Kurt Wagner
@KurtWagner8
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Covering social media, Facebook + X/Twitter for Bloomberg @Business . Author of “Battle for the Bird.” DMs are open. Go Seahawks. Go M’s. Signal: kurtwagner.08
San Francisco
Joined August 2011
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🚨 It's Pub Day 🚨
Truly ecstatic to share that my new book, "Battle for the Bird," is officially out! If you've ever cared about Twitter - or wondered "how did we get here?" - this book is for you! I hope you'll give it a read!
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Elon Musk, a self-described "free speech absolutist," has fired at least two senior Twitter engineers who called him out publicy on Twitter
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New: Elon Musk just said Apple has “fully resumed” advertising on Twitter. He said Apple is Twitter’s largest advertiser.
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Chrissy Teigen quitting Twitter is a really, really bad reflection on the company's ability to fight abuse. She wasn't just some famous person. She was a power user, and a fan favorite internally (she spoke at Twitter's company-wide retreat in early 2020). This one will sting.
Here's what Chrissy Teigen posted on Twitter before her account went dark.
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NEW: Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg just told employees the company is implementing a hiring freeze, and warned there will likely be more restructuring and downsizing to follow
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Mark Zuckerberg completed his 2019 “personal challenge,” in which he set out to “host a series of public discussions about the future of technology in society — the opportunities, the challenges, the hopes, and the anxieties.”
Here’s who he spoke to: 8 men, 1 woman. All white.
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NEW: Elon Musk plans to eliminate ~3,700 jobs at Twitter on Friday. About half the staff. He also plans to end the “work from anywhere” policy… story w/
@EdLudlow
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It sounds like Twitter’s PR/comms team — which was maybe ~80-100 people — is down to just two people after layoffs today….
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It was Sheryl Sandberg’s last day at Meta’s headquarters today. Here’s the send off she got from staff.
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NEW: If President Trump loses the election, he'll no longer be considered a "world leader" when he commits rule violations on Twitter
That means instead of hiding his tweets behind labels, Twitter could demand he delete them, suspend him or even ban him
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And another one!
lol just got fired for shitposting
i said it before and i'll say it again
kiss my ass elon 💋
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There were the two execs that joined Elon on Spaces yesterday when they tried to soothe advertiser concerns. Hearing from a number of folks asking: "Who is left?"
Hard to overstate how gutted Twitter's leadership ranks have become
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Something big is happening at FB - employees are speaking out publicly against CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s decision not to remove Donald Trump’s posts glorifying violence
In the many years I’ve covered FB, I’ve never seen this kind of public criticism before
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Hearing that some of those who are being laid off from Twitter are pregnant. And they don’t know what severance or insurance coverage they’ll have moving forward. Just so much uncertainty right now on top of losing your job…
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To be clear I am not saying employees who bash their boss on Twitter should keep their jobs!
I’m just pointing out that even though Musk believes people should say “outrageous” things on Twitter, there are still consequences
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Elon’s Twitter takeover: “omg craziest tech story ever!”
SBF: “omg craziest tech story ever!”
SVB collapse: “omg craziest tech story ever!”
OpenAI: “omg craziest tech story ever!”
^ all in the past ~13 months.
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Yikes. This means Fidelity values Twitter around ~$15 billion
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Can confirm many are indeed angry with Jack. But it’s not because he grew Twitter too quickly. They feel betrayed that he helped orchestrate the sale to Elon.
Folks at Twitter past and present are strong and resilient. They will always find a way no matter how difficult the moment. I realize many are angry with me. I own the responsibility for why everyone is in this situation: I grew the company size too quickly. I apologize for that.
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🚨Personal news alert: After nearly 5 great years at Recode, I’m excited to share that I’m joining the Bloomberg
@Technology
team starting next week!
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Here's the note Twitter CEO
@paraga
just sent employees. Company all-hands scheduled for 2 pm PT to discuss Elon Musk buying the company
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These have been deleted. But this is an example of the kind of stuff advertisers are worried about. Very few brands would be OK with their ad running before or after this tweet.
Multiple masturbation jokes so far from Twitter CEO Elon Musk and it’s not even 9 am PT. Happy Monday!
