Hello, I'm Samantha Edwards, editor of The Globe and Mail. Welcome to Lately, The Globe's new technology newsletter. If you're new here, welcome! Every Friday morning, I break down the week's biggest tech story and explain how it relates to and will change the world.
This week's issue includes:
🚨 European Union goes after Apple and Microsoft
🎶 Music publisher sues AI-generated company
👶 A new smart smartphone for kids is coming to Canada
🎤 Experience a summer concert up close (VR headset recommended)
Apple and Microsoft are the first companies to be subject to EU digital competition law
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Apple could face a $38 billion fine if it doesn't comply with new EU rules. Andy Wong/AP
This week, Apple was accused of violating the European Union's new digital rules. The landmark Digital Markets Act, passed in 2022, was designed to curb the dominance of “online gatekeepers” – specifically Apple, Amazon, Meta, Google, ByteDance and Microsoft – and make it easier for users to move between platforms. Failure to do so could expose these companies to heavy fines. Imagine being able to chat with your iMessage and Green Bubble friends on one platform. It could be a reality!
The EU claims that Apple prohibits app makers from directly contacting customers to promote sales or special offers outside the App Store, a practice known as anti-steering. Apple could be fined 10% of its annual global revenue for violations, or $38 billion based on last year's sales.
Apple will have a chance to respond, with a final decision due in March next year. Microsoft has also come under fire from the EU this week, accused of bundling its video and messaging app, Teams, with core apps such as Microsoft 365. The company has said it is working to address the EU's concerns.
Record companies sue over AI-based music generation tool
Startups Udio and Suno let you create realistic songs with instruments and vocals based on a song description — for example, the prompt “2000s, nu-metal, rap, aggressive male vocalist, radio single, keep rolling, DJ scratch” creates an eerily familiar version of a Limp Bizkit song. (In case you didn't know, nu-metal and all things Y2K-related are cool again.)
This is a problem for the major record labels, who in their lawsuits accuse the two companies of copyright infringement on an “almost unimaginable scale.” They claim the companies must be illegally collecting vast amounts of copyrighted music to train their algorithms.
The issue of generative AI and copyright has prompted a number of high-profile lawsuits by authors, artists, and press organizations against OpenAI and Meta, but as my colleague Joe Castaldo writes, the key question is whether AI companies should license copyrighted material to train their models for commercial purposes, or whether it is fair use.
New Smart Smartphones for Kids
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How addictive are smartphones? Some parents are storing their kids' devices in lockboxes Jennifer Roberts/The Globe and Mail
Earlier this year, my colleague Dave McGinn spoke with parents who were trying to curb their kids' cell phone use by locking their phones in time-limited lockboxes or buying them regular flip phones. Seeing a market opportunity from desperate parents, a series of manufacturers have launched “child-proof” smartphones.
One of them is Pinwheel, which is currently on sale in Canada. It has features like photo sharing, text messaging, and games, but no internet browsing or social media. Parents can manage the contact list, set usage schedules, and remotely monitor text messages. Pinwheel says the phone is aimed at ages 8 to 14+, but it's unlikely many teenagers would be OK with their parents reading their text messages.
Get your Mac fixed right away
Apple says Canadians will soon have access to the parts, tools and manuals they need to repair devices like the MacBook Air and iPhone, and by 2025, they'll be able to buy kits for basic repairs like replacing a cracked iPhone screen or dead battery.
The announcement is part of a long struggle for consumers to get the “right to repair” that companies like Apple have been lobbying for for years. In the US, California and Oregon have passed “right to repair” bills, helping to open up Apple, while in Canada, the Senate is considering amendments that would make it cheaper and easier to make at-home repairs.
What else am I reading this week:
Indonesia tries to block LGBTQIA content from the internet (Rest of the World)
Self-Checkout Disaster (The Walrus)
I'm Laura Kipnis Bott. Making reading sexy and tragic again (Wired)
SOUNDBITE
“My use of 'gay' to mean that it's awesome or cool gets thrown in the same pile as a Nazi using 'gay' to mean that it's vile or nasty, right? This is all the same pile that these models learn from.” – Computer scientist and ethicist Dr Sabine Weber on training AI datasets, heard on this week's episode of Lately.
Adult money
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The speaker has a built-in clip, so no carabiner is required.
JBL Clip 5, $99
This week, I honestly recommend it. I own this Bluetooth speaker, and you should too if you listen to music or podcasts at home or on the go. Hang it on a shower curtain rod (it's waterproof), take it on trips (it weighs only about half a pound), and never worry about running out of battery (it lasts 12 hours on a charge). Despite its compact palm-sized size, the sound is full and surprisingly bass-rich.
Culture Radar
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Missed Sabrina Carpenter's fall tour? Catch her in the metaverse Cheney Orr/Reuters
Sabrina Carpenter is working late because she's performing in the Metaverse
Pop star Sabrina Carpenter, creator of the ridiculously catchy “Espresso,” is touring North America this fall, but if you want to see her live sooner, all you need is a Meta Quest series VR headset and a moderate threshold for motion sickness.
Carpenter will perform a 45-minute VR concert on Meta's virtual platform Horizon Worlds on July 19. During the pandemic, artists like Travis Scott and Charli XCX (or rather, their avatars) performed shows in Fortnite and Minecraft to make up for the lack of live entertainment. Those restrictions may be gone, but virtual concerts remain popular, so much so that the Emmys introduced an award for Outstanding Emerging Media Program.
More Technology and Communications news:
MDA Awarded $1 Billion Contract to Build Canadarm3 for NASA-Led Lunar Missions
U.S. investigates China Telecom, China Mobile over internet and cloud risks
AI 'godfather' Geoffrey Hinton offers $1 million for Ontario Science Centre roof
