YieldWars used Associated Press data to settle their prediction market, but some question the validity of using their call as an oracle
A crypto fund is buying up Bitcoin at a major discount in a high-risk, high-return game. What are the odds of outperforming BTC itself?
Joe Biden’s picks to head key regulatory agencies could redefine cryptocurrency policy in the coming years. Exactly how remains an open question.
Read more Following bitcoin purchases by MicroStrategy and Square, Miller said every major investment bank and high net worth firm will eventually have exposure to bitcoin or commodities like gold.
Read more Hany Rashwan, CEO of Amun/21Shares, explains how the proverbial bitcoin lightbulb went off when his native Egypt’s currency devalued in 2016.
Read more Welcome back to Human Capital and congrats on making it through one of the hardest weeks of the longest year.
Now that the Associated Press has called the election in favor of Joe Biden, it should be good news for DEI practitioners, who expressed some worry they’d be out of a job if Trump was allowed to continue on his path of destruction.
Meanwhile, over in California, the Uber and Lyft -backed gig worker ballot measure, Prop 22, passed. We’ll get into what that all means and the implications moving forward.
Human Capital is a weekly newsletter that lands in subscribers’ inbox every Friday at 1 p.m. PT. Sign up here to receive it.
Gig workers will continue being independent contractors in CA
As y’all may have seen by now, the Uber and Lyft-backed gig worker measure, Proposition 22, passed in California.
The current count is 58.4% in favor of Prop 22 and 41.6% in opposition. Below, you can see how mostly counties in Northern California along the coast drove the opposition.
That means gig workers will continue to be classified as independent contractors in the state. It also essentially makes these gig companies exempt from AB-5, the gig worker bill that went into law at the beginning of the year. Lastly, it means we can expect these gig companies, which spent $205 million on the ballot measure, to seek similar legislation in other states.
“To get Prop 22 passed, gig companies — which have yet to turn a profit — spent a historic $205 million on their campaign, effectively creating a political template for future anti-democratic, corporate law-making,” Meredith Whittaker, co-founder of AI Now Institute and Veena Dubal, professor of law at the University of California, Hastings, wrote.
On Uber’s earnings call this week, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said the company would “more loudly advocate for laws like Prop 22” throughout the U.S. and worldwide.
Meanwhile, labor groups are already planning their next steps forward. Partnerships for Working Families, for example, is considering potentially lobbying the hopeful Biden administration’s Department of Labor for better federal laws for worker classification, according to Cal Matters. Other options entail suing for issues around worker’s compensation requirements or the ⅞ supermajority needed to amend Prop 22.
Below are statements issued over the past couple of days from interested parties.
Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi to drivers: “With this vote, drivers and delivery people will get what so many of you have been asking for: access to benefits and protections, while maintaining the flexibility and independence you want and deserve.
The future of independent work is more secure because so many drivers like you spoke up and made your voice heard—and voters across the state listened.”
Lyft Chief Policy Officer Anthony Foxx: “California voters have spoken, and they stood with more than a million drivers who clearly said they want independence plus benefits. Prop 22 is now the first law in the nation requiring health, disability and earnings benefits for gig workers. Lyft stands ready to work with all interested parties, including drivers, labor unions and policymakers, to build a stronger safety net for gig workers in the U.S.”
DoorDash CEO Tony Xu: Passing Prop 22 is a big win for Dashers, merchants, customers, and communities. Californians sided with drivers, recognizing the importance of flexible work and the critical need to extend new benefits and protections to drivers like Dashers
Gig Workers Rising: “Billionaire corporations just hijacked the ballot measure system in California by spending millions to mislead voters. The victory of Prop 22, the most expensive ballot measure in U.S. history, is a loss for our democracy that could open the door to other attempts by corporations to write their own laws.”
Gig Workers Collective: “Our organizing has always been untraditional since we aren’t classified as employees and don’t have the legal protections to organize or unionize, but we still found a way to build worker power and fight back. We’re disappointed in tonight’s outcome, especially because this campaign’s success is based on lies and fear-mongering. Companies shouldn’t be able to buy elections. But we’re still dedicated to our cause and ready to continue our fight.”
