Write about technology for any amount of time, you’ll get run through the hype wringer. It’s impossible to avoid. After all, it’s the excitement of new technologies that drew so many of us to this field in the first place. And when DJI debuts a product like the Spark, the word “game changer” gets tossed around a lot, just like it did with last year’s… Read More
British Airways has a problem. Its new IT system has completely crashed five times inside a year, and today it added a sixth global crash to the roster. All flights from Heathrow and Gatwick have been cancelled until at least 6pm in London tonight, affecting all BA flights globally. The airline is asking passengers not to come to the airports. The system failure also took out the BA website… Read More
Sprig is shutting down, Sergey Brin is building a giant airship, Nielsen’s latest data show a ton of people still watch content on TV and bitcoin experiences an outage from all the bitcoin ups and downs. All this on Crunch Report. Read More
LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman announced today that he’s making a big bet on Change.org, the site for social justice petitions. Hoffman is leading a $30 million round, with other investors including big names like Bill Gates and Y Combinator president Sam Altman. “Change.org, the global hub for collective action, is a crucial democratizing force in this era of growing… Read More
Google has launched a new venture capital program focused on artificial intelligence, Axios is reporting. Google declined to comment on the report, which states that the initiative will be led by longtime Google VP of engineering Anna Patterson and involve a rotating cast of engineers instead of the venture investors who work for Alphabet Inc.’s corporate venture unit, GV. It… Read More
TechCrunch Disrupt NY was one of the best yet, and we had a lineup of fascinating speakers discussing everything from CRISPR to online media. Here are a few of the highlights. Read More
This week, DJI announced a brand new drone, Mark Zuckerberg delivered the Harvard commencement speech and Airbnb’s internal data science program was announced. These are the top stories of the week. This post is also a newsletter, so you can sign up to have it delivered to your inbox on Saturday mornings. Read More
Robots are great at doing things they’ve been shown how to do, but when presented with a novel problem, such as an unfamiliar shape that needs to be gripped, they tend to choke. AI is helping there in the form of systems like Dex-Net, which uses deep learning to let a robotic arm improvise an effective grip for objects it’s never seen before. Read More
KidPass, a monthly membership program that gives parents access to a variety of kid-friendly activities across their city, has raised $5.1 million in Series A funding, the startup reported this week. Currently live in New York, the new funds will allow the service to expand to new markets including L.A., San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., and Chicago. The round was… Read More
The on-demand food business is tough, especially if you’re trying to handle all elements of the experience, like sourcing the food, cooking the food and delivering it. It’s a lot. That said, Sprig, the startup that makes and delivers its own food, is shutting down today. Read More
The UK Prime Minister is using the annual G7 summit of seven of the world’s major industrialized democracies to push for more to be done about online extremism, including co-ordinating on ways to force social media platforms to be more pro-active about removing and reporting extremist content to authorities. Read More
“Can anyone tell me what this is?” the teacher asked. Outside the rust rains had come again and the building reacted by assembling a nano sphere shield. They would be inside until it stopped. None of the children were old enough for the skin adaptation. She might as well keep them busy.
She held up half of a glass object, the top edge crude and sharp.
“A cup?” asked… Read More
Google co-founder Sergey Brin is building a massive airship, we learned in April, and now The Guardian reports some additional details about the purpose and nature of the project. It’ll be used both as a private luxury air yacht for Brin and his retinue, as well as for humanitarian aid purposes. Also, it’ll be the largest aircraft in the world, at nearly 200 meters (656 feet) in… Read More
The startup insurance application processor Quilt has added a life insurance product to its portfolio and has begun pitching its digital enrollment in 37 states across the country.
In partnership with Generation Life (a 50-year-old insurance company that was recently acquired by Swiss Re), Quilt is looking to make the process of applying for life insurance easier so that the under-insured… Read More
Share economy startups which allow someone to ‘share’ their labour or skills have proliferated over the last few years. Even simple ‘share your skills’ communities with no commercial model have appeared such as Impossible. Now these companies are joined by Pickle, a peer-to-peer mobile app that enables users to do ‘jobs’ for one another. Founder Daneh… Read More
Engage Ventures is a new, Atlanta-based accelerator fund for early-stage deals. It isn’t managing a ton of money — it just closed on $15 million for its debut effort — but it does have some interesting financial backers. Read More
After a painful first-quarter miss, Snap, the parent company of the popular social app Snapchat, is looking to avoid the same fate in the second. According to Digiday, Snap is working to drive new and increased business ahead of the end of its second quarter. To do so, the company is said to be cutting deals. In the words of the report, Snap is “looking to goose its ad business with… Read More
You’d be forgiven if you can’t be bothered to drag yourself to the store to shop for shoes and clothes and things. The internet is there for you, after all. But if you don’t know what you want? Well, I guess there is an app for that. In this episode, Friedlander, a self-described shoe expert because he “has feet,” tries to be better at shopping than an app… Read More
It was a long road that took the two founders of Boxbot from drinks at Drake’s Dealership to winning the prestigious Pear Berkeley Challenge, but both Austin Oehlerking and Mark Godwin are very at home on the road. The still-in-stealth technology they developed was so impressive that it won the Pear competition, along with some seed investments. Read More
