Year: 2019

Turns out training a robotic arm to play Jenga is a surprisingly complex task. There are, so to speak, a lot of moving parts. Researchers at MIT are putting a modified ABB IRB 120 to work with the familiar tabletop game, utilizing a soft gripper, force-sensing wrist joint and external camera to design a bot that can remove a block without toppling the tower.

The robot was trained with 300 attempts, rather than the thousands it would traditionally take, learning to cluster different attempts into groups as a kind of short hand similar to how human teach themselves. With each attempt, the robot pushing against the block, testing for tactile feedback to determine whether it’s a safe bet.

“Unlike in more purely cognitive tasks or games such as chess or Go, playing the game of Jenga also requires mastery of physical skills such as probing, pushing, pulling, placing, and aligning pieces. It requires interactive perception and manipulation, where you have to go and touch the tower to learn how and when to move blocks,” says MIT assistant professor Alberto Rodriguez. “This is very difficult to simulate, so the robot has to learn in the real world, by interacting with the real Jenga tower. The key challenge is to learn from a relatively small number of experiments by exploiting common sense about objects and physics.”

The robot has gotten pretty good at making attempts, but the team is quick to note that it’s not quite ready to take on experienced players. Among other things, the robot isn’t able to determine strategic blocks that can sabotage the tower’s strength for upcoming turns. 

Rigetti Computing, one of the leading startups in the quantum computing space, today announced the public beta of its Quantum Cloud Services (QCS) platform. With this, developers can get access to Rigetti’s quantum processors, as well as all the classical computing resources necessary to build and test quantum algorithms on this hybrid platform.

Beta users will get $5,000 in credits toward running their programs on the platform. The platform itself consists of classical computing resources (you still need those as the quantum chips are essentially specialized co-processors) and Rigetti’s quantum chips, including two of its latest Aspen quantum processors. In order to run your algorithms on those chips, you’ll have to book time using the service’s online booking system.

The core of the user experience, though, is Rigetti’s Quantum Machine Image, which features all of the company’s tools for building quantum algorithms, including its Forest SDK and a simulator for testing code. That image then runs on a regular server in Rigetti’s cloud, but it’s tightly coupled with the company’s quantum computing resources.

Developers also get access to the first set of quantum applications written by various Rigetti Partners like Zapata Computing, a company that specialized in algorithms for quantum computing. Those applications range from a tool for compressing quantum data to QuantumFreeze to some basic machine learning applications. There’s also a game where you help a penguin navigate a frozen lake that’s pocketed with holes. You can either make classical moves or split the penguin into a superposition of states. Why not, I guess.

It looks like Facebook is not the only one abusing Apple’s system for distributing employee-only apps to sidestep the App Store and collect extensive data on users. Google has been running an app called Screenwise Meter, which bears a strong resemblance to the app distributed by Facebook Research that has now been barred by Apple, TechCrunch has learned.

In its app, Google invites users aged 18 and up (or 13 if part of a family group) to download the app by way of a special code and registration process using an Enterprise Certificate. That’s the same type of policy violation that led Apple to shut down Facebook’s similar Research VPN iOS app, which had the knock-on effect of also disabling usage of Facebook’s legitimate employee-only apps — which run on the same Facebook Enterprise Certificate — and making Facebook look very iffy in the process.

First launched in 2012, Screenwise lets users earn gift cards for sideloading an Enterprise Certificate-based VPN app that allows Google to monitor and analyze their traffic and data. Google has rebranded the program as part of the Cross Media Panel and Google Opinion Rewards programs that reward users for installing tracking systems on their mobile phone, PC web browser, router, and TV.

Originally, Screenwise was open to users as young as 13, just like Facebook’s Research app that’s now been shut down on iOS but remains on Android.

Now, according to the site’s Panelist Eligibility rules, Google requires the primary users of its Opinion Rewards to be 18 or older, but still allows secondary panelists as young as 13 in the same household to join the program and have their devices tracked, as demonstrated in this video here (which was created in August of last year, underscoring that the program is still active):

Unlike Facebook, Google is much more upfront about how its research data collection programs work, what’s collected, and that it’s directly involved. It also gives users the option of “guest mode” for when they don’t want traffic monitored, or someone younger than 13 is using the device.

Putting the not-insignificant issues of privacy aside — in short, many people lured by financial rewards may not fully take in what it means to have a company fully monitoring all your screen-based activity — and the implications of what extent tech businesses are willing to go to to amass more data about users to get an edge on competitors, Google Screenwise Meter for iOS appears to violate Apple’s policy.

This states, in essence, that the Enterprise Certificate program for distributing apps without the App Store or Apple’s oversight is only for internal employee-only apps.

Google walks users through how to install the Enterprise Certificate and VPN on their phone. Developers seeking to do external testing on iOS are supposed to use the TestFlight system that sees apps reviewed and limits their distribution to 10,000 people.

We have reached out both to Apple and Google for a comment on why this app is either the same, or different to the app Facebook had been distributing.

If Apple considers this a violation of its Enterprise Certificate policy, it could shut down Screenwise’s ability to run on iOS. And if it truly wanted to punish Google like it did Facebook, it could invalidate the certifications for all of Google’s legitimate apps that run using the same certificate.

That could throw a wrench into Google’s product development and daily work flow that could be more damaging than just removing one way it gathers competitive intelligence.

We’ll update this post as we learn more.

Free TV and movie streaming service Tubi is preparing to double down on content acquisitions this year, the company announced this morning. The service today offers over 12,000 movies and TV series, totalling 40,000 hours of content. All of this can be streamed for free as the content is paid for not via customer subscriptions, but rather by advertising. Now the company is preparing to invest over $100 million to expand its library this year, after hitting profitability in Q4 2018, and tackle new markets.

Founded in 2014, Tubi has benefitted from the trend towards cord cutting, as well as the increasing number of younger consumers who never opt to pay for cable or satellite TV in the first place – sometimes called the “cord nevers.”

The company claims that its viewership increased by over 4.3 times from December 2017 to December 2018, which allowed it to hit the profitability milestone. In the fourth quarter alone, it saw more revenue than in all of 2017 combined, it also noted. And it grew revenues by 180 percent-plus in 2018.

On the advertising front, the company says it ran campaigns from over 1,000 advertisers in 2018, including those from the majority of the top CPG and automotive companies.

However, several aspects of Tubi’s business aren’t being disclosed alongside today’s news – only the highlights. What the company won’t say is how many monthly active users it has, how many hours they watch, or how many ad impressions take place across its platform. These sorts of metrics are critical to measuring success in ad-supported video.

Along with its plans to grow its library, Tubi is preparing to expand outside the U.S. and Canada, with the first market launching this quarter.

To help fund its growth and content acquisitions, Tubi closed on $25 million in debt financing from Silicon Valley Bank in December.

These plans come at a time when Tubi’s business model has been seeing increased competition.

For example, Roku entered ad-supported programming with its own The Roku Channel launch in fall 2017, and said earlier this month it now has 27 million user accounts. Of course, Roku doesn’t break that down by how many use its platform for other services, versus those who specifically launch Roku’s own free content – but that is its ad-supported channel’s potential reach.

In addition to Roku, Tubi competes against Walmart’s ad-supported video on Vudu; Amazon-owned IMDb’s new service Freedive; Viacom’s latest acquisition, Pluto TV; Sinclair’s local broadcaster-focused service Stirr; and soon, Plex. Comcast will also launch a free streaming service for its pay TV customers in 2020.

Tubi, like many of these services, believes in its potential as consumers tire of being nickeled and dimed for video subscriptions.

“In 2018 we at Tubi saw tremendous growth as consumers, fatigued by SVOD subscriptions and services, sought alternative entertainment choices,” said Farhad Massoudi, CEO of Tubi, in a statement. “We will continue to use profits to make bigger bets on content, enhance the viewing experience, and continue to press ahead into new grounds in what is our core advantage: technology and data,” he added.

