One of the biggest trends in gaming is the ability to play console games wherever you are, on whatever type of device, thanks to the magic of cloud streaming. The tricky part has been finding a way to bring such gaming to iOS — since Apple wants to review and approve each game as a separate app.
Yes, but: Google, Nvidia and Microsoft have decided to work around, rather than with, Apple's rules. In recent weeks, all three have announced plans to bring their game services to iOS via the web browser — the one big opening in the wall around Apple's garden.
Microsoft has brought on the government affairs firm Lot Sixteen to lobby on sustainability and climate change, a newly public filing shows.
Why it matters: While Microsoft has lots of in-house and outside lobbyists working on all sorts of things, it's the first time an outside firm will be lobbying only on climate and environmental topics, Microsoft confirmed.
President-elect Joe Biden will enter office with no fast fixes at hand to stem a tide of online misinformation that has shaped election-year politics and, unchecked, could undermine his presidency.
Where it stands: Election and coronavirus misinformation spreading widely on digital platforms has already done serious damage to the U.S., and it's bound to go into overdrive as the Biden administration starts enacting its agenda.
Air gondolas — ski-lift-type conveyances that have become common sights in Latin American cities like Medellín, Mexico City and La Paz — could one day dot the U.S. urban landscape, some transportation planners say.
Why it matters: These appealing and eco-friendly cable cars — serving commuters and tourists alike — move people quietly and expeditiously and seem tailor-made for the COVID-19 era, since they fit a small number of riders per car.
Facebook says it removed more than 265,000 pieces of content from Facebook and Instagram in the U.S. for violating its content policies on voter interference leading up to the election.
Why it matters: The company was much more proactive this election cycle than last in taking down and labeling content attempting to disrupt the election.
Facebook said it took action on 22.1 million pieces of hate speech content to its platform globally last quarter and about 6.5 million pieces of hate speech content on Instagram. On both platforms, it says about 95% of that hate speech was proactively identified and stopped by artificial intelligence.
Details: In total, the company says that there are 10–11 views of hate speech for every 10,000 views of content uploaded to the site globally — or .1%. It calls this metric — how much problematic content it doesn't catch compared to how much is reported and removed — "prevalence."
While many developers will benefit from Apple's move Wednesday to cut commissions for companies earning less than $1 million per year in App Store revenue, the company's critics derided the move as a cynical attempt to distract from what they see as Apple's broader anticompetitive business practices.
Why it matters: Apple's move appears designed to appease concerns from critics and regulators, but it's unclear how far it will go to assuage them. Thus far, not very.
Google announced a significant expansion of its Google Pay service on Wednesday, adding peer-to-peer payments to its contactless payment system as well as a partnership with banks to incorporate banking and checking services next year.
Why it matters: Contactless payments can be a gateway to other financial services, as Apple has shown by expanding from Apple Pay to Apple Card.
The VC firm Brown Venture Group has agreed to invest seed funding in Ecolution kWh, a startup looking to commercialize tech that stores and dispatches kinetic energy from vehicle motion, the companies said Wednesday.
Driving the news: The amount of Brown Venture Group's financing was not disclosed, but the firm will be the lead investor in a seed round that's targeting at least $3 million, according to Ecolution.
With the Federal Trade Commission expected to unveil long-awaited antitrust action against Facebook in the near future, the agency's mixed record on regulating tech has experts viewing the case as a "put up or shut up" moment.
The big picture: Most of the tech cases the FTC has tackled involve consumer protection rather than restraining monopolistic behavior. Past antitrust investigations of tech mergers or companies, like a review of Google that ended in 2013, led critics to paint the FTC as toothless.
Executives and senior managers say they will prioritize hiring candidates who have skills in automation and AI, according to a survey first shared with Axios.
Why it matters: Automation hasn't yet transformed the business world, in part because companies don't yet know how to harness these new technologies. If that's going to happen, they'll need workers who know how to use AI.
