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The new Disney-centric streaming service, Disney Plus, launched on November 12, 2019.

The platform offers access to a large selection of movies and TV shows from Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, National Geographic, and 20th Century Fox. In addition to many classic titles and recent releases, Disney Plus also features a growing lineup of original films and original series developed exclusively for the service. 

Disney Plus is available to watch on a variety of streaming players, smart TVs, smartphones, and tablets. Members can also enjoy simultaneous streaming on up to four devices, support for up to seven profiles, and unlimited downloads. 4K playback with HDR video and Dolby Atmos audio are supported on select titles as well. 

For those ready to subscribe, the Disney Plus service costs $6.99 a month or $69.99 a year. But, if you're just a casual Disney fan or you're not sure whether you'll like the new service, you don't have to commit to a full subscription quite yet. Instead, you can test out Disney Plus with a free seven-day trial.  

Updated on 06/09/2020 by Steven Cohen: Added details about a few upcoming Disney Plus exclusive titles.

How to get a free trial of Disney Plus 

Disney Plus offers a free seven-day trial. This will give you the chance to browse and watch all of the movies and shows on the service. The free trial is only available to new subscribers. 

You can sign up via a web browser, mobile device, Apple TV, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Samsung Smart TV, and Amazon Fire TV. When you sign up, you're required to enter your payment information, which will be used to bill you at the end of the seven-day period.

If you don't wish to continue the service beyond the free trial, you can simply cancel your subscription by visiting the account details page under your profile icon. As long as you cancel before the trial ends you won't be billed.   

What's included in the Disney Plus free trial? 

Everything a paying subscriber has access to. This includes classic features, such as the Disney and Pixar movies you grew up watching, recently released movies, such as "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker," and exclusive original programming, like "The Mandalorian."

We recommend using the trial as an opportunity to see whether these classic titles and new original programs are worth the monthly cost.

Disney Plus is also set to release a few high-profile movies and shows over the coming weeks and months, including "Artemis Fowl" on June 12, "Hamilton" on July 3, and "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier" in August. If any of those titles are of interest but you're not sure whether you want to commit to a subscription just yet, you can simply hold off and time your free trial to match up with one of those upcoming releases. 

Learn more about all the original shows and original movies Disney Plus has to offer. 

Is there a free trial for the Disney Plus bundle? 

There's also an option to buy a bundled package with Disney Plus, Hulu, and ESPN+, which costs $12.99 per month for all three services. Individually, the ad-supported version of Hulu is currently $5.99 a month, and ESPN+ is $4.99 a month.

If you haven't explored the world of streaming services fully yet, the bundle could be the perfect opportunity to do so for a competitive price. Signing up for all three of the services individually would cost $17.97, so you end up saving about $5 per month with the bundle. There's also a way to get the bundle with the ad-free version of Hulu. 

However, the caveat of signing up for either of these bundles is that you don't get a free trial. Your paid subscription starts the first day you sign up. 

Are there Disney Plus gift cards? 

If you're looking for a great Father's Day gift for the Disney fan in your life, you can purchase a Disney Plus gift subscription. The gift subscription is available for one year of the streaming service and costs $69.99. It's sent via email on a date of your choice and is only redeemable by new subscribers. 

Learn more about how to buy a Disney Plus gift subscription.

Read everything else you should know about Disney Plus:

Disney Plus: Everything you need to know about Disney's ad-free streaming serviceHow to use the Disney Plus app to download and watch movies and shows offlineHow to get the Disney Plus bundle with ESPN Plus and the ad-free version of HuluAll the new movies you can watch on Disney Plus — from the live-action 'Lady and the Tramp' to holiday comedy 'Noelle'All the new shows you can watch on Disney Plus — from 'The Mandalorian' to new Pixar shortsAll the kids' movies you can stream on Disney Plus — from 'Snow White' to 'Frozen'All the new kids' shows you can watch on Disney Plus — from 'Vampirina' to the new reboot of 'Star Wars: The Clone Wars'All the Marvel movies and shows you can stream on Disney Plus — from 'Iron Man' to the new 'Loki'Every single Star Wars movie will be available on Disney PlusAll the Pixar films and shorts you can stream on Disney Plus — from 'Toy Story' to 'Inside Out'The 12 best Christmas movies on Disney Plus you can stream right now — from 'Miracle on 34th Street' to 'Home Alone

Original author: Connie Chen and Steven Cohen

Many startups are now navigating their first official recession in the United States after a historically strong market globally.Brian Patterson, a partner at Silicon Valley law firm Gunderson Dettmer, told Business Insider that he's been helping startups sort out their finances and extend existing funding since the coronavirus pandemic shut down the California Bay Area in March.Patterson said that the uncertainty rippling through public markets has materialized in private markets, which has led to lowered valuations and fewer founder-friendly terms on venture deals.Some deals that were in negotiations before March have fallen through or were entirely redrawn after the pandemic hit, Patterson said.The most secure way forward for any startup, according to Patterson, is to explore all merger and acquisition options over the next 6 to 12 months.Click here for more BI Prime stories.

The sky has officially fallen in Silicon Valley as the United States officially enters recession territory. The end of the economy's historic run, which insiders had been predicting on and off for years, is here.

Predicting the next bubble or economic calamity is one of the Bay Area's few seasonal pastimes, with founders and investors attempting to predict the future based on little more than valuations and tea leaves. But now that the recession is here, many startups are navigating the turbulent economic times for the first time.

Brian Patterson, a partner at Silicon Valley law firm Gunderson Dettmer, told Business Insider that he's been helping startups sort out their finances and extend existing funding since the coronavirus pandemic shut down the California Bay Area in March. The lingering shutdown and pending economic downturn has forced many startups to abandon expensive office leases in favor of remote work, and start looking to cut headcount as they scale back other costs.

"I've been working with those companies to find out how they've prepared, how they can stretch existing financing, or evaluate if they need to bring in new financing in the short term," Patterson said. "We're looking at how the business plans and runways change based on those factors, and they've all held board meetings in the aftermath of COVID where they considered if they need to totally revamp the models."

Frugality is of particular interest for venture-backed startups whose investors are evaluating how long the companies can last without outside injections of cash. Runway, or the amount of time a startup has before running out of money, is key to surviving long periods of economic uncertainty, Patterson said. Venture investors are not immune to the uncertainty currently riding through public markets, Patterson said. The delayed effects on private investing could cause even well-worn investors to hesitate before writing new checks.

"Many [investors]  are saying they are open for business, but they have reassessed what it means to make a new investment in this environment," Patterson said. "It's all conducted over Zoom now, and many haven't actually closed on an investment via Zoom so it's a new dynamic."

That uncertainty is causing investors to step cautiously when they do decide to invest, Patterson said. This has put downward pressure on private company valuations, and has even led to renegotiations when the investors were unsure original deal terms could be sustainable in the current environment. The shift is a direct contrast to the founder-friendly terms that have prevailed in Silicon Valley over the last decade, Patterson said.

"I've definitely seen my handful of down rounds, but I don't feel like we are in the largest part of the curve on that yet," Patterson said. "The companies understand the money they raised in the last year or two, at the valuations they raised at, will be hard pressed to retain those values moving forward."