In reality, however, Tubi competes for attention among a growing streaming market, which includes those paid subscription video offerings. Today’s consumers are building out customized bundles that make sense for them – a little Netflix and HBO perhaps, fleshed out with some free content through services like Tubi, for example.

Tubi’s advantage, of course, is that it doesn’t have to spend the billions on content and originals that subscription video services like Netflix do to win users. Instead, it relies on titles that have mainstream appeal, but may not be winning any awards – like older movies, kids shows, B-flicks, horror films, and reality TV.

At the end of the day, however, Tubi won’t necessarily gain from people tiring of subscription video, but from the growing influx of cord cutters who are searching for older or niche content not included in subscription libraries -or who just want to watch a free movie.

 

Braving 20-degree weather, protesters crowded the steps of New York City Hall this morning with signs highlighting a “crumbling MTA” and rising tuition. Several held pro-union placards, while a man in a bright yellow warehouse vest claimed, “Amazon doesn’t let me pee.”

This morning, New York’s City Council held a hearing examining Amazon’s proposed HQ2 in Long Island City. Titled “Does the Amazon Deal Deliver for New York City Residents?,” the hearing follows one held last month that focused on the closed-door proceedings that delivered Amazon’s bid to the industrial Queens neighborhood.

The second time around, the council promised to explore the tax incentives that made the deal possible, along with the potential impact such a move could have on the city, residents and infrastructure.

Last year, New York was revealed to be one of two cities that would house a second headquarters for the retail giant. The other, Crystal City, North Virginia, approved $750 million in subsidies after a brief debate earlier this week.

The company has been subject to a larger pushback in New York, where rent prices and infrastructure are already feeling the strain of the city’s 8.6 million residents. Both the company and city officials came under scrutiny for backdoor dealings ahead of the official announcement.

“In this case, the deal was done backwards,” Speaker Corey Johnson said in his opening remarks. “The City and State made a deal with HQ2 in Long Island City and agreed to give away at least $3 billion in public subsidy before they did their due diligence.”

Amazon Vice President of Public Policy Brian Huseman attended the hearing to represent the retail giant’s position. “We believe our new headquarters should provide job opportunities for all New Yorkers,” he hold the Council. “Amazon’s investment in Long Island City will create 25,000 jobs over 10 years with an average salary of more than $150,000.”

Huseman was also quick to cite plans this week to fund high school classes in the city and used the opportunity to announce partnerships with LaGuardia Community College (LAGCC), the City University of New York (CUNY) and the State University of New York (SUNY), which would create a cloud computing certificate program for students. Both serve the clear function of demonstrating Amazon’s commitment to the community while providing a potential pipeline for future employees.

The site chosen for the office space, council members were quick to point out, was previously designated for two public schools, 5,000 units of affordable housing, parks and commercial space. 

An upcoming hearing will feature statements from the community. For now, however, those who made it through the chamber doors were asked to sit quietly. The crowd largely heeded the warning, save for a few outbursts and the constant presence of bright orange handbills reading, “Caution: Amazon Lies,” along with a frowning face playing off the company’s familiar “A to Z” logo.

As Huseman delivered his opening remarks, twin black banners were unfurled from the balcony, claiming that “Amazon Delivers Lies” and “Supports Deportation.” Police escorted protesters out, before a third shouted complaints about Amazon’s union policies. He, too, was escorted out, as security issued a warning that any additional outbursts would force the balconies to be cleared.

Union policies were a recurring theme throughout. Council member Daniel Dromm declared that “New York is a Union town,” while Deputy Leader Jimmy Van Bremmer shamed the company for an anti-union stance. 

Johnson pressed Huseman, asking whether the company would agree to remain neutral with regards to workers unionizing. “No sir,” the executive answered. Pushed whether Amazon’s surveillance technology has been employed by agencies like ICE to deport immigrants, Huseman answered, “We cannot disclose who our customers are without their consent.”

Huseman added that inclusion played a role in the company’s ultimate decision to settle in Queens. The borough is, notably, the most diverse county in the U.S. “We asked cities and locations to identity the diversity of the talent pool,” he told the council. “We are very excited about the diversity of the talent pool.”

