Washington Post's Eugene Volokh did a deep dive on this topic, looking at political speech rights and where you can get fired for it.

Why it matters: "The First Amendment applies only to government employers; it doesn't apply to nongovernmental entities (whether or not those entities have government funding or contracts)," per Volokh.

What it means: If someone is fired on these grounds, these laws would all "likely authorize civil lawsuits," Volokh writes. And the First Amendment keeps all of this in the balance since it is possible it would preempt any claims that political speech creates a hostile work environment, protecting the person who participated in political speech.

Caveat: Most employment is "at-will," meaning an employer can fire an employee for whatever reason, so long as it is forbidden by a statute.

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Neal Rothschild
16 hrs ago

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How the Mooch hire set off a White House domino effect

Rebecca Zisser / Axios

The hire of Anthony Scaramucci set off a chain of events that changed the makeup of the White House staff. Lingering tensions, factions and alliances had already laid much of the groundwork, but Scaramucci's entrance served as the catalyst.

As Axios' Jonathan Swan put it: "Jared and Ivanka brought Mooch in to get rid of [Reince Priebus] and [Steve Bannon]. He did it in a gorier and more chaotic way than anyone expected. He took out Reince and his extreme disruption appears to have catalyzed the reordering of the West Wing and increased urgency to getting rid of disruptive forces internally."

Keep reading ... words

The events:

July 21: Anthony Scaramucci hired as White House communications director.
July 21: Sean Spicer, who had objected to Mooch's hiring, resigns as press secretary. Sarah Sanders is named as replacement.
July 25: After Scaramucci vowed to rid the White House of leakers, assistant press secretary Michael Short is forced out.
July 26: In a profanity-laced interview with the New Yorker's Ryan Lizza, Scaramucci rips chief of staff Reince Priebus as a paranoid leaker.
July 28: Trump announces in a Friday late-afternoon tweet that Priebus is out as chief of staff. Priebus and Bannon both worked to prevent Scaramucci's hire.
July 28: Former DHS Secretary Gen. John Kelly named new chief of staff.
July 31: John Kelly's first day as chief of staff. Kelly is intent on ushering in a culture of discipline and organization, leaving freelancers like Scaramucci and Bannon at risk.
July 31: Scaramucci pushed out.
August 12: Axios' Jonathan Swan reports that Trump believes Bannon is behind damaging leaks, putting his job in jeopardy.
August 16: Hope Hicks assumes communications director duties.
August 18: Steve Bannon out as chief strategist.

Lasting effects:

A new chief of staff bent on bringing discipline and order to the White House
The exit of the architect of Trump's nationalist, "America First" strategy
A new press secretary and a (temporary, at least) return of on-camera press briefings
The departure of both the RNC presence (Priebus, Spicer, Michael Short) and the central nationalist presence from the White House

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Shannon Vavra
11 hrs ago

Featured

What's at stake for China in North Korea

Andy Wong / AP

Amid escalating anxieties that North Korean tensions with the U.S. might lead to all out war, this week America sent its highest-ranking military officer to do the rounds to try and patch up differences and assuage some fears about military operations, visiting South Korea first, then China and Japan.

And it actually appears to have worked — Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joe Dunford signed a deal with his Chinese counterpart to increase operational communication between the U.S. and Chinese militaries. The idea is to avoid miscommunication and inadvertent encounters in the military realm.

This comes on the heels of last week's South China Sea encounter, in which China told a U.S. warship to turn around 10 times, claiming the U.S. "violated Chinese and international law." But the Pentagon told Axios the move was lawful. (This probably didn't cause the visit, but they likely discussed it; the WSJ reports the visit was planned in advance of last week.)

What's at stake ... words

Why it matters: Working with Beijing first is a key step to denuclearization of the North, as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger argued in the WSJ. This agreement also serves as a reminder that China's in a tough spot between the U.S. and North Korea.

China's got a treaty with North Korea with a mutual defense provision, meaning if the DPRK were attacked, China would have to help, which is part of why China is wary of some U.S. behavior towards North Korea, Waheguru Pal Singh Sidhu, an expert on North Korea at the NYU SPS Center for Global Affairs, told Axios. Particularly, China is wary in the military realm. Plus, if China were to renege on the treaty, it would reflect poorly on them to other countries.
China shares a border with North Korea: China is also concerned about what would happen if North Korea gets isolated too much due to strong sanctions regimes, which could lead to a collapse of the North and leave it outside of Beijing's orbit, Sidhu said. Plus if the North collapsed, China would likely have a humanitarian crisis on its hands with an influx of millions of refugees (and although China wouldn't say the reason, it's been building up its border with North Korea in the last few months.)
China's concerns are also economic; it has a trade relationship with the North that's mutually beneficial.
China might look responsible if chaos breaks out and risks deteriorating relations with the U.S. if it doesn't pressure Pyongyang enough, per Kissinger.

What to look out for: Diplomacy is about to get even tougher. Next week the U.S. and South Korea will be conducting their annual military exercises, involving tens of thousands of American and South Korean troops. That's despite pressure from China, Russia, and North Korea to refrain from running them since, to them, it looks like preparations to invade the North. Gen. Dunford said scrapping the drills is not on the table, which is not likely to go over well with Beijing.

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Alexi McCammond
14 hrs ago

Featured

Trump weighs in on Boston protests

Evan Vucci / AP

Thousands marched in Boston today in opposition of a planned "free speech rally," which invited "libertarians, conservatives, traditionalists, classical liberals, (Donald) Trump supporters or anyone else who enjoys their right to free speech," according to a group calling itself the Boston Free Speech Coalition, per CNN.

This comes exactly one week after the white nationalist "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville last weekend. Trump had a terrible week of responding to the violent Charlottesville attack, but he quickly made a statement on Twitter about today's Boston protests:

Why it matters: Trump called for a "swift restoration of law and order" in his initial remarks about the Charlottesville rally last weekend. Today's response echoes that sentiment and, similar to his remarks on Tuesday doubling down on the "both sides" argument in which he only condemned the "alt-left," today Trump labeled the left-wing protestors as "anti-police agitators" deserving of "tough" police presence.

Jonathan Swan
14 hrs ago

Featured

Trump's Breitbart endorsement could soon backfire

President Trump promoted Breitbart on Twitter this afternoon setting it up as a real news source in opposition to the rest of what he calls the fake, mainstream media. "Steve Bannon will be a tough and smart new voice at @BreitbartNews...maybe even better than ever before. Fake News needs the competition!" he tweeted.

Why this could create challenges: The president is positioning Breitbart as Real News and they're about to ramp up a relentless campaign against half the West Wing — including the "globalists" and the "West Wing Democrats." That's Bannon-speak for Ivanka and Jared, Gary Cohn, H.R. McMaster and Dina Powell.

Mark down this prediction: Within a few weeks' time - actually probably sooner -West Wing officials will be anonymously telling reporters that Breitbart is a joke and its hit pieces shouldn't be taken seriously.

Axios
15 hrs ago

Featured

Immelt is frontrunner for Uber CEO

Steven Senne / AP

Recode's Kara Swisher reports that Jeff Immelt, the former chairman of GE, is the leading candidate to be the next CEO of Uber. Citing several sources, she reports the pick isn't final and others are still in the running, though none of them are women. A decision by the board could come in the next 2 weeks.

Why it matters: Swisher reports Immelt is a strong candidate because as an experienced CEO he'll be able to navigate the tumultuous board dynamic (ousted CEO Travis Kalanick is still a member and an investor is suing to get him removed), and he's well known to Wall Street ahead of a possible IPO.

Axios
15 hrs ago

Featured

WH lawyer: Mueller probe should end by Thanksgiving

J. Scott Applewhite / AP

"White House lawyer [Ty] Cobb predicts quick end to Mueller probe," by Reuters' Karen Freifeld:

Cobb to Reuters: "I'd be embarrassed if this is still haunting the White House by Thanksgiving and worse if it's still haunting him by year end ... I think the relevant areas of inquiry by the special counsel are narrow."
"Cobb [said] he talks to Trump on an almost daily basis and has been in contact with the team of Robert Mueller."
Understatement of the year: Cobb's "projected timeline ... suggests a speedier end to Mueller's probe than several outside experts believe is likely."

Jonathan Swan
16 hrs ago

Featured

Sheldon Adelson privately supports anti-McMaster campaign

Kin Cheung / AP

Republican megadonor Sheldon Adelson has privately told one of his allies that he supports a campaign that depicts H.R. McMaster as anti-Israel and seeks to remove him from his post as national security adviser.

In an email to Mort Klein, the president of the Zionist Organization of America, Adelson writes: "Now that I have talked to somebody with personal experience with McMaster, I support your efforts."

Why this matters: Adelson is arguably the most influential donor in Republican politics, spending tens of millions of dollars each election season. He also funds the ZOA, which has been relentlessly attacking McMaster and leading an outside campaign to remove him from his post.

Keep reading ... words

Adelson's spokesman Andy Abboud told Axios recently that Adelson had nothing to do with ZOA's campaign against McMaster and was "perfectly comfortable" with the job McMaster was doing.

Abboud was correct about Adelson being unaware of the campaign, though Adelson makes clear in his email to Klein that he was never "comfortable" with McMaster because he knew nothing about him.

What changed: Adelson tells Klein he spoke with Safra Catz, the Israeli-born CEO of Oracle. Adelson says Catz told him about a dinner she had recently with McMaster and "it certainly enlightened me quite a bit."

But Adelson also makes clear in his email that he doesn't want to be publicly associated with the campaign against McMaster. (Klein never claimed Adelson was supporting it, and while he accepts funding from Adelson he is known as an independent Israel hawk who cannot be corralled, even by his major donor.)

