Author: azeeadmin

23andMe is beefing up its African, East Asian and Native American ancestry capabilities — something it has sorely lacked. Specifically, 23andMe has added to its database 12 new regions across Africa and East Asia. When I first tried 23andMe a few years ago, it told me I was 71 percent West African, which tells me next to nothing about which countries the bulk of my ancestry comes from. Well, that’s all changing — though, I already received the information from Ancestry — with 23andMe’s latest product update.

“Key to this update is really the availability of more data from around the world, specifically in Africa and Asia,” 23andMe Senior Product Manager Robin Smith told TechCrunch. “It’s possible through certain initiatives, like the African Genetics Project and Global Genetics Project.”

Before, 23andMe only provided three subgroups in the Sub-Saharan Africa region. Now, there are eight additional subgroups in the area, as well as four additional populations in East Asia.

Here are the 12 additional populations on 23andMe:

1. Southern East African
2. Congolese
3. Coastal West African
4. Ethiopian & Eritrean
5. Senegambian & Guinean
6. Nigerian
7. Somali
8. Sudanese
9. Chinese Dai
10. . Vietnamese
11.  Filipino
12. . Indonesian, Thai, Khmer & Myanma

23andMe first launched in 2007, but it’s taken a long time to collect the data needed to provide a more comprehensive genealogical view to certain populations. Roughly 75 percent of 23andMe’s customers are of European descent, 23andMe CEO Anne Wojcicki said at TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2017. So, 23andMe realized “at some point that we needed these initiatives to go out and get the data,” Smith said.

For early 23andMe adopters, they’re going to have to re-take the test because this update is only available for people on the most recent genotyping chip, Smith said. 23andMe is now on the fifth version of its chip, which he said is “reflective of a better idea of the diversity of the world.”

That means they’ll either have to buy a new kit or opt-in for a yet-to-be-available upgrade program, Smith said. Beyond this update, 23andMe plans to regularly release updates and continue adding new populations.

“We haven’t done an update like this in a long time,” Smith said. “It’s been on our roadmap for many years now.”

Last September, 23andMe raised $250 million at around a $1.75 billion valuation. As part of that capital raise, Wojcicki said, 23andMe planned to work to expand the diversity of the data and the research on that diversity.

In addition to ancestral information, 23andMe also offers health reports. Earlier in 2017, the Food and Drug Administration started allowing 23andMe to test for 10 different genetic risk tests, including ones for Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. In addition to testing risks for certain diseases, 23andMe also tells you fun facts like how your DNA influences your appearance, preferences and physical responses.

I’ll be retaking the 23andMe test soon and will let you all know what I find. In the meantime, a researcher over at 23andMe shared a before and after look at their results. Check it out below.

 

HTC continues to bet big on VR, today announcing the launch of pre-orders for the Vive Wireless Adapter. The adapter allows Vive and Vive Pro owners to cut the cord, so to speak, and allow users to tether wirelessly to their PC.

The Base Adapter works with both the Vive and Vive Pro, though the Vive Pro requires an extra $60 compatibility pack that includes a connection cable for the Vive Pro, foam padding, and an attachment device that works with the Vive Pro.

The Vive Wireless Adapter itself retails for $299.

According to the blog post, installation works like this:

Installation of the Vive Wireless Adapter occurs in minutes by installing a PCI-e card and attaching a sensor from the PC that broadcasts to and from the newly wireless Vive headset. The adapter has a broadcast range of 6 meters with a 150 degree field of view from the sensor and runs in the interference-free 60Ghz band using Intel’s WiGig specification, which, combined with DisplayLink’s XR codec, means low latency and high performance with hours of battery life.

The Adapter is powered by the HTC QC 3.0 PowerBank, which doubles as a portable charger for a smartphone, and is included in the price with the Adapter.

This isn’t the only wireless adapter for the HTC Vive . TPCast unveiled an adapter in 2016 for $220, as well as an enterprise version of the adapter that delivers 2k content to several HTC Vive units with sub-2ms latency.

Pre-orders for HTC’s own Adapter will begin on September 5 from retailers like Amazon, Best Buy, Microsoft, NewEgg, and Vive.com.

Early this year, the attorneys general of 22 states and the District of Columbia filed a suit attempting to block the Federal Communications Commission’s controversial revesal of Obama era net neutrality regulations.

The old team is back together, filing a brief that asks  the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to reverse the reversal. Together, the AGs represent states totaling 165 million people — more than half of the U.S. population. The list includes a number of populous states, including California, Illinois, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

New York Attorney General General Barbara Underwood is leading the charge. “A free and open internet is critical to New York – and to our democracy,” Underwood writes in the new filing. “As we detail in our brief filed today, the rollback of net neutrality will have a devastating impact on millions of New Yorkers and Americans across the country, putting them at risk of abusive practices while undermining state and local regulation of the broadband industry.”

The Attorneys General are hardly alone on this one. As Reuters notes, Mozilla, Vimeo and Etsy also joined forces today to file a legal challenge, while governors in six states have signed executive orders and three states have passed their own net neutrality laws.

From new wearables that detect breast cancer to creating the industrial supply chain for the meat replacement industry, the latest crop of Y Combinator companies showcased the breadth of entrepreneurial innovation that encapsulates the waning days of 2018. While the entire batch of 63 companies was impressive, a few in particular caught our eye.

So take a look below at our picks for some of the hits from this year’s summer cohort of companies.

Oxygen

Breaking freelancers from the month-to-month boom-and-bust payment cycles that bind them, Oxygen provides working capital loans to freelancers who can go months without getting a paycheck. The company is more than willing to work with a group of borrowers who collectively make $1.4 trillion in 1099 income annually and who are locked out of loans. Oxygen offers flat-fee access to credit and free mobile banking, all while using machine learning to determine credit worthiness. Freelance workers of the world unite, indeed!

Why we liked it: Opening a new market in the lending space is a multi-billion-dollar opportunity for the company that gets it right.

Higia

By monitoring thermal patterns inside a breast, the startup Higia hopes it can offer women a better, non-invasive method to detect breast cancer. The company’s wearable device, called EVA, can be placed under any sports bra, and offers a new way to fill the gaps that current screening techniques aren’t addressing — things like early breast cancer detection in women with high breast density. The company has already pre-sold 5,000 units in Mexico and will begin shipping them in the fall of 2018. Aiming for accurate and immediate risk assessments, Higia will release its device for $299, focusing on the U.S. market at first and moving forward with clinical trials at Stanford.

Read more about Higia here.

Why we liked it: A new diagnostic tool in the battle against breast cancer that clocks in at a reasonable price point for consumers could be a huge win for investors and the world.

C16 Biosciences

C16 Biosciences is aiming to greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions across the globe with their lab-grown palm oil, an alternative to a product that is found in a truly massive amount of goods. C16’s alternative is grown in bioreactors and is 20 percent less expensive to customers but “doesn’t destroy the planet,” the company says.

The startup has already begun early partnerships with a number of beauty and food distributors that together spend $1.2 billion on palm oil annually.

Why we liked it: While everything old is new again in this venture capital cycle, highly touted technologies that were part of the first round of “clean tech” innovation have a chance to hit their stride in the current market.

JITX

Designing circuit boards as a service won JITX a spot in this latest batch of Y Combinator companies. Currently, every circuit board is designed manually by skilled engineers, but using JITX’s machine learning software, circuit boards can be created automatically, which can save both time and money for hardware companies. JITX is already selling circuit board designs that were totally computer generated and HP is on board, alongside at least one other major company they can’t name yet. The team out of Berkeley is taking aim at a $9.2 billion market, charging 20 percent of what a human-crafted design would cost.

Why we liked it: This startup is generating a ton of buzz already among investors, and while its current round is slated to clock in at $800,000, we’re hearing that it’s already three times oversubscribed. The draw? Put simply, the company is pitching a better way to make one of the building blocks of all tech hardware.

