NEWSWORTHY
Re-do. After getting lumped in with rivals, Apple is trying to separate itself from the pack on privacy protection once again. Addressing the controversy over contractors listening to customers' Siri recordings, the company apologized and said it would require an explicit opt-in from customers before saving or using their Siri recordings. And employees, not contractors, would listen to any such recordings, Apple said in a short statement . Separately, Apple also will sell iPhones online and at its own retail stores for the first time in India starting in a few months, after the government relaxed import restrictions.
Not exactly Taylor Swift material. Speaking of things that should have been thrown away, turns out Amazon execs were compiling a record of statements by opponents to the company's sweetheart tax deal to build a new HQ in New York. The so-called burn book (actually a Microsoft Word file) helped convince the company to drop the plan, the Wall Street Journal reveals in an interesting behind-the-scenes report of what went wrong.
Please make it stop. Employee troubles at Google are back in the news AGAIN, after a former company lawyer wrote a post about her relationship with Alphabet chief legal officer David Drummond. Jennifer Blakely wrote that Drummond violated workplace relationship rules and refused to pay child support. Google didn't comment. Seeking to end a different controversy, Google's YouTube said it's starting a new site and mobile app just for kids. The app will segment videos by age . "We know that what is great content for a 4-year-old may not be great content for a 10-year-old," the company noted. After listening to one too many Raffi songs in my time, I can't disagree.
Volatility is as volatility does. For no apparent reason, prices of cryptocurrencies plunged on Wednesday. Bitcoin, for example, fell 6% and dropped below the symbolic $10,000 level for the first time in more than a month.
Repackaged. Speaking of plunging prices, shares of cloud app and storage provider Box dropped 9% in pre-market trading on Thursday even after the company released quarterly results better than analysts expected. Box shares were already down 18% this year.
Saving my pennies. It's a big time of year for new product announcements in tech. Here are a few that caught my eye besides that new Fitbit watch: Garmin introduced the fenix 6X Pro Solar watch, which, as the name implies, recharges from the sun. Canon announced two new digital cameras, the DSLR 90D and the mirrorless M6 Mark II. And Sony went all mirrorless with its new cameras, the A6600 and A6100.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
About a year ago, Dell Technologies was in the process of assimilating its partially-owned software unit, VMware. But VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger had other ideas and convinced Michael Dell to let his company remain somewhat segregated from the larger Dell ecosystem. After all, VMware has to run on all kinds of hardware, including machines sold by Dell rivals. VMware's stock price hasn't done much since–it's down 3% this year–but Gelsinger is sticking to his guns in an interview with ZDNet.
"How much time do I spend worrying about surface mount technology and injection moulding–and this is a dominant issue inside Dell. Now if I bring those two companies together, executive staff meetings are dominated by supply chain issues," he said. "I don't care–I care, but it's not the core of my business, so I'll say every aspect has reinforced a major innovative enterprise software company that has independence, but also great value for interrelationship and partnership with a world class-scale hardware partner."
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Peloton's IPO Filing Is Yet Another Example of Companies Going Oprah By Polina Marinova
Amazon's Ring Partners With 400 Police Forces, Adding Fuel to an Already Raging Privacy Debate By Kevin Kelleher
20,000 Striking AT&T Workers Return to Work, Just Days After Walking Out By Aaron Pressman
Why Tesla's Planned China Price Hikes Shouldn't Worry Investors By Don Reisinger
A 15-Year Old Video Game Is Catching Fire All Over Again By David Z. Morris
How Millennials Invest: Finance and Tech Execs Opine By Robert Hackett
Schwab Bets That Investors Will 'Binge' on Advice With Netflix-like Subscription Service By Chris Taylor
BEFORE YOU GO
Talk about self-help, the cybersecurity firm Avast teamed with French police to take control of a server being used by crooks to install digital currency mining malware on victimized PCs. But they didn't stop there. They then used the server to reverse the process and remotely delete the malware from nearly 1 million computers. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.
This edition of Data Sheet was curated by Aaron Pressman. Find past issues, and sign up for other Fortune newsletters.
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