Axios

Amazon has been considering locating its second headquarters in Boston, a person briefed on the matter told Bloomberg. That push is coming from "several senior" Amazon executives, Bloomberg's Spencer Soper reports.

Why it matters: Amazon says its new headquarters will cost $5 billion and create 50,000 jobs over about 15 to 17 years.

A source briefed on the matter said Boston's advantages include its proximity to Harvard and MIT, direct flights to Seattle and Washington, D.C. and a lower cost of living than some other big cities. Boston Mayor Marty Walsh was enthusiastic last week about Amazon's search, tweeting that it was "an incredible opportunity."

Go deeper:

• Other contenders for the second headquarters
• The bidding process

Update: Amazon has now replied to the report on Twitter saying, "Bloomberg is incorrect - there are no front-runners at this point. We're just getting started & every city is on equal playing field"

Russian operatives with reported links to the Russian government remotely organized anti-immigrant rallies in the U.S. by using Facebook Events, The Daily Beast reports.

The events reportedly included an August 2016 anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim rally in Idaho. The Facebook page behind that event had 133,000 followers when the social network shut it down last month.

The Trump administration took its first step into the regulation of self-driving cars and trucks that could transform the nation's roadways. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao rolled out updated voluntary guidelines for the vehicles during an appearance in Michigan:

• They clarify that you don't need to get pre-approval from the Department of Transportation before deploying a autonomous vehicles, the department's agency tasked with the issue said on Tuesday. That's in line with the industry-friendly leanings of the Trump administration.
• They also make other changes industry will appreciate, like pulling back on data-sharing requirements for companies and removing privacy from a clear part of the guidance, the agency said.
• And the guidelines clear up the role of state and federal governments. Automakers and technology companies don't want a patchwork of state safety regulations.

The big picture: Federal authorities are trying to stake out their place in dealing with self-driving technology as Detroit and Silicon Valley race ahead. The House has already approved a bill that would accelerate testing, and the Senate is in the process of vetting a similar proposal.

We (briefly) got our hands on one the iPhone X demo units after Apple introduced the high-end device. Here are some quick impressions, followed by a video of the device in action.

Apple's big event matched exactly what had leaked and what we said to expect. Apple has introduced the iPhone X, the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, as well as a cellular-equipped Apple Watch and an updated Apple TV.

Thanks to some rather unprecedented leaking from within Apple's walls, we already know a great deal about what Apple is set to show off today at its brand new headquarters.

Count on three new iPhones (incremental updates to the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus, along with a high-end model with edge-to-edge screen, facial recognition and wireless charging capabilities). In addition, Apple is expected to introduce a cellular-equipped Apple Watch and an updated version of the Apple TV set-top box. Oh yeah, and iOS 11 will arrive for devices new and old.What matters most: The new iPhone dwarfs the other products in importance, as it accounts for a huge chunk of Apple's sales and profits and is critical to the company's long-term future. This iPhone, in particular, is expected to push the company in new directions as it uses a new screen technology, a different form of biometrics for securing the device and purchases, and also serves as a gateway into augmented reality.Competitive pressure: The new iPhone is paramount for Apple to maintain its edge in the face of stiff competition: Samsung and LG just introduced new phones and Google is expected to do so soon.Here are three things I'll be watching for:What do all the 3D sensors on the high-end iPhone do in addition to face recognition? I'd expect that Face ID will be the signature use, but also imagine the sensors could pave the way for more. One leaked use is to create animated emoji that mirror someone's facial expression, and I imagine there will be a lot more to come. Price and availability: As we've reported, we expect the high-end model of the iPhone to be in especially short supply. Knowing this, Apple could price it even higher than expected to ensure enough business goes to the more incremental updates, which should be easier for Apple to ship sooner. There'll be a fair bit of complaining about a high price tag, but I suspect many of those complaining will be the same ones willing to stay up until midnight to pre-order the high-end model. There's more price flexibility for phones in the U.S. given the fact most people pay in monthly installments.Augmented reality: ARKit, Apple's toolkit to make augmented reality apps mainstream, has been the iOS 11 feature developers have been most excited about and I'd expect Apple to have a much more complete story around it. Developers have been hard at work building ARKit apps based on the capabilities in iOS 11. With its dual camera and additional sensors, the new phone may be capable of even more tricks than prior devices running the new software.Plus: There are a couple of Apple products promised for this year that won't be ready to launch Tuesday. Apple has said a professional version of the iMac and the HomePod speaker should launch by December. It will be interesting to see what, if anything, Apple has to say about either product.Parting thought: There's little doubt that today's product launch will inspire many people to open their wallets. Perhaps just as important is whether, a decade in, a new iPhone can still manage to stir people's passion.

Cruise, the self-driving car startup that sold to General Motors last year, has reached a new milestone: it has a self-driving car model, based on its Bolt electric vehicle, that's now ready for the factory production line and ride-hailing passengers.

Why it matters: Cruise touts this new development as a giant step that puts it ahead of the competition. No one else, the company claims, has a "production design" self-driving car ready to roll off the factory line. This is also a reminder that unlike startups in the space, Cruise has the resources of a century-old automaker.

A leaked version of iOS 11 over the weekend confirmed much of what was already known and suspected about the new iPhones and other Apple devices.

• There will be three new iPhones. Two are incremental updates to the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus while the third is the all-new design with the edge-to-edge screen and lack of a physical home button. The leak suggests the phones will bear the names iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus, and iPhone X.
• As we have reported, the face recognition feature on the iPhone X will be a big, big deal.
• The Apple Watch will come in a connected, LTE-equipped version.

The sign hanging in T-Mobile COO Mike Sievert's office tells you much about his philosophy and that of T-Mobile USA:

Orville Wright did not have a pilot's license.

Its moves: In the past five years, T-Mobile has helped change much about the U.S. mobile industry, from ending two-year contracts and spurring a return to unlimited data, to free streaming of music and video. It's also helped move T-Mobile from a distant No. 4 to a feisty No. 3 that is consistently stealing customers from larger rivals AT&T and Verizon.

"Our strategy is working," Sievert said in an interview at the company's headquarters in the Seattle suburb of Bellevue. "AT&T, Sprint and Verizon are all in service revenue decline and have been for a while we're growing significantly."

Mobile World Congress Americas kicks off today in San Francisco, and on the docket is plenty of talk about 5G technology and how it will power the Internet of Things, mobile entertainment and connected cars. Ahead of the show, Axios caught up with Meredith Attwell Baker, former Commerce Department official and FCC Commissioner who is now the wireless industry's chief lobbyist in Washington.

Why it matters: The wireless industry can't seem to get it's hands on enough airwaves to power networks to handle demand by smartphone-obsessed consumers. Wireless streaming and other content-rich applications are only increasing the competition for bandwidth. 5G networks take advantage of high-frequency airwaves that don't travel as far, raising the need for twice as many cell sites to power them.

IBM has donated $240 million to MIT for a new joint laboratory to research artificial intelligence, instantly producing one of the richest academic-industry efforts in the world. Anantha Chandrakasan, MIT's new dean of engineering, told Axios that the 10-year IBM grant is the result of discussions that began only in the summer, and will result in the establishment of the MIT–IBM Watson AI Lab.

The lab, to involve more than 100 AI scientists from both IBM and MIT, will conduct fundamental research and encourage faculty and students to spin out companies from discoveries they develop.

The lab's establishment comes amid an AI research-and-commercialization frenzy at universities, in Silicon Valley and in tech companies around the world, all attempting to capture part of what is seen as an inflection point in the next economy — the shift to intelligent products. In 2015, for instance, Toyota announced more than $1 billion in funding for its own center, plus research at both MIT and Stanford.