HoneyLove

HoneyLove aims to disrupt the traditional shapewear market by making an affordable, high-quality product that actually works.

The $89 product uses supportive structures inside the seams of the garment, similar to the flexible boning used in old-school corsets, and encases those structures in a soft channel of protective fabric. This simple enhancement ensures that the garment doesn’t bunch up around the legs or waistband. The company has already sold $500,000 in product

Read more about HoneyLove here.

Why we liked it: The market is huge and we’re hearing that the company’s early numbers are really, really promising.

Camelot

Camelot is a mobile app for esports betting… and one of the first companies to blaze a trail in the sure-to-be-lucrative business operating at the intersection of video gaming and sports betting. The company gives fans access to live updates and stats and an interface to bet against friends. In the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision, there are billions of dollars to be made facilitating betting in any sport — including esports. Camelot is rolling the dice that it can hit the right number in this emerging market.

Why we liked it: Sports betting is already a billion-dollar business (at least). Expect esports to follow the same trajectory.

Inokyo

Inokyo wants to be the indie Amazon Go, with a cashierless autonomous retail store. Cameras track what you grab from shelves, and with a single QR scan of the app on your way in and out of the store, you’re charged for what you’ve picked up.

The first store is now open on Mountain View’s Castro Street, selling an array of kombuchas, snacks, protein powders and bath products.

Read more about Inokyo here.

Why we liked it: White-labeling the technology that Amazon and Alibaba have spent untold millions to perfect for a lower price and with rapid deployments for retailers is a persuasive pitch for any startup.

Hepatx

Hepatx is creating therapies for severely damaged livers. Chronic liver disease affects 3.9 million Americans and is the cause of death for more than 40,000. The founders of Hepatx are developing a regenerative solution enabling hepatocyte production for therapeutic purposes. That means regenerating liver cells to avoid the cost and morbidity of whole-organ transplant. More than 200,000 people in the U.S. need a liver transplant but only a few thousand get one. Hepatx aims to fix the liver by taking fat tissue, turning that into liver cells and introducing that into patients to regrow the liver.

Why we liked it: Regenerating or creating new liver tissue is a big swing at a problem that is literally life-or-death. With a solid founding team and positive early trials, Hepatx seems like it could be a home run.

Cambridge Glycoscience

Looking to bake the perfect treat with a sugar substitute that can mimic not just the sweetness, but the gooey caramelization and stickiness that typically only comes from real sugar? Well, YC company Cambridge Glycoscience has the sweetener for you. The company expects to produce its sugar substitutes at a cost that can make low- and no-sugar foods even more accessible for mainstream consumers. So toss that corn syrup and get ready for a new flavor revolution.

Their manufacturing process will let them produce their sugar substitute at scale and they have a patent portfolio to protect their innovation. Notably, they have signed letters of intent with five companies already, including Haribo.

Why we liked it: Roughly 74 percent of packaged foods and beverages in the U.S. are made with some form of sweetener, which would size that market at roughly $100 billion, according to an article in Fortune citing a study from The Lancet.  If Cambridge Glycoscience can make its replacement at scale, that’s a sweet opportunity.

Seattle Food Tech 

At this point the notion of tastier, better, plant-based meat substitutes is no longer a fantasy. Investors have poured millions into making it a reality. The pitch from Seattle Food Tech is making that tastier, better, cheaper plant-based meat substitute at scale. They are using novel and efficient food processing equipment and facilities that can enable large-scale, low-cost production that can transform the way institutional food service companies that supply the office and university cafeterias across the country deliver tasty foods to hungry breakfast, lunch, and dinner diners.

“We’re using aerospace engineering to make plant-based chicken nuggets,” says chief executive Christie Lagally, a former Boeing engineer and technical project manager.

Why we liked it: While the company’s pitch onstage emphasized those tasty nuggs, what makes Seattle Food Tech compelling is its potential to create an industrial supply chain for the meat replacement market.

