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☆ Microsoft Outlook users hit with Monday morning outage
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-05 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: 1 min

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☆ Amazon fires Alabama warehouse worker who led union push
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-02 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

And I’ve given every fiber of my soul into organizing Amazon these past three years,” Bates said in a statement Friday. Amazon workers at a New York warehouse voted to form the company’s first US union last year, though Amazon has since refused to recognize the union or come to the bargaining table. Other efforts to unionize Amazon facilities, including one across the street from the New York warehouse, have failed. The closely-watched union election at the Bessemer facility ended with the results too close to call due to hundreds of challenged ballots. “Amazon’s behavior must not go unchallenged, and workers in Bessemer, Alabama must have their rights protected under the law.”

Persons: Jennifer Bates, “, I’ve, ” Bates, ”, Bates “, Bates, ” Mary Kate Paradis, we’ve, Stuart Appelbaum, Appelbaum, ” Appelbaum Organizations: CNN, Wholesale, Department Store Union, Amazon, National Labor Relations Board Locations: Alabama, Bessemer , Alabama, United States, New York, Amazon

☆ Airbnb sues New York City over its short-term housing restrictions
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-02 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

CNN —Airbnb on Thursday sued New York City over its restrictions on short-term housing rentals, in a legal dispute that pits the company’s concerns about its ability to operate in a key market against the city’s efforts to address an affordable housing crisis. The San Francisco-based tech company sued New York City over the Short-Term Rental Registration Law, a local ordinance passed in 2022 and set to begin being enforced next month. The law requires short-term rental hosts in the city to register with the mayor’s office, disclose who else lives on the property and agree to comply with other city codes. Three Airbnb hosts in New York City also filed a companion lawsuit against the city. The lawsuit is the latest example of Airbnb clashing with officials in New York City and New York State over the past decade.

Persons: CNN — Airbnb, Airbnb, ” Airbnb, Jonah Allon, ” Allon Organizations: CNN, New York, New York State Locations: New York City, San Francisco, ”, Manhattan, New York

☆ National Eating Disorders Association takes its AI chatbot offline after complaints of ‘harmful’ advice
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-01 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

New York CNN —An eating disorder prevention organization said it had to take its AI-powered chatbot offline after some complained the tool began offering “harmful” and “unrelated” advice to those coming to it for support. The National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA), a nonprofit organization aimed at supporting people impacted by eating disorders, said on Tuesday that it took down its chatbot, dubbed “Tessa,” after some users reported negative experiences with it. (NEDA emphasized in an email that its Tessa tool is “not ChatGBT,” in an apparent reference to the viral chatbot.) Earlier this year, news outlet CNET was called out after it used an AI tool to generate stories that were riddled with errors, including one that offered some wildly inaccurate personal finance advice. Microsoft and Google have also been called out for AI tools dispensing some inaccurate or inaccurate information.

Persons: “ Tessa, ”, Tessa Chatbot, “, ” Liz Thompson, Tessa chatbot, ChatGPT, NEDA, Thompson, Tessa’s, Tessa, ” NEDA, ” Thompson Organizations: New, New York CNN, Eating Disorders, CNN, NPR, Facebook, CNET, Microsoft, Google Locations: New York, chatbots

☆ Amazon corporate workers plan to stage walkout, citing ‘lack of trust’ in leadership
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-31 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —Nearly 2,000 corporate workers at Amazon have pledged to walk off the job on Wednesday to signal a “lack of trust” in the company’s leadership, in what could be the most visible sign of dissent among the e-commerce giant’s office workers in recent memory. Organizers said they will also have a way for employees at other Amazon corporate offices to participate virtually. All told, Amazon has said this year that it is laying off some 27,000 workers over multiple rounds of cuts. At the same time, Amazon and other tech companies are trying to get workers into the office more. “Amazon must keep pace with a changing world,” the group wrote in a Twitter thread last week calling for the walkout.

