Newslit Daily

Today’s pick

BuzzFeed investors have pushed CEO Jonah Peretti to shut down entire newsroom, sources say. Several large shareholders have urged BuzzFeed CEO Jonah Peretti to shut down the company's news organization. BuzzFeed News has won awards, including a Pulitzer Prize, but is now shrinking through voluntary buyouts. (Alex Sherman / CNBC)

Bored Ape Yacht Club creator raises $450 million to build an NFT metaverse. Yuga Labs, the owner of three of the biggest NFT brands on the market, has raised $450 million in funding at a $4 billion valuation, the company announced today. The team behind Bored Ape Yacht Club plans to use the money to build a media empire… (Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge)

Fury As Okta-The Company That Manages 100 Million Logins-Fails To Tell Customers About Breach For Months. Okta, the $25 billion market cap company that handles logins for more than 100 million users, confirmed it suffered a breach in January via a third party customer support provider. (Thomas Brewster / Forbes)

EU to unveil landmark legislation to tackle market power of Big Tech. The EU is poised to unveil a landmark law designed to rein in the market power of Big Tech this week, after a deal was struck on crucial details such as the size of companies targeted by the long-anticipated legislation. (Javier Espinoza / Financial Times)

Zoom's new virtual avatars let you show up to your next meeting as a dog. Zoom will let you show up to your next meeting as a rabbit, fox, dog, or another type of animal, using its new Avatars feature that replaces you with a virtual character that copies your expressions, Memoji-style. (Mitchell Clark / The Verge)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

A Case Of Shrunken Brains: How Covid-19 May Damage Brain Cells. This story is part of a larger mosaic of stories on Post-Acute Sequelae of Covid-19 (PASC), also known as Long Covid. Thanks to a new study from the UK we are now beginning to uncover the effects of SARS-CoV-2 infections in the brain. (William A. Haseltine / Forbes)

Powell Says Fed Will Consider More-Aggressive Interest-Rate Increases to Reduce Inflation. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank is prepared to raise interest rates in half-percentage-point steps and high enough to deliberately slow the economy if it concludes such steps are warranted to bring inflation down. (Nick Timiraos / Wall Street Journal)

The Entirely Predictable Impact of Salary Transparency. Europe is about to decide whether to make everyone's salaries public, a move that could dramatically narrow the gender pay gap. (Megan Carnegie / WIRED)

Podcasters, get ready to find out how many followers you have on Apple Podcasts. Apple Podcasts is rolling out new features to incentivize podcasters to offer paid subscriptions to listeners on the app. One of those features will — for better or for worse — reveal to podcasters in their private analytics dashboard… (Amanda Silberling / TechCrunch)

Meta's Yann LeCun strives for human-level AI. What is the next step toward bridging the gap between natural and artificial intelligence? Scientists and researchers are divided on the answer. Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Meta… (Ben Dickson / VentureBeat)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

Time for a Law That Puts Workers, Not Unions, First. As Americans grapple with soaring inflation and life after lockdowns, they want more job flexibility and protection of their rights in the workplace. Frustration over classroom closings, reckless spending and how to return to normal highlights a… (Tim Scott / Wall Street Journal)

New York City's Renewed Vibrancy Is Hiding Deep Economic Pain. Workers still aren't flocking back to offices and unemployment is double the U.S. average, ratcheting up pressure to reinvent the city's economy. (Alicia Diaz / Bloomberg)

Elon Musk's Business Ties to China Create Unease in Washington. Elon Musk's ties to China are causing unease in Washington, including among some Republican lawmakers who have been among the billionaire entrepreneur's ardent supporters. The concerns center on the potential for China to gain access to the… (Brody Mullins / Wall Street Journal)

Goldman Sachs announces milestone with first over-the-counter crypto trade with Galaxy Digital. Goldman is close to announcing that it is the first major U.S. bank to trade an over-the-counter crypto transaction, CNBC has learned. Goldman traded a bitcoin-linked instrument called a non-deliverable option with crypto merchant bank Galaxy… (Hugh Son / CNBC)