The average US household with children spent nearly $170 per week on groceries in 2017, and the race is on among companies that want to be the recipient of that spending, with more traditional grocery providers going head to head with companies opting for a digital-first, e-commerce experience. In the latest development, a startup called Boxed — which focuses on bulk-sized groceries through an online-only storefront — said that it has raised $111 million in funding.

Boxed is not disclosing its valuation but a write up in the NYT notes it is now $600 million. Notably, the company was in talks earlier this year for a possible sale to Kroger for between $400 million and $500 million — a deal that the startup reportedly rejected. The company never commented on the negotiations, but notably its CFO parted ways with the startup not long after. That potentially gives you an idea of its pre-money valuation with this round.

Alpha Square Group, CDIB Capital, consumer technology investor Gabriel Naouri and existing investors also participated. Its long list of previous backers include American Express, Founders Fund, GGV, DST, Bessemer and FJ Labs.

Competing specifically against the likes of Costco — which alongside Amazon and Target had also reportedly tried to buy Boxed — in targeting families and other consumers who like to look for bargains by shopping for food and other groceries in bulk sizes, Boxed said that this latest round of funding is led by a strategic backer: Aeon, the largest retailer in Japan in terms of sales.

The deal will not mean that Boxed is soon adding Japan to its footprint — currently the company says it only sells to the contiguous United States — but the two companies said that they will start with a “knowledge share” in areas like logistics, robotics, AI-driven data usage, and to help consult Aeon on putting more digital processes into its business.

“Our industry is constantly evolving. Our latest fundraising efforts will allow us to capitalize on those changes. We’ll also continue to expand our national footprint by focusing on reaching our core consumer in various key markets, to increase national brand awareness of Boxed,” Chieh Huang, co-founder and CEO, said in a statement.

In times past, grocery businesses, and food production in general, was largely focused around small businesses, but the last 75 years has seen a big swing to economies of scale, both in terms of the companies making what is sold and those who are selling it. That means a tricky playing field for smaller startups that are building grocery shop businesses from scratch, who have not only to contend with established brick-and-mortar chains, but also those new entrants, like Amazon, that are putting huge amounts of investment into their own efforts, leveraging their existing e-commerce and logistics empires to develop their own sizeable stakes in the market.

This latest funding brings the total raised by Boxed to $243 million, which is a sizeable amount of funding across startups, but ironically on the more modest side when it comes to e-commerce, which is capital intensive both because of the nature of the business (in Boxed’s case, it is buying in goods), as well as for marketing and customer acquisition, before you consider the technology that needs to underpin it.

In the case of Boxed, it sounds like the funding is largely aimed at developing the last of these categories, with a bit of the second category mixed it. It says it plans to “ramp up automation of facilities with hardware developed by Boxed’s in-house robotics team.” The company claims it is “one of the very few commerce companies in the world that writes its own software, runs its own fulfillment centers and builds its own automation robotics in-house.”

“The autonomous vehicles our robotics team has created will help support our rapid growth, enabling us to meet customer demand through increased efficiency, and put us at the forefront of fulfillment center technology,” said Huang in a statement. It’s also looking to expand in Chicago, it said.

Talla is taking aim at the customer service industry with its latest release, an AI-infused knowledge base. Today, the company released version 2.0 of the Talla Intelligent Knowledge Base.

The company also announced that Paula Long, most recently CEO at Data Gravity, has joined the company as SVP of engineering.

This tool combines customer content with automation, chatbots and machine learning. It’s designed to help teams who work directly with customers get at the information they need faster and the machine learning element should allow it to improve over time.

You can deploy the product as a widget on your website to give customers direct access to the information, but Rob May, company founder and CEO says the most common use case involves helping sales, customer service and customer success teams get access to the most relevant and current information, whether that’s maintenance or pricing.

The information can get into the knowledge base in several ways. First of all you can enter elements like product pages and FAQs directly in the Talla product as with any knowledge base. Secondly if an employee asks a questions and there isn’t an adequate answer, it exposes the gaps in information.

“It really shows you the unknown unknowns in your business. What are the questions people are asking that you didn’t realize you don’t have content for or you don’t have answers for. And so that allows you to write new content and better content,” May explained.