Amazon also conceded that tax incentives were one of several motivating factors in the decision. “Labor was the primary driver,” a representative said. “The cost of doing business was also a driver.”

No date has been announced for the third hearing. 

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here:

1. Apple bans Facebook’s Research app that paid users for data

In the wake of TechCrunch’s investigation, Apple blocked Facebook’s Research VPN app before the social network could voluntarily shut it down.

The Research app asked users for root network access to all data passing through their phone in exchange for $20 per month. Apple says that yesterday evening, it revoked the Enterprise Certificate that allows Facebook to distribute the Research app without going through the App Store.

2. Foxconn pulls back on its $10 billion factory commitment

In 2017, Foxconn announced the largest investment of a foreign company in the United States when it selected Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin for a new manufacturing facility. In an interview with Reuters, a special assistant to Foxconn’s CEO says that those plans are being scaled back.

3. It’s time to pay serious attention to TikTok

The short-form video app hailing from Beijing’s ByteDance just had its biggest month ever with the addition of 75 million new users in December — a 275 percent increase from the 20 million it added in December 2017, according a recent report from Sensor Tower.

4. Apple’s global active install base of iPhones surpassed 900 million this quarter

It’s not surprising that Apple has a massive active install base of iPhones across the globe, but we now finally have an exact number to put behind it.

5. Amex blocks Curve as the fintech startup vows to fight ‘anti-competitive’ decision

Just 36 hours after Curve, the London fintech that lets you consolidate all of your bank cards into a single Curve card, re-instated support for Amex, the feature has once again been unceremoniously blocked by American Express.

6. AT&T misses on revenue for Q4 2018

AT&T has added 134,000 postpaid phone subscribers over the quarter (analysts had expected more). Revenue is up 15.2 percent year over year, but that’s mostly due to AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner.

7. Sinemia drops ticket subscription prices, adds rollover feature

Beginning this week, one-ticket-a-month plans start at $4 per month — down two bucks from before. The price also includes a new rollover feature, letting subscribers carry over one unused ticket per month.

A day after Amazon detailed plans to fund computer science classes in New York area high schools, in an effort to expand its tech pipeline for its new HQ2 location in Queens, the company this morning announced a second educational initiative that sees it teaming up with New York City and state colleges. Amazon says it will work with LaGuardia Community College (LAGCC), the City University of New York (CUNY), and the State University of New York (SUNY) to create a cloud computing certificate program for students across New York. The goal will be to get students ready for entry-level tech roles – like those at Amazon or elsewhere.

The program, which begins this fall, will be offered to the tens of thousands of students across these universities, Amazon says. In addition, LAGCC will partner with at least one New York City high school to offer concurrent enrollment in the 15-credit certificate program.

While the new high school courses are being funded through the Amazon Future Engineer program, this certificate program for college students is being handled through Amazon’s AWS Educate program. The Educate program is today being used by over 1,500 institutions to train students in cloud computing by offering them hands-on experience in AWS technology. This skill can then be used to apply for jobs at Amazon and other companies.

The program includes curriculum development workshops and AWS trainings for faculty, while students receive free AWS Promotional Credits in order to perform their project assignments.

Another feature of the program is a job board that allows students to upload resumés, receive job alerts, connect with recruiters, and search for cloud computing jobs and internships at Amazon and other tech companies.

Amazon notes cloud computing is one of the highest-paying I.T. jobs, but its goal here is not altruistic, of course. It’s prepping the tech talent pipeline to ensure its new NYC “HQ2″ has room to grow. The company also adds that local demand for cloud computing talent will increase 17 percent by 2024, citing New York Department of Labor forecasts.

“As we continue to expand our presence in New York, we’re excited to work with the community to provide more opportunities for skills development,” said Ardine Williams, VP of Workforce Development at Amazon, in a statement about the program. “There is such rich talent in New York, and we want to ensure we’re reaching New Yorkers from diverse backgrounds, as we hire for 25,000 jobs across the region. We see this collaboration with LAGCC, CUNY, and SUNY as ensuring that more students have the opportunity to join companies like Amazon as we seek out more tech talent. This is the beginning of our workforce development efforts in New York – we’re looking forward to launching more initiatives to meet New Yorkers where they are, providing opportunities for new skill sets and even better paying jobs,” Williams said.