DEI professionals hope for a Biden administration
Uber Chief Diversity Officer Bo Young Lee said on Twitter that for many DEI professionals, “the results of the election will impact how we do our jobs and may even impact if we have jobs in the long term.”
Now that Biden is the presumptive president, the change in the administration will likely mean a change in the executive order banning types of diversity training for federal contractors.
Late last month, three civil rights groups filed a federal class-action lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s execute order. That suit came after Microsoft disclosed that the U.S. Department of Labor Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs contacted the company regarding its racial justice and diversity commitments made in June.
Shine app founder talks mental health for Black people and people of color
Shine app co-founders Naomi Hirabayashi and Marah Lidey
On this week’s episode of Mixtape, we spoke with Shine app founder Marah Lidey about mental health. We spoke about the psychological and physiological manifestations of racism, the adverse effects of 2020 and how Black death isn’t new, but it’s finally getting global attention.
“Nothing necessarily new is happening with Black people dying in the streets,” Lidey said. “[Black people] all know that. But when all of your friends and co-workers become aware in this very new way and want to understand and want to share and want to ask you questions and you’re watching this play out at this national level and you’re bombarded at the global level, right I mean, this is in our DNA. Our cells were in the cells of those people who were enslaved.”’
You can check out the full conversation here.
This is The TechCrunch Exchange, a newsletter that goes out on Saturdays, based on the column of the same name. You can sign up for the email here.
Are you tired? I am. What a week. But, if you kept your eyes off American politics and instead focused on the stock market, this was not a week of stress at all. It was a celebration.
Yes, the election appears to be influencing stocks, with investors delighted at what could be a divided government. Their bet is that with different parties in control of different bits of the government, nothing will happen, and thus taxes and regulation won’t change. You can handicap that as you wish.
Regardless, this week’s stock market boom was a multifaceted affair. Software stocks rallied as the summer-era trade appeared to come back into vogue, in which investors pour capital into SaaS and cloud companies in hopes of parking their wealth into something with growth potential. Software earnings also look pretty good thus far (we chatted with JFrog and Ping Identity and BigCommerce), improving on their early performance.
Uber and Lyft drove their own rally as California voters decided that their long-standing labor arbitrage would stand. And then Uber failed to vomit on itself during its earnings report. Not bad.
Big tech stocks rose, as well. All this is to say that after some fear in the market a week ago, things are back to being heated for tech companies. And it is, as we expected, flushing out the next wave of IPOs.
Airbnb is expected to file publicly early next week (we have four questions here that we cannot wait to get answered), and Upstart actually filed this week, which you probably missed because you were watching something else. No worries. We are here for you.
Another notable possible include DoorDash, now unshackled from its expensive California regulatory battle. How many debuts shall we see? Hopefully many.
Market Notes
Upstart’s IPO filing brings a fintech IPO to the fore, and overall its numbers are pretty good if you discount worries about its customer concentration. Its debut could augur well for fintech as a whole, a segment of the startup population that, when viewed through the lens of PayPal’s earnings, is having a hell of a year.
Fintech VCs are active, as well, dropping over $10 billion into startups focusing on financial technology products and services in Q3. Payments, insurtech, wealth management and banking startups caught our eye as sectors to watch in that niche.
It was not a perfect week for fintech, however, as the U.S. government decided that the Visa-Plaid deal should not happen. Damn. As discussed on Equity, this deal could limit M&A interest for fintech startups from large players. Does that mean that fintech IPOs, then, have to carry the liquidity bucket for the sector?
Maybe! And if so, Upstart’s impending flotation seems to take on extra importance. We’ll keep you posted.
- Moving along, the Ant Group IPO termination by the Chinese government was probably the biggest tech story of the week, though as the company is worth a few hundred billion, it’s not really a startup event. For China, it’s a bad day, as it undercuts its goal of becoming a global financial center. For Ant, it’s a huge setback. For Jack Ma, it’s a warning, if not more.
