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US antitrust investigators demand internal documents from Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon
The US House Judiciary Committee and antitrust subcommittee have sent letters to Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon, demanding access to executives' correspondence as part of their investigation into anticompetitive behaviour by the big four tech giants (The Guardian).
Committee chairman Jerrold Nadler said: “there is growing evidence that a handful of corporations have come to capture an outsized share of online commerce and communications.” It's only one of numerous US and international investigations into the firms, who've been criticised for practices including buying potential competitors and competing with other companies that use their sales platforms, such as smartphone app stores, using sales and user data from those platforms.
Disney CEO Bob Iger has left Apple's board
A US Securities and Exchange Commission filing by Apple shows that Disney CEO Bob Iger has resigned from iPhone maker's board(The Verge). Both Disney and Apple are on the verge of launching new, competing streaming TV services, so the move was inevitable, as conflicts of interest would prevent Iger from being present for any board discussions about the Apple TV Plus due to his close involvement in Disney+.
Apple's aggressive pricing may not be enough to save the iPhone
Last week, Apple priced its new entry-level iPhone 11 at $699 – that’s $50 (£40) cheaper than it had priced its equivalent, the iPhone XR, at the same time last year (WIRED). But more significantly, it then gave the XR a $150 (£120) discount and priced the two-year-old iPhone 8 at $449 (£479 UK price). For a company that is famous for premium pricing, Apple’s sudden shift to more affordable devices (even if it is its older line-up) comes as a surprise. But as its users have begun to upgrade less frequently, it's all part of a push to get more people into the company's ecosystem and, it hopes, subscribing to its streaming services.
New surveillance tech means you'll never be anonymous again
The fight over the future of facial recognition is heating up (WIRED). But it is just the beginning, as even more intrusive methods of surveillance are being developed in research labs around the world. As civil rights groups and legislators hasten to catch the law up to facial recognition tech many equally if not more invasive – potentially even harder to regulate – systems are being developed. WIRED takes a look at some of what might be coming down the pipeline.
Discord Nitro will end its bundled games library
Gaming-oriented chat service Discord has announced that, on October 15, it will close the bundled library of indie games that subscribers to its Nitro service get, because “the vast majority of Nitro subscribers didn’t play them” (VentureBeat). Instead, Nitro will now focus on its core communications features, including livestreaming and enhanced chat server features. Numerous games publishers, services and retailers have opened stores and free games libraries recently and the market will inevitably slim down in time.
Should your pets be vegan?
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This article was originally published by WIRED UK
