Tech

Social media giant, Facebook says that it would rather cut people’s access to news in Australia than comply with the country’s proposed law which would make it pay local news publishers. On Tuesday local time Facebook said that it would stop allowing news publishers and individuals in Australia from sharing local and international news via

Teddy Riley can remember the first time he experimented with the concept of 3D audio, nearly 30 years ago during the making of Michael Jackson’s “Dangerous.” Using the now-defunct Roland RSS Space Sound Compressor, Riley filtered his voice through the gear to create a surround-sound “5-4-3-2-1” countdown during the intro of Jackson’s 1991 single “Jam”

SoundExchange has announced the appointment of Esther-Mireya Tejeda as chief marketing and communications officer. Tejeda will report to SoundExchange President and CEO Michael Huppe. According to the announcement, Tejeda will oversee the company’s brand strategy and marketing, global communications and public relations, industry relations, and public policy groups as well as a team of nearly

David Blaine nixed his plan to float over the Hudson River from New Jersey to New York City strapped to a bunch of helium balloons, blaming logistical challenges. Instead, the magician and performer will attempt to perform the stunt — which is being bankrolled by YouTube as an original livestreaming special — more than 2,000

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg conceded in a town-hall meeting with employees this week that the social giant fell down on the job in failing to remove a militia group’s “call to arms” that had urged followers to engage in violence amid the unrest in Kenosha, Wisc., following the shooting of a Black man. “It was

Both Madison Square Garden in New York and the Forum in Los Angeles will be converted into voting locations for the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Earlier today, the NBA announced plans to use its arenas for polling, a move that impacted the decision to offer the Forum up for voting, though the Inglewood, Calif. arena

Apple has officially booted “Fortnite” and other Epic Games titles off the App Store: On Friday, the tech giant suspended the games company’s developer account amid their ongoing legal brawl. The suspension of Epic’s developer account means that users can’t download “Fortnite” (or other Epic games) from the Apple App Store or update them. Apple’s

Condé Nast named Dawn Davis, a 25-year veteran of the book publishing business and a prominent editor in the field, as editor-in-chief of Bon Appétit. Her appointment comes after the June ouster of former EIC Adam Rapoport amid allegations of racial discrimination at the food-media brand. In the last month, several people of color who had

In virtual deal talks over the past several months, Roku execs have delivered a basic message — in not so many words — to WarnerMedia and NBCUniversal negotiators: You need us more than we need you. So far, Roku is refusing to cede ground on deal terms to add WarnerMedia’s HBO Max and NBCU’s Peacock to

Walmart is the latest to jump into the fast-moving bidding war for TikTok, as the retailing giant said Thursday that it is partnering with Microsoft on a deal to acquire the app. As first reported by CNBC, Walmart said it believes TikTok’s integration of e-commerce and advertising in the popular video-sharing app would be a

Spotify signed a deal with Rickey Thompson and Denzel Dion, best friends and popular fashion and lifestyle influencers, for an exclusive weekly podcast series. The two L.A.-based comedic internet stars, who first rose to fame on the now-defunct Vine app, have sizable followings on Instagram, YouTube and TikTok — a fanbase Spotify is banking on

Kevin Mayer has stepped down as CEO of TikTok, just months after taking the job and after recent pressure by President Trump over the app’s security, Variety has confirmed. Mayer sent a letter to TikTok and ByteDance employees on Wednesday night, announcing his decision. “In recent weeks, as the political environment has sharply changed, I have done

Popular podcast host and cultural commentator Joe Budden said he will leave Spotify after a two-year exclusive run of his “The Joe Budden Podcast with Rory and Mal” on the service, claiming the audio provider is “pillaging” his audience. In his most recent podcast episode on Wednesday, Aug. 26, Budden spent the better part of

Investors mounted a new rally behind Netflix, with shares of the streamer jumping 11.6% on Wednesday, to close at $547.53 per share, near the stock’s all-time high. The bump gives Netflix a market capitalization of more than $241 billion, and the stock is just shy of its peak closing price of $548.73 per share on

Toss a coin to your smartphone: A new mobile game set in “The Witcher” fantasy universe is in development, in which players encounter deadly beasts in the world around them — and, of course, must kill them in creative ways. “The Witcher: Monster Slayer” is a free-to-play augmented reality and location-based role-playing game. The first-person

Mark Cuban is gunning for a 2020 Emmy Award with “Shark Tank,” the entrepreneur reality-competition show he co-hosts on ABC, and the billionaire investor says he’s still as gung-ho as ever on the business-pitch series as it enters its 12th season. “Shark Tank” just completed the first round of shooting for the upcoming season, which

Does the world need another streaming entertainment recommendations app? Bingie co-founder and CEO Joey Lane believes there’s a big opportunity for his company to stake out territory as a new virtual watercooler for finding out about — and discussing — new TV shows and movies. Bingie, which carries the tagline “Never wonder what to watch

Bella Thorne set a new record on subscription-based social platform OnlyFans: The actor, model and influencer officially earned over $1 million through revenue on the platform in the first 24 hours after debuting her account, according to the company. Thorne announced her plans to launch on OnlyFans in a video montage posted to Instagram on

Facebook is preparing to mount a legal challenge to the Thai government order that this week forced it to block content posted by an anti-monarchist group. Facebook began blocking access within Thailand to a group called Royalist Marketplace, which was formed in April and had over a million followers. The site “provides a platform for

Apple has quietly made another small virtual-reality acquisition: The company has bought Spaces, a developer of location-based VR experiences that recently pivoted to launch a VR extension for videoconferencing platforms like Zoom and Skype. An Apple rep confirmed the purchase but declined to comment further (as is its usual policy). The acquisition was first reported

There have been a lot of virtual festivals in the past six months of lockdown, but the one taking place from Sept. 1 through the 3 rd is likely to be different: Megan Thee Stallion, Lil Baby, Phoebe Bridgers, Sam Hunt, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats and other artists will perform at “Red Rocks

While summer technically goes on for another month and Labor Day is a two weeks away, Spotify has unveiled its Songs of Summer and Podcasts of Summer, based on streaming data between June 1-August 15. The full lists are included at the bottom of this note. Coming in at the most-streamed Song of Summer 2020

Audible has announced a new service being introduced in preview that will provide unlimited listening to a curated library of audio entertainment. Audible Plus will provide subscribers access to 68,000 hours of content from more than 11,000 original productions, audiobooks, and podcasts. The new offering will be available for $7.95 per month. Audible will continue

Twitter has hidden a tweet by President Trump and labeled it “misleading” after he said certain election ballot drop boxes are not “Covid sanitized” and threaten voter security. Trump sent the tweet on Sunday morning, writing “So now the Democrats are using Mail Drop Boxes, which are a voter security disaster. Among other things, they

The Suicide Squad is ready to take on Superman — and, well, the entire Justice League. Rocksteady Games revealed the cinematic trailer for its upcoming “Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League” video game at DC FanDome, giving fans a first look at the mayhem slated to come to game consoles and PC. In the teaser,

L.A. residents and other Californians followed the real-time plot twists Thursday of the status of the two major ride-sharing services — Uber and Lyft — which had threatened to suspend service in the state. The issue: Uber and Lyft were set to be subject to a recently-enacted California labor law, Assembly Bill 5 (aka AB5),

Universal Filmed Entertainment Group has its head in the cloud — and now it’s going to push its production teams there. The company has embarked on a major multiyear strategy to move its studios’ film and TV production from in-house servers to the Microsoft Azure cloud computing platform. The goal is to let creatives collaborate

Comedian Randy Rainbow is in hot water after tweets have resurfaced online in which Rainbow uses racist and transphobic language. Rainbow, who identifies as gay, is most well-known for his parody songs and political spoofs targeting Donald Trump. Though much of his content comes from his YouTube channel, he appeared on an episode of “RuPaul’s

This is a bit meta: Spotify enlisted Ashley Graham for a new limited-series talk show about her favorite podcasts… which will stream on Instagram Live. Spotify is hoping to get more exposure for its podcast lineup by getting in front of the supermodel and entrepreneur’s 11.2 million followers on Instagram with the live show. It’s

Facebook said it removed hundreds of Facebook Pages, groups and Instagram accounts tied to conspiracy-theorist cult QAnon as well as those of “offline anarchist groups” including those that identify with the Antifa movement. The social giant said that it is restricting such groups’ ability to organize on its platforms, saying it will allow users to