It’s that time of the week, folks: Week in Review (YR) time. If you’re new to WiR, it’s the newsletter that TechCrunch rewrites in Tech Week. We get it – you’re a busy person. We all are. And what better way to find out what happened than in a summarized point-by-point form? We can’t think of one – and believe us, we tried.
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A tragic murder; Bob Lee, creator of the Cash app and former CTO of Square, was stabbed to death in San Francisco this week. Roman Before joining Mobile, Lee wrote that he worked at Google for the first few years of Android, focusing on core library development. He later joined payments company Block and was an investor in startups including SpaceX, Clubhouse, Tile and Figma.
Twitter sends Doge: on Monday, Alex Twitter wrote that it has added a token for the cryptocurrency dogecoin to a popular spot on Twitter.com as a result of the dogecoin price spike. Not coincidentally, Twitter CEO Elon Musk has been embroiled in a cryptocurrency-related lawsuit — with Musk’s lawyers calling Dogecoin “a legitimate cryptocurrency that continues to command a market cap of nearly $10 billion.”
Gen Z receives Fanfix: More and more Gen Z users are jumping on the content creation train in an effort to make a living beyond the typical 9-to-5 gig. However, given the recent drama surrounding major social media apps, many creators are worried. Lauren That’s why more and more Gen Xers are jumping on Fanfix — a Patreon competitor that allows only pure content and allows influencers to earn money directly from their followers.
Here comes the long-promised treadmill: Startup Virtuix — the long-promised mass-market all-in-one treadmill that raised more than $1.1 million on Kickstarter and $35 million from investors to bring it to market — has finally begun shipping a home version of the product. Brian The $2,595 Omni One reportedly has some upgrades to the Virtuix original, including a new connecting arm, and comes with a custom Pico Neo 3 headset.
Violations against Western Digital: Data storage giant Western Digital has confirmed that hackers recently leaked data from its systems during a “network security incident”. Carly He wrote. The California-based company said in a statement on Monday that an unauthorized third party had access to “numbers” of its internal systems on March 26. Western Digital has not confirmed the nature of the incident or explained how it was compromised, but the statement suggests that the incident may be related to ransomware.
Android apps get the option to delete: Ivan Google announced this week new account cancellation guidelines for Android apps, giving apps that offer account creation an easier way to delete an account. The move, which is set to take effect sometime next year, follows Apple, which implemented a similar policy for apps on the App Store last June.
Publisher-oriented alt to Twitter: Post, the Twitter alternative that’s rethinking how publishers should engage with social media, has opened its doors to the public. Sarah With Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, many are looking for a new place to read and discuss news or share their thoughts with their followers, and the startup is in this space like no other. But Post doesn’t want to be just another Twitter clone.
SpaceX Propulsion Machine: SpaceX’s super-heavy launch system is gaining momentum for its first orbital flight test. The hype began to peak this week when the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an air traffic advisory identifying April 10 as a major launch date. But the FAA has yet to grant SpaceX the all-important launch permit. Arya Writes – The final regulatory green light is the non-negotiable step before the company conducts the test.
Audio
TechCrunch isn’t just a source of well-reported written pieces (how’s that for Obligatory Talk Friday?) — it’s a podcasting machine, too, don’t you know? At Equity, the team talked about Y Combinator’s demo day as well as Q1 numbers, deals of the week and venture activity in Latin America. TC’s Found podcast highlights The Nudge, a text-based app that helps users make the best plans in their city. Chain Reaction – nominated for a Webby Award (by the way, voting closes on April 20) – Ariana Simpson, general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, interviewed about the firm’s focus on crypto investments. And TechCrunch Live dove into Oma Fertility, a company that has raised more than $70 million to revolutionize in vitro fertilization.
TechCrunch+
TC+ subscribers get in-depth commentary, analytics, and surveys — something you already know if you’re a subscriber. If not, consider signing up. Here are a few highlights from this week:
Favorites from the YC Winter 2023 Showcase: The TC staff rounded up some of the best from Y Combinator’s Winter 2023 batch, including comics software, meat-based plants, and Tesla-powered heat pumps.
climate technology slowdown; Tim He writes about the slowdown in the climate technology agreement that is happening as investors expect a recession in the coming months. Climate technology’s resilience has so far led some to call it the ultimate “recession-proof” investment. Tim investigates whether that is still true.
Glum Q1: Alex Look at how the global capital market went down in Q1 2023 and it would have been much worse if not for a few mega deals. The decline in funds indicates that the current decline in startup investment may not be on course any time soon.
