Delicious Digest #17 - Magic, Eras, and Goodbyes

A tasty newsletter of what I’ve seen in (mostly) tech & games and thought was interesting. This week: Magic, Eras, and Goodbyes.

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😳 Must reads of the week

◼ “Some People”. Stay safe everyone! Link

🗞 News

◼ Apple has closed all stores outside of China and its annual WWDC will be online only. Link

◼ As if this weren’t costly enough, Apple has also been fined $1.2 billion by the French anti-trust authorities. Sure, that’s “only” ~2% of Apple’s quarterly revenue, but still. Ouch. Link

◼ Google meanwhile has decided to cancel Google I/O completely. Link

◼ YouTube, Netflix, Amazon, and Apple are reducing the default quality of their streaming service to save bandwidth upon request of the European Commission. Disney+ will do the same and even delay its launch in France for two weeks. Link

◼ The UK will start raising a “Digital Services Tax”, similar to France. This focuses on large tech companies that make a lot of money in the UK but divert profits into lower-tax countries. Tensions with the US will surely rise. Link ($)

◼ Magic Leap, the highly-funded former wonder-kid of AR, might be up for sale. Textbook case of Amara’s law as big, disruptive, mass-market killer applications of AR are still not in sight. Link

◼ Bill Gates steps down from the boards of Microsoft and Berkshire Hathaway to focus on his philanthropic efforts. Likely less of an actual change as much as it is a symbolic step for the end of an era. Link

◼ Huzzah! Github has a native mobile app. Dare I say “finally”? Link

🕹 Games

◼ Staying home is good for gaming: “Record number of Steam users online during coronavirus outbreak”. Link

◼ In fact, it increases time spent in most mobile apps. Link

◼ But Xbox Live and Nintendo Switch Online are struggling to keep up with current demand. Link

◼ “Making games in lockdown: How Italy’s developers are coping with COVID-19” Link

◼ Supercell has a new game in beta. Hay Day Pop looks like mash-up of Toon Blast and Gardenscapes. A very rational move with a good IP to match. It still feels so unlike Supercell to me. Link

◼ GDC 2020: Proletariat’s Tori Schafer offers key considerations for studios including LGBT+ representation in their games: realistic, considerate, explicit, respectful. Link

◼ Call of Duty Warzone keeps growing: 30m players in 10 days. Link

◼ A shorter GDC has been rescheduled for August. I think this is optimistic. Link

◼ Scopely has raised an additional $200m, which increases its series D round to $400m. Growth ain’t cheap. Link

◼ Nerds rejoice, we got numbers! “PlayStation 5 vs. Xbox Series X: Comparing the specs” Link

😋 Tasty Tidbits

◼ Starting with a positive: due to the quarantines in China and Italy, NOx emissions have plummeted. Links: ESA | NASA

◼ “Leaving and Waving”: a photographer took pictures of her parents waving goodbye every time she left their house - for 27y. Both heartwarming and moving. Link

◼ “The Great Buenos Aires Bank Heist” Link

◼ The Cristal Baschet is an instrument I didn’t even know existed. Hans Zimmer already ordered his. Link

I work for King. All views in this newsletter are personal and my own. They do not represent the views of King or ActivisionBlizzard. This newsletter is provided for informational purposes only and it’s surely no investment advice. This newsletter links to other websites and information obtained from third-party sources and I cannot ensure nor verify accuracy of the information or its appropriateness for a given situation.