- The nine-figure neobank rounds? Not done yet.
- Pony’s epic raise this week makes the point that self-driving tech is not dead. Indeed, the great race to let computers drive continues. Just more slowly than everyone had hoped.
- Udacity underscored the edtech boom by raising $75 million in debt and reported “Q3 bookings up by 120% year-over-year and average run rates up 260% in H1 2020.” Our own Natasha Mascarenhas also reported on booming edtech M&A volume, again highlighting that edtech has gone from zero to hero in 2020, at least from a VC perspective.
- $30 million for Hustle Fund, and €66.5M for All Iron Ventures, among other VC raises this week.
- ByteDance is looking for $2 billion at a valuation of $180 billion? Also, what happened to the whole TikTok fiasco?
- And TikTok’s rival’s IPO filing really shows how hard it is to build a similar network. It’s also very expensive.
Various and Sundry
Sticking under our target word count for the first time in so long I nearly forgot what it is, here are a few iotas and crumbs for your weekend:
- The volcano method for understanding the fintech revolution
- How Fortnite plans to get back onto iOS
- VCs dropping Form D filings on Election Day did not prevent us from finding them
- Some good news and some great news
Have a good weekend. Stay safe. Fight COVID-19. And listen to this.
Editor’s note: Get this free weekly recap of TechCrunch news that any startup can use by email every Saturday morning (7 a.m. PT). Subscribe here.
The US is settling in for some new form of national gridlock, but state and local propositions are busy defining how technology businesses will be allowed to work (legally) in the US. Policies on topics as broad as customer usage and employment or as narrow as a drug chemical got the vote across the country. The results provide a blueprint for what you might expect to see in many more places.
Perhaps the best example is Proposition 22 in California, where a majority of the voters approved of new rules that allow companies like Uber and Lyft to continue operating with drivers as independent contractors. A previous piece of state legislation and related lawsuit would have required the companies to classify many drivers as full-time employees. Here’s Megan Rose Dickey, on the impact of the result:
Throughout the case, Uber and Lyft have argued that reclassifying their drivers as employees would cause irreparable harm to the companies. In the ruling last month, the judge said neither company would suffer any “grave or irreparable harm by being prohibited from violating the law” and that their respective financial burdens “do not rise to the level of irreparable harm.”
But now that Prop 22 is projected to pass, this lawsuit has far less legal ground to stand on. It’s also worth noting that Uber has previously said it may pursue similar legislation in other states.
Naturally, the affected companies got a boost to their stock prices after the vote was called, and Uber is already working on taking the campaign global.
The US presidential election of 2020 has been the most technologically sophisticated ever, but I’m gonna skip because there are relatively few startup angles for us here. However, if you are trying to craft user policies about politics, consider this election-eve analysis from Taylor Hatmaker about how Facebook and Twitter have changed their approaches since 2016.
Other notable startup-y items from our election coverage:
Cannabis legalization measures set to pass in 5 states
Portland, Maine passes referendum banning facial surveillance
Calm’s hilarious CNN ad campaign sent the meditation app flying up App Store charts
YC-backed nonprofit VotingWorks wants to rebuild trust in election systems through open source
Something else happened in government this week that was not about the election — but may still be relevant to your startup. The SEC will now let companies raise up to $5 million per year in equity crowdfunding, up from a previous rule of $1.07 million. Lucas Matney has more for Extra Crunch.
The next billion-dollar e-commerce company will be a B2B marketplace
Business-to-business transactions are full of complexities beyond the consumer space, including four types of standard payment methods, sophisticated financing tools, bulk discounts, contractual pricing, delivery schedules, insurance and compliance. Merritt Hummer of Bain Capital Ventures breaks it down in a big guest post for Extra Crunch:
[I]t’s no wonder B2B e-commerce has been slower to digitize than B2C. From product discovery through the checkout process, a consumer buying a bag of licorice looks nothing like a retailer buying 100,000 bags of licorice from a distributor. The good news for B2B marketplace founders is that, based on the parameters above, there are many creative ways to extract value from transactions that go beyond the GMV take rate. Let’s explore some of the creative ways to monetize a B2B marketplace.
Instead of trying to take a cut of the gross merchandise value, like what Apple does with the App Store, successful startups have to be creative. These can include data monetization, embedded financial services, targeted advertising, private-label products, subscription fees and sampling fees. Here’s an excerpt from Hummer about that last one:
In most B2B verticals, individual transactions are so large that charging fees on a percentage basis means scaring potential customers away. In high-value markets with infrequent orders, charging a take rate on purchase orders will be perceived as unfair, especially when suppliers and buyers know each other already. But the fee-per-sample model is a unique wedge to aggregate suppliers and buyers, who often sample supplies before placing large orders.
One of our portfolio companies, Material Bank, has used this monetization strategy with success. Material Bank is a B2B marketplace for construction and interior design materials that warehouses samples (fabric swatches, paint chips, flooring materials, wall coverings, etc.) from hundreds of brands. Architects and interior designers can order free samples from Material Bank and receive them the next morning, and then ship samples back for free when they’re no longer needed. Material Bank charges the manufacturers a fee every time one of their samples is shipped out. Manufacturers receive new customer leads that require no effort to generate and are happy to outsource sample fulfillment, which was historically a cost center and not a core competency. Other B2B markets where sampling is well-established include chemicals, apparel and packaging materials.
How to start a VC fund without being rich already
Barriers to venture investing have been falling in recent years, as money has flowed into the asset class and as the opportunities for tech continue to grow. It is actually quite possible to raise your own fund if you don’t have much wealth to leverage — you’ll still have many things to figure out, though. Connie Loizos talks to limited partners and VCs who have been taking creative approaches for TechCrunch this week:
First, find investors, i.e. limited partners, who are willing to take less than 2% or 3% and maybe even less than 1% of the overall fund size being targeted. You’ll likely find fewer investors as that “commit” shrinks. But for example Joanna Rupp, who runs the $1.1 billion private equity portfolio for the University of Chicago’s endowment, suggests that both she and other managers she knows are willing to be flexible based on the “specific situation of the GP.”
Says Rupp, “I think there are industry ‘norms,’ but we haven’t required a [general partner] commitment from younger GPs when we have felt that they don’t have the financial means.”
Bob Raynard, founder of the fund administration firm Standish Management, echoes the sentiment, saying that a smaller general partner commitment in exchange for special investor economics is also fairly common. “You might see a reduced management fee for the LP for helping them or reduced carry or both, and that has been done for years.”
Explore management fee offsets. Use your existing portfolio companies as collateral. Make a deal with wealthier friends if you can. Get a bank loan. Consider the merits of so-called front loading.
She goes on to explain a number of tips including:
-
Explore management fee offsets.
-
Use your existing portfolio companies as collateral.
-
Make a deal with wealthier friends if you can.
-
Get a bank loan.
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Consider the merits of so-called front loading.
Yegor Aleyev/TASS (Photo by Yegor AleyevTASS via Getty Images)
Edtech startup M&A grows with the pandemic boom
Natasha Mascarenhas takes a look at the motivations behind recent acquisitions in the space for Extra Crunch this week, as edtech has gone from supplemental to vital during the pandemic. Here’s more detail about the Course Hero acquisition of Symbolab from the other week.
Symbolab is a math calculator that is set to answer over 1 billion questions this year. With each answer, Symbolab adds information to its algorithm regarding students’ most common pain points and confusion. Course Hero, in contrast, is a broader service that focuses on Q&A from a variety of subjects. CEO Andrew Grauer says Symbolab’s algorithm isn’t something that Course Hero, which has been operating since 2006, can drum up overnight. That’s precisely why he “decided to buy, instead of build… It made a lot of sense to move fast enough so it wouldn’t take up multiple years to get this technology.”
Around TechCrunch
Learn how to score your first check with TMV’s Soraya Darabi on November 10
Just one week left for early-bird passes to TC Sessions: Space 2020
Relativity Space’s Tim Ellis is coming to TC Sessions: Space 2020
Across the week
TechCrunch:
China postpones Ant’s colossal IPO after closed-door talk with Jack Ma
Study shows cities with ride-hailing services report lower rates of sexual assault
Mixtape podcast: Wellness in the time of the struggle
Why Florida residents may soon be seeing jet-powered ‘flying taxis’
UK report spotlights the huge investment gap facing diverse founders
Extra Crunch:
3 tips for SaaS founders hoping to join the $1 million ARR club
Inside fintech startup Upstart’s IPO filing
4 takeaways from fintech VC in Q3 2020
Is fintech’s Series A market hot, or just overhyped?
Implementing a data-driven approach to guarantee fair, equitable and transparent employee pay
#EquityPod: Fortnite is actually a SaaS company
Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast (now on Twitter!), where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines.
What a week from us here in the United States, where the election is still being tabulated and precisely zero people are stressed at all. But, no matter what, the wheels of Equity spin on, so Danny and Natasha and Alex and Chris got together once again to chat all things startups and venture capital:
- Up top there was breaking news aplenty, including a suit from the U.S. government to try to block the huge Plaid-Visa deal. And, it was reported that Airbnb will drop its public S-1 filing early next week. That IPO is a go.
- Next we turned to the gaming world, riffing off of this piece digging into the venture mechanics of making and selling video games. Our hosting crew had a few differences of opinion, but were able to agree that Doom 3 was a masterpiece before moving on.
- Then it was time to talk Ant, and what the hell happened to its IPO. Luckily with Danny on deck we were in good hands. What a mess.
- Prop 22 was passed, which effectively allows Uber, Instacart and Lyft to keep their gig workers labeled as independent contractors, instead of employees. As a result, Uber and Lyft stocks soared, while gig worker collectives said that the fight is still on.
- Natasha scooped a series of Election Day filings from venture capital firms. In the mix: Precursor Ventures Fund III, Hustle Fund II and Insight Partner’s first Opportunity Fund.
- And finally, despite Election Day turning into an entire week, the public markets are rallying. Will we see a boom of IPOs?
- And, as a special treat, we didn’t even mention Maricopa County for the entire episode. Take care all!
Equity drops every Monday at 7:00 a.m. PDT and Thursday afternoon as fast as we can get it out, so subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts.
Following a tense week of vote tallying, Joe Biden won the state of Pennsylvania and vaulted ahead in the race to become the next president of the United States. Biden’s win in the critical state put him over the threshold of 270 electoral votes, cutting off all avenues for his opponent.
Biden prevailed by flipping key states that went to Trump in 2016, including Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. Trump again won in Florida and Ohio, but in the end was unable to chart a path to an electoral victory. Biden also leads by millions in the popular vote, with a record number of votes cast this year, many through the mail.
As his vice president, Kamala Harris will make history in myriad ways, becoming the first woman — and the first woman of color — to occupy the office. Harris, a California senator and the state’s former attorney general, built a career in the tech industry’s front yard.
Shattered barriers aside, this year’s election will likely go down in infamy for many in the U.S. The race was the strangest in recent years, characterized by rising storms of misinformation, fears over the fate of scaled-up vote-by-mail systems and a deadly virus that’s claimed well over 230,000 American lives. Biden’s campaign was forced to adapt to drive-up rallies and digital campaigning instead of relying on door-knocking and face-to-face interaction to mobilize the vote.
The circumstances of the election also created the perfect ecosystem for misinformation — a situation made worse by President Trump’s false claim of victory early Wednesday morning and ongoing claims of Democratic voter fraud. Trump appears to be in no mood to concede the election, but in the end the vote is what it is and Joe Biden will take office on January 20, 2021.
While a sitting president rejecting that unwritten democratic norm would be alarming, Trump’s decision will have little bearing on the ultimate political outcome. Whatever the coming days hold, the U.S. is entering into a new and unprecedented phase of uncertainty in which misinformation abounds and political tensions and fears of politically-motivated violence are running high.
The former vice president’s win brings a four year run of Trumpism to an abrupt end, though its effects will still reverberate throughout American politics, likely for decades. It also ushers in a new era in which Joe Biden plans to draw on the influence of an unlikely coalition of Democrats from across the political spectrum. The Senate still hangs in the balance with two tight races in Georgia headed to January runoffs.
Biden has laid out plans for sweeping climate action, and a healthcare extension that would cover more Americans and provide an opt-in Medicare-like public option. But his ability to enact most of those grand plans would hinge on a Democratic Senate. While either party was likely to continue pursuing more aggressive regulation for the technology industry, we’ll be watching closely for signals of what’s to come for tech policy.
But even without the Senate, the president-elect may be capable of making a swift and critical impact where it’s most needed: the coronavirus pandemic. In the continued absence of a national plan to fight the virus and a White House that downplays its deadliness and discourages mask-wearing, COVID-19 is raging out of control in states across the country, signaling a very deadly winter just around the corner.
Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the TechCrunch series that recaps the latest OS news, the applications they support and the money that flows through it all.
The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 204 billion downloads and $120 billion in consumer spending in 2019. People are now spending three hours and 40 minutes per day using apps, rivaling TV. Apps aren’t just a way to pass idle hours — they’re a big business. In 2019, mobile-first companies had a combined $544 billion valuation, 6.5x higher than those without a mobile focus.
Top Stories
Apps and the Elections
The tight, nail-biting U.S. elections this week had a number of impacts on the app market.
Image Credits: Sensor Tower
The apps Americans chose to watch the elections on their iPhone were reflective of the nation’s divisions. Instead of a more neutral news source, like a broadcast network, the top 2 apps were CNN and Fox News — cable news channels that lean left and right, respectively.
On the day after Election Day, the Fox News app hit No. 2 among the top free iPhone apps on the U.S. App Store. This is the highest it has ever ranked. The second-highest ranking it reached was No. 9 on November 9, 2016.
Meanwhile, the CNN app hit No. 3 on the same — its highest rank since it hit No. 2 back on Jan. 20, 2017, the date of Trump’s inauguration. This was also the 3rd highest ever rank. (The app previously reached No, 1 on Nov. 9, 2016).
As of Nov. 5, CNN maintained a top ranking at No. 4 but Fox News slipped to No. 14.
Other news apps didn’t do as well, barely cracking the top 50 at best
Android users showed less interest in the elections, where Fox News only got as high as No. 12 on Nov. 5 and CNN reached No. 16.
Image Credits: Sensor Tower
Image Credits: Sensor Tower
In lighter news from this stressful week, Calm’s meditation app made headlines for its hilarious ad campaign that saw it sponsoring CNN’s coverage of the presidential election. The app popped up on the screen during CNN’s “Key Race Alert.” The move seemed to benefit the app in terms of downloads and rankings.
On social media apps, companies had to react quickly to clamp down on the rapid-fire spread of misinformation and conspiracy theories, and other violating content. Facebook and Instagram ran notifications to inform users that votes were still being counted after Trump falsely claimed he had won.
Facebook also removed conspiracy groups and hashtags associated with election misinformation, as did TikTok. In Facebook’s case, a hashtag block is not a full removal — content will still be returned if you search for a blocked phrase, even if it’s largely from news organizations reporting on the trend. On TikTok, however, a blocked terms returns nothing. TikTok also took more decisive action to fully remove videos spreading election misinformation.
However, for those in the market for misinformation, it’s still fairly easy to find across TikTok, as many other hashtags and terms where misinfo is shared remained untouched.
YouTube, however, took a more controversial stance on its handling of misinformation. The platform this week demonstrated how it’s complicit in the spread of false and dangerous information, when it refused to remove a video that falsely claimed Trump won the election and worked to undermine Americans’ trust in democratic elections. YouTube believes demonetization and warning labels are the solution, but by keeping this content online, it retains users. And then those people do, in fact, watch ads elsewhere, allowing YouTube to profit.
The company did draw the line, at least, at a video from Steve Bannon, that called for violence against and deaths of Anthony Fauci and FBI director Christopher Wray.
According to Sensor Tower, the top social media apps in the U.S. including TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter saw their combined iOS and Android installs from November 3 to November 5 decline 8% week-over-week when compared to the installs from October 27 to October 29.
Right-wing social app Parler, meanwhile, ranked at No. 1,023 on iOS on November 2. On November 5, it had climbed to No. 241. As of Friday, it was No. 29.
Apple rolls out a big update to iOS 14
Apple this week released iOS 14.2, which brings a number of new features in addition to the usual bug fixes and security updates.
Of note to consumers, the update brings 117 new emojis.
Every new emoji in iOS 14.2 https://t.co/qMqdhe4Kff pic.twitter.com/X14PbaFMat
— Emojipedia (@Emojipedia) November 5, 2020
Among the new emoji is a tweaked version of the “Face with Medical Mask,” which changes the face so the eyes are smiling. Other notable additions include the transgender flag, pinched fingers, people hugging, a smiling face with tear, a man bottle-feeding a baby and a more inclusive set of tuxedo-wearing people and people wearing a veil. There’s also a gender-inclusive alternative to Santa and Mrs. Claus, which offers a gender neutral option of a person in a Santa hat.
The updated iOS also offers eight new wallpapers in both light and dark version; new AirPlay controls; the ability to connect the HomePod to Apple TV for stereo, surround sound and Dolby Atmos audio; support for iPhone 12 Leather Sleeve with MagSafe; optimized battery charging for AirPods; headphone audio level notifications; and more.
One of the more interesting new features, however, is an accessibility upgrade for blind users that takes advantage of the lidar support in iPhone 12, 12 Pro Max and iPad Pro.
The “People Detection” features leverages lidar to detect how close people are to the device owner, as a way to help blind users better navigate the world.
Get ready for Apple’s new “app privacy” labels
Image Credits: Apple
Apple this week announced a deadline of December 8, 2020 for app developers to submit their app’s privacy information to the App Store. This information will be required to submit new apps and app updates, and will give consumers a better understanding of how apps are accessing their data.
On each app’s product page following the deadline, users will be able to see what data an app collects and how that data is used to track them, Apple says. This doesn’t only include data the app developers collect themselves, but also data that’s transmitted off the device for later use by the developer or a third-party partner. That means app developers will have to disclose how data is being handed over to analytics tools, ad networks and other third-party SDKs and other vendors.
With this pro-consumer privacy change, Apple customers will know how developers are tracking and/or sharing their personal info, health data, financial information, location, contacts data, user content, browsing and search histories, purchases, app usage, diagnostic and more.
While it’s hard to argue that this is a change for the better, in terms of consumer benefits, Apple’s reasons may not be just about serving their customer base.
By cutting off the ad analytics industry with its upcoming crippling of IDFA and making it more obvious which apps track user data, Apple is putting its own ad tech in a more favored position. Its framework SKAdNetwork hugely benefits from these changes — effectively giving Apple a seat at the table in the multi-billion-dollar ad industry. So, let’s stop pretending this is all about how much Apple cares for its users. This is business.
Weekly News Round-Up
Platforms
- Fortnite finds a way to skirt App Store ban. The game, banned by Apple in a battle over App Store fees, may have another way to reach the iPhone user base by way of Nvidia’s GeForce cloud gaming service that runs on the mobile web.
- WhatsApp rolls out a payments service in India. The Facebook-owned messaging app began testing the service in 2018, but struggled to get government approval. The service, which is built on UPI, offers a challenge to Google and Walmart which currently dominate the mobile payments market in India.
- WhatsApp adds disappearing messages. The new ephemeral messages disappear after seven days and rolled out across iOS and Android. It also made it easier for users to delete large files and manage storage.
