Specializing in Computer Repair, Networking, Internet Solutions, Web Designing, Hybrid App Designing and Windows Operating systems.
BuzzFeed News:
Distracted Boyfriend, Blinking White Guy, Pepe the Frog, and more: a rundown of 100 influential memes from the 2010s — 100. Yodeling Walmart Kid — 99. Moth Memes 98. VSCO Girls — Every generation has its subcultures, and in 2019, Gen Z's was undoubtedly VSCO girls.
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Paul Sawers / VentureBeat:
Airbnb rival WhyHotel, which operates temporary hotels out of unrented luxury apartment buildings, raises $20M Series B, bringing total raised to $35M — Airbnb has emerged as the single greatest disruptor of the $500 billion hotel industry over the past decade.
Michael Hytha / Bloomberg:
China-based autonomous air taxi company EHang closed at $12.49 in its first day of trading on Thursday, down one cent from its US IPO price after raising $40M — EHang Holdings Ltd., one of several companies seeking to commercialize autonomous taxi aircraft, closed its first day of trading …
Michelai Graham / Technical.ly DC:
Arcadia, an app that can help US consumers lower their electricity bills by connecting their accounts to clean energy options, raises $30M Series C led by G2VP — D.C.-based Arcadia has closed a $30 million Series C funding round. — The renewable energy tech company …
Business Wire:
Imply, a real-time analytics company, raises $30M in funding led by Andreessen Horowitz's Late Stage Venture Fund, bringing its total funding to $45.3M — Andreessen Horowitz-backed firm plans to aggressively expand as demand for Apache Druid (incubating) - based solution grows
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Carsome, a Malaysia-based marketplace for trading used cars, raises $50M Series C from MUFG Innovation Partners and others to grow in Southeast Asian markets — Carsome, a Malaysia-based marketplace for trading used cars, has closed a new $50 million financing round to fend off its rivals …
Jonathan Vanian / Fortune:
Q&A with Cisco CEO about company's new business line - selling standalone networking chips, in bid to win big datacenter clients like Facebook and Microsoft — Cisco is best known for selling routers and switches, but now the networking giant is expanding into the highly-competitive business of selling computer chips.
Amy X. Wang / Rolling Stone:
Music streaming subscription prices have remained flat for a decade, amid competition from tech giants like Apple that can operate their music arms at a loss — The price of music streaming has stayed flat for a decade, but not because tech companies are generous
Alex Wellerstein / Restricted Data:
Creator of NUKEMAP, which lets users visualize effects of nuclear explosions, explains why it isn't using Google Maps anymore, citing API stagnation and pricing — When I created the NUKEMAP in 2012, the Google Maps API was amazing.1 It was the best thing in town for creating Javascript mapping mash-ups …
Recently released documents revealed the FBI has for years secretly demanded vast amounts of Americans’ consumer and financial information from the largest U.S. credit agencies.
The FBI regularly uses these legal powers — known as national security letters — to compel credit giants to turn over non-content information, such as records of purchases and locations, that the agency deems necessary in national security investigations. But these letters have no judicial oversight and are typically filed with a gag order, preventing the recipient from disclosing the demand to anyone else — including the target of the letter.
Only a few tech companies, including Facebook, Google, and Microsoft, have disclosed that they have ever received one or more national security letters. Since the law changed in 2015 in the wake of the Edward Snowden disclosures that revealed the scope of the U.S. government’s surveillance operations, recipients have been allowed to petition the FBI to be cut loose from the gag provisions and publish the letters with redactions.
Tech companies have used “transparency reports” to inform their users of government demands for their data. But other major data collectors, like credit agencies, have failed to publish their figures altogether.
Three lawmakers — Democratic senators Ron Wyden and Elizabeth Warren, and Republican senator Rand Paul — have sent letters to Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion, expressing their “alarm” as to why the credit giants have failed to disclose the number of government demands for consumer data they receive.
“Because your company holds so much potentially sensitive data on so many Americans and collects this information without obtaining consent from these individuals, you have a responsibility to be transparent about how you handle that data,” the letters said. “Unfortunately, your company has not provided information to policymakers or the public about the type or the number of disclosures that you have made to the FBI.”
