Amazon empowers Alexa with generative AI

ARLINGTON, United States — Amazon’s popular Alexa digital assistant is about to be supercharged with the powers of generative artificial intelligence, the company said on Wednesday, as the tech giant steps into the AI race dominated by ChatGPT, Google and Microsoft.

Voice assistants like Alexa or Apple's Siri are often designated as perfect candidates to have their sometimes-glitchy and robot-like technology streamlined with capabilities of generative AI.

Generative AI, such as used in the ChatGPT chatbot, delivers content as complex as a poem or scholarly essay in just seconds, and Amazon's goal is that Alexa could do that and even more with verbal commands from a user's living room or kitchen.

At an event at the company's offices near Washington, the company said that an English-language version of Alexa AI would be made available as an opt-in on all its devices in the United States in the coming months.

"It's going to take some time to integrate these technologies into the surface area that is Alexa. But I am super optimistic that we are off to a wonderful an excellent start," said Dave Limp, Amazon’s senior vice president of devices and services.

With the change, Alexa will be able to converse with a more personable style and drop its robotic tone, the company said.

Alexa would also tap into real-time information and create the semblance of a personal rapport with users that would include an awareness of their habits or favorite sports teams.

"For example, you could say 'Alexa every morning at 8 am turn on the coffee machine, open the blinds, dim the lights in the study and play my morning news,' and boom -- it creates the routine," Limp said.

While widely plugged as the next stage of consumer technology, in the past decade Alexa and its connected smart home devices have yet to become big money spinners for Amazon, with Google and Apple also struggling to make traction in the space.

Daniel Rausch, the executive in charge of Alexa, told reporters that the AI would put an extra emphasis on accuracy and that its efforts in AI were not comparable with chatbots that have been shown to output inaccuracies or go off the rails.

"Accuracy in smart home means yes, we did turn on the right light, we did lock the right door, we are sure about the state of the security system," he said.

At the launch event, Amazon also introduced its latest Echo 8 smart home hub as well as a soundbar for televisions and new AI-fueled search capabilities on its FireTV service.

Limp, Amazon's longtime device chief, is retiring after more than a decade in the role amid reports he will be replaced by a senior executive from Microsoft.

Agence France-Presse 

'Godfather of AI' urges governments to face dangers

TORONTO, Canada — Geoffrey Hinton, one of the so-called "godfathers" of artificial intelligence, urged governments to step in and make sure that machines do not take control of society.

Hinton made headlines in May when he announced that he was quitting after a decade of work at Google to speak more freely on the dangers of AI, shortly after the release of ChatGPT captured the imagination of the world.

The highly respected AI scientist, who is based at the University of Toronto, was speaking to a packed audience at the Collision tech conference in the Canadian city.

The conference brought together more than 30,000 startup founders, investors and tech sector workers, most looking to learn how to ride the AI wave and not hear a lesson on its dangers or a call for government meddling.

"Before AI is smarter than us, I think the people developing it should be encouraged to put a lot of work into understanding how it might try and take control away," Hinton said.

"Right now there are 99 very smart people trying to make AI better and one very smart person trying to figure out how to stop it taking it over and maybe you want to be more balanced," he said.

Hinton warned that the risks of AI should be taken seriously.

"I think it's important that people understand that this is not science fiction, this is not just fearmongering," he insisted. "It is a real risk that we must think about, and we need to figure out in advance how to deal with it."

Hinton also expressed concern that AI would deepen inequality, with the massive productivity gain from its deployment going to the benefit of the rich and not workers.

"The wealth isn't going to go to the people doing the work, it is going to go into making the rich richer and not the poorer and that's a very bad society," he added.

He also pointed to the danger of "fake news" created by ChatGPT-style bots and said he hoped that AI-generated content could be marked in a similar way central banks watermark cash money.

"It's very important to try, for example, to mark everything that is fake as fake. Whether we can do that technically, I don't know," he said.

Agence France-Presse

Google to release ChatGPT-like bot named Bard

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Google said Monday it will release a conversational chatbot named Bard, setting up an artificial intelligence showdown with Microsoft which has invested billions in the creators of ChatGPT, a language app that convincingly mimics human writing.

ChatGPT, created by San Francisco company OpenAI, has caused a sensation for its ability to write essays, poems or programming code on demand within seconds, sparking widespread fears of cheating or of entire professions becoming obsolete.

Microsoft announced last month that it was backing OpenAI and has begun to integrate ChatGPT features into its Teams platform, with expectations that it will adapt the app to its Office suite and Bing search engine.

The potential inclusion in Bing turned the focus on Google and speculation that the company's world-dominating search engine could face unprecedented competition from an AI-powered rival.

Media reports said the overnight success of ChatGPT was designated a "code red" threat at Google with founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page -- who left several years ago -- pulled back in to brainstorm ideas and fast-track a response.

The pressure to act was heightened by the poor earnings posted last week by Google-parent Alphabet, which fell short of investor expectations. The company last month announced that it was laying off 12,000 people as it put more emphasis on AI projects.

Google's announcement came on the eve of an AI-related launch event by Microsoft, further that the two tech giants will do battle over the technology, also known as generative AI.

"Generative AI is a game changer and much like the rise of the internet sank the networking giants that came before (AOL, CompuServe etc.) it has the potential to change the competitive dynamic for search and information," said independent tech analyst Rob Enderle.

"Google still largely lives off the fact their search engine is the most widely used, this could change that relegating them to history," he added.

'High-quality responses'

In his blog post on Monday, Google CEO Sundar Pichai said that Google's Bard conversational AI was to go out for testing with a plan to make it more widely available to the public "in the coming weeks."

Google's Bard is based on LaMDA, the firm's Language Model for Dialogue Applications system, and has been in development for several years.

"Bard seeks to combine the breadth of the world's knowledge with the power, intelligence, and creativity of our large language models," Pichai said, referring to the technology behind ChatGPT-like AI.

"It draws on information from the web to provide fresh, high-quality responses," he added.

Before the emergence of ChatGPT, which was released in late November, Google had been reluctant to launch its own language-based AI fearing the reputational risk of releasing technology that wasn't ready.

Pichai insisted that responses churned out by Bard would "meet a high bar for quality, safety and groundedness in real world information."

And much like ChatGPT, Bard would also use a limited version of its base language model in order to reduce computing power and reach a wider audience.

Crucially for its looming duel with Microsoft, Google also said that users would soon see AI-powered features in its search engine.

New-style responses would "distill complex information and multiple perspectives into easy-to-digest formats," Pichai said.

Agence France-Presse

Google's money churning ad engine sputters in rough economy

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Google parent Alphabet reported quarterly earnings that fell short of market expectations as belts tightened in the digital ad market that drives its revenue.

Alphabet said it made a profit of $14 billion in the third quarter on ad revenue that grew just 6 percent to $69 billion when compared with the same period of last year.

Aside from one period at the start of the Covid pandemic, that would mark the weakest revenue growth at Alphabet for any quarter since 2014.

"When Google stumbles, it's a bad omen for digital advertising at large," said Insider Intelligence analyst Evelyn Mitchell.

"This disappointing quarter for Google signifies hard times ahead if market conditions continue to deteriorate."

Alphabet shares slipped 6.8 percent to $97.35 in after-market trades that followed the release of the earnings report.

Google's foundation in advertising on its heavily used search engine does give it an advantage, however, over other ad-reliant tech firms such as Meta, Snap and Twitter, the analyst added.

"Over time, we've had periods of extraordinary growth and then there are periods I viewed as a moment where you take the time to optimize the company to make sure we are set up for the next decade of growth ahead," Alphabet and Google chief Sundar Pichai said on an earnings call.

"I view this as one of those moments."

Alphabet chief financial officer Ruth Porat said the financial results in the quarter showed "healthy fundamental growth in Search and momentum in Cloud" computing revenue, but suffered from foreign exchange rates given the strong US dollar.

"We're working to realign resources to fuel our highest growth priorities," Porat said.

Big tech firms are grappling with multiple challenges, from inflation to the war in Ukraine, putting pressure on earnings.

Alphabet recruited throughout the pandemic, but announced a slowdown in hiring as ad revenue growth cooled this year.

"Within this slower headcount growth next year we will continue hiring for critical roles, particularly focused on top engineering and technical talent," Porat said.

Many other tech companies have decided to lay off staff, including Netflix and Twitter, or slow the pace of hiring, such as Microsoft and Snap. 

YouTube squeeze? 

Worsening the financial situation for Alphabet is the fact that Google tends not to aggressively promote advertising on its platform with tactics such as trying to convince businesses that online marketing is a smart move during tough economic times, said independent tech analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group.

"They don't like the idea of making their money off advertising, so they don't treat the market very well," Enderle contended.

"Now, you are seeing the adverse impact of not taking your revenue source seriously."

The earnings report also showed that ad revenue at YouTube was slightly lower than it was in the same quarter a year earlier, despite a hot trend of people watching video on-demand on the internet.

"Overall, I feel YouTube remains in a really good position to continue to benefit from the streaming boom," chief business officer Philipp Schindler said during an earnings call.

However, Alphabet noticed a "pullback in spending" by advertisers at YouTube in the quarter, Schindler told analysts.

"They have a ton of competition in video, and TikTok is probably hitting YouTube pretty hard," Enderle said.

Netflix last week reported that it gained subscribers in the recent quarter, calming investor fears that the streaming giant was losing paying customers.

The company said it ended the third quarter with slightly more than 223 million subscribers worldwide, up some 2.4 million, after seeing subscriber ranks ebb during the first half of the year.

The turn-around in subscriber growth comes as Netflix is poised to debut a subscription option subsidized by ads in November across a dozen countries.

Rival streaming platform Disney+ is to launch ad-subsidized subscriptions in December.

Agence France-Presse

Google outage reported by tens of thousands of users

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Tens of thousands of users reported being unable to access various Google services on Monday night, according to outage monitor Downdetector.

"User reports indicate Google Maps is having problems since 9:36 PM EDT (0136 GMT)," Downdetector tweeted.

More than 40,000 users, including in New York City and Denver, Colorado, reported disruptions when trying to use Google's services, particularly the maps and search engine.

After around two hours, reports of the outage began tapering, but a small number of users continued to report trouble accessing Google's cloud and calendar functions, according to Downdetector.

"We're aware of a software update issue that occurred late this afternoon Pacific Time and briefly affected availability of Google Search and Maps, and we apologize for the inconvenience," a Google spokesperson said. 

"We worked to quickly address the issue and our services are now back online."

On Twitter, some users posted screenshots of the 500 error message they received while trying to use Google, which said the server had "encountered an error and could not complete your request." 

Agence France-Presse

YouTube, Google Play suspend payment-based services in Russia

Alphabet Inc's YouTube and Google Play store are suspending all payment-based services in Russia, including subscriptions, as Western sanctions start to pose banking challenges in the country.

Google will also pause ads for advertisers based in Russia across its properties and networks globally, the company said. This is in addition to the company's recent suspension of ads in Russia.

Google and YouTube had earlier stopped selling online advertising in Russia following similar pauses by Twitter Inc and Snap Inc after Moscow's invasion of Ukraine. 

"As a follow-up, we're now extending this pause to all our monetization features, including YouTube Premium, Channel Memberships, Super Chat and Merchandise, for viewers in Russia," YouTube said in a statement on Thursday.

YouTube channels in Russia will still be able to generate revenue from viewers outside of Russia, which include Super Chat and merchandise sales. Free apps on Google Play also remain available in Russia, according to a company support website.

-reuters-

Alphabet eyes $2 trillion value after blowout results

Google parent company Alphabet Inc advanced nearer to joining peers Apple Inc and Microsoft Corp in the elite $2 trillion market valuation club on Wednesday as the search giant's shares surged more than 8 percent following a blowout quarterly report.

Last trading at about $2,975, Alphabet's stock was on track for its largest one-day percentage gain in almost two years, easing concerns around owning Big Tech following a sector-wide selloff in the past few weeks.

Alphabet's stock market value peaked just above $2 trillion after the start of the trading session, and was last at $1.97 trillion. That includes class B shares that do not trade on the stock market and are held by insiders.

A close above $2 trillion would be the first ever for the Mountain View, California-based company.

"The technology sector started 2022 with some of the biggest question marks over it since the dotcom crash more than two decades ago," said Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell. "However, the largest and highest quality US tech names continue to deliver the answers the market wants with big earnings beats."

Shares of Wall Street's most valuable companies have soared in the past two years, driven by pandemic-led shifts in how people work and learn, even as regulators around the world scrutinize them over allegations of breaches of privacy and antitrust concerns.

At least 20 brokerages raised their price targets on Alphabet's stock after the company late on Tuesday delivered record quarterly sales that topped expectations. The median analyst price target is now $3,450, 16 percent above its current price.

Alphabet also announced a 20-to-1 stock split, which will give shareholders 19 shares for every share they hold.

Splitting stocks is a method companies use to woo investors by making them more affordable. However, some brokerages, such as Robinhood Markets, allow investors to buy fractions of shares, making the tactic less effective.

Tesla Inc and Apple split their stocks in 2000 to make their shares more appealing to mom-and-pop investors.

"The split will make the shares more accessible for retail investors and likely facilitate inclusion in the Dow Jones Industrial Average (which is somehow still share price-weighted), but it has no fundamental impact," J.P. Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth said.

Facebook parent Meta Platforms, which is set to report results on Wednesday after the bell, was last up 1.1 percent.

Adding to the rebound in tech stocks, Advanced Micro Devices Inc's shares jumped over 5 percent after its results topped Wall Street expectations. Rivals Nvidia Corp, Qualcomm Inc and Micron Technology Inc also rose.

-reuters-

App store antics: Legal screws tighten for Google, Apple

PARIS - David Barnard owes his entire livelihood to Apple.

In 2008, he sold his car to start a company building apps for the fledgling iPhone. He's since found success making what he self-deprecatingly calls "boring" apps, including ones that check the weather or help drivers monitor their gas use.

But his conflicting feelings sum up a growing debate -- playing out in courts and parliaments around the world -- over whether both Apple and Google are abusing their monopoly over the app market. 

In a world first, South Korean MPs passed a law Tuesday banning the two tech giants from forcing app developers to use their payment systems.

Until now, those restrictions have allowed Apple to take a cut of up to 30 percent from payments made inside apps downloaded via the App Store, and Google to do the same through its Play Store. 

The tech giants, whose operating systems run on 99 percent of the world's smartphones, have argued this is fair recompense for providing the platforms that allow apps to be downloaded in the first place.

And to some extent, Barnard agrees. "Apple enabled me to build a business, which I'm incredibly grateful for," he said from his home in Texas. "But it comes with some pretty big trade-offs."

Barnard said he had witnessed frustrating cases of companies building clever apps, only for Apple to release similar features that work better with the phone's technology "in ways that developers can't compete with".

And with tens of billions of dollars floating through Apple and Google's payment systems as apps become increasingly integrated into people's shopping and entertainment habits, the commission charges have come in for particularly fierce opposition.

EPIC LEGAL BATTLES 

The fees are at the heart of a bitter lawsuit between Apple and Epic Games, maker of the phenomenally successful video game Fortnite.

The game lets players spend real money on digital items like clothing and weapons. It sounds frivolous, but the trial revealed that this translated to at least $100 million collected by Apple. 

Furious over these lost profits, Epic is also suing both Apple and Google in Australia and has filed complaints with EU and UK competition authorities, in what competition lawyer Pierre Zelenko described as a "worldwide battle" against the tech giants.

"They're piling on the pressure on multiple fronts to have more chances of a recognized authority coming out in their favor," the Linklaters lawyer said. 

Epic are not the only challengers taking on the app market overlords.

In July, 37 US states banded together to sue Google, alleging that the Play Store represents an illegal monopoly.

They claim Google used various strategies to prevent viable competitors to the Play Store emerging, including offering to pay Samsung to make its Galaxy Store less appealing. 

Consumers are meanwhile waging class actions against both companies in the US and UK, while France's competition authority has joined forces with an alliance of start-ups to take Apple to court.

'TOXIC MESS'

Analysts say the new South Korean law could set a precedent as US and European lawmakers debate similar proposals to ban tech giants from forcing customers to use their app stores and payment systems. 

Both Apple and Google have sought to fend of criticism that its hefty fees strangle smaller businesses, by taking a reduced 15 percent from companies earning less than $1 million a year from app sales.

Last week, Apple also proposed a settlement to a class action that would see it pay $100 million to smaller developers like Barnard. 

The offer "clarified" the company's policies to state that developers can use information collected inside apps -- like customers' email addresses -- to tell them about payment efforts that don't involve handing money to Apple.

But developers have complained that the changes are much less radical than Apple claims.

"I've finally come to the conclusion that it's going to take regulation to get Apple to do right by developers and ultimately customers," Barnard said. 

Both tech giants have argued that their stores help consumers by vetting apps, offering better security and privacy. 

Without the App Store, Apple chief Tim Cook told the Epic trial, the app marketplace would be "a toxic kind of mess". 

Barnard broadly agrees that Apple's system makes life easier for consumers, and that it's entitled to reward itself for that.

But he also thinks the vast amounts the company is paying itself are untenable.

"It's time for Apple to rethink how much they charge," he said.

Agence France-Presse

Epic Games says Google paid phone and game makers to avoid $1-billion app store hit

"Fortnite" developer Epic Games on Thursday unsealed details about contracts it alleges Alphabet Inc's Google signed with phone makers and other top video game companies to avoid losing $1.1 billion in annual app store profit.

Epic in 2018 launched "Fortnite" through its website and a partnership with handset maker Samsung Electronics Co , bypassing Google's Play Store, which charges developers fees of up to 30 perecnt of their sales.

Google feared other companies copying Epic and blocked that possibility by erecting unlawful hurdles, Epic alleged in an antitrust lawsuit filed against Google last year.

