Shock and surprise were the predominant emotions bustling through ByteDance employees when their softly spoken founder Zhang Yiming announced that he will be stepping down as CEO of what has been described to be the world’s biggest unicorn. Zhang – a 38-year-old billionaire estimated by Forbes to have a net worth of $35.6 billion – […]
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Turkey’s competition watchdog said Friday it was told by WhatsApp that the chat app won’t apply a controversial privacy update following an investigation, but the announcement was contradicted by the Facebook-owned app, which said it still plans to roll out the update for Turkish users. It’s a fresh sign of the confusion between regulators and […]
There’s a wild card in the push to return to pre-pandemic life: Many workers don’t want to go back to the jobs they once had. Layoffs and lockdowns, combined with enhanced unemployment benefits and stimulus checks, gave many Americans the time and the financial cushion to rethink their careers. Their former employers are hiring again […]
Two amateur computer coders taken by police from their Beijing homes last year were standing trial Tuesday in a case that illustrates the Chinese government’s growing online censorship and heightened sensitivity to any deviation from the official narrative on its COVID-19 response. Authorities have not said specifically why Chen Mei, 28, and Cai Wei, 27, […]
AOL and Yahoo are being sold again, this time to a private equity firm. Wireless company Verizon will sell Verizon Media, which consists of the once-pioneering tech platforms, to Apollo Global Management in a $5 billion deal. Verizon said Monday that it will keep a 10% stake in the new company, which will be called […]
Sony Interactive Entertainment and Discord announced on Monday a partnership that will see the popular gaming-focused chat app integrated within the PlayStation’s in-house social tools, both companies said in a joint statement. While the brief announcement didn’t specify the nature of the partnership, it highlighted a promise to “bring the Discord and PlayStation experiences closer […]
Facebook’s stock jumped Wednesday into record territory after the social media giant reported stronger-than-expected results for the first quarter thanks to soaring ad revenue. CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the extra money means the company will invest more in new areas of potential growth — including augmented and virtual reality, commerce, business messaging and content creators, […]
Samsung Electronics said Thursday its operating profit for the last quarter jumped 46% from a year earlier driven by increased sales of smartphones and televisions as its business continues to flourish amid the pandemic. The South Korean tech giant also said its quarterly revenue of 65.39 trillion won ($59 billion) was its highest for the […]
Last week, the Indian Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology urged several social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram to take down user content critical of the nation’s response to the COVID-19 outbreak as cases go on a sharp rise yet again. Over 100 such take-down requests were sent out to stamp out […]
Microsoft’s profits soared during the first three months of 2021, thanks to ongoing demand for its software and cloud computing services during the pandemic. The company on Tuesday reported fiscal third-quarter profit of $14.8 billion, up 38% from the same period last year. “Over a year into the pandemic, digital adoption curves aren’t slowing down. […]