TechCrunch Industry News

Googleisn’t one to shy away from bold claims. “We have had no reported or confirmed account takeovers since implementing security keys at Google,” a spokesperson told TechCrunch. And it’s probably true. Think of a security key as like a two-factor authentication code that’ssent to your phone — but instead a USB stick in your pocket. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

SurveyMonkey, which helps businesses gather feedback through its survey platform, has submitted paperwork to the SEC for its upcoming NASDAQ public offering. The company plans to raise $100 million in the IPO, per the filing, though that’s likely a placeholder amount. The company, which will list under the symbol SVMK, has yet to price its shares. Most recently, SurveyMonkey brought in $250 million from Tiger Global, ICONIQ Capital and Social+Capital Partnership. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What do you do if you’re a European startup competing against the likes of Box and Dropbox, and are looking to make a splash in international markets like the U.S.? Well, if you’re the Dutch startup WeTransfer (which raised a cool $25 million about three years ago to take the U.S. market by storm), you get weird. Really, really, avant garde-level weird. WeTransfer, Funky Dutch Cousin Of Dropbox And Box, Gets $25M To Go Large In The U.S. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Back in March, Nest and Yale teamed up to release a smart door lock to complement Nest’s then brand-new video doorbell. It’s a solid piece of hardware, but it had a curious quirk for something made under Google’s watch: it didn’t work with Google Home or Google Assistant. That’ll change later this week. On August 29th, the lock will be getting an update that adds Google Assistant and Home support to bring a handful of voice-powered tricks into the mix. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

No, it’s not just you. Yes, Slack is having connectivity issues yet again. Though this time, they seem a bit less pronounced. I know we’re having some problems off and on, with different channels appearing offline. For the most part, however, communication is still up, so you probably won’t be able to convince your boss to take the rest of the day off. Sorry. We're investigating the cause of connectivity issues affecting all users. Thanks for your patience. https://t. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you’re not sure about watching a whole movie where your point-of-view is limited to computer and smartphone screens, you’re not alone — “Searching” filmmakers Aneesh Chaganty and Sev Ohanian told me they had very similar reservations. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

At least eleven people have been shot and four people were killed in a mass shooting attack at a livestream event debuting the new “Madden NFL 19” game at an arcade in Jacksonville, Fla., according to local news reports. The Jacksonville Sheriff’s office confirmed on Twitter that one suspect was dead at the scene and the police were still investigating. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome back toEquity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week we had a full house which was super great. TechCrunch’s Connie Loizos and Sarah Buhr held down the fort in San Francisco along with our guest, Susan Mac Cormac, a partner at Morrison Foerster where she works on some of the most interesting deals in the private capital space. I dialed in from the home office in Providence. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

