Byte refutes rumors that laid-off employees fight with HR/New York school bans ChatGPT/Amazon CEO announces 18,000 layoffs... More news today here

Daily News from Aofei Temple
Quantum Bit | Public Account QbitAI

Hello everyone, today is Thursday, January 5th. I haven’t seen Crazy Four Literature for a long time. Let’s have some renaissance.

△ Picture source: Game 369

What major events are happening in the tech world today? Let’s talk about it with Mr. Daily~

Amazon lays off more than 18,000 employees

The real winter in the technology world has not yet arrived, and Amazon is about to record the largest number of layoffs in technology history!

Just now, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy issued a letter to all employees, confirming that more than 18,000 employees will be laid off , accounting for about 6% of the company's total employees of 300,000, far exceeding the 10,000 previously rumored.

Among them, the laid off personnel mainly involve Amazon’s store operations department, experience and technology teams.

In the letter to all employees, Andy Jassy also mentioned that affected workers will be notified starting from January 18 , and stated:

We will also work to support those affected, including severance payments, transitional health insurance benefits and external employment support.

However, investors reacted positively to Amazon's series of "belt-tightening" actions, believing that this may increase the company's profits. As soon as the news of layoffs came out, the company's stock price rose by nearly 2% after hours.

Google wants RISC-V to become a "first-class" Android architecture

After a lapse of six months, Google’s attitude towards RISC-V has undergone a big turn.

According to arstechnica, six months ago Google did not dare to publicly express its support for RISC-V. Now at the RISC-V Summit, Android Engineering Director Lars Bergstrom boldly declared:

It is hoped that RISC-V will be regarded as the "first-level platform" of Android.

This means that RISC-V has about the same meaning to Android as ARM.

However, Android's support for RISC-V is still in a very early stage. Bergstrom said that optimizing Android based on RISC-V will require "a lot of work" and will take several years.

△ Source: arstechnica

It’s worth mentioning that once Google decides to get Android up and running on RISC-V, it will be up to the manufacturers and application ecosystem to support the platform.

New York bans students and teachers from using ChatGPT

ChatGPT has begun to cause panic in the education field.

According to vice news, the New York City Department of Education issued a ban: access to ChatGPT is prohibited . ChatGPT will be restricted on the networks and devices of New York public schools.

As for why ChatGPT was banned, New York City Department of Education spokesperson Jenna Lyle said in a statement:

ChatGPT may have a negative impact on student learning, and the security and accuracy of the content it produces is not guaranteed;

While it can provide quick and easy answers, it does not develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills in students.

Previously, the New York Times showed writers and educators writing samples from ChatGPT and those from human students, and none of them could reliably tell the difference between the bot and the real thing.

Regarding this ban, ChatGPT itself also made a "response":

It is important to consider the potential risks and benefits of using ChatGPT in education and to carefully weigh the evidence before making a decision. It is also important to listen to the views and concerns of all stakeholders, including educators, students, and parents, so that an informed and fair decision can be made.

In fact, this is not the first time that ChatGPT has been banned. Just last month, Stack Overflow banned it on the grounds that "ChatGPT always gives incorrect answers to programming questions."

Byte refutes rumors: laid-off employees fight with HR

Byte's laid-off employees fought with HR because they didn't receive year-end bonuses? The official response is here:

The information is false. After investigation, no fighting was found within the company; ByteDance’s year-end bonus evaluation work has not yet started this year, and it is usually awarded in April every year.

According to Jiemian News, Byte had already started layoffs at the end of last month. Several relevant people estimated that the scale of this optimization accounted for 10% of the company.

Each business line has basically confirmed optimization goals. Employees in Toutiao, Douyin, Feishu, Tiktok, Commercialization, Data, Dianchedi and other business lines have received layoff notices.

In addition, the layoffs involve multiple positions including R&D, product, and operations.

Meta was fined 2.85 billion yuan

At the beginning of the new year, Meta was fined 390 million euros (approximately RMB 2.85 billion) by Ireland for "violating privacy laws" .

According to techcrunch, the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) said that Meta cannot use its contracts with Facebook and Instagram users to serve targeted ads to users based on their online activities, which violates the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR ). ) .

And in its ruling, the DPC said that Meta must bring its data processing operations into compliance within three months.

However, Meta is very dissatisfied with this ruling and plans to appeal against the ruling and fine, and gave the following reasons:

It is incorrect to state that "Meta can no longer serve personalized ads in Europe" without first obtaining each user's consent.

There has been a lack of regulatory clarity on this issue and given the nature of our services we fully comply with the GDPR and rely on contracts for targeted advertising.

It is worth mentioning that in the first nine months of 2022, Meta’s “targeted advertising” business brought it US$83 billion in revenue, nearly a quarter of which came from Europe.

Luxshare Precision clarifies rumors of Apple cutting orders

A few days ago, there were rumors that Apple asked suppliers to reduce production, and Luxshare Precision, a major domestic apple chain manufacturer, fell by the limit on Wednesday.

Now the response is coming. This morning, Luxshare Precision issued an announcement to clarify:

Currently, the company's cooperation with existing customers is proceeding normally , and the business is progressing in an orderly manner according to the work plan. There are no special changes or impacts on the company's related business mentioned in the report.

In addition, according to the British Financial Times, people familiar with the matter revealed that Apple will also sign a contract with Luxshare Precision to produce high-end iPhone models.

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