Finally, the company can import information into the knowledge base from Salesforce, ServiceNow, Jira or wherever it happens to live, and that can be added to a new page or incorporated into existing page as appropriate.

Employees interact with the system by asking a bot questions and it supplies the answers if one exists. It works with Slack, Microsoft Teams or Talla Chat.

Customer service remains a major pain point for many companies. It is the direct link to customers when they are having issues. A single bad experience can taint a person’s view of a brand, and chances are when a customer is unhappy they let their friends know on social media, making an isolated incident much bigger. Having quicker access to more accurate information could help limit negative experiences.

Today’s announcement builds on an earlier version of the product that took aim at IT help desks. Talla found customers kept asking for a solution that provided similar functionality with customer-facing information and they have tuned it for that.

May launched Talla in 2015 after selling his former startup Backupify to Datto in 2014. The company, which is based near Boston, has raised $12.3 million.

You’re not the only one feeling run down by the news of the day. The folks at Google apparently believe we could all use a dose of good news, at times, too. The company today announced it’s testing a new Google Assistant feature called “Tell me something good” that will allow users to hear a summary of more uplifting news stories. The stories will focus on people who are “solving problems for our communities and our world,” says Google.

To activate the feature, Assistant users in the U.S. can say, “Hey Google, tell me something good” to kick off the daily briefing of happy stories.

Google offers some examples of what the “good news” may include, like a story about how Georgia State University stopped students from slipping through the cracks; or how backyard beekeepers in East Detroit are bringing back the dwindling bee population; or how Iceland curbed teen drinking.

The stories are selected and summarized by the nonpartisan nonprofit Solutions Journalism Network, an organization that helps train journalists to better cover how people are responding to problems and how those actions can have positive results.

The stories themselves, meanwhile, will be chosen from a wide range of media outlets.

The feature arrives at a time when many people are feeling overwhelmed by the news, much of which is negative and troubling.

Some psychologists believe this sort of exposure may have long-lasting effects on mental health, contributing to stress, anxiety, depression, and even PTSD, in some cases. The impact may be greater if the news outlets you’re exposed to emphasize the suffering and emotional components of the stories they present, according to psychologist Dr. Graham Davey, who spoke to The Huffington Post about the topic back in 2015.

In addition, a more recent survey from the American Psychological Association found that more than half of Americans now say that the news causes them stress, and many report feeling anxiety, fatigue or experiencing sleep loss as a result. And new data from Blue Cross Blue Shield states that more than 9 million people in the U.S. are now suffering from major depression – up 33% from 2013 through 2016.

Of course, many people continue to keep up because they feel it’s their responsibility to stay informed.

Unfortunately, what’s shifted between the era of the daily paper and the nightly TV news, is the way people consume news. Stories often include visual or shocking elements, and include videos, photos, and audio clips captured by bystanders. We’re also continually checking our phones throughout the day, as well, instead of reading or watching news at designated times.

Being addicted to social media isn’t helping either – continually scrolling through our feeds is something that’s already linked to feelings of social isolation, as well as prolonged feelings of hopelessness or sadness, studies have shown.

A dose of good news from Google Assistant won’t solve these problems, as not everyone is aware of the cause of their stress and anxiety, nor will they seek out solutions to make themselves feel better. Plus, listening to a few good stories here and there won’t cancel out the larger majority of “bad” news stories that we more regularly consume.

Google acknowledges this feature won’t be some sort of “magic bullet,” it says.

“But it’s an experiment worth trying because it’s good info about good work that may bring some good to your day,” the company says.

The Google Assistant feature works on any Assistant-enabled devices including mobile phones, smart displays or Google Home devices.

It happens every day of the week. People who’ve been successful in tech invest in who they believe could be the tech leaders of tomorrow.

Now a new fund called Neo is taking the idea to the nth degree. Started by serial entrepreneur, successful investor and half of Silicon Valley’s best-known and networked set of twins, Ali Partovi, Neo “identifies awesome young engineers, includes them in a community of tech veterans, and invests in companies they start or join.”

The conceit isn’t entirely new. Several years ago, Bloomberg Beta, the venture firm backed by the media and services giant Bloomberg, began a data-driven campaign to identify people who it suspected might eventually begin a company. The idea was to start a dialogue with those individuals, and continue it. The personal loans startup Upstart somewhat similarly began life as a way for investors to bet on individuals poised for success. (Investors on its platform would lend money to individuals in exchange for a percentage of their future pre-tax income.)

Still, Partovi thinks he may have a special talent for identifying talent, and Neo’s investors must think he does, too, as evidenced by the fact that Neo just closed its debut fund with $80 million. Though Partovi isn’t naming names, he says the outfit’s investors include “CEOs, CTOs and founders of Amazon, Airbnb, Affirm, Dropbox, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Quora and Stripe,” among others.

“I’m not going to say that I can predict the best founders five years before they start companies,” says Partovi, who is also an investor in the fund along with his brother, Hadi, though they are minority investors. “I’m skeptical of anyone’s ability to do this,” he adds. “But I do have some prior experience with this — both in terms of successes and failure.”

One of the hardest lessons for Partovi, he says, was not believing enough in Craig Silverstein, the first person employed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin at Google, after he studied for a PhD alongside them at Stanford. “Craig was easily the smartest kid in our class” as an undergraduate at Harvard, says Partvoti. “When he told me about Google, I had already sold my first startup and I could have easily invested in it. But I missed it.”

Partovi says he “also could have told you that Max Levchin, a contractor of one of my first startups, was a genius — an absolute prodigy.”

Partovi and his brother didn’t make the same mistake when they met a young Mark Zuckerberg. “I remember Hadi telling me, ‘Mark reminds me more of Bill Gates than anyone I’ve ever met.'” The comparison was based on first-hand interactions with Gates. Ali Partovi was on the founding team of the Internet ad company LinkExchange, acquired by Microsoft in 1998 for $265 million. Hadi Partovi was on the founding team of the speech recognition company TellMe Networks, also acquired by Microsoft, for $800 million in 2007. Indeed, despite having reservations about Facebook’s business, they wound up backing it.

Partovi says now that he wishes he could “go back in time and tell myself the importance of investing in people.” Since he can’t, he created Neo, which he prefers to characterize as a “community that includes a communal VC fund.” As he explains it, he and partner Nadia Singer, who was formerly the head of outreach for the Q&A platform Quora, “hope to create a new type of entity in a way that, when YC first started, was something different and still today is somewhat different. It doesn’t occupy the same role as other VCs.”

One of subtle ways the firm is differentiating itself is by talking with top computer science students at a dozen colleges about, well, themselves. Allan Jiang, who graduated from Stanford this year, is now the CEO of Motif, a platform that allows session-recording and screen-sharing in any web browser. It’s also notably backed by Neo. But Jiang says that Partovi — with whom he had long discussions over the last year or so — didn’t talk about funding him but rather advised him as an individual.

“He kind of naturally said, ‘I would like to help out with this company that you started on,'” says Jiang, but it wasn’t like a lot of other venture firms that courted him with discussions first about capital, he says, including Lightspeed Venture Partners and Pejman Mar. “For Neo, that was secondary. It finds ways to support you as a person before there are any discussions about money.”

Christina Wadsworth, another freshly minted Stanford graduate who recently began work at one of the FANG companies (but was asked by the company not to discuss her new role just yet), similarly tells us that Partovi has been helpful to her for more than a year, even while knowing she might never start her own thing. “I never said I was going to create a company any time soon,” says Wadsworth, “and he was still happy to have me as a part of the Neo community, which I can use to build relationships and that I’ll maintain throughout my career.”

That support “may or may not lead to startup,” she adds, “and if not, that’s totally fine, too.”

Indeed, what feels perhaps the freshest about what Neo is doing is that no one is under any obligation to do anything other than Partovi. He says Neo basically makes a promise to the students it zeroes in on to back them if ever, whenever, they start a company, no matter how dumb-seeming their idea. “I’m not going to let my business judgment preclude me from an incredible business opportunity.”

