Category: UNCATEGORIZED

It looks like choose-your-own-adventure Twitter games won’t be a one-hit wonder, now that Apple’s social team has adopted the format. A new tweet from the @AppleTV Twitter account today helps users find a movie to watch by having them click through a series of Twitter threads. However, their effort (so far at least) pales compared with the original viral sensation — a Twitter choose-your-own-adventure style game that blew up earlier this month, where Twitter users try to not get fired as Beyoncé’s new assistant.

If you haven’t seen this masterpiece of Twitter handiwork, give yourself a break this Friday and go try it. It’s great fun.

The game is played by presenting you with a multiple choice question. You then click on your answer from among the Twitter replies presented by the original poster.

For example, you start your day by ordering Queen Bey her breakfast. You’re asked to choose between ordering a five-star breakfast or granola and yogurt. If you choose the former (spoiler alert!), you’re fired. If you click the right answer, you move on to the next task.

Further questions take you to new threads where you choose things like who Beyoncé should FaceTime, what activity you suggest while she waits for hair and makeup, what song to play for her when she asks for music, when she should get dressed for the event and where, whether you should photobomb her on the red carpet to fix her dress, where she sits at an event, and so on.

The game isn’t always simple A/B choices, either. The answers lead you down different paths. Your choice may not immediately result in being fired, but still could later on. For instance, if you send Beyoncé swimming, there’s no way to save your job when the next set of choices comes.

According to a TIME profile, the idea for the thread came from 19-year-old student Landon Rivera, who lives in L.A.

The thread, now which now has over a quarter million Twitter likes, was noticed by celebs like Chrissy Teigen and Questlove, the report also noted

After the Beyoncé game blew up into a viral hit, the creator started new threads about being Cardi B’s bodyguard and getting away with murder. These haven’t yet taken off to the extent the original Beyoncé thread did, which today stands at over 250K Likes on the thread placeholder tweet, and 97,300 retweets.

While it’s interesting that Apple’s social media team has now copycatted the idea, their choose-your-own-adventure thread falls short.

Actually, really short.

In fact, it’s not much of an adventure at all.

Instead, the movie suggestion thread doesn’t go much further than letting your pick between two movie watching scenarios, then directs you into a genre of your choosing…then, it dead ends with a movie suggestion.

This misses the reasons the Beyoncé game went viral in the first place: because it was lengthy, complex, multi-branched, and funny. You could get down several threads deep into the thing and then get booted out and lose.

The questions themselves also prompted commentary from those who knew Beyoncé actual habits (or at least, thought they did.)

Social media teams looking to replicate this formula for their own success will need to do more than create a handful of quick-to-end threads with little payoff. Either invest the serious effort in designing a clever branching narrative or just tweet as usual.

Back in 2013, Apple announced that it would it would be assembling its high-end desktop in the U.S. After manufacturing had mostly moved out the country, the company made a point of touting its use of its Texas plant to help produce the Mac Pro.

When the long-awaited followup was announced earlier this month at WWDC, many wondered whether the company would return to Austin. Apple didn’t comment on its plans at the time, but a new report from The Wall Street Journal claims that the desktop will be produced by Quanta Computer Inc. in a plant outside of Shanghai.

Apple hasn’t denied the report, which comes courtesy of “people familiar with its plans.” Asked for comment, a spokesperson for the company highlights the other parts of the production process,

“Like all of our products, the new Mac Pro is designed and engineered in California and includes components from several countries including the United States,” the statement reads. “We’re proud to support manufacturing facilities in 30 US states and last year we spent $60 billion with over 9,000 suppliers across the US. Our investment and innovation supports 2 million American jobs. Final assembly is only one part of the manufacturing process.”

The report comes at a particularly sensitive time for U.S./China relations, as a trade war has been stoked, in particular, by Trump. Apple has long been aware of the potential impact of tariffs on components and international sales. Last year, CEO Tim Cook noted that he had met with the President, telling him that tariffs were “the wrong move.”

Influencer Marketing has ballooned into a $25 billion industry, yet many marketing managers are left confused by this, because for them, it’s really not delivering the results to justify the hype.