AWS cuts in half the price of most of its Lightsail virtual private servers AWS Lightsail, which launched in 2016, is Amazon’s answer to the rise of Digital Ocean, OVH and other affordable virtual private server (VPS) players. Lightsail started as a pretty basic service, but over the course of the last two years, AWS added features like block storage, Windows support and additional regions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tim Kentley-Klay, the co-founder and CEO of secretive self-driving vehicle company Zoox, was fired suddenly Wednesday by the company’s board. Kentley-Klay’s departure was firstreported by The Information, which cited an unnamed source. Kentley-Klay later tweeted a statement confirming that he had been fired by the board. Kentley-Klay and Zoox could not be reached for comment. TechCrunch will update the story as it develops. Cheers to the most legendary crew, ever. pic.twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Mosaic Manufacturing Palette 2 – an upgrade the original Palette – is a self-contained system for full color 3D printing. It works by cutting and splicing multiple filament colors and then feeding them through as the object is printed. The system uses a unique and internal cutter called the Splice Core that measures and cuts filament as it prints, ensuring the incoming filament can change colors quickly and easily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Are you trying to stay off social media, but just can’t seem to stop yourself from posting? When random thoughts pop into your head, do you find yourself launching Twitter and typing before you remember you’re trying to quit? Well, now there’s a better way. Hello, Brizzly. Brizzly is a revolutionary new app designed just for social media quitters. With Brizzly, you can satisfy your over-sharing urges with its all-natural social media substitute. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Streaming TV services now reach 5% of U.S. Wi-Fi households, up 58% since last year The number of U.S. households watching streaming TV services – those that deliver cable TV-like programming over the internet – has grown a remarkable 58% over last year, according to new data from comScore. However, these services still account for a small portion of the overall market, as only 5 percent (4.9 million) of U.S. households with Wi-Fi streamed TV over one of these services in April 2018. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Joanna Glasner Contributor More posts by this contributor Boston-area startups are on pace to overtake NYC venture totals While tech waffles on going public, biotech IPOs boom Unicorn exits are taking flight. With the IPO window wide open, an apparent record number of venture-backed companies privately valued over $1 billion have launched public offerings this year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Twitter tried to downplay the impact deactivating its legacy APIs would have on its community and the third-party Twitter clients preferred by many power users by saying that “less than 1%” of Twitter developers were using these old APIs. Twitter is correct in its characterization of the size of this developer base, but it’s overlooking millions of third-party app users in the process. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the future everyone will be naked for fifteen minutes. It’s with this novel thought in mind that I connect with a model named Nazanin who will walk me through the new world of bi-directional teledildonic cam life. I was there to test a new device from Kiiroo called the Kiiroo Launch. This novel sex jar connects with a Flashlight – essentially a masturbator – and can send and receive signals from a remote dildo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome back toEquity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week was a corker. We had Alex Wilhelm in-studio with ourguest Minal Hasan, founder of K2 Global, and TechCrunch’s Danny Chriton jumped in from New York to help the crew dig through the biggest and best stuff from the last seven days. It’s been busy, to say the least. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tim Merel Contributor Tim Merel is managing director of Digi-Capital. More posts by this contributor China could beat America in AR/VR long-term Ubiquitous AR to dominate focused VR by 2022 AR/VR/XR are going to be big, but not everyone will win. Today’s market is a collection of related point solutions to specific problems, but not a fully functioning ecosystem. Not yet. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s hard to be a fan of Twitter right now. The company is sticking up for conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, when nearly all other platforms have given him the boot, it’s overrun with bots, and now it’s breaking users’ favorite third-party Twitter clients like Tweetbot and Twitterificby shutting off APIs these apps relied on. Worse still, is that Twitter isn’t taking full responsibility for its decisions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

U.S. accelerator Y Combinator is expandingto China after it announced the hiring of former Microsoft and Baidu executive Qi Lu who will develop a standalone startup program that runs on Chinese soil. Shanghai-born Lu spent 11 years with Yahoo and eight years with Microsoft before a short spell with Baidu, where he was COO and head of the firm’s AI research division. Now he becomes founding CEO of YC China while he’s also stepping into the role of Head of YC Research. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As summer comes to a close and the leaves begin to brown, the gaming world goes through its own sort of transition. A handful of new titles prep for launch, including Call of Duty: Black Ops 4. But unlike previous CoD titles, Black Ops 4 represents a counter-attack on the world’s biggest game, Fortnite Battle Royale. For the first time, Call of Duty is ditching a campaign and opting to introduce a new Battle Royale mode to the first-person shooter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

At a Samsung event last week, Tyler “Ninja” Blevins explained why he doesn’t stream with female gamers. “If I have one conversation with one female streamer where we’re playing with one another, and even if there’s a hint of flirting, that is going to be taken and going to be put on every single video and be clickbait forever,” said Ninja, who is married, in an interview with Polygon. As you might expect, this stance was met with plenty of backlash. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Trulia, the online real estate site owned by its former rival Zillow, wants to give you a better idea of what a certain neighborhood feels like before you move there. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Let’s get the fish in the barrel out of the way. Voatz are a tech startup whose bright idea was to disrupt democracy by having people vote on their phone, and store the votes on, you guessed it, a blockchain. Does this sound like a bad idea? Welp. It turned out that they seemed awfully casual about basic principles of software security, such as not hard-coding your AWS credentials. It turned out that their blockchain was an eight-node Hyperledger install, i.e. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe launches tonight to “touch the sun” If you think it's hot on Earth right now... NASA’s ambitious mission to go closer to the Sun than ever before is set to launch in the small hours between Friday and Saturday — at 3:33 AM Eastern from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, to be precise. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The 1960s were a beautiful time for watches. Horlogy was in its prime and the great names we know and love today – Rolex, Omega, Cartier – were just one of many watchmakers churning out commodity products to a world that needed to tell the time. Their watches – simple, elegant, and mechanically complex – were the ultimate in mechanical efficiency and design and no one did it quite as well as Seiko. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome back toEquity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week Matthew Lynley and Alex Wilhelm were joined by 500 Startups CEOChristine Tsaifor what turned out to be a super packed episode. We kicked off with the latest from Slack: $400 million new dollars at a shiny, new $7 billion valuation,according to TechCrunch. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Last year I had a good time comparing Sony’s DPT-RP1 with the home-grown reMarkable. They both had their strengths and weaknesses, and one of the Sony’s was that the thing was just plain big. They’ve remedied that with a much smaller sibling, the DPT-CP1, and it’s just as useful as I expected. Which is to say: in a very specific way. Sony’s e-paper tablets are single-minded little gadgets: all they do is let you read and lightly mark up PDFs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Remember those rumors that Samsung would be working to keep costs of its new flagships at reasonable levels? Yeah, no such luck, bucko. The Samsung Galaxy Note 9 starts at $999.95. That will get you the base-level model, with an admittedly generous 128GB of storage and 6GB of RAM. The next SKU up will really make the eyeballs pop out of your head like a Tex Avery cartoon, however. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tesla CEO Elon Musk is thinking about taking the company private, he said in a Tweet this morning. More specifically, he said he may buy back the company for $82 billion (at a share price of $420 plus debt), and already has the funding to do so. Am considering taking Tesla private at $420. Funding secured. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 7, 2018 I’ve reached out to Tesla — given that this could just be Musk trolling all of us — and will update this story if I hear back. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

IDC’s latest tablet numbers tell a familiar story. Shipments are down yet again, a trend that shows no sign of abating. There is, however, one clear bright spot in all of this, bucking the trend. Quarter after quarter, convertibles have continued to grow, as users have demanded more productivity than is traditionally possible with slates. It’s no surprise, then, that Apple, Microsoft, Google and Samsung are all vying for mindshare. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Let’s be honest, if you use a receiver as the hub of your home entertainment system, you probably only use about a quarter of the buttons, dials and inputs on it, at most. Not everyone needs all the bells and whistles of a receiver-driven surround sound system. For those looking to get their sound with a considerably smaller footprint, 2.1 powered systems consisting of a pair of bookshelf speakers and a subwoofer are just the ticket, and Edifier‘s $300 S350DB is solid option. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Clear, the biometrics company you’ve probably seen at airports and at a few other prominent queues, is rolling out the capability to simultaneously verify your ID and pay for an alcoholic drink with your fingerprint. It’s only at Seattle’s CenturyLink and Safeco Fields (and only a handful of concessions stands at those) but if it’s successful you can bet we’ll be seeing more of it. That makes it the first time in the U.S. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