- Apple announces a new event. The expectation is that this one will be Mac-focused.
- Apple warns investors that reduced App Store revenues would hurt its financial results. The warning comes amidst increasing regulatory pressure on the App Store, which today requires developers to distribute through its platform to reach iOS users, and requires IAPs through Apple Pay.
Services
- Google Stadia, the cloud gaming service, rolls out Stadia Family Sharing. The feature lets families of up to six share games.
- All the U.K. contact tracing apps are now compatible and work across borders. The separate apps address England & Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland markets, and use the Apple/Google API.
Politics
- PUBG Mobile plots a way to return to the Indian market, after a ban over cybersecurity concerns due to its connections with Chinese giant Tencent. The company is looking for a local publisher.
- Facebook and Instagram added notifications during the tight U.S. election this week to alert users that votes were still being counted. The move follows Trump’s spread of conspiracies that elections were rigged and his lies saying he had won before all votes had been counted.
Security & Privacy
- Google Screenwise is dead. The tracking app, which records users’ web usage, had been in the news last year for improperly using an iOS enterprise certificate for distribution.
Apps in the News
- Spotify adds standalone streaming support to its Apple Watch app. That means users can leave their iPhone behind and stream directly from their Watch over Wi-Fi or cellular.
- Facebook tests “dark mode” on Android. The new dark mode option had been tested earlier on desktop.
- Triller names Daniel Gillick its Global Head of Partnerships. The exec was previously senior manager of music content and industry relations at Triller rival TikTok.
- TikTok signed a new, longer-term agreement with Sony Music. The deal allows the app to continue to offer music from Sony artists in its app.
- TikTok tests iOS 14 “App Clips.” The test was spotted in beta, and would allow users a full-screen preview with a download prompt.
- NBC News launched an iOS 14 widget for putting election news and results on your home screen.
- Pokémon GO reaches $1 billion in 2020; lifetime revenue tops $4 billion, says Sensor Tower.
- Tencent claims record 100 million daily users on mobile game, Honor of Kings. The game consistently ranks among the world’s top-grossing games, as well.
- Match Group reported Tinder subscriber growth despite a pandemic where people are supposed to be social distancing. Tinder had 6.6 million subscribers in the quarter, up from 6.2 million in the prior quarter. Tinder revenue rose 15%, but ARPU slipped 1%.
Trends
- App Store revenue grew 30% year-over-year during the month of October, according to Sensor Tower preliminary data.
- Apple IAPs rose 54% during Q2 according to research from mCommerce agency JMango360.
- 56% of marketers said iOS 14 updates will negatively impact their businesses, due to how Apple’s new consumer privacy protections offer users more ways to block tracking.
- TikTok still tops worldwide downloads in October 2020.
Image Credits: Sensor Tower
Funding and M&A (and IPOs)
- Delivery startup goPuff, whose app lets you order convenience store items and alcohol for same-day delivery, acquires alcoholic beverage chain BevMo for $350 million.
- TikTok parent company ByteDance looking to raise $2 billion before its IPO on the Hong Kong StockExchange.
- Kuaishou Technology, the world’s second-largest short term video app and TikTok rival, filed for IPO in Hong Kong.
- European challenger banking app Vivid Money raises $17.6 million. The bank offers a metal debit card controlled by an app, and other tech-forward features.
Downloads
The Roku Channel app
The recently released app lets anyone, including non-Roku users, stream from Roku’s catalog of free, live and premium movie and TV content on their iOS or Android device. The app also offers more than 115 live channels including live news, weather, sports, food & home, reality TV, science fiction, true crime, kids’ entertainment and Spanish language content.
The Collage Atlas
Looking to wind-down from a week of stress and anxiety? The Apple Arcade game, The Collage Atlas, may help. This unique hand-drawn game created by developer John William Evelyn is a work of art where players are invited to journey through a pen-and-ink dream world, accompanied by a soundtrack shaped by your gameplay. The title, which was in development for more than four years, is more of something to experience than something to more actively “play” — and that may be just what’s needed right now.
