Rich McCormick | Vox

Comcast is reportedly planning to buy DreamWorks for more than $3 billion

2019-03-06T05:15:10-05:00

Comcast is in discussions to buy DreamWorks for more than $3 billion, The Wall Street Journal reports, a purchase that could see the animation company joining a stable of Comcast-owned studios that includes Universal Pictures. The WSJ says that the acquisition would allow Comcast to put the pressure on Disney by more effectively copying that company’s business model, licensing movies such as “Shrek,” “Kung Fu Panda” and “How to Train Your Dragon” for commercial and theme park purposes in much the same way it has already done so with Universal Pictures’ animated films like “Minions” and “Despicable Me.”

This isn’t the first time DreamWorks has been linked with a big telecoms company — the studio held talks with Japanese firm SoftBank in 2014, the same year that it also discussed a possible purchase with toy company Hasbro.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Sharp Accepts Foxconn’s Takeover Bid (Update: Deal on Hold)

2019-03-06T05:17:54-05:00

Foxconn will take over Sharp in a deal worth about 700 billion yen (about $6.24 billion), Sharp announced today, confirming months of reports that the huge Taiwanese corporation was looking to buy the Japanese firm.

Foxconn’s share purchase will give it control of 65.9 percent of Sharp. The Taiwanese company beat out competition from Innovation Network Corp. of Japan, a group funded by the Japanese government, to complete one of the biggest ever acquisitions of a Japanese company by a foreign entity.

Update, Feb. 25: After Sharp accepted its bid, Foxconn said it would delay signing the takeover agreement. According to sources speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Foxconn received a list of “contingent liabilities” worth about $3 billion from Sharp on Wednesday.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Apple Must Pay $625 Million for Infringing Patents With FaceTime, iMessage

2019-03-06T05:38:49-05:00

Apple must pay $625.6 million to a patent holding firm, a U.S. court has ruled, for infringing on a number of its intellectual properties. A jury ruled unanimously in favor of VirnetX — which reportedly only makes money through suing for patent violations — agreeing that Apple had infringed communications protocol patents in its FaceTime, VPN on Demand and iMessage services, as well as in the devices that used them.

This is the second time VirnetX has sued Apple for the use of these specific patents, after the company previously won a judgment of $368 million from the tech giant in 2012, and almost scoring a “running royalty” of one percent of iPhone and iPad sales. Apple was forced to redesign FaceTime after the jury ruled in favor of VirnetX, but that verdict was later thrown out in 2014, when an appellate court stated the decision was “tainted.”

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

The Bullet That Lyft Just Dodged Is Still Coming for Uber

2019-03-06T05:19:24-05:00

Lyft will not have to reclassify its drivers as employees after reaching a settlement yesterday, in which it agreed to pay $12.25 million extra in compensation and benefits. Uber is facing a similar lawsuit from its drivers, but a quirk in the litigation could make the outcome way worse for the world’s biggest ride-hail company.

In challenging their status as independent contractors, Lyft’s drivers were unable to bring a class action lawsuit against the app company thanks to an arbitration clause contained in their contract with Lyft. As such, the drivers had to settle for promises from Lyft to reimburse some of their expenses and to warn them before they were about to be deactivated for poor customer ratings.

The drivers weren’t able to achieve “global changes” at Lyft, but those changes are still possible at Uber, explained Shannon Liss-Riordan, the attorney representing both Lyft drivers and Uber drivers in their respective cases.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

David Bowie Dies, Aged 69, After 18-Month Battle With Cancer

2019-03-06T05:18:36-05:00

David Bowie has died at the age of 69. In a statement posted to his official Facebook account, Bowie’s representatives said the singer, actor and legendary musician died “surrounded by his family after a courageous 18-month battle with cancer.” A post confirming his death also appeared on his official site.

The news was also confirmed by Bowie’s publicist to The Hollywood Reporter, and by his son, Duncan Jones, the director of “Moon” and the upcoming “Warcraft” movie. Bowie’s death came as a shock to fans, who were unaware that the artist had been apparently been fighting cancer for the last year and a half.

