To better compete with Amazon, Walmart is reinventing itself from a big box retailer into a tech powerhouse, starting with the 2016 purchase of Jet.com. Other recent deals in this vein include a partnership with Alphabet’s Waymo to provide rides to and from its stores; Uber, Lyft and Postmates deals for grocery delivery; and another with Japan’s Rakuten for Kobo e-readers. Last month, Walmart switched its cloud operations to Microsoft Azure and Office 365 and inked a five-year deal to work with Microsoft on AI projects. Read more

After years of fending off federal attempts to regulate handling of private data, some tech companies are now working with policy makers to create federal privacy laws. The Information Technology Industry Council, which represents Amazon, Facebook, Alphabet’s Google and Salesforce, hopes that federal legislation would preempt state regulations, such as the strict online privacy laws recently adopted by California, and create a single regulation rather than a confusing array of multiple state laws. Read more

Sony Music, EMI Music, Universal Music, and Warner Bros. Records, among others, filed a piracy liability lawsuit against Cox Communications, claiming the ISP ignores persistent lawbreakers using its network. The suit lists more than 10,000 copyrighted works, and damages could potentially exceed $1 billion. Under U.S. law, copyright holders send takedown notices to ISPs to warn them of subscribers sharing copyrighted material and the ISP is obliged to cut off repeat offenders “in appropriate circumstances.” Read more

The U.S. Department of Justice stated it is now reviewing the so-called Paramount consent decrees, settlements struck between 1948 and 1952 that govern the way movie studios do business with movie theaters. The DoJ’s announcement was unexpected, and could have major implications for how Hollywood does business. Those 70-year old decrees broke up Hollywood studios’ monopoly over production, distribution and exhibition by making them sell their theater chains. The review is aimed at ending outdated antitrust judgments. Read more

Although Q3 is typically Apple’s weakest quarter, the company revealed stellar revenue, proof of its success in finding ways to grow in a diminished global smartphone market. Chief executive Tim Cook said the company is reaching into emerging markets and expanding its services business, to achieve “strong double-digit growth in revenue.” According to Apple finance chief Luca Maestri, demand for the iPhone X, 8 and 8 Plus have been steady. On Tuesday, Apple’s market value hit $950 billion. By Thursday, Apple had become the first U.S. company to exceed $1 trillion in market value. Read more