Facebook sees 30 million updates to profiles each day, but it can’t build every tool to keep your photos and videos interesting. So today it’s globally rolling out its Profile Expression Kit to all developers. This makes it easy to add media like Vine videos, Boomerang GIFs, Beauty+ enhanced selfies, MSQRD face filters, Lollicam stickers, and Flixel cinemagraphs (seen above) as… Read More
LinkedIn, the social network for the working world that now has some 450 million members and is in the process of being acquired by Microsoft for $26.2 billion, today took the wraps off its newest efforts to expand its site beyond job hunting and recruitment, its two business mainstays. The company has launched a new site called LinkedIn Learning, an ambitious e-learning portal tailored… Read More
More White House staffer emails have been leaked, Politico reports, this time from the compromised private Gmail account of an employee who seemed to handle travel and other day-to-day scheduling and logistics tasks. The dump, which was posted to DCLeaks, includes what looks like a digital scan of first lady Michelle Obama’s passport. The fresh leak follows the release of a number of… Read More
Death and taxes may be the only two certainties in life (according to Ben Franklin), but tax compliance software provider Avalara has raised $96 million with a pitch to make one a lot less painful. The company’s whopping new round of growth capital will be used to buy out some undisclosed existing shareholders and to provide $50 million in new money for growth and acquisitions.… Read More
As we hurtle noiselessly into a dystopian future, headphone makers have already started offering Lightning-only earbuds, something that should give early adopters some solace but might be a hard sell for folks with a shoebox full of tangled traditional earbuds. But the future is here and JBL Reflect Aware is the first active-noise canceling soldier in the paddle against the headphone jack.… Read More
If you reside in the States, it’s probably best not to get your hopes up when it comes to Sony handsets. Availability has been, at best, spotty. That’s one of the reasons the two new phones announced at IFA a few weeks back managed to make waves stateside – the company clearly appeared to be planning a US push. This morning, Sony offered up some key news on that front.… Read More
Taxi startup Flywheel is officially making its move into New York City, with the aim to better equip old-school taxis to take on Uber and Lyft. Flywheel recently received approval from the NYC Taxi and Limousine Commission to operate TaxiOS, its smartphone-based taxi meter that comes with electronic dispatch, payments, navigation and GPS-based metering. Competitors like Arro by Creative… Read More
Facebook’s chat app wants to help you and your friends decide where to go for dinner or what movie to see, then use machine learning to remind you to pay them back. Today Messenger users on iOS and Android in the US get two new features which could roll out to other countries if they test well. Facebook tells me “We look at this chat assist function with polls and payments as… Read More
A company called Flybrix is putting legos on the wing. The San Francisco startup today began selling build-a-drone kits for kids age 14 and up comprised of: LEGO bricks, boom arms and motors that don’t require soldering, and other off the shelf and Flybrix-designed parts. Once assembled, Flybrix drones are lightweight and meant to be flown indoors. They can be operated with a… Read More
Fresh from raising $750 million in new financing this week, Uber rival in Southeast Asia Grab is now making a move into the self-driving car space after it agreed to a partnership with NuTonomy, the MIT spin-out that is developing autonomous vehicles. Read More
Tesla has filed suit with the Western District Court of Michigan over its ability to sell its cars directly to consumers in the state, Electrek reports, as well as its ability to service vehicles owned by state residents. The lawsuit follows the rejection of an application for a dealership license earlier this month, and lines up with Tesla’s stated goal of pursuing the right to sell… Read More
A new report may have mutual fund investors beaming right now — and traditional venture investors sniggering.
According to new research from the data company Pitchbook, Fidelity Investments has assembled stakes in 24 “unicorn” startups. That’s more than any venture firm. Fidelity’s peer and rival, T. Rowe Price, isn’t doing too shabbily on the same front. Read More
The full version of Minecraft: Education Edition is finally arriving on November 1, following an extended testing and free trial period that began this summer. The version of Minecraft aimed at educators and schools came out of Microsoft’s acquisition of learning game MinecraftEdu earlier this year, which built upon Minecraft to give teachers tools to build lessons around STEM, art,… Read More
It’s worth noting right off the bat that this is all still in the very early stages. Apple scouts plenty of locations for its stores, and plenty never come to fruition. But the fact that Cupertino is potentially looking to plant its flag in South Korea is pretty telling – not only because it’s a big market in which the company has no proprietary retail presence, but also the… Read More
All we knew was that BART had received 66 complaints, with excessive use of force being the primary allegation, according to a 2010 audit. In 2015, when a homeless man was shot and killed on Skid Row in Los Angeles, there was no data available on how many homeless people are shot by the LAPD. When San Francisco police shot and killed Mario Woods, we couldn’t determine how many people… Read More
Watch out, Shutterfly. Amazon has quietly launched a new service called Amazon Prints, which allows consumers to print photos and custom photo books, and soon, other photo products like stationery and calendars, at prices that are significantly cheaper than rivals. Though the company made no formal announcement, Amazon Prints debuted last week and is being made available to customers who use… Read More
Europe continues to test the waters of shared vehicle ownership models, and the Amber One is a car designed to help eliminate the huge amount of time our own vehicles currently spend idle. The all-electric concept has a 250-mile range on a single charge, a top speed of over 93 mph, and a 0 to 60 time of a respectable 7 seconds. But you can’t buy one – to gain access, you… Read More
When was the last time you printed a photo? Well, Fotr is a new iPhone app that wants to turn that trend on its head, by automatically printing every photo you take. The idea is to bring back an aspect of analog photography: shoot fewer, but higher-quality photos. Read More
Signia Venture Partners has closed its second fund at $85 million to lead early-stage deals in emerging tech startups mostly in and around San Francisco. For the unfamiliar, Signia is typically the first money in and the lead investor in the companies it backs, writing $1-2 million in seed stage deals or $2-8 million in later stage rounds. The firm was started in 2012 by Rick Thompson, the… Read More
The Voyager Golden Record wasn’t made for you. It was made for aliens. But if buying stuff that wasn’t originally intended for you isn’t what Kickstarter is for, I honestly don’t know what is. Longtime Boing Boing editor David Pescovitz has teamed with Amoeba Records manager Timothy Daly and graphic designer Lawrence Azerrad (who apparently can list both The Beach Boys… Read More
