StartupOS launches what it hopes will be the operating system for early-stage startups

Running a startup can be a chaotic time; a million things need to be built, done, tracked, analyzed, considered, reported and validated. Keeping an overview of it all can be hard, and there’s always a threat of something (maybe something important?!) slipping through the cracks. StartupOS today launched a platform to bring some sanity to it all in a bid to help founders stay on track.

The platform was built in partnership with (and backed by) SVB, the parent company of Silicon Valley Bank. It includes access to business tools, guidance, mentors and investors, with the hope that the founders can learn how to best shepherd their startups through the process of validating ideas, building MVPs and finding product-market fit.

Your MVP is neither minimal, viable nor a product

The company is headed up by CEO and co-founder Paul Pluschkell, who spent the past quarter century building startups, and has a handful of successful exits under his belt, including MXNet, IXnet, Spigit, Global Center and Kandy.

“One of the primary reasons startups are successful is because they were empowered from the beginning of their journey with access to the tools, sources of funding, and network needed to support the growth of their company,” shares Pluschkell in a statement to TechCrunch. “Unfortunately, however, not every founder has the same level of empowerment and support due to their background and or geographic location. Through StartupOS, we aim to change that.”

Early next year, the company is adding the ability to connect to a network of investors, turning the StartupOS into a source of early-stage dealflow to interested angels and investors.

StartupOS’s stated mission is that it “aims to dramatically increase the overall number of startups and their probability of success for new, diverse generations of founders.” Which sounds good. As a middle-aged dude with 20+ years of work experience, however, I feel qualified to level this sliver of criticism: It feels a bit rich to have “diverse founders” as a stated goal when the press info features three middle-aged dudes — Mr. Pluschkell (CEO), Mr. Wagner (head of biz dev) and Mr. Dhillon (COO) — with 20+ years of work experience. Adding a woman or some fresher blood to the team might have been a nice touch. When I challenged the StartupOS team on its sausagefest at the top of the pyramid, the company didn’t quite agree.

“We do have a diverse leadership team. In fact, approximately 50% of the top execs at StartupOS are diverse, including women and minorities. Our platform was set up so that startups that would traditionally not have an opportunity for mentorships/investments through accelerators can now have a more direct path to success,” said Pluschkell. “This will be a major advantage for minority-owned businesses that have previously struggled to secure the funding that they need to grow. We are proud of the diversity in our leadership team, and we will continue to hire the best talent, regardless of race, religion, gender and creed.”

Paul Pluschkell, founder and CEO at StartupOS. Image Credits: StartupOS

Curiously, none of the press materials nor the site itself says anything about what the platform is considering as its business model, which made me a little suspicious — from the screenshots, it looks as if the platform is gathering a lot of very valuable data about the various startups, and the old adage is true: If you’re not paying for the product, you are the product. Digging a little deeper, the team shed a bit of light on the road map:

“We have a multi-tiered business model that focuses on the demand side. Startups are free on our platform,” explains Pluschkell. “We will offer a subscription-based service that offers opportunity providers (VCs, accelerators, educational institutions, corporations, etc.) a dashboard to StartupOS companies or enrolled portfolios to view, filter, create watchlists, and connect with Startups on our Platform. We have a Sponsorship & Referral Model that allows for ads on our site for companies that service Startups and can provide services at a discount.”

The company also has a “PowerUP Builder” that enables companies to create PowerUPs (tools that provide learn-by-doing exercises) that work within our platform and create initial awareness by offering a lightweight version of their enterprise tools for startups. The idea is that this is lead gen, in the hope that the startups will subscribe to enterprise services once they raise funds and continue their growth trajectory.

“Later next year we plan to offer a Data Subscription that is aggregated and anonymized data about certain sectors, geographies, business models, and stages of a company lifecycle,” says Pluschkell. “For example, a corporate client in financial services with a StartupOS data subscription can access median revenue growth, cash burn, etc. of pre-Series A financial services startups.”

StartupOS’s terms and conditions were buried at the bottom of the site’s FAQ. Image Credits: StartupOS

I wanted to dig a little deeper and discovered that the site’s privacy policy and terms and conditions aren’t where you’d expect to find them. Instead they were buried at the very bottom of the FAQ. In any case, the T&C’s highlighted that all content (“all information, data, and other content, in any form or medium, that is collected, downloaded, or otherwise received, directly or indirectly, from you […] by or through our Service”) you upload to the site can be shared with other site users in perpetuity, and “You further grant (…) an irrevocable, perpetual, transferable, sublicensable (through multiple tiers), fully paid, royalty-free, and worldwide right and license to use, copy, store, modify, distribute and display Your Content.”

Given how much startup info can be proprietary, I’d probably think twice as to whether I’d want to hand over a bunch of my startup’s information to StartupOS.

I find myself wondering if, given the incredible breadth of startups and the needs of various founders, StartupOS is able to be as broadly useful as it is setting out to be. SaaS companies can often play by a similar playbook, but hardware companies or companies operating in regulated spaces (fintech, medtech, etc.) often have a lot of variety in terms of what the “long pole in the tent” represents. It’ll be interesting to see whether the platform is able to attract startups, and whether it’s able to help them in a way that ends up being efficient.

In any case, StartupOS is one to keep an eye on as it scoops up its first few startups and starts proving its thesis.

StartupOS launches what it hopes will be the operating system for early-stage startups by Haje Jan Kamps originally published on TechCrunch

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T-minus 72 hours left to save on passes to TC Sessions: Space

We’re getting ready to launch a price hike, but you still have time — 72 hours to be precise — to attend TC Sessions: Space 2022 on December 6 in Los Angeles for $199. Will you be in the room?

Click, register and save: Space tech may come with a jaw-dropping price tag, but this space conference doesn’t. Buy your pass before December 2 at 11:59 p.m. PST — prices go up to $495 at midnight. Why pay more if you don’t have to?

Let’s take a gander at just some programming we have lined up for the day. Check out the event agenda for specifics on all the speakers, topics and times.

TechCrunch Space Pitch-off: You can improve your own pitch by watching how the VC judges react and by the questions they ask. It’s a window into what might make them decide to schedule a meeting with you. We’ll announce the competitors soon, and they’ll have to deliver their very best to impress our panel of expert judges: Jory Bell (Playground Global), Mark Boggett (Seraphim Space), Tess Hatch (Bessemer Ventures) and Emily Henriksson (Root Ventures).

Gearing Up the Next Generation of Scientists, Explorers and Robots: As chief technologist of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Carolyn Mercer has her finger on the pulse across countless projects to explore and understand our planet and solar system. As priorities and methods shift in the Artemis era, Mercer can speak to how tech helps us move forward and how NASA’s unique insights and well of talent can put it to use.

Space Station Shake-up: Commercial space stations are all the rage these days, especially with the mission end in sight for the existing ISS. Blue Origin has announced Orbital Reef, a “mixed-use business park” in low Earth orbit. We’ll talk with Shahir Gerges — director of business strategy at Orbital Reef, Blue Origin — about the orbital economy and what we can expect from privately operated successors to the ISS.

Of course you’ll have plenty of time during the day for networking. The event app makes it easy to find and connect with the people who can drive your mission forward. Use it to schedule meetings in advance, on the fly — or you can roll old-school, like, you know, strike up a conversation in the exhibition area or between sessions. You never know what opportunities a brief meeting or casual conversation might present.

TC Sessions: Space 2022 takes place on December 6 in Los Angeles, but you have only three days left until that $199 deal leaves orbit. Buy your pass by December 2 at 11:59 p.m. PST. The price increases to $495 at midnight. Don’t space out on serious savings!

Is your company interested in sponsoring or exhibiting at TC Sessions: Space? Contact our sponsorship sales team by filling out this form.

 

T-minus 72 hours left to save on passes to TC Sessions: Space by Lauren Simonds originally published on TechCrunch

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Dems In Array! Hakeem Jeffries Vote Is Unanimous, Meanwhile

If there is one thing we all learned from Nancy Pelosi’s incredible career as Speaker, it is that math counts.

_______

Editor's Note (Frances Langum): Democrats know how to count to 100%, which is how many Hakeem Jeffries got for the Democratic Leadership position. Dems in array! Congrats to Hakeem!

House Democrats elected Rep. Hakeem Jeffries to serve as minority leader becoming the first new Democratic leader in 2 decades & the first Black lawmaker to lead a major political party in either chamber of Congress

Jefferies ran unopposed for minority leader

— Mona Salama (@MonaSalama_) November 30, 2022

MEANWHILE...

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K-Mac is terrible at math.

McCarthy's math problem

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)... is at risk of a humiliating and potentially career-ending defeat with just five weeks until the Jan. 3 speaker election, as several members of the right-wing House Freedom Caucus are still publicly vowing to deny him crucial votes.

So how bad is it? Bad (Emphasis mine):

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Apple’s iOS 16.1.2 update just dropped with security fixes and crash detection improvements

Apple rolled out iOS 16.1.2 on Wednesday, citing updates involving user security. Apple hasn’t yet detailed the nature of the security updates, as the company doesn’t disclose security issues until after they’ve been investigated or patched.

The update also includes improved compatibility with wireless carriers, as well as crash detection optimizations for iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Pro models. Crash detection, which was announced at Apple’s September event, is a new feature that triggers Emergency SOS if it suspects you’ve been in a crash. While this feature could be life-saving in certain situations, users have reported issues in which crash detection is falsely triggered while riding roller coasters. Apple doesn’t outright name the roller coaster issue in its patch notes, but it’s a bug that’s been on adrenaline-seeking customers’ minds.

To update to the latest version of iOS, navigate to your iPhone’s settings. Then, click “general.” At the top of your screen, you should see a tab called “software updates” that will allow you to check for new versions of iOS.

Apple offers a deeper dive into crash detection

Apple’s iOS 16.1.2 update just dropped with security fixes and crash detection improvements by Amanda Silberling originally published on TechCrunch

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Netflix launches 9 more mobile games, including Gameloft’s ‘FarmVille’ clone

Netflix released nine more mobile games this month, the company announced on Tuesday. The addition of games brings Netflix’s total to over 40 titles, keeping the streamer on track to have more than 50 titles in its mobile games catalog by the end of 2022.

Newly added games include “Country Friends,” the “FarmVille” clone developed by Gameloft; “Reigns” Three Kingdoms,” a card-swiping strategy game; “Skies of Chaos,” an arcade-style shoot-em-up game; “Flutter Butterflies,” a game for butterfly collectors and “Cats & Soups,” a relaxing cooking game. Other new titles include “Hello Kitty Happiness Parade,” “Immortality,” “Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales” and a TV game, “Triviaverse.”

Gameloft released “Country Friends” in 2015 when FarmVille and Hay Day were at their peak. “Country Friends” offers the same experience as the other farm management games, but it’s likely Netflix hopes that players will want to check out the game for yet another way to fulfill their farmer fantasies.

The company re-launched “Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales,” based on its hit series. Developed by Next Games, “Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales” used to be free on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. However, Netflix has since purchased the game, and it’s now exclusively available to Netflix subscribers. Netflix acquired Next Games in March for $72 million.

A match-3 puzzle RPG adventure game, “Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales” lets players fight the Demogorgon, collect and level-up characters from the show as well as enjoy different storylines and quests.

There are already two other “Stranger Things” mobile games in Netflix’s library–“Stranger Things: 1984” and “Stranger Things 3: The Game.”

The streaming giant tends to rely on well-known games and IP to beef up its library. For instance, Netflix released the “Hello Kitty Happiness Parade” yesterday, November 29, which feels like a slower version of “Subway Surfers” and “Temple Run.” Featuring adorable characters from the Sanrio universe, such as Hello Kitty, My Melody and Pompompurin, “Hello Kitty Happiness Parade” lets players join Hello Kitty’s friends in a festive parade where they can show off their dance moves. Players must avoid traps set by Kuromi and Nyanmi to keep the party going.

Only Netflix subscribers can play its mobile games. However, there are no extra fees, ads, or in-app purchases. The games are available on iOS and Android devices and can be found within the Netflix mobile app. Once you click on a game, you will be redirected to the app store to download the game separately. You must have your Netflix login information to play.