The down round is one of the ghosts of downturns past that many founders and investors dread. But Patterson said that many founders who have shorter runways and need funding soon will have to accept what is available at whatever terms investors are willing to give them. What founders may not realize, according to Patterson, is that venture investors are under their own kind of pressure to make sure the deal terms are in the interest of their larger investors, typically referred to as LPs. That could mean that even investors with the best reputations are forced to remove formerly founder-friendly terms from deals made under the current circumstances.

Investor terms that might have seemed overly demanding may now be rolled out again, such as provisions that guarantee an investor returns that are a multiple of the money they invested when the startup is sold or goes public.

"If you are competitive, you don't have multiples in your preference because that's a no-no," Patterson said of liquidation preferences that are specified by investors in such deals. "Including multiples is not founder-friendly at best and completely vulture-like at worst, and it's really demeaning your reputation as an investor. The fact that certain investors are bringing that into play now shows their LPs are demanding these VCs take a harder stance on the way these deals are structured and protect the interest of their own investors."

Patterson said he has seen at least one such deal fall apart during negotiations as the investor tried to renegotiate to include similar provisions. The deal was already in the works prior to March, he said, and so it felt like a relic from a previous time even just a month later. 

Startups in similar situations with limited options have one promising path forward, he said. Pursuing a merger or acquisition could be the best way to shore up the company's finances without relying on outside venture investors, according to Patterson.

"All companies that are significantly impacted by COVID need to consider [mergers or acquisitions] if that's better than going it alone, given the inherent risks at a macro level and within the business itself," Patterson said. "It's being offensive, but in a smart way." 

Original author: Megan Hernbroth

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Original author: Antonio Villas-Boas

The market for initial public offerings has rebounded over the last few weeks.But the tech IPO market has yet to bounce back and likely won't be in full swing until September, said Rick Kline, an attorney with Goodwin who helps companies prepare for the public offerings.Right now, the market seems most interest in companies that haven't been hit by or may have even benefitted from the coronavirus crisis, he said.The election, a potential resurgence in the pandemic, or a violent turn to the ongoing protests could all potential derail the IPO market rebound, Kline said.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Like much of the rest of the US economy, the initial public offering market has reopened for business in the wake of the coronavirus crisis.

But don't expect a rush of venture-backed tech IPOs just yet.

A few such startups, like insurance technology company Lemonade, which released its offering paperwork on Monday, may go public in coming months, Rick Kline, a partner at Goodwin who co-chairs the law firm's capital markets practice and helps tech companies prepare for IPOs, told Business Insider. But many more are likely to wait at least until Labor Day, when the public offering typical picks up after the usual summer lull.

"It does seem like the IPO market is starting to open some. I still think it will be [in] fits and starts this summer," Kline said. "If I had to pick a month ahead of the election," he continued, "I would probably say September will be the month where we'll see the most tech IPOs."

There were 12 public offerings in the US in January and 20 in February, according to Nasdaq, before the COVID pandemic and the subsequent lockdown orders shut down much of the economy and throttled the IPO market. There were just five offerings in March and nine in April

But the market started bouncing back last month, when 18 companies went public. There have already been 10 IPOs this month.

There have been few tech IPOs lately

Few of the offerings during the rebound thus far have been from tech companies. Instead, many have been from pharmaceutical or life sciences companies or from so-called blank-check firms, which raise money with the express purpose of using the money to buy another company.

That may be starting to change, though. ZoomInfo, which offers a proprietary online directory of companies and corporate managers, went public last week, as did Shift4 Payments, which offers digital payment systems and services to restaurants and other companies. Online used-car marketplace Vroom is expected to public later this week, while SoftBank-backed online insurance company Lemonade is now waiting in the wings.

The initial signs that markets were unfreezing happened about two months ago when some of the companies hit hardest by the coronavirus, including Carnival and Southwest Airlines, went out on the public markets and successfully raised money through convertible debt offerings. About the same time — in April and May — there was a wave of secondary offerings, where already public companies sell new tranches of shares to public investors.

The success of those debt and secondary offerings showed that the financial markets were still open for business and there was still plenty of liquidity in them, Kline said. That seems to have given startups and their backers the confidence to move forward with their IPOs.

"It's been a little bit of a rolling wave," he said.

The rebound could still lose its bounce

The resurgence in the stock markets has also helped, Kline said. After hitting their nadir in third and fourth week of March, the markets have bounced back, with the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 back in record territory.

"I think the markets have held up really well, bounced back better and quicker than at least I expected, maybe than most expected," he said.

The companies that are likely to go out in the next few months are those that have done well during the pandemic or even benefitted from it, he said. Companies that were hit hard by the crisis are likely going to have to wait, perhaps into next year.

Lemonade, which says it was largely unaffected by the coronavirus crisis but is bleeding cash and saw its losses swell in recent months, could be a test case to see whether the market has regained its appetite for fast-growing but money-losing tech startups.

"I think what the market's saying is they're interested in growth," Kline said. "It probably is responsible growth with a path to profitability."

While he's expecting the tech IPO market to really get into gear in September, companies may have a limited window of opportunity to go out. The presidential election could well close the market again, as attention turns to it. The markets don't like uncertainty, and if the election starts to look like it's too close to call, investors, worried about how things will turn out, could shy away from investing in new offerings, he said.

And other things could halt the rebound, such as a sharp resurgence in the pandemic or a sharp increase in violence associated with the ongoing protests over police killings and brutality toward Black people, Kline said.

"I think if you don't see something going on in the world right now that could derail the IPO markets, you're not watching," he said.

Got a tip about the tech industry or tech investing? Contact Troy Wolverton via email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., message him on Twitter @troywolv, or send him a secure message through Signal at 415.515.5594. You can also contact Business Insider securely via SecureDrop.

Original author: Troy Wolverton

More than 50 former Change.org employees have drafted an open letter demanding that the company disclose how much money it raised from its record-breaking "Justice for George Floyd" petition and donate the money to Floyd's family or Black Lives Matter-focused charities.The petition became the most-signed petition in the site's history last week, racking up over 17 million signatures. Change.org urges petition signers to "become a hero" by donating money to "get the petition on the agenda."But as Business Insider reported last week, Change.org does not pass along donated funds to petition organizers or to affected parties like Floyd's family. Instead, it keeps the money and uses it to "circulate" petitions more widely and pay for its own operating costs."Since Change.org is a for-profit corporation which depends on collecting new email addresses to make money, these actions constitute Change.org profiting from the death of Black people," the former employees wrote.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

More than 50 former employees of petition site Change.org sent an open letter to the company's leadership Tuesday demanding that it answer questions about money raised through a "Justice for George Floyd" petition and commit to donating that money.

The petition became Change.org's most-signed US petition ever last week, with more than 17 million signatures. Change.org solicits donations from petition signers, urging them to "become a hero" by donating a few dollars to "get this petition on the agenda."

But last week, people who gave money through the petition told Business Insider they felt duped by Change.org's call for donations after realizing the money doesn't go to Floyd's family or to any charity — rather, the venture-backed company keeps the money and uses it to cover operating costs and expensive marketing campaigns that further promote Change.org and its petitions.

"Since Change.org is a for-profit corporation which depends on collecting new email addresses to make money, these actions constitute Change.org profiting from the death of Black people," the former employees wrote.

Change.org spent some of the money raised from the petition to purchase billboards promoting the petition and its site. Change.org

The open letter calls on Change.org to disclose how much money was raised through the Justice for George Floyd petition and commit to donating that money to Floyd's family or to relevant charities, and to do the same for prominent petitions that call for justice for Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery.

The former employees also demand that Change.org draft a policy against profiting from such petitions in the future and allow petition creators to opt out of the company's fundraising mechanism.

"Change.org is a for-profit corporation owned and led primarily by white people, with fewer than a dozen Black staff members out of 264 global staff, and must take decisive action to avoid any possibility of profit from anti-Black violence and systems of white supremacy," they wrote.

Change.org previously declined to answer Business Insider's questions about how much money was raised through the Floyd petition, citing company policy. A Change.org spokesperson said the money was used to buy ads promoting the petition on Facebook and Instagram, purchase billboard advertisements across the US, and otherwise cover Change.org's operating costs.

In response to the open letter, a Change.org spokesperson defended the company's revenue model but acknowledged it "can do much more."

"In a process led by Black staff, we're actively working on how the record-breaking signatures on Kellen's petition — and the money contributed to promote the campaign — can be of most service to this historic movement. Promotions from signers contributed to how fast and far this spread, and helped drive impact; and we know we can do much more. We'll publicly share more as details are finalized," the spokesperson said.

Original author: Aaron Holmes

Juneteenth will be a company holiday at Twitter and Square, CEO Jack Dorsey said Tuesday. The June 19 holiday, which celebrates the emancipation of US slaves in Texas in 1865, will be set aside for "celebration, education, and connection," he said.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Twitter and Square will make Juneteenth a permanent company holiday for "celebration, education, and connection," CEO Jack Dorsey announced Tuesday.

Celebrated on June 19, the holiday commemorates the end of slavery in the United States. Specifically, it's a celebration of the day slaves in Texas learned of the Emancipation Proclamation a full two and a half years after it was issued by President Abraham Lincoln.

"Countries and regions around the world have their own days to celebrate emancipation, and we will do the work to make those dates company holidays everywhere we are present," he said on Twitter.

 

Twitter's announcement comes after weeks of protests following the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. In the wake of the nationwide demonstrations, activists have successfully won a pledge by Minneapolis' city council to defund the city's police department, the rollback of a secretive law in New York that protected cops' disciplinary records, and hiring reforms in Washington D.C.

But they haven't all been met with open arms. President (and frequent tweeter) Donald Trump has expressed outrage over the protests, calling in National Guard troops and demanding state governors use force to quell the demonstrations. Twitter in May placed a warning next to one of his tweets, prompting outrage that could intensify with Tuesday's announcement. But that doesn't appear to phase Dorsey.

The billionaire said this month he would expand planned charitable giving to groups fighting issues like the coronavirus, girl's health, and education, which will also include Colin Kaepernick's charity.

"I hope this inspires others to do something similar," he said. "Life is too short, so let's do everything we can today to help people now."

Original author: Graham Rapier

Chinese internet company Tencent is building a 320-acre city in China over the next seven years as a work-life campus for employees.Net City will have offices, residences, schools, retail, open spaces, and grass-covered rooftops.Tencent is one of the most recent tech firms to delve into master-planned communities.The now-abandoned Quayside in Toronto was supposed to be a $900 million high-tech city of the future for Google's sister company before "economic uncertainties" spelled its end in May.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Chinese internet behemoth Tencent is building a city the size of Midtown Manhattan in China for employees, complete with offices, residences, schools, and retail spaces.

Designed by NBBJ — an architecture firm with designs for Google, Samsung, and Amazon under its belt — Net City will be built from the ground up on 320 acres in Shenzhen, China, and will be completed in seven years, as The Wall Street Journal reported.

The master-planned city project is one of the latest launched by a tech company that proposes providing a sprawling campus where employees can work, live, and play.

Here's what the futuristic city would look like.

Original author: Katie Canales

To delete your Reddit history, you can head to the "Overview" section of your profile and delete posts one-by-one.You can also delete your entire Reddit history at once using the "Nuke Reddit History" extension for Google Chrome.Deleting your Reddit history involves deleting your posts and comments, so no one else will be able to see them.Visit Business Insider's Tech Reference library for more stories.

Reddit is built around posting and commenting. That's how you start conversations, make your voice heard, and even earn Karma — Reddit's version of virtual clout.

However, as time goes on, you may regret a post or comment you make. When this happens, you could delete your entire account so your username won't appear anymore — but your posts will still be there.

To really delete your Reddit history, you'll need to delete the posts and comments themselves. Luckily, this is easy to do in two ways from your computer. 

Note, though, that if what you actually want to do is delete the history of what Reddit pages you've visited, you're better off clearing your browser history.

Check out the products mentioned in this article:

Apple Macbook Pro (From $1,299.00 at Apple)

Acer Chromebook 15 (From $358.99 at Staples)

How to delete your Reddit history via the "My Profile" page

1. Log into your account on Reddit.com and click your username in the top-right corner, and then select "My Profile."

2. This will bring you to the "Overview" section of your profile, where each post and comment you've made will be listed. Find the post or comment you want to delete and click the ellipsis icon ("...") below it, and then select "Delete."

Original author: Emma Witman

Marketing-tech firm Bombora is suing rival ZoomInfo, alleging it's illegally collecting people's data.Bombora claims that ZoomInfo's practices do not meet the requirements of the California Consumer Privacy Act, a six-month-old law that restricts how companies collect data from consumers.The complaint focuses on a ZoomInfo product that gives businesses free access to data from email signatures in exchange for sharing data.A ZoomInfo spokesperson called the claims "meritless" and an "attempt at retaliation against ZoomInfo for ending a vendor relationship with Bombora."Click here for more BI Prime stories.

Bombora, a tech firm that that helps business-to-business marketers target customers, is suing rival ZoomInfo, claiming that its data-collection process violates the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) and gives the firm an unfair advantage. 

California's law regulates how companies collect and use consumers' data, similar to Europe's General Data Protection Regulation. The California law requires people to take an action if they don't want to share their data with companies. The law rolled out in January and is set to begin being enforced in July.

Bombora alleges that ZoomInfo's data-collection practices violate California's law

Six-year-old Bombora is a private company that has raised $1 million in funding. ZoomInfo is a 20-year-old software firm that is owned by DiscoverOrg and recently went public with a valuation of $13 billion.

Bombora and ZoomInfo collect data from publishers, tech firms, and marketers and sell it to business-to-business companies that use the data to pitch their products to companies.

Bombora's complaint, filed in California's Superior Court in Santa Clara, focuses on a ZoomInfo products called Community Edition that plugs into email software like Microsoft Outlook. The product scans a person's email signature and pulls data from it — like addresses and phone numbers — and puts it into a database. The product lets businesses access contact information for 150 million people and 16 million businesses, according to ZoomInfo's website. Businesses use Community Edition for free in exchange for contributing contact data.

