Technology news

Amazon’s Dash buttons are no more. The tiny stick-on buttons that allowed customers to quickly reorder popular household items with a press have been discontinued by the online retailer, as confirmed by CNET. Dash buttons were priced at only $5 and were available for a slew of brands spanning many categories — from paper towels and laundry detergent to condoms. They could be mounted wherever made the most sense, whether in the kitchen, bathroom, or any other spot where users might n

Amazon has said it’s ending plans for a New York City headquarters, but a group of state officials, businesspeople, and union leaders are asking the company to stay. In an open letter set to be published in the New York Times tomorrow, the group will ask Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to reconsider the company’s decision to abandon a new office in Queens.
The letter was obtained in advance by the Times, which also reported that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has been personally speaking with

The Apple Pencil that works with the sixth-generation iPad, as well as iPad Pro models released prior to 2018, is $20 off of its usual $99 price tag at Amazon, per MacRumors. At $79.88, it’s a more affordable purchase if you’ve been wanting to use your iPad to jot down notes or practice drawing.
Compared to more affordable styluses for the iPad, like Logitech’s Crayon, the Apple Pencil offers pressure and tilt sensitivity, which makes it the better choice for those who want to

Oculus will enforce tight rules for publishing a game or app on the Oculus Quest, asking developers to demonstrate “quality and probable market success” on the upcoming virtual reality headset. In a blog post yesterday, publishing director Chris Pruett wrote that Oculus is setting the standard for Quest apps “higher than we’ve ever enforced before,” compared to standards for the Oculus Rift, Samsung Gear VR, or Oculus Go. Pruett says the move will give Quest owners

In a major shift, Tesla announced that it will only sell its vehicles online. The electric carmaker will close most of its stores over the “next few months” and lay off some retail employees. Tesla announced the move at the same time it said it will finally begin to sell its long-promised $35,000 Model 3.Customers who purchase their Teslas online will have up to a week to return the car if they aren’t satisfied. In a call with reporters Thursday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said he wa

The long-awaited $35,000 Tesla Model 3 has finally arrived, three years after CEO Elon Musk promised to bring the electric vehicle to market at that price point. But that cheaper Model 3 comes with a dramatic shift for Tesla.
Tesla said that to achieve this lower price it will shift all sales globally to online only, meaning the company will be closing many of its stores over the next few months. The stores that remain, in high-traffic locations, will be turned into information centers, Musk sai

The people who volunteer their time modifying and updating old games are among the most generous of developers. So when drama erupts there’s not just irritation and testy emails but a sense of a community being betrayed or taken advantage of. A recent conflict over work on the perennially renewed classic Skyrim may seem small, but for those involved, it’s a huge upset.
I don’t mean to make a bigger deal out of this niche issue than it is; I feel though that sometimes it’s

Tesla is finally rolling out the long-awaited $35,000 version of the Model 3. The company is currently making multiple versions of a “Standard Range” Model 3 that can travel 220 miles on a single charge. Previously, the most affordable Model 3 started at $42,900 after a February price reduction.
The Standard Range base model will start at $35,000, offers a top speed of 130mph and can go from 0 to 60mph in 5.6 seconds. A second version called “Standard Range Plus” will be

After missing its initial planned release timeframe, the $400 JBL Link Bar has been delayed yet again and is now scheduled to launch sometime in the summer — assuming the plan actually sticks this time. The product was first announced at Google I/O last May as a unique hybrid soundbar/streaming device running Google’s Android TV software. JBL initially hoped to get it out by late summer. Then that turned into the fall / October. And when that didn’t pan out either, the shippin

You might want to watch Tesla’s website in just under an hour, because Elon Musk is teasing — well, Tesla’s teasing something. To focus your attention, the company has suspended sales of the Model 3, Model S and Model X, as noted by CNBC, with all the buy buttons redirecting to this page.
We’ve known since Tuesday that Elon Musk had some sort of announcement in store, but at first it seemed like his cryptic tweet — he merely wrote “Thursday 2pm” —

Even after California banned non-medical exemptions for vaccines, an unvaccinated teenage boy in the state still spread measles to a half dozen people in an outbreak last year, a new study reports. The findings show that while tightening legislative loopholes is key to stopping the spread of measles, it’s not enough.The outbreak investigation, published today in the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, follows a 15-year-old boy who came

Women’s health has long been devoid of technological innovation, but when it comes to fertility options, that’s starting to change. Startups in the space are securing hundreds of millions in venture capital investment, a significant increase to the dearth of funding collected in previous years.
Fertility entrepreneurs are focused on a growing market: couples are choosing to reproduce later in life, an increasing number of female breadwinners are able to make their own decisions about

If you’ve ever dabbled in collectible card games — Magic: The Gathering, Pokémon, etc. — you know how quickly collections can grow. One pack turns into two. Two turns into five. Then they release some new set and… screw it, why not buy a whole box?
Card resellers have the same problem, just magnified to an extreme. People who’ve stopped playing a game for whatever reason (sometimes years prior) walk in with massive collections and just want to get rid of the

Comcast left customers of its Xfinity Mobile phone service vulnerable to hacks and identify theft by setting the default PIN codes of its accounts to “0000,” making it easy for malicious third parties to steal customers’ identities. The vulnerability was pointed out by one user who wrote in to The Washington Post to describe “a tech horror story,” which Comcast then confirmed.The hacked user, from California, told the Post he had his phone number hijacked and trans

Teslabuyers might have a hard time ordering a vehicle through its website for the next several hours.
The “order” webpages for the Model 3, Model S and Model X vehicle all redirect to show a nebulous message that reads “The wait is almost over.” Below the main message, it reads “Great things are launching at 2 pm.”
Updated: Musk’s Twitter page has changed just slightly. His profile photo now has a Tesla vehicle, and not the Mars shot.Tesla CEO Elon Musk

Uberand Lyftare reportedly going to give money to some of its drivers to enable them to buy stock in the transportation companies’ respective initial public offerings, The Wall Street Journal reported earlier today.
Citing people familiar with the matter, the WSJ says both Uber and Lyft will reward some of their more active or long-time drivers with a cash award with an option to buy stock in the initial public offerings. Uber’s program will reportedly be worth hundreds of millions o

As the mobility world awaits Harley Davidson’s EV debut, there’s plenty of motion in the e-moto startup space.
Zero Motorcycles unveiled its new 110 horsepower SR/F model in New York this week, offering a 200 mile range, one hour charge capability, and top speed of 124 mph.
The California based startup—whose investors include New York VC firm Invus—wired the SR/F with Zero’s new Cypher III operating system and Bosch’s Motorcycle Stability Control.Both combine

Some TikTok users are having their accounts and videos deleted without warning after inputting a birthdate that would make them younger than 13, following a change to the app’s terms yesterday regarding children’s privacy law.TikTok is prompting users to prove they’re of age to use the app following an FTC settlement agreement that required the app to come into compliance with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, or COPPA, which dictates that apps and websites g

Twittertoday confirmed it’s developing a new “Hide Tweet” feature, which it says will give users another option to protect their conversations. The option, spotted in Twitter’s code, is available from a list of moderation choices that appear when you click the “Share” button on a tweet — a button whose icon has also been given a refresh, it seems. Like it sounds, “Hide Tweet” functions as an alternative to muting or blocking a user, while sti

Customer experience management platform Medalliahas filed to raise up to $70 million in Series F funding, according to regulatory documents obtained by the Prime Unicorn Index. The new shares were priced at $15 apiece, valuing the nearly two-decades-old business at $2.4 billion.
Medallia confirmed the funding. A previous version of this report pinpointed Medallia’s valuation at $1.7 billion.
Medallia is expected to finally transition to the public markets in 2019, a year chock-full of high

YouTubewill shut off comments on videos featuring “younger minors and videos with older minors at risk of attracting predatory behavior,” according to a statement from the company. It’s an effort to stamp out predatory behavior from viewers that included salacious notes in the comments section of videos featuring underage kids.
Last week, TechCrunch confirmed reports which first arose on Reddit about the existence of a soft-core pedophile ring that was communicating via YouTube

A few of today’s best deals are new, but mostly consist of leftovers from earlier in the week. It’s another opportunity to check them out if they passed you by before. There’s a good spread of discounts across several product categories, including connected home tech, televisions, Xbox One X consoles, home entertainment accessories, and more.
The Roomba 890 robot vacuum is $359.99 at Newegg with the offer code EMCTVVD54 used at checkout. This particular model costs around $449

Reddit is testing out a new tipping feature where users can give each other real money. So far, you can only pay one guy in one subreddit, which made me immediately wonder: who is this lucky fella?
The chosen user is u/shittymorph who tends to leave well-written comments all over Reddit that seem truly insightful and make you realize what a great site you’re browsing, until they frustratingly end in the same copypasta everytime — an obscure piece of wrestling trivia.
As for why Redd

Sony has announced the new CFexpress Type B spec and its newest CompactFlash memory card that’s supposed to be faster than anything else on the market. The new card’s read and write speeds are 1,700 MB/s and 1,480 MB/s, respectively. That stomps out Sony’s previous fastest card, which topped out at 630MB/s.The new CEB-G128 memory card will come in 128GB and 256GB storage versions, with an even bigger 512GB variant “planned for the future.” Sony also announced a new

Embattled venture capitalist Justin Caldbeck(pictured) is suing his former co-Binary Capital founder Jonathan Teo, alleging breach of contract, fraud and more.
Caldbeck, accused of sexual harassment and unwanted sexual advances in 2017, took an indefinite leave of absence from Binary Capital, leaving to Teo all the responsibilities of the $175 million fund. Shortly after, Teo offered to step down in a last-ditch effort to keep the firm afloat. Ultimately, Binary Capital shut down and New York ve

With Slack gearing up to go public and now seeing daily active users of 10 million with 85,000 organizations using it to help employees communicate with each other, Facebook today released some updated numbers of its own for Workplace, its enterprise-focused platform: the company says that there are now 2 million paid users on the service, not counting those who are using its free tier; and NGOs and educational organizations using Workplace for Good — if you add these in you get “mil

Believe it or not, the retention of black and Latinx employees at Googlewas better last year than in 2017. Though, Google’s attrition rates of black and Latinx — which indicate the rate at which employees leave on an annual basis — are still higher than the national average.
For Native American employees, Google’s attrition rates significantly increased from the year prior. To be clear, that’s a bad thing. For what it’s worth, Google is also not great at retai

A political action committee has placed hundreds of thousands of illegal robocalls impersonating President Trump’s reelection campaign, according to a new report from CNN today.According to CNN, the Support American Leaders PAC has placed over 200,000 calls raising more than $100,000 in January alone. None of the money raised is going to the Trump campaign, CNN said. It’s going to the PAC which is supposedly affiliated with the campaign, but has yet to spend any money on the 2020 el

Founders. This is your shot. TechCrunch is officially in the hunt for the most disruptive startups for this year’s Startup Battlefield at TechCrunch Disrupt San Francisco 2019. Startups can apply here to compete on our world-famous stage for a $100,000 equity-free prize and the coveted Disrupt Cup. With more than 10,000 attendees, hundreds of press outlets and top investors from around the world, your company will launch to the most influential players in tech.
The application. Simple. Fil

A group of democratic lawmakers today announced a bill to end the practice of forced arbitration, an issue that was recently pressed by Google employee organizers, who appeared alongside lawmakers during the announcement.Mandatory arbitration clauses, frequently inserted into contracts, require employees and others to waive their right to sue. Instead, complaints are funneled through a private system. The practice, critics of the widespread system say, gives employers the upper hand in disputes

Buyers of the new Samsung Galaxy S10 and S10 Plus will find a preinstalled plastic screen protector on their device when they unbox it beginning March 8th. Samsung has confirmed that it’s shipping the S10 with a protector on the display, meaning you won’t have to immediately hunt for something that’s compatible with the ultrasonic in-display fingerprint sensor on day one. Now, this is just your very basic screen protector — similar to what OnePlus does with their phones,

Samsung’s promised Bixby remapping update is now available for owners of older Galaxy flagships, including the S8 and S8 Plus, S9 and S9 Plus, Note 8, and Note 9, after debuting on the soon-to-be-released S10 line.
Assuming you have a compatible device that’s running Samsung’s Android Pie / One Touch UI software, you should be getting a new update that’ll bring the much requested feature to your phone.
There are a few caveats to the feature, as noted by The Verge’s