Music streaming powerhouse Spotify is expanding its narrative footprint with the acquisition of audiobook distributor Findaway. The purchase brings Spotify a large catalog of audiobooks as well new revenue streams not only through audiobook sales and subscriptions, but through units like Findaway Voices, which provides turnkey services for authors who want their writings recorded. Spotify’s evolution to all-things-audio follows the company’s Q3 announcement that its podcasting business had overtaken market leader Apple in terms of downloads. Spotify says it expects the global audiobook sector to grow from $3.3 billion today to $15 billion by 2027. Continue reading Spotify Targets Audiobook Market with Purchase of Findaway

Apple is accelerating its plans to enter the self-driving car market, with 2025 the new target date to launch a fully automated electric vehicle that the company is hoping to produce without steering wheel or pedals, although an emergency takeover mode is under discussion. Interior designs under consideration are said to look radically different than today’s cars, with u-shaped or side-facing seating configurations. Apple’s secretive car venture, known as Project Titan, is being led by technology vice president Kevin Lynch, who was instrumental in the success of the Apple Watch. Continue reading Apple Eyes an Earlier Launch Date for Its Self-Driving Vehicles

Quantum startup QuEra Computing has emerged from stealth mode with a splashy announcement of $17 million in funding and completion of a 256-qubit device the company says “will be soon accessible to customers.” Launched in 2019 by scientists from Harvard and MIT, the Boston-based firm claims to have already generated $11 million in revenue from its scalable machines in a white-hot quantum space that includes tech giants including Amazon, IBM and Google jockeying for position. QuEra’s approach leverages what the company calls “nature’s perfect qubits,” based on 256-qubit atoms. Continue reading Startup QuEra Is Making Major Strides in Quantum Computing

In what’s billed as a major triumph in the “right to repair” movement, Apple says it will begin selling the parts and tools to allow people to make their own iPhone repairs. The movement gained momentum in July when the FTC announced it would step up enforcement against tech firms that made gadget repairs difficult for consumers and small businesses. Microsoft, which along with Apple, Google and Amazon had lobbied against the FTC effort, in October announced it was joining Dell, HP and Motorola in getting a jump on “right to repair” legislation. Continue reading Apple Self Service Repair Shop Is Good News for Consumers

TikTok has added a Safety Center to its platform, simultaneously releasing a 38-page summary of the months-long global research project on the impact its challenges and hoaxes have on adolescent users. The study — which queried more than 10,000 teens, their parents, and teachers across Asia, Europe and the Americas — was written by independent agency Praesidio Safeguarding. The move is a response to negative attention TikTok has received from media and lawmakers involving allegations of “blackout challenges” and slap-a-teacher dares. Critics are saying the social video platform’s new safety features do not go far enough. Continue reading TikTok Debuts Safety Center Following Survey on Teen Users

Netflix has changed its audience measurement system to reflect the total number of hours viewed. The streaming service had previously ranked viewership based on users who watched at least two minutes of a program. The company has also switched to a weekly schedule of releasing viewer data rather than quarterly. The Korean drama “Squid Game” remains Netflix’s No. 1 show of all time, having accrued a massive 1.65 billion hours of viewing in the 28 days following its September 17 premiere. That’s about 2.6 times the viewership of No. 2 “Bridgerton,” with 625 million hours. Continue reading Netflix Updates Measurement Charts to Include Viewing Hours

China is furthering its protectionist goals by accelerating a plan to replace non-native technology with local suppliers. Reports surfaced this week that Beijing’s Information Technology Application Innovation Working Committee (ITAIWC) will be vetting and approving everything from cloud services to semiconductors for sensitive sectors like banking and government data centers, a market projected to be worth $125 billion by 2025. The secretive, government-backed committee formed under Xi Jinping in 2016 will also have a decisive role in setting industry standards and training personnel to operate approved hardware and software. Continue reading Chinese Committee Is Drafting Plans to Replace Foreign Tech

Meta’s Reality Labs division has previewed a haptic glove designed to give the user sensation of handling a real object when manipulating things that only exist digitally in virtual space. Reality Labs, a division of Facebook prior to that company’s renaming as Meta Platforms, has spent seven years working on a haptic glove prototype, now rolled into Meta’s announced 2021 spending of $10 billion to develop hardware, software and apps for the metaverse — an AR/VR fused world conjured through digital sight, sound and touch. Companies including HaptX, Hi5, Manus and SenseGlove have also demonstrated haptic gloves, an increasingly competitive field. Continue reading Meta Reality Labs Haptic Glove Aims for VR Touch Sensation

