Seattle’s election commission says Facebook broke a city law that requires it to disclose who paid for campaign ads. Reuters reports that the Seattle Ethics and Elections Commission’s executive director, Wayne Barnett, said Facebook must reveal advertising spending information for last year’s city elections or potentially face fines of up to $5,000 per ad purchase. Read More
February 5, 2018
Feedback for Salespeople Should Focus on Behaviors
Busy sales managers tend to deliver a curt message to their reps: “Get better and sell more.” This feedback may work for some salespeople, but not for most. Instead of asking your reps “What’s closing this month, and how can we make those deals happen faster?,” talk with them about the indicators that have historically […]
Badi bags $10M to build out its room rentals platform in Europe via @TechCrunch
Barcelona-based Badi launched a marketplace for urban room rentals in September 2015 with the goal of making it easier to find flatmates. The startup has now closed a $10M Series A investment, led by Spark Capital, with the aim of ramping up its presence across Europe. Read More
Express Writers January 2018 Report (Infographic): 1.8 Million Words Written, 3 Reasons We Hit Our Busiest Month, & Policy Reminder
When December of 2017 came to a close, I wrote my goals for the upcoming New Year down on my whiteboard. One in particular was a big, bold goal for Express Writers, which I’ve been running for six years now (seven if you count my first year as a freelancer). I’d never physically wrote this […]
Where do we go now? via @TechCrunch
The crypto crash is reverberating through the Internet while the “rest” of the economy – namely the stock market – enters free fall. Commentary on the very human and thus flawed stock market is still well within the realm of pundits and guys who press funny buttons on TV, whither crypto? First, the die hards are chiming in noting that they are retaining their… Read More
Get smart about smart glasses: here are 15 companies building futuristic AR eyewear via @TechCrunch
Today, Intel showed off a pretty awesome-looking pair of smart glasses that look better than pretty much anything we’ve seen to date. It’s unclear what the development future will be for the glasses as the company is reportedly exploring a partial sale of the division and it has already shut down work on its “merged reality” headset program. While there are a lot of… Read More
Weekend Hashtag Project: #WHPillusion Weekend Hashtag Project… via #Instagram Blog
Weekend Hashtag Project: #WHPillusion Weekend Hashtag Project is a series featuring designated themes and hashtags. For a chance to be featured, follow @instagram and look for a post every week announcing the latest project. The goal of #WHPillusion was to take photos and videos that create optical illusions. Each week, we feature some of our favorite submissions from the project, but be sure to check out the rest here.
Twitter’s director of AR/VR leaves the company via @TechCrunch
The head of Twitter’s AR/VR team announced today via a tweet that he is leaving the social media site after 18 months. Alessandro Sabatelli joined Twitter in June of 2016 after leaving a virtual reality startup he led which created music-focused VR experiences. Sabatelli had previously worked as a designer at Apple. We’ve reached out to Sabatelli for more details on what… Read More
Behind the scenes of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy launch day prep via @TechCrunch
SpaceX is launching its Falcon Heavy rocket tomorrow, and if it’s successful, it’ll be twice as powerful in terms of cargo capacity as its next closest active rival. That will help give SpaceX an edge in the growing private space race, and open up new opportunities in terms of potential clients, as well as set the stage for traveling to Mars. The launch itself is happening on… Read More
Africa Roundup: Partech Ventures launches $70M fund, TPG Growth acquires TRACE, Rensource raises $3.5M via @TechCrunch
Last month we characterized 2017 as the year Sub-Saharan Africa’s startup scene found its stride. 2018 looks to be the year of numerous VC investments. Read More
Upcoming Webinars – February
It’s February, time to munch your way through several pounds of chocolate, go ice skating, and… go back to school? You read that right marketers – this month’s webinars are kicking off a series: The B2B Marketer’s Study Hall, where we’ll take you through the basics of getting started with marketing automation, to finding more […]
This company will tell you which vitamins and supplements to take based on your DNA via @TechCrunch
Nutrigene believes your genes may hold the secret to what you might be missing in your diet. The company will send you tailor-made liquid vitamin supplements based on a lifestyle quiz and your DNA. You fill out an assessment on the startup’s website, choose a recommended package such as essentials, improve performance or optimize gut health and Nutrigene will send you liquid… Read More
SpaceX could launch another Falcon Heavy in a few months (if the first one doesn’t blow up the launch pad) via @TechCrunch
Tomorrow is a huge day for SpaceX: It’s the first-ever flight of the company’s massive, reusable rocket, Falcon Heavy. (It’s also the day, if all goes as planned, that Elon Musk’s Tesla Roadster will go to space.) But will it go as planned? This one is just a test flight, so no one — even Musk himself — is truly certain how it’ll go. Read More
Watch Ehang’s passenger drone take flight via @TechCrunch
Like many who attended CES 2016, we were taken with the Ehang 184. If nothing else, the passenger drone was a nice break from all of the smartphones and giant TVs. That said, the big quadcopter amounted to little more than a giant paper weight and some goofy composite videos. Earlier today, however, the company showed off some pretty impressive video of the drone carrying actual humans. In… Read More
Author Nick Montfort tells us how to define the future via @TechCrunch
Nick Montfort is a professor in MIT’s Comparative Media Studies/Writing and the author of a new book, “The Future.” His book explores “future makers” – people who create the future with their work. It’s a fascinating read and he’s a fascinating thinker in the space. Our conversation on Technotopia started with the Norman Bel Geddes, designer of… Read More
Why I decided to install Messenger Kids via @TechCrunch
I’ve been struggling with whether or not to download Facebook’s new app aimed at children, Messenger Kids, onto my daughter’s iPad. This weekend, I took the plunge. I sat with her as she typed her first message and sent a selfie. I watched as she discovered GIFs. I wasn’t sure I had done the right thing. No one wants to surrender their kids to online social networks,… Read More
Mixpanel analytics accidentally slurped up passwords via @TechCrunch
The passwords of some people using sites monitored by popular analytics provider Mixpanel were mistakenly pulled into its software. Until TechCrunch’s inquiry, Mixpanel had made no public announcement about the embarassing error beyond quietly emailing clients about the problem. Yet some need to update to a fixed Mixpanel SDK to prevent an ongoing privacy breach. It’s unclear… Read More
VISA and Mastercard make it harder to buy Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies via @TechCrunch
Sometime in the last week Bitcoin investors started noticing additional fees on their bank statements. It turns out that VISA and Mastercard both decided (how convenient!) to reclassify the way Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency purchases are processed on their networks. Incidents like this pose several challenges for the cryptocurrency industry short-term, but also show just how scared the… Read More
Strava appears to have disabled a key tracking feature over privacy concerns via @TechCrunch
This will come as no surprise to those who’ve been following the news of the past couple of weeks, but it appears that Strava’s disabled at least one top feature as it works to get to the bottom of recent privacy concerns over its mapping features. The app’s Segments feature looks to be at least temporarily offline, as first noted by The Verge by way of Reddit. We reached out… Read More
These are the arguments that define the Uber Waymo lawsuit via @TechCrunch
In a crowded courtroom in San Francisco, the trial that could determine the fate of Uber’s autonomous driving program is finally underway. For the past year, lawyers for Waymo (the self-driving car unit spun out from Alphabet in December 2016) and ride-hailing juggernaut Uber have been sparring in court over evidence and witnesses and proceedings. At the center of the lawsuit is an… Read More
Snapchat slips in features like fonts and do not disturb amidst redesign via @TechCrunch
Snap is waking up to the “Time Well Spent” movement Facebook is already addressing. Snapchat is offering a way to mute specific people without formally blocking them. Meanwhile, the sweeping redesign that’s slowly rolling out comes with ways to jazz up your Snaps with colorful text styles. Read More
Watch how SpaceX’s first Falcon Heavy launch should go via @TechCrunch
SpaceX is launching its Falcon Heavy rocket for the first time on Tuesday, and preparations are well underway. Now, we also know how the launch would go down in ideal circumstances, thanks to the new animation above detailing the mission’s planned progression. Elon Musk shared the short clip via Twitter, and it’s the first real look we’ve had yet at every step in the process… Read More
YouTube Will Start Labeling State-Funded News Content, but There’s a Big Problem
Last Friday, YouTube announced it would be work to further curb the spread of propaganda on its channel — this time, by adding a designated…
You Don’t Have to Be a Data Scientist to Fill This Must-Have Analytics Role
Artur Debat/Getty Images It’s no secret that organizations have been increasingly turning to advanced analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) to improve decision making across business processes—from research and design to supply chain and risk management. Along the way, there’s been plenty of literature and executive hand-wringing over hiring and deploying ever-scarce data scientists to make […]
Buglife wants to put the power to report mobile software bugs in user’s hands via @TechCrunch
