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☆ It’s official: Silicon Valley’s entire business model is a scam
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-18 | by ( Adam Rogers | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +13 min

The problem is, conservative economists at the University of Chicago have spent the past 50 years insisting that under capitalism, predatory pricing is not a thing. Predatory companies could never recoup their losses, which meant predatory behaviors are irrational. Lots of economists have come up with solid counter-counterarguments to the Chicago School's skepticism about predatory pricing. A company that engages in predatory pricing and its late-stage investors might not recoup, but the venture investors do. "If people in Silicon Valley start thinking about this as a predatory pricing scam, then I think the late-stage investors will start asking questions."

Persons: Matt Wansley, Wansley, we're, Uber, Cardozo, Sam Weinstein, gobs, you've, —, Brooke, Spencer Waller, Matsushita, Weinstein —, Justice Department —, it's, Weinstein, Matt, that's, Will Uber, Waller, David, Maurer, they've, Adam Rogers Organizations: Lyft, Big Tech, Cardozo School of Law, Justice Department, University of Chicago, Chicago School, Supreme, Matsushita Electric Industry Co, Zenith Radio Corp, Brooke Group, Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp, United, Loyola's School of Law, Venture, Matsushita, VCs, Chicago, Loyola, pharma, aha, Wansley Locations: United States, Chicago, Silicon Valley, Silicon

☆ Samsung’s A.I. Moment Is Here, but Is It Ready?
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-04 | by ( Chang Che | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The introduction of ChatGPT has lit a fire under the shares of companies that produce microchips, the brains of artificial intelligence. Bets on the potential of so-called generative A.I. Samsung Electronics, the South Korean giant, is hoping to get in on the action. At an event in California last week, Samsung detailed what it called its “vision in the A.I. era.” Samsung believes it can snatch market share from the leading chip manufacturer, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, but recently the trend has gone the other way.

Persons: Samsung, TSMC Organizations: Nvidia, Samsung Electronics, Samsung, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Counterpoint Research Locations: Hong Kong, California, TSMC

☆ French cave markings may be oldest known engravings by Neanderthals
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-23 | by ( Katie Hunt | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —Made by dragging fingers across relatively soft rock, lines, swirls and dots on the walls of a cave in France are the oldest known engravings by Neanderthals, according to a new analysis of the ancient marks. The finding adds to a growing body of evidence that Neanderthals — who have been characterized as dim-witted cave dwellers — were creative beings and more complex than the stereotype suggests. Neanderthals’ ‘deliberate composition’To understand how the markings were made and whether they were intentional, the researchers made detailed 3D models of the engravings from photographs of the Loire Valley’s La Roche-Cotard cave using a process known as photogrammetry. Based on the shape, spacing and arrangement of these engravings, the team concluded that markings in eight panels in La Roche-Cotard cave were intentional shapes and patterns created by human hands. At some cave sites in Spain, there’s evidence — albeit contentious — that Neanderthals created abstract motifs and hand stencils.

Persons: Jean, Claude Marquet, Cotard, La Roche, JC Marquet Organizations: CNN, University of Tours Locations: France, La Roche, Europe, Bulgaria, Spain

☆ Bill Gates-Backed Mining Company Is Silicon Valley’s Newest Unicorn
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-20 | by ( Julie Steinberg | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

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Persons: Dow Jones

☆ Silicon Valley’s Newest Unicorn Is a Mining Company
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-20 | by ( Julie Steinberg | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Persons: Dow Jones

NEW YORK, June 6 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Sequoia is blazing another new trail in venture capital. As one of Silicon Valley’s pioneers, Sequoia Capital has backed everything from Apple (AAPL.O) to Zoom Video Communications (ZM.O) over the past half-century, and many others in between, including Instagram, 23andMe (ME.O) and DoorDash (DASH.N). The world has changed, however – and changed yet again – since Sequoia opened its doors. Valentine named Sequoia after a tree that lives thousands of years, signifying a plan to survive and grow through any sort of climate. Follow @thereallsl on TwitterFollow @anshumandaga on TwitterCONTEXT NEWSVenture capital firm Sequoia Capital said on June 6 that it would separate its China, India and Southeast Asia, and U.S. and European arms into three businesses.

Persons: Don Valentine, – Roelof Botha, Neil Shen, Shailendra Singh –, Valentine, Sequoia, ByteDance, Jeffrey Goldfarb, Sharon Lam Organizations: YORK, Reuters, Sequoia Capital, Apple, Video Communications, Investments, HK, Sequoia, Venture, Thomson Locations: China, India, U.S, Sequoia, Southeast Asia, United States, Mumbai, Shanghai

☆ Venture Capital Giant Sequoia Spins Off China and India Units
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-06 | by ( Lauren Hirsch | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Sequoia Capital, one of Silicon Valley’s most prominent venture capital firms, is breaking itself up, spinning out its Chinese unit into an independent company at a time of rising tensions between China and the United States over investment and access to advanced technologies. The firm announced on Tuesday that it planned to split into three independent partnerships, with its businesses in China and India adopting new brands and the firm in the United States and Europe retaining the Sequoia name. The firm’s global footprint had become “increasingly complex” to manage, said a statement from Sequoia’s managing partner Roelof Botha; the firm’s China head, Neil Shen; and its India head, Shailendra Singh. “Increasingly, we deal with portfolio conflicts across entities because founders really now have global ambitions,” Mr. Botha said. “And the brand confusion was just starting to chafe at everybody.”

Persons: Roelof Botha, Neil Shen, Shailendra Singh, Botha, ”, “, ” Mr Organizations: Sequoia Locations: China, United States, India, Europe

☆ Apple WWDC 2023: What to expect at Apple's big developer event
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-04 | by ( Samantha Murphy Kelly | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

The highly anticipated release of an AR/VR headset would be Apple’s biggest hardware product launch since the debut of the Apple Watch in 2015. Here’s a closer look at what to expect:A ‘mixed reality’ headsetFor years, Apple CEO Tim Cook has expressed interest in augmented reality. Apple’s new headset is expected to pack apps for gaming, fitness and meditation, and offer access to iOS apps such as Messages, FaceTime and Safari, according to Bloomberg. New MacBooksA mixed reality headset may not be the only piece of hardware to get stage time this year. New features for iPhone, iPad and Apple WatchConsidering WWDC is traditionally a software event, Apple executives will likely spend much of the time highlighting the changes and upgrades coming to its next-generation mobile operating systems, iOS 17 and iPadOS 17.

Persons: Tim Cook, it’s, Siri, Justin Sullivan, Apple Organizations: CNN, Apple, Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple Watch, YouTube, Bloomberg, VR, MacBook, Wall Street, Big Tech Locations: Cupertino , California, Silicon Valley

☆ Elizabeth Holmes Must Report to Prison on May 30 and Pay Restitution
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-18 | by ( Lora Kelley | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The LatestElizabeth Holmes, the disgraced founder of the failed blood testing start-up Theranos, who was convicted last year on charges that she defrauded investors of more than $100 million, has lost her latest bid to stay out of prison while she appeals her conviction. Ms. Holmes, whose case cast a harsh light on Silicon Valley’s culture of hubris, must report to prison on May 30, a judge ruled after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit rejected her attempt on Tuesday to remain free on bail. Ms. Holmes and her top lieutenant at Theranos, Ramesh Balwani, who was found guilty of fraud in a separate trial and who began serving his prison sentence last month, were also ordered to pay $452 million in restitution to victims of the company’s fraud. Of that total, the judge, Edward J. Davila of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, who oversaw both trials, determined that Ms. Holmes and Mr. Balwani should pay $125 million to the media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who invested in Theranos. Walgreens and Safeway, which had entered into business deals with the company, were also identified as victims for the purposes of restitution.

☆ Peter Thiel Is Latest Billionaire Said to Have Met With Jeffrey Epstein
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-18 | by ( Matthew Goldstein | Ryan Mac | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In 2014, the venture capitalist Peter Thiel was gaining prominence as one of Silicon Valley’s most successful entrepreneurs and investors. That made him an ideal contact for Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender with a knack for cultivating the rich and powerful. Mr. Thiel apparently had several meetings with Mr. Epstein that year, according to scheduling records of the disgraced financier that were reviewed by The New York Times. The records — in the form of emails that Mr. Epstein’s assistant sent to remind him of upcoming events — show that in September 2014 Mr. Thiel was scheduled to meet with Mr. Epstein on at least three occasions, either in one-on-one meetings or with others over lunch or dinner. Two other times, Mr. Thiel was listed among more than a dozen other well-known people Mr. Epstein should try to see while at his New York mansion.

☆ Who is Sam Altman? The man behind ChatGPT is about to have his moment on Capitol Hill
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-15 | by ( Jennifer Korn | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

New York CNN —For a few months in 2017, there were rumors that Sam Altman was planning to run for governor of California. Altman, the CEO and co-founder of OpenAI, the artificial intelligence company behind viral chatbot ChatGPT and image generator Dall-E, is set to testify before Congress on Tuesday. Maybe I’m wrong?’ Thank God someone with so much power has so much humility.”Others want Altman and OpenAI to move more cautiously. OpenAI co-founder & CEO Sam Altman speaks onstage during TechCrunch Disrupt San Francisco 2019 at Moscone Convention Center on October 03, 2019 in San Francisco, California. Similar generative AI technology is quickly finding its way into productivity and search tools used by billions of people.

☆ Opinion | The Future Is Going to Be Weird. Are We Ready?
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( The Ezra Klein Show | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

But if there’s one thing that’s certain, it’s this: The future — shaped by technologies like artificial intelligence — is going to be profoundly weird. It’s going to look, feel and function differently from the world we have grown to recognize. How do we learn to navigate — even embrace — the weirdness of the world we’re entering into? We discuss how Silicon Valley’s particularly weird culture has altered the trajectory of A.I. development, why programs like ChatGPT can profoundly unsettle our sense of reality and our own humanity, how the behaviors of A.I.

☆ Tech Billionaires Bet on Fusion as Holy Grail for Business
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-23 | by ( Jennifer Hiller | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Sam Altman became a tech sensation this year as the CEO of OpenAI, the artificial-intelligence startup that seems pulled from science fiction. But Mr. Altman, who has been among Silicon Valley’s most prominent investors for more than a decade, has placed one of the biggest bets of his career on a company that might be even more futuristic: a nuclear-fusion startup called Helion Energy Inc.

☆ Tech layoffs raise new alarms about how platforms protect users
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-06 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +11 min

Some also formed ethical AI teams and invested in oversight groups. And Facebook-parent Meta suggested that it might cut staff working in non-technical roles as part of its latest round of layoffs. “With that outsourcing, I feel like they had this comfort level that they could cut some of the trust and safety team, but Twitch is very unique,” the former employee said. It invested heavily in content moderation, public policy and an oversight board to weigh in on tricky content issues to address rising concerns about its platform. Tech leaders may also be grappling with the fact that even as they built up their trust and safety teams in recent years, their reputation problems haven’t really abated.

☆ Cash App Founder Bob Lee Fatally Stabbed in San Francisco
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-05 | by ( Alyssa Lukpat | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Bob Lee built a career as a Silicon Valley executive and angel investor, according to his LinkedIn page. Bob Lee , the founder of money-transfer company Cash App and the chief product officer at cryptocurrency company MobileCoin Inc., was fatally stabbed in San Francisco on Tuesday. MobileCoin founder Joshua Goldbard confirmed Mr. Lee’s death in an email to The Wall Street Journal. Mr. Lee, who had been MobileCoin’s chief product officer since 2021, had previously worked on some of Silicon Valley’s most well-known products.

☆ How your phone learned to see in the dark
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-05 | by ( Samantha Kelly | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

While shots like these used to require advanced cameras, they’re now often possible from the phone you already carry around in your pocket. People watch fireworks during a Fourth of July celebration, in this photo taken using the Google Pixel 5 Night Sight setting. “The quality of the lens is still a big deal, and how the phone addresses the lack of depth,” Ray said. The next big thingWhile night photography on phones has come a long way, a buzzy new technology could push it ahead even more. If this technology is added to smartphone photo systems, it could eventually make night modes even more powerful, Su said.

☆ TikTok CEO to tell lawmakers its parent company is ‘not an agent of China’
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-22 | by ( Brian Fung | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —TikTok CEO Shou Chew plans to tell US lawmakers that the app’s parent company, ByteDance, does not work for the Chinese government as he seeks to avert a US ban and reassure policymakers TikTok poses no national security threat. “Let me state this unequivocally,” Chew will say, according to a copy of his remarks released by a key House panel. New TikTok data created by US users is already being stored on cloud-based servers operated by the US tech giant Oracle, a change that took effect last month, according to the testimony. USDS already has nearly 1,500 full-time employees and the company plans to hire more. Chew plans to describe the incident as a “misguided attempt to trace the source of a leak of confidential TikTok information.” TikTok informed the Energy and Commerce Committee about the spying “within moments of informing our employees,” Chew will add.

☆ Where is Silicon Valley's J. Pierpont Morgan?
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-17 | by ( Anita Ramaswamy | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

After withdrawals lashed the banking system in 1907, financier J. Pierpont Morgan corraled his peers into using their own money to calm the crisis. The contrast with Silicon Valley – which is also embroiled in the ongoing firestorm – couldn’t be more stark. Startup and technology firms’ cash crunch precipitated the fall of Silicon Valley Bank and its parent SVB Financial (SIVB.O), which in turn sparked panic in the financial system. Silicon Valley is fragmented and built on an individualistic ethos. Real, toothsome regulation might force Silicon Valley’s great minds to realize how interconnected their ecosystem is.

NEW YORK (Reuters) -U.S. authorities were preparing “material action” on Sunday to shore up deposits in Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and stem any broader financial fallout from its sudden collapse, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. Biden administration officials worked through the weekend to assess the impact of startup-focused lender SVB Financial Group’s failure on Friday, with a particular eye on the venture capital sector and regional banks, the sources said. REUTERS/Nathan FrandinoAnd amid increased withdrawals from other regional banks, U.S. officials are also keeping close watch on the wider sector. The S&P 500 regional banks index dropped 4.3% on Friday to end the week down 18%, its worst week since 2009. Signature Bank, First Republic Bank, PacWest Bank and Charles Schwab did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

☆ Silicon Valley Bank collapse sends tech industry into a panic
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

Following the bank’s collapse on Friday, uncertainty in the startup community only grew. Founders Fund, an influential venture capital firm founded by billionaire Peter Thiel, reportedly advised its portfolio companies to pull money from the bank. “SVB is the most important capital provider to tech startups and the biggest supporter of the community,” he said in a tweet. “Now is the time to support them.”The rapidly unfolding fallout at Silicon Valley Bank comes at a challenging moment for the tech industry. Now, the bank’s collapse risks compounding the industry’s cash crunch and broader turbulence.

☆ A generation of high-profile women tech leaders have stepped aside. What’s next?
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-24 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

The tech industry has now lost an entire generation of trailblazing women leaders and replaced them mostly with men. And in the wake of the pandemic, women leaders in corporate America more broadly are more likely than ever to quit, according to the most recent Women in the Workplace report from McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.Org. Now that she’s departing, Big Tech is facing a new reckoning over its failure to promote and support women leaders, and what this could mean for the next generation of women in the industry. “Without women in the C-suite who have come before them, it could make this transition period tougher for next generation women leaders,” Kray said. “I think that what she achieved and what she modeled will be something that will live on beyond the fact that now we don’t have a female Big Tech CEO.”

☆ Tesla to base engineering headquarters in California
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-22 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Companies Tesla Inc FollowHP Inc FollowFeb 22 (Reuters) - Electric-vehicle maker Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) will make its global engineering headquarters in California, Chief Executive Elon Musk and California Governor Gavin Newsom announced on Wednesday. Tesla in December 2021 moved its corporate headquarters from Silicon Valley’s Palo Alto, California, to Austin, Texas, where it is operating a new car factory. Billionaire Musk himself moved from Los Angeles to the Lone Star State, which does not have state income tax. California remains a key source of talent for tech companies, and the Tesla engineering headquarters will be in a former Hewlett Packard building in Palo Alto. "This is a poetic transition from the company that founded Silicon Valley to Tesla," Musk said.

☆ AI Becomes Silicon Valley’s Next Buzzy Bandwagon as Crypto Boom Fizzles
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-18 | by ( Christopher Mims | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

The new artificial-intelligence tools getting widespread attention for spitting out text, images and computer code are also generating something else: talk of the next technology bubble. Technologists broadly agree that the so-called generative AI that powers systems like ChatGPT has the potential to change how we live and work, despite the technology’s clear flaws. But some investors, chief executives and engineers see signs of froth that remind them of the crypto boom that recently fizzled.

☆ California’s heavy rains deliver hope of a lifeline for one devastated industry – rice
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-16 | by ( Parija Kavilanz | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

After years of drought, California has received an epic amount of rain already in 2023. The Sacramento Valley is the hub of California’s rice production. During the seed planting and growing season, which runs from March through August, farmers flood rice fields with up to five inches of water. The way the rice business goes is how the economy goes,” Ponciano said. “After harvest season, the sky over the rice fields would be filled with geese and ducks,” he said.

☆ The Desert Is Their Inspiration. The $600,000 Art Studio? Their Oasis.
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-15 | by ( Alina Dizik | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

This week, The Wall Street Journal’s Mansion section is rolling out stories from our special desert living issue. Check out stories like this one on short-term renters flocking to the desert, a visit to Coachella Valley’s most expensive ZIP Code and more. Wendy Wacker wanted a space to do her creative writing when she built a 144-square-foot studio at her second home. She made it her own private sanctuary by having the only entrance connect to her bedroom. She made it more welcoming by using the Mojave Desert as a focal point.

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