Techmeme: Investors Debate The Ethics Of Anonymity Apps (Alexia Tsotsis/TechCrunch)

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March 16, 2014, 6:30 PM

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Alexia Tsotsis / TechCrunch:

Investors Debate The Ethics Of Anonymity Apps — VCs are publicly and privately debating the morality of investing in the burgeoning “anonymish” app space, after a series of negative posts, mainstream gossip, a high profile resignation and even bomb and violence threats have pushed the volume of the debate to eleven.

More: Both Sides of the Table, Chris Saad, Hunter Walk, Re/code and Medium

Tweets: @msquinn, @davidbyttow, @nrrrdcore, @msuster, @ginab, @mikeisaac, @parislemon, @lauraglu, @tolles, @mm, @samfbiddle, @pmarca and @pmarca

Kevin Rose / TechCrunch:

Foundation: Secret's David Byttow Talks Privacy, Security, and Company Origins — Today is an exciting day for Secret, one of the most talked about new startups in Silicon Valley which just raised another round of funding. — I sat down with Secret's co-founder David Byttow this week …

More: Medium

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Secret Now Warning Users Not To “Defame” Others

More: PC Magazine and 9to5Mac. Tweets: @davidbyttow

Michael J. de la Merced / New York Times:

Alibaba Confirms It Will Begin I.P.O. Process in U.S. — The Alibaba Group, China's online commerce giant, confirmed early on Sunday that it planned to begin the process of becoming a public company in the United States. — In a post on its corporate blog, the company said it planned …

More: Alizila, Wall Street Journal, BuzzFeed, ZDNet, Re/code, The Next Web, Reuters, brecorder.com, TechNode, CNET, BBC and Fox Business. See also Mediagazer

Enda Curran / Wall Street Journal:

How Hong Kong Lost the Alibaba IPO — Exchange, Chinese E-Commerce Giant Fell Out Over a Rule — HONG KONG—Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.'s planned listing in New York is a blow to Hong Kong's stock exchange, which failed in an effort to change its rules so as to accommodate …

TechCrunch:

Julie Ann Horvath Describes Sexism And Intimidation Behind Her GitHub Exit — The exit of engineer Julie Ann Horvath from programming network GitHub has sparked yet another conversation concerning women in technology and startups. Her claims that she faced a sexist internal culture …

More: Re/code, ReadWrite, The Verge and Business Insider

Tweets: @cbracy, @mims, @pchap10k, @paulg, @fmanjoo, @nrrrdcore, @zedshaw, @aredridel and @nrrrdcore

Nicholas Weaver / Wired:

How the NSA's QUANTUM internet attack system works — A Close Look at the NSA's Most Powerful Internet Attack Tool — We already knew that the NSA has weaponized the internet, enabling it to “shoot” exploits at anyone it desires. A single web fetch, imitated by an identified target …

Tweets: @ncweaver, @normative, @normative and @scribandotcom

Ryan Gallagher / The Intercept:

Compare the NSA's Facebook Malware Denial to its Own Secret Documents

More: Techdirt and eWeek

Peter Kafka / Re/code:

Warner Brothers to “Veronica Mars” Backers: Okay, Okay — Use iTunes or Amazon if You Want — “Veronica Mars” was supposed to be a triumphant mix of Hollywood and crowd-sourcing: Fans of Kristen Bell's old TV show, aided by Kickstarter, helped fund a movie version, in conjunction with Warner Bros.

More: PC Magazine, Los Angeles Times, VentureBeat, Boing Boing, The Verge and Flavorwire. See also Mediagazer

Moisés Chiullan / TechHive:

Why Veronica Mars embraced UltraViolet and angered fans

More: Kickstarter, Gigaom, The Kickstarter Blog, The Wrap, The Wrap, Engadget, IGN, Hollywood Reporter, Boston Herald, iMore, Deadline.com and The Next Web. Thanks:@jsnell. See also Mediagazer

Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:

Ukrainian hackers claim they took down NATO websites ahead of secession vote — Ukrainian hackers are claiming responsibility for a cyberattack that brought down a pair of NATO websites today, in an act of protest against Western powers on the eve of a major vote that could see a portion of Ukraine handed over to Russia.

More: Reuters, Motherboard, Reuters, RT, CNN, SecurityWeek, NPR and SlashGear

Jesse Lichtenstein / Atlanta Magazine:

A profile of Glass tech lead Thad Starner, who built his first head-mounted computer in 1993 — Magnifying glass — Thad Starner has been wearing some kind of computer on his head for twenty years. Now the Georgia Tech professor and Google Glass pioneer wants the world to join him.

More: Quartz and Glass Almanac. Tweets: @tdechant and @tsimonite

David Román / Wall Street Journal:

Vodafone to pay just over €7 billion for Ono after Ono shareholders agree to sell — MADRID— Vodafone Group PLC has reached an agreement with shareholders of Ono SA to buy the Spanish cable company for just over seven billion euros ($9.73 billion) including debt, people with knowledge of the deal said Sunday.

New York Times:

Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen: “it's possible to end repressive Internet censorship within a decade” — The Future of Internet Freedom — OVER the next decade, approximately five billion people will become connected to the Internet. The biggest increases will be in societies that …

Steve Kovach / Business Insider:

‘I Know I Look Weird But I Like It’: Meet Shingy, AOL's Dumped On Digital Prophet — About five minutes before I met David Shing in the Sheraton hotel bar in Austin, Texas, his image was going viral through my Twitter feed. Again. For the second time in about a month.

Tweets: @delrey, @mattstraz, @jyarow, @ashfein and @markgurman

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