Every day we encounter bugs in mobile apps. They may lock up or perform in a way we didn’t expect, but what if you could report the bug to developers as it happened with all of the contextual information they need to fix the problem? That’s what Buglife a member of the Winter 2018 Y Combinator class is trying to do. The founders, Dan DeCovnick and Dave Schukin, came up with an… Read More
Safe Catch Tuna is a startup on a mission to eradicate the risk of mercury poisoning from your fish via @TechCrunch
Bay Area startup Safe Catch Tuna has developed a patented technology to detect mercury levels in a variety of fish and pledges that its own brand of tuna products have the lowest levels of any brand. The company is one of those overnight successes more than a decade in the making. Co-founder Sean Wittenberg started the company in 2004 after his own mom was diagnosed with mercury poisoning. Read More
Amazon settles tax optimization dispute with French authorities via @TechCrunch
Amazon has signed an undisclosed deal with the French tax authorities, Amazon told the AFP. From 2006 to 2010, Amazon operated in France using its subsidiary in Luxembourg. This way, the company could pay less taxes. But French authorities think French sales should be taxed in France. That’s why they were asking for $252 million in unpaid taxes (€203 million). Both Amazon and the… Read More
Paige.AI nabs $25M, inks IP deal with Sloan Kettering to bring machine learning to cancer pathology via @TechCrunch
Artificial intelligence has become one of the key weapons in the fight against cancer and the many forms and mutations that it takes, and today a startup is coming out of stealth and announcing funding and a significant data deal as it seeks to build an AI system specifically to help understand one aspect of the treatment cycle: cancer pathology. New York-based Paige.AI — an acronym… Read More
Lightmatter aims to reinvent AI-specific chips with photonic computing and $11M in funding via @TechCrunch
It takes an immense amount of processing power to create and operate the “AI” features we all use so often, from playlist generation to voice recognition. Lightmatter is a startup that is looking to change the way all that computation is done — and not in a small way. The company makes photonic chips that essentially perform calculations at the speed of light, leaving… Read More
The Pixel 2’s Visual Core photo processor now works with Instagram, WhatsApp and Snapchat via @TechCrunch
Visual Core was a strange little surprise from Google when it revealed it back in October. The system company waited three weeks until after the Pixel 2’s announcement to talk up the system-on-a-chip that had been lying in wait inside the handset the whole time. Now, as promised, the technology is coming to third-party apps. Read More
Before You Set New Goals, Think About What You’re Going to Stop Doing
Tim Robberts/Getty Images Remember your new year’s resolutions? Are you still doing them? If the answer is “no,” most likely you fell into the trap that stops most individuals from accomplishing their resolutions: not consciously taking old activities out of their schedule to make room for the new. It’s the equivalent of trying to stuff more […]
Ban These 5 Words From Your Corporate Values Statement
CSA Images/Getty Images Practically every organization today has a set of core values that ideally function as the “operating instructions” of the company. The goal of articulating the essential and enduring principles of your organization is to inform, inspire, and instruct the day-to-day behaviors of everyone who works at your company. But this rarely happens, […]
When Taking a Lower Paying Gig Pays Off
There are certain pieces of advice that are sacred to the freelance writing community. One is: fiercely protect your rate. That is, you should always…
Intel wants smart glasses to be a thing via @TechCrunch
Over the years, we’ve seen folks try and fail at the smart glasses game. Google Glasses never had a chance, and even the Snap Spectacles heyday has come to an end. But that’s not stopping Intel from getting in on the fun. The glasses are called Vaunt, first seen by the Verge, and they are nearly indistinguishable from regular glasses. Instead of some cumbersome headset with a… Read More
Businesses with Apple and Cisco products may now pay less for cybersecurity insurance via @TechCrunch
Apple and Cisco announced this morning a new deal with insurer Allianz that will allow businesses with their technology products to receive better terms on their cyber insurance coverage, including lower deductibles – or even no deductibles, in some cases. Allianz said it made the decision to offer these better terms after evaluating the technical foundation of Apple and… Read More
Why There’s No Such Thing as a Corporate Entrepreneur
PhotoAlto/Jorge Goncalves/Getty Images Can we please agree that there is no such thing as a corporate entrepreneur? The term corporate entrepreneur devalues what real entrepreneurs do, and it creates a haze of hokum around people trying to innovate in large companies that sets them up to fail. There is an ocean of difference between people […]
The False Choice Between Automation and Jobs
