Techmeme
January 14, 2021, 9:05 AM

Top News

Elizabeth Dwoskin / Washington Post:
Jack Dorsey says Trump ban was the right decision for Twitter, but reflects a “failure” to promote healthy conversation and sets a dangerous precedent  —  Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey explained in a tweetstorm that the company faced an ‘extraordinary and untenable circumstance’
Sara Fischer / Axios:
Snapchat says it will permanently ban Trump's account on January 20 in the interest of public safety and based on repeated violations of Snapchat's guidelines  —  Snapchat will permanently ban President Trump's account on Jan. 20, Axios has learned, after locking it indefinitely last week following the Capitol siege.
Elizabeth Dwoskin / Washington Post:
Sandberg deflected blame for Capitol riot, but fliers and hashtags promoting the pro-Trump rally circulated on Facebook and Instagram weeks beforehand  —  Fliers and hashtags promoting the pro-Trump rally circulated on Facebook and Instagram in the days and weeks beforehand
Wall Street Journal:
Internal docs: in hours ahead of Capitol riot, user reports of violent content on Facebook jumped 10x, and false news surged to ~40K reports/hour, 4x daily peak  —  Following surge in reports of violent content ahead of Capitol attack, executives took their most aggressive steps yet to rein in the president and his supporters
Elizabeth Culliford / Reuters:
In an interview, Parler CEO John Matze says he is not sure whether the social network will ever return after being cut off by service providers  —  (Reuters) - Social media platform Parler, which has gone dark after being cut off by major service providers that accused the app of failing …
Jessica Bursztynsky / CNBC:
Airbnb says it is canceling and blocking reservations made for the week of Biden's inauguration in the Washington, DC metro area  —  - Airbnb is canceling and blocking future reservations in the Washington, D.C., metro area during the week of President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration, the company said Wednesday.
The Guardian:
Audio and chat logs of walkie-talkie app Zello reveal some Capitol rioters communicated via the app; Zello says it has now deleted 2K+ militia-related channels  —  Audio and chat logs show insurrectionists communicated via the app, which has avoided proactive content moderation
Gené Teare / Crunchbase News:
Global VC report 2020: overall funding rose 4% YoY to ~$300B, despite a slow Q1, with ~$13.6B seed, $88.4B early-stage, and $198.4B late-stage and growth  —  Startups closed out 2020 in a much stronger position than the one they started the year in, with global venture funding up 4 percent year over year to $300 billion.
Jeff John Roberts / Fortune:
Crypto startup Anchorage says it has received a federal bank charter, making it easier for big banks to use Anchorage to offer cryptocurrencies to customers  —  A startup called Anchorage announced on Wednesday that it has become the first cryptocurrency company to receive a federal charter …
Jay Peters / The Verge:
What to expect from Samsung's Galaxy Unpacked event: Galaxy S21, S21 Plus, and S21 Ultra, with S Pen support, Galaxy Buds Pro, SmartTag, and more  —  Three new phones, new earbuds, an item tracker, and more  —  Samsung's next Unpacked event is less than a day away, kicking off on January 14th at 10AM ET …
John Callaham / Android Authority:
Asus announces Chromebook Flip CX9 for enterprises, with Titan C security, and CX5 for students, both equipped with Intel 11th-gen Core i7 and Iris Xe graphics  —  - Asus announced new Chromebook Flip models today as part of CES 2021.  — The Chromebook Flip CX5 Chromebook is targeting students …
Bloomberg:
Sources: Poshmark is pricing its IPO at $42 per share, raising $277M, up from its $35-$39 price initially noted in an earlier filing  —  - Online marketplace is raising $277 million in share sale  — Poshmark IPO follows trading debut by consumer lender Affirm
More: TechCrunch
Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:
Ring says it is adding opt-in end-to-end encryption for eight cameras in technical preview for US users  —  Starting today in a ‘technical preview’  —  Ring is starting to add support for end-to-end encryption to its cameras.  The feature will keep video streams encrypted from the camera …
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Xentral, which develops enterprise resource planning software for online SMBs, raises $20M Series A led by Sequoia Capital  —  Small enterprises remain one of the most underserved segments of the business market, but the growth of cloud-based services — easier to buy, easier to provision — has helped that change in recent years.
Paul Sawers / VentureBeat:
Sana Labs, which uses AI to personalize training courses for professionals, raises $18M Series A led by EQT Ventures  —  Sana Labs, a startup that's using machine learning to personalize training courses for professionals, has raised $18 million in a series A round of funding led by EQT Ventures.
More: FinSMEs
Jonathan Shieber / TechCrunch:
DecisionLink, which develops software for cost-benefit analyses of business services, raises an $18.5M round led by Accel Partners  —  DecisionLink, an Atlanta-based company that provides software for cost-benefit analyses of business services from a customer's perspective …

Sponsor Posts

Meta:
Open Source AI: Available to all, not just the few  —  Meta's open source AI enables small businesses, start-ups, students, researchers and more to download and build with our models at no cost.
Tribe AI:
Build AI products that matter  —  Tribe AI helps organizations rapidly deploy AI solutions that have real business impact.  We bring together world class AI talent and tooling to drive differentiated results.
Zoho:
5 common accounting mistakes  —  This is a guest post by Yaali Bizappln Solutions.  A lot of businesses manage their customers and finances on separate platforms.  This disconnect often leads to missed invoices …
Hamming:
Make AI Voice Agents trustworthy  —  Hamming AI automatically tests AI voice agents and continuously monitors them in production.
Techmeme Ride Home:
Fri. 11/22 - An LLM Siri But... Only The Year AFTER Next?
The day's tech news, every day at 5pm ET. Fifteen minutes and you're up to date.
Subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or RSS.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 9:05 AM ET, January 14, 2021.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.

More News

Benjamin Powers / CoinDesk:

Earlier Picks

Ben Thompson / Stratechery:
Jessica Bursztynsky / CNBC:
Lauren Feiner / CNBC:
Stephen Nellis / Reuters:
Karissa Bell / Engadget:
Romain Dillet / TechCrunch:
Axios:
Nick Statt / The Verge: