Sponsored By:

• Alderon Games: Alderon Games is looking to hire talented remote workers. They believe in the power of play and the magic of immersive worlds and are looking for passionate individuals.
• Tailscale: Tailscale is the easiest way to create a peer-to-peer network with the power of Wireguard.

Links:

• ⚡ Alby: Your Boost companion for the web — Create an Alby Account to get a lightning wallet for payments wherever you go.
• 🎉 Coder Radio on the Podcastindex.org — Boost from the Web. Once you have Alby topped off, you can Boost from our page on the Podcast Index.
• 🔌 Grab Sats with Strike Around the 🌎 — Strike is a lightning-powered app that lets you quickly and cheaply grab sats in over 36 countries.
• 📷 Boost from Fountain's Website — Use Strike, Cash App, or your favorite app with Lightning support and Boost via QR Code. No other app is needed!
• Spotify lays off 17 percent of workforce in latest round of job cuts — CEO Daniel Ek announced the cuts in a memo to employees today. They’re expected to impact around 1,500 people at the company.
• Broadcom cuts at least 2,800 VMware jobs — Broadcom's first big move is going to be layoffs: according to WARN notices filed with multiple states (catalogued here by Channel Futures), Broadcom will be laying off at least 2,837 employees across multiple states, including 1,267 at its Palo Alto campus in California.
• Gerald Pfeifer on X — "Broadcom CEO tells VMware workers to ‘get butt back to office’ after completing a $69 billion merger of the two companies"
• Apple contractors to be cut - Austin Business Journal
• Twilio Lays Off Another 5% of Staff in Third Round of Cuts — Company has shed one-third of workforce since September 2022
• Unity Layoff 3.8% Of Workforce — Videogame software provider Unity Software (U.N) will eliminate 265 jobs or 3.8% of its global workforce and end an agreement with a digital video effects company founded by the “Lord of the Rings” director as part of a “reset,” the company said on Tuesday.
• Stefan Ottenbrite on X — CBC/Radio-Canada employees will have a virtual meeting on Monday with CEO Catherine Tait. Between 600 and 700 employees are expected to be laid off across the country, 300 just in Quebec.
• LFNW2024: Ready or not — Quick on the heels of our wildly successful MiniFest this Fall, LinuxFest Northwest is proud to announce a full event: LinuxFest Northwest 2024 1 - April 26-28 2024!
• LinuxFest Northwest 2024: Call for Speakers — We invite you to submit your proposal
• Activision Blizzard had a plan — or ploy — to launch its own Android game store — Court documents show the gaming giant wanted more from mobile.
• Xbox Talking to Partners for Mobile Store, CEO Spencer Says — “It’s an important part of our strategy and something we are actively working on today not only alone, but talking to other partners who’d also like to see more choice for how they can monetize on the phone,’’ Spencer said in an interview in Sao Paulo during the CCXP comics and entertainment convention.
• Microsoft is building an Xbox mobile gaming store to take on Apple and Google — Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard deal is key to the company’s mobile gaming efforts. Microsoft is quietly building a mobile Xbox store that will rely on Activision and King games.
• What's new in .NET 8 — .NET 8 is the successor to .NET 7. It will be supported for three years as a long-term support (LTS) release.
• .NET Aspire overview — .NET Aspire is an opinionated, cloud ready stack for building observable, production ready, distributed applications.​ .NET Aspire is delivered through a collection of NuGet packages that handle specific cloud-native concerns.
• Google to face investigation over deleted chat history — “I’m going to get to the bottom of who is responsible,”
• OpenAI Agreed to Buy $51 Million of AI Chips From a Startup Backed by CEO Sam Altman — Documents show that OpenAI signed a letter of intent to spend $51 million on brain-inspired chips developed by startup Rain. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman previously made a personal investment in Rain.
• @laurengoode — "Altman talked to investors in the Middle East in recent months about raising money to start a new chip company to help OpenAI and others diversify beyond their current reliance on Nvidia GPUs and specialized chips from Google, Amazon, and a few smaller suppliers, according to two people."
• Nixified AI — The goal of nixified.ai is to simplify and make available a large repository of AI executable code that would otherwise be impractical to run yourself, due to package management and complexity issues.

Sponsored By:

• Linode: Receive a $100 60-day credit towards your new account. Promo Code: linode.com/coder
• Tailscale: Tailscale is the easiest way to create a peer-to-peer network with the power of Wireguard.

Links:

• Apple is reportedly preparing to allow third-party app stores on the iPhone — Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports Apple will respond to upcoming EU rules with next year’s iOS 17 update. But it could still have strings attached, like only being available in Europe or only allowing installation of approved apps.
• Apple Announces End-to-End Encryption Option for iCloud Photos, Notes, Backups, and More — Apple today announced it is expanding end-to-end encryption to many additional iCloud data categories on an opt-in basis for enhanced security.
• FBI Calls End-to-End Encryption 'Deeply Concerning' as Privacy Groups Hail Apple's Advanced Data Protection as a Victory for Users — Apple yesterday announced that end-to-end encryption is coming to even more sensitive types of iCloud data, including device backups, messages, photos, and more, meeting the longstanding demand of both users and privacy groups who have rallied for the company to take the significant step forward in user privacy.
• IRS Reminder: Service providers, others may receive 1099-Ks for sales over $600 in early 2023 — The Internal Revenue Service reminds taxpayers earning income from selling goods and/or providing services that they may receive Form 1099-K, Payment Card and Third-Party Network Transactions, for payment card transactions and third-party payment network transactions of more than $600 for the year.
• FTC sues to block Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard — Federal Trade Commission commissioners voted 3-1 in favor of a complaint against Microsoft’s planned $68.7 billion acquisition that will go before the agency’s administrative law judge.
• FTC Seeks to Block Microsoft Corp.’s Acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Inc
• Send a Boost into the Show — Upgrade to a Podcasting 2.0 app, get great new features, and send a Boost into the show 🎉

