Techmeme
June 16, 2022, 1:50 AM

Top News

New York Times:
Internal Kraken comms and interviews with five workers: some staff accuse CEO Jesse Powell of fostering a hateful workplace and dozens are considering quitting  —  Jesse Powell, who leads the crypto exchange Kraken, has challenged the use of preferred pronouns, debated who can use racial slurs and called American women “brainwashed.”
Molly White / @molly0xfff:
[Thread] A look at Kraken's announcement of a culture overhaul, eschewing “stereotypical team diversity measurements”, as the crypto exchange touts hiring plans  —  Kraken, a U.S.-based crypto exchange, has announced they'll be continuing to hire, and have announced a culture overhaul that promotes “diversity of thought” over “stereotypical team diversity measurements” and prohibits describing another's words as “racist” or “x-phobic”. 🧵
Alex Heath / The Verge:
Internal memo: Meta plans to make Facebook more like TikTok, including bringing Messenger back into the app and recommending posts from “unconnected” sources  —  Facebook employees were recently given a new directive with sweeping implications: make the app's feed more like TikTok.
The Markup:
Investigation: 294+ US crisis pregnancy centers, which try to dissuade people from abortions, share website visitor info with Meta via Facebook's tracking pixel  —  The social media giant gathers data from crisis pregnancy centers through a tracking tool that works whether or not a person is logged in to their Facebook account
Josh Taylor / The Guardian:
CNN:
Japan passes an amendment making “online insults” punishable by up to a year in prison, after the suicide of a reality TV star who had faced social media abuse  —  Tokyo (CNN)Japan's parliament on Monday passed legislation making “online insults” punishable by imprisonment amid …
Ron Miller / TechCrunch:
DataStax, which develops a cloud-native noSQL database built on Apache Cassandra, raised $115M at a $1.6B valuation; DataStax had an $830M valuation in 2014  —  When DataStax hired Chet Kapoor as CEO in October 2019, one of the first moves he made was to bring in his old pal Sam Ramji …
New York Times:
NHTSA data from July 1, 2021, to May 15, 2022: six people died in 392 incidents involving driver-assistance tech; Teslas were in 273 crashes and five were fatal  —  The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration released data on 10 months of crashes involving systems like Tesla's Autopilot.
Reuters:
Sources: the US increased its funding into VPN companies nthLink, Psiphon, and Lantern by about 50% since February to support the surge in their Russian users  —  The U.S. government has pushed new, increased funding into three technology companies since the start of the Ukraine conflict …
Javeria Khalid / Rest of World:
After Pakistan banned dating apps Tinder, Grindr, and Skout in September 2020, Facebook matchmaking groups for Pakistanis gained tens of thousands of members  —  A ban on dating apps like Tinder has left young Pakistanis with limited avenues to meet new people.  Facebook matchmaking groups are gaining popularity among them.
Vildana Hajric / Bloomberg:
Cardano, Solana, and Dogecoin gained 4.5% to 11% after the Federal Reserve's interest rate hike; bitcoin rose as much as 6.1% and ether gained as much as 6.6%  —  Wednesday brought at least one positive development in the beaten-down crypto space: Alternative digital currencies posted big rallies …
Anna Kramer / Protocol:
The NLRB files a complaint against Mapbox, whose leadership allegedly threatened jobs for union organizing and fired organizers after a failed August 2021 vote  —  Mapbox has just been slapped with a complaint from the National Labor Relations Board that alleges the company's leadership threatened job loss …
Jon Porter / The Verge:
Carl Pei reveals Nothing phone (1) ahead of its July 12 launch event, saying “leaks are harder to contain nowadays”; details likely to come over the next month  —  Nothing, the consumer tech startup led by OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei, has shown off the rear design of its debut Phone 1 smartphone.

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Shopify's new AI commerce stack  —  Their VP of Product digs into just-launched products to help entrepreneurs and developers build with the latest AI and tech.
Zoho:
Why eIDAS 2.0 might be the EU's boldest digital move yet  —  eIDAS: The first building block of digital trust More than a decade ago, the EU introduced the eIDAS regulation (Regulation [EU] No 910/2014) …
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Big Technology Podcast:
Sam Altman: How OpenAI Wins, AI Buildout Logic, IPO in 2026?
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.
Access:
Betting on reality with Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
Lenny's Podcast:
The new AI growth playbook for 2026: How Lovable hit $200M ARR in one year | Elena Verna (Head of Growth)
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.
Channels with Peter Kafka:
"Neither Side Is Used to Losing." Lucas Shaw on What's Next for Netflix and Paramount in the Battle for Warner Bros.
Media and tech aren't just intersecting - they're fully intertwined. To understand how those worlds work, Peter Kafka talks to industry leaders, upstarts and observers.
Subscribe to Channels with Peter Kafka.
Uncapped with Jack Altman:
Saam Motamedi from Greylock Partners
Conversations with people I admire about things I'm genuinely interested in.
Subscribe to Uncapped with Jack Altman.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ted Sarandos: Netflix and how tech changed storytelling
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 1:50 AM ET, June 16, 2022.

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

Sydney Maki / Bloomberg:
Mariella Moon / Engadget:
Miles Kruppa / Wall Street Journal:

Earlier Picks

Financial Times:
Foo Yun Chee / Reuters:
Frank Chaparro / The Block: