After more than three years of litigation, Apple has quietly dropped its lawsuit against Gerard Williams III, a former chip executive the company accused of poaching employees. After over a decade at the company, in 2019, Williams left Apple to co-found Nuvia, a chip design firm later acquired by Qualcomm in 2021. When the tech giant first sued Williams, it accused him of “secretly” starting Nuvia and recruiting talent for his startup while he was still an Apple employee. Williams disputed Apple’s claims and accused the company of spying on his text messages. The case was dismissed, mired in a lot of legalese and multiple court documents.
Apple requested to dismiss the suit against Williams earlier this week. The request does not state the company’s reason for dropping the case, but in March, Apple wanted the recusal of Judge Sunil Kulkarni, because its legal team added lawyers from a company that Judge Kulkarni had previously worked at. So, conflicts of interest, initiated by Apple recruiting more legal firepower. Apple and Qualcomm, Williams’ current employer, did not immediately respond to Engadget’s request for comment.
– Mat Smith
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The company still has to pay a daily fine.
On Saturday, a federal appeals court in Brazil lifted the country-wide ban on messaging app Telegram. Brazilian authorities wanted the app suspended after Telegram failed to hand over a full set of data on a pair of neo-Nazi groups on the app accused of inciting violence against schools. According to Reuters, judge Flávio Lucas ruled that a complete suspension of the messaging app was “unreasonable” given that thousands of people in Brazil rely on the platform. At the same time, he upheld the daily $200,000 fine on Telegram for failing to provide local authorities with the data they requested. This isn’t the first time Telegram has been briefly banned in Brazil. In 2022, the country’s highest court suspended the app for failing to freeze accounts accused of spreading disinformation ahead of the country’s recent presidential election. Similarly, that ban was lifted just days later.
Budget-friendly headphones with premium sound.
Engadget
On paper, the 2023 edition of Sony’s midrange headphones should continue the company’s reputation for solid headphones – and a viable alternative to the pricey flagship WH-1000XM5. The WH-CH720N has the same V1 chip as the M5, which powers both active noise cancellation (ANC) and overall sound quality. There’s also an updated design and a lower price ($130), following another early cut. The noise cancellation does a decent job, but it’s not the best, and you’ll have to make do without automatic pausing. Still, you’d be hard-pressed to find a better option at this price.
What, you don’t remember the 1995 PlayStation game?
After those sweet Super Mario Bros. Movie box office numbers, more companies want a piece. Streaming service Peacock is joining the video game adaptation wars with a live-action comedy based on the PS1-era vehicular warfare simulator Twisted Metal, and it just dropped the first trailer. The franchise arguably reached its pinnacle in 1996 with Twisted Metal 2, but when have clowns and car explosions not been cool?
There wasn’t much plot to the game, but hey, look at ‘Twisted Metal.’
Vampire Survivors
Yes, the addictive hit game Vampire Survivors is getting the animated TV show treatment.. Developer Luca Galante said in a (hopefully) cheeky tone, “The most important thing in Vampire Survivors is the story.” (Note: There really isn’t much of one.) Media company Story Kitchen will partner with Galante (founder of developer poncle), to make the series.
A miraculous display in a laptop you can skip.
Engadget
The Razer Blade 16 is one of the most unique laptops we’ve ever seen. It can handle 4K gaming just as well as high-speed 1080p gameplay, thanks to a dual-mode screen. And it’s one of the fastest notebooks around, featuring Intel’s latest CPUs and NVIDIA’s newest GPUs. And notably, it can be configured with an RTX 4090. But it’s noticeably heavier than the Blade 15, and you’ll have to pay at least $3,300 to own one with the dual-mode display. It’s an additional cost that Razer devices didn’t need.
The chatbot is even helping Walmart save money.
Walmart is using a chatbot from Pactum AI to automatically negotiate some of its supplier deals. The technology saves an average of three percent on contracts and is even preferable to the vendors. Walmart says three out of four suppliers prefer haggling with the AI over a human. Pactum’s system simply asks Walmart to set its budget and requirements, such as discounts and payment terms. It compares a supplier’s demands with trends, commodity values and competitors’ costs. After that, the AI can strike a deal in a matter of days, rather than the weeks or months of conventional talks.