Spokespeople for Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion did not respond to a request for comment outside business hours.
It’s not known how many national security letters were issued to the credit agencies since the legal powers were signed into law in 2001. The New York Times said the national security letters to credit agencies were a “small but telling fraction” of the overall half-million FBI-issued demands made to date.
Other banks and financial institutions, as well as universities, cell service and internet providers, were targets of national security letters, the documents revealed.
The senators have given the agencies until December 27 to disclose the number of demands each has received.
Simone Stolzoff / The Atlantic:
A graduate of Slack's Next Chapter initiative, which helps former prison inmates land tech jobs, recounts how he managed to land a full-time job at the company — Jesse Aguirre's workday at Slack starts with a standard engineering meeting—programmers call them “standups”—where he and his co-workers plan the day's agenda.
Apple may dominate the wearable conversation here in the States, but things look a fair bit different on the other side of the world. In Asia, Xiaomi is the giant in the room. According to new numbers form Canalys, the Chinese manufacturer was the key driver in global growth.
Wearable band shipments grew 65%, year over year for Q3. Xiaomi continues to top the list, with an even more impressive 74% versus this time last year. That puts gives the company 27% of the total global wearable band market — its highest number since 2015.
Low prices have been the key to the company’s success, which have helped grow shipments in China by 60% overall. The company’s strategy has also rubbed off on competitors like Samsung and Fitbit (soon to be counted among Google’s numbers), which have sought to offer low cost devices in order to appeal to those users, particularly in Asia.
Huawei saw substantial growth for the quarter, as well, at 243% year over year, courtesy of strong sales in its native China. Those numbers helped the company hold onto third place globally, just ahead of Fitbit.
Even Apple is offering up lower cost devices by keeping older model Apple Watches around, hitting the $200 price point The company’s new, premium devices continue to dominate, however. The Series 5 comprise upwards of 60% of the company’s global shipments for the quarter.
Welcome back to Startups Weekly, a weekend newsletter that dives into the week’s noteworthy startups and venture capital news. Before I jump into today’s topic, let’s catch up a bit. Last week, I wrote about U.S. VC activity in Europe. Before that, I noted Chinese investor activity in Africa.
Remember, you can send me tips, suggestions and feedback to kate.clark@techcrunch.com or on Twitter @KateClarkTweets. If you’re new, you can subscribe to Startups Weekly here.
Hello from Berlin, where we’ve just wrapped our annual conference, TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin. Top investors shared insight into European venture capital, well-known individuals and firms made announcements (large and small), and entrepreneurs pontificated about the future of startups in their respective regions.
As I spoke with various early-stage startup founders presenting at the event, chatted with U.S. and European venture capitalists and brain-stormed with my colleagues, I reflected on my last 12 months inside the tech bubble. Soon, I’ll be publishing an extended look at what I see as the 10 biggest themes in startups and VC in 2019. But for now, here’s a sneak peek at my top picks.
If you like this newsletter, you will definitely enjoy Equity, which brings the content of this newsletter to life — in podcast form! Join myself and Equity co-host Alex Wilhelm every Friday for a quick breakdown of the week’s biggest news in venture capital and startups.
This week, I sat down with Chris Mayo, head of primary markets at the London Stock Exchange, to discuss the rise of direct listings.
Equity drops every Friday at 6:00 am PT, so subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts.
Financial Times:
Fintech startups in Asia are proving to be formidable competitors to traditional banks, offering a slew of financial services, but many are bleeding cash — Rice Basket Queen is the name of a stall run by Ruri Ruhyaty in a bustling suburb of Jakarta. A year ago it was typical of thousands of others.
Will Knight / Wired:
China's AI unicorns like Megvii, which thrived on government contracts for facial recognition, are now facing challenges amid US sanctions and cheaper tech — Companies such as Megvii thrived on government contracts for facial recognition, but they face challenges from US sanctions to cheaper tech.
