Techmeme: Alibaba invests $3.3B in its logistics arm Cainiao, raising its stake to 63% (Jane Zhang/South China Morning Post)

Top News

Donie O'Sullivan / CNN:

YouTube has run the Trump ad wrongly accusing Biden of corruption, which was seen 10M-30M times, but Google says it strives to ensure ads are “honest” — (CNN Business)You'd be forgiven for thinking that the only tech platform that allows politicians to run false ads is Facebook.

More: Wired, Politico, and Business Insider

Tweets: @oliverdarcy, @ericboehlert, and @donie

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Emily Glazer / Wall Street Journal:

Sources: Google has been holding internal meetings on changing its political ad policy, and plans to share more information with employees soon

More: The Guardian, Washington Post, The Independent, Politico, Rude Baguette, MIT Technology Review, CNN, The Hill, and Axios

Tweets: @glynmoody, @whotargetsme, @sivavaid, @emilyglazer, @jason_kint, @jason_kint, @dseetharaman, and @profcarroll

Romain Dillet / TechCrunch:

Andreessen Horowitz is launching a free crypto startup school, with a seven-week program that starts in February 2020 — Last month, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) general partner Chris Dixon announced at TechCrunch Disrupt that the VC firm would run a free crypto startup school.

More: Decrypt and a16z. Thanks:@ninasuthers

CNBC:

Bob Iger says Disney+ will be on Amazon's Fire TV when it launches on November 12 — - Analysts will be looking to see if Disney gives any color on expected subscriber numbers for Disney+. — Disney shares were up about 3% after the company reported an earnings beat for its fiscal fourth-quarter on Thursday.

More: Wall Street Journal, MacRumors, CNET, The Mac Observer, BGR, iPhone in Canada Blog, Thurrott, Tor.com, Pocket-lint, GeekWire, AppleInsider, Business Wire, TechCrunch, The Streamable, 9to5Mac, The Verge, Seeking Alpha, Engadget, and Fast Company

Tweets: @discussingfilm, @cnbcnow, and @cnbcnow

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Kris Holt / Engadget:

Disney says Disney+ will launch in UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain on March 31

More: TechCrunch, iPhone Hacks, TalkAndroid.com, MSPoweruser, The Verge, Yahoo Finance, Tom's Guide, CNET, and iPhone in Canada Blog

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Will Oremus / OneZero:

US safety investigators report: dilemma for self-driving cars is not saving one innocent victim over other; it's between caution and competitive advantage — It has nothing to do with the ‘trolley problem’ — he advent of self-driving cars revived the decades-old philosophical conundrum known as the “trolley problem.”

More: The Verge, Axios, Android Central, TechSpot, Ars Technica, and 9to5Google

Tweets: @willoremus, @alexhern, and @meganmorrone

Alnoor Peermohamed / The Economic Times:

AngelList launches its VC and angel fund product in India, which will allow individuals to raise small blind pools of capital and deploy them within 6-12 months — AngelList will manage the legal and regulatory aspects of raising capital and investing it, while the byte-sized funds will be able …

More: Medium, Crowdfund Insider, Entrackr, and Inc42 Media

Tweets: @samidhas, @somani_utsav, and @svickram

Jane Zhang / South China Morning Post:

Alibaba invests $3.3B in its logistics arm Cainiao, raising its stake to 63% — Cainiao will use the money raised to invest in technologies and logistics infrastructure services Cainiao also offers solutions to Alibaba's international e-commerce business, including Tmall Global …

More: TechCrunch and PYMNTS.com

Bloomberg:

Sources: Alibaba is planning to launch a Hong Kong IPO next week with plans to raise as much as $15B — - It's said to proceed with listing hearing early next week — Alibaba's share sale comes after a U.S.-China agreement — Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is moving ahead with plans …

More: New York Times, New York Times, and Forbes

Sarah Frier / Bloomberg:

Internal chats from 2012 and 2013 show Facebook staff lamenting its “unethical” practices, as Zuckerberg argued that the company's survival was more important — - New documents show dissent within Facebook's top ranks — Disclosures come as company faces multiple antitrust probes

Tweets: @sarahfrier, @campuscodi, and @autiomaa

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:

Blackstone buys majority stake in MagicLab, owner of dating apps Badoo and Bumble, valuing the company at $3B+; Whitney Wolfe Herd to become CEO of the company — Bumble, the popular and profitable dating and networking app built around the ethos of women calling the shots on how connections …

More: Wall Street Journal, Reuters, and Thinknum Media

Tweets: @fruhlinger and @ingridlunden

Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:

Snapdocs, a platform that digitizes the mortgage closing process, raises $25M Series B led by F-Prime Capital — Real estate tech company Snapdocs today revealed that it has raised $25 million in series B funding to further develop its products and platform.

More: Wall Street Journal, San Francisco Business Journal, Inman, HousingWire, National Mortgage News, Crunchbase News, and FinSMEs

Darrell Etherington / TechCrunch:

Small-satellite startup Kepler provided satellite broadband connectivity to the Arctic at over 100Mbps to a German icebreaker sea vessel — Small-satellite startup Kepler has done something never before accomplished with satellite-based broadband connectivity: providing a high-bandwidth to the Arctic.

More: Slashdot

Alex Wilhelm / Crunchbase News:

Cloudflare, in its first earnings report after IPO, announces Q3 revenue growth of 48% YoY to $73.9M as GAAP loss increased to $40.9M from $38M in Q3 2018 — Update: After rising in after-hours trading, shares of Cloudflare are down as we prep the Daily for publication.

More: Business Wire, The NyseNasdaqLive News, Yahoo Finance, and StreetInsider.com. Tweets: @alex. Thanks:@marisahaleyyy

Alex Kantrowitz / BuzzFeed News:

Twitter says it will begin a series of experiments within two weeks that tweak functions like the retweet and reply to promote healthier conversations — Twitter knows we treat each other terribly on Twitter. We dunk, ridiculing friends and strangers via quote-tweets. We ratio, piling on replies to bad tweets.

More: Slate, The Verge, The Overspill, Reclaim The Net, Thurrott, Social Media Today, and Digital Trends

Tweets: @kantrowitz, @jimwaterson, @justagirl515, @thekarami, @jesseltaylor, @lottelydia, @pashulman, @lizkelley, @ryanlawler, and @kantrowitz

Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet:

Pwn2Own Tokyo 2019 hacking contest: Amazon Echo speakers, Samsung and Sony smart TVs, Xiaomi Mi9, others hacked; Facebook Portal and Google Nest not attempted — Amazon Echo, Samsung and Sony smart TVs fall on first day of Pwn2Own Tokyo 2019 hacking contest.

Tweets: @campuscodi

Eudora Wang / DealStreetAsia:

Lori Systems, a Kenyan logistics platform that connects cargo owners with truck fleets, raises $30M Series A led by Chinese investors — Lori Systems, an African logistics platform that connects cargo owners with truck fleets, has secured nearly $30 million in a Series A round of financing led …

More: TechCrunch and China Money Network

Manish Singh / TechCrunch:

Google hires Sanjay Gupta, a former Disney and Star executive, as the manager and vice president of sales and operations for its India business — Google said on Friday it has appointed Sanjay Gupta, a former top executive with Disney India and Star, as the manager and vice president of sales and operations for its India business.

More: MediaNama. Tweets: @vsengupta and @tech2eets

Mya Frazier / Bloomberg:

Indiana passes law, targeting Big Tech, that exempts sales taxes for an unprecedented 50 years to companies that commit $750M+ to a data center in the state — Ed Soliday likens data centers to the Spruce Goose, the enormous wooden airplane Howard Hughes flew just once.

Bloomberg:

Google contractors recall the often absurd predicament of representing Google, like escorting job candidates around campus, while not working for the company — Kevin Kiprovski had a lofty title, “Expeditions Associate,” and a fun job — he got to demo Google virtual reality gear to young students.

Tweets: @thestalwart, @mhbergen, @ron_miller, @josheidelson, @business, @menakadoshi, @mattmday, @ellenhuet, @kevintkrueger, @dougdavid14, and @shiraovide

Adi Robertson / The Verge:

Microsoft starts shipping its $3,500 HoloLens 2 to preorder customers in the US, France, Germany, Ireland, New Zealand, Australia, and the UK — New gesture controls and a bigger field of view — Microsoft's HoloLens 2 mixed reality headset is shipping today after being announced earlier this year.

More: Microsoft, TechCrunch, Windows Central, Firstpost Tech, SiliconANGLE, Digital Trends, The Next Web, BGR, and OnMSFT.com

Tweets: @hololens and @tomwarren

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

YouTube rolls out a new homepage design with larger thumbnails and features like an “add to queue” option, a desktop version of “Don't recommend channel”, more — YouTube's homepage is getting a makeover. The company announced today an updated …

More: YouTube Blog, Droid Life, The Verge, Techdows, Thurrott, Social Media Today, Geek.com, Search Engine Journal, MSPoweruser, Android Police, iPhone Hacks, 9to5Google, and Digital Trends

Tweets: @nicknimmin, @mattnavarra, and @loudmouthjulia

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