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What happened: The U.S. PIRG Education Fund reports that heightened sales of Chromebooks during the pandemic have led to a buildup of electronic waste as the budget laptops begin to expire in their short lifespans. Details: From 2019 to 2020, sales of Chromebooks rose 87% as U.S. schools purchased many Chromebooks to aid in remote learning. Three years later, the devices are failing as Google no longer provides updates after the software "expires" several years after a laptop is certified. Manufacturers often lack the necessary parts for costly replacements, resulting in piles of e-waste at many schools, PIRG says. 
What the numbers say: The non-profit estimates that the 31 million Chromebooks sold during 2020 contributed to an estimated 9 million tons of CO2 emissions. Doubling the lifespan of the laptops sold in 2020 would be equal to removing 900,000 cars from the road, PIRG says, and could save U.S. taxpayers $1.8B across 48 million K-12 students. 
Relevance: To help slow down this so-called "Chromebook churn," the lobby group urges Google to do away with its Automatic Update Expiration system, though Google says it now provides eight years of automatic updates, up from five years. PIRG also recommends that OEM partners produce at least 10% overstock of replacement parts for Chromebooks, while it says should have standardized parts across manufacturers and models. THE VERGE 
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U.S. tech giants, including Alphabet, Amazon, Meta Platforms, and Microsoft, are set to report quarterly results this week. The companies, which collectively command more than $5T in market capitalization or 15% of the value of the S&P 500, have all recently announced job cuts following the pandemic-era hiring boom. More: - Investors will be watching closely to see if the restructurings have boosted profits to their satisfaction, while the companies emphasize the role of artificial intelligence in their future growth.
- Analysts forecast that Microsoft, Alphabet, and Meta will all post a 4.5% increase in profits, on average, from the previous quarter.
- Amazon is expected to post a significant rise in profit compared to the prior quarter, which saw a large drop due to valuation losses related to its investment in EV maker Rivian.
- Compared to the year earlier, analysts expect profit to dip nearly 16% on average, with Microsoft the least affected at only a 0.5% decrease.
- From November through March, the four companies announced layoffs that jointly affected more than 70,000 employees.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
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 Google has reportedly halted construction on its 80-acre "Downtown West" campus in San Jose, California, CNBC reports. The pause comes after layoffs that disbanded part of the project's development team. Google received approval for the project in 2021, with plans to transform the 80 acres with 7.3 million square feet of offices, 50,000 square feet of retail and cultural space, and 4,000 housing units. More: - Following the initial demolition phase, Google has now halted construction on the campus without notifying contractors of when it plans to resume.
- Some local leaders have said they hope the pause is only temporary. San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan reportedly spoke to Google, which told him that the plans had not changed except for a reassessment of the construction timeline.
- A Google spokesperson said the company is assessing how best to move forward with the development but is committed to San Jose in the long term.
- The company wants to ensure its office space reflects the "future needs" of its business, its hybrid workers, and the local community, the person said.
- Google estimates the economic impact of the campus to reach $19B and bring 25,000 jobs to the South Bay.
Zoom Out: - Last spring, Google announced plans to invest nearly $10B in 20 U.S. real estate projects in 2022.
- However, the company's finance chief disclosed in February that Google expected to incur costs of $500M during Q1 to reduce its global office space.
CNBC
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Twitter appears to be restoring the legacy blue badges for accounts with more than 1 million followers, even if they did not pay for a subscription to the service. The company has "re-verified" a number of high-profile followers, including some accounts belonging to dead celebrities. More: - Last week, Twitter began removing the blue check marks from accounts that hadn't signed up for a paid subscription to its Twitter Blue service.
- CEO Elon Musk later said that he was paying for “a few” subscriptions “personally,” including those belonging to LeBron James, Stephen King, and William Shatner.
- Several high-profile accounts, including those belonging to Neil Gaiman, Lil Nas X, and Richard Osman, have also confirmed that they have received blue checks despite not paying for them.
- Twitter is also requiring companies that want to advertise on the platform to pay for verification, although businesses already spending $1,000+ a month on ads automatically receive the checks, which are gold instead of blue.
Zoom Out: - According to TechCrunch, the interest in Twitter Blue, available for $8 per month, has been "underwhelming" since its relaunch in December.
- The paid service brought in only $11M worth of mobile-based subscriptions for the first three months, the report found.
TECHCRUNCH
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British chip designer Arm Ltd. is building a semiconductor to show off its product capabilities ahead of its planned IPO later this year. The in-house prototype is said to be more advanced than any previously produced chip. More: - Arm Ltd., a subsidiary of Japan's SoftBank Grou Corp., designs the CPU cores found in more than 90% of the world's smartphones.
- While it licenses its chip architecture to other companies, Arm doesn't plan to license or sell the new chip's design to other firms.
- Instead, the company's new "solutions engineering" team is building the prototype chip to showcase its capabilities and attract new customers ahead of its planned listing in the U.S.
- Arm anticipates teaming up with its manufacturing partners to ramp up production of the semiconductors.
- The chip design company is seeking to meet a demand for quality manufacturing chips amid geopolitical tensions and a global shortage.
FINANCIAL TIMES
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Humane, a startup founded by former Apple employees, has demoed an AI-powered wearable device that could someday replace smartphones. The standalone "personal assiatant" is smaller than a smartphone and is activated by voice and gesture commands. As a screenless pocketable projector, it can display information and visual interfaces onto nearby objects and surfaces. More: - Humane chairman and president Imran Chaudhri showed off the device during a TED Talk last week.
- During the demo, Chaudhri interacted with his wife during a phone call and displayed the call information as an image projected onto his hand.
- The former Apple design director also showed off the device translating his voice into French, using AI to retain his same tone. He noted that the device doesn't need to be paired with a smartphone to work.
- Humane has now raised at least $230M, including a $100M round announced in March, from investors including Kindred Ventures, Microsoft, and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
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Community Corner Last week, we asked our tech community, "What’s the best thing tech has allowed you to do that you couldn’t do 50 years ago?" Here are some highlighted responses we received: - Shelly Houser (p/Shouser70), CEO at Inclusive Consulting, answered, “As an amputee, I never imagined 50 years ago that I would see or use the high level of technology that I have now! My C-Leg knee component reads where I am in space 12 different ways 100K times a minute and syncs with my Helix hip! The 6-year-old in me thinks that's pretty badass! Not only is it fast, it keeps me safe from falling on uneven surfaces and slows me down if I am about to fall. Think of it as ABS brakes in your car. Older folks who drove cars before ABS brake systems will appreciate the difference.”
- Anna Nadeina (p/anna-nadeina), Head of Growth at saas.group, answered, “I'm not old enough to talk about 50 years but in the last 10 years my life has been drastically affected by technology. I could start traveling and choosing the best places to stay and see. I could at the same time stay in touch with my family and friends and not lose meaningful relationships but even gain some! It gave me a chance to find an amazing job and do it from any place in the world, and do it well. Technology allowed us to create another layer of life and fill it with things that we love and cherish. You take your books, music, connections, creations with you anywhere you go and with such ease. It's mesmerizing!”
Join the conversations at Inside.com, and we may shout out your name and business, or contact you for more! ⭐️
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- Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai received total compensation of about $226M in 2022, including stock awards of $218M. The report comes as the Google parent company continues cost-cutting measures that included layoffs of 12,000 workers announced in January.
- Trusted leaker Kuba Wojciechowski shared a video of what's purported to be the upcoming Pixel Fold, Google’s first foldable phone.
- Tom Brady's legal representatives have issued a cease-and-desist letter to comedians Will Sasso and Chad Kultgen, demanding they remove an AI-generated comedy special impersonating Brady. The pair complied but argued that the impersonation was obviously a parody.
- Brilliant’s bite-sized interactive lessons make it easy (but not too easy) to sharpen your math, data, and CS skills. Try it free for 30 days.*
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 |  | Beth is a writer and editor at Inside.com covering artificial intelligence and daily technology news. She has written the Inside AI newsletter since 2019. You can reach her at Beth.Duckett@inside.com. |   | | Editor | Eduardo Garcia is a writer and editor based in New York. He is the author of "Things You Can Do," an illustrated book about climate action. Bylines in The New York Times, The Guardian, Slate, Scientific American, and others. In one of his previous lives, Eduardo worked as a Reuters correspondent in Latin America for nearly a decade. | |
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