Hey folks, welcome to Week in Review (WiR), the regular TechCrunch newsletter that tries to summarize the big happenings in the tech-o-sphere — or most of them, anyway. With the world's largest AI conference, NeurIPS, kicking off under the bright lights of New Orleans, Google shared more on Gemini, its flagship AI model family — and lots else besides.

In this edition of WiR, we cover Cruise's cut of 24 percent from its driverless workers as well as, tied, Tesla's autopilot recall. We also discuss Twitch new policy regarding nudity, app language by Adobe, new release of generative AI–supported editor by Instagram, or meta's Threads app as growing, FCC denying subsidy to star link, Apple's different change in policies related with its push notification data, and then competition between Amazon and its Goodreads' same service.

It's a lot to recap, so we won't dillydally. But first, a reminder to sign up here to receive WiR in your inbox every Saturday if you haven't already done so.

Most read
Gemini comes to more apps: Google's Gemini GenAI models — specifically Gemini Pro, a lightweight version of a more capable model, Gemini Ultra, set to arrive in the coming months — is making its way into more Google products. Duet AI, the company's suite of dev assistance tools for code completion and generation, will soon start using Gemini. So will AI Studio (formerly MakerSuite), Google's AI app design experience on the web, and Vertex AI, the tech giant's managed AI dev platform for enterprises.

Cruise cuts staff: Cruise, GM's self-driving car subsidiary, is cutting 900 mostly field staffers in a plan to slash costs and revamp the company, Kirsten reports. Wall Street seemed to approve of the cutbacks, following an October 2 incident in which a pedestrian was stuck under and then dragged by one of Cruise's robotaxis; GM shares rose after the downsizing was announced.

Tesla issues recall: Tesla is limiting the use of its Autopilot driver-assistance software as part of a two-million-vehicle recall — one of the first results to come from an ongoing multiyear investigation by the U.S.'s top automotive safety regulator, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. In documents released Wednesday, the NHTSA says that the way Tesla's cars check to see if drivers are paying attention to the road while using Autosteer, an Autopilot feature that allows the cars to stay planted in the center of a lane even around big curves, is "insufficient."

Nudes on Twitch: Last week, Twitch said that it was overhauling its sexual content policy as well as its content classification system, briefly opening the door again to previously banned material-including illustrated nipples and what the company called "erotic dances"-but then reversed those changes. As of today, depictions of both real and fictional nudity are prohibited from Twitch once again. For now, streamers will be free to show nudity in M-rated games.

Adobe shows off Spectrum 2: Adobe has rolled out an update to Spectrum, the design system the company has used as the basis for all of its app and web products for the last 10 years. Dubbed Spectrum 2 (no surprise there), the new design system takes a step back from the austerity of the current Spectrum design and adds quite a few more splashes of color. You can already find parts of Spectrum 2 in recent Adobe web apps like the company's Firefly generative AI service, Adobe Express and some of the new Acrobat web experiences.

Instagram rolls out background editor: The company introduced its GenAI-powered background editing tool to users in the United States on Wednesday. The tool lets users quickly change the background to their images; when users tap on the new background editor icon on an image, they get pre-populated prompts like "On a red carpet," "Being chased by dinosaurs" and "Surrounded by puppies." Users can write their own prompts to change the background as well.

Threads expands: Word is that Meta will launch Threads in the EU next month — possibly with a "view-only mode" to get it into compliance with the EU's data handling and recommendation algorithms rules. In the meantime, the social network is working on adding a fact-checking program to Threads and testing support for ActivityPub, the open social networking protocol adopted by decentralized social networking platforms, including Mastodon.

FCC denies Starlink: The FCC has made a final denial of Starlink's application for $885 million in public funds to expand its orbital communications infrastructure to cover parts of rural America, saying the company "failed to demonstrate that it could deliver the promised service." As Devin notes, the money in question was part of the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, a multi-billion-dollar program to subsidize the rollout of internet service in places where private companies have previously decided it's too expensive or distant to do so.

Apple changes its notification policy: Apple said it will no longer hand over records of users' push notifications to law enforcement unless the company receives a valid judge's order. The company previously allowed police to obtain these records with a subpoena, which are issued by police departments and law enforcement agencies with no judicial oversight. The policy change comes days after U.S. senator Ron Wyden revealed that Apple and Google can be "secretly compelled by governments" to turn over the contents of push notifications sent to customers' phones.

Amazon competes with its own Goodreads: This week, Amazon launched its own competitor to Goodreads, a book tracking and recommendations site it also owns. Your Books organizes all the books you’ve bought, borrowed or saved, including print books, as well as Amazon’s Kindle and Audible titles. As Sarah points out, with Your Books, the focus is directed more on commerce and leveraging Amazon’s data to make recommendations, rather than — as with Goodreads — leaning on other people’s reviews, negative or positive.

Audio
Need some weekend listening material for your podcast? The good news is that TechCrunch's got plenty on offer there.

On Equity, the crew welcomed Matt Mullenweg, Automattic CEO and co-founder of WordPress, along with Kishan Bagaria, founder of Texts.com. Automattic bought all-in-one messaging app Texts.com for $50 million back in October, and on this week's Equity episode, the hosts dug into the transaction and what it means — and the general state of the written word online.

Meanwhile, Found focused on James Wagoner, co-founder and CEO of Joule Case, a startup creating a cleaner alternative to diesel generators. Wagoner spoke about how he got to the point of launching the company after his first startup with his co-founder did not survive the 2008 financial crisis.

And on Chain Reaction, Jacquelyn interviewed Johann Kerbrat, general manager of crypto at Robinhood. Johann is leading the effort at the app to expand its business on the crypto exchange side, and to make digital assets accessible to more retail investors.

TechCrunch+
TC+ subscribers get access to deep commentary, analysis and surveys—of which you are surely already aware if you're already a subscriber. If you're not, consider subscribing. Here are a few highlights from this week:

Temu vs. Shein: Alex writes about fast-fashion retailer Temu's latest lawsuit against chief rival Shein. In it, Temu alleges "dubious copyright infringement" complaints filed against it by Shein — and also alleges that Shein abuses its suppliers by leveraging a "monopoly power" and "exclusive-dealing agreements."

COP28 recap: Tim reports on the UN climate change conference proceedings this year. COP28 was significant in a few unexpected ways, he says — and not just because the United Arab Emirates, the world's seventh largest oil producer, hosted.

Epic fallout: Google losing the antitrust lawsuit brought by Epic Games concerning the Play Store will have far-reaching implications for the mobile app economy. Alex has the full story.