Innholdsfortegnelse for #572 i Techlife News

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., the biggest contract manufacturer of processor chips for smartphones and other products, said Thursday that its quarterly profit rose 79.7% over a year earlier to a record $8.8 billion amid surging demand. Quarterly revenue rose 47.9% over a year ago to $19.2 billion, the company reported. TSMC, headquartered in Hsinchu, Taiwan, makes processor chips for brands including Apple Inc. and Qualcomm Inc. Many of their products are assembled by factories in China, which has exposed TSMC to the possible impact of U.S.-Chinese tension over technology and security. TSMC’s U.S.-traded shares fell 14% in value after Washington tightened restrictions on Chinese access to advanced computer chips. Those controls are based on limiting the ability of TSMC and other suppliers to use U.S. chip or manufacturing technology for…

Andy Warhol and Prince held center stage in a copyright case before the Supreme Court on Wednesday that veered from Cheerios and “Mona Lisa” analogies to Justice Clarence Thomas’ enthusiasm for the “Purple Rain” showman. Despite the light nature of the arguments at times involving two deceased celebrities, the issue before the court is a serious one for the art world: When should artists be paid for original work that is then transformed by others, such as a movie adaptation of a book? The case affects artists, authors, filmmakers, museums and movie studios. Some amount of copying is acceptable under the law as “fair use,” while larger scale appropriation of a work constitutes copyright infringement. As the 90-minute arguments unspooled, the justices discussed how courts should make that determination. Justice…

A Chinese firm tested out an electric flying taxi in Dubai this week, offering a glimpse of futuristic technology that could one day whisk people through cities high above any traffic. The XPeng X2, developed by the Guangzhou-based XPeng Inc’s aviation affiliate, is one of dozens of flying car projects around the world. Only a handful have been successfully tested with passengers on board, and it will likely be many years before any are put into service. The demonstration was held with an empty cockpit, but the company says it carried out a manned flight test in July 2021. The sleekly designed vehicle can carry two passengers and is powered by a set of eight propellers. The company says it has a top speed of 130 kilometers (80 miles) per…

Electric truck and SUV maker Rivian Automotive said it is recalling almost all the vehicles it has delivered to customers in order to tighten a loose fastener that could potentially affect drivers’ ability to steer. The company, which was founded in 2009, said it is recalling about 13,000 vehicles because a fastener connecting the vehicles’ front upper-control arm and steering knuckle may not be torqued enough. There have been seven reports potentially related to the issue, but no injuries have been reported, Rivian said. “If you experience excessive noise, vibration or harshness from the front suspension, or a change in steering performance or feel, you should call immediately,” Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe wrote in a letter to vehicle owners. The company based in Irvine, California, said the fix would only…

Facebook parent Meta unveiled a high-end virtual reality headset this week with the hope that people will soon be using it to work and play in the still-elusive place called the “metaverse.” The $1,500 Meta Quest Pro headset sports high-resolution sensors that let people see mixed virtual and augmented reality in full color, as well as eye tracking and so-called “natural facial expressions” that mimic the wearer’s facial movements so their avatars appear natural when interacting with other avatars in virtual-reality environments. Formerly known as Facebook, Meta is in the midst of a corporate transformation that it says will take years to complete. It wants to evolve from a provider of social platforms to a dominant power in a nascent virtual-reality construct called the metaverse — sort of like the…

TikTok appears to be deepening its foray into e-commerce with plans to operate its own U.S. warehouses, the kind of packing and shipping facilities more associated with Amazon or Walmart than the social media platform best known for addictive short videos. In the past two weeks, TikTok has posted several job listings on LinkedIn looking for candidates to help it develop and grow its “Fulfillment by TikTok Shop” in the U.S. to accommodate sellers using the app. According to the listings, TikTok plans to provide warehousing, delivery and item return options to sellers. A company spokesperson declined to comment on TikTok’s e-commerce plans in the U.S. But the U.S. job listings offer a window into a possible U.S. e-commerce expansion. In some listings, TikTok says it is looking for a…

More than $100 million in grants have been announced by the federal government as part of a major effort to close the digital divide in parts of rural Alaska. The projects will improve upon an existing system of internet service that is a series of microwave transmitters with limited data transmission and vulnerability to bad weather, the Anchorage Daily News reported. The grants include $73 million for a partnership between the Alaska Native village corporation for Bethel, Bethel Native Corporation, and telecommunications company GCI. That partnership, announced this week, is aimed at delivering fiber cable to 10 villages and more than 10,000 people. The project has been dubbed the Airraq Network, with Airraq translating to “string that tells the story,” according to a press release. The project includes $42 million…

Samsung Electronics has been granted an exception that will allow it to continue to at least temporarily maintain memory-chip production facilities in China, according to a Biden administration official, a week after the U.S. tightened export rules for China, limiting its ability to get advanced computing chips. The official, who was not authorized to comment and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that Samsung has received a license for the equipment needed to maintain existing facilities but not to export chips that are prohibited. The U.S. Commerce Department declined to comment specifically on the Samsung exemption, citing agency rules. But in a prepared statement the department said companies can seek case-by-case authorizations to help mitigate supply chain concerns. Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security was set to hold a…

The Biden administration proposed new standards that could make it more difficult to classify millions of workers as independent contractors and deny them minimum wage and benefits. The U.S. Department of Labor rule, which could take months to take effect, would replace a scrapped Trump-era standard that had lowered the bar for classifying employees as contractors, workers who are not covered by federal minimum wage laws and are not entitled to benefits including health insurance and paid sick days. The reaction in markets for major gig companies was immediate. Shares of the ride-hailing company Lyft fell 12% while rival Uber tumbled about 10%, although both companies dismissed the significance of the new proposal and its potential to affect their business. In one key change, employers are required to consider whether…

Crypto exchange Bittrex was fined $24 million by U.S. authorities for helping clients evade U.S. sanctions in places such as Syria, Iran and Crimea. It is the largest penalty ever levied against a crypto currency exchange by the Office of Foreign Assets Control, the agency said. The Treasury Department said that Bittrex allowed customers in Cuba, Syria, Iran, Sudan and the disputed region of Crimea to trade approximately $263.5 million worth of digital currencies between 2014 and 2017. In its statement, the U.S. said that Bittrex should have been aware these customers were in sanctioned parts of the world due to their physical addresses as well as their IP addresses. In one case, a customer in Iran gave a physical address in Iran and uploaded an Iranian passport to verify…

General Motors, which plans to go almost entirely electric by 2035, is creating a new energy division that will produce chargers for electric vehicles, as well as solar panels and other energy-related technology for homes and businesses. The company said that the unit, called GM Energy, will create systems for households and commercial customers that link electric vehicles to power storage and generation. The division should have the capacity to sell energy from electric vehicle and stationary storage batteries back to utilities during peak periods of energy usage. “GM Energy has the opportunity to help deliver sustainable energy products and services that can help mitigate the effect of power outages and provide customers with resilient and cost-effective energy management,” Travis Hester, vice president of GM EV Growth Operations, said in…

Why is it so hard to build a metaverse avatar — a visual representation of ourselves in the digital world — that walks on two legs? “I think everyone has been waiting for this,” said a cartoonish digital version of Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, unveiling his new avatar legs and jumping up and down at a virtual-reality event Tuesday. “But seriously, legs are hard. Which is why other virtual reality systems don’t have them either.” Early avatar models introduced by Meta, as well as Microsoft, have been ridiculed for appearing as legless, waist-up bodies floating around their virtual worlds. That’s in part because tech companies have been eager to show off their progress in building out virtual-reality environments while still working on the technical challenges of making avatars more human-like…

The head of Britain’s cyber-intelligence agency accused China of trying to “rewrite the rules of international security,” saying Beijing is using its economic and technological clout to clamp down at home and exert control abroad. Jeremy Fleming, director of GCHQ, said that despite war raging in Europe since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Beijing’s growing power is the “national security issue that will define our future.” In a rare public speech to the Royal United Services Institute think tank, Fleming alleged that Beijing’s Communist authorities want to “gain strategic advantage by shaping the world’s technology ecosystems.” “When it comes to technology, the politically motivated actions of the Chinese state is an increasingly urgent problem we must acknowledge and address,” Fleming said. “That’s because it’s changing the definition of national security into…

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen sought to project confidence in the U.S. financial outlook while pledging vigilance in responding to “risks on the horizon.” She is offering that message as global finance leaders gather in Washington to discuss the increasingly dismal view of the global economy. “Our economy remains resilient in the face of global economic headwinds,” Yellen said at a meeting on the sidelines of this week’s annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and its sister lending agency, the World Bank. Her remarks to the Bretton Woods Committee’s International Council crediting President Joe Biden’s domestic policies for contributing to U.S. economic strength came as administration officials try to talk up the president’s policies ahead of midterm elections. Those elections will decide the balance of power in Congress and…

It’s no secret Apple is working on several exciting products at Apple Campus, from virtual reality headsets to self-driving cars. Before too long, we expect to hear Tim Cook say “one more thing” and lift the lid on another significant innovation from the Cupertino company. APPLE REALITY ONE: AN AR/VR EXPERIENCE In what’s perhaps one of the worst-kept secrets in Silicon Valley, Apple is believed to have been working on several augmented and virtual reality headsets for release in the coming year. The new mixed-reality product will allow consumers to interact with apps that combine virtual and augmented reality and serve as the next big thing - the spiritual successor to the iPhone and the App Store, pushing technology in yet another direction. It’s all but confirmed that the devices…

Credit scores are complicated and because rating agencies consider many factors, the process of improving them can look different for everyone. When Willard Carpenter, 68, wanted a loan to open a new business, he realized that his credit score was not high enough to get approved. After checking his credit history, he found several issues he needed to solve. Carpenter’s credit was heavily affected by credit card debt that his father left on their joint account after his death over a year and a half ago. He’s also had no credit cards for at least 10 years — he stopped using them after he declared bankruptcy due to credit card debt. Now, he is working with a financial advisor to erase his father’s debt from his history and start building…

Honda says it will build a $3.5 billion joint-venture battery factory in rural southern Ohio and hire 2,200 people to staff it as the company starts to turn the state into its North American electric vehicle hub. Honda, which announced its first Ohio factory 45 years ago, also plans to invest $700 million and add 300 jobs at three of its own Ohio factories to prepare them to start making EVs and components. The battery plant, to be built jointly with LG Energy Solution of South Korea, could see a total investment of $4.4 billion. The plant site is off Interstate 71 in Fayette County, about 40 miles southwest of the state capital of Columbus. In addition, Honda’s assembly plants in Marysville and East Liberty, northeast of Columbus, and its…

Amazon said this week it will invest 1 billion euros ($972.1 million) to add thousands of more electric vans, long-haul trucks and cargo bikes to its delivery network in Europe. The investment would grow the number of electric delivery vans the company has in Europe from roughly 3,000 to 10,000 by 2025, the Seattle-based retail giant said in an announcement on its website. With the investment, Amazon is also hoping to purchase more than 1,500 electric trucks, up from five in the United Kingdom. To accommodate those vehicles, the company said it will build hundreds of fast chargers across its European facilities that can charge the vehicles in roughly two hours. “Our transportation network is one of the most challenging areas of our business to decarbonize, and to achieve net-zero…

China criticized the latest U.S. decision to tighten export controls that would make it harder for China to obtain and manufacture advanced computing chips, calling it a violation of international economic and trade rules that will “isolate and backfire” on the U.S. “Out of the need to maintain its sci-tech hegemony, the U.S. abuses export control measures to maliciously block and suppress Chinese companies,” said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning. “It will not only damage the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies, but also affect American companies’ interests,” she said. Mao also said that the U.S. “weaponization and politicization” of science and technology as well as economic and trade issues will not stop China’s progress. She was speaking after the U.S. updated export controls that included adding certain advanced,…