Network Support Blog

Zoe Schiffer / The Verge: A look at the rise of employee dissent at Apple, including pushback against returning to the office, fighting for pay equity, and increasing leaks  —  On June 14th, 2021, Apple's remote work advocacy group sent an anonymous email to Tim Cook.  —  “We all agree that we are here at Apple … https://bit.ly/2YdJuVj

Mike Masnick / Techdirt: Facebook Files don't show that the company's execs are evil or incompetent, but highlight their hubris in believing they can still get things back under control  —  Over the last few weeks, the WSJ has run a series of posts generally called “The Facebook Files,” which have exposed a variety … https://bit.ly/3usEFTD

Samantha Cole / VICE: Source: ex-OnlyFans staff had access to highly sensitive user and model data, like bank statements, legal names, and KYC images, long after leaving the company  —  Addresses, full names, passports, bank statements and other sensitive personal data were viewable.  —  Samantha Cole https://bit.ly/3zYrqLM

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch: Sweden's Sinch acquires Pathwire, the cloud-based email provider behind Mailgun, for ~$1.9B in cash and stock, setting up Sinch as a competitor to Twilio  —  Sinch, the Swedish company that competes with Twilio and others in the world of messaging and other communication APIs is making another big M&A play to build out its platform. https://bit.ly/3zXcPAa

Harsh Upadhyay / Entrackr: B2B commerce and financing startup OfBusiness raises $200M Series F led by Tiger Global at a $3B valuation, after raising $160M at a $1.5B valuation in July  —  Business to business e-commerce platform OfBusiness has raised $200 million in its Series F round led by Tiger Global … https://bit.ly/3CY642W

The Verge: Facebook shares two of its internal research docs about Instagram's impact on teen mental health reported on by WSJ, with annotations for context  —  The company shared the PDFs Wednesday night  —  Facebook has shared the internal research about the impact of Instagram on teenage mental … https://bit.ly/3CWKADB

Cheyenne Ligon / CoinDesk: Ethereum developer Virgil Griffith pleads guilty to violating US sanctions law following a crypto and blockchain presentation at a 2019 North Korean conference  —  Griffith was charged with violating sanctions law by giving a cryptocurrency and blockchain presentation at a North Korean conference in 2019. https://bit.ly/3CWaAir

Dieter Bohn / The Verge: Google says it is improving Search using the MUM AI model, with features like “Things to know”, which gives users additional context about searched topics  —  At its Search On event today, Google introduced several new features that, taken together, are its strongest attempts yet … https://bit.ly/3CUzrTR

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch: EquityBee, which runs a marketplace with ~12K investors to help startup employees exercise their stock options, raises $55M Series B led by Group 11  —  Stock options can hold a lot of potential reward for employees when their company is doing well, but not every person will have the funds … https://bit.ly/2WnvgjG

South China Morning Post: Chinese regulators jointly detail a three-year plan to regulate algorithms and hold companies accountable for misusing them, following draft rules from August  —  A three-year plan jointly published by nine central government bodies asks local authorities to regulate the use of algorithms … https://bit.ly/3AX7YQL

Gene Park / Washington Post: Tim Sweeney and Epic execs discuss Epic's metaverse plans, contrasting it with Facebook's “manicured” feed, and emphasizing the role of creators  —  Epic CEO Tim Sweeney and other executives detail their plan for the metaverse and how it differs from Facebook's vision https://bit.ly/3kMWCcy

Dieter Bohn / The Verge: Amazon's head of hardware Dave Limp underscores how Amazon's new devices aid its push toward a future with “ambient intelligence”  —  For his last column in 2017, Walt Mossberg predicted that technology would fade into the background, and so-called “ambient computing” would become ubiquitous. https://bit.ly/3uiFBKi

Wall Street Journal: Internal docs: Facebook was “exploring playdates as a growth lever”, including engaging tweens as they hung out together  —  It has investigated how to engage young users in response to competition from Snapchat, TikTok; ‘Exploring playdates as a growth lever’ https://bit.ly/3zKgpgU

Richard Lawler / The Verge: Amazon's Blink announces $50 Blink Video Doorbell, with Alexa integration, 1080p video, more, and a $130 solar-powered camera bundle and $140 flood light cam  —  The $49.99 doorbell can operate wired or wire-free  —  Amazon has released a few new products from Blink since acquiring … https://bit.ly/2WqQAoE

