Sherwood News

Could TikTok’s sister app, Lemon8, offer a lifeline for ByteDance and creators?

When life gives you laws you don’t like, push Lemon8.

1/9/25 11:55AM

Tomorrow marks one of the biggest days in recent history for ByteDance, and for the most screen-addicted Americans in your life, as representatives from the Chinese tech giant make last-ditch appeals to the Supreme Court to try to divert the US ban on the company’s flagship app, TikTok.

As things stand, a bipartisan bill signed off by Joe Biden last April means that the short-form social-media behemoth would be outlawed in the US on January 19 (next Sunday), unless ByteDance sells the platform to an American company, or the Supreme Court intervenes, or President-elect Donald Trump intervenes, or some as yet unknown outcome saves the app, which reportedly counts more than 170 million users in the US.

While a ban wouldn’t automatically wipe TikTok from those 170 million Americans’ devices before they could say the word “rizzler,” new users wouldn’t be able to download it, and a ban on updates would eventually make the platform practically unusable.

Public support for the ban, proposed due to safety concerns around sensitive user data, has been dwindling, with millions of Americans already looking to another ByteDance app as an alternative if the ban goes through.

According to data from site-traffic tracker Similarweb, more than 2.3 million unique visitors clocked just over 5 million page views on the landing page for Lemon8 in America last month. That number has grown as TikTok creators — some of whom are being paid to do so by ByteDance — push users to the photo- and video-sharing “lifestyle community” TikTok alternative, per Axios.

Though Lemon8, which launched in the US in early 2023 but didn’t take off in the same way as TikTok, might not be the safest port in this particular storm. Indeed, the divest-or-ban part of the bill reportedly applies to other properties owned or operated by ByteDance, meaning that even the replacement app’s future could be in peril.

Jon Keegan7h

Google’s Gemini 3.0 reportedly due to be released in December

Google is aiming to release the latest version of its flagship AI model, Gemini 3.0, in December, according to a report from Sources.news.

The updated model is expected to make significant gains that should boost it to the top of the leaderboards, according to the report.

The Gemini app also spent some time at the top of the iOS App Store leaderboards, propelled by Google’s Nano Banana image generation model, which proved popular with users looking to turn themselves into action figures. Gemini briefly knocked ChatGPT from the top spot, which is now occupied by OpenAI’s other hot app, Sora.

Recently, there have been signs of ChatGPT downloads slowing, which could provide an opening for Gemini to gain market share. Adding some premium Gemini features to the free tier is a plan under discussion within Google, per Sources.news.

Sources.news also reports that a “small, secretive team” inside Google is working to integrate Gemini into Apple’s operating systems.

Google readies Gemini 3, Perplexity hits its goal

Sources.news also reports that a “small, secretive team” inside Google is working to integrate Gemini into Apple’s operating systems.

Jon Keegan12h

Meta strikes $30 billion deal with Blue Owl to finance Hyperion data center

Meta’s Hyperion mega data center site in Richland Parish, Louisiana, is currently under construction. The city-sized development will be the home to one of the largest data centers in the world, housing around 2 million pricey GPUs, and will scale up to an eventual 5.5 gigawatts.

So, how is Meta planning to pay for this expensive project?

Bloomberg reports that Meta has signed a deal with asset management company Blue Owl Capital to finance $30 billion to pay for the project, marking what could be the largest private capital deal ever.

According to the report, Blue Owl and Meta would co-own the site, with Meta retaining a 20% stake in the project. PIMCO is also part of the financing for the deal, as the anchor lender.

Raising the massive capital to fund all of these huge AI data center projects is pushing companies to use unusual financing arrangements. The Information reported that xAI made such a deal with Valor Equity Partners worth $20 billion to rent the GPUs needed for its Colossus 2 data center.

Blue Owl Seals Largest Private Capital Deal for Meta’s AI Growth

According to the report, Blue Owl and Meta would co-own the site, with Meta retaining a 20% stake in the project. PIMCO is also part of the financing for the deal, as the anchor lender.

Rani Molla15h

EssilorLuxottica surges to record high after saying Ray-Ban Meta glasses helped boost revenue growth

European eyewear company EssilorLuxottica said during its earnings call yesterday that its Ray-Ban Meta glasses helped boost its revenue growth, something that’s sent the ADR up to a record high.

“Clearly, there is a lift coming from Ray-Ban Meta wearables as a product category,” the company’s CFO, Stefano Grassi, said on the call Thursday. “The contribution from Ray-Ban Meta in wearables, as I mentioned before, is in excess of 4 percentage points overall for the group.”

EssilorLuxottica’s revenue was up 11.7% in the third quarter compared with a year ago.

Meta has a nearly 3% stake in the eyewear company, which it has partnered with on the smart glasses. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has also claimed that its Ray-Ban Metas are a hit, saying that the “sales trajectory that we’ve seen is similar to some of the most popular consumer electronics of all time.” We looked at the numbers and aren’t so sure.

Tom Jones

ARR you watching?

17h

The revenue race between Anthropic and OpenAI is getting more heated

Hey Claude, when do you think you’ll start making more money than ChatGPT?

44%

Matt Phillips10/16/25

JPMorgan economists estimate that the basket of stocks they use as a rough gauge of AI’s market impact is now worth about 44% of the S&P 500’s total market cap, up from 26% in 2022.

Using a basket of 30 AI stocks picked by the bank’s equity analysts as a barometer of AI, the economists find that American households have seen their aggregate wealth go up by about $5 trillion over the last year as a result of AI, they reported in a note published Thursday.

They also estimate the surge in stock market wealth could raise annualized US consumer spending by some $180 billion, due to wealth effects.

JPM acknowledges some uncertainty around this estimate, noting that the spending impact could be lower “if the wealth gains are accruing disproportionately to upper income households with lower [marginal propensity to spend].”