Techmeme: Tango, chat app unicorn, lays off 9% of staff, around 30 employees, after its e-commerce move failed despite Alibaba and Walmart partnerships (Jon Russell/TechCrunch)

Open Links In New Tab

Mobile Archives Advertise Site News Contact Editors

November 24, 2015, 10:35 PM

Top News

Jason Del Rey / Re/code:

Jet.com lands $350M in funding led by Fidelity and says it has verbal agreements for another $150M, at a $1B pre-money valuation — Jet.com Lands $350 Million in Funding, With $150 Million More Coming — Jet.com has closed $350 million in new funding, and says it has verbal agreements for another $150 million.

More: MarketWatch, TechCrunch, VentureBeat, Business Insider, Fortune and internetretailer.com

Tweets: @mattlynley, @levynews, @brianroemmele, @mdudas, @delrey and @ktbenner

Mark Bergen / Re/code:

Google burying competitors like Yelp, TripAdvisor in local search results beneath its own, says it's a bug — Google Says Local Search Result That Buried Rivals Yelp, TripAdvisor Is Just a Bug — Over the weekend, executives from public Internet companies Yelp and TripAdvisor noted a disturbing trend …

More: The Daily Dot, Search Engine Land, Ubergizmo and TrustedReviews

Tweets: @arrington and @bgurley

Ed Bott / ZDNet:

Microsoft reverses course: its media creation tool now installs latest Windows 10 version — Microsoft reverses course, restores downloads of Windows 10 November Update — Last weekend, Microsoft suddenly pulled its online tool for downloading the latest Windows 10 installation files.

More: VentureBeat, Windows Central, Computerworld, BetaNews, Ars Technica, SuperSite for Windows, WindowsITPro, Neowin, WinBeta, Computerworld, TechNet Blogs and ZDNet. Tweets: @maryjofoley

Jon Brodkin / Ars Technica:

T-Mobile gives existing Simple Choice customers three months of unlimited LTE, as long as they use the Binge On feature, which downgrades video streams to 480p — T-Mobile gives existing customers three months of unlimited LTE — One catch: You can't watch high-definition video.

More: T-Mobile Newsroom, DSLreports, GeekWire, 9to5Mac, Digital Trends, Tech Times, Gotta Be Mobile, Android Police, The Verge, Consumerist, Droid Life, Digital Trends, MacRumors and BGR

Arik Hesseldahl / Re/code:

Sources: EMC and VMware shareholders demand changes to Dell buyout deal including VMware stock buyback, shutting down Virtustream, more — EMC and VMware Shareholders Demand Changes to Dell Buyout Deal — EMC and VMware shareholders, who have watched their stock prices plummet …

More: USA Today, PE Hub Blog, VentureBeat and Seeking Alpha

Reuters:

Sources: EMC to retain majority stake in Virtustream, VMware to assume a minority stake

More: Seeking Alpha

Zack Whittaker / ZDNet:

Amazon forces resets of account passwords for some users, citing insecure password handling — Amazon force-resets some account passwords, citing password leak — It's not clear how many accounts are affected. — Amazon has force-reset an unknown number of accounts, after passwords may have been compromised.

TechCrunch:

Apple Has Acquired Faceshift, Maker Of Motion Capture Tech Used In Star Wars — As the market for virtual reality technology continues to grow, Apple has made an interesting acquisition that could further its role in the space. TechCrunch has confirmed that Apple has snapped up Faceshift …

More: MacRumors, AppleInsider, 9to5Mac, iMore and SlashGear

Alistair Barr / Wall Street Journal:

Sources: Alphabet will ask its “bet” companies like Google X and Google Fiber to pay for corporate services, in attempt to rein in spending — Google Parent to Ask Subsidiaries to Pay for Corporate Services — Alphabet says it wants “bet” companies to be more accountable on spending

More: New York Times, Business Insider, The Verge, Mashable, Seeking Alpha, Engadget, FierceCIO News and The Information. Tweets: @fmbutt

Steven Hepting / The Twitter Blog:

Twitter adds native video support to its developer kit, available now for iOS, coming soon to Android — Launching native video support for Twitter Kit — From unbelievable sports highlights to powerful first person footage, Twitter is full of unique stories told with immersive videos.

More: The Next Web, 9to5Mac, Engadget and VentureBeat

Casey Newton / The Verge:

Google expects to launch Accelerated Mobile Pages, its version of Facebook's Instant Articles, early next year — Google says its version of Facebook's instant articles will arrive early next year — Last month Google introduced Accelerated Mobile Pages, its open-source program designed …

More: Accelerated Mobile …, VentureBeat, Marketing Land, Wall Street Journal, Re/code and Search Engine Land. See also Mediagazer

Robert McMillan / Wall Street Journal:

IBM makes its System ML machine learning software freely available to share and modify through the Apache Software Foundation — IBM Turns Up Heat Under Competition in Artificial Intelligence — Programmers of artificial intelligence software got a new tool to work with Monday …

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Amazon Video, Music And More Now Available On Majority Of JetBlue's “Fly-Fi” Enabled Planes — Half a year after Amazon originally announced a partnership with JetBlue to bring its Amazon Prime Instant Video service and its Prime Music service to the airline's passengers …

More: GeekWire, .INVESTIS, VentureBeat, MacNN and VatorNews

Tracey Lien / Los Angeles Times:

Uber appoints safety advisory board to advise on physical safety of drivers and passengers, data security, and working with law enforcement — Uber gets serious with newly created safety advisory board — Uber's newly created advisory board will advise it on security and safety issues.

More: Uber Global, GeekWire, NBC Bay Area, Tech Times, bizjournals, Engadget, Digital Trends and Business Insider

Rachel King / ZDNet:

HP reports Q4 net revenue of $25.7B, down 9% YoY, misses earnings targets in first report since the split on November 1; stock down over 7% after hours — HP Inc. misses on Q4 earnings targets on first post-split report — HP stipulated in Tuesday's report that the fourth quarter results …

More: VentureBeat, PCWorld, h30261.www3.hp.com, Re/code, Computerworld, Mercury News, Business Insider and Tech Trader Daily

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:

Google to donate $1 for each Android Pay purchase, up to $1M, toward special education projects in partnership with DonorsChoose.org — Google To Donate Up To $1 Million Toward Education In Android Pay Charity Campaign — In an effort to kickstart its mobile payments solution, Android Pay …

More: Official Android Blog, Android Authority, The Next Web, SlashGear, DonorsChoose.org Blog, BetaNews, Engadget and PYMNTS.com

Jon Russell / TechCrunch:

Tango, chat app unicorn, lays off 9% of staff, around 30 employees, after its e-commerce move failed despite Alibaba and Walmart partnerships — Tango, Chat App Unicorn, Lays Off 9% Of Staff Following Failed Move Into E-Commerce — Tango, the mobile messaging unicorn that reached …

Sponsor Posts

Subquadratic:

Subquadratic: the LLM built for 12M-token reasoning — SubQ can reason across entire codebases and document sets in one pass with no RAG workarounds. Read how SubQ 1.1 Small holds near-perfect retrieval out to 12M tokens.

Cape:

Most carriers track everything. Cape doesn't. — Unlimited talk, text & data, 24-hr metadata deletion, network ID rotation, SIM-attack defense, and more. Switch today and get 29% off for life.

Zoho:

Introducing Zoho Sign MCP: AI-powered digital signature workflows for business — Ever wish you could have your AI agent send a document for signatures and track its progress for you?

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.

Sponsor Techmeme

Featured Podcasts

Uncapped with Jack Altman:

Tony Xu from DoorDash

Conversations with people I admire about things I'm genuinely interested in.

Subscribe to Uncapped with Jack Altman.

Invest Like the Best:

Sam Altman - How to Make an Abundant Future

The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.

Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.

Grit:

Ex-Twitter CEO on Why AI Needs a New Internet | Parag Agrawal

Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.

Subscribe to Grit.

Lenny's Podcast:

Anthropic's first technical PM on token maxing, the jagged edge, and living in the future | Dianne Penn

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:

What Happens If AI Fails?, Subprime Data Center Crisis, How Bad Can SpaceX Get?

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.

Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:

Connecting the Unconnected: Doreen Bogdan-Martin

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.

Add your podcast here

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 10:35 PM ET, November 24, 2015.

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.