The North Face announced its decision on Friday.
The clothing company said it would also stop advertising on Instagram, which Facebook owns.
"We know that for too long harmful, racist rhetoric and misinformation has made the world unequal and unsafe, and we stand with the NAACP and the other organizations who are working to #StopHateforProfit," Steve Lesnard, The North Face's global VP of marketing, said in a statement.
Today, I participated in the Juneteeneth 4.0 Celebration that was hosted by OHUB, ThePlug, and Living Cities and led by Rodney Sampson. In addition to being part of a panel, I made several commitments as part of the #RacialEquityEcosystemPledge. Hereâs the fact sheet released by OHUB today.
Iâve agreed to:
Do a monthly podcast called Equity.District with Rodney on racial equity in entrepreneurial ecosystems and other issues around racial equity in entrepreneurship.Help organize and co-host a Racial Equity conference inclusive of Rodneyâs network, my network, and anyone else who wants to participate.Make a meaningful financial contribution to the OHUB Foundation from the Anchor Point Foundation. If you are able, I encourage you to donate as well.Make a meaningful financial contribution to at least two more Black-led ecosystem building organizations recommended by OHUB.Work with Rodney and the OHUB team on an ongoing campaign to raise money for Black ecosystem builders, funds, and founders.The entire event is below. Thereâs a lot of awesome stuff in it.
In addition to the awesomeness, I made a mistake. Right after I spoke, I got a text from a White friend who is an entrepreneur Iâve invested in who watched the event live.
I immediately sent Rodney an email under the heading âI apologize for the microaggression.â
Apparently in my closing comments I said that you were âarticulateâ (I wasnât aware that I used the word.) While I hadnât seen this NY Times article I know that âarticulateâ is viewed as a microaggression.
So, regardless of whether it was intended, or you heard it, or anything else, I want to simply apologize.
You are incredible. You inspire me.Â
Rodney quickly responded:
Thanks for this. Tell your friend they are right. Apology accepted. However, in this case, I know that you meant âvocal in my leadershipâ. Â
Weâve got a lot of work to do. Iâm up for it.
When I make a mistake, I try to own it, apologize, and learn from it. Iâm far from perfect here, but Rodneyâs response, by acknowledging my mistaking, quickly accepting my apology, and getting back to work with me motivates me even more to work with him!
Twitter blocked viewers from seeing a video President Donald Trump shared on the social media platform Thursday night.Â
The social media network first labeled the post as "manipulated media" on Thursday. It then moved to completely hide it from Twitter users on Friday, saying it was "removed in response to a report from the copyright holder."
The video appears to be a clip from CNN but is actually an edited version of a viral video from last year that shows two little boys, one Black one white, hugging and playing, Insider previously reported.
The video mocks CNN as "fake news" and also says "America is not the problem," to suggest racism is a fabricated problem created to simply cause public outcries.
Twitter's policy says users "may not deceptively promote synthetic or manipulated media that are likely to cause harm," and it will flag such posts to help other users "understand their authenticity and to provide additional context."
After the video was flagged as "manipulated media," a CNN spokesperson told Insider the media outlet doesn't condone Trump's tweet.
"CNN did cover this story â exactly as it happened. Just as we reported your positions on race (and poll numbers)," CNN wrote in an email to Insider. "We'll continue working with facts rather than tweeting fake videos that exploit innocent children. We invite you to do the same. Be better."
Jukin Media, a media company that had a partnership with the person who owns the video that was doctored, told Insider it didn't give Trump permission to use the video.
"Neither the video owner nor Jukin Media gave the President permission to post the video, and after our review, we believe that his unauthorized usage of the content is a clear example of copyright infringement without valid fair use or other defense," a Jukin spokesperson wrote in an email to Insider. "We have submitted a DMCA takedown notice on behalf of the video's creator, and in accordance with Twitter's policy. Separately, in no way do we support or condone the manipulated video or the message it conveys. We hope and expect Twitter will take swift action to remove the video.