As we’ve previously learned, a reported average of 1.7 million users play Netflix games daily, which is less than 1% of its streaming subscriber base. Despite this, Netflix continues to invest in gaming. Last month at TechCrunch Disrupt, Netflix VP of Gaming Mike Verdu revealed that Netflix was opening a new studio in Southern California and is venturing into cloud gaming.

Also, earlier this month, Netflix added “Triviaverse” to its interactive series lineup. Players must answer questions as quickly as they can using the TV remote before time is up.

Netflix launches a new interactive trivia experience, ‘Triviaverse’

Netflix launches 9 more mobile games, including Gameloft’s ‘FarmVille’ clone by Lauren Forristal originally published on TechCrunch

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USA Beats Iran 1-0 In World Cup, Advances To The Knockout Round

The United States men's soccer team has advanced to the knockout round in the 2022 World Cup after Christian Pulisic scored a first half goal and held on for the victory at Al Thumama Stadium.

The USMNT has finished second in Group B and will play the Netherlands on Saturday.

Christian Pulisic, who plays for Chelsea in the EPL, gave up his body and scored on a perfect cross from Sergino Dest at the 38th minute and the young American squad held on for the 1-0 victory.

Leading up to this game, there was a lot of controversy surrounding Iran and United States in Qatar, which put another spin on the game, but in the end the players on both teams played hard.

This is the first time the USA has made it to the round of 16 since 2014.

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Magic creator Richard Garfield on why he put a paper game on the blockchain

Richard Garfield is a name familiar to many in the tabletop gaming world, most notably as one of the creators of Magic: The Gathering, the most prominent trading card game out there. But Garfield is dipping his toes into the world of digital and in particular blockchain-adjacent games, and TechCrunch took the opportunity to quiz the veteran gamemaker on the pros and cons of this and other new approaches to gaming.

It should be noted at the outset that unlike the dubious profit-focused gameplay of your Axie Infinity and suchlike, Garfield’s new game, technically a “mode” of Blockchain Brawlers, is not focused on speculation but more of an experiment in distribution of a complete card-based game outside traditional publishing methods.

It should probably also be noted that the game platform is full of the usual NFT and monetization chatter, but the core game itself, a 1v1 bluffing style match, is capable of being played with ordinary playing cards or for that matter numbered pieces of paper. I played a few rounds with him that way and it’s actually quite fun and straightforward (I would like to state for the record that I was in a fair way to win but we had to stop early). A follow-up game unrelated to Garfield’s design and which uses more rarity/stat/token-focused mechanics is underway for a separate release in 2023.

TC: Why is introducing blockchains, tokens and things into game design worth it? When you have consumer fears about things like FTX… I know that they’re very different, but why is the why is the asset worth the risk?

Garfield: There’s some benefits of not being tied to paper, and there’s some benefits of not being digital. In the digital space, the opportunity to sell people games which are digital but ownable has some appeal. In particular, when you sort of contrast what’s evolved in other digital spaces, where there’s so much free to play, which has a lot of negative baggage along with whatever positive it brings to the table.

TC: Of course, FTX can crash and that has nothing to do with, you know, a tracking mechanism for ownership of a card or whatever. But in the minds of consumers, they can be conflated. Is that is that just a consumer education thing? Or is that a branding thing?

Garfield: It’s all the above and more. It’s also a designer and a publisher choice. I think there’s some natural caution in this space, because so much of the design has been in an area which I don’t think is healthy for games, which is trying to conflate it with speculation — which I’ve got a lot of experience with, because this was the environment which Magic: The Gathering began in. And it was very poisonous for the gameplay to have people basically buying just to see their money go up. Because it got in the way of the game as a game.

Image Credits: Blockchain Brawlers

A lot of the designers and publishers these days are embracing that and saying, ‘join this game now, make a lot of money.’ That’s not healthy for game design, but is not intrinsically a part of players ownership of digital assets anymore. The negative qualities of free to play, for instance, aren’t intrinsically a part of free to play. It’s just there’s some things that are difficult to avoid, because of the way the revenue model works. And players these days, with digital ownership are, it’s natural for them to conflate that with the speculation bubble, in the same way that a player who engages free to play, it’s always going to be a danger for them to think that’s it’s pay to win, or it’s some sort of hustle. But there is some confusion, and some reasons for that confusion.

TC: At the beginning of Magic, I’m curious what kind of blowback you got at the time regarding both the business model and the unanticipated hoarding of valuable cards, taking them out of play. Was there skepticism that this was a valid gaming model, and a valid business model? And do you think that kind of reaction is also happening now?

A lot of the designers and publishers these days are embracing that and saying, ‘join this game now, make a lot of money.’ That’s not healthy for game design, but is not intrinsically a part of players ownership of digital assets anymore.

Garfield: Yes, there was some skepticism. And, and it actually took a lot of effort to get past that. And it was quite divisive inside Wizards of the Coast itself. The problem was that as the prices went up with speculation, everybody drew comparison to the comic book market or Cabbage Patch Kids or whatever people collected, and got really popular, and then always busted.

I wasn’t very educated in that area when when I began, because I didn’t pay much attention to collectibles. But very quickly, I adopted the idea that this speculation was just awful for gameplay, that there was no upside for the players.

We had to really work to bust that cycle – intentionally overprinted, for example, because we had to make it so that it wasn’t appealing to collect. When we finally managed to do that, there were some people at the company that thought we had sunk the product. And some players did, because they saw the value of their collection go down. But the game just blossomed at that point. And in the end, that’s what it was about: it was a game. It became very clear that the people who were playing the game were doing it because they loved the gameplay, not because of any investment.

TC: Do you think that something similar will have to happen now with digital ownership? How do you prove that model out? Because I know that people will people will be skeptical like, ‘how do I know I’m not gonna get the rug pulled out on me once I invest a couple 100 bucks in this game?’

Garfield: You really have to trust your publisher. When you’re doing a tradable object game, the publisher can always mess it up.

Image Credits: Blockchain Brawlers

On the other hand, people don’t buy Settlers of Catan and worry about whether the publisher is going to screw that by making their game weaker; they’ve got the game, and they can play it. And that is, to me, the potential appeal of digital ownership, that is that people don’t necessarily have to rely on the publisher. They only have to rely on the publisher to be fair when they’re in charge of some ongoing environment.

