Virtual Skinny: Friday Fave

Posted by The Virtual Skinny on May 13, 2016 in Internet & Tech, Newsletter 0 Comment

5.13.2016

Good to Know: Want to delete your fave dating app? Just deleting the app from your phone won’t do the trick. Take these steps to delete your profile and avoid any awkward encounters or questions.

THE SKINNY

When It’s The Same Story, Different Source …

Facebook is having one of the worst weeks ever. More info has leaked about its editorial team and “Trending Topics” section. This time it’s courtesy of The Guardian.

When It’s More Of The Same …

The Guardian obtained a leaked internal document intended to give FB’s editorial staff guidelines on how to determine what news is trending and what’s not. The docs confirms things that we’ve already heard. FB’s new team relied on 10 major new sources, staff can “inject” a story into Trending Topics even if it actually isn’t trending on the network, and new stories about FB are kind of off limits. A couple of things here: (1) FB’s VP Tom Stocky said earlier this week that the company does not “insert stories artificially” and (2) FB leads users to believe the stories are picked by algorithms, but there’s actually quite a bit of human involvement. Hmmm … Whoops!

When It’s Time to Deny, Deny, Deny …

FB responded and said that the Guardian’s doc is out of date and isn’t the current practices of the company. FB’s VP of Global Operations Justin Osofsky responded with an official blog post of how “Trending Topics” actually works. He says the team relies on 1,000 new sources (not just 10). Osofsky says the team also uses an RSS web crawler to I.D. hot topics. And, he says that FB’s not about suppressing political views even if they are conservative.

When You Don’t Want No F&^#@! Problems …

Mark Zuckerberg is in full on damage control. He put out a lengthy FB status about the situation. He says the company is investigating the matter but has not found any wrongdoing yet. Also, he wants to pow-wow with conservatives and others to put this whole thing to bed.

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?

When Amazon Isn’t Your Fave …

U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is not a fan of Amazon. He thinks the company has a “huge antitrust problem.” It all comes down to the fact that Amazon’s Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos also owns the Washington Post (WaPo). Trump is under the impression that Bezos is using WaPo to influence politicians and ultimately avoid paying taxes. #Interesting

THE STREETS ARE TALKIN’

Pitching your startup to venture capitalists – the latest thing you can do on Snapchat.

Basketball legend Magic Johnson is leaving payment company Square’s board. Who knew? Johnson’s kicking off his fund for urban development.

Virtual Skinny: (Almost) Festival Season …

Posted by The Virtual Skinny on March 10, 2016 in Internet & Tech, Newsletter

3.10.2016

Good to Know: It’s almost festival season … Super cool tech and music festival South by Southwest kicks off this weekend. Even, U.S. President Barack Obama is making a cameo. #Jelly

THE SKINNY

When You’re Trying to Get Your House in Order …

These days, we’re used to hearing about the Googles and the Facebooks of the world trying to bring Internet access to emerging and underrepresented areas. But, this week, President Obama is keeping things closer to home. The Administration announced new broadband plan for the U.S. called ConnectALL.

When Things Aren’t As They Seem …

Over the past 15 years, Internet access has been growing like gangbusters in America but is still very much out of reach for some households. ConnectALL intends to bring broadband access to underserved communities.

When You Need to Move, NOW …

The Administration is wasting no time and plans to kick off an immediate effort – a new digital literacy pilot project. Calling all, Americorps volunteers to help people step up their computer skills at libraries, museums, and other community centers located in these areas.

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?

When You Haven’t Over-Stayed Your Welcome …

The Obama Administration is coming out strong this week with yet another announcement. This time, it’s talking immigration policy for highly-skilled, foreign-born workers – always a hot topic in tech sector. Good news for foreign students studying science, technology, math, or engineering (STEM). After snatching up their diplomas, they’re now welcome to stay in the country for 3 years to get jobs and get their hands on those sometimes elusive H-1B visas aka work visas to stay state-side legally. But of course, not everyone’s happy on account of the counter-argument that this will take jobs away from Americans and all.

Coulda, Shoulda, Woulda …

Billionaire media mogul and former New York City Michael Bloomberg bowed out of getting into the U.S. presidential election as an independent. It’s unfortunate for some, including sharing economy companies like Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, AirBnB, etc. The word is Bradley Tusk, who led Bloomberg’s NYC campaign, would’ve incorporated these services into Bloomberg’s would’ve-been campaign. Tusk figured since there’s no blue print to run as an independent, the sharing economy would’ve been the perfect match to get things going for field operations (e.g., hiring Ubers to get people to the polls). Oh, what would’ve been!

Real Quick …

While we’re on the election, former HP CEO and former Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina has officially backed Senator Ted Cruz in his bid … In case you didn’t get that. That’s Fiorina telling Cruz: Hello? It’s me. I was wondering if after all the months, I could be your potential VP.

QUICK POLL – RUN THOSE NUMBERS …

About 47% of Americans surveyed are #TeamApple, and we’re not talking Apple Martin aka the daughter of actress Gwyneth Paltrow and rocker Chris Martin. Most Americans in a recent Pew survey are siding with the smartphone manufacturer in its beef with the U.S. government over encryption.

