21 Jan 2018

Inside Amazon’s surveillance-powered no-checkout convenience store

 By now many have heard of Amazon’s most audacious attempt to shake up the retail world, the cashless, cashierless Go store. Walk in, grab what you want, and walk out. I got a chance to do just that recently, as well as pick the brain of one of its chief architects. My intention going in was to try to shoplift something and catch these complacent Amazon types napping. But it became clear… Read More
21 Jan 2018

Sex, the final frontier: Cindy Gallop raises $2M from mysterious investor for social sex tech

 “Everything’s a battle,” Cindy Gallop sighs, although ti’s clear she relishes those battles. What she means is that the entire Internet has long been divided into two separate, walled fiefdoms: one labelled “pornography,” the other marked with those three dread words “no adult content.” The territory between those two worlds, which she is trying… Read More
21 Jan 2018

Why inclusion in the Google Arts & Culture selfie feature matters

 When Google Arts & Culture’s new selfie-matching feature went viral earlier this week, many people of color found that their results were limited or skewed toward subservient and exoticized figures. In other words, it pretty much captured the experience of exploring most American or European art museums as a minority. Read More
20 Jan 2018

The Chinese think Palo Alto is dumpy

 Good news! The great Raw Water Story of 2017 is finally over. Google tells me that searches went up ten-fold over the raw water craze, but thankfully, humans seem to have filtered out any more stories or follow ups. Silicon Valley can rest easy. But wait! There is another crisis brewing, and it isn’t the animal fecal matter in your algae water. Over the past few days, we’ve seen… Read More
20 Jan 2018

Mike Moritz and the declining America worker

 Storied Sequoia investor Mike Moritz threw fire into the tech Twitter gumbo with his observations of hard-working Chinese workers and slothful Silicon Valley engineers. Moritz, a billionaire, clearly needs page views to fund his retirement. The major money quote about Silicon Valley is this: “In recent months, there have been complaints about the political sensibilities of speakers… Read More
20 Jan 2018

Katalyst.Ventures, a new firm led by Susan Choe, has raised $34 million

 There aren’t a lot of venture funds that are led by a single general partner who happens to be a woman. Sonja Hoel Perkins is one. The longtime Menlo Ventures managing director founded her own venture firm two years ago. Cindy Padnos, who spent four years with Outlook Ventures as a director before founding her own firm, Illuminate Ventures, nine years ago, is another. Now Silicon Valley… Read More
20 Jan 2018

Women’s March embraces collaborative social app Crunchet

 Today’s nationwide Women’s March attendees will advocate for voter registration through every conceivable social network, so one of its planning organizations has allied with a new app that lets you combine posts from across apps. Crunchet will help the Women’s March Alliance and Chicago march create collages of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Twitch, YouTube, Spotify, and… Read More
20 Jan 2018

WTF is GDPR?

 Within a matter of months, the General Data Protection Regulation will apply across the EU and business processing citizens’ data will need to be sure they’re compliant. We explain the major changes incoming and take a look at some possible impacts… Read More