Microsoft’s Surface and AI event is coming up this Thursday, September 21st in New York City. Zdnet.com reports that we will likely see a couple new two-in-one surface models, new laptops like the Surface Laptop Studio 2, and the Surface Laptop Go 3 and Go 4, and of course, a big helping of AI-powered features and services. It is thought that during the event, Microsoft will also make some previously announced AI features available for users. The Microsoft event won’t be live-streamed for the public. They plan to put out rolling announcements all day Thursday and into Friday as well. 

TikTok has been fined 345 million Euros over privacy settings for kids. According to arstechnica.com, the EU is whacking the platform for the way it processes the personal data of children and teens. What TikTok did was set profiles of kids ages 13-17 to public by default…meaning anyone on or off the platform could view their content and contact them. The EU has been pretty aggressive in policing platform conduct…this year they fined Meta’s Facebook 1.2 billion Euros. As for TikTok, they have 90 days to comply with the ruling to change settings and pay up.

After going on sale along with the other iPhone 15 series handsets at a bit after 5am Friday, the 15 Pro Max sold out to the point that orders after 7:30am were looking at November deliveries. Macrumors.com says that noted analyst Ming-Chi Kuo finds that iPhone Pro Max demand has easily outstripped iPhone 14 Pro demand at the same time period a year ago despite the $100 price bump…BUT demand for the iPhone 15 Pro is softer than it was for the 14 Pro so far. Kuo attributes this to the better telephoto lens with 5 power optical zoom. I was able to get in during the first few minutes…and will report on the telephoto zoom probably next week. By the way, the iPhone 15 models are roughly on par with where the 14’s were selling at this same time last year. 

The SEC has nicked Lyft to the tune of $10 million for failing to disclose a board member’s role in the sale of almost a half billion worth of private shares before the initial public offering. TechCrunch.com says a Lyft board member director arranged for a shareholder to sell $424 million worth of shares to a special purpose vehicle set up by an investment advisor affiliated with the same director. Neither Lyft nor the SEC has disclosed the name of the director involved, and Lyft had no immediate comment. 

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.