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Given how much Facebook and tech in general talk about diversity, seems problematic that this group would be so...exactly what you’d think. Of the 9 people he spoke to, 7 were professors or doctors. Only one was under the age of 40.
Not exactly branching out.
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Can also confirm
@CaseyNewton
’s good scoop: some people who were fired from Twitter are now being asked to come back. Some were laid off by mistake, others the company now realizes they may need…oops! w/
@EdLudlow
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Plot twist! I’m told while Wheeler did indeed resign earlier today, Elon convinced her to stay.
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NEW: Microsoft is is talks to acquire TikTok’s operations in the U.S.
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New: Elon Musk will be in Twitter’s SF office this week “meeting with folks, walking the halls,” according to an internal email from
@leslieberland
“You’ll all hear directly from him on Friday”
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NEW: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is extending Trump’s suspension. The President is now blocked from posting on Facebook or Instagram until after the inauguration. What an ending to this Presidency...
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"Justin Bieber Carpool Karaoke" is exactly what it sounds like and I'm not upset about it
http://t.co/lNNYYmsYcV
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NEW: Twitter is under investigation by the FTC for alleged misuse of users' personal data. This is *not* because of the recent hack, however. It's because Twitter was using phone numbers uploaded for security purposes to target users with ads
Estimated fine: $150-250 million
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Employees have been bracing for this for weeks. These numbers and this timing have changed over time. But it sounds like things are starting to solidify.
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Ha!
@john
is now mentoring
#alexfromtarget
on dealing with crazy Twitter fans. Nice
@nickbilton
profile on Alex:
http://t.co/HiApE2BXe5
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NEW: Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg is telling employees this morning they plan to hire aggressively for remote workers, and existing employees can soon request to work remote permanently. Says 50% of FB’s workforce could be remote in 5 to 10 years.
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Twitter CEO
@jack
told employees via email yesterday that they could take today off - no need to take PTO
It’s been a long week...
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Unilever, which has an annual advertising budget of almost $8 billion, is pulling all U.S. ads from FB, Instagram and Twitter for the rest of 2020...
Part of the reason FB stock is down more than 7% today
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This was a fun interview -- Vine Star
@KingBach
Is Making the Jump to Hollywood
http://t.co/vKMATjmqh0
http://t.co/gbD3KUAuxT
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NEW: Facebook says it has disabled accounts and severed API access for a group of NYU researchers running the Ad Observatory project. FB sent the same group a cease and desist letter in Oct.
The researchers are studying political ad targeting on FB
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Twitter's former Trust and Safety head
@yoyoel
just gave a long, interesting interview w/
@karaswisher
at a Knight Foundation event. She finished by asking him what advice he would give Elon.
"Humility goes a really long way."
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It is possible that exceptions will be made for some employees on the remote work policy. But generally, the days of “everyone can work from anywhere they want” are over
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In the past week, Elon:
* Was invited to join Twitter board
* suggests Twitter user numbers are inflated by bots
* asks if Twitter is “dying”
* asks if Twitter should turn HQ into a homesless shelter
* rejects Twitter’s board offer
Absolutely bonkers
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~ Personal News ~
I am writing a book about
@jack
Dorsey and Twitter with
@AtriaBooks
! I’ve been writing about both Jack and Twitter since 2013 and the story only gets more and more interesting. I’m excited to go even deeper with a book.
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sounds like budgets for most teams will be cut heading into next year. Zuckerberg said teams will adjust accordingly.
Some will stop filling open roles as people leave, others will shift people to other teams, and still others will "manage out people who aren't succeeding"...
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Between permanent WFH, Juneteenth as a company holiday, and now election day off, Twitter continues to be the most progressive employer I can think of
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This was 5 days ago
Apple has mostly stopped advertising on Twitter. Do they hate free speech in America?
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Wow. Facebook claims it blocked 80% of the New Zealand shooter videos that were uploaded with its AI technology. The problem is the 20% that made it past the AI equaled 300,000 videos (!)
Facebook’s scale is its own worst enemy these days
In the first 24 hours we removed 1.5 million videos of the attack globally, of which over 1.2 million were blocked at upload...
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And Apple spends more than $100m per year on Twitter ads. So a massive client for them.
