Hey, friends — you’re done with the weekend. Congratulations! That’s an achievement worth celebrating, I say. And what better way to ring in the weekend than with a tech week recap? It’s Week in Review (WiR), TechCrunch’s weekly news roundup, where we highlight the most important, influential and otherwise compelling stories of the past few days. We know it – you’re busy. So, a digest that highlights all the important events.
Before we get to the good stuff, a reminder that on May 17, TechCrunch Live, TC’s virtual speaker series, will feature Intel Capital’s Mark Rostick and Garima Kapoor – the founders of MiniIO, a construction startup in an enterprise grade, but open source. , object storage solution. On the further horizon, there is TC City Spotlight: Atlanta on June 7, which will host a pitch competition, a panel discussion on investing in the Atlanta ecosystem and more. Last but not least is Disrupt in San Francisco (from September 19–21), a conference full of expert-led sessions and interviews with movers and shakers in the technology space. Mark the dates!
Now, with that out of the way, here are the top headlines.
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Google I/O, recapped: On Google I/O keynote day, the search and internet advertising giant unleashed a rapid fire of announcements during its developer conference – including several unveilings of new AI-related things it’s working on. If you don’t have time to watch a two-hour presentation, the TechCrunch team took that and delivered stories on new products and features — plus quick hits on the biggest news in a digestible, easy – skim list.
Cleaning continues: Twitter is purging inactive accounts on its platform, which could free up many long-desired usernames, according to recent tweets by owner Elon Musk. Although Twitter has for years promised to return more usernames to the rotation, it has not yet made any major effort to do so, although there an inactive account policy in place suggesting that Twitter users must log in at least every 30 days to avoid permanently deleting accounts.
Twitter’s new CEO: In other Twitter news, Elon Musk says he has found a new CEO for Twitter. Musk has not yet determined who will take on the role, although The Wall Street Journal is now reporting that NBCUniversal’s head of advertising Linda Yaccarino is actively “in talks” for the position. on a tweet, Musk announced that he would be transitioning from his role as the company’s CEO to serving as its executive chair and chief technology officer. The new CEO is expected to start in six weeks, according to Musk.
Health records leaked: NextGen Healthcare, a US-based provider of health record software, admitted that hackers breached its systems and stole the personal data of more than 1 million patients. In a data breach notice filed with the Maine attorney general’s office, NextGen Healthcare confirmed that hackers accessed the personal data of 1.05 million patients, including approximately 4,000 Maine residents.
Rapid layoffs: Rapid, formerly known as RapidAPI, a startup that built an API marketplace worth $1 billion last year, laid off another 70 employees less than two weeks after letting go of 50% of its staff of this, TechCrunch has learned. An affected employee who wished to remain anonymous told TC that only 42 people remained in the company – from 230 in April – representing an 82% reduction in the number of people.
Meta contractors protested: Content moderators under Sama, Meta’s content review subcontractor in Africa, earlier this week picketed the company’s headquarters in Kenya demanding their April salaries. 184 moderators are suing Sama for allegedly illegally firing them, after Meta cut its content review arm in March, and Majorel, the social media giant’s new partner based in Africa, for blacklisting in the Meta instruction.
From Pokémon to Peridot: From the makers of Pokémon Go comes another mobile game that brings the little creatures to our fingertips: Peridot. Like a ’90s Tamagotchi toy, Peridot is a pet simulator, but it takes place inside augmented reality. You can eat, play, walk, breed and socialize your Peridots, but don’t worry — if you take a break from the game, your creatures won’t run off your screen and/or die.
Texting, but differently: “The medium is the message” is the common phrase, but entrepreneur Alexis Traina believes that the messages themselves – text messages, to be exact – deserve attention as well. Traina is the CEO and co-founder of HiNOTE, an app that helps people create messages, placed over personalized backdrops of anything from a tipped-over wineglass to a branded letterhead notebook page. The idea, he said in an interview with TechCrunch, is that he doesn’t get up every day and wear green, blue and gray – so why do our text messages stick to colors?
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Need listening material for your weekday commute – or shower, for that matter? TechCrunch has you covered. At Equity, the crew dives into a brace of Mayfield’s new funds, as well as how Wellthy is helping caregivers feel less overwhelmed and the slow growth of tech companies. At Found, the team spoke to the co-founders of Juliet, who reimagined boxed wine. The Chain Reaction team released a bonus episode from a fireside chat with Nadya Tolokonnikova, the creator of the protest art collective Pussy Riot, at NFT NYC in April 2023. . To round things off, TechCrunch Live talked about the development of therapeutics for anti-aging with James Peyer, the co-founder of Cambrian BioPharma, and Maryanna Saenko, co-founder and partner of Future Ventures.
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TC+ subscribers have access to in-depth commentary, analysis and surveys — which you already know if you’re a subscriber. If you’re not, consider signing up. Here are some highlights from this week:
Visions of a colorful future: How far has the psychedelics medical industry come in the last 12 months? Well, it depends on where you look. A recent survey shows that instead of just looking for attractive opportunities, investors and founders are increasingly setting their minds on building the foundations for an industry that can harness the power of psychedelics to lives will be changed.
AI food search: News from Google’s AI-soaked developer event this week makes it clear that we’re on the cusp of a new era in search. After Microsoft’s infusion of OpenAI technology into Bing, Google is experimenting with its own AI tech and opening up new ways to use search. It is clear that we are about to see the first major improvements in the market for searching information on the internet in a long time.
Salesforce includes generative AI: Salesforce is increasingly investing in generative AI as it becomes apparent that the technology has the potential to change how we interact with software – allowing us to describe what we want instead of clicking or tapping.
Get your TechCrunch fix IRL. Join us at Disrupt 2023 in San Francisco this September to immerse yourself in all things startup. From headline interviews to intimate roundtables to a jam-packed startup expo floor, there’s something for everyone at Disrupt. Save up to $800 when you buy your pass now through May 15th, and save 15% on top of that with promo code WIR. Learn more.