Tag: meta platforms

Apple retreats in fight to defend App Store in Europe
13Mar By adminNo Comments
Technology

Apple retreats in fight to defend App Store in Europe

[ad_1] Apple made a major concession in its battle to protect the dominance of its App Store on iPhones and other devices in Europe on Tuesday, saying developers will be free to distribute their apps directly to consumers.Apple announced the changes to comply with the European Union's Digital Markets Act (DMA), which kicked in last week. The changes could dent the high profit margins and steady stream of revenue that Apple has come to rely on from its App store, where it charges developers fees of up to 30%. The changes, which affect only the European Union, come amid continuing criticism from rivals that Apple's compliance efforts are falling short. Beginning this spring, software developers operating in Europe will be able to distribute apps to EU customers directly from their own web...
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Trump calls TikTok a threat but says some kids could ‘go crazy’ without it
12Mar By adminNo Comments
Technology

Trump calls TikTok a threat but says some kids could ‘go crazy’ without it

[ad_1] U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Monday that TikTok was a national security threat but also said that a ban on the popular app would hurt some kids and only strengthen Meta Platforms' Facebook, which the Republican has harshly criticized.Trump reiterated his concerns as lawmakers weigh a bill this week that would give TikTok owner ByteDance about six months to divest the popular short video app. The U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote on Wednesday on legislation that gives China's ByteDance a quick deadline to divest the popular TikTok short video app used by 170 million Americans. The House is voting under fast-track rules that require two-thirds of members to vote "yes" for the measure to win passage. The FBI, Justice Department and Office of the Direct...
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Big Tech App Stores Focus of EU Digital Crackdown, Vestager Says
6Mar By adminNo Comments
Technology

Big Tech App Stores Focus of EU Digital Crackdown, Vestager Says

[ad_1] The European Union's sweeping new law to rein in potential market abuse from the world's biggest tech firms will first focus on sorting out app stores, the bloc's competition chief Margrethe Vestager said. Just days before the Digital Markets Act comes into force Vestager said in an interview with Bloomberg TV that she's most concerned about smaller app stores being given fair access to operating systems run by companies that dominate the market like the likes of Apple Inc., Alphabet Inc.'s Google, and Microsoft Corp. “I think it's important for instance that you can have more than one app store on your phone,” Vestager said. “In any other circumstance, if you don't like one shop, you can go into another one.”  Under the DMA, firms face a slew of new restrictions across operating...
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Meta’s Facebook, Instagram down for hundreds of thousands of users across globe
5Mar By adminNo Comments
Technology

Meta’s Facebook, Instagram down for hundreds of thousands of users across globe

[ad_1] Meta Platforms-owned Facebook and Instagram were down for hundreds of thousands of users across the globe on Tuesday, according to outage tracking website Downdetector.com.The disruptions started around 10:00 am ET, with more than 300,000 reports of outages for Facebook and about 40,000 reports for Instagram, according to the website. "We're aware people are having trouble accessing our services. We are working on this now," Meta spokesperson Andy Stone said in a post on X social media. Meta's status dashboard showed the application programming interface for WhatsApp Business was also facing issues. There were around 200 reports of outages for WhatsApp on Downdetector, which tracks outages by collating status reports from several sources, including users.The outage was among the ...
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WhatsApp looks to break barriers, will enable cross app messaging with Signal and Telegram
3Mar By adminNo Comments
Technology

WhatsApp looks to break barriers, will enable cross app messaging with Signal and Telegram

[ad_1] In a continual effort to enrich user experience, Meta Platforms-owned WhatsApp is set to introduce a new feature allowing users to send messages to third-party apps such as Signal and Telegram. The eagerly anticipated update, marked as version 2.24.6.2, was revealed by WABetaInfo.Cross-App ConnectivityThis innovative move by WhatsApp aligns with the Digital Markets Act (DMA), emphasizing chat interoperability to foster seamless communication across various platforms. In response to the DMA, WhatsApp had previously announced beta testing for a chat interoperability feature in version 2.24.5.18 for Android. The latest examination of the 2.24.5.20 beta update on the Google Play Store indicates the active development of a dedicated chat info screen for third-party chats. The chat inf...
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Billionaire Elon Musk’s X could face EU’s digital dominance crackdown
3Mar By adminNo Comments
Technology

