Amazon today is launching a new perk for Prime members that will give them cash back on purchases – even if they’re not paying for items using an Amazon cashback credit card. Through a new rewards program called Amazon Prime Reload, Prime members can receive 2 percent back on purchases when they first load funds into their Amazon Balance using a debit card attached to their… Read More
Amidst a tough time for Uber, CEO Travis Kalanick’s parents were in a tragic boating accident last month that took the life of his mother. Now to grieve and clear his head before enacting changes at Uber, Travis has told his team he’ll be taking a leave of absence of unspecified length. You can read the CEO’s full letter to Uber below. Kalanick notes that “During… Read More
It’s hard to believe that Microsoft was able to make the latest generation Xbox so compact, and yet still so much more powerful. We had the chance to check out the console ourselves, and we were rather impressed. The no-nonsense black box of gaming power is about as simple as it comes where the hardware is concerned, but based on the gameplay we saw at the Microsoft presser yesterday,… Read More
At WWDC this month, Apple introduced an entirely revamped App Store that puts a much greater focus on editorial, with plans for stories about the apps, how to’s, interviews, and more, in addition to regular postings of curated lists and “app of the day” type features. Today, Google announced its own plans to expand editorial involvement on Google Play, with the launch of its… Read More
Across the country, businesses in every industry are bracing themselves for a new wave of digital disruption. In the last year, Amazon announced it is creating supermarkets without salespeople, McDonald’s decided to replace all of its cashiers with self-serve kiosks, and Caterpillar began investing in driverless tractors. While the tech industry is accelerating these advancements… Read More
Nintendo is back at E3, in much more successful spirits after the sales boom with the Switch’s launch earlier this year. One of the game titles announced include an unnamed and still-in-progress proper Pokemon RPG, built by Game Freaks for the Switch. Updates to other franchises include Metroid Prime 4, Fire Emblem Warriors, a new Kirby title and much-awaited details on the upcoming… Read More
Twitter today is rolling out a new feature that will allow businesses to prompt their followers to take an action beyond a simple fav or retweet. The company is introducing the ability for businesses to add buttons inside their direct message conversations designed to encourage customers to do things like tweet about the company’s Twitter bot, visit their website, follow the… Read More
Figure 1 isn’t for the squeamish, but investors apparently love it. The company, a kind of social network where more than a million healthcare professionals can view rare conditions, learn about novel treatments and even teach cases, has just raised $10 million in Series B funding.
Kensington Capital Partners led the round in Figure 1, which has also been called the Instagram for doctors. Read More
Israel has been a key flash-point for tensions in the Middle East between Jewish and Muslim people, and while politicians continue to work on (and fight over) the route to a peaceful future, some of the most interesting developments for cooperation and progress are happening not in political halls but in the tech world. We’re very excited to welcome and talk with some of key people in… Read More
The Nintendo Switch has invigorated the gaming community, so it goes without saying that the Nintendo Digital Showcase today is one of the more hotly anticipated events of E3 2017. Unlike some of the other press conferences at the event, Nintendo is holding a purely digital experience, which means we’ll be watching this stream at the exact same time as everyone else. We expect to see a… Read More
It’s now official. After Yahoo shareholder approval last week, Verizon today announced that it has finally closed its acquisition of Yahoo, which it plans to combine with its AOL assets into a subsidiary called Oath, covering some 50 media brands (including TechCrunch) and 1 billion people globally. It will be led by Tim Armstrong, who was the CEO of AOL before this. As expected,… Read More
Facebook may be the world’s most powerful app, but it’s still just an app on Apple’s operating system. Facebook’s grand vision for augmented reality was that it would make it easy for any developer to build and distribute an AR experience — as long as it lived inside Facebook’s app. But Apple has once again used its control of the mobile operating system… Read More
Astro is today rolling out a new bot that merges Slack and email. The bot will allow you to receive your most critical emails within Slack, write and respond to emails using Slack usernames, as well as share important emails – and their attachments – into Slack private messages or channels, among other things. The bot is an expansion on Astro’s previously launched email… Read More
Submittable, a startup used by more than 9,000 companies to manage submissions, has raised $5 million in Series A funding.
Missoula, Montana-based Submittable was founded in 2010 with an initial focus on literary magazines that wanted help keeping track of manuscript submissions. As co-founder and CEO Michael FitzGerald put it, “We started with the poorest customers you could possibly… Read More
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has bestowed its highest ever SUV safety rating to Tesla’s Model X. The Model X earned a 5-star rating in every category and sub-category that NHTSA tests, using the government body’s own independent testing process. This also puts the Model X second only to the Model S in terms of overall injury probability to passengers per… Read More
Atlassian today announced the launch of Atlassian Stack, a new subscription service that bundles virtually all of the company’s self-hosted developer tools into a single offering. Starting at $186,875 per year for 1,000 licenses, this new bundle is meant to make the procurement process for enterprises easier and cheaper (despite what looks like an eye watering price at first). Instead… Read More
Europe’s data protection chiefs have fired a warning shot across the bows of the executive body of the Union ahead of the first annual review of the EU-US Privacy Shield. Read More
Eero is launching a new version of its flagship Eero wireless base station. The second-gen Eero is the same size and shape of its predecessor, but the company has drastically upgraded the underlying hardware. It’s also launching Beacon, which is designed to plug directly into wall sockets in places like kitchens, hallways and stairwells, where it’s inconvenient to have a corded product Read More
Local Guides in Google Maps, Google’s gamified program for getting its users to update data in Google Maps and upload photos of local venues, is getting a bit of an overhaul today. Most importantly, Google is changing how it rewards points and how its leveling system works. Until today, Local Guides users we able to scale the ladder up to the fifth level. Once you hit 500 points,… Read More
In a very brief interview with Bloomberg, Apple CEO Tim Cook confirmed that the company has been working on an Apple car. This isn’t the first time Apple talked about the company’s ongoing work in the car industry. Cook described Apple’s car project as the combination of three different factors — self-driving cars, electric vehicles and ride-sharing. Those three… Read More