Here’s the thing. Influencer marketing is not a one-size-fits-all marketing strategy such as Facebook or Adwords advertising. Each company needs to take a closer look at what influencer marketing can achieve, where it falls down, and how you can do a better job with this latest form of marketing that delivers, on average, $6.50 of value for every $1 spent.

The analysis below relies on clients and case studies from our experience at OpenSponsorship.com (my company) which is the largest marketplace connecting brands with over 5500 professional athletes for marketing campaigns.

With over 3500 deals to date across clients as big as Vitamin Shoppe and Anheuser Busch, established players like Jabra and Project Repat, and new startups like Brazyn and Gutzy, we have seen a lot go wrong (who knew you could disable comments on a post!) and a lot go right (an unknown skiier’s $100 Instagram, posted right before the Winter Olympics, going viral after he won the Silver)!!

Thanks to our in-house data experts, integrations with IBM Watson, robust ROI tracking tools and 10 years+ of experience combining the learnings of sports sponsorship with influencer marketing, we have gained extensive insights into campaign strategies.

We will share our learnings about what criteria to consider when choosing the best influencer to work with, figuring out how much to pay the influencer, what rights to ask for in the deal, what terms and conditions are reasonable and how to track ROI for the deal.

Table of Contents

• Who is the right influencer?
• What is the right price to pay?
• What rights to include in the deal?
• T&Cs: need-to-have vs. nice-to-have?
• ROI, the holy grail, what and how to track?
• In Conclusion…

Who is the right influencer? 

At OpenSponsorship, we match brands with athletes for marketing campaigns, with a view to further expand into other areas of media and entertainment such as music artists, comedians, actors. Even within the athlete world, there is the concept of micro-influencers such as yogis, triathletes, marathon runners, all the way to macro-influencers such as NFL Quarterbacks, starting NBA point guards and everything in between.

Our 3 recommendations for picking the right influencers are:

Miles away from the fancy parts of Gurgaon, where a cohort of Uber and Ola cars race all day to dot the surrounding, hundreds of people are working on a different solution to contribute to India’s push for improved mobility.

When Uber entered India six years ago, and its local rival Ola began to expand in the nation, many thought the two cab services will be able to meet the needs of most Indians. To be sure, the heavily discounted cab rides in the early days meant that the two companies were able to quickly scale their businesses to dozens of cities and were clocking about three million rides a day.

But in the years since, it has become clear that Ola and Uber alone can’t serve the masses — a significant portion of which lacks the means to book a cab ride — or magically circumvent through India’s alarmingly congested roads. This has resulted in the emergence of a growing number of electric bike makers such as Yulu — which partnered with Uber last month, Vogo — which is backed by Ola,  Bounce, and Ather Energy that are both showing promising growth and attracting big bucks from investors.

For four years, another startup has been quietly working on expanding its platform. But unlike the bike startups and cab aggressors, it is betting on buses. Shuttl operates over 1,300 buses in more than 300 routes in five cities of India. The platform serves more than 65,000 customers each day.

Shuttl, too, hasn’t had much difficulty in attracting capital. It has raised about $48.5 million to date. TechCrunch recently learned that the startup was in talks with investors to raise an additional $50 million. Amit Singh, cofounder and CEO of Shuttl, declined to comment on the upcoming funding round. But he sat with us to explain his business and the challenges it comes with.

The Tesla Model S vehicle fire that occurred in Shanghai this past April, prompting international media attention, was caused by a single battery module and is not a system defect, the company said Friday.

Tesla provided the update on the cause of the fire in a post Friday on its Weibo social media account. A team of investigators analyzed the battery, vehicle history, software and manufacturing data. The fire was caused by a single battery module at the front of the vehicle, Tesla said.

The company has issued a software update that will change battery charge and thermal management settings in Model S sedans and Model X SUVs.

This software update was first announced in May following the company’s investigation into another Model S fire in Hong Kong. In that incident, a Tesla Model S caught fire March 14 while parked near a Hong Kong shopping mall. The vehicle was sitting for about a half an hour before it burst into flames. Three explosions were seen on CCTV footage.