THE STREETS ARE TALKIN’

Not an astronaut? No worries, Amazon CEO and owner of space startup Blue Origins Jeff Bezos is working on test flights for regular folks beginning in 2017. The goal is to make things offisch by selling tix for short suborbital flights to us in 2018. Your move, Elon Tusk & SpaceX …

Anonymous messaging app Yik Yak is probably getting tired of always being in the middle of controversy. User names are now a thing for the app.

Facebook and Google want to share their data center designs with you via the Open Compute Project. It’s a win-win … People get to give these companies a hand in advancing Internet hardware and the companies get to keep their hardware costs low, low, low, low …

BTW, Facebook isn’t back down from competitor Snapchat. The OG social media platform (relatively speaking) just bought video filter app Msqrd.

It’s getting’ hot out there … You know what that means? Let the trip planning begin. Not sure where to go? Google it, duh! The search engine’s got a new feature called Destinations to help with your planning needs.

Instagram just pulled the kill-switch on “Being,” its app intended to give users an inside look into another user’s Insta for discovery purposes. Probably for the best on account of all its technical problems.

The Virtual Skinny: Happy Holidays from Us to You!

Posted by The Virtual Skinny on December 22, 2015 in Internet & Tech, Newsletter

12.22.2015

Good to Know: See here for our our end of year note to you! Yesterday, we branched out a bit and released the first newsletter of our new financial technology (FinTech) weekly series. 2015 has been great, and we’re looking forward to an even better 2016! We’ll see you back here on Tuesday, January 5, 2016! Happy New Year!

THE SKINNY

In 5, 4, 3, 2, 1…

Elon Musk’s SpaceX successfully launched and landed its Falcon 9 rocket yesterday after the rocket launched 11 satellites into space.

If At First You Don’t Succeed…

After some failed attempts in landing Falcon 9 over the past year, SpaceX dusted itself off and tried again. This isn’t a case where we can say “NBD” because it is in fact a very big deal. It marks the first time that a rocket of the Falcon’s size and complexity has shot deep into space then made a safe and controlled return back down to Earth. The usual outcome? Rockets launched into orbit are usually either destroyed or lost. Huge step for reusable rockets, which could mean major cost-savings for space travel.

#FunShade or #ShadyShade?

People celebrated the occasion, and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who also owns his own space startup called Blue Origin, chimed in with a tweet. Bezos tweeted “…Welcome to the club.” That was a reference to what Blue Origin did about a month ago, which was very similar to Falcon 9’s mission. Differences being that the Blue Origin effort was a trial (not a real mission), and Blue Origin’s rocket was on a “suborbital” flight (i.e., it didn’t go quite as high as Falcon 9). On that note, we’re gonna say #FunShade.

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?

You’re Not Hearing Us …

Tech companies’ rejection of governments’ requests to gain more access to their users’ personal info is fast becoming their least favorite pastime. The latest? The United Kingdom (UK) now has a bill known as the “Investigatory Powers” bill that would take things a little too far. Internet and tech companies like Apple, Microsoft, and Yahoo want no part in hacking their own users’ information on behalf of the UK. These companies are speaking out against the bill because it has potential to violate other countries’ laws where they operate. The UK wants everyone to chill as it simply wants to make sure things like child sexual exploitation and crime cartels are handled. The struggle continues …

Lawyer Up!

Google’s experimenting with its driverless cars and turns out that following traffic rules isn’t always safe. Since human drivers don’t always play by the rules on the road, there are more traffic accidents with the driverless cars than expected. Humans are to blame, of course. But, what happens if there’s a computer glitch and an accident occurs? If driverless cars go commercial, plaintiff lawyers may have a field day. The possibilities of whom to blame for accidents involving driverless cars could be endless … One more thing: Google’s said to be partnering with Ford on making the driverless car thing happen by 2020.

When You Mess up, But Not As Badly as Miss Universe Host Steve Harvey ….

Facebook’s effort to bring Internet access to the entire globe, Internet.org, is under fire in India. The issue is whether the program goes against net neutrality since it offers only a few select apps for free to participants and not the whole web. FB’s been sending out notifications to users in India to express their support of the program to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRIA). U.S. users received similar notifications, which people found strange. FB said “our b …” It was a mistake. BTW, whatever TRIA decides about Internet.org is a big deal. For one, India is a massive growth market for FB, and other emerging markets like Brazil and Indonesia will be watching. #NoPressure

THE STREETS ARE TALKIN’

Short videos are the new selfies if Apple and Facebook have anything to do with it. Look for that feature on FB in 2016.

Word to the wise: Don’t let people waste your time and be strategic about how you spend every minute of the day. That’s how Jack Dorsey is able to be the boss man of Twitter and mobile payments company Square at the same time. Jack definitely needs more sleep. Being the boss is hard…

Twitter just filed a patent for “messaging with or from” drones … Interesting …

Operating system Android is still killing it in the U.S. market (sorry iOS).

Apps can be used for good and not just games. Social entrepreneurs are trying to figure out how to use apps to fight human trafficking.