Also in this story: Apple spends more than $100m per year on Twitter ads. A big big advertiser that Twitter likely needs right now (w/
@markgurman
) $AAPL
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It is not an exaggeration to say that IG culture and product are 100% tied to these two. One of IG’s great benefits all these years was that it operated largely independently (or at least felt that way to employees). Their departure means IG will he run primarily by FB execs now.
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Celts' Kyrie Irving apologized for saying Earth is flat, which I respect.
He also dropped this quote, which I also respect: "I'm actually a smart-ass individual."
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Twitter employees have Friday off for Veterans Day. I’m sure it will be a quiet, totally normal day off for everyone with no news 👍🏼
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Instagram, which was once known for its simplicity, has become too cluttered and complicated as Facebook keeps stuffing it with new features to fight off competitors.
Good newsletter this morning from Instagram expert
@sarahfrier
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One other small but important note: Musk seems very interested in two specific policies:
1. The general misinfo policy, which he feels is too broad
2. A “hateful conduct” policy about targeting transgender people by misgendering or deadnaming
He wants both to be reviewed
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For those outside the industry: This is called a news embargo -- you agree to hold information until a set time in exchange for early access to that info
FB asks journalists to do this every single day. This is standard practice.
Right now 30+ journalists are finishing up a coordinated series of articles based on thousands of pages of leaked documents. We hear that to get the docs, outlets had to agree to the conditions and a schedule laid down by the PR team that worked on earlier leaked docs.
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it finally happened...
"Mr. Bezos I believe you're on mute"
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NEW: The personal banking data for ~29,000 Facebook employees was compromised last month when a thief stole several unencrypted hard drives from an employee’s car.
You can’t make this stuff up...
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Peak San Francisco: A homeless man is sleeping on a bunch of Amazon Fresh delivery boxes in my neighborhood and I found out via Nextdoor
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time to buy YouTube
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New: Twitter is planning a bunch of new privacy features, including the ability to archive old tweets, hide the list of tweets that you’ve liked, and cull your follower list
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The crazy
@nytimes
story tonight on FB has me asking: Will someone be fired for Facebook’s role in all of this? And if so, who? And, if not, why not?
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Twitter published a blog post today about its content policies. Hard to take it seriously when it says things like: "We want to assure you of a few things: First, none of our policies have changed."
Twitter stopped enforcing its Covid misinfo policy last week.
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Here's the full statement from Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom confirming his departure, and suggesting that he and Krieger will build something else.
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New: Elon Musk's plan to fight misinfo on Twitter using Community Notes has a big problem: Notes are only added to tweets when users from both political ideologies find them helpful.
That means the most divisive/polarizing misinfo often goes unchecked
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NEW (recap): Stripe, Mastercard and eBay have all now left the Libra Association, Facebook's effort to build a global cryptocurrency. PayPal left last week. That makes 4 of the original 28 "founding members" out before the Charter was even signed
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Reading Disney CEO Bob Iger's autobiography. I didn't appreciate at the time just how close Disney came to buying Twitter in 2016. Iger says both boards basically approved a deal and he walked at the last second with "cold feet"
His explanation for "why" very relevant right now
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NEW: TikTok CEO Kevin Mayer has resigned. He just took the job from Disney in May...
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New: Elon Musk will be deposed on Monday as part of the arbitration hearings involving thousands of former Twitter employees. The deposition will be in-person and last for seven hours, according to an email sent to former employees. Story w/
@EdLudlow
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NEW: Peter Thiel, who has been a Facebook board member and Mark Zuckerberg adviser for almost 17 years, is leaving the company's board to push "Trump's agenda" in the 2022 election
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NEW: Elon Musk has subpoenaed former Twitter CEO
@jack
Dorsey in his legal fight with Twitter
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Remember how FB stored tens of millions of user passwords unencrypted on their servers? They just updated the blog to say that "millions of Instagram users" also had their passwords stored unencrypted. They originally said "tens of thousands of IG users"
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Mark Zuckerberg & Pricilla Chan are on CNN with Anderson Cooper & Sanjay Gupta right now
Cooper commented that Chan just finished giving Zuck a haircut before the interview. He said it looked good
Zuck: “I think you might be the only person who’s ever complimented my hair”
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I have 42 Instagram Stories live from friends/celebs in my app right now, compared to just 12 Stories on Snapchat. A year ago, those numbers were flipped.
Data set of one, but damn.
