Iger is back, Trump is back, Ye is back, and Elon Musk, well, he never leaves the news cycle.
Ex-Disney CEO Bob Iger is back at the helm of the Mouse House in an announcement that surprised everyone, including Disney executives and some employees who thought Iger’s email announcing the change came from a hacked account, according to the Wall Street Journal. The outgoing Bob — Bob Chapek — wasn’t even quoted in Disney’s official announcement.
Elon Musk brought Trump, Ye, and others back to Twitter, despite previously saying that “no major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen” before a new content moderation council “with widely diverse viewpoints” had a chance to convene. Trump has yet to tweet, but Ye returned with an is-thing-on??? mic test followed by the Jewish greeting for peace.
Stay tuned, as we continue to update this list with the most important news of today: Monday, November 21st, 2022.
Nov 21, 2022
Bob Iger steps back in as Disney CEO, replacing Bob Chapek
Illustration by Alex Castro / The VergeIn a sudden turn of events, Disney has reversed the CEO swap that surprised us in early 2020, with Bob Iger returning to his post, replacing his own successor, Bob Chapek. Iger, who is also the company’s largest shareholder, is now set to serve a new two-year term as CEO. Part of Iger’s job in those two years will be to pick and groom his long-term successor.
Read Article >Of course, Chapek was an Iger choice too. Chapek had been called the “Tim Cook to Iger’s Steve Jobs,” but during his tenure, their handover got off to a rocky start, while blowups like the Scarlett Johansson Black Widow lawsuit and Disney’s initial lack of reaction to the “Don’t Say Gay” bill in Florida scuffed its all-important reputation.
Nov 21, 2022
Ubisoft is back to releasing games on Steam, including Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
Key art for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. Image: UbisoftUbisoft is bringing Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Anno 1800, and Roller Champions to Steam, arguably its first major releases on Valve’s PC distribution platform since 2019.
Read Article >“We’re constantly evaluating how to bring our games to different audiences wherever they are, while providing a consistent player ecosystem through Ubisoft Connect,” reads part of a statement from Ubisoft spokesperson Jessica Roache to The Verge. Roache declined to say whether that means Ubisoft will now regularly bring games to Steam or if it’ll be on a case-by-case basis.
Nov 21, 2022
This is the Twitter account Elon Musk should be worried most about losing.Apple’s Phil Schiller, who runs the App Store, has deactivated his verified Twitter account. If Schiller has soured on how Elon Musk is running Twitter, that is potentially very bad news for Musk.
Don’t believe me? Then listen to Twitter’s former head of trust and safety, Yoel Roth:
“Failure to adhere to Apple’s and Google’s guidelines would be catastrophic, risking Twitter’s expulsion from their app stores and making it more difficult for billions of potential users to get Twitter’s services. This gives Apple and Google enormous power to shape the decisions Twitter makes.”
Nov 21, 2022
Elon Musk is laying off even more Twitter workers
Illustration by Laura Normand / The VergeElon Musk announced a new wave of layoffs affecting Twitter’s sales teams on Monday, according to a report from Bloomberg. Sources familiar with the situation told Bloomberg that Musk is cutting more workers to balance out each team, but it’s still not clear how many people lost their jobs.
Read Article >Musk began weighing additional layoffs last week and fired Robin Wheeler, the company’s head of ad sales, and Maggie McLean Suniewick, Twitter’s vice president of partnerships, after they didn’t agree to terminate more workers. Sarah Rosen, Twitter’s head of US content partnerships, also left the company last Friday. Platformer was the first to report this most recent round of layoffs.
Nov 20, 2022
“Horizon Workrooms is bad.”If you haven’t listened to this week's episode of The Vergecast yet or read Adi Robertson’s review of the Meta Quest Pro headset, that line about sums it up.
On the other hand, can you afford to miss Meta’s Notorious B.I.G. “VR concert experience” on December 16th?
It’s unclear exactly what that will be like, but this blog post makes the point that maybe Meta could have focused on living artists. It points out several who already perform VRChat, and other platforms that succeed in ways the Horizon environments haven’t yet.
Nov 20, 2022
Alexa isn’t pulling its weight.Internal documents obtained by Insider indicate that Amazon’s Alexa division made up the “vast majority” of the over $3 billion that the company lost across its “Worldwide Digital” department, which includes Alexa, Echo devices, Prime Video, and other products.
Amazon confirmed layoffs affecting thousands of employees on its hardware and services teams last week, and the company’s CEO says to expect even more job cuts next year.
Amazon is gutting its voice-assistant Alexa.[Business Insider]
Nov 20, 2022
Elon Musk says he’s letting Donald Trump back on Twitter
Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty ImagesDonald Trump is allowed to rejoin Twitter, Elon Musk has announced. Musk justified that decision based on the results of his own personal Twitter poll. The @realDonaldTrump account and its tweets are fully visible again, just days after Trump confirmed he will run for president again in 2024.
Read Article >Shortly after taking control of the social network, Musk said he wouldn’t be reinstating any banned accounts until the company had set up and convened a content moderation council with “widely diverse viewpoints.”
Nov 19, 2022
Reddit’s software community is laughing at Elon.Musk posted an image from his late-night Twitter “code review” and… well, at least we got this very funny Reddit thread out of it.