This isn't the first time Twitter has flagged one of Trump's posts.
In late May, Twitter used the "glorifying violence" tag to flag one of Trump's tweets that read "when the looting starts, the shooting starts," in which he referred to the violence in Minneapolis following the death of George Floyd.
The North Face has become the first major brand to boycott Facebook on the heels of mounting pressure from civil-rights organizations over the platform's content-moderation policies and handling of hate speech in the aftermath of George Floyd's death.
In a tweet saying "We're in. We're Out" the clothing company announced Friday it would stop buying Facebook ads in the US in solidarity with organizations including the NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League, and Sleeping Giants.
In a follow-up statement to Business Insider, the company said it would also halt paid advertisements on Instagram, which is owned by Facebook.
"We know that for too long harmful, racist rhetoric and misinformation has made the world unequal and unsafe, and we stand with the NAACP and the other organizations who are working to #StopHateforProfit," Steve Lesnard, The North Face's global VP of marketing, said in a statement.
A company spokesman said it was halting all US paid advertising with Facebook, effective June 19, until stricter policies are in place to stop racist, violent, and hateful content and misinformation from circulating on the platform. The North Face is not pulling ads from Facebook-owned Instagram, CNN reported.
Only a handful of smaller companies, including the meditation app Talkspace and the payment company Fons, had said that they won't advertise on Facebook before The North Face.Â
Carolyn Everson, Facebook's VP of global business group, said that the company was in conversation with marketers and civil-rights organizations about how they could work with them to "be a force for good."
"We deeply respect any brand's decision and remain focused on the important work of removing hate speech and providing critical voting information," Everson said in a statement.
The platform has been under fire over its content-moderation policies, particularly its handling of President Donald Trump's posts in the aftermath of George Floyd's killing. While it has faced criticism on its handling of user data and the spread of misinformation before, such calls have rarely translated to wider collective action against Facebook or dented its advertising business.
But advertisers say it's different this time. IPG Mediabrands' Elijah Harris said in a Business Insider interview last week that the reaction against Facebook was an issue of "brand safety, not political activism."
Another ad-agency source told Business Insider their agency anticipated a number of other brands to also walk out on Facebook, as the social-media giant's executives try to put out the fires in memos sent to various agencies this week.
Facebook, which generates 98% of its revenue through ads, took in $17.4 billion from advertising in its most recent quarter, despite marketers across the board pausing advertising in the face of the pandemic.
Update Friday, June 19, 2020: This story was updated to add that North Face will also be halting paid advertising on Instagram.
After a young customer died by suicide and left a note expressing confusion over the platform's product, the founders of the trading app Robinhood said Friday they're introducing changes and hiring an education specialist to help users navigate sophisticated trading strategies.Â
Alexander Kearns, a 20-year-old college student at the University of Nebraska, killed himself on June 12, his family said. Kearns saw a negative cash balance of $730,165 in his account, Forbes first reported, a figure that was likely the result of a glitch inside the app.
The next day, Robinhood was alerted to Kearns' death, and offered to speak with his family, cofounders and co-chief executives Vlad Tenev and Baiju Bhatt said.Â
The commission-free trading app is now making changes to various aspects of its product, including improving in-app messages and emails sent to customers about multi-leg options spreads, a sophisticated style of trading involving two or more options.Â
It's also adding new details to the app's history page to better help users "understand the mechanics of early options assignments," and is working to change parts of its user interface.Â
"We are considering additional criteria and education for customers seeking level 3 options authorization to help ensure customers understand more sophisticated options trading," Tenev and Bhatt said in a statement.Â
They said the changes will "take a bit of time to roll out," but a spokesperson declined to comment on any timeline.
Robinhood also said it's making a donation to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
Valued at over $8 billion after its most recent funding round, Robinhood has become one of the most well-funded and widely used financial-technology startups in recent years.
It accelerated a new generation of traders' appetites for commission-free trades using their phones, and ultimately pushed legacy brokerages like Charles Schwab to drop trading fees for retail investors.
Robinhood, which claims some 13 million users, has raised more than $1 billion in outside funding, according to Crunchbase.Â
The startup has also come under scrutiny for the way it gives the masses, including inexperienced investors who may not have the risk tolerance or know-how, a way to trade complex products.
"I liken it to giving the keys of a sports car to a 12-year-old," Tara Falcone, founder of the financial education company ReisUP, told NBC News last year.
If you or someone you know is struggling with depression or has had thoughts of harming themselves or taking their own life, get help. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (1-800-273-8255) provides 24/7, free, confidential support for people in distress, as well as best practices for professionals and resources to aid in prevention and crisis situations.
Facebook on Friday removed a post by Donald Trump that featured a doctored version of a 2019 viral video that shows two toddlers.
"We received a copyright complaint from the rights holder of this video under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and have removed the post," A spokesman told Business Insider.
The original video, which went viral last year, shows a Black child and white child running toward each other and embracing. But the altered version posted by Trump to Twitter and Facebook on Thursday is overlaid with a fake CNN graphic and edited to suggest news footage of the white child chasing the terrified Black child.
On Thursday, Twitter slapped the video with a "manipulated media" label.
While Trump's post remains live, anyone clicking on the label will learn the video has been altered, with Twitter adding the following: "In September 2019, CNN reported on a viral video about a friendship between two toddlers. On Thursday, the president shared a version of the video which many journalists confirmed was edited and doctored with a fake CNN chyron."
According to CNN, the copyright complaint has come from Jukin Media, a company that frequently snaps up rights to viral videos. The firm filed a copyright complaint with Facebook on behalf of one of the toddler's parents.
Jukin Media said late Friday it had filed a similar complaint with Twitter. Â
"In no way do we support or condone the manipulated video or the message it conveys," the company said. "We hope and expect Twitter will take action to remove the video."
Social media companies have taken more robust action against Trump's posts over the last month: Facebook removed a Trump campaign ad on Thursday that featured an inverted triangle, a symbol often used by the Nazis to demarcate political enemies.
The platform said the ad violated its policies on hate speech.
Apple will re-close 11 stores in the United States after coronavirus cases have spiked in some states across the country, the company announced Friday.
The decision comes after Apple began re-opening stores in the US last month. Bloomberg first reported the news.
The store closures will occur in Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Arizona. Specifically, Apple is closing two stores in Florida, two stores in North Carolina, one store in South Carolina, and six stores in Arizona.
These states are all seeing upward trends in new cases of COVID-19, particularly in June, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Florida, Arizona, South Carolina, and North Carolina are also among the 10 states that have seen record-high seven-day averages of new daily coronavirus cases, according to CNN. The increase in COVID-19 cases comes as stay-at-home orders have relaxed across the country and businesses have begun reopening under restrictions.
"Due to current COVID-19 conditions in some of the communities we serve, we are temporarily closing stores in these areas," Apple said in a statement to Business Insider. "We take this step with an abundance of caution as we closely monitor the situation and we look forward to having our teams and customers back as soon as possible."
Apple said roughly one month ago in May, when it began reopening US stores, that its decisions could change depending on the situation.
"We look at every available piece of data â including local cases, near and long-term trends, and guidance from national and local health officials," Deirdre O'Brien, Apple's senior vice president of retail and people, said in a letter last month. "These are not decisions we rush into â and a store opening in no way means that we won't take the preventative step of closing it again should local conditions warrant."
Apple temporarily closed all of its retail stores outside of China in March to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic. It reopened its first store outside of China in mid-April when its location in South Korea resumed operations. The company began opening some stores in the US last month under limited occupancy with a focus on customer service at the Genius Bar. Apple said it would also be requiring face coverings and conducting temperature checks at the door in stores that are open.
Facebook is reaching out to ad agencies as it faces mounting pressure over its content moderation policies and its handling of President Donald Trump's posts in the aftermath of George Floyd's death.
Civil rights organizations including the Anti-Defamation League, Color of Change, Common Sense Media, Free Press, the NAACP and Sleeping Giants, urged media buyers and brands to stop advertising on the platform in July.
Three separate ad agency sources confirmed that they received a memo from Facebook to Business Insider, with two saying that they received it from Facebook's VP of global marketing solutions Carolyn Everson directly, and another saying that it was forwarded by their Facebook rep. A Facebook spokeswoman confirmed the authenticity of Everson's memo but did not provide additional comment.
In the memo, Everson acknowledged that organizations were calling for businesses to pause advertising on Facebook and said the company was open to meeting with them and welcomed their feedback.
"There are competing pressures every day when managing a platform," Everson wrote, adding that Facebook's focus was to act on "what is most important: removing hate speech and content that harms communities, while using our platform for efforts like providing authoritative voting information and registering people to vote."
She pointed to efforts Facebook had made, including a voter registration effort CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in a USA Today op-ed this week, a move to let people see fewer political ads on Facebook and Instagram, and improved detection capabilities for hate speech.
While the company has faced criticism on its handling of user data and the spread of misinformation on before, such calls have rarely translated to wider collective action against Facebook or dented its advertising business. The company generates 98% of its revenue through ads and took in $17.4 billion from advertising in its most recent quarter, despite marketers across the board pausing advertising in the face of the pandemic.
But advertisers say it's different this time. IPG Mediabrands' Elijah Harris said in an interview last week that Facebook was an issue of "brand safety, not political activism."Â Two agency sources that shared Everson's memo told Business Insider that they were advising their clients to consider participating in the boycott.
"We've taken a hardline stance, and I think we will see a number of brands over the next day or two that come out and say they are not spending on Facebook in the month of July," one of the sources told Business Insider.
Read Everson's memo below:
As you're probably all aware, we were made aware last night that a group of organizations are calling for businesses to pause advertising and posting on Facebook during the month of July 2020. We remain open to meeting with any of these organizations and we welcome feedback on the issues they have raised, just as we continue to solicit feedback from our civil rights auditors.Â
This new call to action to end voter suppression comes at the exact moment we're launching the largest voting information campaign in American history. There are competing pressures every day when managing a platform. Our focus is to act on what is most important: removing hate speech and content that harms communities, while using our platform for efforts like providing authoritative voting information and registering people to vote.
In this spirit, I wanted share a few points:
Voting: Last night, USA Today ran an Op-Ed by Mark Zuckerberg outlining our civic responsibilities and sharing our plans for a major effort around Voting. This will be the largest voter registration effort ever in the United States, designed to give citizens the resources and information they need to register and make their voices heard at the ballot box. These efforts will include a new Voting Information Center at the top of the Facebook News Feed and on Instagram, and will give millions of people accurate information about voting. We are also reviewing our policies around voter suppression.Political Content: In addition to voice, we are giving people choice. Starting in the US, people will be able to choose to see fewer political ads on Facebook and Instagram, if they choose.Hate Speech: We know hate speech is a weapon often wielded by those in a privileged majority. We recognize that we have to work harder than ever to ensure those whose voices are the most historically marginalized have the opportunity to make their voices heard. For us this means having the strongest policies against hate and the most advanced technologies in the world to remove it. As you know, we don't tolerate hate speech and remove it whenever we find it. We have been working on improving our detection capabilities and in our last report we removed 89% of content for violating our hate speech policies before anyone reported it to us.  We are of course not stopping here, and will look to continue to build on the strides we have made in the last few yearsâup from 23% in 2017.ÂAs always, we will meet with anyone to hear feedback as we have a major effort across the company being led by Mark on how the platform can be used to combat systemic racism. Â
I am of course available for a call to discuss this or any additional feedback you have at any time. For now, we will continue to push as fast as we can to make progress on the specific areas of product, policy, talent and community as I shared in my note to you last week.
Thank you for your ongoing partnership and feedbackâ¦.
Snapchat's Juneteenth filter has been removed after receiving criticism, per CNBC.
The filter displayed a Pan-African flag and read "Juneteenth, Freedom Day."
Like many other Snapchat filters, the Juneteenth filter promoted users to smile, after which chains appeared and then broke in the background of the filter.Â
The filter began to receive attention and criticism after Mark Luckie, a digital strategist and former journalist, tweeted about it.Â
Business Insider previously reported that Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel announced that the company would keep its diversity report private on June 11.
Juneteenth celebrates the day that the news of the Emancipation Proclamation reached Texas, the most confederate state in the U.S., freeing enslaved African Americans, on June 19, 1865. June 19 recognizes the effective end of slavery in the U.S.
Early-stage founders, July 21 – 22 is coming up fast and that means it’s time get ready for TC Early Stage — the virtual startup conference designed with you in mind. We’ve packed this two-day event with more than 50 breakout sessions covering topics and issues early-stage startup founders need to succeed — even more so in these unprecedented times. You have just one week left to buy an early-bird ticket and save $50. Don’t wait — prices increase on June 26 at 11:59 p.m. (PT).
Early-stage founders have so much to learn. Building a startup is no mean feat under ordinary circumstances and, thanks to Covid-19, global circumstances are by no means ordinary right now. In addition to navigating a pandemic, there are plenty of other issues to keep you up at night:
How to hire the best talent? What’s the best time to raise funds? Crafting a media strategy? How to create the culture you want straight out of the gate? What the heck is wrong with my pitch deck? The questions are endless. Come to TC Early Stage and get answers to help you grow your business.
All breakout sessions feature leading experts from across the startup ecosystem. We’re adding sessions regularly to the agenda, and ticket holders receive 24-hour notice before we announce the next batch.
We’re limiting each session to about 100 people, and seats are available on a first come, first serve basis — sign up quickly to make sure you get the ones you want most. Hot tip: If you run into a schedule conflict, you can drop a breakout session and choose another one. Plus videos of all the sessions will be available on demand to ticket holders exclusively.
Here’s a quick peek at just some of the breakout sessions.
How to get your first yes — Fundraising can be a bit like dominoes. Once you get one investor on board, it’s much easier to bring others along for the ride. But getting that first “yes” can be the most difficult part. Hear the do’s and don’ts of hyper early stage fundraising from Cyan Banister, venture partner at Long Journey Ventures.Hiring your early engineers — The first few employees determine a startup’s trajectory. Learn the dos and don’ts of hiring your early engineers from entrepreneur and investor Ali Partovi, founder and CEO of Neo. Hear how these hiring decisions can determine not only the type of culture you build for your employees, but also the overall success of your company.How to avoid 1,000 landmines — When you’re starting your company, there are thousands of small, avoidable mistakes that can turn success into failure. Garry Tan, founder and managing partner at Initialized Capital, helps you learn how to navigate around them and maximize your chance of success.TC Early Stage takes place on July 21 – 22, and you have just one week left to buy an early-bird ticket. Grab this rare opportunity to have your tough startup questions answered by the pros and save.
Is your company interested in sponsoring the TC Early Stage? Contact our sponsorship sales team by filling out this form.
As remote employees increasingly leak confidential company information during the coronavirus crisis, a New Zealand startup is launching a new product to ebb the flow.Â
The company, PRAAS, is launching what it says is the first "Print as a Service" product that works on all printers â even home printers used by remote workers â to help enterprise cybersecurity teams monitor a key weakness in data loss and theft: employees printing sensitive information. Â
"When COVID hit, we realized the world's knowledge workers weren't heading back to the office anytime soon," says Brendan Francis, the CEO of PRAAS. "Print is not secure, and there was no visibility into data loss."
