Mission Everywhere

China's third aircraft carrier, Fujian, at its launch ceremony in Shanghai on June 17, 2022. Li Gang/Xinhua via AP Recent photos and videos show developments in Chinese early-warning aircraft and stealth fighter jets. Currently, Chinese aircraft carriers must rely on helicopters as their airborne early-warning system. China has stepped up efforts to develop its next generation of ship-based warplanes for its new aircraft carriers , with recent photos revealing Beijing's progress in developing early warning aircraft and stealth fighter jets. A video circulating on Chinese social media this week showed the KJ-600 — China's first fixed-wing early-warning plane capable of operating on the carriers — on a test flight over the northwestern city of Xian, where its manufacturer, Xian Aircraft Industrial Corporation, is based. The KJ-600 made its first flight in August 2020. And the latest online pictures showed a plane in green and white paint — suggesting it was still ...

Brittney Griner in a Russian jail cell (left), Elon Musk (right) ALEXANDER ZEMLIANICHENKO/POOL/AFP via Getty Images (left) and JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images (right) Elon Musk responded to reports of a US-Russia prisoner exchange to free WNBA player Brittney Griner. "Maybe free some people in jail for weed here too?" he tweeted alongside a meme on Sunday.  Griner was imprisoned in Russia after officials found vape cartridges containing hashish oil in her luggage. Elon Musk tweeted Sunday in response to a US-Russia prisoner exchange offer reportedly made by the Biden administration to free WNBA star Brittney Griner. The two-time Olympic gold medalist has been detained in Russia since February after Moscow airport officials claimed they found vape cartridges containing hashish oil in her luggage. "Maybe free some people in jail for weed here too?" Musk wrote in Sunday's tweet, alongside a meme captioned: "People in the US in jail for weed while ...

Rest of World : Inside China's $16B virtual influencer industry, as motion capture actors complain of hard working conditions powering their avatars four to five hours per day   —  Hidden behind the perfect faces of China's $16 billion virtual celebrity industry is an angry, overworked labor force. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/SHbtUWL

Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois outside a January 6 committee hearing on June 13, 2022. Drew Angerer/Getty Images Adam Kinzinger told CNN on Friday he found GOP leader Kevin McCarthy to be untrustworthy. After McCarthy contradicted statements from Cassidy Hutchinson, Kinzinger questioned the GOP leader. Kinzinger said that McCarthy will "do whatever he has to do" to become House speaker next year. Rep. Adam Kinzinger on Friday blasted House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy after the California Republican said last week that he couldn't "recall" speaking with ex-White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson on January 6, 2021. Hutchinson, who last month testified under oath while speaking with the House committee investigating the Capitol riot, said that she spoke to McCarthy on the phone on January 6 as the election fraud rally at the Ellipse headlined by then-President Donald Trump was coming to a close; she said McCarthy was upset when Trump initiall...

Bolt Mobility, the Miami-based micromobility startup co-founded by Olympic gold medalist Usain Bolt, appears to have vanished without a trace from several of its U.S. markets.  In some cases, the departure has been abrupt, leaving cities with abandoned equipment, unanswered calls and emails and lots of questions. Bolt has stopped operating in at least five U.S. cities, including Portland, Oregon, Burlington, South Burlington and Winooski in Vermont and Richmond, California, according to city officials. City representatives also said they were unable to reach anyone at Bolt, including its CEO Ignacio Tzoumas. TechCrunch has made multiple attempts to reach Bolt and those who have backed the company. Emails to Bolt’s communications department, several employees and investors went unanswered. Even the customer service line doesn’t appear to be staffed.  The PR agency that was representing Bolt in March of this year told TechCrunch it is no longer working with the company....

Natasha Singer / New York Times : Cyberattack on Illuminate Education, exposing information on 1M+ students, highlights the dangers of stockpiling sensitive info on millions of school children   —  At a moment when education technology firms are stockpiling sensitive information on millions of school children, safeguards for student data have broken down. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/cn8M3uQ

Joanna Glasner / Crunchbase News : A look at the rise and fall of Bird, now a penny stock with a public market cap under $140M, as valuations in its sector collapse   —  Almost exactly five years ago, the scooters came.  That's when Bird, the first unicorn in this once sizzling startup sector, launched its inaugural scooter-sharing service. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/WeB9QrY

Rep. Adam Schiff of California. Brandon Bell/Getty Images Rep. Adam Schiff is gauging a potential run for House Democratic leader, per The Washington Post. Schiff, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee, is a prominent face within the party. However, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries has long been seen as a frontrunner to succeed Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Rep. Adam Schiff — the California Democrat and influential chairman of the Intelligence Committee who rose to national prominence as a manager of former President Donald Trump's first impeachment — is maneuvering behind the scenes to potentially succeed Speaker Nancy Pelosi as House Democratic leader, according to The Washington Post . Pelosi, who has led the Democratic caucus in the lower chamber since 2003 and served as speaker from 2007 to 2011 before regaining the speaker's gavel in 2019, is running for reelection this fall but has not committed to remaining in leadership beyond this year — when the party is poised to brin...