 

Well that didn’t last long.

In 2017, Foxconn announced the largest investment of a foreign company in the United States when it selected Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin for a new manufacturing facility. Buttressed by huge economic development grants from Wisconsin, an endorsement from President Trump, and Foxconn CEO Terry Gou’s vision of a maker America, the plant was designed to turn a small town and its environs into the futuristic “Wisconn Valley.”

Now, those dreams are coming apart faster than you can say “Made in America.”

In an interview with Reuters, a special assistant to Gou says that those plans are being remarkably scaled back. Originally designed to be an advanced LCD factory, the new Foxconn facility will instead be a much more modest (but still needed!) research center for engineers.

It’s a huge loss for Wisconsin, but the greater shock may be just how obvious all of this was. I wrote about the boondoggle just a few weeks ago, as had Bruce Murphy at The Verge a few weeks before that. Sruthi Pinnamaneni produced an excellent podcast on Reply All about how much the economic development of Mount Pleasant tore the small town asunder.

The story in short: the economics of the factory never made sense, and economics was always going to win over the hopes and dreams of politicians like Wisconsin governor Scott Walker, who championed the deal. Despite bells and whistles, televisions are a commodity product (unlike, say, airfoils), and thus the cost structure is much more compatible with efficient Asian supply chains than with American expensive labor.

Yet, that wasn’t the only part of the project that never made any sense. Foxconn was building in what was essentially the middle of nowhere, without the sort of dense ecosystem of suppliers and sub-suppliers required for making a major factory hum. (Plus, as a native of Minnesota, I can also attest that Wisconsin is a pile of garbage).

Those suppliers are everything for manufacturers. Just this past weekend, Jack Nicas at the New York Times observed that Apple’s advanced manufacturing facility in Austin, Texas struggled to find the right parts it needed to assemble its top-of-the-line computer, the Mac Pro:

But when Apple began making the $3,000 computer in Austin, Tex., it struggled to find enough screws, according to three people who worked on the project and spoke on the condition of anonymity because of confidentiality agreements.

In China, Apple relied on factories that can produce vast quantities of custom screws on short notice. In Texas, where they say everything is bigger, it turned out the screw suppliers were not.

There are of course huge manufacturing ecosystems in the United States — everything from cars in Detroit, to planes in Washington, to advanced medical devices in several major bio-hubs. But consumer electronics is one that has for the most part been lost to Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, and of course, China.

Geopolitically, Foxconn’s factory made a modicum of sense. With the increasing protectionism emanating from Western capitals, Foxconn could have used some geographical diversity in the event of a tariff fight. The company is Taiwanese, but manufacturers many of its products on the mainland.

And of course, a research center is still an enormous gain for a region of Wisconsin that could absolutely use high-income, professional jobs. Maybe the process of rolling out a next-generation manufacturing ecosystem will take more time than originally anticipated, but nothing is stopping further expansion in the future.

Yet, one can’t help but gaze at the remarkable naïveté of Wisconsin politicians who offered billions only to find that even massive subsidies aren’t enough. It’s a competitive world out there, and the United States has little experience in these fights.

India may put friction on foreign firms to protect domestic startups

One of the major battles for tech supremacy is over the future of the Indian IT market, which is rapidly bringing more than a billion people onto the internet and giving them robust software services. I’ve talked a bit about data sovereignty, which mandates that Indian data be stored in Indian data centers by Indian companies, pushing out foreign companies like Amazon, Google, and Alibaba.

Now, it looks like India is taking a page from the Asian tiger-school of development, and is going to increasingly favor domestic firms over foreign ones in key industries. Newley Purnell and Rajesh Roy report in the WSJ:

The secretary of India’s Telecommunications Department, Aruna Sundararajan, last week told a gathering of Indian startups in a closed-door meeting in the tech hub of Bangalore that the government will introduce a “national champion” policy “very soon” to encourage the rise of Indian companies, according to a person familiar with the matter. She said Indian policy makers had noted the success of China’s internet giants, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and Tencent Holdings Ltd. , the person said. She didn’t immediately respond to a request for more details on the program or its timing.

The idea of national champions is simple. Unlike the innovation world of Silicon Valley, there are obvious sectors in an economy that need to be fulfilled. Food and clothes have to be sold, deliveries made, all kinds of industrial goods need to be built. Rather than creating a competitive market that requires high levels of duplicate capital investment, the government can designate a few companies to take the lead in each market to ensure that they can invest for growth rather than in, say, marketing costs.

If done well, such policies can rapidly industrialize a country’s economic base. When done poorly, the lack of competition can create lethargy among entrepreneurs, who have already won their markets without even trying.

The linchpin is whether the government pushes companies to excel and sets aggressive growth targets. In Korea and China, the central governments actively monitored corporate growth during their catch-up years, and transferred businesses to new entrepreneurs if business leaders failed to perform. Can India push its companies as hard without market forces?

As the technology industry matures in the West, entrepreneurs will look for overseas as their future growth hubs. The challenge is whether they will be let in at all.

Video game geopolitics

Korea and Japan are two of the epicenters of the video game industry, and now one of its top companies is on the auction block, raising tough questions about media ownership.

Nexon founder Kim Jung Ju announced a few weeks ago that he was intending to sell all of his controlling $9 billion stake in the leading video game company. The company has since executed something of a multi-stage auction process to determine who should buy those shares. One leading candidate we’ve learned is Kakao, the leading internet portal and chatting app in Korea.

The other leading candidate is China-based Tencent, which owns exclusive distribution rights in China of some of Nexon’s most important titles.

Tencent has been increasingly under the sway of China’s government, which froze video game licensing last year as it worked to increase content regulation over the industry. Now the question is whether it will be politically palatable to sell a leading star of Korea’s video game industry to its economic rival.

From the Financial Times:

Mr Wi added that Nexon would be an attractive target for Tencent, which pays about Won1tn in annual royalties to the South Korean game developer. But selling the company to Tencent would be “politically burdensome” for Mr Kim, given unfavourable public opinion in South Korea towards such a sale, he cautioned.

“Political risks are high for the deal. Being criticised for selling the company to a foreign rival, especially a Chinese one, would be the last thing that Mr Kim wants,” said Mr Wi.

Such concerns around Chinese media ownership have become acute throughout the world, but we haven’t seen these concerns as much in the video game industry. Clearly, times have changed.

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What’s Next

• More work on societal resilience

This newsletter is written with the assistance of Arman Tabatabai from New York

Facebook could face fresh scrutiny in Europe following a TechCrunch report on its use of a VPN app to monitor people’s smartphone activity — including teenagers as young as 13.

The Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC) told us it’s asked Facebook to provide more information on what data is collected via the market research program, codenamed ‘Project Atlas’, so that it can determine whether there are grounds for further investigation.

“The Irish DPC only became aware of this story through this morning’s media reporting. Before we can make any assessment as to whether or not there are any data protection concerns, we will need to understand better to what extent, how and on what basis the personal data in question is being processed and used. We have asked Facebook to provide us with this information,” said the DPC’s head of communications, Graham Doyle.

Under European union law there are special requirements for processing minors’ personal data. And, as we reported earlier, Facebook’s research program is open to people around the world — although the company has yet to confirm whether it has any teenage participants in Europe. (We’ve asked and will update this report with any response.)

If it turns out that European teens have been participating in the research effort Facebook could face another barrage of complaints under the bloc’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) — and the prospect of substantial fines if any local agencies determine it failed to live up to consent and ‘privacy by design’ requirements baked into the bloc’s privacy regime. (Facebook’s international HQ is located in Ireland, which makes the Irish DPC the lead agency for any investigation of the project.)