A Nio-led team of experts that included the supplier of the battery pack module, investigated a reported fire involving an ES8 in Shanghai. The team concluded there was a vulnerability in the design of the battery pack that could cause a short circuit. In this case, battery packs in the vehicles involved were equipped with a module specification NEV-P50.

Vehicles with 70kWh battery packs produced after October 20, 2018 are equipped with the NEV-P102 modules and have different internal structural designs. These packs don’t have the same risk, Nio said.

The Tesla Model S vehicle fire that occurred in Shanghai this past April, prompting international media attention, was caused by a single battery module and is not a system defect, the company said Friday.

Tesla provided the update on the cause of the fire in a post Friday on its Weibo social media account. A team of investigators analyzed the battery, vehicle history, software and manufacturing data. The fire was caused by a single battery module at the front of the vehicle, Tesla said.

The company has issued a software update that will change battery charge and thermal management settings in Model S sedans and Model X SUVs.

This software update was first announced in May following the company’s investigation into another Model S fire in Hong Kong. In that incident, a Tesla Model S caught fire March 14 while parked near a Hong Kong shopping mall. The vehicle was sitting for about a half an hour before it burst into flames. Three explosions were seen on CCTV footage.

A Nio-led team of experts that included the supplier of the battery pack module, investigated a reported fire involving an ES8 in Shanghai. The team concluded there was a vulnerability in the design of the battery pack that could cause a short circuit. In this case, battery packs in the vehicles involved were equipped with a module specification NEV-P50.

Vehicles with 70kWh battery packs produced after October 20, 2018 are equipped with the NEV-P102 modules and have different internal structural designs. These packs don’t have the same risk, Nio said.

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1. Jony Ive is leaving Apple to launch a new firm

The man who won over decades of Apple fans with iconic product design and his pronunciation of “aluminum” is out at the company.

The executive will begin transitioning away from Apple at the end of 2019, launching a new project titled LoveFrom next year. In a press release, Apple noted that it will remain a client of his new design firm.

2. Amazon launches Counter in-store pick-up in the US, starting with 100 Rite Aid locations

The longer-term plan for Amazon is to expand the pick-up option to 1,500 stores (including non-Rite Aid partners) by the end of 2019 — a very quick ramp-up in the next six months.

3. Google Maps can now predict how crowded your bus or train will be

This is a new prediction technique Google has been perfecting for over half a year. Starting in October, the company began to ask Google Maps users who traveled between 6am to 10am for details about their journey.

4. Apple’s Sidecar just really gets me, you know?

Darrell has been trying out Sidecar, the feature that lets you use an iPad as an external display for your Mac — and he says it’s just about everything you could ask for.

5. Niantic is throwing a Harry Potter: Wizards Unite fan festival this summer

Niantic has been doing in-person “anomaly” events around the world for their first title, Ingress, for years, and the company has also held dozens of real-world events for Pokémon GO.

6. My six months with $30/month email service Superhuman

A $30-per-month email service capturing the adoration of investors and founders in Silicon Valley is perhaps an unsurprising story in a subscription-obsessed landscape, yet we’re only now hearing how stealth-y startup Superhuman has captured major funding.

7. The rise of the new crypto ‘mafias’

Drawing on the idea of the “PayPal mafia,” this article examines the formation and flow of talent within the crypto landscape today. (Extra Crunch membership required.)

Amazon -owned game streaming site Twitch will be participating in Amazon Prime Day this year, with giveaways of free content from Apex Legends and EA Sports games, live-streamed events, and apparently, even a live-streamed shopping show. The latter was reported this morning by AdWeek, which detailed the streaming site’s plans for a 2-day live shopping show on its Twitch Presents channel.

Twitch had planned to release these details in a staggered fashion today, so the details of the live show aren’t yet on its blog alongside its other Prime Day announcements. But the broad strokes of Twitch’s plan is to loop in some of the gaming site’s favorite streamers to Amazon’s big shopping holiday.

It’s worth noting Amazon has tried to make QVC-style video shopping work several times in the past.

