Techmeme
February 28, 2021, 11:40 PM

Top News

Kim Lyons / The Verge:
Verizon support advised its users in a now-deleted tweet to “turn on LTE”, which would turn off 5G, to preserve battery life  —  This, despite the carrier's relentless promotion of its 5G network  —  Despite its relentless promotion of 5G phones and the fact that it spent …
Patrick McGee / Financial Times:
Skydio raises $171M led by a16z at a valuation of $1B+, the first significant fundraising by a US-based drone maker after China's DJI was blacklisted by the US  —  Placement of DJI on trade blacklist has opened new opportunities for US manufacturers  —  California-based Skydio has become …
Jason Aten / Inc.com:
A look at Clubhouse's privacy flaws: room audio is “temporarily” saved for trust and safety purposes, user accounts or personal data can't be deleted, and more  —  Clubhouse was sort of perfectly made for the pandemic.  People aren't going out, and they're desperately searching for social connections and entertainment.
Chris Dixon / Andreessen Horowitz:
NFTs are great for creators because they remove intermediaries, enable granular price tiering, and eliminate customer acquisition costs by making users owners  —  In his classic 2008 essay “1000 True Fans,” Kevin Kelly predicted that the internet would transform the economics of creative activities:
Naomi Klein / The Intercept:
Big tech is aiding India's govt-led crackdown on climate activists, from banned social media accounts, to sharing data and allowing state officials' hate speech  —  The bank of cameras that camped outside Delhi's sprawling Tihar jail was the sort of media frenzy you would expect to await …
Kashmir Hill / New York Times:
How ACLU and activist Kade Crockford convinced Massachusetts lawmakers to pass a police reform bill banning the use of facial recognition tech in criminal cases  —  Massachusetts is one of the first states to put legislative guardrails around the use of facial recognition technology in criminal investigations.
Mario Gabriele / The Generalist:
How Reddit, at ~$6B arguably one of the most undervalued companies in world, can unlock the next step-change in valuation and protect against niche competitors  —  One of social media's oldest companies is also its most undervalued. … ‍  —  “You ever stop to realize how fragile all this is?”
Will Oremus / OneZero :
Twitter Super Follows and Clubhouse portend a shift from algorithmic, scale-focused, low-attention feeds to low-volume, high-attention relationships with users  —  Products like Clubhouse and Twitter's “Super Follows” offer a new kind of engagement  —  Open Facebook, Instagram, TikTok …
Ben Smith / New York Times:
Profile of Discovery+, which has hit 12M paid subscriptions globally and offers a reality TV-focused catalog with 55K episodes, rivaling Netflix in sheer volume  —  Discovery's new app has taken off largely because viewers love watching people fix houses, tour diners and bicker about their relationships.

Sponsor Posts

Command Line:
Copilot to autopilot: Why no single safeguard is enough  —  Microsoft designed a layered model that lets an AI agent resolve network incidents on its own within defined boundaries.
Will Reed:
The best sales leaders aren't job hunting.  Here's how to reach them without months of cold outreach.  —  Our team came from Box, Square, and Brex, so we already know the GTM leaders worth meeting.
Zoho:
UK tax compliance with Zoho Books  —  The evolving tax landscape in the UK has added an additional responsibility to business owners, accountants, and bookkeepers to ensure their choice of accounting software supports compliance …
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Grit:
The 20-Year Bet to Make Fusion Energy Work | Jeff Lawson
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Acquired:
Seinfeld
Learn the playbooks that built the world's greatest companies - and how you can apply them as a founder, operator, or investor.
Subscribe to Acquired.
Lenny's Podcast:
Inside the black box of AI: How AI models actually think | Emmanuel Ameisen (Anthropic)
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Big Technology Podcast:
Anthropic IPO Panic, A Spy At OpenAI?, The Great Food Slop Debate
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
Great Chat:
What happened to tech's backbone?
A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.
Subscribe to Great Chat.
The Upstarts Podcast:
The $7B Startup Mapping Your Health In Just One Hour | Neko's Hjalmar Nilsonne
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
Subscribe to The Upstarts Podcast.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 11:40 PM ET, February 28, 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

Tatiana Cirisano / Billboard:
Andrew Jacobs / New York Times:
Financial Times:
Sarah E. Needleman / Wall Street Journal:

Earlier Picks

CNN:
Andrew Liszewski / Gizmodo:
Cecilia D'Anastasio / Wired:
Bloomberg:
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch: