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US tech giants continue with layoffs despite improving economy
The tech giant cut 12,000 employees from its global workforce last week, joining the continuing spate of layoffs by tech firms. Mark Zuckerberg sounded equally contrite last November when Meta fired more than 11,000 employees.
Google introduces AI system that generates music from text descriptions
However, the company is fearing the risks, and has no immediate plans to release it, reports TechCrunch. Google isn't the first to try generative AI for songs, as there have been other attempts, including Riffusion, an AI that composes music by visualising it, as well as Dance Diffusion, Google's own AudioML and OpenAI's Jukebox.
'It feels like slap in the face': Sacked Google worker whose mother died of cancer
Tommy York, who is based in San Francisco in the US, wrote in a LinkedIn post that his mother died in December 2022 after battling stage-four cancer. "I was laid off from Google last week. I found out on my fourth day back from bereavement leave for my mom, who died from cancer in December," York wrote.
Google complies with CCI order, changes its rules for Android platform in India
Indian users will now have the option to choose their default search engine via a choice screen that will soon start to appear when a user sets up a new Android smartphone or tablet in the country, the tech giant said in a statement. "The CCI's recent directives for Android and Play require us to make significant changes for India, and we've informed the CCI of how we will be complying with their directives," said Google.
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US govt sues Google over its monopoly on digital advertising market
Filed in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, the complaint alleged that Google monopolises key digital advertising technologies, collectively referred to as the "ad tech stack", that website publishers depend on to sell ads and that advertisers rely on to buy ads and reach potential customers.
Techies earning up to $1 mn a year laid off at Big Tech firms
At Google, laid-off employees included those who had previously received high performance reviews or held managerial positions "with annual compensation packages of $500,000 to $1 million,a reports The Information. According to the report, 12,000 impacted employees belonged to every department, from Google Cloud and Chrome to Android and "search-related groups under senior executive Prabhakar Raghavan".
Google pauses green card applications from employees amid layoffs
"Recognising how this news may impact some of you and your families, I wanted to update you as quickly as possible on the difficult decision we've had to make to pause new PERM applications. This does not impact other visa applications or programmes," an email from a company executive read.
16 years at Google, this employee was sacked at 3 am
Justin Moore, who is based in Washington DC in the US, wrote on his LinkedIn profile, "So after over 16.5 years at Google, I appear to have been let go via an automated account deactivation at 3 am this morning as one of the lucky 12,000". "I don't have any other information, as I haven't received any of the other communications the boilerplate "you've been let go," website (which I now also can't access) said I should receive," he continued.
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About 3,000 tech employees now being fired a day on average in Jan
The sacking episodes have gained speed amid global economic meltdown and recession fears. More than 65,000 employees have been sacked by 166 tech companies to date. Google's parent company Alphabet announced to lay off 12,000 employees, or about 6 per cent of its workforce. Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella last week said the company will be "making changes that will result in the reduction of our overall workforce by 10,000 jobs through the end of FY23 Q3 (third quarter)".
Google may introduce ChatGPT competitor in May
The chatbot powered by AI, ChatGPT, has overtaken the tech world over the past several months because it can give people the information they need in an understandable way, reports Engadget. Google CEO Sundar Pichai has declared a "code red" and boosted AI development, as the tech giant sees ChatGPT as a threat to its search business.
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