As the race to commercialize quantum computing heats up, IBM has unveiled its Eagle 127-qubit processor, positioning it as the first quantum chip that can’t be simulated by a classic supercomputer. Speaking at the IBM Quantum Summit, executives said the Eagle is the first IBM quantum processor to contain more than 100 qubits. It follows the 65-qubit Hummingbird processor debuted by IBM in 2020 and the 27-qubit Falcon of 2019. Eagle is the latest step on the scaling path to the “quantum advantage,” the point at which quantum systems can outperform their classical counterparts in a meaningful way. Continue reading Eagle Chip: 127-Qubit Milestone in IBM’s Quantum Roadmap

Facebook’s internal experiments with turning off its News Feed algorithm revealed that users benefit from the often-controversial ranking system. Documents recently parsed by the news media indicate Facebook’s digital formula knows more about what users want than the users themselves when it comes to deciding which posts people see and in what order. The news comes as both the House of Representatives and Senate consider bills that would require social media platforms to offer users the option of disabling what’s known as “automated content recommendations.” The bills follow whistleblower allegations that Facebook’s News Feed is damaging to users. Continue reading Automated News Feed May Be Good for Facebook and Users

GeForce NOW’s six-month $100 tier that let’s players game using the equivalent of an RTX 3080 rig has officially been proclaimed “a big deal” by tech media, due to the fact that the top-rated $700 graphics card is virtually unavailable for legions of would-be purchasers (described as camping out at stores and resorting to truck heists to obtain them). After Google’s Stadia service was shuttered in February, some questioned whether cloud gaming had a viable future. First movers in the game space seem to feel GeForce NOW has provided a quality option. Continue reading Nvidia Brings Power Gaming to the Cloud with GeForce NOW

Cerebras Systems has raised $250 million in a series F funding round, bringing the Sunnyvale, California-based firm’s value to more than $4 billion, according to the company. Cerebras makes what is described as the world’s fastest chip, the Wafer Scale Engine 2 (WSE-2). Investment from Alpha Wave Ventures and Abu Dhabi Growth Fund will allow Cerebras to make the CS-2 AI accelerator compute system designed around the turbo-charged WSE-2 chips available to new customers globally in what co-founder and CEO Andrew Feldman describes as the “democratization of AI.” Continue reading AI Firm Cerebras Systems Raises $250 Million in New Funding

Sky Glass, the streaming television platform that Comcast offers European customers as an alternative to dish-delivered Sky Q, has begun generating reviews. Billed as a turn-key smart TV solution, Sky Glass features a 4K display, HDR10, HLG and Dolby Vision, a built-in set-top-box and six-speaker Dolby Atmos. It also touts wake-word voice commands at the press of a button and multiscreen functionality via the Sky Stream Puck. However, as a walled garden Sky Glass is said to lack the versatility of Android TV or LG’s webOS TV platforms. Continue reading Comcast’s Sky Glass 4K QLED Smart TV: The Pros and Cons

Sports Illustrated makes its Snapchat debut with “America’s Best Sports Videos.” The Snap Original series aims to connect the 67-year-old sports franchise with younger audiences through user-generated footage debuting Fridays. According to Snap, more than 85 percent of the Gen Z population watched a Snap Originals video in the second half of 2020. Snap users can access the program by scanning SI’s unique Snapcode or searching by title on the Snapchat Discover page. The show is hosted by 28-year-old Ashley Nicole Moss, host and co-creator of SI’s “Laces Out” series about sneaker culture. Continue reading Sports Illustrated Launches Original Video Series on Snapchat

The MoviePass subscription theater ticket service appears on track for a re-launch. The company was purchased by one of its original co-founders, Stacy Spikes, as a liquidated asset of parent company Helios and Matheson Analytics, which filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 2020. Spikes was upon launch in 2011 the CEO of MoviePass, which Helios acquired in 2017. He released a statement last week confirming the acquisition, which was “encouraged by the continued interest from the moviegoing community,” and said he hopes to relaunch the service next year with new investors. Continue reading Co-Founder Acquires MoviePass, Aims to Relaunch Next Year