After raking in tens of millions in preorders and venture capital, the drone maker — if it can really be called that — Lily is shutting down. But its problems won’t end there: San Francisco’s District Attorney filed a lawsuit today accusing the company of false advertising and unfair business practices. Read More
For the past few years, anyone who owned a Tesla could charge it up at one of the company’s Supercharging stations free of charge. But as we’ve known for a few months now, this all-you-can-eat setup is being phased out. While existing owners will still get to charge up for free, anyone who orders a Tesla after January 15th would get around 1,000 miles worth of charging credit each… Read More
ZergNet pitches itself as a higher-quality alternative to content recommendation widgets like Taboola and Outbrain. Now co-founder and CEO Reggie Renner is planning to become a bigger source of revenue for ZergNet publishers with the launch of what the company is calling its Content-Only Monetization Platform. Before this launch, ZergNet’s main selling point to publishers was helping… Read More
Layoffs and an office auction sparked rumors that home rental startup RadPad was on its deathbed last year. After raising more than $12 million in funding, hefty legal fees from a “data scraping” lawsuit with Craigslist had put the LA-based startup nearly out of business. But TechCrunch has learned that RadPad has found itself a new home. Dallas-based LandlordStation has purchased… Read More
Snapchat just made it much easier to navigate the app and find friends, groups, Discover publishers and Our Stories with a universal search bar that’s always accessible at the top of the app. Launching today for some people on Android and rolling out soon to all iOS and Android users, the search bar lets you dig out of Snapchat the best content and conversations. The company tells… Read More
Plenty of people try to stay vigilant about their health and watch for signs that they might be coming down with something — but who has the dedication to watch their heart rate, skin temperature and other signs all day, every day? Probably no one — unless their smartwatch does it for them. Read More
Pandora said it would lay off around 7 percent of its U.S. workforce, excluding Ticketfly, by the end of the first quarter this year in an announcement that it would beat the guidance it set for the fourth quarter in 2016. Pandora now has more than 4.3 million paid subscribers, which at the end of the year is a flash of good news for a company desperately in need of some. Pandora has had… Read More
Apple’s newest computers will no longer have to bear the title of the first MacBooks not to receive Consumer Reports’ coveted seal of approval. After working with the company over the holidays to address irregular battery life tests, ranging from an extremely inconsistent 3.75 to to 19.5 hours, the publication has re-run tests to much better effect. The new tests were run after… Read More
Nintendo’s New York storefront already announced it would be offering up a limited number of pre-orders to eager customers who sign up in person. But that’s apparently just the start of the Switch-related news we can expect over the next couple of days. Tonight at 8PM PT (that’s 1PM tomorrow in Tokyo), the company will be taking to the stage to announce some key information… Read More
Those of us in userland may rarely have to worry about the nuts and bolts of encryption, but they exist nevertheless and must be replaced or updated now and then. Google is taking aim at one particularly stubborn nut, public key verification, with a new open source project called Key Transparency. Read More
After their much-publicized meeting with President-elect Donald Trump last month, many prominent figures in tech appear to be circling back to Trump Tower. Eric Schmidt is the latest to be spotted at Trump’s Manhattan outpost, stopping by a few hours after AT&T’s Randall Stephenson met with Trump. Around the time of his visit, Schmidt, a former close Hillary Clinton… Read More
Merck, the German multinational chemical and pharmaceutical company, is teaming up with Silicon Valley’s highest-profile data and analysis software company, Palantir, to more quickly develop new drugs and, hopefully, improve patient outcomes.
The idea at the start is for the companies to partner on three of Merck’s business sectors: healthcare, life sciences, and performance… Read More
Netflix has a new original film arriving January 27 called ‘iBoy,’ which follows a regular teen who gets superpowers when smartphone components are embedded in his noggin after he gets beat up. The powers seem to include being able to tune into and control wireless frequencies, among other things. Using these powers, he pursues an agenda of revenge against the ne’er-do-wells… Read More
Customers who pre-ordered the new Boosted Board 2 will be disappointed to hear there’s been a recall for the new board’s battery. The Boosted Board 2 had a small general release along with units sent to personalities and publications; it’s those units that are affected. The most cumbersome process about a recall like this for myself and other riders is that Boosted is… Read More
Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich is soliciting outside legal counsel to pursue a consumer fraud lawsuit against the beleaguered blood testing startup Theranos, according to a document posted on the state’s procurement website. Brnovich has so far declined to comment on any action, but the document contends Theranos may have defrauded customers in the state and the office is… Read More
Tech startups have tried to make language learning possible without human tutors since way back in the 90s when CD-ROMs and Rosetta Stone were state-of-the-art. The rise of social media and smartphones inspired a new wave of language learning apps like Duolingo, OKPanda, or Lingua.ly, to name a few. But the CEO of Lingo Live, Tyler Muse, asserts it’s not possible to become fluent at a… Read More
The Inspector General of the Justice Department announced today that it is looking into allegations that the FBI acted improperly in regards to a number of issues connected with the 2016 election, particularly its handling of the Hillary Clinton email probe. Read More
He won’t take office for another week, but President-elect Trump’s administration has been happy to take credit for a number of job-creation stories, including, notably, a deal with Indiana-based HVAC manufacturer Carrier and Japanese telecom company SoftBank. The Trump team’s latest bit of self-congratulation comes from something of an unexpected source. This week,… Read More
In his Senate confirmation hearing on Thursday, retired Marine General James Mattis delivered his testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee. Mattis, Trump’s appointment for secretary of defense, faced no questions about his involvement in Theranos, the embattled biotech startup being sued for fraud by a number of its investors. Mattis did note that he has been living in… Read More
YouTube announced a new feature today aimed at helping creators make money while connecting with their fans during a live stream: Super Chat. The addition is reminiscent of streaming site Twitch’s Cheering feature, which allow viewers to pay real money in order to have their messages stand out in the chat stream through the use of emotes (animated icons.) In YouTube’s case,… Read More
