Salesforce, the CRM powerhouse that recently surpassed $20 billion in annual revenue, announced today it is wading deeper into enterprise social by acquiring Slack in a $27.7 billion megadeal. From a report: Salesforce co-founder and CEO Marc Benioff didn't mince words on his latest purchase. "This is a match made in heaven. Together, Salesforce and Slack will shape the future of enterprise software and transform the way everyone works in the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world," Benioff said in a statement. Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield was no less effusive than his future boss. "As software plays a more and more critical role in the performance of every organization, we share a vision of reduced complexity, increased power and flexibility, and ultimately a greater degree of alignment and organizational agility. Personally, I believe this is the most strategic combination in the history of software, and I can't wait to get going," Butterfield said in a statement.

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Salesforce, the CRM powerhouse that recently surpassed $20 billion in annual revenue, announced today it is wading deeper into enterprise social by acquiring Slack in a $27.7 billion megadeal. From a report: Salesforce co-founder and CEO Marc Benioff didn't mince words on his latest purchase. "This is a match made in heaven. Together, Salesforce and Slack will shape the future of enterprise software and transform the way everyone works in the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world," Benioff said in a statement. Slack CEO Stewart Butterfield was no less effusive than his future boss. "As software plays a more and more critical role in the performance of every organization, we share a vision of reduced complexity, increased power and flexibility, and ultimately a greater degree of alignment and organizational agility. Personally, I believe this is the most strategic combination in the history of software, and I can't wait to get going," Butterfield said in a statement.

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Salesforce and Slack Technologies have entered into a definitive agreement under which Salesforce will acquire Slack. In a statement, the two companies said: Under the terms of the agreement, Slack shareholders will receive $26.79 in cash and 0.0776 shares of Salesforce common stock for each Slack share, representing an enterprise value of approximately $27.7 billion based on the closing price of Salesforce's common stock on November 30, 2020. Combining Slack with Salesforce Customer 360 will be transformative for customers and the industry. The combination will create the operating system for the new way to work, uniquely enabling companies to grow and succeed in the all-digital world. "Stewart and his team have built one of the most beloved platforms in enterprise software history, with an incredible ecosystem around it," said Marc Benioff, Chair and CEO, Salesforce. "This is a match made in heaven. Together, Salesforce and Slack will shape the future of enterprise software and transform the way everyone works in the all-digital, work-from-anywhere world. I'm thrilled to welcome Slack to the Salesforce Ohana once the transaction closes." Editor's note: The story was updated on Tuesday with confirmation about the deal from the two companies.

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Amazon is laying the groundwork for a quantum computer, deepening efforts to harness technology that can crunch in seconds vast amounts of data that take even the most powerful supercomputers hours or days to process. From a report: Amazon has been hiring for a Quantum Hardware Team within its Amazon Web Services Center for Quantum Computing, according to internal job postings and information on LinkedIn. Marc Runyan, a former engineer with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, lists his title on the professional social network as senior quantum research scientist at Amazon and describes his role as "helping to design and build a quantum computer for Amazon Web Services." [...] Among Amazon's recent hires are research scientists focusing on designing a new superconducting quantum device as well as device fabrication. Developing its own quantum computer would let Amazon more closely mirror the approach taken by its major cloud rivals. International Business Machines first made a quantum computer available to the public in 2016 and has rolled out regular upgrades.

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Microsoft says it will make changes in its new Productivity Score feature, including removing the ability for companies to see data about individual users, to address concerns from privacy experts that the tech giant had effectively rolled out a new tool for snooping on workers. From a report: "Going forward, the communications, meetings, content collaboration, teamwork, and mobility measures in Productivity Score will only aggregate data at the organization level -- providing a clear measure of organization-level adoption of key features," wrote Jared Spataro, Microsoft 365 corporate vice president, in a post this morning. "No one in the organization will be able to use Productivity Score to access data about how an individual user is using apps and services in Microsoft 365." The company rolled out its new "Productivity Score" feature as part of Microsoft 365 in late October. It gives companies data to understand how workers are using and adopting different forms of technology. It made headlines over the past week as reports surfaced that the tool lets managers see individual user data by default. As originally rolled out, Productivity Score turned Microsoft 365 into a "full-fledged workplace surveillance tool," wrote Wolfie Christl of the independent Cracked Labs digital research institute in Vienna, Austria. "Employers/managers can analyze employee activities at the individual level (!), for example, the number of days an employee has been sending emails, using the chat, using 'mentions' in emails etc."

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Microsoft says it will make changes in its new Productivity Score feature, including removing the ability for companies to see data about individual users, to address concerns from privacy experts that the tech giant had effectively rolled out a new tool for snooping on workers. From a report: "Going forward, the communications, meetings, content collaboration, teamwork, and mobility measures in Productivity Score will only aggregate data at the organization level -- providing a clear measure of organization-level adoption of key features," wrote Jared Spataro, Microsoft 365 corporate vice president, in a post this morning. "No one in the organization will be able to use Productivity Score to access data about how an individual user is using apps and services in Microsoft 365." The company rolled out its new "Productivity Score" feature as part of Microsoft 365 in late October. It gives companies data to understand how workers are using and adopting different forms of technology. It made headlines over the past week as reports surfaced that the tool lets managers see individual user data by default. As originally rolled out, Productivity Score turned Microsoft 365 into a "full-fledged workplace surveillance tool," wrote Wolfie Christl of the independent Cracked Labs digital research institute in Vienna, Austria. "Employers/managers can analyze employee activities at the individual level (!), for example, the number of days an employee has been sending emails, using the chat, using 'mentions' in emails etc."

