The company has successfully reduced its record-setting EU fine of €1.06 billion to €376.36 million, at most. It was levied way back in 2009 after the x86 maker was found guilty of anticompetitive practices like paying PC makers to halt or delay the launch of products fitted with competing chips.
So, is the legal battle over? Nope! But Intel’s definitely not a dominant chipmaker anymore.
LiFX’s new Outdoor Permanent Lights consists of 30 lights spread across two 25 foot segments. Set them to orange for Halloween, green for St. Patrick’s, red for Xmas, and a seizure-inducing strobing effect for November 5th.
$199, well spent.
The EU’s DMA continues prying open the walls around Apple’s exclusive garden.
Per 9to5Mac:
With the release of the first beta of iOS 18.2 to developers on Wednesday, Apple has published documentation for a new API that will let third-party browsers add web apps to the iPhone Home Screen using their own custom engine. This means that the entire web app experience will run using the same engine as the browser through which it was added.
Great, but nine months since Apple announced support in iOS 17.4, we’re still waiting for custom browser engines like Chrome’s Blink or Firefox’s Gecko to arrive.
Apple had already said this feature was coming, but it’s now possible with the iOS 18.2 developer beta, 9to5Mac reports. In addition to the App Store, EU users can delete Camera, Safari, Messages, and Photos, too.
Since the last report, according to Microsoft:
Russian actors continue to integrate generative AI into their content, Iranian groups ramp up their preparations to enable cyber-influence operations, while Chinese actors shift focus to several down-ballot candidates and members of Congress. Russian actors have notably attempted to target the Harris-Walz campaign by attacking the candidates’ characters.
[Microsoft On the Issues]
Sub.club, the recently-launched tool to help the fediverse make money, now has a WordPress plugin. If you want to get an idea of how it all works in practice, check out this video tutorial from sub.club adviser Anuj Ahooja. Seems useful!
[sub.club & mammoth on Notion]
Om Malik did some interesting math on Siri usage:
I looked up the number of active Apple devices. That number is estimated to be 2.2 billion devices... So 1.5 billion requests a day is actually far less than one daily request per active device.
Malik says he hardly ever uses Siri on purpose. And now I’m thinking about my own Siri usage, which is definitely more than once a day but basically only for alarms and reminders. So I want to know: do you use your phone’s assistant consistently? If so, what for?
[On my Om]
The attorneys for WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg make that very clear in a legal response to WP Engine’s lawsuit. The response also blames WP Engine for relying on WordPress.org, “a website owned and run by Defendant Matt Mullenweg individually:”
WP Engine, a private equity-backed company, made the unilateral decision, at its own risk, to build a multi-billion dollar business around Mr. Mullenweg’s website. In doing so, WP Engine gambled for the sake of profit that Mr. Mullenweg would continue to maintain open access to his website for free. That was their choice.