Google said the lawsuit remains baseless and mischaracterizes business conversations. A trial has not been scheduled.

Among new details a judge ordered be unredacted, Google in 2019 estimated up to $6 billion in Play revenue and $1.1 billion in profit would be at risk in 2022 alone if Epic's approach spread and alternative stores found success, according to the lawsuit.

But Google avoided the feared hit.

In 2019, it launched "Premier Device Program" to pay phone makers to ensure the Play Store's exclusivity and limit the appeal of partnerships similar to what Epic had reached with Samsung, according to the newly released details.

Premier partners received 12 percent of Google's search revenues from their phones, compared with 8 percent traditionally, according to the filing. Some partners, including LG Electronics Inc and Lenovo Group's Motorola, also received 3 percent to 6 percent of Google "Play spend."

Separately, Google in 2019 as part of an effort dubbed "Project Hug" approved spending "hundreds of millions of dollars" on over 20 top developers in marketing and other benefits to keep them on the Play Store, according to the details. The "vast majority" accepted Google's offer by December 2020.

According to the lawsuit, Google internally called the new deals a success in stopping a "contagion" of developers sidestepping the Play Store. 

-reuters-

New child safety features for Google, YouTube

Google on Tuesday unveiled a series of online safety measures for children, including a private setting for videos uploaded by teens and safeguard for ads shown to users under 18.

The new features, which come amid heightened concerns about online child exploitation and safety at a time of growing internet usage during the global pandemic, affect Google's YouTube video platform as well its online services such as search and Google Assistant.

"As kids and teens spend more time online, parents, educators, child safety and privacy experts, and policy makers are rightly concerned about how to keep them safe," said Google product and user experience director Mindy Brooks.

"We engage with these groups regularly, and share these concerns."

Google's "safe search" -- which excludes sensitive or mature content -- will be the default setting for users under 18, which up to now had been the case only for under-13 users. 

On the massively popular YouTube platform, content from 13- to 17-year-olds will be private by default, the tech giant said.

"With private uploads, content can only be seen by the user and whomever they choose," said a blog post by James Beser, head of product management for YouTube Kids and Family.

"We want to help younger users make informed decisions about their online footprint and digital privacy... If the user would like to make their content public, they can change the default upload visibility setting and we'll provide reminders indicating who can see their video."

Google will also make it easier for families to request removal of a child's photos from image search requests.

"Of course, removing an image from search doesn't remove it from the web, but we believe this change will help give young people more control of their images online," Brooks said.

In another safety move, Google will turn off location history for all users under 18 globally, without an option to turn it back on. This is already in place for those under 13. 

Google will also make changes in how it shows ads to minors, blocking any "age-sensitive" categories and banning targeting based on the age, gender or interests of people under 18.

Agence France-Presse

Google and Facebook say on-campus workers must be vaccinated

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Google and Facebook on Wednesday said workers returning to offices will need to be vaccinated against Covid-19, in the latest move by firms and US government agencies.

Spikes in infections due to a Delta variant of the virus have ramped up concerns in the United States, where 611,000 people have died in the pandemic.

Google will make campuses off-limits to unvaccinated employees and extend its global work-from-home option through October 18, according to chief executive Sundar Pichai.

"Anyone coming to work on our campuses will need to be vaccinated," Pichai said in a blog post.

"We're rolling this policy out in the United States in the coming weeks and will expand to other regions in the coming months."

Implementation will be adapted to local conditions, including vaccine availability, according to the Silicon Valley-based tech titan.

"I hope these steps will give everyone greater peace of mind as offices reopen," Pichai said.

"Seeing Googlers together in the offices these past few weeks filled me with optimism, and I'm looking forward to brighter days ahead."

Google and Facebook were among companies worldwide that abandoned campuses early last year, letting people work remotely rather than risk exposure to Covid-19 in offices.

Google has been paying the salaries of campus workers unable to do their jobs because of closed offices, and helping employees get access to vaccines, according to Pichai.

"Even as the virus continues to surge in many parts of the world, it’s encouraging to see very high vaccination rates for our Google community in areas where vaccines are widely available," Pichai said.

"This is a big reason why we felt comfortable opening some of our offices to employees who wanted to return early."

Tech titan Facebook put out similar word on Wednesday, saying that as its offices re-open, only vaccinated workers will be welcomed.

"We will be requiring anyone coming to work at any of our US campuses to be vaccinated," Facebook vice president of people Lori Goler said in response to an AFP inquiry.

"We will have a process for those who cannot be vaccinated for medical or other reasons and will be evaluating our approach in other regions as the situation evolves."

Many unions and critics of mandates have spoken out against required vaccinations, citing personal freedom arguments.

President Joe Biden said Tuesday that a vaccine mandate for America's more than two million federal workers was under consideration.

California and New York City announced that official workers would need to get vaccinated or take weekly tests.

Agence France-Presse

Google is starting to tell you how it found Search results

Alphabet's Google will now show its search engine users more information about why it found the results they are shown, the company said on Thursday.

It said people googling queries will now be able to click into details such as how their result matched certain search terms, in order to better decide if the information is relevant.

Google has been making changes to give users more context about the results its search engine provides. 

Earlier this year it introduced panels to tell users about the sources of the information they are seeing. It has also started warning users when a topic is rapidly evolving and search results might not be reliable.

-reuters-

Amazon may prove exception to global tax rules

PARIS - The Group of Seven wealthy nations may have endorsed a plan to ensure the world's biggest companies pay a minimum global tax rate, but US tech behemoth Amazon may escape it.

The landmark deal is supposed to help put an end to top multinationals shopping for countries with low corporate tax rates in which to book their profits instead of paying where they conduct their business.

By introducing a minimum tax rate of 15 percent without exceptions proponents of the plan hope multinationals will have less incentive to go through complex efforts to shift where they pay taxes.

Top 100 

There is a second "pillar" in the plan: countries would be allowed to tax a share of the profits of the most profitable companies in the world, regardless of where they are based.

The caveat: it applies only to companies whose profit margins exceed 10 percent.

That would affect about 100 companies, including US tech giants such as Facebook and Google, but as some experts have pointed out, not Amazon.

Despite Amazon's colossal footprint and market capitalization of more than $1 trillion, its profit margin last year amounted to just 6.3 percent.

It did not take long before the first brickbats were aimed at the deal by Britain's Fair Tax Foundation.

"Just one more reason for the G20 to revisit and embolden the package" when the group of the world's top industrialized and emerging nations look to sign off on the arrangement next month, the group said on Twitter.Amazon caught by web 

A source close to the talks confirmed that Amazon overall would not fall under the provisions allowing countries to tax part of its profits. 

However its cloud computing arm, Amazon Web Services (AWS), "turns in profits of around 30 percent" and "it will therefore be taxed on this segment of activity" by different nations, said the source. 

There is no other "exception" or loophole in the provisions, the source added.

Amazon, which has been surfing an e-commerce wave since COVID-19 hammered bricks and mortar retail, more than tripled its first-quarter net profit for this year to $8.1 billion.

AWS meanwhile saw its quarterly sales soar 32 percent to $13.5 billion.

Like fellow online giant Facebook, Amazon welcomed the G7 accord. 

In a statement to AFP, the company called it "a welcome step forward" which will "help bring stability to the international tax system."

Uniform approach welcomed 

Amazon's country director for Italy and Spain, Mariangela Marseglia, declared herself "very happy" with the deal reached by finance ministers and central bankers of the Group of Seven wealthy states over the weekend.

She said it adopts "a uniform approach to the taxation of multinational companies (which) is what we have been trying to pursue for a long time."

Amazon has long supported countries working together on corporate taxation, she said, in order to reduce the risk of double taxation. 

That may be an allusion to taxes imposed unilaterally by countries including France, Italy, Spain and Britain which will fall away once a global agreement takes effect.

Amazon has been variously targeted by the United States and several European countries over its tax optimization arrangements involving sophisticated accounting schemes which exploit differences in different jurisdictions.

Essentially this involves booking profits in countries with relatively low tax levels while conversely declaring losses where tax levels are higher.

Such measures allow Amazon to considerably lower its tax bill.

Amazon says it is now waiting on the details of a global accord. 

The reform now goes to a G20 finance ministers meeting in July before moving to negotiations between 139 countries overseen by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Agence France-Presse

Australia's Nine Entertainment signs content deal with Facebook, Google

Nine Entertainment Co Holdings Ltd said on Tuesday it had signed multi-year content-supply deals with Google and Facebook under Australia's news media bargaining code.

The agreement, terms of which were not disclosed, comes after rival Seven West Media Ltd and News Corp signed similar deals following the enactment of tough laws to make US tech giants pay for displaying news on their platforms.

The multi-media firm said it would supply content for Google's News Showcase platform for five years and to a similar Facebook product for three.

Google would also expand its marketing ventures across Nine's platforms, the publisher of the Australian Financial Review, The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald newspapers added.