Actually, forcing people to go back to the office isn't the way to save big cities. Ever since the COVID-19 pandemic struck the US, the shock waves from the disease have been most pronounced in our biggest cities. A once-vibrant sidewalk ballet morphed into grim desolation as hundreds of thousands fled cities altogether. But now… (Alex Yablon / Business Insider)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

What happened to Starbucks? How a progressive company lost its way. Starbucks's app has made the coffee giant healthier financially, but at a cost to its culture, cafés, and even its brand identity. (Clint Rainey / Fast Company)

Amazon completes its $8.5 billion acquisition of MGM. Amazon has closed its $8.5 billion acquisition of MGM, the company announced on Thursday. The completion of the transaction will see more than 4,000 films and 17,000 TV shows become a part of Prime Video, the online retailer's streaming service. (Aisha Malik / TechCrunch)

Most Medical Debts to Be Removed From Consumers' Credit Reports. The biggest credit-reporting firms will strip tens of billions of dollars in medical debt from consumers' credit reports, erasing a black mark that makes it harder for millions of Americans to borrow. (AnnaMaria Andriotis / Wall Street Journal)

A Zelensky Deepfake Was Quickly Defeated. The Next One Might Not Be. On March 2, the Ukraine government's Center for Strategic Communication warned that its enemies might be preparing a “ deepfake ” video that appeared to show president Volodymyr Zelensky announcing his surrender to Russia's invasion. (Tom Simonite / WIRED)

Mortgage Rates Top 4% for the First Time Since 2019. The era of ultralow mortgage rates is over. The average rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage topped 4% for the first time since May 2019, Freddie Mac said Thursday. (Orla McCaffrey via Wall Street Journal)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you on Monday!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

How much is 'link in bio' real estate worth? Linktree's new valuation says $1.3 billion. Who would've thought that an entire swath of startups would spring up all because Instagram, TikTok and Twitter only let you link to one website in your bio? Apparently, Linktree co-founder and CEO Alex Zaccaria did. (Amanda Silberling / TechCrunch)

Crypto evangelists want to build an internet utopia, but their supposedly revolutionary Web3 is just creating a new set of corporate overlords. Web3 claims it will bring down Google and Facebook. But it's already giving rise to a new wave of mega-platforms that seek to rule our digital lives. (Paris Marx / Business Insider)

Federal Reserve approves first interest rate hike in more than three years, sees six more ahead. The Federal Reserve on Wednesday approved its first interest rate increase in more than three years, an incremental salvo to address spiraling inflation without torpedoing economic growth. (Jeff Cox / CNBC)

Website Builder Webflow Hits $4 Billion Valuation As It Nears $100 Million Revenue. The startup raised a $120 million Series C—but that isn’t why CEO Vlad Magdalin has been getting attention at Starbucks. (Kenrick Cai / Forbes)

How Glossier founder Emily Weiss' tech dreams derailed the hottest millennial beauty brand. In early 2018, Emily Weiss, Glossier's founder and CEO, hired a DJ to launch her new line of makeup, Glossier Play. The products, inspired by music, were intended to be an edgier, more maximalist spin-off of Glossier's beloved barefaced staples. (Melkorka Licea / Business Insider)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

Vimeo is telling creators to suddenly pay thousands of dollars - or leave the platform. Popular Patreon creators are being hit with unexpected Vimeo price hikes as Vimeo shifts corporate strategy. (Mia Sato / The Verge)

Mark Zuckerberg confirms NFTs are coming to Instagram. Love them or hate them, NFTs will soon be coming to Instagram. Speaking at SXSW, Mark Zuckerberg confirmed that digital collectibles would be arriving on Instagram “in the near term.” (Karissa Bell / Engadget)

How WordPress and Tumblr are keeping the internet weird. CEO Matt Mullenweg on why he bets big on small companies (Nilay Patel via The Verge)

Starbucks wants to become the gas station of the future for EVs. With 15,000 locations across the U.S., the coffee chain is betting it can convince electric vehicle owners that it's the perfect place to charge up. (Literally!)… (Adele Peters / Fast Company)