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MojoKid writes: NVIDIA expanded its line-up of Ampere-based graphics cards today with a new lower cost GeForce RTX 3060 Ti. As its name suggests, the new $399 NVIDIA GPU supplants the previous-gen GeForce RTX 2060 / RTX 2060 Super, and slots in just behind the recently-released GeForce RTX 3070. The GeForce RTX 3060 Ti features 128 CUDA cores per SM, for a total of 4,864, 4 Third-Gen Tensor cores per SM (152 total), and 38 Second-Gen RT cores. The GPU has a typical boost clock of 1,665MHz and it is linked to 8GB of standard GDDR6 memory (not the GDDR6X of the RTX 3080/3090) via a 256-bit memory interface that offers up to 448GB/s of peak bandwidth. In terms of overall performance, the RTX 3060 Ti lands in the neighborhood of the GeForce RTX 2080 Super, and well ahead of cards like AMD's Radeon RX 5700 XT. The GeForce RTX 3060 Ti's 8GB frame buffer may give some users pause, but for 1080p and 1440p gaming, it shouldn't be a problem for the overwhelming majority of titles. It's also par for the course in this $399 price band. Cards are reported to be shipping in retail tomorrow.

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weiserfireman writes: The worst fears of engineers has happened. The massive Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico collapsed in on itself overnight. The catastrophic failure had been predicted by engineers after the telescope suffered two major cable malfunctions over the last couple of months, risking the integrity of the observatory's entire structure. Pictures of Arecibo surfaced online this morning, revealing that the massive 900-ton platform that is normally suspended above the observatory was no longer there. The National Science Foundation, which oversees Arecibo, confirmed to The Verge that the platform did come crashing down onto the telescope's giant 1,000-foot-wide dish. No injuries have been reported, according to the agency. "NSF is working with stakeholders to assess the situation," the agency tweeted. "Our top priority is maintaining safety. NSF will release more details when they are confirmed."

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Qualcomm has officially announced the Snapdragon 888 at its Snapdragon Tech Summit, offering a first look at its next-generation flagship smartphone processor. The 888 will power the next wave of 2021 Android flagships from companies like Samsung, OnePlus, LG, Sony, and more. From a report: In a first for the company's top-of-the-line 8-series chipsets, the Snapdragon 888 is making a big improvement for 5G: it'll finally offer a fully integrated 5G modem, unlike last year's Snapdragon 865 (which required that manufacturers include a separate modem chip inside the cramped interior of a modern smartphone). The Snapdragon 888 will feature Qualcomm's X60 modem, announced earlier this year, which jumps to a 5nm process for better power efficiency and improvements for 5G carrier aggregation across the mmWave and sub-6GHz bands of the spectrum. Between the new 5nm architecture and the power efficiency gains from an integrated modem, the new chip looks to offer some substantial battery improvements when it comes to 5G. In addition to the 5G improvements, Qualcomm also teased several other advances coming to the Snapdragon 888, including the company's sixth-gen AI Engine (running on a "redesigned" Qualcomm Hexagon processor), which promises a big jump in performance and power efficiency for AI tasks.

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Google said it is launching Android Enterprise Essentials, a mobile device management service for small enterprises. From a report: Based on the Android Enterprise Recommended program, Google's Android Enterprise Essentials is a pared down version with default features and smaller budgets. Google is trying to address the reality that smaller organizations are often targeted by cybercriminals. Features include: Requiring a lock screen and encryption on devices to prevent unauthorized access to company data. Enforcing mandatory malware protection with an always-on Google Play Protect. The ability to wipe all company data from a device. The core security features are applied automatically without the need to configure devices.

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The telescope was used in decades of astronomical discoveries and as a backdrop for Hollywood films.

I've heard it asked who wrote the best bit of journalism in the last decade? That answer is very easy. Evan Osnos in the New Yorker.

In Sept 2016, he wrote a piece about what a Trump presidency would be like. He's the only one who did. It was unthinkable at the time that he'd win.

Why this was the best.

1. Osnos thought of doing it.
2. He didn't just dash it off, he thought, really learned about the subject.
3. The piece was chilling.
4. The artwork also.

And of course Trump did win, and now we're all experts in what happened next.

Writing about the unthinkable, that's when journalism can be great.

Here's my writeup of his piece, at the time. I called it the missed story of 2016.

OK, here's a free idea. I just read an audiobook written by a living author. I loved the book, and think he's a great writer. The author of the book could say what three books he recommends reading after his book and why they would be good choices. Having just read the book, I have an idea of what I'd like to learn about next. And the author's opinion would have a lot of value. I'd just spent a bit of time reading what they wrote. And of course the author could update the list, change which three books they recommend, and why.

What's the top thing you owe your surviving the pandemic to.

Today's song: Every Little Thing She Does is Magic.