After considering these new deals and ongoing subscription revenue for Nine's mastheads, the Sydney-based company said it expected growth of A$30 million to A$40 million ($23.2 million to $31 million) in its publishing unit's fiscal 2022 core earnings.

-reuters-

Italy fines Google 100M euros for abuse of market position

ROME— Italy's competition authority said Thursday it had fined Google more than 100 million euros ($120 million) for abuse of market position for shutting out a rival's smartphone app offering recharging of electric vehicles.

The anti-trust authority ordered Google, whose Android operating system and Google Play app store dominate the Italian market, to include in its Android Auto mobile system an Enel X app for users of electric vehicles, finding the US giant had shut its rival out.

Agence France-Presse

YouTube says rule-breaking videos get scant views

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - YouTube on Tuesday said rule-breaking videos get looked at very little before being removed by the Google-owned platform.

YouTube added "Violative View Rate" to its quarterly transparency report to indicate what percentage of views come from content that violates its policies, and said the figure was a small fraction of a percent in the final three months of last year.

"It's a very low number," YouTube director of trust and safety Jennifer O'Connor said while briefing journalists.

"Of course we want it to be lower, and that's what my team works day in and day out to try to do."

The rate derived by sampling YouTube content indicated that violating content accounted for 16 to 18 of every 10,000 views on the platform, where the biggest category for rule breaking is typically spam, O'Connor said.

YouTube did not provide a breakdown of which rules were being violated by videos involved in the calculation.

Automated systems at YouTube detect 94 percent of violating content flagged, removing 75 percent of it before a video gets 10 views, according to the streaming platform.

Internal teams at YouTube have used the VVR as a metric for their efforts since 2017, and it has fallen some 70 percent as the company has invested in technology and workers to catch unwanted videos, O'Connor said.

More than 20,000 people at Google are devoted to keeping the platform safe, she added.

Google and YouTube are among internet services that have been hammered with criticism that they have not done enough to stop the spread of misinformation and other abuses that can cause real-world harm.

Since it started releasing community guideline enforcement reports in 2018, YouTube has removed more than 83 million videos and 7 billion comments, according to the service.

The VVR is calculated by sending samplings of videos on YouTube to reviewers to determine whether they violate policies in a system O'Connor touted as statistically reliable.

"By sampling, we gain a more comprehensive view of the violative content we might not be catching with our systems," YouTube said in a blog post.

"We believe the VVR is the best way for us to understand how harmful content impacts viewers, and to identify where we need to make improvements."

Agence France-Presse

Google agrees to pay Italian publishers for news

MILAN, Italy - Google announced on Wednesday it has signed licensing deals with numerous Italian media publishers to pay for news content, in the US tech giant's latest move to tamp down media anger over lost advertising revenue.

It follows an agreement struck with some French publishers earlier in the year over "neighboring rights", which were introduced by an EU directive two years ago and call for payment for showing snippets of news content as part of internet searches.

Wednesday's deal will give the Italian publishers access to the Google News Showcase program, which sees it pay outlets for a selection of enriched content.

"Signed on an individual basis, these agreements represent an important step in Google's relationship with Italian publishers by remunerating the publishers," Google said in a statement.

Google News Showcase will be available in Italy in the coming months, it added.

Fabio Vaccarono, CEO of Google Italy, said "these agreements represent an important step forward and confirm Google's commitment to Italian publishers".

Among the publishers who signed deals were the RCS MediaGroup, Il Sole 24 Ore, Monrif, Citynews, Caltagirone Editore, Il Fatto Quotidiano, Libero, Il Foglio, Il Giornale and Il Tempo.

The head of Il Sole 24 Ore, Giuseppe Cerbone, said "remuneration for news, including the rights related to the distribution of digital content, is a front on which our publishing group is engaged on the front line".

Urbano Cairo, CEO of the RCS MediaGroup, said "we are pleased to have signed this agreement, which governs the issue of related rights and acknowledges the importance of quality news and the prestige of our titles," which include the Corriere della Sera newspaper.

Neighboring France was the first EU country to enact the "neighboring rights" law, but Google initially refused to comply. However after turbulent negotiations, the search giant sealed a deal with certain French publishers in January.

News outlets struggling with dwindling print subscriptions have long seethed at Google's failure to give them a cut of the millions it makes from ads displayed alongside news search results.

Australia has aggressively pushed to force digital companies to pay for news content, and last month Google struck a deal to make "significant payments" to Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. 

Agence France-Presse

Google phone cameras will read heart, breathing rates with AI help

Cameras on Google Pixel smartphones will be able to measure heart and breathing rates starting next month, in one of the first applications of Alphabet Inc's artificial intelligence technology to its wellness services.

Health programs available on Google Play's store and Apple Inc's App Store for years have provided the same functionality. But a study in 2017 found accuracy varied and adoption of the apps remains low.

Google Health leaders told reporters earlier this week they had advanced the AI powering the measurements and plan to detail its method and clinical trial in an academic paper in the coming weeks. The company expects to roll out the feature to other Android smartphones at an unspecified time, it said in a blog post on Thursday, but plans for iPhones are unclear.

Apple's Watch, Google's Fitbit and other wearables have greatly expanded the reach of continuous heart rate sensing technologies to a much larger population.

The smartphone camera approach is more ad hoc - users who want to take a pulse place their finger over the lens, which catches subtle color changes that correspond to blood flow. Respiration is calculated from video of upper torso movements.

Google Health product manager Jack Po said that the company wanted to give an alternative to manual pulse checks for smartphone owners who only want to monitor their condition occasionally but cannot afford a wearable.

Po said the technology, which can mistake heart rates by about 2 percent, requires further testing before it could be used in medical settings.

The new feature will be available as an update to the Google Fit app.

Google consolidated its health services about two years ago, aiming to better compete with Apple, Samsung Electronics Co and other mobile technology companies that have invested heavily in marketing wellness offerings.

-reuters-

Google hit with third antitrust lawsuit, by new state coalition

SAN FRANCISCO - Dozens of US states on Thursday hit Google with its third antitrust suit in as many months, accusing the internet giant of abusing its internet search dominance to eliminate competition.

The suit by antitrust enforcers from 38 US states and territories is in line with, but goes beyond a case filed by the US Justice Department against Google earlier this year.

"Google’s anticompetitive actions have protected its general search monopolies and excluded rivals, depriving consumers of the benefits of competitive choices, forestalling innovation, and undermining new entry or expansion,” said Colorado attorney general Phil Weiser.

The suit came a day after a group of states led by Texas filed a separate antitrust suit, and asks to be consolidated with the federal case against Google.

Nebraska attorney general Doug Peterson called the antitrust assault on Google historic, saying the combined suits represented the biggest alliance since a case against Microsoft decades ago.

"This is really historic," Peterson said.

The suit charges that Google made deals to shut out competitors and set out to lock out rivals by getting its search and advertising systems into smart speakers, cars, smartphones and more.

"We are in a new time, a new era, and it is very critical that we in the field of enforcement in competition remain very engaged in the tech industry going forward," Peterson said.

CASES ON SEARCH, ADVERTISING

Several US states led by Texas filed a suit against Google on Wednesday over alleged anticompetitive practices, branding it an "internet Goliath" that had eliminated competition in online advertising and was harming consumers.

In the earlier case, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton contended that Google rigged advertising auctions, taking advantage of its position serving up ads as well as online search results.

Amazon, Tripadvisor, Yelp and other internet firms involved in recommending products or services have long complained that Google favors its own offerings in general search results.

While Google ad revenue has continued to grow, its share of the booming US online ad market is ebbing under pressure from competitors such as Facebook, Amazon and others, according to eMarketer.

The market tracker expected Google this year to command just shy of 30 percent of the US ad market set to total about $42.4 billion.

Google software not only crawls the internet and indexes what it finds, it determines which results to provide for queries and what ads are displayed.

The California-based internet giant also handles auctions for ads competing to be displayed. 

Google's long-running business model coupling a free search engine and free services like email and YouTube with paid advertising is being put to the test in a landmark antitrust lawsuit filed by the US Justice Department.

The US government filed its blockbuster lawsuit in October accusing Google of maintaining an "illegal monopoly" in online search and advertising. 

The country's biggest antitrust case in decades, it opens the door to a potential breakup of the Silicon Valley titan.

Agence France-Presse

Google delays return to office and eyes 'flexible work week'- NYT

Alphabet Inc's Google will allow its employees to work from home until September next year, extending the return to the office by a few months, the New York Times reported on Monday.

The company was also testing the idea of a "flexible workweek" once it is safe to return to the office, Chief Executive Officer Sundar Pichai told the company's staff in an email on Sunday, according to the report.

As part of the plan, Google's employees would be expected to work at least three days a week in the office while working from home the other days, the newspaper report said.

"We are testing a hypothesis that a flexible work model will lead to greater productivity, collaboration, and well-being," Pichai wrote in the email.

Google was one of the first companies to ask its employees to work from home due to the pandemic. 

It has previously delayed the timing by when the employees should return to the office from January next year to July. 

(Reporting by Akriti Sharma in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur)

-reuters-