15 names that would have been better than Android Pie Let’s say, hypothetically, that you make a mobile operating system, and somewhere along the line, you decided whimsically to name major updates after alphabetical dessert foods. What a fun idea! Sure, some letters will prove harder than others. “K” and “O” are admittedly tough, but that’s nothing that little bit of clever cross-branding can’t fix. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For being the richest company ever with $243 billion in cash, Apple sure cuts corners in the stingiest ways. The hardware giant became the first trillion-dollar company week. Yet it’s tough to reconcile Apple earning $11 billion in profit per quarter with it still screwing us over on cords and keyboards. The “it just works” philosophy has slipped through the cracks of the money-printing machine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome back toEquity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week TechCrunch’s Matthew Lynley and Crunchbase News’s Alex Wilhelm were joined byJyoti Bansal, the founder of AppDynamics and a partner at Unusual Ventures, among other startupwork. Our own Connie Loizos was off this week. This episode was effectively a news grab-bag. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How should you feel to know your employer is far, far richer than Croesus? As Apple CEO Tim Cook tells it — in a memo to staff, obtained by BuzzFeed News, re: yesterday’s news that the computer company Steve Jobs founded back in 1976 is now worth more than $1,000,000,000,000 — you should feel A) pretty stoked that your labor has helped achieve a significant financial milestone but also B) know it’s not a success metric to get hung up about because it’s the passion for innovation and creation (not the towering mounds of gold) that really counts and so C) please,... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Virtual reality is an isolating experience. You power it up, strap the headset on and just sort of drift off into your own world. But maybe that doesn’t have to be the case. Maybe there’s a way to slip into a virtual world and still interact with your surroundings. Electronauts presents an interesting example. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Apple released the fifth beta of iOS 12 a few days ago. 9to5mac discovered strings in configuration files that reference dual SIM devices. You should expect at least one new iPhone model with two SIM trays. Apple is said to unveil three new iPhone models in September. In addition to an updated iPhone X, the company should announce a bigger second generation “iPhone X Plus”. Apple also plans to bring the notch to more devices with a replacement to the iPhone 8. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Well, Elon Musk sure had a good run at fixing the world’s pressing problems. Stuff like climate change — with those fancy electric sports cars, built in a fancy tent. Or those fancysolar roof tiles. (Fancy rockets aren’t really a ‘fix’ at this point but he’s thinking about the extraterrestrial future of humanity, okay. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You probably never think about the Google Clock app on your Android phone. And unless you are one of those happy early risers, it’s not exactly an app that brings you joy. But every day, it wakes you right on time, with either some annoying chirps or other sounds that, over time, will stress you out. But stress no more. Google today launched an update to the Clock app that now lets you choose any song or playlist from Spotify to wake you up. This works for any Android phone running Android 5. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Several dummy units of future iPhone models have leaked over the weekend. It gives a good idea of what you should expect to see in September when Apple introduces the next iPhone. Most likely, the iPhones on these photos aren’t actual iPhones. They are just dummy units. Every year, a few manufacturers create objects that look exactly like future iPhones. They are based on leaked design schematics and usually look just like the real thing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Back at Google I/O, Google announced two new features for Google Assistant: custom routines, and schedules. Both focusing on automating things you do regularly, but in different ways. The first lets you trigger multiple commands with a single custom phrase — like saying “Hey Google, I’m awake” to unsilence your phone, turn on the lights, and read the news. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tesla is no stranger to branded merch. Its got the standard company swag — the hats, the shirts, and the mugs. It’s got quirkier stuff, like miniature Teslas for kids and USB chargers shaped like the Superchargers that juice up their vehicles. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tickets to theTechCrunch Summer Party at August Capitalare on the verge of selling out. If you want to attend our 13th annual summer fete on July 27, there’s no time to waste. Reserve your ticket right now. This event draws an incredible mix of Silicon Valley’s startup community — a who’s who of founders, investors, tech makers, movers and shakers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In what could be the biggest one-day drop of all time, Facebook shares opened at $174.89, down 19.6 percent compared to yesterday’s closing price of $217.50 (NASDAQ:FB). When it comes to market capitalization, Facebook was worth $629.6 billion yesterday. The company is now worth $506.2. In other words, Facebook has lost $123.4 billion in value overnight. Today’s performance isn’t due to yet another data misuse or election interfering scandal. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This review took a lot of pork. Over the last few months, I’ve used the Traeger Timberline 850 several times a week. Cooking on this grill is easier than using an oven. With a little bit of planning, a person can simultaneously grill a flock of chickens, a couple of pork butts and a load of veggies and have them turn out perfectly. I did, and it was the best Mother’s Day ever. First the good. It’s simple: This grill can cook the perfect brisket every time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

SpaceX confirmed on Twitter this morning that it recovered the booster from the latest Falcon 9 launch. Shortly after launchingfrom Vandenberg Air Force Base in Southern California at 7:39AM ET this morning, the booster stage landed on theJust Read The Instructions drone ship. The company will now try to catch the rocket’s fairing with a giant net attached to the ship Mr. Stevens. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Xiaomi gave Google’s well-intentioned but somewhat-stalled Android One project a major boost last year when it unveiled its first device under the program, Mi A1. That’s now joined by not one but two sequel devices, after the Chinese phone maker unveiled the Mi A2 and Mi A2 Lite at an event in Spain today. Xiaomi in Spain? Yes, that’s right. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Pokémon GO just got a little surprise update, complete with a curious new feature: “Lucky” Pokémon. Most things in Pokémon GO are adapted from things that already exist in the Pokémon universe. Items like incense, lucky eggs and the like all exist in the main Pokémon series (though what these items actually do tends to be a bit different in GO). Lucky Pokémon, as far as I know, is a new concept altogether. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices