Techmeme
July 20, 2016, 10:00 AM

Top News

Dan Primack / Fortune:
Unilever acquires Dollar Shave Club, sources say for $1B; DSC founder and CEO Michael Dubin to continue running the company  —  Unilever announced on Tuesday evening that it is getting into the razor business, by agreeing to acquire Dollar Shave Club.  —  No financial terms were disclosed …
David Pakman:
VC at Venrock on how Dollar Shave Club became successful and why he invested in it  —  Success has many fathers, but in this case, there is only one.  —  When I first met Michael in June of 2012, I had already seen the DSC launch video like everyone else.  I saw his site melt down and watched the video explode and actually go viral.
Charlie Warzel / BuzzFeed:
Twitter permanently suspends Breitbart tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos for repeated violation of rules regarding targeted abuse of users  —  After years of provocation, Twitter has permanently banned Milo Yiannopoulos from its service.  —  After years of provocation, Twitter has permanently banned Milo Yiannopoulos from its service.
Larry Dignan / ZDNet:
Microsoft Q4: Azure revenue up 102% YoY with compute usage doubling, Intelligent Cloud revenue up 7% YoY, Surface revenue up 9% YoY; Office 365 subs top 23M  —  The company delivered strong cloud growth as its Office 365, Dynamics and Azure products and services chugged along.
Microsoft:
Jon Russell / TechCrunch:
Source: Niantic postponed Pokémon Go Japan launch after internal communication from McDonald's Japan, the game's sponsor, detailing the launch leaked  —  Game-maker Niantic has postponed today's scheduled launch of Pokémon Go in Japan following an email leak.
Jon Russell / TechCrunch:
Sources: Pokémon Go to launch in Japan with McDonald's as the first launch partner, with 3K+ stores set to be sponsored “gym” locations  —  Pokémon Go fever has doubled the value of Nintendo's business, pushing it past Sony in the process.
Nick Statt / The Verge:
Twitter now lets anyone request a verified account  —  Twitter is opening the blue checkmark to everyone.  Starting today, the company will let users request a verified account on its website by filling out a form with a verified phone number and email address, a profile photo …
Ganesh T S / AnandTech:
Seagate unveils three 10TB, helium-based 7200 RPM hard drives for the consumer market, with prices starting at $460  —  Our recent interview with Seagate's CTO, Mark Re, gave us an idea about of the future of the hard drive market.  As late as Q1 2016, Seagate had considered helium-based drives suitable for high-end applications only.
Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:
Snapchat confirms acquisition of Toronto startup Bitstrips, integrates Bitmojis into app to offer more personalized emoji  —  Snapchat bought Bitstrips, the startup behind Bitmoji, back in March.  The acquisition was worth a reported $100 million, but at the time, how the product would be integrated wasn't clear.
Vlad Savov / The Verge:
Nintendo's market value more than doubles to $42.5B since Pokémon Go release, surpasses Sony market value of about $40B  —  For a game that isn't even technically a Nintendo property, Pokémon Go is having quite the healthy impact on the Japanese company's finances.
Guillermo Parra-Bernal / Reuters:
Brazil's Federal Supreme Court suspends a ruling by a low-tier judge that had blocked WhatsApp  —  Brazil's Federal Supreme Court on Tuesday suspended a ruling by a low-tier judge ordering wireless phone carriers to block access to Facebook Inc's WhatsApp, the third such decision against the popular phone messaging app in eight months.

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Earlier Picks

Hannah Karp / Wall Street Journal: