Tips and tricks for all

Lauren Feiner / CNBC : A look at top Democratic presidential candidates' stances on tech issues like breaking up Big Tech, digital privacy, encryption and backdoors, and Section 230   —  - Voters from 14 states and one U.S. territory will decide which Democratic candidate to support for the presidential nomination on Super Tuesday. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2I6JTgL

Mary Ann Azevedo / Crunchbase News : K Health, whose AI-powered primary care app lets patients in 47 US states chat with doctors, raises $48M Series C, bringing its total raised to $97M   —  K Health, a primary care consultant powered by artificial intelligence, announced this morning it has raised a $48 million Series C round. from Techmeme https://ift.tt/39ajtXi

Andrew J. Hawkins / The Verge : Union of Concerned Scientists study: ride-hailing trips today result in an estimated 69% more climate pollution on average than the trips they displace   —  Union of Concerned Scientists recommends more electric cars and pooled trips  —  Uber and Lyft have weathered criticism about pollution … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/38824wV

eMarketer : eMarketer: in the US, TikTok is expected to grow 21.9% YoY to 45.4M MAU in 2020, down from 97.5% growth in its breakout year of 2019   —  More than 20% of social users will use TikTok this year … After nearly doubling its US user base last year, growth for TikTok will slow in the coming years … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/388xTFN

This week, we read a very short story, The Great Silence , as we start to head toward the end of Ted Chiang’s Exhalation collection. This story asks questions about how we connect with nature, and also how to think about innovation and where new ideas come from. We will finish the remaining two stories in the collection in the coming week, and then it will be time (sadly!) to change books. I’ll announce the next book in the book club hopefully shortly. Some further quick notes: Want to join the conversation? Feel free to email me your thoughts at bookclub@techcrunch.com (we got a real email address!) or join some of the discussions on Reddit or Twitter (hashtag TCBookClub) Follow these informal book club articles here: https://techcrunch.com/book-review/ . That page also has a built-in RSS feed for posts exclusively in the Book Review category, which is very low volume. Feel free to add your comments in our TechCrunch comments section below this post. Reading The Great Sile

Joanna Glasner / Crunchbase News : Market intelligence platform ZoomInfo, formerly known as DiscoverOrg, files to raise around $500M in an IPO   —  ZoomInfo Technologies is the latest heavily funded SaaS player to publicly file for an IPO.  —  The Vancouver, Washington-based company, which operates a cloud market intelligence platform … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2I5TKDn

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said today that it would allow new diagnostics technologies to be used to test for the novel coronavirus , COVID-19, at elite academic hospitals and healthcare facilities around the country. The agency’s new initiative comes as critics have assailed various U.S. government agencies for being woefully underprepared to effectively address the spread of the novel coronavirus in the country despite being aware of the potential risks the virus posed since the first cases were reported in Wuhan, China in early December. As the first diagnosed cases of the new virus appeared in the country, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had conducted only 459 tests . Meanwhile, China had five commercial tests for the coronavirus on the market one month ago and can now conduct up to 1.6 million tests per week. South Korea has tested another 65,00 people so far, according to a report in Science Magazine . Initial tests in the U.S. were hampered by the d

These days capitalism and democracy seem to mean that it’s never too early to take advantage of the misery of others, and the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, COVID-19, is the latest proof point. On Saturday the Washington Post reported that an agency within the State Department had compiled a report of two million tweets, which peddled conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak. Among the hoaxes compiled in the report and reported by the Post included the suggestion that the virus had been created by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation or was the result of a bioweapon developed by the Chinese government. In all, these tweets represent about 7 percent of the total tweets surveyed by the government, according to the Post’s reporting. Critically, the report indicated that some of the misinformation spread online appeared to be the result of “inauthentic and coordinated activity,” the Post reported the document saying. The report mirrors warnings from cybersecu

[Editor’s note: Welcome to our weekly review of news that startups can use from across TechCrunch and Extra Crunch. If you want this post by email, just subscribe here .]  Why some fintech startups aren’t blinking at customer acquisition costs Distribution channels are getting saturated across the internet and beyond, and in many tech sectors the cost of acquiring new customers is crimping profitability. But so far, so good in the “great credit card craze,” as Alex digs into this week for Extra Crunch . It turns out that the remaining revenue possibilities combined with the current revenues from interchange fees mean costs are staying relatively flat — or so say a few well-placed execs. “If anything, our customer numbers are massively accelerating despite cutting back on marketing spend,” explains Brian Barnes of M1 Finance. “And I do think that gets into how we positioned ourselves [as] a firm and what drives at the capital efficiency of how we’ve gotten to where we’ve gotten.”

Aditi Shrivastava / The Economic Times : Sources: Amazon to launch a food delivery service in India in March, charging restaurants commissions of 10-15%, about half of what Swiggy and Zomato charge   —  The food delivery platform is open to own employees for now, pilots underway across five high-density pin codes in Bengaluru from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2TuSsHv

Biz Carson / Protocol : Anonymous Twitter account @VCBrags hits a nerve mocking VC's propensity for self-promotion by quote-retweeting boastful tweets   —  Investors either are loving or blocking @VCBrags, which retweets investors' best brags.  —  A parody Twitter account is getting under the skin … from Techmeme https://ift.tt/2vvhgHh

The basis of the classic James Bond film “Tomorrow Never Dies” is an evil media mogul who instigates war between the U.K. and China because it will be great for TV ratings. There’s been a wake-up call recently that our most popular social networks have been indirectly designed to divide populations into enemy camps and reward sensational content, but without the personal responsibility of Bond’s nemesis because they’re algorithmically driven. (This is part five of a seven-part series about virtual worlds .) The rise of “multiverse” virtual words as the next social frontier offers hope to one of the biggest crises facing democratic societies right now. Because the dominant social media platforms (in Western countries at least) monetize through advertising, these platforms reward sensational content that results in the most clicks and shares. Oversimplified, exaggerated claims intended to shock users scrolling past are best practices for individuals, media brands and marketing depart