Three news stories summarized & contextualized by analytic journalist Colin Wright.

Amazon sued by FTC and 17 states over allegations it inflates online prices and overcharges sellers

Summary: E-commerce giant Amazon has been sued by the US Federal Trade Commission and 17 states on allegations of monopolistic abuse of power.

Context: This lawsuit is the result of a years-long investigation, and is considered to be a substantial threat to the company; the primary complaint is that Amazon has used its centrality to the online sales world to incentivize sellers to not offer lower prices on their goods elsewhere, to bury less-expensive options on their own listings, to charge sellers increasingly high fees, to force merchants to raise their prices over time—on and off Amazon—and to compete with folks selling on Amazon in anti-competitive ways; there are also allegations of replacing search results with ads, positioning their own brands over often better versions of the same from other companies, and overall just utilizing its position of power to kill off competition; Amazon controls something like 40% of the US e-commerce market, and Amazon has said this is an overstep by the FTC, and that it has done nothing illegal.

—The Associated Press

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Spotify is going to clone podcasters’ voices and translate them to other languages

Summary: Audio-streaming company Spotify has announced a new partnership with ChatGPT developer OpenAI that will allow them to clone the voices of podcasters, with those podcasters’ permission, and then use those voices to create dubs of their shows in different languages.

Context: The announcement included example, translated episodes from well-known podcasters like Lex Fridman, Bill Simmons, and Monica Padman, and though this isn’t a completely novel generative AI utility—other, smaller companies are offering similar services, many using the same OpenAI Whisper tool that Spotify’s using—Spotify is a behemoth in this space, and even if these dubs are imperfect (and they absolutely are) this could open up a whole lot of currently English-language content to folks who speak other languages, and it could, if made widely available and cheap or free, make audio content in any language available to folks who speak every other language, expanding the reach of all such content, and the ideas and personalities and information it carries.

—The Verge

Donald Trump found liable for fraud in New York civil case

Summary: A New York State Supreme Court judge has found former US President Trump liable for fraud for consistently overstating the value of his assets in financial statements, allowing him to fraudulently attain favorable terms on loans and other financial tools over the years.

Context: Trump allegedly overstated the value of his wealth by as much as $2.2 billion a year, and the New York attorney general is seeking a fine of $250 million; Trump has denied any wrongdoing, and has indicated that he may appeal the ruling, though the judge has basically ruled that there doesn’t need to be a trial—the documents show that Trump has been doing what he’s been accused of doing—and subsequent proceedings will focus on the size of the fine; if this ruling stands, it could result in Trump losing the ability to do business in New York, and it’s probably important to note that this is a civil trial, not a criminal one, so this doesn’t represent another indictment—it’s separate from the four indictments he currently faces in other courts.

—Reuters

The exodus of ethnic Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh—a region long-governed by a separatist government, but recently retaken by the Azerbaijani military—continues, with tens of thousands of people flooding across the border into Armenia, fearing ethnic cleansing, and a gas station explosion (crowded by people filling up their tanks as they flee) that has killed dozens of people and injuring scores more adding to the chaos.

—The Conversation

1,500

Approximate number of troops the French government will pull from Niger following the country’s military coup in July.

The new Nigerian government demanded France withdraw these troops soon after it took control, believing them to be a possible threat (they’re in the area to help fight extremist militant groups in the area, having worked with the previous Nigerian government toward this end) but the French government slow-walked a response until now.

Niger is now one of a trio of military dictatorship-led governments in western Africa, and the removal of French troops is being seen as a potential opening for other outside influences, like Russia, which might step in to take their place.

—Reuters

Trust Click

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