There is so much content on streaming services, it’s difficult to decide what to watch next. Stop struggling and let these apps recommend your next binge-watch.
This isn’t about whether you should choose Netflix or Disney+ or Amazon Prime. No matter which streaming service you use, you are spoilt for choice. And you can’t even rely on IMDb or Rotten Tomatoes as much anymore because it seems like everything gets a good rating these days.
How much do you trust the internet? If you believe in statistics guiding your choices, then let Goodviews take the wheel. The website relies on what the internet is talking about to create charts for current TV series.
The app tracks TV shows being talked about on Twitter and Reddit, web searches, as well as most torrented shows. By aggregating statistics from all of these different sources, Goodviews creates something akin to the Billboard charts for streaming TV series. There is an overall list, as well as sub-categories.
You can sort the list by network or streaming service, as well as genre. You can even see shows ranked by a specific source, such as the most talked-about shows on Twitter right now. Each show gives you its ranking history, recent news about it, and all the other information you might need to find in a click.
If you’re looking for a movie marathon or a TV show that will take up the whole weekend, you don’t need to do those calculations. BingeClock takes care of the heavy lifting so you can focus on the screen.
Create an account and start adding movies or TV shows to it. BingeClock will count their entire runtime to tell you how long you will be watching that marathon for. You can create multiple “playlists” for your marathons, and add to them as you see fit.
BingeClock is especially good with TV shows, telling you the entire time it will take to watch a series. There are quick links for season-wise binge watches, a way to plan your marathon, and calculations for what happens if you cut commercials and titles. For ongoing series, it also includes information about when the next episode will air.
The app also has its own lists and rankings, included with any show you search for. That’s a great place to get a few recommendations you might have otherwise not known about.
TV Line is all about TV news, reviews, recaps, and ratings. That makes it a great place to find information about new shows, and save time by reading a review about a series or episode before watching it. But it shines in the current annual recap.
The “Best & Worst of 2019” section is excellent for anyone who wants to catch up on what has happened in the last year and ensure you didn’t miss out on an awesome show or moment. TV Line has turned it into articles about best episodes, best moments, scenes, plot twists, and so on.
Who wants to wait till the Emmys or Golden Globes to find a similar list? Right now, you can find what’s unmissable from 2019.
Reelgood has always been one of our favorite sites to find which TV show to watch next. But it has leveled up its game with the Reelgood Roulette. This randomly picks a TV series to watch, while still giving you a few ways to narrow down your options.
Sign up for an account and you’ll be able to add the streaming services that you have access to. Then spin the roulette wheel to get a random series selection on one of those services. You can add a few filters like minimum rating on IMDb or Rotten Tomatoes, as well as the genre.
Reelgood’s extensive database sets it apart from a lot of other such “random pick” services. In one click, you’ll find series info, cast and crew, episode breakdowns, ratings and descriptions, and a lot more. And you can keep spinning the wheel as much as want till you find what you like.
The upvote system is the internet’s favorite new way to rank any list. Add any item, and people will upvote it if they like it, but there aren’t any downvotes to reduce its rank. It works for Product Hunt and Hacker News, so why won’t it work for a TV series?
Serieslist.io tried it out and it’s a neat way to find a new show to watch. It’s only a list of names of TV shows, and which streaming service it’s available on. You can sort the list by upvotes, newest, or comments. Simple and easy.
TV series aren’t the same as movies. You don’t have an intermission or a clearly demarcated time to stop watching and take a break. So all you can do is stop between episodes. But how long is an episode going to be? Episode Length will tell you.
A quick search on Episode Length will tell you the average runtime of an episode of any TV series. That should help you plan which series to watch, or when you can stop between an episode. It’s unscientific, but hey, for now, it’ll have to do.
Streaming services seem to spell the end of good old fashioned TV. But you’d be surprised to find that there are ways to still get that on your phones and computers. You just need to know where to look.
Check out these 15 sites to watch TV on your computer. Chances are, you’ll find a way to view your favorite shows without worry about which service it’s streaming on.
Read the full article: 6 Ways to Find Which TV Series to Binge Watch Next