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. Global app spending reached $65 billion in the first half of 2022, up only slightly from the $64.4 billion during the same period in 2021, as hypergrowth fueled by the pandemic has slowed down. But overall, the app economy is continuing to grow, having produced a record number of downloads and consumer spending across both the iOS and Google Play stores combined in 2021, according to the latest year-end reports . Global spending across iOS and Google Play last year was $133 billion, and consumers downloaded 143.6 billion apps. This Week in Apps offers a way to keep up with this fast-moving industry in one place with the latest from the world of apps, including news, updates, startup fundings, mergers and acquisitions, and much more. Do you want This Week in Apps in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here: techcrunch.com/newsle...

From left: Meiloorun Juice, Tatooine Sunset, Sour Sarlac (top) on display. Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images The cost of tickets to Disneyland went up 8% in 2021, reports say. Disney is experiencing the effects of inflation like 'any restaurant on the street,' expert says. Food and beverage prices at Disneyland have gone up 12% over the past two years. The cost for a day at Disneyland is only going up as inflation continues to drive up the price of concessions at the theme park. Disneyland, which is in Anaheim, California, is no stranger to price increases when it comes to tickets, parking, and fast passes. Ticket prices went up 8% while parking increased by 20% in 2021, the Los Angeles Times reported . Now, patrons also are having to pay more for food inside the park and even reportedly deal with smaller portions.  Over the last two years, food and beverage prices at Disneyland have gone up 12%, according to the LA Times .  New Orleans mint ju...

Welcome to Startups Weekly, a fresh human-first take on this week’s startup news and trends. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here. Bootstrapped startups, or companies that use their own revenue or existing cash flow to fund growth instead of relying on external capital sources, sit in a very separate box than venture-backed startups. By nature of asset class, bootstrapped startups prioritize revenue to keep alive, while venture-backed startups prioritize growth to keep investor buy-in for future runway needs. Bootstrapped companies follow less of an exponential growth curve, while venture-backed companies need to be an outlier. Enter a downturn and both sides get a tad more interesting. The built-in business discipline of bootstrapped startups may feel especially downturn-proof as the overfunded companies announce rounds of layoffs. As venture starts to be more interested in the stable fundamentals of the startup bunch, is it the bootstrapper’s time to swing big? For Healthie,...

Monica Chin / The Verge : Dell XPS 13 Plus review: thin with a great OLED screen and a powerful P-series chip but expensive, gets very hot, mediocre battery life, and very few ports   —  The XPS 13 has a new design and a whole bunch of new problems  —  Dell collectively shocked everyone who follows the laptop market when it announced the XPS 13 Plus. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/IC2XK7h

Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Eric Baradat/Getty Images US stocks experienced a bear-market rally in July but the recent upswing is likely to fade, Bank of America said Friday.  The stock market rally found 'oxygen' from the fall in the 10-year Treasury yield prompted by 'recession shock.'  BofA said a Fed pivot from its rate-hike campaign will emerge but the central bank isn't there yet.  US stocks have made strong gains this month, but the bear-market rally looks unsustainable as the Federal Reserve has yet to back off its aggressive rate-hike campaign, according to Bank of America.  The  S&P 500 on Friday was on course to close out July with a gain of about 8%, and the  Nasdaq Composite was set to lock in a 10% rise over the month – the best performance for each index since November 2020. Bank of America said in its Flow Show note published Friday that this week marked the largest inflow into US stocks in six weeks, at $9.5 billion.  "Ox...

How healthy is the market for technology products today? The question is too broad. Large markets can have varying internal results that contrast with top-line numbers. An example of this from recent history is disparate results in venture capital activity we’ve noted around the world. While the aggregate venture market is slowing , we’ve also seen pockets of strength in certain regions.  Are tech sales similar? Some secular trends are powering technology growth. The movement off of on-prem solutions to public cloud providers, for example, among enterprise customers. As we learned when COVID-19 was driving lockdowns around the world a few years back, economic downturns don’t necessarily impact most of the tech world as much as they do other parts of the global economy. (This is perhaps why software valuations have stopped losing ground, despite a worsening global macroeconomic profile.)   The Exchange explores startups, markets and money. Read it every morning on TechCr...

Chance Miller / 9to5Mac : Apple expands App Store ads from the Search tab and Search results to the App Store's Today homepage and individual app pages   —  Apple is expanding its advertising business and adding two new ad slots to the App Store.  Currently, the App Store has two ad slots: one on the main ‘Search’ tab and one in the Search results. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/M6YyS1a

Equal Ventures , a venture firm that debuted in 2020 with a $56 million first fund, has raised a pair of new investment vehicles, SEC filings show. The New York City-based firm has closed a $94.8 million second fund and its first opportunity fund, worth $75 million. The investment firm is led by two investors, Richard Kerby and Rick Zullo, equal partners in the firm. Kerby declined to comment about the funds over email. Equal Ventures looks to be the first institutional investor in a startup, a level of conviction that means that it is more focused on a concentrated portfolio than small checks in a widespread group of startups. The firm’s portfolio includes Ghost, a marketplace that connects brands with extra inventory to retailers, Block Renovation, a platform that productizes the home renovation experience for consumers, and Smarthop, which helps truckers optimize their work. Zullo formerly invested on behalf of Lightbank, a Chicago-based venture operation, while Kerby spent year...