Tag - tech

 
 

TECH

Dating back to its time as a marginal player in the personal computer market, Apple's business model has long been based on charging users a premium for technology products where the company dictates nearly all of the details of how the device works and can be used.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 22, 2024
Apple accused of monopolizing smartphone markets in U.S. antitrust lawsuit
The suit seeks to free markets from the iPhone maker's "anticompetitive and exclusionary conduct and restoring competition to lower prices for consumers."
The Bing website on a smartphone. Microsoft has received a wave of criticism from human rights groups on how its search engine works in China.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 21, 2024
Microsoft is attracting growing criticism for censoring Bing in China
Bing is reportedly removing information about human rights, democracy, climate change and other topics.
People visit the Huawei stand at the 2024 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona last month.
BUSINESS / Tech
Mar 20, 2024
U.S. weighs sanctioning Huawei’s secretive Chinese chip network
Any move would come after the Chinese telecom giant notched a significant technological breakthrough last year.
Mustafa Suleyman, the co-founder & CEO of Inflection AI, at the Greylock Partners office in Menlo Park, California in May 2023. Suleyman, a co-founder of Google’s DeepMind artificial intelligence lab, is leaving the startup he was running to lead Microsoft’s consumer AI business, in another sign of Microsoft’s aggressive plans for the technology.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 20, 2024
Microsoft deepens AI focus, hiring DeepMind co-founder for consumer tools
Over a year after unveiling an AI-enhanced Bing search, the company has made few gains in the search market, still dominated by Google.
The annual South by Southwest Conference (SXSW) in Austin, Texas, was held on Saturday.
BUSINESS / Tech
Mar 20, 2024
Will AI help or hurt workers? At SXSW, that depends on who you ask.
According to a global survey from Slack, 42% of office workers say they’re excited about AI, but some 27% find the prospect concerning.
A man walks through the financial and business district of La Defense, near Paris, on March 13.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 19, 2024
EU's new gig-worker rules could tame 'management by algorithm'
The opaque nature of algorithmic management tools can result in random job assignments and performance ratings, and even termination.
Giovanna Gonzalez of Chicago demonstrates outside the U.S. Capitol following a press conference by TikTok creators to voice their opposition to the "Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act," pending crackdown legislation on TikTok in the House of Representatives, on Capitol Hill in Washington on March 12.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 19, 2024
TikTok and its 'secret sauce' caught in U.S.-China tussle
China's ByteDance's algorithm has helped drive TikTok's stratospheric success since the app was launched for the international market in 2017.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.'s (TSMC) new plant in Kikuyo, Kumamoto Prefecture
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 18, 2024
TSMC eyes advanced chip packaging capacity in Japan, sources say
Bringing its chip-on-wafer-on-substrate packaging technology — currently all in Taiwan — to Japan is one of the options the chipmaker is considering.
South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol delivers remarks during the Third Summit for Democracy in Seoul on Monday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Mar 18, 2024
South Korea-hosted summit warns of AI risks to democracy
South Korea is hosting the Summit for Democracy conference, an initiative aimed at discussing ways to stop the erosion of rights and freedoms.
Shintaro Tajima (left) and his son, Daisuke, pose in their forest in Hita, Oita Prefecture, in January. At their feet is wasabi growing in clusters.
BUSINESS / Companies / Regional Voices: Kyushu
Mar 18, 2024
Oita forestry firm signs carbon trade deal with Line operator
LY, which operates Line and Yahoo services, will purchase 1,500 tons of carbon credit per year from Tajima Forest for 10 years.
A group of high schoolers promoting self-liberation from social media and technology meets in New York in December 2022. Young people around the world are switching their smartphones for “dumbphones.”
COMMENTARY / Japan
Mar 18, 2024
How switching from a smart to a flip phone saved me
To stop the endless doomscrolling, some people are turning the clock back and switching to "dumbphones."
Chinese President Xi Jinping during an event at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 11
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Mar 18, 2024
Decoding Xi’s new catchphrase aimed at reviving China’s economy
Slogans matter in China, and the adoption of new catchphrases can herald profound shifts in policy.
A closed McDonald's in Tokyo on Friday after a tech issue forced outlets of the burger chain to shut around the world.
BUSINESS
Mar 16, 2024
Big Mac goes Big Tech — with a few hiccups
McDonald's reliance on tech backfired on Friday when an outage forced it to shut stores around the world.
A closed McDonald's in Nikko, Tochigi Prefecture, amid an outage that affected stores in Japan and abroad on Friday. The chain resumed operations on Saturday at almost all of its outlets in Japan.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 16, 2024
McDonald’s Japan resumes operations after outage
The recovery comes after McDonald’s was hit by a system outage that appears to have started in the Asia-Pacific region Friday.
People stand in front of a temporarily closed McDonald's in Tokyo's Shimbashi district on Friday as the chain experienced widespread tech issues.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 15, 2024
McDonald's suffers widespread tech outage in Japan and abroad
Many McDonald's stores in Japan stopped taking in-person and mobile customer orders because of the system disruption.
Makoto Uchida (left), president and CEO of Nissan, and Honda President Toshihiro Mibe give a joint news conference in Tokyo on Friday to announce a new strategic partnership in electric vehicles.
BUSINESS / Companies
Mar 15, 2024
Nissan and Honda to explore electric vehicle partnership
Analysts said the move was aimed at catching up with Chinese rivals who have stolen a march in EVs while Japanese firms have lost ground.
Residents remove snow from rooftops together with workers from a snow removal company in Joetsu, Niigata Prefecture, in January 2021. In fiscal 2022, 49 people in Japan died during activities related to the clearing of snow. Of these, 39 people — or roughly 80% — were age 65 or older.
JAPAN / Society
Mar 15, 2024
Land ministry goes digital to prevent snow-clearing accidents
The system is aimed at assessing the risks associated with snow removal at individual houses to avert mishaps, particularly ones involving the elderly.
A student at Hanoi University of Science and Technology looking at a printed circuit board in the school's lab in Hanoi.
ASIA PACIFIC / Society
Mar 15, 2024
The Gen-Z students at the heart of Vietnam's chip plans
Long viewed as a low-cost destination to make clothes, shoes and furniture, the country is now eyeing a rapid climb up the global supply chain.
The massive Gemini fiasco unveils critical questions about artificial intelligence's role and accountability in decision-making.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 15, 2024
Google’s bad Gemini rollout did the world a favor
Part of the difficulty in grappling with AI’s full implications is the huge effort that has gone into devising models that express themselves like humans.
The number of elementary school children who became victims of crimes through social media totaled a record 139 last year in Japan, National Police Agency data showed Thursday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 14, 2024
Child victims of social media-related crimes on the rise in Japan
The number of victims has grown fivefold in the past decade.

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami