Tech

I will defend the $700M fizzy water

by

Silly season is out in venture capital land. Today investors and founders alike will bore your ears off with notes about incremental cash flow positivity and their timeline to adjusted EBITDA profitability. Lame. Despite the general boringness of today’s venture capital landscape, replete with conservative valuations, falling deal sizes, and clucking investors sitting atop a mountain of capital, … Read more

Twitter’s edit button is rolling out to Blue subscribers in Canada, Australia and New Zealand

by

Twitter is rolling out the ability to edit tweets to Twitter Blue subscribers in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the social network announced on Monday. The company says the edit button will roll out to Blue subscribers in the U.S. soon, but didn’t provide a specific launch date. Twitter Blue subscribers in these countries can … Read more

Why aren’t we seeing more aggressive SaaS M&A?

by

Heading into 2022, it seemed like we were poised for a big year in M&A. This was especially true for enterprise SaaS companies that saw their values begin to fall in late 2021, a trend that extended into this year. Why are we not seeing more aggressive M&A activity and some good old-fashioned bargain hunting … Read more

The Trevor Project cuts ties with student surveillance software after online backlash

by

Gaggle monitors students’ work on school-owned accounts for potentially “harmful” keywords. | Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge The Trevor Project, a nonprofit that provides crisis support to LGBTQ-plus youth, will cut ties with student-focused monitoring software company Gaggle after the partnership sparked backlash from activists. The organization began listing Gaggle as a … Read more

YouTube is asking some users to purchase a Premium subscription to watch in 4K

by

YouTube’s Premium paid subscription includes benefits like ad-free viewing, video and song downloads for offline consumption, and background plays. Now, it might also be shifting video streaming in 4K resolution (currently free for all users) to the premium tier. Over the weekend, users across Reddit and Twitter noted that YouTube had been asking them to … Read more

Firefly’s Alpha rocket has reached orbit for the first time

by

Firefly Aerospace’s Alpha rocket has successfully reached orbit, achieving its objectives and deploying three satellite payloads on board. | Image: Everyday Astronaut Firefly Aerospace’s Alpha rocket successfully reached orbit following its launch from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base on Saturday. The launch was announced as a “100% Mission success” while deploying three satellite payloads on … Read more

Beats: Italian antitrust fine for Apple and Amazon cancelled on appeal

by

An antitrust win for Amazon and Apple in Italy where an appeals court has cancelled a multimillion dollar penalty the pair were hit with last year for alleged collusion following an investigation into the reselling of Apple and (Apple-owned) Beats kit on Amazon’s Italian e-commerce marketplace. The original €203M (total) penalty had already been reduced … Read more

Rape kit DNA protected under a new California law

by

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge In California, DNA collected from sexual assault victims during an investigation can no longer be used for other purposes, including investigating other crimes. California Governor Gavin Newsom signed the bill into law Friday. The bill was introduced in California after the district attorney’s office discovered that the San … Read more

Kahani wants to turn your e-commerce website into an interactive experience

by

Jesse Pujji believes the future of mobile e-commerce will look more like TikTok, Instagram and Snap, and started Kahani, a SaaS company for merchants, to lead the charge. Prior to Kahani, the serial entrepreneur was a founder in several companies, including Gateway X, Ampush and GrowthAssistant. After moving into the executive chairman role at Ampush … Read more