8 – Breaking News & Latest Updates 2026
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Tech Archive

Archives for October 2024

Mia Sato
Mia Sato
A new generation is discovering Trump’s Access Hollywood tape.

Young people who were kids when Trump was caught bragging about groping women are hearing the recording for the first time via TikTok. Teen Vogue compiled some videos and comments:

i was in 7th grade in 2016 and i don’t [remember] much from it, but now i’m 20, educated, and ready to vote for the first time.”

The Amazon Echo graveyard

The Echo ecosystem has seen its fair share of failures while trying to popularize Amazon’s Alexa smart assistant.

Andrew Liszewski
Emma Roth
Emma Roth
A former Disney employee is accused of hacking a menu system and altering allergy info.

As outlined in a federal complaint spotted by 404 Media, the former employee also allegedly locked 14 staff members out of their Disney accounts using a script to perform thousands of login attempts. He’s also accused of having a “dox” folder on his computer containing personal information about the workers he targeted.

Victoria Song
Victoria Song
Marathon season is in full swing, and Garmin’s doing gangbusters.

The company bumped its full-year revenue estimate to $6.12 billion. Its wearable business also brought in $464 million during Q3, beating investors’ estimates of $396 million.

Wholly unsurprising. My social media algorithm is chock full of runners debating Apple Watch versus Garmin — and most of them are firmly #TeamGarmin. Plus, we’re in the middle of a marathon boom, with more people signing up than ever.

Alexa, thank you for the music

When dealing with an aging parent, Alexa was a great help — in both practical and emotionally important ways.

Barbara Krasnoff
Adi Robertson
Adi Robertson
Stream my works, ye mighty, and despair!

Nothing beside remains:

In today’s digital landscape, corporate interests, shifting distribution models, and malicious cyber attacks are threatening public access to our shared cultural history. The rise of streaming platforms and temporary licensing agreements means that sound recordings, books, films, and other cultural artifacts that used to be owned in physical form, are now at risk — in digital form — of disappearing from public view without ever being archived.

Alexa, where’s my Star Trek Computer?

When Amazon launched its Alexa voice assistant, it envisioned a computer platform that could do anything for you. A decade later, the company is still trying to build it.

Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
Nothing is making a glow-in-the-dark phoneNothing is making a glow-in-the-dark phone
Andrew Liszewski
Jay Peters
Jay Peters
SAG-AFTRA has announced an agreement with Ethovox, which is building a “foundational AI model for voice.”

The agreement will help voice performers get compensated if their voices help train the model. which could be used to provide voices for “digital replicas.” According to a press release:

In addition to ensuring performers can participate in Ethovox’s consensual foundational model knowing that they will be protected and compensated fairly, the voice model will reflect a commitment to diversity and inclusion. Further, the SAG-AFTRA-Ethovox contract leads the field in performer compensation as it provides both session fees and ongoing revenue sharing for the life of the foundational model.

Video game voice actors are still on strike, Variety reports.

Alex Heath
Alex Heath
Google CEO teases the company’s next Gemini model.

I reported last week that Google is aiming to release its next big Gemini AI model in December. On the company’s earnings call today, CEO Sundar Pichai confirmed that it’s coming:

We’ve had two generations of Gemini model. We are working on the third generation, which is progressing well.

Relatedly, The Information reported after my scoop that Google is working to bring agent-like behavior to the next Gemini. The idea is that the model can take over a computer screen in a way that would work similarly to what Anthropic recently released.

Umar Shakir
Umar Shakir
App Store Intelligence.

Apple might soon add a new auto-generated review summary for apps in the App Store, according to 9to5Mac.

It sounds similar to Amazon’s AI-generated “Customers say” summary section at the top of the reviews on some product pages.