Mission Everywhere

Emily Dreyfuss / Wired : Profile of Venezuela Hasta Los Tuétanos, a channel on the walkie-talkie like app Zello, that Venezuelans turn to in search for food, medical supplies, and truth   —  EVEN WHEN MARIA sleeps, she hears the voices.  —  One at a time, they speak of chaos, hunger, confusion. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2CMoLdn

Facebook announced today that it is adding a feature called “Why am I seeing this post?” to News Feeds. Similar to “Why am I seeing this ad?,” which has appeared next to advertisements since 2014, the new tool has a dropdown menu that gives users information about why that post appeared in their News Feed, along with links to personalization controls. Meant to give users more transparency into how Facebook’s News Feed algorithm works, the update comes as the company copes with several major events that have highlighted the platform’s shortcomings, including potentially harmful ones. These include its role in enabling the dissemination of a video taken during the shooting attacks on New Zealand mosques two weeks ago, which were originally broadcast using Facebook Live; a l awsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that accuses Facebook’s ad-targeting tool of violating the Fair Housing Act and its role in spreading misinformation and propaganda (after year...

Olga Kharif / Bloomberg : DappRadar: only 28% of active dapp users were on Ethereum blockchain as of January, losing major ground to Tron and EOS, which now leads with 40% of dapp users   —  - EOS, Tron surpass Ethereum in popularity with many developers  — Some startups are now issuing tokens on competing networks from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2U95dut

Matt Weinberger / Business Insider : Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney says Fortnite's Creative mode, where players build together instead of battling, has attracted 100M players since its December launch   —  - Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney says that the company has big plans for “Fortnite,” which it sees “evolving beyond being a game.” from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2TN7aHM

Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch : Poland fines digital marketing firm Bisnode ~€220K for GDPR violations; Bisnode argues it may cost €8M+ to reach people it can only contact via physical mail   —  An interesting decision came out of Poland's data protection agency this week after the watchdog issued … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2YHEgN9

Ramya Sethuraman / Facebook : Facebook announces “Why am I seeing this post?”, a feature to help users better understand and control what is seen from friends, Pages, and Groups in News Feed   —  News Feed is always personalized to you — and starting today you'll have even more information and control over your experience. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2V6tz4g

I’ve been doing a lot of interviews lately, and I’ve been watching the rise of Lambda School — which I think is fantastic, incidentally — and the combination has me wondering two things: how educated do software engineers need to be? And how well does that map to what they actually learn from formal education? Let’s step back and define some terms before we try to answer those. First, by “formal” education I generally mean a four-year accredited university, whereas people with eg Lambda School or boot camps behind them are “informally” educated, and in turn distinguished from autodidacts. This is not universal. Early Google didn’t seem to consider anyone with less than a masters “formally” educated. Second, of course there’s no absolute need . Since the dawn of the first vacuum tube, and very much including hardcore grotty stuff like compilers and cryptography, software has been a field in which people with no formal training whatsoever have thrived and succeeded wildly. Obvious...

Laurence Dodds / Telegraph : Facebook announces “Why am I seeing this post?”, a feature to help users better understand and control what is seen from friends, Pages, and Groups in News Feed   —  Facebook will finally begin telling its users why posts appear in their news feeds as it seeks to assuage public concerns … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2U5yBBI

Jeff Kauflin / Forbes : A profile of payment card services startup Marqeta, which according to a source has doubled its revenue every year since 2016, reaching close to $150M in 2018   —  n the spring of 2015, Jason Gardner, the founder of Marqeta, a payments processor, left a grim board meeting and went for a walk … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2V8QsUO

How’s your weekend going? Good, good. Now, here, have a billionaire’s super autotuned rap track about a famous deceased gorilla: Tesla/Space X/Boring Company guy, Elon Musk has apparently uploaded a SoundCloud track titled “RIP Harambe,” about the 17-year-old Western lowland gorilla who was shot to death at a Cincinnati zoo in 2016 after a three-year-old boy climb into his enclosure. No word yet on precisely what role Musk played in the creation of the track, beyond releasing it on his “failed […] record label.” This might be my finest work — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 30, 2019 “This might be my finest work,” the billionaire tweeted about the track, uploaded to his Emo G (emoji) Records SoundCloud account. The song, which includes lines like “RIP Harambe / Smoking on some strong hay” appears to be more meme-centric that serious musical pursuit. But as James Dolan can happily attest , you should never let a little thing like being an ultra-wealthy executive get in the way o...

Josh Constine / TechCrunch : Proxy, a startup that is building a mobile identity layer on top of Bluetooth LE for keyless entry and more, raises $13.6M Series A led by Kleiner Perkins   —  You know how kings used to have trumpeters heralding their arrival wherever they went?  Proxy wants to do that with Bluetooth. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2Umk6Zs

This is a preview of the Internet of Things (2018) research report from Business Insider Intelligence . To learn more about the IoT ecosystem, tech trends and industry forecasts, click here . The Internet of Things (IoT) is transforming how companies and consumers go about their days around the world. The technology that underlies this whole segment is evolving quickly, whether it’s the rapid rise of the Amazon Echo and voice assistants upending the consumer space, or growth of AI-powered analytics platforms for the enterprise market. And Business Insider Intelligence is keeping its finger on the pulse of this ongoing revolution by conducting our second annual Global IoT Executive Survey, which provides us with critical insights on new developments within the IoT and explains how top-level perspectives are changing year-to-year. Our survey includes more than 400 responses from key executives around the world, including C-suite and director-level respondents. Through this exclusive ...

Andrew Liptak / The Verge : Care.com, the largest site in the US for finding caregivers, scrubbed ~46,594 or ~72% of day-care centers claiming to have a state license, after a WSJ inquiry   —  A prior investigation found providers without proper licensing and criminal histories  —  On March 8th, The Wall Street Journal published … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2CJVxMg

Larry Dignan / ZDNet : Equifax and FICO launch Data Decision Cloud, combining data behind their consumer credit scores for a new offering for financial companies and marketers   —  By combining data pools and platforms, the companies hope to find more insights, build better predictive models and manage customer experiences better. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2OE8kEp

Digital transformation has arrived. Not a single industry is safe from the unstoppable wave of digitization that is sweeping through finance, retail, transportation, and more. And in 2019, there will be even more transformative developments that will  our businesses, careers, and lives. Business Insider Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service, has put together a list of 40 Big Tech Predictions for 2019 across Apps and Platforms, Digital Media, Payments, The Internet of Things, E-Commerce, Fintech, Transportation & Logistics, and Digital Health. Some of these major predictions include: Amazon will launch an Alexa-powered car product similar to Apple's and Google's. Amazon will buy Snapchat as the social app struggles to add users, compete with Instagram, and make money. Despite the hype around the Chase-Visa deal, it alone won’t mark an inflection point for contactless payments in the U.S. Smart speaker prices will hit $20 for the newest model...

Wall Street Journal : Care.com, the largest site in the US for finding caregivers, scrubbed ~46,594 or ~72% of day-care centers claiming to have a state license, after a WSJ inquiry   —  Online child-care marketplace Care.com removed from its site tens of thousands of unverified day-care center listings just before a WSJ investigation was published. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2V6ZVMt

This is a preview of a research report from Business Insider Intelligence , Business Insider's premium research service. To learn more about Business Insider Intelligence, click here . Current subscribers can read the report here . 5G is very nearly here, and these lightning-fast networks will change how telecommunications shapes business and offer new and transformative possibilities in the IoT space. As 5G networks become a reality in 2019 and 2020, the new standard will further increase the appeal of cellular solutions in the areas where it's available.  And, as 5G-supported hardware rolls out, companies can use the network to support their IoT business. But the excitement around 5G doesn't mean it should be selected above all other options whenever available. In fact, in some cases, it's not even the best among cellular solutions. Companies that use IoT devices and providers of IoT-based services and solutions need to be discerning in their determinations of whe...