Of course, whether that approach works will take time to discover. Partovi says that Neo now counts roughly 30 “scholars” from across the U.S. and Canada, and that it has written 10 checks — some to people straight out of college, as with Jiang — and some to founders outside the Neo sphere of influence but who Partovi and Singer think are special in their own way — and who may eventually benefit from an introduction to someone in Neo’s world. Altogether, that includes about 180 individuals, including Neo’s many investors, who will also happily mentor those whom Neo gives the nod.

As for students whose successful careers at big companies might get derailed by the ever-lingering prospect of startup funding, Partovi insists that he actually advises most students to get a job.

“We have a whole cohort of students who are chomping at the bit to start companies. I don’t give the same advice to everyone, but more often than not, I tell them my own story of getting a job and working at two companies before taking the leap myself. I spend a lot of time trying to discourage them from starting a company because I think it’s the right advice but also to make sure that if they do it, their heart is really in it.”

Continues Partovi, “I tell them, it’s a potentially demoralizing, depressing process, with many ups and downs. If they’re discouraged by me, then they weren’t really ready.”

China’s internet population has now grown beyond 800 million, according to the latest data from the Chinese government.

A new report [in Chinese] issued by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) put the number of people in China with access to the internet at 802 million. The agency — which is a branch of the Ministry of Industry and Information and is responsible for controlling the .cn country code — estimates that 29.68 million people in China came online for the first time in the second half of 2018.

For some context, the U.S is estimated to have around 300 million internet users. The number of internet users in China is now more than the combined populations of Japan, Russia, Mexico and the U.S., as Bloomberg noted.

The new statistic takes internet adoption in the country to 57.7 percent, with 788 million people reportedly mobile internet users. That’s a staggering 98 percent and it underlines just how crucial mobile is in the country.

Other notable data points from the report include:

• 21 percent of China’s internet users are also online banking users
• 71 percent used online payments or e-commerce services
• 74.1 percent used short video applications, which include ByteDance’s Douyin app (known as TikTok outside of China)
• 30.6 percent used bike sharing apps
• 43.2 percent used taxi-booking apps
• 37.3 percent used the internet to reserve buses and trains

The growth of China’s internet also puts pressure on the government to maintain its policy of control over information that appears online.

It is common knowledge that Western services such as Twitter and Facebook are inaccessible in Mainland China, but the government has also cracked down on local services that include Toutiao, which is run by new media firm ByteDance, which is currently talking to investors to raise $2.5-$3.5 billion. ByteDance was ordered to shutter a parody app it operated in China while four news and content apps were suspended from the App Store and Google Play for offending authorities. ByteDance responded by doubling its content moderation team and developing stronger systems for checking content.

Apple has also been caught in the crosshairs. The company reported purged thousands of apps from the App Store in China recently. Last year it removed more than 50 VPN apps, which can be used to circumvent China’s internet censorship system, because they are deemed to be illegal in China.

Four months after arriving on desktop, Gmail’s potentially job/relationship/self-respect-saving self-destruction feature is finally available on Android. The new feature, which was spotted by Android Police, arrived as part of the version 8.2 update.

It works similarly to its desktop counterpart. When you send a message, a small progress bar pops up at the bottom of the screen, with the word “Undo” on the right side.

From there, you’ve got approximately seven seconds to reconsider your life choices through a cinematic-style montage of increasingly horrific butterfly effects that will unfold over the coming months and weeks until you’re left dead in by the side of the road in a pit of jagged glass and self-loathing.

All of that because of one stupid email. You’re better than that, friend.

Go with Plan B by clicking Undo, and it will bring you back to the body of said email as a draft. The future is bright and wide open. See, was that so hard? I’m not saying you shouldn’t send any emails, ever. That’s just silly. I’m just saying choose your words a bit more careful next time is all. I’m looking out for you here. 

The feature is live now, though it appears to only work with emails sent from Gmail addresses within the app.