making_ultimate/Getty Images We live in a world where productivity, a key pillar of long-term economic growth, has crumbled. In the United States, Europe, and other advanced economies, productivity growth has slowed so drastically in the past decade that economists debate whether we have entered a new era of stagnation—and this at a time when we […]
SpaceX will try a triple booster landing with Falcon Heavy launch via @TechCrunch
SpaceX’s historic first Falcon Heavy flight will be immediately followed by a historic first landing attempt, too: The commercial space company headed by Elon Musk confirmed over the weekend that the test launch will also include an attempt to recover the three booster cores used by the rocket to propel it to orbit (via Space.com). The two cores on either side of the rocket will return… Read More
Continental taps Nvidia for its full-scale autonomous vehicle platform via @TechCrunch
Continental is the latest top-tier automotive supplier to work with Nvidia, and the latest to announce its intent to build a full-scale, top-to-bottom autonomous driving system. Continental (which might be most familiar from its tire division, but which supplies a range of automotive parts and systems across the industry) will be using Nvidia’s DRIVE autonomous vehicle platform for… Read More
The creator of Snoo, the $1200 high tech bassinet just came out with a baby swaddle via @TechCrunch
“Five second” baby swaddle Sleepea (pronounced “sleepy”) is a sleep sack for your little one promising to be more efficient and effective than the other swaddles on the market. This is the second product to debut from Happiest Baby founder Dr. Harvey Karp, the creator of the Snoo, a $1200 robot bassinet that rocks and vibrates your baby to sleep. The swaddle is more of… Read More
Lyft expands tax-saving commuter benefits to all Lyft Line cities via @TechCrunch
Lyft is hoping to make its Lyft Line commuter route service even more appealing by expanding commuter benefits, which allows riders to use pre-tax dollars via a benefits card from a number of providers to pay for their ride. This can result in savings of up to 35 percent vs. paying for the service the usual way. Lyft Line currently operates in 18 cities across the U.S., and Lyft says that in… Read More
Get your first look at ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ in the new trailer via @TechCrunch
Alden Ehrenreich seems to basically channel Harrison Ford in a couple of scenes in this brand new short teaser trailer for Solo: A Star Wars Story, which is coming out May 25 in the U.S. He nails the grin, and the instant, ‘just a good dude’ grin that Ford brought to bear on Solo in the original trilogy. As for the rest of it, what we seem to have his a heist movie, although that… Read More
Lino is launching to be a crypto YouTube with $20 million from China’s most famous seed investor via @TechCrunch
YouTube on the blockchain is one of the holy grails of the crypto community. The new generation of video artists and their audience seem tailor-made for a blockchain-based distribution and restitution system — one that depends on micro-payments and digitally secured provenance. It’d also be a system that could get creators out from under the yoke of YouTube, Snap, and Facebook… Read More
Fair.com closes another round of funding, acquires rental car delivery service Skurt via @TechCrunch
Just a week after we reported that Fair.com was acquiring the leasing portfolio of Xchange Leasing from Uber, the flexible car-ownership startup is making two more moves. Today, the company confirmed that it has raised another round of funding led by next47, the VC firm backed by Siemens; and it has made another acquisition, of Los Angeles-based Skurt, a service that lets you rent a car, and… Read More
Zebra Fuel raises $2.5M to deliver fuel direct to your vehicle via @TechCrunch
Zebra Fuel, a London-based startup that wants to eliminate the inner city gas station by delivering fuel directly to your vehicle, has raised $2.5 million in seed funding. The round is led by Robin and Saul Klein’s LocalGlobe, with participation from Brent Hoberman’s Firstminute Capital, and Alex Chesterman, the Zoopla founder and one of the U.K.’s most active angel investors. Read More
Former Intel president launches new chip company with backing from Carlyle Group via @TechCrunch
Ampere, a new chip company run by former Intel president Renee James, came of stealth today with a brand-new highly efficient Arm-based server chip targeted at hyperscale data centers. The company’s first chip is a custom core Armv8-A 64-bit server operating at up to 3.3 GHz with 1TB of memory at a power envelope of 125 watts. Although James was not ready to share pricing, she promised… Read More
Here's How Featured Snippets Work, According to Google
Friends, I have a confession to make. There are moments when I obsess over Google’s algorithm in the same way that certain movie characters might obsess about their exes. I mean, we all do, right? After all, just look at how much my colleagues and I discussed it right here on the Marketing Blog. Here’s […]
Here's How Featured Snippets Work, According to Google
Friends, I have a confession to make.
