More than 450 antiquarian book dealers in around 26 countries pulled their books off a subsidiary of Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) after the site dropped all sellers from several nations, a report by The New York Times said.
The stores called their strike Banned Booksellers Week.
The protest got started after AbeBooks sent emails last month to booksellers in countries including South Korea, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Russia to say that it would no longer “support” them.
“We apologize for this inconvenience,” the company said. As the news spread, even unaffected dealers were surprised and angered. AbeBooks, together with Amazon itself, is by far the biggest international marketplace for secondhand and rare books, the report said.
Amazon shares rose 0.31% to $1,622.90 late on Tuesday.
READ: Amazon gives all US customers free shipping with no minimum purchases during holiday season
On the eve of the US mid-term elections, Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) said it blocked 115 Facebook and Instagram accounts believed to be engaged in manipulation after getting a tip from federal law enforcement who suspected the activity was linked to foreign entities, a report on Yahoo said.
The company said its early investigation identified about 30 Facebook accounts and 85 Instagram accounts engaged in “coordinated inauthentic behavior,” the report said.
“Typically, we would be further along with our analysis before announcing anything publicly,” said Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of cybersecurity policy, in a blog post published Monday. “But given that we are only one day away from important elections in the US, we wanted to let people know about the action we’ve taken and the facts as we know them today.”
Facebook says it doesn’t know which foreign actors were attempting to spread mischief on its platform, or whether any of these accounts are linked to the Russia-based Internet Research Agency.
All the Facebook pages associated these accounts appear to be in the French or Russian languages. The Instagram accounts are mostly in English - some were focused on celebrities, others political debate, Gleicher wrote.
Facebook stock slipped 0.05% to $148.60.
Alphabet Inc's Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) changed the website's latest Google Doodle by dedicating it to the US mid-term elections, Mashable said in a report.
The search engine changed its iconic logo from "Google" to "Go Vote", the report said. When you click the doodle, you're taken to the search results page for "Where do I vote #ElectionDay."
Once you are there, you can easily determine your polling place by entering your address into Google's 2018 election tool.
Underneath the tool are additional resources that can help users check if they're registered to vote and get familiar with candidates and issues on the ballot, the report said.
Google stock increased 0.8% to $1,048.46.
READ: Google walkout: Employees stage global protest over sexual harassment, workplace culture
Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) is gradually transitioning from a product company into a service giant, a report by Seeking Alpha said.
Analyst Vishesh Raisinghani wrote that services now account for 16% of Apple's revenue and a large portion of its gross margins. The service company as a standalone business is already worth one-third of Apple's market cap and is growing rapidly, he said.
Apple plans to halt publishing unit sales figures and average selling prices for iPhones, Macs and its other product lines. In other words, everything physical will be lumped together.
"I think it’s reasonable for investors to assume this move implies softer sales figures. However, I think the decision also indicates a paradigm shift in Apple’s fundamental business model. I believe Tim Cook and his team are trying to transition the company away from Jobs’ vision of the ‘ultimate product company’ to an ‘efficient services provider’," he said.
Apple shares added 0.5% to $202.64.
Netflix Inc (NASDAQ:NFLX) is adding to its lineup of family content just as Disney gears up for its streaming service, a report by Engadget said.
The newly announced films include "My Father's Dragon", which tells the story of a young runaway who goes off in search of a captive dragon, and The Willoughbys, an adaptation of a Lois Lowry novel about four children abandoned by their parents.
The six projects have release dates between 2019 and 2021, the report said.
Netflix stock fell 2.3% to $308.15.
Reporting by Rene Pastor, contactable on rene.pastor@proactiveinvestors.com