Less aware of the risks

Setting out conditions applicable to consent for processing the personal data of children aged 13 or older, one section of text from the GDPR reads: “Children merit specific protection with regard to their personal data, as they may be less aware of the risks, consequences and safeguards concerned and their rights in relation to the processing of personal data.”

“Given that children merit specific protection, any information and communication, where processing is addressed to a child, should be in such a clear and plain language that the child can easily understand,” runs another.

The VPN app that Facebook has been using as a data-harvesting vehicle (since we reported on the story it’s closed down the iOS version of the app) requires participants give root access to their device — potentially affording the company a very high resolution view of their digital activity indeed.

According to an investigation we commissioned data continuously collected via the VPN app could include private messages in social media apps; chats from in instant messaging apps – including photos/videos sent to others; emails; web searches; web browsing activity; and ongoing location information.

Although Facebook has also not confirmed exactly what data types it pulls via the program.

Participants are offered payments of up to $20 (in e-gift tokens) to incentivize them to sign up to have their data harvested on an ongoing basis, with the program open to people aged 13-35.

Facebook says parental consent is required for minors aged 13-17. But it’s not clear how robust the company’s age verification process is — after BBC journalist Dave Lee reported being able to sign himself up to participate in Project Atlas, earlier today, as a “14-year-old boy… with two kids”.

“It required no proof of parental consent at all. I’ve just been sent a link to download the iOS app, ” he added via Twitter.

So while Facebook previously told us less than 5% of the (unknown number of) participants in the research program are teens it’s not clear whether it can make that sort of assertion — or indeed put any verifiable figure on children’s participation in the program — if its age verification process fails at the first hurdle.

We’ve reached out to Facebook with questions and to the app testing companies it’s been working with to administer the program — namely Applause/uTest and BetaBound — to ask how they verify the age of participants and how parental consents are collected. At the time of writing none had replied.

In an earlier statement, provided in response to our first report on Project Atlas, Facebook defended the initiative, saying:

Like many companies, we invite people to participate in research that helps us identify things we can be doing better. Since this research is aimed at helping Facebook understand how people use their mobile devices, we’ve provided extensive information about the type of data we collect and how they can participate. We don’t share this information with others and people can stop participating at any time.

Questions over verification

Returning to the GDPR, Article 8 — which concerns conditions application to children’s consent for processing personal data — states data controllers must make “reasonable efforts” to verify consent when processing children’s personal data:

The controller shall make reasonable efforts to verify in such cases that consent is given or authorised by the holder of parental responsibility over the child, taking into consideration available technology.

And in further guidance on conditions for processing children’s data, the UK’s data protection agency says “data protection by design and by default” must be the baseline.

“Transparency is also key,” it continues. “You can raise children’s (and their parents’) awareness of data protection risks, consequences, safeguards and rights by: Telling them what you are doing with their personal data; Being open about the risks and safeguards involved; and letting them know what to do if they are unhappy. This will also help them make informed decisions about what personal data they wish to share.”

Facebook has said parental consent forms were “signed” and also claims it provided “extensive information” about the data being collected. But plenty of questions remain over exactly how robustly it verified participants’ ages; how parental consents were obtained; as well as the quality and accessibility of the information provided to parents and teens.

One UK-based EU data protection expert we asked for a view, Pat Walshe, suggested the approach to consent described in the article would not pass muster under GDPR.

As well as offering up to $20 a month in incentivize teens to sign away their privacy, Facebook’s program also included a referral scheme — which meant users could increase their ‘earnings’ by recommending a friend — aping the ‘growth hacking’ tactics deployed by app developers everywhere hoping to spark a viral run for their latest release.

But a viral run on kids’ privacy wouldn’t be at all cool.  

In instances where minors signed up to be watched by Facebook the program appears to have rewarded them for pestering their peers to do the same.

Yet an age verification system that can’t distinguish an adult male from a 14-year-old boy seems unlikely to be able to correctly identify a child younger than 13 who’s — say — pretending to be an adult in order to get some sweet e-gift rewards…

Last fall the children’s commissioner for England published a report raising concerns about how extensively minors’ data is being collected and shared across the board, in both the private and public sectors, writing that: “Children and parents need to be much more aware of what they share and consider the consequences.”