TC: How do we move forward on that ownership piece to a point where people can say, ‘Hey, I paid my 50 bucks, I have that digital copy.’ People will trust Steam for a PC game. But if it gets more complicated with, you know, NFT based instances of cards and things like that.

Garfield: Well, it’s a matter of, if you’re having your game engine being provided by somebody, you’ve got to trust them. That’s the end of the story. Here you have other avenues. Whether those will evolve or not depends on the community, and you know, whether there’s people who are interested enough to pursue that.

I should point out that, with the game that I’ve worked on here, I was very firmly in the board game category, in the sense that the game that’s been provided is something where there’s no distinction between what players own — it’s a completely fair game. Really, it was the only reason I became interested in the project, because the publisher said they backed me on that.

[Note: Players can own different “moves” and cosmetics but the gameplay elements, essentially the numbers 1-8 and some other minor things, are functionally the same for all even though they are treated as NFTs or some other owned digital item. These items may serve different purposes in other modes or games.]

That part of the game is always there for people, like they can play it themselves, or somebody can code a new framework for it. And it’s simple enough that that’s not hard. This really is a very close to a traditional game, in the sense that you buy a box and you can play.

TC: I feel like my readers are going to ask, well, why am I not just buying this game on Steam? Or what is what is really the improvement over a free to play situation where, you know, if there’s 50 cards, I pay $50. And now I’ve got all the cards. What really are the advantages that you see in this approach versus the traditional publishing or a free to play model?

Garfield: Frankly, I think that the advantages have been overstated by a lot of people. And in fact, that’s what’s kept me out of it for so long is that I really didn’t see the advantage over a server based system for a long time. The key thing which got me involved is just how hard it is to get certain games done in the digital space, because of this free to play expectation.

Like there’s a lot of games that, in theory, yeah, you could just put it on Steam, or put it up on iOS and have people download and play it. But you actually can’t do that, because you can’t charge for it. And if you put it up for free, you got to pay for it. And if you start attaching some free to play monetization to it, you’ve got advertisements or, you know, you got to fill a bar, or do cosmetics, or something which may not be of interest to designers or the players.

The key thing which got me involved is just how hard it is to get certain games done in the digital space, because of this free to play expectation.

So the game that’s being done here, for example, it could be done on Steam, or it could be done on iOS. But the games I’ve done in the past, which are in this description have been really hard to get going because of this, because you’ve got to make it free. And then you’ve got to put in ads or something. So I’m being drawn to it in the same way that I really like working with paper publishers, because I can say: ‘here’s a card game,’ and they can print it, put it in a box, sell it to people. And nobody complains about that as a revenue model.

TC: There’s obviously there’s been this huge renaissance of tabletop gaming. Everybody loves it, everybody’s playing with paper, everybody’s playing with cardboard and wood, and it’s great. But then you also have crossover successes, like Gloomhaven, which has a great digital version and paper version. I’m curious how you think it’ll play out over the next few years as analog and digital gaming both become more popular, and continue to cross pollinate one another.

Garfield: That’s a really exciting area. I could talk for a long time on that. I’ve been really interested in that space. I first began to think about it back in, I guess, the late 90s, where I just was struck by how I liked computer games, I like board games. And then I would play whatever, TF [Team Fortress]. I would play some digital shooter or something like that, and then I would play Scrabble.

And I’d think, how are these even in the same space? They’re just such different experiences, and why aren’t there more games sort of that are like the board games I love, but taking advantage of all the things which have to be offered digitally.

So to see more and more examples of that, including, like, Slay the Spire, these games, which have this sensibility really rooted in traditional gameplay, but taking full advantage of what the computer has to offer, and not making you just play twitch games or something like that… It’s a very exciting area, I’m really excited to see where it goes, and happy to contribute anything to it where I can.

Magic creator Richard Garfield on why he put a paper game on the blockchain by Devin Coldewey originally published on TechCrunch

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'Purely Political': Judge Smacks Down Trump's Immunity Claim

Donald Trump is facing a lot of legal woes, including the Supreme Court's ruling that the former President will have to hand over his tax returns to a House committee that has been seeking them. And Republican-appointed appeals court judges didn't appear too keen on his latest bid to slow the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case. On Monday, a federal judge ruled that Trump can't claim presidential immunity to avoid a lawsuit that accuses him of civil rights violations in his efforts to undermine the results of the 2020 election.

Via Bloomberg:

Trump had argued that he was "absolutely immune" from damages for actions within the "outer perimeter" of his official duties as President and that his post-election activities in 2020 were part of an effort to protect and defend the Constitution.

But US District Judge Emmet Sullivan in Washington agreed with the challengers -- the NAACP and Michigan voters and advocates -- that Trump's conduct was "purely political," according to the ruling.

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AWS adds automated agent monitoring to Amazon Contact Center

AWS introduced Contact Center, its customer service oriented product some years ago, putting it smack dab in the middle of enterprise applications. It also places the company in the position of competing directly with the likes of Salesforce and other established enterprise SaaS vendors.

When you are competing in that space, you need some powerful features, and today at AWS re:invent in Las Vegas, AWS CEO Adam Selipsky introduced three features to help bring more automation to managing Amazon Contact Centers running on AWS.

For starters, the company is introducing new performance management capabilities under Contact Lens for Amazon Connect designed to help managers identify CSAs who are having issues. The solution uses a combination of performance review forms and machine learning-driven voice analytics to review job performance.

In reality, it’s supposed to help identify agents who might need additional training or coaching. “These reduce the time the contact center managers spend identifying performance issues and helping to coach agents,” Selipsky explained today. Employees could see it differently (the bot says I didn’t answer correctly).

Somewhat along the same lines, AWS is also introducing a new capability to guide agents through customer interaction so they can resolve issues faster and in a more consistent manner. This should help reduce the number of mistakes, and the need for the prior feature (at least in theory).

Image Credits: AWS

The company also announced the general availability of Amazon Connect forecasting, which was originally announced in March this year. It’s designed to help contact center managers optimize agent schedules and ensure that they have the right people available.