Years ago, it briefly ran a fashion-and-beauty focused show called “Style Code Live,” that was canceled in spring 2017. It also ran live video during past Prime Day events right on Amazon.com to show off some of its brand advertisers’ best deals.

And most recently, Amazon launched a dedicated section on its site, Amazon Live, which features a live-streamed video shows brands build using a new app, Amazon Live Creator.

Given its push for more live video, it only makes sense that Twitch would get involved with Prime Day in this way, too.

Beyond Twitch’s plans for live video, the streaming site is also offering a number of giveaways and hosting live events.

Twitch Prime, which comes with an Amazon Prime subscription, will offer members an exclusive character and weapon skins for Apex Legends, along with free content in multiple EA Sports titles. Members will have to link their Twitch Prime account to their EA Account to gain access to the in-game offers, Twitch says.

In addition, Twitch will host two events ahead of Prime Day. On July 13, Las Vegas and London will host Twitch Prime Crown Cup tournaments, featuring Apex Legends and EA Sports games. In London, Olympic gold medalist runner Sir Mo Farah, footballer Thierry Henry, and five-time X Games gold medalist street skateboarder Leticia Bufoni compete against each other in an unnamed EA Sports game.

Meanwhile, the Vegas event will feature music producer Murda Beatz, global platinum-selling DJ Dillon Francis, and others, the company says.

The 8-hour event will be live-streamed on Twitch Prime’s channel starting at 10 AM PDT.

Twitch Prime is a gaming perk with Amazon’s $119/year Prime membership. This year, it’s given away more than $2,000 in free games and content, the company says, including two dozen free games.

Unrelated to Prime Day, Twitch also announced this week the launch of subscriber-only streams for its top creators, Twitch Partners and Twitch Affiliates.

Bumble is giving users some new options to get to know each other inside its dating app, announcing today that they are adding voice and video calls to their app.

The feature is double opt-in, meaning you won’t get a video call from some rando the second that you match with them. Instead, users will see an icon inside their chat that they can tap on to enable the features that move beyond text. Once both users get onboard, you can get to chatting without worrying about exchanging your numbers or social media profiles.

You can only get to know someone so well between photos and chat messages though that’s more that enough for some interactions.

The goal of the new features was “giving users a more real life interaction, and saving them time by getting a deeper understanding of who they’ve matched with before they decide to meet in person or share valuable contact information,” MagicLab (the newly-announced parent company of Bumble, Badoo, Chappy and Lumen) CEO Andrey Andreev told TechCrunch in an email.

The ability to have a phone call or video call inside the app without exchanging numbers is a nice way to protect users from harassment. Bumble announced “Private Detector” a couple months ago which analyzes photos sent in chat and lets users know if there’s anything “explicit” in the photo so they know what they’re getting into when they open it. That feature is launching this summer.

MagicLab plans to bring voice and video calls to its other dating apps as well.

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Moon landing, which is coming up on July 20, NASA has restored and re-opened the original Apollo Mission Control Center at Johnson Space Center in Houston. The restoration is a painstakingly detailed recreation, which involved years of research of archival footage and photography, and seven months of restoration work.

Everything used in the restoration, which was guided by a team that included members of the actual Apollo Mission Control team who supported the Apollo 11 astronauts, is either an original or a carefully crafted recreation. That means not only the large items like computer consoles and terminals, but also carpeting, articles of clothing, ashtrays and pens. They’ve all been put in place as close as possible to where they were during the actual mission, both in the control room proper, and in the visitor’s gallery and simulation support room adjacent to the room itself that make up the larger Control Center facility.

This restored marvel of modern history will be accessible to the public, via tours provided to visitors of Space Center Houston, and it’s safe to say it’ll be a pretty popular attraction come next month leading up to, and including the milestone anniversary of Apollo 11.

The facility was actively used to coordinate missions from Gemini, through Apollo, Skylab and Space Shuttle programs, from its initial test debut in 1965 to its last use in 1992 for Space Shuttle Discovery’s STS-53 mission.

Below, you can get a better look at some of the finer detail work done on the restoration – including a pipe, three-hole punch, and a variety of other once-mundane errata now embed with a weird historical awe-inspiring quality.

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