Today's tech news is extra premium.
So it's sponsored by Cerdo, software that helps detect threats on iPhones.
We'll have more to say about them later, but until then, speaking of iPhones and premiums,
Apple just got fined 1.8 billion euros,
or almost $2 billion by the EU after Spotify
complained about the company's anti-competitive app store practices.
Ah, Apple and anti-competition. A love story for the ages.
While that might not sound like a lot for a multi-trillion dollar company,
the fine is almost four times larger than expected and actually caused Apple to lose $80 billion
in market value. The fine was levied after the European Commission
discovered that Apple bans music streaming app developers
from telling iOS users about cheaper subscription services outside their apps
and also bans them from providing any instructions
on how to subscribe to said cheaper options. These shocking facts were uncovered
by an exhaustive investigation lasting hundreds of seconds.
It probably costs a lot though. These practices undertaken by Apple are illegal under EU law.
They have such good laws there and the bloc has ordered the company to stop it now.
Unsurprisingly, Spotify is happy with the decision, while Apple pretty miffed Tim Cook and the boys.
Tim Cook and the boys. Tim Cook and the boys, they say that
they plan to appeal the ruling, claiming that the commission failed to uncover
any credible evidence of consumer harm. I mean, people love being overcharged.
Isn't that why they buy iPhones? Intel is shaking things up
with their upcoming Aero Lake processors. At least that's according to reports
from a reputable Chinese leaker, Golden Pig Upgrade,
which is also the title of a movie cataloging my glow up through college.
In a post on Billy Billy translated by video cards, the leaker claimed that Aero Lake is highly unlikely
to be named 15th gen and will instead be Core Ultra Processor Series 2.
According to WCCF Tech, this means Intel's 14th gen Raptor Lake CPUs
will be the last lineup to use separate naming schemes for desktop and mobile processors.
Furthermore, Golden Pig States Aero Lake will ditch low power eCores and hyper threading
and will only feature up to four Xe cores, Z cores,
half the amount of Xe cores Meteor Lake God. Even more shocking,
despite Intel hyping up their 20 angstrom process, the leaks suggest that most of Aero Lake
will use TSMC nodes. Apparently only mid-range Aero Lake processors
with six P cores and eight E cores will actually use Intel's 28,
but it's unclear if that's just for mobile CPUs
or for desktop SKUs as well. This is of course all unverified,
so we'll have to wait and see when Aero Lake actually launches,
but these allegations could still affect Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger's chances
of being named this year's sexiest Pat Gelsinger alive
by People Magazine. He's in convention.
Meta has decided to stop paying Australian news publishers
after the company's current deal expires. Meta signed agreements in 2021
after the country's news media bargaining code took effect. The legislation allows the government
to designate digital platforms like Facebook as subject to certain obligations
if it is determined that there is a significant bargaining power imbalance between said platforms
and Aussie news businesses. So far, no platforms have been designated
due to agreements like the one Meta has decided to end.
But after Meta announced their decision last week, while also stating that they would be deprecating
Facebook's dedicated news tab in Australia and the US,
the Australian government is looking to take action against the Czech giant.
For its part, Meta claims that this decision was made to better align their investments
with their services that people value the most, claiming the use of Facebook news in Australia
and the US had dropped by 80% in the last year.
Meta has also claimed that news makes up less than 3%
of what people see in their Facebook feed. But the Aussie government has fought back
against that statistics. They say the company has de-prioritized news content.
Personally, I agree. The reason only 3% of what you see on Facebook is news
is because 17% of what you see are angry posts from older relatives and 80% are ads.
Quick bits are like a box of chocolates. If that box only fit five chocolates
and the chocolates were actually small news stories,
you eat them with your ears. Apple is facing a class action lawsuit
over alleged anti-competitive behavior in the cloud storage market this time.
A complaint filed in California accuses the company of restricting
certain Apple device file types to only back up to iCloud,
things like app data and device settings. The filing alleges this allows Apple
to stifle competition and inflate prices, making iCloud one of the company's most profitable products.
The lead plaintiff's representation, the Hagan's Berman law firm,
has brought multiple class actions against Apple in the past,
including the 2011 lawsuit over price fixing in the Apple Books app.
It makes sense if there's anyone that knows something about overcharging.
It's a lawyer. AMD's CTO has teased AI-powered FSR
in an interview with YouTube channel NoPriors.
A lot of letters in there, but whatever. During the conversation, the AMD executive and master of paper,
Mark Papermaster said, we're enabling our gaming devices
to upscale using AI, and 2024 is really a huge deployment year for us.
At this point, we aren't sure if this AI upscaling will be limited to new hardware
like what NVIDIA does, or if it'll be more accessible for older cards.
All we know for sure is that Mark Papermaster possesses at least 1,000 origami cranes,
and they do his bidding. Google seems to be planning to add a satellite SOS feature
to Pixel phones based on an update for the Adaptive Connectivity Services apps.
According to Google News on Telegram, the feature sounds very similar to iPhone's emergency SOS
via satellite functionality. Unlike Apple's version though, satellite SOS teases a partnership with Garmin.
Based on screenshots, users will be able to purchase Garmin's search
and rescue insurance, cool. I mean, the last thing you want to be worrying about
while you're fighting for your life after falling off a cliff is if you can even afford
to get your ARM reattached. Thanks Garmin. Google has reportedly approached Meta to partner
on its in development Android XR platform only to find themselves coldly rejected,
which is basically like getting turned down for prom by that weird kid who bites.
According to Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth, affectionately known as Bos,
who confirmed the story, Meta would love to work with Google to create a cohesive VR ecosystem.
It's just that Google's terms are just too restrictive.
Meta's quest already uses an Android fork as its OS,
but they probably prefer to make their platform a standard rather than submit to Google's demands.
Demands like, go to prom with me and stop biting.
Some people like the biting. And China has plans to expand
its already massive video surveillance network, casually known as Skynet to the moon
as security for the unmanned research station the country plans to start building in 2028.
The system will reportedly monitor both infrared and visible light spectrum using three
and a half ounce cameras equipped with AI chips capable of identifying, locating, tracking
and aiming at suspicious targets independently.
If the system detects abnormalities, it will sound an alarm
and initiate appropriate response measures like sending a high tech cyborg assassin back in time
to kill the mother of the human resistance leader to prevent him from ever being born.
This could be a movie. And a new episode of TechLink will be born on Wednesday.
I can't promise you'll be lightning and semi trucks getting chopped in half,
but you better watch it anyway or else it'll find you.