“Connect is a great example of how the cloud is removing constraints to reimagine business challenges like delivering better customer service,” Selipsky said, something that SaaS companies have known all along, but for AWS, which tends to concentrate on infrastructure and platform pieces, it is a different approach.

AWS adds automated agent monitoring to Amazon Contact Center by Ron Miller originally published on TechCrunch

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AWS gets data clean rooms for analytics data

AWS today launched a new service that will help users inside an advertising or marketing organization share data with other employees inside their company or with outside partners, all without running the risk of inadvertently sharing personal data.

This new service is part of Amazon’s new AWS for Advertising & Marketing initiative, which aims to leverage existing AWS services — and those from its partners — to provide purpose-built services for them. Clean Rooms is the first major new product of this initiative.

“Data clean rooms are protected environments where multiple parties can analyze combined data without ever exposing the raw data have emerged as a solution,” AWS CEO Adam Selipsky explained in today’s keynotes. “The clean rooms are hard to build. Their complex requirements take months to develop and once you’ve built a clean room you have to continuously update the data all the while meeting requests for new collaborators and data types.”

A company that has a customer’s loyalty data, for example, could collaborate with another that has data on a user’s ad-clicking behavior to create new insights into a user’s behavior, all without every sharing that user’s raw and identifiable data, Selipsky argued.

“With these insights, we can produce even more relevant ads while maintaining privacy for everyone to get started,” he said. “Brands and media publishers use the clean room console or the API and they set up a clean room and start collaborating with other companies in just a few clicks. So instead of spending months of development time to customize the types of queries and restrictions, you just need to allow partners to run these clean rooms with you.”

The idea here is to provide a single service that companies can use to collaborate on data while still protecting the underlying data, using a set of configurable controls. All collaborators can contribute their own data, be it in plain text, hashed, or pre-encrypted. Then, they can use these clean rooms to collaborate on this data, all without revealing the raw data to each other.

In total, there can be up to five collaborators and their data is stored in an AWS Glue Data Catalog. When anyone runs a query over this data, Clean Rooms will read it, wherever it lives, and then the service will automatically apply the pre-set rules to protect each participant’s raw data. Each table can have its own rules, which restrict the type of query that is allowed. Encrypted data will remain encrypted when these queries are run.

“Customers in the advertising and marketing industry have been seeking new ways to interoperate with their partners while protecting consumer data and reducing heavy lifting from their engineering teams,” said Tim Barnes, director of solutions for advertising & marketing technology at AWS. “With the launch of AWS Clean Rooms and AWS for Advertising & Marketing, AWS customers now have a broad set of solutions that make it easier for them to securely collaborate together, operate cost-effectively at petabyte scale and millisecond latency, and innovate more quickly in areas like advertising measurement and customer experience.”

AWS gets data clean rooms for analytics data by Frederic Lardinois originally published on TechCrunch

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Steve Bannon Whines: Arizona Certified A Stolen Election

Steve Bannon proclaimed on Real America's Voice the Arizona election was stolen soon after after Maricopa County’s five supervisors voted unanimously to certify the results of the Nov. 8 election.

Speaking with MAGA proponents from Gateway Pundit and Law and Border, Bannon was pissed at the supervisors that certified the election.

"Is there any doubt in their mind that this election could not be certified -- basically they approved a stolen election, sir?" Bannon said and asked

"Yeah, no doubt at all, They know they certified their own fraud," Jordan Conradson said.

Law and Border RAV MAGA nut Ben Bergquam joined in.

"There is no question that the voters of Arizona don't believe that this vote can be certified. That this election can be certified," Bergquam claimed.

Jack Posobiec came on later and it warmed the cockles of my heart to see their unhinged ranting about another election they lost.

I do fear for anyone involved in elections because these ravings may lead to mass shootings in the future.

All three praised the insane antics from the Christian Nationalists that were spewing biblical gibberish about God, Hell, and the apocalypse at the supervisors.

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Elon Musk’s next trick? Picking a fight with Apple

After decimating Twitter’s workforce, imperiling its infrastructure and emptying its ad coffers all within his first month at the company, it’s on to the next thing for Elon Musk.

The erratic billionaire picked a fight with Apple in a series of tweets on Monday, bracing for a battle — or perhaps just another volley of tweets — that would comfortably position the perpetually aggrieved Twitter owner as the David to Apple’s Goliath.

Musk is now claiming that Apple threatened to “withhold” Twitter from the App Store, implying that the iPhone maker might take action against the social app over changes under its new ownership without offering any evidence of that. TechCrunch has reached out to Apple for clarification, but for now we don’t know if Apple really contacted Twitter over content moderation concerns or something else entirely.

Apple has also threatened to withhold Twitter from its App Store, but won’t tell us why

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 28, 2022

Apple has mostly stopped advertising on Twitter. Do they hate free speech in America?

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 28, 2022

Twitter’s new owner also claims that Apple has pulled most of its advertising on the platform, which seems possible or even likely considering how many other major ad buyers have done the same since Musk’s takeover, citing concerns about brand safety and content moderation changes.

Whatever is really going on here, a few things are true. For one, Twitter needs to stay in the App Store and to do so it needs to clear Apple’s low bar for content moderation, which Truth Social and Parler — apps with far less mature algorithmic content moderation systems — have managed to do. Even with Musk’s threatened policy changes and his deep cuts to moderation teams, Twitter would likely still remain on Apple’s good side if those apps pulled it off.

Google blocks Truth Social from the Play Store — Will Apple be next?

It’s also true that Apple’s rules for what gets an app get kicked out of the App Store are vague and arbitrarily enforced. Apple warns against “content that is offensive, insensitive, upsetting, intended to disgust, in exceptionally poor taste, or just plain creepy” which would seem to rule out a lot of social apps, pre-Musk Twitter included, if it really came down to it.

At the same time that Musk is portraying Apple as a censor, he’s also railing against the fees the company charges apps that operate in its ecosystem. Musk calls this a “secret 30% tax” but in reality Apple’s cut is well-documented and much-discussed. Epic Games and Apple went to court over Apple’s fees in 2020, with Epic arguing that the iPhone maker wields monopoly power in the software market.

pic.twitter.com/uKEY9mVujp

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 28, 2022

Whether intentional or not, Musk reigniting the App Store antitrust battle is timely. Epic’s ongoing fight with Apple is kicking off again in appeals court and Congress could be poised for another push to pass the Open Markets Act, a bipartisan bill that would crack open the App Store and “tear down coercive anticompetitive walls in the app economy,” according to its sponsors.

It’s also possible that Apple actually has cautioned Musk that reinstating thousands of accounts banned for stuff like hate speech and harassment might nudge the app afoul of the App Store’s actually quite lenient content moderation requirements. In that case, Musk could position himself as a high profile champion of the anti-Apple crowd, joining Epic’s whole thing and making nice with regulators who are rightfully concerned over Musk’s Twitter plans (or lack thereof).

But even then, Twitter needs Apple in both the short and long term and Apple certainly doesn’t need Twitter. And fighting on yet another front would stretch Musk’s attention even more when he should probably be focused on the basics, like running his myriad other companies or not bankrupting Twitter, say. You can be mad that Apple takes 30 percent of what you make on the iPhone, but 30 percent of zero is still zero.

At the end of the day, Musk, the world’s literal richest man and maker of luxury cars and spaceships, generally seems to enjoy portraying himself as a scrappy upstart fighting against larger powers that be. If Musk wants to recreate that dynamic at Twitter, Apple is arguably one of the only entities that can still make the hugely influential social media company look like the little guy. Musk might be the Twitter boss now, but he knows that turning everyone against the big boss is a good way to maintain the approval of the miscellaneous internet devotees that affirm his existing beliefs and vote in his deeply unscientific tweet polls, so maybe it’s just about that.

Whatever inspired his anti-Apple tirade, waging a war on Apple is probably a losing fight. But it’s a fresh conflict that diverts attention from Musk’s embarrassing and seemingly endless parade of catastrophes as he fumbles Twitter’s policy, personnel and product alike, possibly running one of the world’s biggest social networks into the ground in the process.

The Epic Games-Apple antitrust battle resumes today in appeals court

Elon Musk’s next trick? Picking a fight with Apple by Taylor Hatmaker originally published on TechCrunch

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Marge Wants Us To Know Trump Is 'Just Sick' Over Jailed J6 Insurrectionists

Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) revealed that former President Donald Trump and former First Lady Melania Trump are both "just sick" because some Jan. 6 defendants are still behind bars.

During an interview with right-wing podcaster Steve Bannon on Saturday, Greene explained that she had posted a thread of messages defending the former president on Twitter. Greene said that she was trying to enjoy the Thanksgiving holiday when she saw Twitter users angry at Trump for failing to pardon the Jan. 6 defendants.

"I thought, this is ridiculous; they're lying about him," the lawmaker recalled. "People are lying about him. The very idea that he could have pardoned all the Jan. 6 defendants before he left the White House on Jan. 20 is impossible because the high majority of those people weren't even arrested until after he left office!"

"And he didn't even know them!" she continued. "He had no idea who they are. He doesn't know who they are still. He had nothing to do with what they did on Jan. 6, um, so it would have been impossible for him to magically know how to find these people and pardon them."

Greene said that she gave a report about the Jan. 6 defendants to Trump and the former first lady.

"President Trump and Melania were both just sick over what they learned," she revealed. "And he said over and over that he will — he will pardon the Jan. 6 defendants."

"This is real political persecution," Greene added. "And it shouldn't be happening in America and so the criticism on President Trump is ridiculous!"

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Move over, operators — consultants are the new nontraditional VC

Operating experience has become a buzzword over the last few years as venture capitalists pump up their resumes in a quest to set themselves apart from other sources of startup capital. Now, it seems that we are seeing the next evolution of that trend.

This year has seen a wave of startup consultant firms looking to raise venture funds of their own to take stakes in companies they are already working with or that align with their practice. In theory, this makes total sense because both consultants and venture capitalists have the same goal at the end of the day: helping companies grow.

“Most come on board because we provide the capital, plus. What is that plus? The plus with us is storytelling.” FNDR CEO James Vincent

But why are so many consultant-led venture capital funds launching now? It’s a particularly rough time in the broader venture market, and economy in general, in addition to being one of the toughest periods for emerging managers and first-time fundraisers. It’s worth noting that all of these funds are raising outside capital as opposed to investing off their balance sheets.

For one thing, the startups they were already working with were asking them to.

Move over, operators — consultants are the new nontraditional VC by Rebecca Szkutak originally published on TechCrunch

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What’s the next on crypto’s chopping block?

It’s me! Hi! (I’m not the problem, just the podcast’s host, here to bring you the latest greatest in startup and tech news this fine Monday morning). Welcome back to Equity, the podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines. And for those of you who hummed the first sentence of this post, extra points to you.

I’m starting things off this week as a test run before Alex heads on paternity leave. We have lots to get to, so shake off the holiday feels and let’s remember how this ecosystem works?

Here’s what we got to:

•  The markets are broadly down, due to COVID-19 protests breaking out in China.
•  Blockfi filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Our crypto reporter Jacquelyn Melinek has more on what happened – and she explains just how intertwined this universe is. I’ll also get to notes I took from our recent crypto conference and how the reality may be looking like Web 2.5 before it looks like Web 3.0.
• We also talk about Amazon’s three-pronged retreat, and the common thread of India between them all.
• After that, some good news from all-women led venture firm Pact and its debut fund. More funding for climate startups, please. Tim keeps writing about really cool ones.
• We end with a note on Pipe, a $2 billion fintech that announced all of its co-founders are stepping down from their roles last week. Soon after that decision was announced, rumors and allegations began flying about tensions under the hood at the fintech. Mary Ann Azevedo has the story and keep reading the site today for the follow up. As I said on Twitter, on one end, when three founders step down in a single moment, people are undoubtedly going to talk and worry (out loud) about the stability of the company.

That was fun. Thanks for letting me spend a bit of your Monday with you. More to come! You can follow me on Twitter @nmasc_ or on Instagram @natashathereporter. 

Equity drops at 7 a.m. PT every Monday and Wednesday, and at 6 a.m. PT on Fridays, so subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. TechCrunch also has a great show on crypto, a show that interviews founders, one that details how our stories come together, and more!

What’s the next on crypto’s chopping block? by Natasha Mascarenhas originally published on TechCrunch

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Microsoft 365 faces darkening GDPR compliance clouds after German report

Legal trouble may be brewing for Microsoft in the European Union where an assessment by a working group of German data protection regulators that’s spent around two years looking into a swathe of privacy concerns attached to its cloud-based 365 productivity products — including by engaging directly with the tech giant to try to get it to fix compliance issues — has found Microsoft has still not been able to resolve any of the compliance problems they’ve raised with it.

The working group’s update could crank up pressure on Microsoft 365 customers in Germany — and elsewhere in the European Union where the same data protection framework applies and other regulators are also investigating cloud services’ GDPR compliance — to reassess usage of its software and/or seek out less compliance-challenged alternatives.

The EU’s data protection supervisor (EDPS), which oversees the bloc’s own institutions’ GDPR compliance, has been looking into the European Commission’s use of Microsoft Office 365 since May last year — as well as probing EU bodies’ use of Amazon’s cloud services.

The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) also kicked off a related coordinated enforcement action in February that it said would focus on public sectors use of cloud services — which it said would take about a year to report, with the aim for the action to harmonize regulatory interventions in this area.

“Use of non-compliant ICT products and services by the public sector threatens the protection of personal data of all EU residents,” the EDPS wrote in an update on its probe in April (which also does not appear to have concluded and finally reported yet). “Public sector bodies at national and EU level have a duty to lead by example, including when it comes to outsourcing and transfers of personal data within and outside the EEA [European Economic Area].”

Public sector bodies’ use of cloud services probed in joint EU data protection enforcement

Microsoft announced some changes to its cloud contact terms in Europe back in 2019, following an earlier warning by the EDPS raising serious concerns — and after a Dutch ministry obtained some contractual changes and technical safeguards and settings in amended contracts it agreed with Microsoft that year after it requested changes — but it remains to be seen how the data supervisor will assess GDPR compliance for use of its cloud services now.

For one thing, it’s a more complicated situation for EU-US data transfers at present, in the wake of the July 2020 Schrems II CJEU ruling — and still with no replacement transatlantic data transfers agreement formally adopted by the bloc.

President Biden signs executive order aimed at legal reboot of EU-US data flows

German working group weighs in

The German working group’s report is focused on assessing Microsoft 365 (née Microsoft Office 365)’s compliance with certain provisions of the pan-EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) — after an earlier assessment by a local regulator, in January 2020, found that “no data protection-compliant use of Microsoft Office 365 is possible”.

Among the ongoing issues raised by the group are concerns over a lack of clarity and precision in Microsoft’s contracts and processing for 365, and the legal base it claims to process data — including for what it describes as “legitimate business purposes”.

The working group said a central theme of the talks was trying to determine in which cases Microsoft acts as a data controller, which carries a more expansive set of responsibilities under EU data protection law (e.g. accountability obligations), and in which scenarios it’s only a processor (as the 365 customer is the controller) — but their summary concludes: “This could not be conclusively clarified.”

They also query the viability of Microsoft relying on a “legitimate interest” ground as a legal base for processing data for its own purposes where 365 customers are public sector organizations like schools, with the group raising doubts that it can be applied in that context.

Their report also questions the sufficiency of additional technical and organizational measures added by Microsoft in response to concerns about the safety of exported data — arguing that legal uncertainties remain over the claimed security measures which it points out only cover a subset of personal data subject to the contract.

In a statement accompanying the report, the Datenschutzkonferenz (DSK) — a steering body for Germany’s decentralized application of data protection law — said it’s not possible for users of Microsoft’s cloud-based software to demonstrate compliance in spite of a series of changes it made to its 365 contracts in a data protection addendum from September 2022 which are assessed as being only “minor improvements” compared to the problems identified.

Or, put another way, the group’s conclusion is there’s currently no way to use Microsoft 365 in compliance with the GDPR.

Summarizing their assessment of Microsoft’s response to earlier compliance concerns, the group said it was not able to achieve “any significant improvements” in contract wording, as regards types and purposes of processing — noting that comprehensive descriptions and details are still lacking.

While it has taken the view that contractual amendments made by Microsoft as a result of this regulatory engagement — with regards to its own processing for so-called “business activities” (previously described in its contracts as “legitimate business purposes”) — are also superficial wording tweaks that do not bring any “substantial improvements”.

On that, the report refers to a statement made by Microsoft that it has not actually made any adjustments to its processing activities. The group’s assessment remains, therefore, that Microsoft continues to grant itself insufficiently limited rights for certain types of processing.

Microsoft’s large-scale collection of telemetry and diagnostic data — under what legal basis — is another concern for the regulators, with the group suggesting the data is processed by Microsoft “fundamentally for self-interested purposes” — which they point out is a particular challenge for public sector users of 365 to be able to justify under the GDPR.

Data transfers out of the EU are another area of focus, given ongoing legal uncertainties related to EU data exports to third countries like the US (and the group points out it’s not currently possible to use Microsoft 365 without data being processed in the US). As are concerns about legal issues arising as a result of US laws like the Cloud Act and FISA 702 — which could compel Microsoft to hand over customer data, which runs counter to EU privacy laws that require data to be adequate protected outside the bloc as well as within.

The working group points out that many 365 services require Microsoft to access customer data in the clear — meaning the obvious fix of applying strong encryption is not regularly available in this cloud service context.

Microsoft’s policies towards retention and deletion of data also do not always meet the requirements set out in the GDPR, per the group’s report.

They are also unimpressed by the level of notification and detail Microsoft provides to customers about sub-processors/sub-contractors — which is says falls below the specificity afforded in the updated Standard Contractual Clauses template provided by the European Commission last year.

Contacted for a response to the working group’s criticisms, Microsoft sent us this statement:

“Microsoft 365 products meet the highest industry standards for the protection of privacy and data security. We respectfully disagree with the concerns raised by the Datenschutzkonferenz and have already implemented many suggested changes to our data protection terms. We remain committed to working with the DSK to address any remaining concerns.”

It also pointed to a blog post it published in German (the same statement is here in English translation) in which it expands on its claim of no EU privacy law concerns attached to Microsoft 365 products — arguing that the DSK’s concerns “do not appropriately reflect” changes it claims to have already undertaken and making a further assertion that the working group has misunderstood how its services operate and measures (and “significant changes”) it says it’s already implemented.