Year-Round Daylight-Saving-Time Bill Passes the Senate. The Senate on Tuesday passed a bill to allow states to make daylight-saving time permanent, under a proposal that would end the twice-yearly tradition of springing the clocks an hour forward and then winding them back an hour in… (Natalie Andrews via Wall Street Journal)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

After Walt Disney, Robert Iger Heads to the Metaverse. Robert Iger spent decades helming a company known for its animated characters. For his next act, the former Walt Disney Co. boss is backing a startup that celebrities and others are using to create avatars for the much-hyped metaverse. (Sarah E. Needleman / Wall Street Journal)

Palmer Luckey Says Working With Weapons Isn't as Fun as VR. Who needs the metaverse when your life can be as weird as Palmer Luckey's? In 2016, the founder of the virtual reality startup Oculus was unceremoniously pushed out of the company that acquired it—Facebook. (Steven Levy / WIRED)

Amazon faced questions from FTC about whether it tricked customers into signing up for Prime. Internally, the company knew it did. Amazon was aware of customer complaints about feeling tricked into signing up for the Prime membership for years, internal emails and documents show. (Eugene Kim / Business Insider)

Twitter rolls back its decision to force you into the out-of-order timeline. Last week, Twitter introduced one of its worst product decisions in a while: the service would default to showing the algorithmically served Home feed while the reverse-chronological Latest feed was accessible in a separate tab. (Jay Peters / The Verge)

Google 'hijacked millions of customers and orders' from restaurants, lawsuit says. Google is being sued by a Florida restaurant group alleging that the tech company has been setting up unauthorized pages to capture food orders rather than directing them to the restaurant's own site. (Tim De Chant / Ars Technica)

🇺🇦 Ukraine Crisis

* Russian Forces Kill Civilians, Loot for Supplies in Occupied Ukraine, Residents Say. (Yaroslav Trofimov / Wall Street Journal)

* What to expect as Russia warns of historic debt default. (Tommy Stubbington & Robin Wigglesworth / Financial Times)

* Russia Is Spiraling Toward a $150 Billion Default Nightmare. (Sydney Maki / Bloomberg)

* Ethanol: The Fuel That Powers Putin. (David Frum / The Atlantic)

* Putin's invasion of Ukraine will knock the Russian economy back by 30 years. (Christina Wilkie / CNBC)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

China's 'Silicon Valley' manufacturing hub orders production halts to control a Covid spike. Shenzhen, the biggest city in the manufacturing hub of Guangdong province, told all businesses not involved with essential public services to suspend production or have employees work from home starting Monday. (Evelyn Cheng / CNBC)

Rotten managers are to blame for the surging wave of job burnout - and the fix has to come from them, not overworked employees. Burnout is insidious. It's a creeping malaise that makes easy tasks feel hard and hard tasks feel impossible. And it's not just a buzzword. Employee burnout is now recognized by the World Health Organization as a 'syndrome' caused by 'chronic… (Ed Zitron / Business Insider)

Tencent Faces Possible Record Fine for Anti-Money-Laundering Violations. Chinese technology giant Tencent Holdings Ltd. is facing a potential record fine for violations of some central bank regulations by its WeChat Pay mobile network, as Beijing toughens its regulations for fintech platforms, according… (Jing Yang / Wall Street Journal)

Facebook Has a Child Predation Problem. While trying to map the extent and impact of place-based Facebook groups where QAnon and allied disinformation spread, I went looking for Facebook groups with names including 10, 11, or 12. This was part of my work with the Pitt Disinformation Lab… (Lara Putnam / WIRED)

The real problem with NFTs? They're ugly. The email arrived, like so many others, announcing a “historic NFT sale” of “fRiENDSiES” by “FriendsWithYou” ;, that is soon to take place at Christie's. This was nothing new. Historic NFT events now arrive… (Louis Wise / Financial Times)

🇺🇦 Ukraine Crisis

* Russia asks China for military assistance in its invasion of Ukraine. (Demetri Sevastopulo / Financial Times)

* Russian Prosecutors Warn Western Companies of Arrests, Asset Seizures. (Jennifer Maloney / Wall Street Journal)

* America's Hesitation Is Heartbreaking. (Eliot A. Cohen / The Atlantic)

* Ukraine: How a transgender man escaped Russia's invasion. (Bethany Dawson / Business Insider)

* Russia Lost Access to Half Its Reserves, Finance Minister Says. (Bloomberg)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

How companies are hiding inflation without charging you more. Do consumers notice when their everyday products get smaller? Often they don't and companies are taking advantage by reducing the amount of product they sell while keeping prices the same. (Clarisa Diaz / Quartz)

Seven Seven Six Seeds A Cohort Of New Micro Funds. Alexis Ohanian’s year-old firm helped launch a group of funds led by individuals with large networks and domain expertise. (Rebecca Szkutak / Forbes)

The Infinite Reach of Joel Kaplan, Facebook's Man in Washington. How one man came to rule political speech on Facebook, command one of the largest lobbies in DC, and guide Zuck through disaster—and straight into it. (Benjamin Wofford / WIRED)

Twitter makes it harder to choose the old reverse-chronological feed. Twitter is rolling out a change that, frustratingly, makes it a bit more difficult to see your chronological feed. The design change, which lets you swipe between your Home (algorithmically served) and Latest (reverse chronological) timelines, was… (Jay Peters / The Verge)

Beware the Never-Ending Disinformation Emergency. YouTube still draws a hard line on Trump’s rigged election claims. Two years later, it doesn't hold up. (Gilad Edelman / WIRED)

🇺🇦 Ukraine Crisis

* The Stalinisation of Russia. (The Economist)

* Deutsche Bank defends decision not to exit Russia: It's not 'practical' right now. (Karen Gilchrist / CNBC)

* Inside Putin's circle - the real Russian elite. (Anatol Lieven / Financial Times)

* I Watched Russian TV So You Don't Have To. (Olga Khazan / The Atlantic)

* U.S, Allies Look at Sending Soviet-Designed Air-Defense Systems to Ukraine. (Courtney McBride / Wall Street Journal)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you on Monday!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.

Today’s pick

The many escapes of Justin Sun. How does a crypto hype man stay ahead of regulators? He keeps running. (Christopher Harland-Dunaway / The Verge)

Italy fines Clearview AI €20M and orders data deleted. Another European privacy watchdog has sanctioned the controversial facial recognition firm, Clearview AI, which scrapes selfies off the Internet to amass a databased of some 10 billion of… (Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch)

The untold tale of how Facebook's cryptocurrency dream fell apart. It had the blue-chip partners, the tech and the right players. None of which could save it. (Hannah Murphy and Kiran Stacey / Financial Times)

From digital dollar to tackling illegal activity: Here's what's in Biden's executive order on crypto. U.S. President Joe Biden signed an executive order on Wednesday calling on the government to examine the risks and benefits of cryptocurrencies. (Ryan Browne / CNBC)

TikTok Struggles to Find Footing in Wartime. The short-video app faces one of its biggest challenges since its launch five years ago, as it grapples with a heightened role in geopolitics. (Liza Lin / Wall Street Journal)

🇺🇦 Ukraine Crisis

* Saudi, Emirati Leaders Decline Calls With Biden During Ukraine Crisis. (Dion Nissenbaum / Wall Street Journal)

* Rich Exiles Put Dubai in Spotlight as World Chases Russian Money. (Ben Bartenstein / Bloomberg)

* Russia Has Used Thermobaric Weapons In Ukraine, U.K. Says. (Nicholas Reimann / Forbes)

* How the West Undermines Its Own Sanctions. (Casey Michel / The Atlantic)

* A tech executive is privately funding hundreds of soldiers to fight for Ukraine. (Makena Kelly / The Verge)

Thanks for reading to the bottom and soaking in our Newslit fuelled highlights for your morning.

I hope you found it interesting and, needless to say, if you have any questions or feedback let me know by hitting reply or on Twitter.

Take care and see you tomorrow!

— Jose Montes de Oca

P.S. Was this forwarded to you? Sign up here.