The pushback: A White House source points out that the Israel team at the White House, including noted right winger Ambassador Friedman, "feel McMaster is remarkably pro-Israel and he just had a meeting with senior Israeli officials where he won plaudits from them for understanding their unique security needs."

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Axios
17 hrs ago

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The Daily Stormer is back online

Virginia Mayo / AP

A 20-year-old is making sure the neo-nazi, white supremacist website the Daily Stormer continues to exist online, at least for now, after GoDaddy and Google kicked it off their servers last weekend. ProPublica talked to Nicholas Lim, the man behind Daily Stormer's resurrection, who said he's simply trying to protect free speech rights.

Lim didn't even know what type of content the Daily Stormer publishes before ProPublica reached out to him. "I think there's a lot of stupid ideas here,'' he told ProPublica. "But frankly it's not my decision or something I really want to get involved in."
Daily Stormer was kicked from its internet servers after publishing articles bashing the physical appearance of Heather Heyer, the 32-year-old woman killed by the man who drove his car through a crowd last weekend in Charlottesville.
Lim's company, Bitmitigate.com, just launched in March and he told ProPublica that resurrecting Daily Stormer could bring beneficial publicity to his company. "I thought it would really get my service out there."

Alexi McCammond
18 hrs ago

Featured

Ben Sasse doubts if Trump can calm the nation after more violence

Republican Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska has been trying to understand last weekend's violence in Charlottesville, much like the rest of the country. Between his talks with constituents —one of whom is a self-described Trump supporter who told Sasse "we should admit that the President has done a bad job getting us through this" — and his discussions with family, Sen. Sasse has a prediction for what's next: By equalizing the "alt-right" and "alt-left," Trump's comments could lead to future clashes because his lousy responses don't calm tensions between the groups.

Key quote: "What will happen next? I doubt that Donald Trump will be able to calm and comfort the nation in that moment. He (and lots of others) will probably tell an awful combination of partial truths and outright falsehoods. On top of the trust deficits that are already baked so deeply in, unity will be very hard to come by."

Keep reading ... words

Why it matters: Sen. Sasse has never liked Trump. He's consistently stood up to him, calling him a "megalomaniac strongman" and refusing to say whether or not he even considers Trump an adult. But his public (and blunt) Facebook message against Trump's handling of Charlottesville reflects a larger trend of Republican lawmakers distancing themselves from the president after his week of flip-flopping on whether to denounce violent white nationalists.

Other highlights from Sasse's post:

"I expect that violence will come when white supremacists and the alt-right fight anarchist groups aligned with the extreme left."
"Besides ability and temperament, I also worry that national unity will be unlikely because there are some whispering in the President's ear that racial division could be good politics for them."

Why it really matters: September is just a few days away and Trump will need to push forward (and pass) various important legislation that will require the support of Republican lawmakers. (Think: increasing the debt ceiling, passing a budget to avoid a government shutdown, moving ahead on and introducing a proper tax reform plan, possibly revisiting the health care repeal.) Trump willingly ostracized Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake when he repeatedly attacked them on Twitter. But reactions like Sasse's show that other Republicans, who Trump hasn't targeted in recent weeks, are now choosing to alienate themselves from the president after months of seeing how little he values words and uniting the country.

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Axios
20 hrs ago

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"Where racists are born"

Andrew Harnik / AP

Kim Kingsley — former Politico COO, Henry Crown Fellow at The Aspen Institute, media consultant, Penn State proud — writes about her native Scranton, Pa in a post titled "My Life Lessons in Rust Belt Racism":

Anyone who knows me would say I wear my blue-collar roots as a badge of honor. This very white, working-class town and my big Irish family taught me a whole lot. My now 90-year-old, World War II veteran grandfather worked three jobs at a time — a high school janitor by morning; a railroad worker by night; and a father of nine, 24 hours a day.

Anyone sitting on a branch of this family tree learned the importance of family, faith and friendships — what it means to be loyal, what it means to have work ethic, and how to fight for the little guy.

But it's also in this town, like many white working-class cities across the U.S., where racists are born.

The Trump show's shrinking cast

Trump's circle is shrinking.

Going: Bloomberg: "Billionaire investor Carl Icahn has ended his role as a special regulatory adviser to President Donald Trump after questions were raised about potential conflicts of interests with his business dealings. In a letter to Trump posted Friday on Icahn's website, he denied profiting from his advice-giving role -- a possibility raised by Democratic critic."
Staying: "Trump's evangelical advisers sticking with him amid fallout," by AP Religion Writer Rachel Zoll: "Only one of Trump's evangelical advisers has quit the role ... The Rev. A.R. Bernard, pastor of the Christian Cultural Center in Brooklyn and one of the most influential clergymen in New York, announced his decision Friday night ... Trump won 80 percent of the white evangelical vote."

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Obama's first chief of staff: "I'm going to nominate this White House for a Tony Award for the most drama. Not the best drama, but the most drama."