Billionaire Elon Musk’s X could face EU’s digital dominance crackdown

[ad_1] Elon Musk's social media platform X could face a raft of new European Union rules that place curbs on the behavior of some of the world's largest technology firms, after the company told regulators it may meet criteria to fall under the scope of the bloc's Digital Markets Act. The DMA, set to take effect on Thursday, lays out a series of dos and don'ts for the likes of Alphabet Inc.'s Google Search, Apple's Safari, Amazon.com Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc.'s Facebook among others. It could also be applied to Musk's X, as well as Booking Holdings Inc.'s accommodation platform and ByteDance Ltd., the European Commission said late Friday.   The DMA is intended to head off competition violations by tech firms before they take root. It will be applied to firms with a significant impact ...
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Facebook must face $3.7 bln UK mass action over market dominance, tribunal rules
16Feb By adminNo Comments
Technology

Facebook must face $3.7 bln UK mass action over market dominance, tribunal rules

[ad_1] Facebook must face a collective lawsuit valued at around 3 billion pounds ($3.77 billion) over allegations the social media giant abused its dominant position to monetise users' personal data, a London tribunal ruled on Thursday.Legal academic Liza Lovdahl Gormsen, who is bringing the case on behalf of around 45 million Facebook users in the UK, says users were not properly compensated for the value of personal data they had to provide. The Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) initially refused to give the go-ahead to the case against Facebook's parent company Meta Platforms Inc, which has previously said the lawsuit is "entirely without merit". We are on WhatsApp Channels. Click to join. But the CAT ruled on Thursday that a revised claim put forward by Gormsen's lawyers should be a...
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On Facebook and Instagram, Meta Touts New Way for Small Advertisers to Avoid Apple’s Fees
16Feb By adminNo Comments
Technology

On Facebook and Instagram, Meta Touts New Way for Small Advertisers to Avoid Apple’s Fees

[ad_1]  Meta Platforms Inc. released new guidelines for small businesses that advertise on Facebook and Instagram, aiming to help them get around fees imposed by Apple Inc. Meta is advising the companies to buy ads through a web browser, rather than on the Facebook or Instagram iOS apps, according to guidance released Thursday. That will help them avoid an Apple commission that Meta said would take effect this month.  Apple's new policy requires advertisers to make an in-app purchase whenever they pay to “boost” social media posts — a move that gives them more exposure. Apple takes a cut of as much as 30% on in-app purchases in its iOS software, meaning that Meta will lose a portion of its ad revenue to the iPhone maker.  We are on WhatsApp Channels. Click to join. The policy change was...
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Nearly All Wealth Gained By World’s Rich This Year Comes From AI
15Feb By adminNo Comments
Technology

Nearly All Wealth Gained By World’s Rich This Year Comes From AI

[ad_1]  Nvidia Corp. co-founder Jensen Huang's wealth has surged as a blistering rally in AI-related stocks pushed the chipmaker's market value above Amazon.com Inc.'s for the first time.  The same rally has minted another billionaire in Huang's own family: his distant cousin Lisa Su, chief executive officer of Nvidia competitor Advanced Micro Devices Inc., who's worth $1.2 billion after the stock doubled over the past year. Two chipmaker billionaires in one family illustrates the scope of the artificial intelligence craze, which has come to dominate the stock market and accounts for most of the wealth gained by the world's richest people this year.  Among the 500 wealthiest individuals, 30 attribute at least some of their fortune to companies that are tracked by the Bloomberg Global Ar...
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