Convinced that the infrastructure layer for truly decentralized social apps was lacking, he decided to fill the void, leading to Taiko’s inception in March 2022.
A truly decentralized social networkFor Wang, Taiko provides a critical building block for a social network that is truly owned by users.
The ideal decentralized social app, despite its greater technical challenges, could allow: “1.
Censorship resistance… and thus, freedom of speech.”One of the greatest challenges facing decentralized social apps is content quality and safety.
Each relayer can then filter content that reflects the “unique perspectives” of the underlying decentralized social network, thereby attracting diverse user bases.
Nubank CEO dishes on the neobank’s profit surge and how tourist VCs in LatAm have gone homeListen here or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hello, and welcome back to Equity, the podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines.
This is our interview show, where we sit down with a guest, think about their work, and unpack the rest.
This week, we talked to David Vélez, the co-founder and CEO of Nubank, the $50 billion São Paulo, Brazil-based digital bank that offers credit cards, checking accounts and life insurance to consumers.
Venture capital funding has never been robust for women or Black and brown founders.
Read about funding for Black foundersFunding to Black founders has been on a steady decline since 2021, implying that investors have either lost interest or focus on backing Black founders.
This is a big deal because after the murder of George Floyd, the venture and startup ecosystem made promises to better support Black founders.
Since 2022, TechCrunch has been speaking with experts to find out what is needed to help boost funding to Black founders.
To help gather data, last year, Crunchbase announced it would officially start tracking the amount of venture capital dollars allocated to LGBTQ+ founders.
In May 2019, Ultrahaptics and Leap Motion became Ultraleap (not to be confused with Magic Leap, which operates in the same space).
“I think it’s a long-term vision for XR,” Carter said of the deal.
Founded by a pair of University of Bristol students three years after Leap Motion, Ultrahaptics harnesses ultrasound waves to create tactile feedback.
Much like the earlier Leap Motion product, it would be possible to mount a device to the front of the visor, but directionality is important.
The Leap Motion tech determines your hands’ orientation in space, while haptics provide tactile feedback when you come into contact with the virtual object.
Today, Groq announced that it’s forming a new division — Groq Systems — focused on greatly expanding its customer and developer ecosystem.
In forming the new unit, Groq has acquired Definitive Intelligence, a Palo Alto-based firm offering a range of business-oriented AI solutions including chatbots, data analytics tools and documentation builders.
Prior to launching Definitive Intelligence, Madra and Sherry co-launched Autonomic, a cloud-based platform for connecting mobility systems, that Ford acquired in 2018.
Prior to the acquisition, Definitive Intelligence had raised $25.5 million in venture capital.
Definitive Intelligence is Groq’s second acquisition after Maxeler Technologies, a high-performance compute and AI infrastructure solutions firm, in 2022.
Will we reach AGI before Stripe goes public?
This is our Friday episode, when we dig back through the most critical stories and themes from the week.
Here’s what Mary Ann and Alex got into:Stripe’s valuation recovers: As part of a tender offer, Stripe is now worth $65 billion.
As part of a tender offer, Stripe is now worth $65 billion.
AI and the law: Microsoft’s move to invest in French AI company Mistral is not a bad way to spread its bets.
The lawsuit says that OpenAI has shifted to a for-profit model focused on commercializing its AGI research with Microsoft, the world’s most valuable company.
“This was a stark betrayal of the Founding Agreement.”The lawsuit follows Musk voicing displeasure with OpenAI’s shift in priorities in the past year.
For the first several years, Musk was the largest contributor to OpenAI, the lawsuit adds.
He alleges OpenAI and Microsoft have improperly licensed GPT-4 despite agreeing OpenAI’s AGI capabilities would remain non-profit and dedicated to humanity.
Musk is seeking to compel OpenAI to adhere to its original mission and bar from monetizing technologies developed under its non-profit for the benefit of OpenAI executives or partners like Microsoft.
Google said on Friday it will start removing apps from its Play Store in India if developers fail to comply with its payment policy, taking a definitive stand weeks after the top Indian court granted the Android-maker with relief.
Without naming them, Google said 10 companies in India, including “many well-established ones,” have not paid Google Play’s fee despite being provided with three years to prepare.
“After giving these developers more than three years to prepare, including three weeks after the Supreme Court’s order, we are taking necessary steps to ensure our policies are applied consistently across the ecosystem, as we do for any form of policy violation globally,” the company wrote in a blog post.
“Enforcement of our policy, when necessary, can include removal of non-compliant apps from Google Play.”This is a developing story.
More to come.
The Asian technology and internet company YX International manufactures cellular networking equipment and provides SMS text message routing services.
YX International claims to send five million SMS text messages daily.
But codes sent over SMS text messages are not as secure as stronger forms of 2FA, such as an app-based code generator, since SMS text messages are prone to interception or exposure — or in this case, leaking from a database onto the open web.
TechCrunch found in the exposed database sets of internal email addresses and corresponding passwords associated with YX International, and alerted the company to the spilling database.
YX International would not say for how long the database was exposed.
Spotify is rolling out a new feature called Song Psychic that will allow its customers to ask Spotify questions and get answers in the form of music.
The addition builds on the success of Spotify’s personalized, year-end review called Wrapped, which offers clever ways of turning Spotify’s music data into insights designed for social sharing.
But in the case of Song Psychic, the goal is not to look back and your listening history, but to leverage Spotify’s understanding of music and song titles to answer a range of personal questions — like those you might ask a psychic or Magic 8-Ball just for fun.
Just as a Magic 8-Ball sometimes refuses to answer a question with its “Ask Again Later” response, Spotify’s Song Psychic may respond with an answer of its own, like “Why?” instead of directly responding.
Song Psychic is available to Spotify’s free and Premium subscribers in 64 markets and in 21 languages, the company says.
