JIRA is an antipattern
Atlassian’s JIRA began life as a bug-tracking tool. Today, though, it has become an agile planning suite, “to plan, track, and release great software.” In many organizations it has become the primary…
Instagram is using object recognition tech to describe photos for visually impaired…
Instagram is a visual service; it’s a feed of photos and videos and memes that users take in, but the company is rethinking how to optimize a visual service for users with visual impairments via a…
Amazon, With Little Fanfare, Emerges as an Advertising Giant
Its push is happening online, on devices such as FireTV and on delivery boxes, challenging the big ad sellers, including Facebook, Google and TV networks. Marketers are conflicted between wanting the…
Amazon’s HQ2 Decision Was Always About Transit
In the end, New York’s MTA and D.C.’s Metro were the only transportation networks capable of handling such an influx of new residents.
NASA chooses the landing site for its Mars 2020 rover mission
Five years and 60 potential locations later, NASA has chosen the Jezero Crater as the landing site for its Mars 2020 rover mission. Slated to launch in July, the Mars 2020 rover mission will touch…
Standard Cognition raises $40M to replace retailers’ cashiers with cameras
The Amazon Go store requires hundreds of cameras to detect who’s picking up what items. Standard Cognition needs just 27 to go after the $27 trillion market of equipping regular shops with autonomous…
Pivot or Fail? – AVC
The Pivot is celebrated in startup land. Huge successes like Twitter and Slack are all the results of pivots. So surely pivoting is a good thing, right? Well, I am not so sure. And I certainly don’t…
This Taiwanese grandpa shows the best way to play Pokémon Go is…
After retirement, this grandpa found the best way to catch Pokémon.
Semifinal Round: Vote for the Best History & Biography of 2018!
The 2018 Goodreads Choice Awards have three rounds of voting open to all registered Goodreads members. Winners will be announced December 04, 2018. Opening Round: Oct 30 - Nov 04 Voting opens to 15…
Rumor: Resy Is Acquiring Reserve, the Other Non-OpenTable Restaurant Reservation System
The source of the rumor is Tock founder and Chicago restaurateur Nick Kokonas, who claims to have walked away from a deal with Reserve
China’s Didi Chuxing is poised to expand into hotel bookings
China’s largest ride-hailing app Didi Chuxing is entering the hotel-booking business as it strives to recover from two highly publicized murders of female passengers by drivers on its platform. That’s…
Blue Apron gets a much-needed boost with Jet.com partnership
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. That explains a coming-together between two startups today after Jet.com announced it will give beleaguered Blue Apron a leg-up by introducing its meal kits for…
OpenTable CEO Is Out as Kayak Team Takes Lead
Christa Quarles will step down as OpenTable CEO, effective at the end of the year. Quarles notified OpenTable staff via email this morning. Kayak CEO Christa Quarles will step down as OpenTable CEO,…
The Future Of Search Has No Keywords
“Data-Driven Thinking" is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media. Today’s column is written by Jared Belsky, CEO at 360i. Since the first…
What Spotify can learn from Tencent Music
On Tuesday, Tencent Music Entertainment filed for an IPO in the US that is expected to value it in the $25-30 billion range, on par with Spotify’s IPO in April. The filing highlights just how different its social interaction and digital goods business is
What Does AirBnB's 'Shares for Hosts' Idea Imply for Blockchain? • Tomasz…
Last week, AirBnB proposed granting their most valuable hosts shares in the company, much like employees. This requires a change in securities law. It’s a novel idea that has a history, promise and some risks. In 1998, an online travel agency, TravelZoo, tried this.
Facebook tests Snap Map-style redesign of Nearby Friends
Helping friends meet up offline has been a massive missed opportunity for Facebook . Whether because the brand is too creepy or the politely opt-in 2015 rollout of its location sharing feature wasn’t creepy enough, Facebook Nearby Friends never quite took off. Only 103
Google Maps is getting in-app music support and new commuter tab
If you’re someone who loves arriving at the bus stop seconds before the bus itself, then this update is for you.
LG teases V40 ThinQ’s cinemagraph feature
LG is announcing a new flagship this week. It’s called the V40 ThinQ. These things we know for sure. We also now know that the handset will sport a cinemagraph-style feature called Cine Shot. How? Because LG says so. Also, we had occasion to
Private Labels Rising: How Retailer Products Are Taking Off And Transforming The…
Private labels were once targeted at low-budget shoppers. Today, sales of private-label products outpace the sales of branded products by 3x, forcing CPG giants that have ruled the space for nearly a century to respond.
What America’s Mayors Think of Domino’s Pothole-Paving Publicity Stunt
The corporate pizza chain is building goodwill with small change in towns with subpar roads
Tesla is building its own AI chips for self-driving cars
“We’ve been in semi-stealth mode on this basically for the last 2-3 years,” said Elon Musk on an earnings call today. “I think it’s probably time to let the cat out of the bag…” The cat in question: the Tesla computer. Otherwise known as
How the Need for Growth Failed Our Social Network Experience
Just about 10 years ago, I tried hard to keep my Twitter follows to a manageable amount--to people I actually cared about following and either already knew or wanted to get to know in person. 5000+ follows later and I've failed miserably. It wasn't
