For the first time ever, China’s smartphone market actually declined (by about 4%), last year. So reports BBC News, citing a new report from Canalys. “The decline ends eight years’ growth in the world’s largest mobile phone market,” the BBC notes. “Despite the overall slowdown of the market, Huawei saw double-digit growth.”

Current and former Google employees advocating for more diversity among the company’s ranks say they have been the victims of harassment, Wired reports. In one case, “Fired Google engineer James Damore says he was vilified and harassed for questioning what he calls the company’s liberal political orthodoxy, particularly around the merits of diversity,” Wired writes.

In the fourth quarter of 2017, LG’s smartphone business lost $192.33 million, TechCrunch reports. Yet, the loss actually represented a significant improvement from the third quarter when the company lost $331.37 million. Going forward, meanwhile, “There’s is no sign that things will drastically change anytime soon,” TechCrunch suggests.

Twitter is working on a new tool that will make it easier for users to post videos to the social network. “Currently, to upload videos with tweets or broadcast live from the app, users have to tap on the compose tweet icon then select the camera or live button,” The Verge notes. “The move falls in line with rival apps like Snapchat, which opens right to the camera, and Instagram, which only requires one swipe or tap to open the camera in the app.”

CNN is shuttering Beme, the video-sharing app it acquired in late 2016. Regarding the decision, Beme founder Casey Neistat tells BuzzFeed: “I don’t think I’m giving CNN what I want to give them, and I don’t think they’re getting value from me.” Notes BuzzFeed: “CNN had big plans for Neistat, a viral online filmmaker, envisioning him as a sort of digital Anthony Bourdain who could bring a new generation of news consumers into the cable news channel’s fold.”

In what may represent a threat to Amazon, Apple is reportedly planning a big relaunch for its long-neglected iBooks app. “iBooks is being redesigned with a new bookstore, a spotlight on the user’s current places in books, and improved audiobook integration, all under a slightly tweaked name: Books,” VentureBeat reports, citing a pay-wall-protected story in Bloomberg.  

BuzzFeed appears to have gotten hold of the survey that Facebook plans to serve users in order to gauge their opinion on various news publishers. “Turns out that survey isn’t a particularly lengthy or nuanced one,” it writes. Rather, it simply asks if users recognize a publisher’s Web site, and how much they trust its domain. Of course, “The responses from Facebook’s users could matter a great deal for the many publications relying on traffic from the platform,” BuzzFeed notes.

YouTube is asking some musicians to sign non-disparagement agreements in exchange for promotional support, Bloomberg reports, citing sources. “Non-disparagement agreements are common in business, but YouTube’s biggest direct competitors in music don’t require them,” it notes. The push is apparently “a way to quell persistent criticism [of YouTube] by artists,” Bloomberg notes.

AT&T is asking lawmakers for more consistency and clarity on Web policy. As CNN reports, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson is asking Congress to establish an “Internet Bill of Rights” that guarantees net neutrality, an open internet, and privacy protection for customers. AT&T is getting the message out by buying full-page ad in top U.S. newspapers, to appear this week.

Anti-tracking search engine DuckDuckGo is rolling out revamped mobile apps and browser extensions, which, as TechCrunch notes, “bake in a tracker blocker for third party sites, and include a suite of other privacy features intended to help users keep surfing privately as they navigate around the web.”