Magnetic storage, and we’re talking tape here, is good for long-term storage because it’s cheap and stable — unlike solid state drives and volatile memory, which are quick but expensive and better for temporary storage. New research might lead to a method that combines the best of both worlds. Read More
Following a vote on Friday by the Virginia State Board of Elections, the state will take decisive action to ensure the integrity of its voting machines. Virginia’s election supervisors have instructed 22 localities to abandon their existing machines immediately, citing risks inherent in the way they record votes. “The Department of Elections believes that the risks presented by… Read More
Today’s Stories Here comes the class action lawsuit after Equifax’s massive hack FBI probes Uber’s use of software to target rival Lyft Facebook plans to spend up to $1B on original shows in 2018 Spotify is starting a music event as Apple ends its music festival Credits Written and Hosted by: Anthony Ha Filmed by: Luke Miller Edited by: Joe Zolnoski Notes: Tito Hamze is… Read More
Mars: 2051. In the bitter cold of a martian winter, 30 remote controlled robots walk out of a holding bay across the icy terrain to begin their day in the mines. They pile in to the latest autonomous, hydrogen-powered Waymo rover, power down and charge up at docking ports… It’s going to be a long day. Read More
Some Facebook users have noticed a new section called “Movies” appearing in the mobile app’s main navigation. The feature offers a way to see which movies are playing nearby, available showtimes and a list of local theaters and their movie selections. The section is powered through an integration with Fandango’s booking service, so you can buy a movie ticket right from… Read More
The 340 million users of Sina Weibo, China’s popular microblogging service, have been given one week to link their accounts to a real name. The crackdown is being conducted in order to comply with new government rules restricting anonymous online conversation. Read More
Equifax, which yesterday announced an enormous breach, will not require consumers to forfeit their right to join a class action lawsuit in order to receive credit protection. The company clarified the forced arbitration clause in its terms of service after outcry by consumer advocates, including NY Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who called the requirement “unacceptable and… Read More
As the planet approaches adding another billion or more people, and as an increasing number of those people are wealthier than they’ve been before, the question of where our food comes from and how we raise it becomes more than an academic discussion, as farming is 10 percent of the world economy. Read More
A majority of the most successful startups coming out of Latin America have fallen under the “copycat” business model. On the other hand, there’s been a rise in truly disruptive ideas coming out of Latin America, as well. Certainly, “copycat” startups can be innovators, but not all innovators are disruptors. Read More
Elon Musk has shared a photo of the SpaceX spacesuit the company has designed in-house. This is the second photo shared by Musk of the new spacesuit design created by the company, and the first to feature the suit’s full-body look. The first photo focused on the head and shoulders of the outfit, depicting the full tinted face mask of the helmet, and the angular shoulders and black and… Read More
Many of you have strong personal and political beliefs (or so I hope) — but aside from tweeting angrily, what’s the most effective way to put those beliefs into action? Tech:NYC, a nonprofit group advocating for the New York tech industry in state and city politics, is addressing that problem with a new website called Tech Takes Action. Read More
If you’ve never worked for a complete jerk, consider yourself lucky. Roughly one in five people polled say they’ve experienced bullying in the workplace — and 61 percent of the time, the bully is the person to whom an employee reports directly. None of this is news to Stanford Professor Bob Sutton. We talked with Sutton yesterday about what it means to be an asshole, how to… Read More
In the aftermath of the Note 7 debacle, many wondered whether the Note line was done for good. It seems that the latest iteration — despite carrying a high starting price of $930 — has delivered a win for the folks at Samsung. Today, they announced that its pace for U.S. pre-orders of the Note8 have eclipsed those of every other Note release to date. Read More
Dopamine Labs aims to give any app the same addictive power that Facebook, Zynga and others have spent millions to perfect. Now, armed with $1 million in seed funding and some initial data that they’re experiments in mind control actually work, Dopamine Labs is spending money to boost its staff and sales and marketing efforts to bring more apps in on its brain science. Read More
Airbnb is celebrating a partial win over a housing law change in Berlin that last year led to a total clampdown on the short term renting of entire homes to visitors to the city. City authorities had couched the move as a necessary measure to tackle housing shortages. Read More
WhatsApp is preparing to finally monetize, and its first move follows the same strategy as Facebook Messenger. TechCrunch has discovered code in Facebook’s ad manager that lets businesses buy ads with the call to action “Send WhatsApp Message.” Read More
TechCrunch Include Office Hours are back for September, this time with Greylock Partners. On September 15th from 2-4 pm PT, Greylock Partners’ investors — Sarah Guo, Matt Heiman and Saam Motamedi — will be meeting with underserved and underrepresented founders, providing valuable feedback and guidance. Read More
Last November, YouTube began supporting HDR for those who watch its videos via their TV sets. Today, the company announced it’s expanding the technology to mobile, initially on select Android devices, but not yet on iOS. At launch, YouTube mobile HDR is rolling out to Pixel, LG V30, Samsung Galaxy S8 and Note8 and Sony Experia XZ Premium devices, through the YouTube mobile app. Read More
GrubHub COO Stan Chia took the stand today in the company’s trial surrounding its practices of employing 1099 independent contractors to make deliveries. In Chia’s testimony, GrubHub lawyer Theodore Boutrous focused on the element of the Borello test that looks at whether or not delivery is part of the company’s core business. According to Chia, it is not. Read More
Google today announced a refresh of its privacy and security dashboard, its one-stop shop for checking and changing your privacy settings, opting out of personalized ads and seeing which third-party services have access to your data. You’re not going to find any new controls here, but the company says that the update is meant to make the tools easier to use on mobile. Read More