The 10 Funniest Parody Twitter Accounts to Follow Right Now
The marketing spoof is one of the best and worst institutions in our industry. Done well, it can result in one hilarious comedy skit after another, like SNL’s recent parody of an ad for the smart home assistant, Amazon Echo. Even Apple’s advertising has been parodied so far and wide over the last decade, there […]
The 10 Funniest Parody Twitter Accounts to Follow Right Now
The marketing spoof is one of the best and worst institutions in our industry. Done well, it can result in one hilarious comedy skit after…
In “Brotopia,” sex parties are the least of Silicon Valley’s problems via @TechCrunch
Two years ago, Bloomberg TV journalist Emily Chang set out to write a book about gender discrimination in Silicon Valley. It wasn’t specifically prompted by that now-famous post of former Uber engineer Susan Fowler, wherein Fowler calmly recounted the many ways that Uber’s internal controls were either very messed up or nonexistent. But the national movement that Fowler… Read More
How to Be Efficient: 7 Science-Backed Ways to Build Speed as a Habit
My college roommate was the fastest writer I’ve ever met. If he had a 10 page paper due at 9 AM on a Thursday, he would start writing it at 6 AM … that day. And the craziest part of all was that he always got A’s. I couldn’t never grasp how he could do […]
How to Be Efficient: 7 Science-Backed Ways to Build Speed as a Habit
My college roommate was the fastest writer I’ve ever met. If he had a 10 page paper due at 9 AM on a Thursday, he…
Balderton Capital leads $25M Series A in ‘urban farming’ platform Infarm via @TechCrunch
Infarm, a startup that has developed vertical farming tech for grocery stores, restaurants and local distribution centres to bring fresh and artisan produce much closer to the consumer, has raised $25 million in Series A funding. Read More
Episode 2: Quieting Your Inner Critic
The Science of Happiness Learn research-tested strategies for a happier, more meaningful life, drawing on the science of compassion, gratitude, mindfulness, and awe. Hosted by GGSC Director Dacher Keltner. Co-produced by the GGSC and PRI. All Episodes
Episode 1: Three Good Things
The Science of Happiness Learn research-tested strategies for a happier, more meaningful life, drawing on the science of compassion, gratitude, mindfulness, and awe. Hosted by GGSC Director Dacher Keltner. Co-produced by the GGSC and PRI. All Episodes
Penta, the German digital-only bank account for startups and SMEs, raises €2.2M seed via @TechCrunch
Penta, the German ‘challenger’ bank that offers a digital bank account targeting SMEs, has raised €2.2 million in funding. The seed round is led by Inception Venture Capital, a new London-based VC firm with a heavy fintech focus, and will be used for further hiring, product development and to fuel growth. Read More
Leshi Internet says it must repay $890 million in debts by the end of 2018 via @TechCrunch
Leshi Internet, one of China’s largest video-streaming services, disclosed that it must pay back 5.62 billion RMB (about $890 million) by the end of this year. Leshi Internet’s (also known as Le.com) heavy debts stem from a financial crisis at its sister company LeEco, both of which were founded by Jia Yueting. Jia resigned as Leshi Internet’s chief executive officer last year. Read More