After a storied career in which he reinvented both his sound and himself several times, Bowie seemed to step away from the spotlight in 2003. But after ten years of what appeared to be retirement, he returned, releasing his 24th studio album — “The Next Day” — in 2013. That seemed to kickstart a renewed interest in producing music, and his most recent album, “Blackstar,” was released just a few days before his death. In that time, it had already reached No. 1 and No. 2 in the U.K. and U.S. album charts, respectively.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Brazil Has Blocked Access to WhatsApp for Two Days

2019-03-06T06:07:09-05:00

Brazil is in the midst of a WhatsApp blackout, after a court in the country ordered access to the messaging service blocked for 48 hours, starting at midnight on Thursday, local time. A judge in the city of Sao Paolo initiated the blockade on the service, telling Brazil’s telecoms companies to stop the use of the country’s most popular messaging app, but did not divulge the name of the company or individual responsible for the injunction.

Brazilian telecommunications companies have attempted to halt the stratospheric growth of WhatsApp in the country before, arguing to the government that the messaging app’s free calling option is unregulated and illegal, and blaming the service for a marked decrease in people picking up cellphone contracts. Earlier this year, Amos Genish, president of Brazilian telecoms firm Vivo, called WhatsApp “pure piracy,” specifying that the service used phone numbers that “belonged” to cellphone providers like his. Until now Brazilian companies have been unsuccessful in their quest to regulate WhatsApp, but today’s shutdown may be the beginning of a change of approach from the country’s government.

>>Read the rest of the story on The Verge.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Theranos Relents, Will Publish Blood Test Data

2019-03-06T05:36:55-05:00

Medical testing startup Theranos has agreed to publish data that it says will validate the accuracy of its blood tests after they were called into question by a Wall Street Journal article published last week.

Elizabeth Holmes, the billionaire CEO of the rapidly growing company, confirmed that Theranos would make the information public in a bid to quell attacks claiming the company wasn’t using its own technology in its tests. “Data is a powerful thing because it speaks for itself,” she said, speaking at a conference sponsored by the Cleveland Clinic on Monday night. Holmes did not say when or where her company would actually make the information public.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Apple Could Face $862 Million Penalty for Using University’s Patent

2019-03-06T05:36:15-05:00

A U.S. jury has ruled that Apple used technology patented by the University of Wisconsin-Madison in creating mobile chips used in its iPhone, iPad Mini, and iPad Air — a decision that means the company could be forced to pay almost a billion dollars in damages.

The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation sued Apple in February last year, claiming that A7, A8, and A8X processors used in the iPhone 5s, 6, and 6 Plus benefited from technology developed at the university and patented in 1998.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Verizon Will Share Your Browsing Habits With AOL’s Massive Ad Network

2019-03-06T05:35:44-05:00

When Verizon bought AOL earlier this year, the two companies said they were teaming up to “pursue the joint vision of building the most significant media platform in the world.” But they’re also sharing something else — your personal data.

Starting in November, Verizon will start sharing the information gathered by its controversial “supercookie” — an identifier inserted into mobile internet browsing activity as standard for customers of the network — with AOL’s vast ad network. AOL’s network, which is represented on 40 percent of websites, will be able to match Internet users to their Verizon details, building profiles of their browsing habits and targeting them with specific ads based on their cellphone use.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

FAA Seeks $1.9 Million Fine for Drone Photo Firm’s Illegal Flights

2019-03-06T05:42:11-05:00

The Federal Aviation Administration finally laid down the legal groundwork for the operation of small drones in February, but as the governmental body showed this week, those laws don’t mean you can just fly unpiloted craft wherever you like. The FAA has proposed its biggest fine ever — $1.9 million — to be levied against aerial photography company SkyPan International for illegal drone flights in the busy airspace above New York and Chicago.

The FAA says that SkyPan conducted 65 unauthorized drone flights over urban areas between March 21st, 2012, and December 15th, 2014. The drones involved allegedly lacked a two-way radio, transponder, altitude-reporting equipment, airworthiness certificates and effective registration, while SkyPan itself failed to get a valid Certificate of Waiver or Authorization for the flights. The FAA says that of the 65 flights, 43 of those flights reportedly took place in New York’s tightly restricted Class B airspace, and took off without receiving air traffic control clearance to do so.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.