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Good question: Rep. Porter just asked Zuckerberg to commit to spending one hour per day for the next year watching the same content that Facebook's content moderators do. "I'm not sure it would best serve our community..." he started to say before she cut him off.
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Jack says never again to being the CEO of Twitter
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Twitter Spaces is the best product/feature Twitter has had since Vine.
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I read through most of the FB emails that were released today and was continuously reminded of something I think most people already know: You are Facebook’s product, and your personal data is what gives Facebook its power
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At an event at Twitter HQ today and they said they’re going to let people follow “interests and topics” not just other people on the service. So you could theoretically follow “football” or “Apple” and see tweets in your timeline that are related from people you may not follow
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Jack says thank you for translating his tweets
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NEW: I am beyond excited to share that my book, “Battle for the Bird,” is coming out in February! This is the culmination of years of reporting on Twitter, and I can’t wait for you all to read it. You can pre-order at the link below.
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BREAKING: Elon Musk is expected to propose that the Twitter deal proceed at the original $54.20 per share price $TWTR
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Multiple masturbation jokes so far from Twitter CEO Elon Musk and it’s not even 9 am PT. Happy Monday!
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New: More Twitter layoffs. This time hitting the Trust and Safety team that handles content moderation. Employees were alerted Friday night.
w/
@daveyalba
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I don’t get the sense Elon cares but buying a company for $44B then immediately criticizing one of the company’s longest tenured and most well respected execs seems like a bad start
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NEW: Twitter is finally sharing how many daily users it has: 126 million. That’s 60 million fewer daily users than Snapchat, and a lot fewer users than anything FB owns. $TWTR
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NEW: Twitter has a list of thousands of high-profile users that get expedited treatment from moderators when they’re harassed.
The program is called Project Guardian and includes athletes, musicians, politicians & journalists
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Whether or not you think remote work is a good idea, this flexible work policy existed for multiple years now. There are likely people who relocated their entire family & are now being told to show up in person on like 8 hours notice. I expect a lot more people will be leaving.
NEW: Twitter employees finally heard from new owner Elon Musk. He sent an email in the middle of the night that warned of “difficult times ahead” and banned remote work starting immediately
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A lot of the Twitter reaction to this story has been that it was "no big deal." If you feel that way, I won't argue against you. But any interactions between the most powerful man in technology and an active presidential campaign are worth covering IMO
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🚨NEW
@BW
feature🚨
WhatsApp is the most underrated part of FB’s empire — it’s the world’s largest messaging service, but makes almost no money. That’s about to change.
Here’s how WhatsApp plans to live up to its $19B price tag: commerce + payments
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NEW: Facebook is considering a ban on political ads on its social network in the days leading up to the U.S. election in November. No decision yet, but it’s being discussed, according to sources
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Wow. Senator Hawley just called on Zuckerberg to apologize directly to the the families of victims who were impacted by child sexual exploitation online. He stood up and addressed them in the hearing room. Several of them held up pictures of victims.
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NEW: FB critics, including employees & the Biden campaign, say it’s giving Trump a free pass. FB says it’s upholding free speech.
First
@BW
cover story w/
@sarahfrier
looks at FB’s failures enforcing its policies & what that means for the election
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The President of the United States has now singled out a Twitter employee who is not the CEO, and was certainly not the only person responsible for the decision to add a fact-check label to Trump's tweets
That is dangerous and irresponsible to say the least
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IG is going to do something interesting: later this week it’s going to test removing “like” counts from the feed. That means you won’t be able to see how many people liked each post (unless you are the post’s creator)
Could that make social media healthier? Definitely maybe!
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Twitter is currently auctioning off a bunch of office furniture and decorations. A giant neon Twitter bird is going for $17,500 right now. The "@" plant sculpture is a much more modest $6,250.
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NEW: The Facebook v Apple war continues, now with full-page newspaper ads.
Facebook took out ads in the NYT, WSJ and WaPo today attacking Apple’s expected iOS 14 changes that will make it harder to collect data for targeted advertising
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Weird but interesting streaming deal between the NBA and Twitter: You'll be able to watch some live basketball, but only from a camera focused on a single player
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CAN SOMEONE JUST TELL ME IF I AM GOING TO DELAWARE OR NOT PLEASE
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