(With apologies to Taylor Swift and her instant classic âCardigan,â an ode to the just-completed Epic Games v Apple trial. Best read while playing the original song.)
Gonzalez Rogers district judge
All those lawyers hold a grudge
When youâre a judge they assume you know nothing
Epic games, Apple suit
iOS app store loot
When youâre a judge they assume you know nothing
But you knew Timâs
Sweeneyâs and the Cookâs
sitting in your courtroom, you
You knew them
Hand inside our wallets
so much in-app purchase, you
And when Big Tech went too far: antitrust
Itâs a monopoly
You put them on and asked the big questions
A cut for Timâs a cut from all
His app store, inside his wall
When youâre a judge they assume you know nothing
But you knew them
Playing hide-and-seek with
paying less for Fortnite, you
You knew them
Anti-steering the developers
Monetizing your IP, you
And when Big Tech went too far: antitrust
Itâs a monopoly
You put them on and asked the big questions
To pay on phones and other zones
Was all Eddy wanted
But you groan about the clones
App store review failinâ
âCause you knew them
Bringinâ mobile gamers
Despite all the disclaimers, you
You knew them
Tried to claim the freedom
Android over iPhone, you
You knew them
Askinâ whatâs the problem
with a cheaper option, you
When youâre a judge they assume you know nothing
But you knew heâd cut the take for a bunch of them
Question is whyâd he give them such a deal
The pressure of suits would force commission cuts
âCause you knew nothing was competition
You knew investigations for the longest time
Chasinâ profits on the services line
Tim knew heâd need billions that the stock required
And theyâd be holdinâ at two trillion dollar
And they knew Wall Streetâd want the dough
Verdictâs down to you
And verdictâs down to you
Verdictâs down
And when Big Tech went too far: antitrust
Itâs a monopoly
You put them on and asked the big questions
Aaron Pressman
@ampressman
aaron.pressman@fortune.com
NEWSWORTHY
Stuck in a tracker and I can't get out of it. It won't happen until later this year, but Google plans to give Android users the ability to opt out of advertiser tracking on Android phones much as Apple has done for iPhone users. Unlike Apple, Google won't set non-tracking as the default, however, Bloomberg reports. Speaking of tracking, Apple says it will offer an Android app for its new Airtags trackers that will allow non-iPhone users to participate in the network and find lost stuffâor detect if they're being surreptitiously tracked.
Cut me some hack. Back in November, we discussed the Supreme Court's review of prosecutors using, or misusing, the 1984 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act to accuse people of hacking for pretty much run-of-the-mill activity online. On Thursday, the SCOTUS rejected the overreaching, with Justice Amy Coney Barrett writing that the government's interpretations of the law would âwould attach criminal penalties to a breathtaking amount of commonplace computer activity.â
Don't drive cyberpunk. Then again, some hacking is clearly illegal and really, really bad. The ransomware explosion that took down a key pipeline and half the meat industry is becoming an international relations issue. President Biden plans to ask Russian President Vladimir Putin to put an end to the hacker attacks that have originated in Russia. The pair of world leaders are meeting on June 16 in Geneva.
All I could do was cry. After weeks of rumors, Twitter took the wraps off its new subscription service for power users, Twitter Blue, though it will debut first in Canada and Australia. There's no editing of posted tweets still, but there's some sort of delayed posting feature to preview tweets before they go up. There's also a bookmarks folder for saving tweets and a "reader mode" for easier timeline review. No timeline from the company on when the service will be available in the U.S.
In the line of hire. With more women than men out of work amid the pandemic, Amazon on Thursday expanded its âreturnshipâ program, promising to hire up to 1,000 people in the next several years. The program provides paid job training to candidates who have left the workforce for a year or moreâusually meaning women who stopped working to take care of young children or other relatives.
Offline. The newest annual survey of smartphone ownership and broadband usage by Pew Research shows both reaching all-time highs of 85% and 77% respectively. Among Americans who do not have broadband at home, 45% cited cost as a reason and 25% said they did not have adequate access.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
As one of my final reporting trips, I was able to interview Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg in person in New York City last month. Of course we talked about 5G and all the latest wireless tech. But Vestberg also offered some interesting advice about time management:
In 2009, at Ericsson, we decided thereâs six things you need to do as a CEO. So I said, âLetâs do a forecast of what percentage of time I should be doing each of them.â Since then, Iâve measured every hour I work. There are three external and three internal things. The external ones are being in big scenes, meeting shareholders, meeting customers. Whenever itâs something where you say, âI am the only one at Verizon who can do it.â Going onstage with [Apple CEO] Tim Cook [to announce the first 5G iPhone], nobody else could do that. Internally, the three areas are about talent, strategy, and governance.
And I measure them in order to see that I actually spend the time on the most important things. Because itâs very easy in a company like this, to get bogged down on one big issue. But you know, there should be other people solving it, and you should actually attend to things that they cannot do. So thatâs how Iâve defined my workâand still do today.â
FOR YOUR WEEKEND READING PLEASURE
A few great long reads I came across this week:
Did Paying a Ransom for a Stolen Magritte Painting Inadvertently Fund Terrorism? (Vanity Fair)
The theft of a deeply personal painting by the Belgian artist was a national tragedy. Now an investigation points to a tragedy greater still.
All hail King Pokémon! (Input)
Gary Haase has amassed the worldâs most expensive PokĂ©mon card collection, valued at over $10 million. So why isnât he cashing in?
These architects popularized the open office. Now they say âthe open office is deadâ (Fast Company)
Clive Wilkinson Architects championed open offices for big companies such as Google and Microsoft. Now, as the pandemic has led to a massive overhaul of work life, they envision something completely different.
Kate Winslet Has No Filter (New York Times)
The star of âMare of Easttownâ is back on the sides of buses. Without airbrushing.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Force of nature: How the unstoppable Marc Benioff fueled Salesforceâs stratospheric rise By Michal Lev-Ram
EAâs CEO on the pandemic-driven video game boom and streamingâs future By Jonathan Vanian
Hereâs a list of the best led big U.S. companiesâand Facebook tops it By Lance Lambert
What programmer shortage? âLow-codeâ tools let ordinary workers create apps By Aaron Pressman
Up nearly 3,000% this year, the new king of the meme stocks continues to soar By Bernhard Warner
Appleâs MagSafe tech in some iPhones could present risk to people with pacemakers By Chris Morris
âThe Sunday effectâ: Why does crypto tend to crash on weekends? By Jessica Mathews
(Some of these stories require a subscription to access. Thank you for supporting our journalism.)
BEFORE YOU GO
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