Farmdrop, a farmer-friendly online grocery platform based in the U.K., has raised £7 million in Series A funding. Leading the round is Atomico, the London VC fund founded by Skype co-founder Niklas Zennström. Read More
The Gillmor Gang — Doc Searls, Keith Teare, Frank Radice, and Steve Gillmor. Recorded live Friday, April 21, 2017. Big Media meets the Big Algorithm as we reach subscription saturation. B=V/T: Self-service Bundling based on Value prioritized by Trust erases the distinction between short and long form. + G3: Denise Howell, Elisa Camahort Page, Kristie Wells, Maria Ogneva, and Tina… Read More
Manchester Watch Works aka MWW makes small batch watches that are sometimes homages to historic timepieces and are sometimes entirely new design. This model, the Iconik 3 – the third in the Iconik line – is based on the Blancpain TR-900, a military spec diver’s watch used by navies worldwide in the 1960s. These waterproof workhorses are sought after collectables and the Iconik… Read More
Twitter has evolved dramatically since its founding. What the founders fully envisioned we cannot know. Nonetheless, there is one thing we do know: Many business entities have millions of followers and communicate with these followers using Twitter. This is free advertising, no ifs, ands or buts. So, here’s a proposal to radically change the economics of Twitter. Read More
When Bill Gates recently suggested robots should pay income tax like any other employee, I didn’t immediately disagree. I applaud Gates’ bold thinking to help solve one of society’s biggest upcoming challenges: embracing automation in a way that “lifts all boats” instead of leaving large swaths of society behind. A robot tax would help offset the reduced… Read More
A company called “Hailo Technologies, LLC”, has sued both Uber and Lyft over alleged infringement of U.S. patent 5,973,619, which describes an “automated vehicle dispatch and payment honoring system.” The patent, filed by Alexis Paredes in 1997 and granted in 1999, describes a software system that allows a user to pick a means of transportation from a menu, enter in… Read More
The creator of the PowerEgg, an ovoid flying robot, has begun accepting orders for its newest creation, a submersible camera drone for home use. Dubbed the PowerRay, the waterproof device can find, attract and record fish. It operates at a depth of 30 meters, or about 98 feet, for up to four hours at a time. It is suitable for use in fresh-, salt-or chlorinated-water. The PowerRay garnered… Read More
Apple has developed a testing procedure for drivers who would act as failsafe controls during autonomous vehicle testing, documents discovered by Business Insider via a public records request show. The documents detail the testing procedure that Apple has created in order to comply with the California Department of Motor Vehicle’s rules regarding autonomous testing on state roads.… Read More
In preparation for a preliminary injunction hearing next month, Waymo today filed new claims in its lawsuit against Uber, alleging that its competitor withheld information about technology Uber is using in its development of self-driving cars. Waymo is in the midst of a contentious lawsuit against Uber, in which it claims Anthony Levandowski, a former Google employee, stole confidential… Read More
They’re back! HBO’s “Silicon Valley” is set to return to television, with the fourth season debuting this Sunday.
We had a chance to watch the first two episodes at the premiere and can confirm that they’re very funny (and filled with TechCrunch references). We also sat down for a video with the stars of the show, and got a few hints about what to expect this… Read More
Today’s Stories Q&A app Quora valued around $1.8 billion in $85 million fundraise Elon Musk’s Neuralink wants to turn cloud-based AI into an extension of our brains Duolingo launches paid subscriptions as it experiments with new ways to monetize its service Snap acquires the crucial geofilter patent from Mobli for a record $7.7M Credits Written and Hosted by: Anthony Ha… Read More
YouTube today claims to have fixed an issue with its service that was causing it to incorrectly filter content in “Restricted Mode” and hiding a large selection of LGBTQ+ videos as a result. The company had come under fire last month when it was discovered that users who turned on “Restricted Mode” were no longer able to see a number of innocuous videos referencing… Read More
Over the coming decade, ongoing corporate exploration of the incubator, accelerator and venture capital models will expand the use of these additional forms of external innovation. Read More
Several teams of researchers at USC have joined forces for a study aimed at detecting vital signs to help stem conflicts in couples before they occur. Couples were brought into the lab, equipped with wearable sensors, given smartphones for recording data and sent out on their way. The study largely took place outside of the lab, with participants filling out an hourly survey to offer insight… Read More
Theranos secretly bought lab equipment through a shell company, faked tests and inappropriately pumped up its financial outlook to investors, according to allegations in recently unsealed court documents, first reported by the Wall Street Journal. Partner Fund Management LP, a hedge fund management firm which invested $96 million in Theranos filed the claim in Delaware Chancery Court on… Read More
This week saw movement in two tech lawsuits, Facebook held its annual F8 developer conference and a juice press hardware company came under fire. These are the top stories of the week, and you can sign up for this post as the weekly newsletter here. 1. Everything you need to know about Facebook’s F8 developer conference Facebook held its annual developer conference, F8, announcing… Read More
Windows Central has gotten its hands on an internal document highlighting the hardware performance of Windows 10 Cloud, a rumored operating system spinoff expected to be unveiled at next month’s big education event in New York. Predictably, the slide puts the OS head to head with Google Chromebooks. The category is a no-brainer for Microsoft as the company struggles to gain a foothold in… Read More
Quora just became the unicorn of subjective human knowledge. After eight years carefully cultivating an intelligent question and answer community, it’s just raised an $85 million Series D round co-led by Collaborative Fund and Y Combinator’s Continuity Fund. Read More
That was effectively the only conversation missing from Facebook’s F8 conference — an event that even made time for a progress update on a moonshot project that might one day allow us to hear through our skin. Perhaps that’s the luxury of a company whose advertising revenue is up 57 percent year-over-year. But don’t misconstrue unseen for unimportant. Behind… Read More
I’ve been thinking a lot about retail these days and I’ve been connecting the dots between the seeming death of retailers like Ralph Lauren and the book industry. In short, we are feeling the seismic echoes of the 2008 crash right now on Main Street and things are both ugly and pretty at the same time. The book industry, like the music industry, nearly imploded when the world… Read More
