Day: June 7, 2019

Financial troubles have forced Maker Media, the company behind crafting publication MAKE: magazine as well as the science and art festival Maker Faire, to lay off its entire staff of 22 and pause all operations. TechCrunch was tipped off to Maker Media’s unfortunate situation which was then confirmed by the company’s founder and CEO Dale […]

E3 doesn’t technically start until Tuesday, but the leaks are already arriving fast and furious. Now that winter has come from HBO’s Game of Thrones, creator George R.R. Martin’s got several other projects in the works, including, reportedly, a new video game. Welp. Looks like everything is leaking before E3. Elden Ring is probably next […]

Ten years ago, Sequoia Capital began quietly encouraging founders of its portfolio companies to consider which of their founder friends they might like to get behind financially. Sequoia would let them write checks to those companies, and it would share with them any later rewards. It was a brilliant idea. It allowed Sequoia to keep […]

Of all of the WWDC announcements this week, Sidecar got me the most excited. I’m on the road a lot these days, and apps like Duet and Luna have been lifesavers. They’ve afforded me the ability to carry around a reasonably sized laptop, with an optional second screen in the form of the iPad. Both […]

Lyft is suing the city of San Francisco, claiming that the city is violating its 10-year contract with Lyft that would give the company exclusive rights to operate bike-share programs. San Francisco, however, says the contract does not apply to dockless bike-share, but only station-based bike-share. In its lawsuit, Lyft is seeking a preliminary injunction […]

A year after Walmart’s personal shopping service JetBlack launched in New York, the retailer reports two-thirds of customers engage with the service on a weekly basis, and spend an average of $1,500 per month on JetBlack purchases. To be clear, that doesn’t mean the customers are only buying products from Walmart or its subsidiaries like […]

Uber’s chief operating officer Barney Harford and chief marketing officer Rebecca Messina are stepping down as part of an organizational shakeup put into motion just a month after the ride-hailing company went public. CNBC first reported the departures. The departures, which CEO Dara Khosrowshahi explained in an email to employees, were prompted by his decision […]

FedEx will not renew a contract with Amazon to provide express delivery for the e-commerce giant’s packages in the United States. FedEx, which made the announcement Friday, said in a statement the change would not affect other existing contracts with Amazon or international services. FedEx Express only impacts air services. FedEx will still serve as […]

More than three years ago, self-driving trucks startup Starsky Robotics was founded to solve a fundamental issue with freight — a solution that CEO Stefan Seltz-Axmacher believes hinges on getting the human driver out from behind the wheel. But a funny thing happened along the way. Starsky Robotics started a regular ol’ trucking company. Now, […]

Jessica Powell, Google’s former head of PR from 2012-2018 (years in which Google required a not-insignificant amount of PR leadership), is now a rock star writer whose 2018 debut book, The Big Disruption: A Totally Fictional But Essentially True Silicon Valley Story, was the first novel published by Medium. I recently spoke with Powell for […]