Persons: ”, Amazon, it’s, ” “, Brad Glasser, “, we’ve, who’ve, ” Glasser Organizations: CNN, Amazon, Amazon’s Seattle, Organizers, Twitter, Workers, Big Tech, Puget, Amazon Employees, Climate Justice Locations: Amazon’s, Los Angeles

☆ What Elizabeth Holmes’ life in prison could look like
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-30 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

Holmes reported to the Federal Prison Camp in Bryan, Texas, on Tuesday to begin serving out her 11-year sentence after being convicted on multiple charges of defrauding investors while running the now-defunct startup Theranos. Located approximately 100 miles outside of Houston, where Holmes grew up before moving to California to attend Stanford, FPC Bryan is a minimum-security federal prison camp housing more than 600 women offenders. Disgraced Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes is escorted by prison officials into the the Federal Prison Camp on Tuesday, May 30, 2023, in Bryan, Texas. But according to Mark MacDougall, a longtime white-collar defense lawyer and former federal prosecutor, the prison won’t be a walk in the park for Holmes. Housing at FPC Bryan typically consists of dormitory-style arrangements featuring a four-bunk cubicle and communal bath facilities, he said.

☆ Elizabeth Holmes set to report to prison
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-30 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

CNN —Elizabeth Holmes is set to report to prison on Tuesday, capping off a stunning downfall for the disgraced founder of failed blood testing startup Theranos. Holmes was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison last November, after she was convicted months earlier on multiple charges of defrauding investors while running the now-defunct startup. Holmes was once an icon in the tech world, serving as a posterchild for the limitless ambitions and potential of Silicon Valley. Holmes and Balwani were first indicted together nearly five years ago on the same 12 criminal charges. This month, Davila ordered Holmes and Balwani to pay restitution of roughly $452 million to victims of their crimes.

☆ Montana’s TikTok ban throws users into new era of uncertainty
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-21 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —Keri Williams wouldn’t have her business without TikTok. But earlier this week, Montana Gov. Now, Williams, who lives near Montana’s largest city — Billings — is scrambling to figure out the future of her business. The law, set to take effect in January, has already been the subject of a lawsuit by a group of TikTok users who allege it infringes on their First Amendment rights. TikTok said in March that it has 150 million monthly active users in the United States, up from 100 million users in 2020, when the Trump administration first threatened to ban the service.

☆ Elizabeth Holmes loses bid to avoid prison
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-17 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

CNN —Elizabeth Holmes’ last-minute bid to avoid prison was denied by an appellate court on Tuesday, paving the way for the disgraced Theranos founder to begin her sentence. In a separate ruling Tuesday, Holmes was also ordered to pay $452 million in restitution to those harmed by her crimes, including Theranos investors like media titan Rupert Murdoch. Holmes was previously ordered to turn herself into custody and begin her 11-year prison sentence on April 27 after being convicted on multiple counts of defrauding investors last January. A new prison surrender date for Holmes has not yet been set. He reported to prison last month to being serving out his nearly 13-year sentence, after losing a last-minute appeal similar to Holmes.

☆ Uber will now let parents put their teens in rides alone
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-17 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

CNN —Uber is rolling out new features to make it easier for people of all ages to access its ride-hailing service, including an option that will let teens under the age of 18 ride alone for the first time. Previously, those under the age of 18 were not allowed to use Uber without being accompanied in the car by an adult. A live trip-tracking feature also lets a parent follow the trips’ progress via the Uber app. And parents can contact the driver directly during the trip as well as contact Uber’s support team. Uber has reported strong growth in recent quarters, defying a slump that has hit much of the tech sector in recent months.

☆ How Lyft’s new CEO is ‘copying’ his former boss Jeff Bezos to turn around the company
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-12 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

Days after taking over as the new CEO of Lyft (LYFT) last month, Risher announced plans to “significantly reduce” the company’s workforce and stressed that the decision was his. The next week, Lyft (LYFT) revealed the extent of the layoffs: 26% of the staff, or more than 1,000 employees, would lose their jobs. It has lagged behind its chief rival, Uber (UBER), in recovering from the pandemic shock to business. And that really is Jeff Bezos,” Risher told CNN. “It’s not our focus to be part of somebody else’s company,” Risher said.

☆ Premarket stocks: Wall Street is strangely calm about the debt ceiling. That could change this month
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Nicole Goodkind | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

New York CNN —Dire warnings about the economic chaos and catastrophe that will ensue if the US debt ceiling isn’t lifted soon abound. The debt ceiling crisis of 2011 caused Standard and Poor’s to downgrade US debt for the first time in history. Schwenkler says to expect “a lot more volatility” if debt ceiling issues don’t appear resolved by the last week of the month. By contrast, recovery from a debt-default crisis would likely start the day Congress, belatedly, suspended the debt ceiling,” he added. “A misstep over the debt ceiling would subject businesses and consumers to an economic shockwave,” he added.

☆ Airbnb sees record bookings despite recession fears
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-09 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: 1 min

☆ Graphic images of Texas mall shooting spread on Twitter, rekindling debate on how much to share
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-08 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —Within hours of the mass shooting on Saturday at a Texas outlet mall, some Twitter users shared gruesome pictures of bloodied bodies, purportedly from the crime scene. The apparent spread of these images has revived scrutiny around how social media platforms handle graphic content from mass shootings. There have been 202 mass shootings in the US within the first five months of this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, compared to 647 mass shootings in 2022. The nonprofit and CNN define mass shootings as those in which four or more people are shot, excluding the shooter. But in a tweet Saturday night, Spainhouer slammed a photo from the mall being shared on social media.

☆ Lyft stock plunges nearly 15% on weaker than expected revenue forecast
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

The ride-hailing company reported revenue of $1 billion for the quarter ending in March, marking a 14% year-over-year increase and beating Wall Street estimate’s. But the company forecast weaker-than-expected revenue for the current quarter, which was enough to jitter investors. Shares of Lyft plunged nearly 15% in after-hours trading Thursday following the earnings results. While Uber diversified its business beyond ride-hailing by delivering meals and grocery items during the health crises, Lyft never did. Earlier this week, Uber said in its quarterly earnings report that revenue was up 29%, as demand for its rideshare and delivery services held firm despite lingering recession fears.

The company’s revenue was slightly better than what Wall Street had expected, but it nonetheless represented the second consecutive quarterly revenue decline for the iPhone maker. Despite the continued revenue decline, there were bright spots in the report. Apple also posted an all-time services sales record of $20.9 billion for the quarter. The services business — which includes Apple Music and Apple TV+ — is an increasingly important revenue driver for Apple that is less cyclical than hardware sales. Apple’s latest quarterly earnings report comes amid a sharp decline in PC and smartphone sales globally after a surge earlier in the pandemic.

☆ Uber’s revenue climbs 29% as it continues to defy tech slump
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

CNN —Uber on Tuesday reported revenue of $8.8 billion for the quarter ending in March, a 29% increase from the same period last year and beating Wall Street’s estimates. The company’s continued strength comes despite lingering recession fears and stands in stark contrast to the slowing growth at other tech companies. It also sets Uber apart from its chief rival Lyft, which is undergoing significant layoffs and a shakeup in its C-Suite. Even with higher interest rates and tighter access to capital, Khosrowshahi said “we are well positioned to improve our competitive position across our key markets.”Shares for Uber surged more than 8% in pre-market trading Tuesday morning. Uber has largely avoided having to undergo the significant layoffs that have dominated headlines in Silicon Valley in recent months.

New York CNN —Elizabeth Holmes won’t be starting her 11-year prison sentence just yet. Holmes was sentenced last November after she was convicted months earlier on multiple charges of defrauding investors while running the now-defunct blood testing startup. As a result, Holmes can remain free on bail while the latest appeal is considered by the court, as per the court’s rules. It also came to light that Theranos was relying on third-party manufactured devices from traditional blood testing companies rather than its own technology. Like Holmes, Balwani’s legal team delayed the start of his prison sentence by roughly a month with an appeal.

☆ 2023 layoff tracker: The latest on which companies have announced job cuts
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( Jennifer Korn | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +20 min

New York CNN —BuzzFeed, Lyft, Whole Foods and Deloitte all recently announced layoffs affecting thousands of US workers. With 11,000 job cuts announced in November and the 10,000 announced in March, Meta’s headcount will fall to around 66,000 — a total reduction of about 25%. The company announced in January that it was eliminating some 18,000 positions as part of a major cost-cutting bid at the e-commerce giant. IndeedJob listing website Indeed.com announced cuts of approximately 2,200 employees, representing almost 15% of its total workforce, the company said in March. The cuts come after the company announced several rounds of job cuts throughout the pandemic due to falling demand, followed by rapid hiring last year.

☆ Lyft plans to ‘significantly reduce’ workforce, CEO says
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( Brian Fung | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

CNN —Lyft (LYFT) plans to “significantly reduce” its workforce, the company’s new CEO David Risher told employees on Friday, in another round of layoffs as it struggles to turn a profit and pull off a turnaround. “To do so requires that we reduce our costs and structure our company so that our leaders are closer to riders and drivers. Now Uber is showing renewed strength In its most recent earnings report, Uber said that it had its “strongest quarter ever,” reporting a 49% year-over-year increase in revenue. Lyft’s latest earnings report, meanwhile, was unusually disappointing for Wall Street. Lyft shares were up 6% in midday trading Friday, but the company’s stock is down roughly 70% over the past year.

New York CNN —Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, the former chief operating officer of failed startup Theranos and ex-boyfriend of founder Elizabeth Holmes, has reported to prison, according to his attorney. “Mr Balwani turned himself in… smoothly without incident,” Jeffrey Coopersmith, Balwani’s attorney, said in an email to CNN on Thursday. Holmes was also convicted on multiple counts of defrauding investors and has been ordered to turn herself in on April 27. Balwani, nearly 20 years older than Holmes, first met her in 2002 before she dropped out of Stanford. He served as an informal adviser to Holmes in Theranos’ earliest days and the two became romantically involved.

Members of the public wait to enter the Leonard Williams Justice Center where the Dominion Voting Systems defamation trial against FOX News is taking place on April 18 in Wilmington, Delaware. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images)The court is back in session after a lunch break and opening statements are expected to begin soon in the historic defamation lawsuit brought by election technology company Dominion Voting Systems against Fox News. Here’s what you need to know about the high-stakes case:Why is Dominion suing Fox News? The company alleges that people at Fox News acted with actual malice and "recklessly disregarded the truth" when they spread this disinformation about Dominion. According to Dominion’s theory of the case, Fox promoted these election conspiracy theories because "the lies were good for Fox’s business."

☆ Fox News defamation trial will begin Tuesday, judge says, without explaining one-day delay
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-17 | by ( Marshall Cohen | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis said Monday that the delay in the Fox-Dominion defamation trial “is not unusual” and told the parties that he expects them back on Tuesday to finish jury selection and start the trial. “I made the decision to delay the start of the trial until tomorrow,” Davis said in court, later adding that “it’s a six-week trial. The high-stakes defamation trial against Fox News, initially set to begin with opening statements on Monday, was abruptly delayed on Sunday evening, in an eleventh-hour twist. What to know about the high-stakes trialThe historic defamation lawsuit brought against Fox News by Dominion Voting Systems could have significant ramifications for the right-wing cable channel. But in a major blow to the right-wing network last month, the judge overseeing the case allowed it to go to trial.

☆ The American consumer has bad news for the economy
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( Nicole Goodkind | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

That’s why Wall Street is already fretting over Friday’s retail sales report, which is expected to show that the mighty American consumer is pulling back. Economists forecast that retail sales fell 0.4% in March from the month before. But Goldman Sachs and Bank of America analysts say core sales — that’s without autos, gasoline, and building materials — slowed by about 1%. A taxing problem: Still, the health of the American consumer is still relatively strong, the BofA analysts said. A one-bedroom apartment had a median rent of $4,150, up 9.6% from last year, while a two-bedroom apartment had a median rent of $5,680, up 18.3% from a year ago.

☆ Amazon is ‘investing heavily’ in the technology behind ChatGPT
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-13 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —Amazon wants investors to know it won’t be left behind in the latest Big Tech arms race over artificial intelligence. In a letter to shareholders Thursday, Amazon (AMZN) CEO Andy Jassy said the company is “investing heavily” in large language models (LLMs) and generative AI, the same technology that underpins ChatGPT and other similar AI chatbots. Since ChatGPT was released to the public in late November, Google (GOOG), Facebook (FB) and Microsoft (MSFT) have all talked up their growing focus on generative AI technology, which can create compelling essays, stories and visuals in response to user prompts. With that in mind, Amazon on Thursday unveiled a new service called Bedrock. It essentially makes foundation models (large models that are pre-trained on vast amounts of data) from AI21 Labs, Anthropic, Stability AI and Amazon accessible to clients via an API, Amazon said in a blog post.

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