The Pulse

  If you don't like what's being said, change the conversation. That's advice Don Draper of "Mad Men" once gave. And it appears Tesla ( TSLA ) CEO Elon Musk is taking it. (via finance.yahoo ) By the numbers, Tesla painted a dismal picture   through its latest quarterly results . But the stock told   a different story : excitement. New models are on the way, Musk said. And beyond that, Tesla will prosper as a pioneer in autonomous ridesharing. Shares jumped following the earnings release, and the momentum carried over into morning trading Wednesday as the stock surged as much as 14%. As Tesla car sales faltered, Musk delivered an optimistic pivot: Tesla isn't a car company.Sales fell 9% from a year ago in the most recent quarter, the first drop in four years. Operating profit tumbled more than 50% from the same period last year. Guidance, too, was a drag, as executives foresee "notably lower volume." But the market loved Tesla reassuring the world tha...

  Tesla profits fell 55% to $1.13 billion in the first quarter from the same year-ago period as a protracted EV price-cutting strategy and “ several   unforeseen   challenges”  cut into the automaker’s bottom line. (via techcrunch ) Tesla reported revenue of  $21.3 billion  in the first quarter, a 9% drop from the first quarter of 2023.  Analysts polled by Yahoo Finance expected earnings of $0.51 per share on $22.15 billion in revenue. Tesla reported operating income of $1.2 billion in the first quarter, a 54% decrease from the same year-ago period. The company said in its Q1 earnings report that it experienced “numerous challenges” in the first quarter, including the Red Sea conflict and the arson attack at Gigafactory Berlin and the gradual ramp of the updated Model 3 at its factory in Fremont, California. Tesla also noted that global EV sales continue to be under pressure as many carmakers prioritize hybrids over EVs. On the upside, t...

 Apple has dropped the number of Vision Pro units that it plans to ship in 2024, going from an expected 700 to 800k units to just 400k to 450k units, according to Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. (via macrumors ) Orders have been scaled back before the Vision Pro has launched in markets outside of the United States, which Kuo says is a sign that demand in the U.S. has "fallen sharply beyond expectations." As a result, Apple is expected to take a "conservative view" of headset demand when the Vision Pro launches in additional countries. Kuo previously said that Apple will introduce the Vision Pro in new markets before the June Worldwide Developers Conference, which suggests that we could see it available in additional areas in the next month or so. Apple is expecting Vision Pro shipments to decline year-over-year in 2025 compared to 2024, and the company is said to be "reviewing and adjusting" its headset product roadmap. Kuo does not believe there will be a new...

  Some employees protested the tech giant’s contract with the Israeli government. They’ve been let go.(via washingtonpost ) Google fired about 20 more workers it said participated in protests denouncing the company’s cloud computing deal with the Israeli government, bringing the total number of workers fired in the past week over the issue to more than 50, according to the activist group representing the workers. A spokesperson for Google confirmed it had fired more workers after continuing its investigation into the April 16 protests, which included sit-ins at Google’s offices in New York City and Sunnyvale, Calif. The firings come several days after chief executive Sundar Pichai told employees in a companywide memo that they should not use the company as a “personal platform” or “fight over disruptive issues or debate politics.” “The corporation is attempting to quash dissent, silence its workers and reassert its power over them,” said Jane Chung, a spokespers...

  Bulletproof? Is it waterproof? Ts&Cs say: 'Failure to put Cybertruck in Car Wash Mode may result in damage' (via theregister ) The perils of turning cars into computers were laid bare by a hapless Cybertruck owner who claimed his ride was rendered an $80,000 "paperweight" by something as benign as a wash. Now, we tech-savvy people are well aware that computers and water do not mix. But cars get dirty, and when you've tossed your life savings into a Cybertruck, you'd probably want to keep it looking immaculate. At the same time, we'd hesitate to hose off our motherboard even if the cat hair level was approaching critical mass. But when your car  is  a computer, what are your options? As noted by motoring zine  Jalopnik , a TikTok user going by  @captian.ad  regaled his followers with a  tale  of how he took his Cybertruck to the beach with his dogs. What sounds like a lovely day out soon turned to sorrow, however, as on the way back he stoppe...

  Google has fired 28 employees over their participation in a 10-hour sit-in   at the search giant’s offices in New York and Sunnyvale, California , to protest the company’s business ties with the Israel government, The Post has learned. (read more  nypost ) The pro-Palestinian staffers — who had donned traditional Arab headscarves as they stormed and occupied the office of a top executive in California on Tuesday — were terminated late Wednesday after an internal investigation, Google vice president of global security Chris Rackow said in a companywide memo. “They took over office spaces, defaced our property, and physically impeded the work of other Googlers,” Rackow wrote in the memo obtained by The Post. “Their behavior was unacceptable, extremely disruptive, and made co-workers feel threatened.” In New York, protesters had occupied the 10th floor of Google’s offices in the Chelsea section of Manhattan as part of a protest that also extended to the company’s offices i...

  Haifa Mayor Yona Yahav announces he will name neighborhood in honor of US president as token of appreciation for his uncompromising support for Israel. (via ynetnews )  Haifa Mayor Yona Yahav revealed on Tuesday night that he intends to name a neighborhood in the northern Israeli city after U.S. President Joe Biden as a token of appreciation for his uncompromising support for Israel. Similarly, in June 2019, the government approved the establishment of "Ramat Trump", a community in the Golan Heights bearing the name of former U.S. President Donald Trump as an expression of gratitude for the Trump administration's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and the recognition of Israeli sovereignty in the Golan Heights. Yahav's statement came at the traditional Passover dinner at the Sephardic House in the city where the recently reelected mayor also pledged to include Jewish studies in the curriculum of Haifa schools, aiming to bring together Jewish and Ara...

  Saudi Arabia has publicly acknowledged its involvement in aiding the newly formed regional military coalition in defending Israel against an Iranian attack (via i24 news ).  The statement referenced a report by KAN News detailing Saudi Arabia's participation in the joint military defensive operation, which successfully thwarted an Iranian assault on Israel.  According to the report, 99 percent of the Iranian drones and missiles were intercepted and neutralized before reaching their intended targets. Notably, many of these hostile projectiles had traversed Jordanian and Saudi airspace en route to Israel. While Jordan had openly disclosed its role in the defensive maneuver, Saudi Arabia's acknowledgment came in the form of a summary on its official website, citing insights from a source within the Saudi royal family. The post subtly hinted at Saudi Arabia's involvement in intercepting suspicious entities in its airspace, highlighting the kingdom's proactive stan...

  The decision was made in part because Tehran's drone and missile attacks "caused relatively minor damage." (via jns ) Israel abandoned the option of launching a retaliatory strike on Iranian territory following a Saturday phone call between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Joe Biden,  The New York Times   reported on Sunday, citing officials in Jerusalem. According to the  Times , the decision was made in part because the Iranian drone and missile attacks “caused relatively minor damage.” Biden reportedly told Netanyahu during the call that his administration would not support offensive action against the regime in Tehran. The Islamic Republic fired more than 300 missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles from its territory towards Israel overnight Saturday, in what Tehran says was retaliation for the April 1  killing  of several Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps officers in Syria by Israel. A 7-year-old Israeli Bedouin...

  The social-media Web as we knew it, a place where we consumed the posts of our fellow-humans and posted in return, appears to be over. Lately on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, my timeline is filled with vapid posts orbiting the same few topics like water whirlpooling down a drain. Last week, for instance, the chatter was dominated by talk of  Taylor Swift’s romance with the football player Travis Kelce . If you tried to talk about anything else, the platform’s algorithmic feed seemed to sweep you into irrelevance. Users who pay for Elon Musk’s blue-check verification system now dominate the platform, often with far-right-wing commentary and outright disinformation; Musk rewards these users monetarily based on the engagement that their posts drive, regardless of their veracity. The decay of the system is apparent in the spread of fake news and  mislabelled videos  related to Hamas’s attack on Israel. Elsewhere online, things are similarly bleak. Instagra...

 The Biden administration is preparing to take the unusual step of issuing an order that would prevent US companies and citizens from using software made by a major Russian cybersecurity firm because of national security concerns, five US officials familiar with the matter told CNN. The move, which is being finalized and could happen as soon as this month, would use relatively new Commerce Department authorities built on executive orders signed by Presidents Joe Biden and Donald Trump to prohibit Kaspersky Lab from providing certain products and services in the US, the sources said. Nothing is final until it is announced, the sources cautioned, but the Commerce Department has made an “initial determination” to prohibit certain transactions between the Russian company and US persons, the sources said. It`s the latest US government effort to use its vast regulatory powers to prevent Americans from using popular technology that US officials consider a national security risk. The sourc...

  Another   Boeing whistleblower has come forward   with concerns over one of the planemaker's family of passenger jetliners, pointing to safety concerns in at least 1,400 wide-body airplanes.(via  Business Insider ) In a January  complaint  to aviation regulators that was publicly released for the first time on Tuesday, Sam Salehpour, a veteran Boeing employee and 40-year aerospace engineer, said parts of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner and the Boeing 777 were misaligned during assembly and could pose safety threats. The  New York Times  first reported his allegations. Through lawyers, Salehpour said he observed problems during his work on both programs and documented his concerns to send to the Federal Aviation Administration and Boeing leadership. He said employees were pressured to "overlook" the concerns in what he described as a "schedule over safety" culture, which he claimed affects more than 1,000 Dreamliners and at least 400 777s. Salehpour sa...