Microsoft gives examples of “an improved notification process for subprocessor changes” and “further clarifications” — relative to its use of personal data for “business operations incident to providing services to our customers”.

But its statement does appear to acknowledge the need for it to go further on transparency.

“Microsoft fully cooperated with the DSK, and while we disagree with the DSK’s report, we are committed to addressing remaining concerns,” it writes, adding: “We take to heart the DSK’s push for greater transparency, and while our documentation and transparency practices exceed those of most others in our space, we commit to doing even better.

“Specifically, as part of our EU Data Boundary commitments, we will provide additional transparency documentation on customer data flows and the purposes of processing. We will also provide more transparency documentation on the processing and location by subprocessors and Microsoft employees outside of the EU.”

The EU Data Boundary refers to a pledge made by Microsoft in May last year to localize regional cloud customers data in the EU — as a response to the legal uncertainty that’s clouded transatlantic data transfers for years (most recently since the July 2020 so-called ‘Schrems II’ decision by the bloc’s top court, which struck down the EU-US Privacy Shield arrangement).

The tech giant’s attempt to deflect German regulators’ concerns leans heavily on a couple of things that don’t actually exist yet — with Microsoft referencing “important” changes incoming via an agreement for a new data transfer deal between the EU and the US which it suggests the DSK’s report “fails to reflect” — claiming the expected deal will “provide greater privacy protections for data flows between the EU and U.S.”.

Thing is, that data transfer deal has only been agreed politically for now — and the EDPB has made it clear it cannot apply legally until it is formally adopted by EU lawmakers (which is not expected to happen until next year). 

Microsoft’s EU Data Boundary also isn’t yet up and running — although it previously said it would be operational by the end of 2022. 

But even if that does land soon, it’s not clear whether data localization will fix all Microsoft’s woes here — given, for example, the US Cloud Act can reach data that’s stored outside the US.

It will also not be 100% data localization, with some data exports remaining “necessary” per Microsoft. So, again, it does not sound like a panacea.

Microsoft’s statement referenced above links to a second (7-page) statement, which it has only made available in German — which it says offers a “more detailed” response to some of the issues raised.

In this expanded statement (which we’ve translated using machine translation), Microsoft offers a point by point rebuttal to the DSK’s concerns and also claims the EU Data Boundary will “significantly reduce” data flows outside Europe and boost transparency by providing “detailed documentation on remaining, necessary data flows”.

The document also goes on the attack, accusing “some” German regulators of interpreting GDPR in what it couches as an “excessively risk-averse manner” — which Microsoft claims “overburdens and paralizes those responsible” as a result of “excessive expectations of accountability”.

It will be up to the EU’s regulators to determine whether anything Microsoft argues can really fix the raft of legal issues that keep surfacing over its cloud services’ compliance with GDPR — or whether it’s just more bluster from a data-mining tech giant that’s being called on excessive and unlawful access to customer data, and, therefore, whether more substantial reforms will be required before Microsoft will be the ‘safe’ choice for IT procurers in the EU in future.

Following the German working group’s statement, data protection experts in Europe have been calling for pan-EU enforcement over the problems identified by regulators — and questioning why Microsoft cannot apply meaningful limits on customer data processing, given it previously agreed to drop processing for business activities in government and public sector contracts agreed in the Netherlands, for example.

NL forced Microsoft to provide its software for govt and universities under data terms that prohibit MS from exploiting personal/behavioral data for its own purposes.

It's possible
This is what everyone in the EU deserves, including Home/Pro usershttps://t.co/J2NVP2uNpN pic.twitter.com/rgo0CZH2Xd

— Wolfie Christl (@WolfieChristl) February 22, 2022

Microsoft’s lead data protection authority in the EU is Ireland’s Data Protection Commission — which would be responsible for leading any pan-EU enforcement of the GDPR against the company.

However the DPC told TechCrunch it does not currently have any open inquiries into Microsoft — so it appears more likely that regional enforcement of cloud compliance concerns will be pushed through via decentralized (but coordinated) attention to public sector contracts Microsoft has inked around the bloc by regulators in different Member States. Which sounds like, well, the kind of messy, multi-pronged, resource-draining enforcement nightmare for itself and customers of Microsoft 365 the company should really be doing everything it can to avoid…

Legal clouds gather over US cloud services, after CJEU ruling

Microsoft 365 faces darkening GDPR compliance clouds after German report by Natasha Lomas originally published on TechCrunch

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Do House Republicans Plan To Support Ukraine?

Rep. Mike McCaul and Mike Turner told ABC's Martha Raddatz that Republicans in Congress would not write a blank check for Ukraine and plan to hold all funds accountable.

Both Republican Congressmen issued standard lip service to Ukraine, claiming they still are going to support them. However, their words don't match up with what many in their ranks say.

Rep. Michael McCaul tells @MarthaRaddatz that Republicans will provide “more oversight, transparency and accountability" to Ukraine spending with new House majority.

“We’re not going to write a blank check...We’re going to do it in a responsible way." https://t.co/uMIPFMhYoM pic.twitter.com/KOD5H75nuL

— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) November 27, 2022

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Republican Governor Bashes Trump's Dinner With Extremists

Asa Hutchinson, the Republican governor from Arkansas did not mince words after it was revealed that Trump had dinner with Kanye West, and Holocaust denier neo-nazi Nick Fuentes at Mar-A-Lago.

Kanye, or Ye as he is now known, has been enmeshed in an anti-Semitic controversy and should not have been invited to dinner with any former or sitting president.

CNN's Dana Bash asked the governor to respond after knowing Hutchinson's history of prosecuting white supremacists.

"Well, I hope, someday, we won't have to be responding to what former President Trump has said or done," Hutchinson said. "In this instance, it's important to respond."

"And, as you mentioned, the last time I met with a white supremacist, it was in an armed standoff. I had a bulletproof vest on. We arrested them, prosecuted them, sent them to prison. And so, no, I don't think it's a good idea for a leader that is setting an example for the country or the party to meet with an avowed racist or anti-Semite," he said.

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