According to Bombora's complaint, that data collection method violates the CCPA because the person's contacts have not agreed to share their data and can't opt out of doing so. The company said Bombora only collects information about businesses at the company level and does not collect personal or contact information.

"It's like they're creating their own version of LinkedIn without any permission," said Havona Madama, chief data privacy officer and general counsel for Bombora. 

The complaint claims that the process gives ZoomInfo an unfair advantage over competitors including Bombora.

"Many people believed that the only fines out of the CCPA would be directly out of [the law]," said "No one has brought a case to the court yet of using CCPA as an underlying case of unfair competition in the State of California."

ZoomInfo called the lawsuit "meritless." It has until July 10 to respond to the complaint.

Bombora's complaint could face a couple challenges. The CCPA does not include private right of action, meaning that only government and regulatory agencies can make complaints, not individual companies. ZoomInfo is also a registered data broker, which is covered in a portion of the CCPA.

The complaint claims Bombora lost clients to ZoomInfo

The complaint also alleges that ZoomInfo misrepresented a partnership with Bombora.

Until this year, the two companies had a contract that allowed DiscoverOrg to use Bombora data within its platform. In April, ZoomInfo rolled out its own product called ZoomInfo Intent, taking Bombora's customers with the company, according to the complaint.

Bombora alleges that the company lost $1.95 million as a result of ZoomInfo's product launch. Bombora is seeking the $1.95 million for immediate damages and $18 million in future damages, according to the complaint.

"The claims are meritless, and the lawsuit is Bombora's attempt at retaliation against ZoomInfo for ending a vendor relationship with Bombora," said a ZoomInfo spokesperson. "ZoomInfo fully complies with the CCPA and the regulations issued by the California Attorney General. ZoomInfo intends to vigorously defend the suit and will respond on the timeline set by the court."

Original author: Lauren Johnson

Before you can use Android Beam on your phone, you'll need to enable the feature in your settings menu.Once it's enabled, you can use Android Beam by simply holding your phone against another phone that has Beam enabled.Android Beam works using near-field communication (NFC) chips, which can send data over short distances.Not all Android devices have Android Beam built-in.Visit Business Insider's Tech Reference library for more stories.

These days most smartphones, including Androids, are equipped with near-field communication technology, known as NFC.

The tech itself is pretty cool — it's like having an antenna in your phone that can help securely verify and send data.

Android's proprietary NFC software, called Beam, can be used as a secure way to make payments or transfer data between Android phones. 

However, be aware that not all Android devices can use Beam.

Here how to check if your phone can use Beam, and how to enable and use it.

Check out the products mentioned in this article:

Samsung Galaxy S10 (From $699.99 at Walmart)

How to enable Android Beam

1. On your Android's home screen, swipe down from the top of the screen to open the main options menu.

The smaller gear icon for settings is in the bottom-right corner. Emma Witman/Business Insider

2. Tap the gear icon in the bottom-right of the menu. This will open your phone's Settings app.

You can also search for "NFC" using the search bar at the top. Emma Witman/Business Insider

3. Open the "Connected devices" tab.

4. Tap "Connection preferences."

5. Near the top, you'll see "NFC." Toggle the slider so that it goes from gray to green.

Once NFC is enabled, you'll see the option to use Android Beam become available. Emma Witman/Business Insider

6. Only when NFC is toggled on will you be allowed to enable Android Beam. Double-check that it is by tapping the Android Beam tab, and toggle the slider to "On" if it isn't already.

You'll be able to turn the Android Beam feature on if — and only if — NFC has been enabled. Emma Witman/Business Insider

How to use Android Beam to send content to another Android

1. Make sure both Androids are unlocked, and have Android Beam enabled. Open the content you want to send.

2. Physically touch the phones to each other. You may need to place them back-to-back.

Depending on what model of Android you have, you'll need to position it in a different way. Emma Witman/Business Insider

3. The content you want to beam will shrink to a smaller window, and you'll see the message "Tap to Beam." Tap the screen.

And just like that, the content will be zipped over to the other Android. 

 

Original author: Emma Witman

Microsoft and advertising firm McCann asked the artist Shantell Martin to make a Black Lives Matter mural in Manhattan.In an email, the duo asked Martin to make the mural this weekend "while the protests are still relevant."Martin posted a photo of the email request to Twitter, criticizing the team for insinuating the Black Lives Matter movement won't be relevant after this weekend. "There are many layers to why it is wrong and we can start to make excuses about why or how this type of email came about, but the bottom line is it is unacceptable and a part of the problem," Martin told Insider in a statement via email.Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

Microsoft is under fire after mural artist Shantell Martin leaked an email request the company sent her that insinuated the Black Lives Matter movement was a passing trend.

Martin is a well-known mural artist, famous for her black and white designs that have led her to work with stars like Kendrick Lamar. 

Microsoft and advertising firm McCann approached Martin via email about making a mural in honor of the Black Lives Matter movement on June 3

Microsoft and McCann approached Shantell Martin about creating a Black Lives Matter protest. Astrid Stawiarz / Contributor / Getty Images

The mural was intended to be put up on the Microsoft store located at 5th Avenue in New York City. The store is currently boarded up — as is much of Manhattan – because of the protests in New York over George Floyd's death at the hands of a police officer. 

In the email request, a representative from McCann asked Martin if she could make the mural no later than Sunday June 7, as the movement would not be "relevant" after.

"Hoping to complete the mural while the protests are still relevant and the boards are still up, ideally no later than this coming Sunday," the email read.

Martin shared a screenshot of the email request to Twitter, slamming both Microsoft and McCann for implying the movement wouldn't be relevant after this weekend

The email's implication that the Black Lives Matter movement is a news story that will soon become irrelevant is particularly insulting to demonstrators who have been working to highlight the systematic nature of racism and widespread issues with police brutality in the United States.

It's also worth noting that Martin's tweet comes as thousands continue to protest Floyd's death, with cities like Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia seeing their largest demonstrations to date this weekend. 

Microsoft Chief Management Officer Chris Capossela responded to Martin's tweet, apologizing for the "insensitive language" used in the email and asking the artist if she would be willing to connect to discuss the matter.

Harris Diamond, the Chief Executive Officer of McCann, replied to Capossela's tweet and apologized as well, calling the email "flat out wrong."

In a statement to Insider, Martin said she felt it was important to share the email with her followers

Martin responded to Insider's request for comment via email:

"I'm not happy that I had to post this, but after a couple of days of going over it and thinking about it, I felt that it was really important to share. There are many layers to why it is wrong and we can start to make excuses about why or how this type of email came about, but the bottom line is it is unacceptable and a part of the problem. It also highlights how art and the work of artists is not valued but rather exploited consistently by agencies and companies without little thought.  The points I made in the caption that accompanied the post are straightforward and hopefully something positive will come from this."

Many corporations have received backlash over their statements on the Black Lives Matter movement in recent weeks.

Supporters of the movement argue that companies are only voicing support for protesters because it's trendy, not because they are doing any substantial work to combat systematic racism, as Vox reported. 

Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella recently issued a statement encouraging empathy to combat racism, as well as highlighted the company's work with the Criminal Justice Reform Initiative. Nadella has not yet announced any additional action the company would be taking to combat systematic racism or police brutality. 

Microsoft and McCann did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment. 

Original author: Samantha Grindell

If you're unemployed, or are self-isolating and have extra time on your hands, learning how to code could help your career.According to jobs site Indeed.com, the two most in-demand jobs of 2020 are software architect and full-stack developer, both of which require a proficiency in coding.Tech company HackerRank polled over 116,000 software engineers to find out which languages are associated with the highest salary.From C++ and Python to Ruby and Perl, here are the top 15 coding languages associated with the highest salaries worldwide, along with online courses to learn them.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

More than 20.5 million Americans lost their jobs in April, according to Labor Department data. If you recently lost your job, or just want to learn something new, consider learning what the job site Indeed says is 2020's most in-demand skill: coding.

Analysts at the site combed through its database to find the best jobs of the year based on three factors: average pay, the job title's growth on the site over the past three years, and the number of postings for the job for every 1 million total listings on the site.

The most promising job was software architect, the person who makes high-level decisions about the design and standard of code used in a platform. In second place was a full-stack developer, or someone who has the complete coding skills to make a platform.

While some hiring managers don't require a job applicant know a specific coding language (the coding skills are often transferable across languages), it does help to know which languages are associated with the highest-paying jobs.

HackerRank, a tech company that focuses on competitive programming challenges for both programmers and recruiters, surveyed over 116,000 software developers and students to figure out what coding languages were associated with the highest pay worldwide.

Below is the complete list of languages, along with how they compare to the salary of the average developer, which according to HackerRank's survey is $54,491.

Original author: Marguerite Ward

Prabhakar Raghavan has been elevated to lead Google's search business as part of a major company shakeup announced this week.He will also oversee Google ads, Assistant, commerce and payments, as well as Google's Geo business.It makes Raghavan an incredibly important figure in Google's new org chart, which is being streamlined under Sundar Pichai.In the same week as these changes were announced, so was news that antitrust regulators are closing in on Google's ad and search business.Do you work at Google? Contact this reporter securely using encrypted messaging app Signal (+1 628-228-1836) or email (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

It was all change at Google this week, with several long-term executives getting shuffled into new roles in the biggest org shake-up since Sundar Pichai took the reins as both Alphabet and Google's CEO.

One mover is Jen Fitzpatrick, previously the head of Google's Maps business, who is transitioning to lead Google's core engineering team of 8,000 employees.

But the biggest announcement was that Prabhakar Raghavan will step up to lead the entire Search and Assistant division. He replaces veteran Ben Gomes, who will take a new role focused on Google's work in the education space, although Search Engine Land reports that he will remain a technical advisor on search.

At the same time, Jerry Dischler just became the new head of Google's ads organization and will also report to Raghavan, a Google spokesperson confirmed to Business Insider.

For Raghavan, it means he's now in the position of overseeing all of Google's search, ads, Geo, and commerce and payments — and he just became even more of a critical player in the company org chart.

Prabhakar was previously leading Google's ads and commerce team, and before that was in charge of G Suite in Google Cloud, so his move to leading search has caused a bit of head-scratching to outsiders looking in.

But Raghavan has a long career history in search stretching back to his days at IBM and Yahoo, as Pichai pointed out in a memo to employees this week, not to mention that he published more than one major text on the subject.

The shakeup means that Google's search and advertising products are now led by one person. When cofounders Sergey Brin and Larry Page stepped down from the company in 2019 they talked about wanting to "simplify" the management structure at Google, and this week Sundar Pichai took another step to doing just that.

"While there are many separate teams working on different parts of the user journey, from the user's perspective, it's just Google helping," wrote Pichai in a note to employees this week.

"I want every user experience to feel like this and I've been thinking about how we can best achieve it. So, when Ben and Jen — who both just celebrated their 20th Googleversaries last year — mentioned they were ready for new challenges, I took the opportunity to make some changes across our flagship knowledge products and help them work together more seamlessly."

Putting search and ads under one chief could feasibly help Google better monetize its core moneymaking business, but it also comes at a time where both these areas are facing a potentially huge antitrust storm.

The Justice Department and states are reportedly gearing up to bring antitrust cases against Google as soon as this summer, and this week, Bloomberg reported that Google's search business is being probed by antitrust investigators.

Gabriel Weinberg, CEO of search engine DuckDuckGo, told the publication that he had spoken to state and federal regulators who have asked how Google should give consumers alternatives to its own search engine on Android and in Chrome browsers, Bloomberg said.

As Covid-19 continues to attack Google's ad business and antitrust regulators close in, Raghavan is now front of center of it all, and might have just become the company's new MVP.

Original author: Hugh Langley

Twitter users on Saturday noticed that President Donald Trump's account was recommended when they searched the term "racist" on the platform. "If an account is mentioned often alongside certain terms, it can become algorithmically surfaced together as a recommendation," the spokesperson said.The president just over a week ago put forth an executive order to increase regulation faced by social media companies, including Twitter, after it placed a fact-checking label over his tweet. It later labeled another one of his tweets for violating its rules about violence.Despite his ongoing war of words against Twitter, the president sent 200 tweets out on Friday, which is the most he's ever used the platform in a single day. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Twitter users on Saturday noted that when they searched for the word "racist" on the platform, Twitter pointed them toward the account of President Donald Trump. 

"The top result for racist on Twitter is the president of the United States," The Verge's Tom Warren tweeted. 

Business Insider was able to replicate this on Saturday afternoon by searching for both the terms "racist" and "racism."

A spokesperson for Twitter on Saturday told Business Insider that the president is listed under these terms as a result of the company's algorithm, which is triggered by user behavior. 

"If an account is mentioned often alongside certain terms, it can become algorithmically surfaced together as a recommendation," the spokesperson said.

As Insider previously noted, it's been a rocky few weeks between the president and Twitter. On May 28, he issued an executive order in an attempt to regulate it and other companies like Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube. The order directly followed the company's decision to fact-check his tweets and was issued the day before it flagged another one of his posts as violent.

Despite the ongoing beef, the president has continued to use Twitter to disseminate his platform amid ongoing nationwide protests over the police killing of George Floyd. On Friday, Trump tweeted or retweeted exactly 200 posts during the day — the highest volume posts he's made within a 24-hour span ever, surpassing the 142 tweets he sent during a single day during his Senate impeachment trial. 

Throughout his administration, the president has often faced allegations of racism or stroking white supremacist ideology, though he has denied them and reiterated he believes himself to be the "least racist person in the world." 

When PBS reporter Yamiche Alcindor asked Trump at a press briefing Friday how he planned to combat racism in the US amid ongoing protests surrounding the death of Geroge Floyd, Trump pointed toward recent economic gains amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

"And by the way, what's happened to our country, and what you now see — what's been happening — is the greatest thing that can happen toward race relations, toward the African American community, the Asian American, the Hispanic American community, for women, for everything," Trump said.

The White House did not immediately return Business Insider's request for comment on Saturday.

Original author: Connor Perrett

Designers in the Czech Republic are working on the country's first 3D-printed tiny home. The structure can be built in only 48 hours, with the help of a robot called Scoolpt.The tiny home also floats on a pontoon, but can sit on land, and is largely self-sustaining.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

A tiny home with a view will soon be available in the Czech Republic. The design, Prvok, will be the first 3D-printed home in the Czech Republic, and will float on a pontoon, though it's also able to stand on land. It's innovative in more ways than one; The structure will be built in only 48 hours, and can save up to 50% of the building costs of conventional buildings, its proponents say. 

Creators Michal Trpak and the Erste group have started putting the concept into production, with 3D printing happening this month. They are clear that they hope the project will "change the construction industry forever," making custom homes and construction more affordable and less wasteful than traditional methods. 

Here's Prvok being printed, and what the finished product might look like. 

 

Original author: Mary Meisenzahl

Quibi's sluggish growth since its April debut has made it the butt of some media jokes: "Yes, Quibi still exists," cracked the headline of a June Marketplace episode.Business Insider got the inside story of how people who have developed or worked on shows for Quibi feel about the service post-launch.Most of the people said it showed promise and was producing high-quality programming, but were disappointed with the initial response."I genuinely thought it would do better," one person said. "I'm not using it as much as I thought I would."The insiders also described a demanding workload on Quibi productions, which was intensified by the pandemic, as well as extensive notes from Quibi's content execs, on everything from the graphics to the talent on screen.If you have a tip about Quibi, contact the author at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., or message her on Signal at 347-770-5933.Click here for more BI Prime stories.

Not long after the mobile-video service Quibi launched, its cofounder Jeffrey Katzenberg ruffled feathers with a quip to The New York Times that one of the company's core bets was not panning out.

The startup, which had raised a mammoth $1.8 billion from venture backers, had hired publishers like BBC, ESPN, and E! to create short-form news and lifestyle programming. The slate, called Daily Essentials, aimed to help make Quibi a habit for its target audience of 20- and 30-somethings who spend their days glued to smartphones.

"The Daily Essentials are not that essential," Katzenberg told the Times' Nicole Sperling in early May. He also blamed the coronavirus pandemic for Quibi's anemic growth since launch.

The remark didn't sit well with some people who were actively working on Quibi's Daily Essentials.

"It was disenchanting and concerning," a development exec at one of Quibi's content partners told Business Insider. "You're talking about hundreds of people working on various Daily Essentials ... It leads all of us to ask and wonder, what exactly the future is for the 'essentials'?"

"What exactly is the future" is a fundamental question that plagues not just those working on the Daily Essentials, but other Quibi insiders, as well.

During May and June, Business Insider spoke with 10 people who had developed or worked on shows for Quibi, including four who were actively involved in productions at the time. The people asked to remain anonymous because they did not have permission to speak about Quibi's productions.

The people described a demanding workload that was made more complicated by the pandemic, as well as a stringent content-development team at Quibi that gave feedback — on everything from the graphics to the talent on screen — well beyond what rival platforms like Netflix typically give.

Most of the Quibi insiders said they'd used the service themselves and thought it showed promise and was producing high-quality programming. But, like Katzenberg, they were disappointed with the initial response, and some found themselves not considering Quibi content "essential" in their own media diets.

"I genuinely thought it would do better," a person who had worked with Quibi's content team said. "There was a lot of excitement in development … I watched a few of the shows. I'm not using it as much as I thought I would."

It spotlights a core issue for the subscription service as it prepares its next slate of programming. 

Quibi commissioned top publishers and Hollywood studios to create short-form programming that was as good as the shows and movies you'd find on Netflix or traditional TV.

But the programming — like "Chrissy's Court," a celebrity-infused take on reality court shows; reboots of "Punk'd" and "Reno 911"; and thrillers like "The Most Dangerous Game" — isn't drastically different from what's available on other platforms. The in-between moments of the day that Quibi's 10-minute-or-less episodes were designed to fill have mostly dried up during lockdown. And Quibi has yet to land a cultural hit that forces people to take notice, like Disney Plus' "The Mandalorian," Netflix's "Orange Is the New Black," or Hulu's "The Handmaid's Tale."

Quibi was fighting an uphill battle by launching on April 6, amid a global coronavirus pandemic and with WarnerMedia's HBO Max and NBCUniversal's Peacock on its heels.

The subscription service, which starts at $4.99 per month with ads, gained some early traction with the help of a 90-day free-trial offer that helped drive 1.7 million app downloads in the service's first week. But the service soon sank in the US iPhone app rankings. By May 29, it had fallen out of the top 200 in the iOS app store, according to the analytics firm App Annie.

As Quibi battles to build a subscriber base alongside established video services like Netflix, newcomers like HBO Max, and digital platforms like Instagram and TikTok, Quibi's programming can't just be good, it needs to be unmissable — if not for the general public, then for a passionate subset.

"Nothing has broken out," said Alan Wolk, cofounder of and lead analyst at TVREV. "Quibi hasn't found its niche yet. And then the second part of that is finding a niche that's going to get people to actually subscribe and pay."

Quibi execs are very, very involved in productions and tend to give a lot more notes than competitors

The pandemic has created challenges for Quibi's production teams, which, like the rest of the industry, were forced to pause or shift to remote work.

Quibi thinks about its content in three main buckets: 

Movies "told in chapters," or episodesScripted and unscripted series that are similar in quality to what you'd find on TVDaily Essentials, or timely news and informational programming that is released daily 

Its launch slate of shows and movies was mostly complete by March, when the production shutdowns rippled throughout the global TV and film industry. The Daily Essentials were still in production, as were some shows due to hit during the summer and fall.

The pandemic pushed Quibi's production partners to work even harder to stay on schedule. 

"This process was difficult as it was to begin with," a second development exec working with Quibi said. "The pandemic added so many layers of complication … The workload was really tough, also because of the feedback that came back and forth that I would call nitpicking in some instances."

Multiple insiders said that Quibi's content execs gave extensive notes to production partners on what the shows should look like, down to the graphics, set decorations, on-air talent, wardrobe, and zoom of a shot. 

The feedback, the people said, went beyond what execs at other mobile-first platforms like Snapchat Discover and Facebook Watch, or at Netflix, typically give. Some notes were more extensive than what TV networks provide.

"There are notes and then there are Quibi notes," one of the development execs said. "Quibi from the start of an idea, to the title of the show, to the set design, color scheme, pixels in the graphics, I don't know that there was a detail that Quibi isn't involved in."

The intense feedback was partly because Quibi was endeavoring to create content people hadn't seen before, and had very specific ideas about how it should look.

The workload was also compounded by Quibi's Turnstyle feature, which shifts between portrait and landscape orientations as viewers rotate their devices. It requires two cuts for every video.

"A lot more goes into it than just creating a separate angle for format," another person said. "There's a whole decision-making process on the graphics and styling."

Quibi has touted Turnstyle as a key tool that will unlock new ways for content creators and advertisers to tell stories on smartphones. But, so far, it hasn't been enough to make Quibi stand out for audiences.  

"All of our shows and partners are having to work harder and smarter since COVID forced us into an industry-wide remote reality," Becky Brooks, head of lifestyle programming for Quibi, said in a statement to Business Insider. "We're exceptionally grateful to our partners at how quickly and efficiently they were able to pivot and stand up quality shows."

The streaming service was going after mobile-forward millennials, but is still learning who its real audience is 

In the weeks since launch, the insiders said they hadn't noticed major shifts in the kinds of notes they were getting from Quibi execs. They thought Quibi might need more time to gather and analyze the data before changing course on its content strategy.

Bloomberg's Lucas Shaw and Kelly Gilblom reported in May that Quibi was starting to reassess some of its upcoming slate.

For the most part, production teams are still working off Quibi's initial assumption of who its audience would be, namely, mobile-forward 25- to 35-year-olds. One person described that target audience as a "premium, film watching" audience. Another person described them as young professionals in their early 30s who were very plugged into culture.

Bloomberg reported, however, that the early audience for Quibi had been older and more female than Quibi executives anticipated.

The data Quibi has provided to production partners has so far been limited, said some of the insiders, who declined to share details due to non-disclosure agreements.

But it's not unusual for a streaming service, especially one as young as Quibi, to play its data close to the vest. Netflix, which has been releasing originals since 2013, only said last year that it would start sharing more data with producers.

Quibi has shared some stats with the media: The company says 80% percent of Quibi's viewers complete the episode they are watching, multiple outlets reported. And the app had signed up 1.6 million subscribers to a free trial and been downloaded 4.5 million times, The Wall Street Journal's Benjamin Mullin reported on June 3. 

Quibi needs more than good shows. It needs a viral hit.

Some of the people working on Quibi productions also wondered if the company had backed itself into a corner by restricting how users can share its content on social media.

The Quibi app blocks users from taking screenshots of the content. Mobile apps from competitors like Netflix and Hulu do this too, but users can capture content on web browsers and desktops, Business Insider's Paige Leskin reported. 

Netflix has also leaned into using Twitter and other social platforms to promote its programming, including shows like "Tiger King," which inspired memes and went viral.

"The original sin of Quibi is that it's a closed ecosystem," one of the development execs said. "They created this walled garden that you could only see these things on Quibi.

Quibi also gives its content partners a limited set of assets they can share on social media and other platforms.

Two people said they had been pushing Quibi to allow them to use more clips from their shows and promote their content earlier, in the hopes of making it more discoverable.

Quibi has started experimenting with sharing some of its content on social platforms in recent weeks.

On June 1, Quibi released a full episode of "The Nod with Brittany & Eric," a daily show exploring Black culture that stemmed from a popular podcast, on its social platforms in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. The special episode honored the lives of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and Tony McDade and discussed police brutality.

"We look forward to even more topical episodes and are excited for the future," Ryan Kadro, head of news programming for Quibi, said in a statement to Business Insider.

The video had 12,200 views on Twitter and 682 on YouTube via Quibi's official accounts, as of the morning of June 5. It was also shared on Facebook and Instagram, and through the creators' own social channels.

The social-media response wasn't overwhelming, but Quibi could lean more into this kind of experimentation to try and kickstart online conversation around its programming. But whether it will be effective is another question.

"Quibi wants to be the future of streaming and how people get daily information and entertainment," another of the development execs said. "We're all wondering how that can happen in a world where you need that organic conversation to really blow up."

Original author: Ashley Rodriguez

Many technology companies have shared statements of support as protesters across the country advocate for an end to systemic racism and police brutality.But many of these same companies struggle to hire and retain people of color and women from all backgrounds. Business Insider tracked what enterprise tech companies have said publicly about the ongoing protests, along with their diversity statistics for leadership and their overall workforce, and asked how they plan to promote more diverse and equitable workplaces.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Across the US, people are marching to protest the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and other Black people who have been killed by police.

In response, tech companies have jumped on board, crafting blog posts and tweets to show their support for the Black Lives Matter movement. But while their messages say they stand against racism, employees within those companies have often told a different story.

Silicon Valley has long been a mostly-white boys club: Underrepresented minorities like Black and Latinx people still only make up single-digit percentages of the workforce at many major tech companies. When you look at the leadership statistics, the numbers are even bleaker. 

Making a corporate statement opposing racism should just be an initial step, says Aparna Rae, the cofounder of Moving Beyond, which helps companies make diversity, equity, and inclusion part of their business operations.

Companies should immediately "acknowledge the pain, suffering, and secondary trauma experienced by people of color employees, especially Black employees," she said, while equipping managers to offer time off, mental health resources, and no-meeting days. They can also support Black employees by providing white employees with resources to become better-informed allies, she said. 

Beyond the systemic racism they may deal with in their everyday lives, underrepresented minorities face barriers to breaking into tech that their white counterparts are less likely to face. 

Word choice in job postings can deter underrepresented minorities and women from applying in the first place, and if they do apply, tech interviewers may have unconscious biases that lead them to gravitate towards candidates like themselves (which can mean white males only hiring white males).

Once women and people of color are hired, they may face pay gaps and harassment. According to a Glassdoor survey, 43% of US employees have seen or experienced racism at work. While it's become common for major tech companies to hire diversity and inclusion executives, many startups don't make it a top priority early on, which can affect the way the company grows. 

And when the culture of a company is unwelcoming to underrepresented minorities, it affects their retention rate. In the past year, the tech industry has seen memos circulate from employees at Google and Facebook describing the racism and discrimination they have faced at work. In one memo, a former Black Google employee wrote that they "never stopped feeling the burden of being black at Google," and current Black engineering director Leslie Miley also shared shared how he was accosted at least once a week while wearing his badge because he doesn't look like the employee his coworkers expect.

Women and people of color have also been disproportionately impacted by layoffs during the coronavirus, says Evelyn Carter, director of Paradigm, which works with companies to improve their diversity and inclusion efforts. She says it's partly because layoff decisions are often based on tenure, and, for the aforementioned reasons, women and people of color are more likely to be in junior positions instead of leadership. 

"That influx of diversity is going away if folks aren't intentional about all their decisions in the employee life-cycle," Carter told Business Insider.

In recent years, companies have published their diversity statistics and pledged to increase hiring of people of color and women. In many cases, progress for these companies has been slow. 

Moving Beyond's Rae also said that companies should be publicly and explicitly detailing their plans to diversify company leadership and boards of directors, and focus on approaches grounded in data. 

"We are reading, 'We support Black Lives Matter," and, 'We don't condone racism,' but ultimately, when this dies down, is it going to be business as usual?" Rae said.

The value of making plans public is that it invites feedback and suggestions, and helps employees and outsiders hold the company accountable.

In that spirit, Business Insider put together a list detailing what 17 enterprise tech companies have said publicly about the ongoing protests, along with the diversity statistics at each one. We included statistics both for the company overall and in leadership. In addition, we asked each company what it plans to do in order to improve diversity and inclusion within the company:

Original author: Rosalie Chan, Benjamin Pimentel, Ashley Stewart, Paayal Zaveri and Jeff Elder

Layoffs in the tech industry keep coming as a result of the COVID-19 crisis.Dave Fano, best known for his years at WeWork, is back with a career-coaching startup. He's helping people land new jobs during the COVID-19 crisis.He offers 5 tips on what to do immediately after losing your job, whether it's a layoff or a protest resignation.These tips involve writing a modern resume, updating your LinkedIn with an eye to keywords, looping in and mining your network, and doing the real work, not tricks.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Despite a surprisingly good jobs report for May, the layoffs in the tech industry keep rolling, with more than half a dozen tech companies cutting employees so far in June, according to Layoffs.fyi. All told, 490 startups have cut 63,580 employees since March, when COVID-19 hit the US in force.

The good news is that there are still over 800 tech companies on Layoffs.fyi who say they are hiring for thousands of jobs.

But competition to land a job is fierce, for the first time in years.

Dave Fano, founder of career coaching startup Teal, believes the difference between the people who immediately get a new job and those who struggle is tactics.

"There's so many people that need help right now and there's basic tactical stuff like how to write a resume (a lot of the old advice is wrong), and things like LinkedIn, which makes it more like SEO and content management than it is job searching," he says.

Teal offers a 6-week job-search workshop done in a cohort. It covers things like writing a modern resume, interviewing tactics, and how to search-engine-optimize (SEO) your LinkedIn profile to show up for recruiters. Doing the training in a group also helps with the hardest parts of job searching, loneliness and accountability, he says.

Job searching is "not a skill that most people get," he says, because most of us "just don't do it often enough."

Fano is best known for his years at WeWork as Chief Growth Officer, where he led multiple departments and grew his team from 300 to 3,500, during the office sharing company's heyday. He left about five months before WeWork attempted to go public and then imploded.

He left because he had an itch to turn all of that hiring experience into a new kind of company, he said, a subscription-based career coaching company. It came out of stealth just as COVID-19 struck, so Teal is currently specializing in job searching. The six-week course is supposed to cost $400, but it's half-price for anyone who's lost their job because of COVID-19.

For those who lose a job either through a layoff or, in these troubled political times, quit in protest, Fano teaches his job-searching students that these are the first things you should do:

1. Tell your networks on LinkedIn and elsewhere that you lost your job and are looking for a new one. 

"Once you've grieved and gone through the emotional process, say, 'Hey, I'm looking for work," Fano says.

Some people are ashamed of being laid off and fear that announcing their job hunt publicly will reflect badly on them. But you shouldn't be, "especially in this economy," he says. By writing a public announcement about your situation and your search, you are allowing people to reach out and help you.

"Make it easy for your network to help you. Don't assume that people know," Fano says.

2. Mine your network. Your network isn't just the people who follow you on LinkedIn. It is everyone in your whole career "you've ever had an interaction with," says Fano. "Have the courage to reach out."

He says one of his students reached out to an executive the person knew 10 years earlier, as the executive's dog walker. The exec listened and gave the person a lead on a great job. 

"When you reach out, people want to help," he says, especially in times of crises like today.

3. Do the work. Don't just "spray and pray." Don't just take a standard resume and cover letter and apply to a ton of jobs. "You need to put in the work and apply to each job with care and quality and a tailored application. And you should put it into a person's hands," he said. "Only apply online as last resort."

Think of yourself like a prospective investor. You may wind up investing a lot of your time and energy into this company, so do the research, including meeting connections.

4. "SEO" your LinkedIn resume. Include words that will help your profile be found by recruiters. This includes using keywords in your Headline, About section, and Experience section. Find the right keywords by examining job descriptions, looking at LinkedIn profiles of others, and using a Google keyword tools.

"Make sure your LinkedIn Profile has exact titles and permutations of titles," he says, such as associate product manager and lead product manager.

"We're seeing people get more job interviews, from zero — just crickets — to having inbound recruiters hit them up on LinkedIn, all by fixing their LinkedIn profiles," Fano says.

5. "Don't rely on tricks. Rely on showing why you are awesome," Fano says.

For instance, some people are worried about ageism and think they should hide dates like their college graduation. Recruiters see right through that. Focus on creating "good content. Don't do tricks," he says. Remember that content can include blog posts, videos and other ways you can show off your skills and your passion for your career.

Original author: Julie Bort

I drove a $34,115 Buick Encore GX, an all-new subcompact crossover SUV.The new Encore GX is larger than the previous-generation vehicle, but it has a smaller motor. If that's not confusing enough, the three-cylinder engine is actually more powerful then the old four-cylinder unit.The Encore GX combines appealing styling with premium options and a fun driving experience, as well as surprising versatility.The Encore GX also rises above mass-market competitors from Mazda, Hyundai, Kia, Toyota, Honda, and Nissan to challenge some smaller, entry-level luxury vehicles.Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The Buick Encore is a young-person's car that wears a badge long associated with more mature individuals. It shouldn't work, but it does, yielding impressive sales for the brand and cementing Buick's crossover-driven comeback from near-death during the financial crisis.

As a one-time Buick owner — my parents gave me their Regal in the 1980s — I've approached the Encore with skepticism since the "cute ute's" debut over half a decade ago. I'll never forget the first time I drove one, in 2014. Man, is this thing small, I thought.

But over the years, the Encore has stood out because it's part of a brand that's thought of as "near luxury" and is supposed to rise above the mass market and prepare buyers, in the General Motors' logic, to graduate to a Cadillac someday. 

That old brand ladder doesn't apply anymore, but for the Encore to make good on its brand promise, it needs to be comparable to a small BMW utes, even though one might want to match it up against Mazda and Kia.

For 2020, Buick has rolled out the all-new GX level of the Encore, and I spent a week testing it in New Jersey and New York. Here's how it went.

Original author: Matthew DeBord

 

Welcome to Wall Street Insider, where we take you behind the scenes of the finance team's biggest scoops and deep dives from the past week. 

If you aren't yet a subscriber to Wall Street Insider, you can sign up here.

It was another tough week for the nation, with an outpouring of anguish and frustration continuing through days of protests. You can keep up with our newsroom-wide coverage here. 

Business Insider took a look at how execs at big companies around the country are responding to the deaths of George Floyd and other black people in America and addressing protests against police brutality, and wrote about how leaders can use their visibility to join broader conversations about race and racism and promote actions for change. Business Insider has also spotlighted some of the most influential leaders who are fighting inequality and driving changes in corporate diversity and inclusion.  

Despite social unrest across the US, investors were largely optimistic about the country's economic prospects after months of setbacks due to the coronavirus pandemic. 

US stocks surged this week, boosted by early signs of a labor-market recovery. And the IPO market came roaring back, with Warner Music Group raising $1.9 billion in the biggest initial public offering of the year. Other companies including marketing-software firm ZoomInfo as well as Shift4 Payments priced shares above their expected ranges and skyrocketed in their first day of trading. 

Shift4 Payments was the first company to appear in-person to celebrate a market debut at the New York Stock Exchange since the pandemic took hold. Shannen Balogh talked with Jared Isaacman, the payment-tech firm's CEO, about what it was like live-streaming a bell-ringing to Shift4's over 700 employees and how the company pitched itself to investors without meeting them in person. 

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It was a busy week for real-estate news as well.

Silver Lake added to a string of bets in the struggling travel sector by leading a $108 million investment in vacation-property startup Vacasa. WeWork cofounder Miguel McKelvey is out, and his job as chief culture officer at the coworking giant won't be replaced. And Neiman Marcus's flagship store in the glitzy Hudson Yards mega-mall is now being marketed as office space.

Thanks for reading, and enjoy the weekend, 

-Meredith 

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Original author: Meredith Mazzilli