Plus, new details about Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard are just too juicy to ignore.

Sponsored By:

• Datadog: Try Datadog free by starting a your 14-day trial and receive a free t-shirt once you install the agent.
• Linode: Receive a $100 60-day credit towards your new account. Promo Code: linode.com/coder

Links:

• Windows 11 Guide
• Steam Deck Guide
• Win32 is the stable Linux userland ABI — Linux won’t rule the world just from games, even if some people really want it to be true.
• Activision CEO set for $15M “golden parachute” in Microsoft deal — The filing reveals that Microsoft gaming executive Phil Spencer began talks with Kotick about a potential acquisition on Nov. 19, three days after a Wall Street Journal expose that said Kotick knew of sexual misconduct at the company for years.
• Michael Dominick on Twitter — I was totally wrong on #VR. @ChrisLAS has shown me the light, I absolutely love the #OculusQuest2

Sponsored By:

• Linode: Receive a $100 60-day credit towards your new account. Promo Code: linode.com/coder
• Datadog: Try Datadog free by starting a your 14-day trial and receive a free t-shirt once you install the agent.

Links:

• Seattle Mazda drivers can’t tune their radios away from KUOW — Also gone from the infotainment center were such features as Bluetooth, navigation, the clock and vehicle stats — “Many of the features I paid for when I bought it new,” Welding says.
• How Microsoft hopes to secure Activision Blizzard takeover — "We have developed these principles in part to address Microsoft's growing role and responsibility as we start the process of seeking regulatory approval in capitals around the world for our acquisition of Activision Blizzard," said Microsoft president Brad Smith, in a blog post announcing Redmond's commitments.
• Microsoft Promises Openness on New App Store as It Seeks Approval for Activision Deal — The move is a response to concerns raised by app developers and lawmakers about competition
• Microsoft announces new app store principles, aligning with Open App Markets Act — The rules come as Microsoft is attempting to win regulatory approval for the largest deal in the company’s history
• Want a new Podcast App?
• Making ‘Dinobabies’ Extinct: IBM’s Push for a Younger Work Force — Documents released in an age-discrimination case appear to show high-level discussion about paring the ranks of older employees.

Sponsored By:

• Linode: Receive a $100 60-day credit towards your new account. Promo Code: linode.com/coder
• Datadog: Try Datadog free by starting a your 14-day trial and receive a free t-shirt once you install the agent.

Links:

• Microsoft to acquire Activision Blizzard to bring the joy and community of gaming to everyone, across every device — Microsoft will acquire Activision Blizzard for $95.00 per share, in an all-cash transaction valued at $68.7 billion
• Microsoft Effort to Buy Activision Spurred by Misconduct Fallout at Gamemaker
• Bobby Kotick interview — Bobby Kotick has been CEO of Activision Blizzard since its inception in the merger of Activision and Blizzard in 2008, and he was also CEO of Activision for decades before that. He engineered the $5.9 billion acquisition of King, maker of Candy Crush Saga, in 2015.
• "The deal that will change the industry forever" — This is not only the biggest games M&A deal of recent years, or even the past decade, but the largest in the industry's history.
• Xbox on Twitter — Xbox is committed to our journey for inclusion in every aspect of gaming. We hold all teams to this commitment. We’re looking forward to extending our culture of proactive inclusion to the great teams across Activision Blizzard.
• Vivek Sharma on Twitter — What a time to be alive! Some thoughts on Microsoft + ActiveVision with my usual caveat of these being my own musing and nothing much to do with our work at Meta
• marak 🗿 on Twitter — What's up @Github? Ten days since you removed my ability to publish to NPM and fix the Infinity Zalgo bug in colors.js
• Duane O'Brien on Twitter — The crux of this thread is: we sponsored faker.js, I don't think it helped the maintainer much, we didn't get any notice, and I'd do it all again.
• faker - Open Collective
• Dutch Regulator Says Apple's Plan for Third-Party In-App Payments is Insufficient — As a result, the ACM has hit Apple with an initial 5 million euro fine as a consequence, and fines will continue to be assessed at 5 million euros per week up to a maximum of 50 million euros until Apple complies.
• Introduction to Celery — Celery communicates via messages, usually using a broker to mediate between clients and workers. To initiate a task the client adds a message to the queue, the broker then delivers that message to a worker.
• GE Z-Wave Plus Smart Outdoor Switch — No wiring required. Simply plug in the device and connect to your hub for convenient ON/OFF functions.
• Deezer plans