James Vincent / The Verge: Image sharing service Imgur has been acquired by MediaLab, which owns Kik, Whisper, Genius, WorldStarHipHop, and other brands; Imgur says it has 300M users  —  The image-hosting service started life as an adjunct to Reddit  —  Popular image-sharing site Imgur has been acquired by MediaLab … https://bit.ly/3zP7fzy

Kellen Browning / New York Times: Activision Blizzard settles with the EEOC, which sued it earlier in the day over alleged sexual harassment and discrimination, will create $18M fund for victims  —  The video game publisher Activision Blizzard said Monday that it would pay $18 million in a settlement with a federal employment agency … https://bit.ly/3zNKwnu

Gillian Tan / Bloomberg: SoftBank Vision Fund's sole senior managing partner, Deep Nishar, says he will leave by the end of 2021 after six years at the fund  —  - Nishar is Vision Fund's sole senior managing partner  — Previously an executive at LinkedIn before joining SoftBank https://bit.ly/3ue4cA0

Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat: Astera Labs, a fabless semiconductor startup, raises $50M Series C led by Fidelity at a $950M valuation, bringing its total raised to $85M  —  The Transform Technology Summits start October 13th with Low-Code/No Code: Enabling Enterprise Agility.  Register now! https://bit.ly/3m1z96U

James Hercher / AdExchanger: Google says it will no longer use last-click attribution as the default conversion model in Google Ads, and will default to “data-driven attribution” instead  —  “Because of how we've been improving and training our data-driven attribution models, we've eliminated [that] previously existing requirement,” she said. https://bit.ly/2ZsLlFW

Wall Street Journal: Spotify begins a campaign to win more advertisers, rebranding its ad business as Spotify Advertising, focusing on SMBs, and expanding its podcast marketplace  —  The audiostreaming company wants to appeal to new advertisers and publishers in a new campaign titled “All Ears on You” https://bit.ly/3uh1R7o

Financial Times: A look at the frantic dealmaking behind Europe's instant grocery startups like Gorillas and Flink, as investors see a classic land grab for the top position  —  Gorillas and Flink try to take on Getir in a merry-go-round of funding and merger talks  —  It was a sweltering … https://bit.ly/3o6EWKZ

Zheping Huang / Bloomberg: Cryptocurrency exchanges Huobi and Binance have stopped letting traders use mainland China mobile numbers to register new accounts  —  - Binance, Huobi won't allow new sign-ups via China phones  — Steps come after missive from PBOC about crypto transactions https://bit.ly/3o9qvWt

Joe Rossignol / MacRumors: Apple says it will fix a bug preventing some iPhone 13 users from using the Unlock with Apple Watch feature, in an upcoming software update  —  Apple today said an issue preventing some iPhone 13 users from using the Unlock with Apple Watch feature will be fixed in an upcoming software update. https://bit.ly/3EWhUMI

Jordan Novet / CNBC: Source: Google Cloud Platform to slash its revenue share from 20% to 3% for third-party software on its cloud marketplace, matching Microsoft's cut  —  - Google is matching Microsoft's revenue share terms for purchases of third-party software through cloud marketplaces. https://bit.ly/3lYREsp

Gilad Edelman / Wired: The social media industry needs its own version of journalism's firewall to shield safety, moderation, and enforcement decisions from execs focused on growth  —  Government regulation will never fix everything wrong with online discourse.  The industry needs to develop professional norms—just as journalism once did. https://bit.ly/3m30gOK

Mary Ann Azevedo / TechCrunch: Meru Health, a provider of online mental health services, raises $30M Series B in equity and $8M in debt, and claims it saw about 700% revenue growth in 2020  —  The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly been devastating on many levels.  But if there's any silver lining in the global crisis … https://bit.ly/2ZzguHW

Ari Levy / CNBC: How Toast, founded in Boston with a $500K investment from Endeca's Steve Papa after VCs shunned it, became a $30B business, in part by avoiding the Bay Area  —  - Toast's first backer, Steve Papa, invested in the company because no venture capital firm would write the initial check. https://bit.ly/3AJtIj4

FinSMEs: Shenzen-based Pudu Robotics, which makes commercial service robots for use in airports, restaurants, supermarkets, and hospitals, raises $155M Series C  —  Pudu Robotics, a Shenzen, China-based commercial service robots company, completed an approx. $78m C2-series financing. https://bit.ly/2ZroE4V

Will Oremus / Washington Post: Facebook's history of comparing itself to older, widely accepted tools like chairs and cars shows how its leaders deploy analogies to downplay criticism  —  The social media giant keeps comparing itself to other, less controversial technologies.  Historians aren't buying it. https://bit.ly/2XQbOwd

Rafi Letzter / The Verge: A viral TikTok video from July caused many young women to use Prolific, a survey website for scientists, skewing the demographic data for thousands of studies  —  Thousands of scientific studies had to toss out weeks of data because of a 56-second TikTok video by a teenager. https://bit.ly/3zHjIW3

Bloomberg: Financial software maker Clearwater Analytics closed up 41% at $25.37 per share in its debut, giving it a market cap of $5.9B, after raising $540M in its IPO  —  - Software firm's backers include Welsh Carson, Permira, Warburg  — CEO says IPO was to raise Idaho firm's profile more than cash https://bit.ly/3u9mjaj

Tatiana Cirisano / Billboard: Roblox introduces music listening parties, starting with a new album from Poppy, the project of multimedia artist Moriah Pereira  —  Over the past year, Roblox has hosted immersive virtual concerts with artists like Lil Nas X and Twenty One Pilots.  Now, the gaming platform is inviting artists … https://bit.ly/2XW4M9P

Washington Post: How Facebook is using its metaverse push to rehabilitate its reputation with policymakers and reposition itself to shape regulation of future technologies  —  With a buzzy push for next-wave virtual reality hardware, the tech giant is trying to outrun its mounting woes. https://bit.ly/2XOpAzK

Jenny Leonard / Bloomberg: US Commerce Sec says US is considering using a Cold War-era national security law to force semiconductor companies to provide information on inventory and sales  —  - Biden administration seeks inventory, sales information  — Goal is to prevent stockpiling, ease supply chain bottlenecks https://bit.ly/3u8CRiJ

Jon Porter / The Verge: EU's proposal forces companies to make fast-charging standards interoperable and “unbundles” charger sales; if adopted, companies will have 24 months to comply  —  With the aim of reducing e-waste  —  The European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union … https://bit.ly/2XWvIGr

Davey Alba / New York Times: Interview with Maryana Iskander, Wikimedia Foundation's next CEO, on the org's transparency, handling misinformation on Wikipedia pages, and more  —  Two decades ago, Wikipedia arrived on the scene as a quirky online project that aimed to crowdsource and document all of human knowledge and history in real time. https://bit.ly/3i21uc6

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch: Twitter integrates Strike's wallet to let users receive tips in bitcoin, rolls out Tips globally on iOS, and will explore support for NFT authentication  —  Twitter's slate of new product announcements is not slowing down.  The company today introduced a number of new initiatives aimed … https://bit.ly/3kx0lL3

Lucas Matney / TechCrunch: Syng, founded by an ex-Apple designer to build “triphonic” audio hardware with spatial audio, raises $48.75M Series A led by Eclipse Ventures  —  Audio startup Syng has been building on quite a bit more hype than the average fresh hardware startup, largely because of the team behind it. https://bit.ly/3EKrfY3

Florence Ion / Gizmodo: Google announces a range of features for Android, Google TV, Assistant, and Gboard, including some that were previously Pixel exclusives  —  The company just pushed out over a dozen new Android features, including some we thought would be limited to Android 12.  —  Alerts https://bit.ly/2XD0IuB

Christine Hall / TechCrunch: Spotnana, which offers SaaS tools for the travel industry, emerges from stealth with $34M Series A and $7M seed funding  —  Spotnana emerged from stealth Thursday with $41 million in its pocket and an open global platform targeting the $1.4 trillion business travel industry. https://bit.ly/2XQZOuZ

Tom Warren / The Verge: Discord is testing Watch Together, a feature that lets members broadcast YouTube videos, after Google forced the shutdown of two popular music bots on Discord  —  Discord music returns, kind of  —  Discord is starting to test YouTube integration, just weeks after Google-owned YouTube forced two popular Discord music bots offline. https://bit.ly/3AzmEFH

Michael Crider / Android Police: YouTube is testing letting Premium subscribers download videos from its desktop site through October 19  —  Downloading content for playback later is most useful on mobile, where your connection quality is determined by your location.  But there are plenty of us whose home connection isn't so great either … https://bit.ly/2XHAuas

Scott Stein / CNET: Apple iPad mini (2021) review: A15, Pencil 2 support, better cameras, and USB-C, but no keyboard case support and the screen feels too small for some apps  —  What's the most improved product in Apple's lineup this year?  It might be the sixth-gen iPad Mini. https://bit.ly/3CvZAYO

James Rubin / CoinDesk: Blockdaemon, which offers blockchain staking infrastructure, raises $155M Series B led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 at a $1.26B valuation  —  Blockdaemon has raised $155 million in a Series B capital round at a valuation of $1.3 billion, the provider of blockchain staking infrastructure said Tuesday. https://bit.ly/3zzD3bI

Ranjan Roy / Margins: How Reddit's business model change, hiring of COO Jen Wong, and UX tweaks after raising $200M in 2017 laid the foundations for this year's meme stock mania  —  “You may be interested in....” … Reddit is probably the social platform that has brought me the most uncomplicated joy over the past decade (Note 1). https://bit.ly/3ksdp4f

Konrad Putzier / Wall Street Journal: Google says it will buy St. John's Terminal, a 1.3M square foot office building it is leasing on Manhattan's West Side, for $2.1B in Q1 2022  —  Manhattan deal is priciest sale of a U.S. office building since pandemic began  —  Google said it is buying a Manhattan office building for $2.1 billion … https://bit.ly/2XKW8uK

Lisa Richwine / Reuters: Netflix launches a free plan in Kenya with a quarter of the content from its paid plans, available only on Android phones  —  LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Netflix Inc on Monday began offering a free mobile plan with about one-quarter of its TV shows and movies in Kenya, a strategy aimed … https://bit.ly/3ECpKeo

Chance Miller / 9to5Mac: Kuo: an iPhone SE with 5G is coming in H1 2022; a cheaper 6.7" iPhone and two high-end models with a punch-hole display and 48MP wide camera are due in H2 2022  —  Following last week's release of the iPhone 13 lineup, reliable Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo is out with new expectations for what to expect from the iPhone 14. https://bit.ly/3EDBCwP

Soumyarendra Barik / Entrackr: Indian startup FloBiz, a mobile billing app for small and medium businesses, raises $31M Series B led by Sequoia Capital India  —  FloBiz, a mobile billing app for businessmen like distributors, wholesalers, traders and retailers, has scooped up $31 million in its Series B round led by Sequoia Capital India … https://bit.ly/3hOKLJc

Mikael Thalen / The Daily Dot: In a live Q&A, Epik's CEO Rob Monster was talked into taking down a site that doxxed journalists and admitted the controversial web host was breached last week  —  Rob Monster sparred with journalist and hackers and even asked Jesus to rebuke the demons in the room. https://bit.ly/39A4kAt

Tom Warren / The Verge: A possible retail listing of Surface Pro 8 with a 13" 120Hz display, narrow bezels, and two Thunderbolt ports leaks ahead of Microsoft's event on Wednesday  —  Microsoft is holding a Surface hardware event on Wednesday  —  Microsoft is preparing to launch a new Surface Pro 8 model next week … https://bit.ly/39mJtAd

Kia Kokalitcheva / Axios: LA-based Tradesy, an online marketplace for secondhand high-end fashion goods, raises $67M Series D led by Foris Ventures, the family office of John Doerr  —  Tradesy, an online marketplace for secondhand high-end fashion goods, raised $67 million in Series D funding led by Foris Ventures, John Doerr's family office. https://bit.ly/3lDftWA

Tom Krazit / Protocol: Interview with GitHub COO Erica Brescia on GitHub's infrastructure, changes in open-source software philosophies, and why hybrid work will thrive post-pandemic  —  An astonishing amount of the code that runs the world's software spends at least part of its life in GitHub. https://bit.ly/3tQjsCM

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Telegram blocks Navalny's Smart Voting chatbot on the second day of voting in Russia's parliamentary election  —  Popular messaging app Telegram has suspended all chat bots used in the Russian elections campaign, in another blow to jailed opposition politician Aleksei Navalny's Smart Voting initiative … https://bit.ly/39lenZM