The UK’s ICO is currently working on an Age Appropriate Design Code of Practice — which a spokeswoman told us is due out later this year, following responses to a call for evidence last summer.

It’s been just about a year since the relaunch of WeWork Labs, an accelerator-type program operating under the WeWork umbrella. Since then, it’s grown to 37 locations in 22 cities. And it’s truly international, operating in 12 countries, including Brazil, China, Germany and India.

These Labs offices are often — but not always — housed within a larger WeWork space, and, like an accelerator, they offer mentorship and programming. However, WeWork doesn’t take any equity; instead, it simply makes money by charging rent. (In New York, a desk costs between $450 and $550 a month, but the price varies by location.)

I spoke to Roee Adler, the program’s global head, about how Labs has evolved over the past year. Adler actually has a long history with startups — in fact, his company Soluto won the very first Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt. He’s held a number of positions at WeWork, including chief product officer, and he said that as his role was evolving, he found himself asking, “What is the next startup we can build inside WeWork?”

The answer: “We decided to reevaluate our level of commitment and investment with the earliest of stages for startups.”

WeWork actually had a startup program called WeWork Labs back in 2011, but it languished in the years since. Adler relaunched the program with its first New York space in January of last year, and he’s been opening locations at a furious pace since then.

Each Labs office is supervised by a Labs Manager, who Adler said is usually “a former entrepreneur whose life’s mission is to manage startups.” For example, before Mor Barak joined the program last year to launch Labs in Tel Aviv, she was the general manager of Israel’s oldest accelerator program, The Junction.

“I got to a point where I felt like I finally found what I loved to do, which is to work with startups and to support startups and understand how our connections and our network can help them move forward,” Barak said. “And then I wanted to take that and do that on a bigger scale, as part of a company that can reach new geographies and bring forward local entrepreneurs.”

As a Labs Manager, Barak said her main role is to “be that business connector for the startups,” which means meeting with the entrepreneurs on a weekly basis to understand their needs and challenges. At the same time, she emphasized that Labs is a global program: “As a Labs Manager in Tel Aviv, I can quite easily connect to my colleagues around the world find the people that I need to get to in order to help the startup.”

Adler made a similar point about sharing resources between the different locations.

“A lecture that is at our Najing Xi Lu Road space in Shanghai will get captured, summarized, translated and become available to all of the entrepreneurs around the world,” he said. “Does that mean every piece of information is relevant for everyone? No. But truthfully, who knows?”

To celebrate the one-year anniversary, WeWork Labs held a pitch competition at the company’s New York City headquarters last week, with $250,000 in funding distributed among the winners. The $150,000 grand prize went to Lilu, a startup making a compression bra that helps mothers pump milk. (It’s another Startup Battlefield alum.)

CEO and co-founder Adriana Vazquez told me that Lilu has been working out of the WeWork Labs in Dumbo since August. Vazquez has participated in other accelerator programs and worked out of other coworking spaces, and she said Labs is something else — it allows you to “get the community of an accelerator without the prescribed schedule,” and it offers a very different feeling from a coworking space.

“There is that understanding and respect that everyone’s really busy and has fires to put out,” she said. “We had a brief stay at another coworking space with creatives and small businesses, and there wasn’t that camaraderie, where you see someone that’s working on a weekend and you know you’re not here because they want to hang out on a Friday. It’s almost an unspoken understanding: Yeah, I know what you’re going through.”

As for what Adler has planned for Labs’ second year, he said he wants to do more work connecting startups with larger corporations: “WeWork has really become the only natural nexus in the world where you can have a three-month-old startup entrepreneur bumping shoulders with a senior vice president of Microsoft going to get coffee from the same machine and engaging in a conversation about the future.”

And of course, he plans to open more offices, with the goal of reaching 100 locations by the end of 2019.

“The three of us are sitting in Manhattan right now, one of the wealthiest cities in the world … but it’s not about here,” Adler said said. “It’s about the people who aren’t sitting in the big tech hubs or bubbles. That is exciting.”