The cloud-based product manages all enterprise printer use, meaning that when employees print a document from their work computers â whether in the office or at home â the PRAAS system provides the company IT teams with an audit trail, helping them to track sensitive documents. The PRAAS can manage any brand or model of printer, and the system gives IT teams other printer-related services, too, such as management of contracts, service, and supplies.Â
A recent report from the cybersecurity firm Tessian showed that half of employees cited "not being watched by IT" as a reason for not following safe data practices. Meanwhile, 84% of IT leaders also said that data loss prevention is more challenging when employees are working from home.
A white paper from PRAAS says print-as-a-service may be a promising market because only a quarter of the 80 million remote printers used by employees are currently managed or overseen by employers.  Â
After rapidly transitioning to remote working, companies may lack security, visibility, and control of sensitive customer information, introducing data compliance dilemmas with legislation such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), according to International Data Corporation in an independent market-research report. GDPR is the European data-protection legislation that carries major fines for companies' mishandling of customer data.Â
"Some employees might be unknowingly managing customer data in a non-compliant way, while some might be aware of the risk, but decide to print anyway," the IDC report found.
With many employees desiring to continue remote work after the quarantine lifts, and companies seeing cost-savings as a result, addressing remote oversight of sensitive data is a longterm issue, the IDC report says.Â
PRAAS will launch its service on Microsoft's Azure cloud platform this week,
"The advanced analytics featured in the solution will help organizations print in a more sustainable way, and the security and compliance features are important in the post-GDPR era," Microsoft New Zealand Chief Technical Officer Russell Craig said in a statement, "E specially with so many organizations now having staff working and printing remotely."Â
“Eventbrite is in the unique club that nobody wants to be in,” says CEO and co-founder Julia Hartz. “Which is the first affected and one of the most directly affected businesses of the COVID-19 era.”
Hartz, who co-founded the company with her husband Kevin Hartz and Renaud Visage, joined ExtraCrunch Live recently to discuss moving forward when your core business isn’t just threatened, but wiped out completely.
“You never as a founder — at least I never — ever wondered what would happen if the whole basis of our mission was tested,” she said.
The events world was one of the first industries to feel the pandemic’s impacts and will likely be among the last to be restored. For Eventbrite, which was built on a core business of in-person events and event ticketing, it meant making swift decisions to stay afloat.
External data show some bright spots. According to an operational update from Eventbrite, paid ticket volume on its platform increased 33% in May compared to April 2020. Eventbrite is down 82% in paid tickets in May 2020 compared to the same month year ago.
“A massive market and industry dislocation and disruption. I mean, we’re a living example of that,” she said. “It’s not a victory lap. Certainly, we’re seeing some really exciting signs of recovery, but it’s still very sobering.”
Hartz offered founders at all levels advice on how to work on culture during a crisis and offered tips on communication and transparency.
We also chatted about how open consumers are to paying for virtual events, how the company curates and moderates political events and how Eventbrite plans to address racial injustice beyond, in Hartz’s words, “episodic outrage.”
We pulled out a couple of highlights for you to peruse.
Structurally, events are pivoting to in-person. So it’s not just pivoting online. A good example is the Beanstalk Music Festival in Colorado, a two-day music festival that pivoted to an in-person drive-in night concert. They were wildly successful in selling tickets to this new format.
It was a testament to the strength of their community and the pent-up demand to get together and listen to great music. But what we’re seeing beyond sort of those really creative uses of new types of space and venues that are outdoors are smaller events. Classes, workshops, seminars, small meetups are starting to come back. I think that as creators start to think about how to bring their community back in person, there’s a huge element of trust that exists in this new world.
We’re helping our creators establish that trust and be very upfront about what their event goers and attendees can expect in that moment as you bring yourself together in-person again.
Alexis Ohanian's path to becoming the "Mayor of the Internet" wasn't a conventional one.Â
The Baltimore, Maryland-raised Ohanian initially thought he wanted to become a lawyer before an epiphany at a Waffle House made him realize he'd rather be an entrepreneur. He and his college best friend, Steve Huffman, went on to create Reddit, the online community site known as "the front page of the internet." Today, the company is worth $3 billion.
Since selling Reddit in 2006, Ohanian has gone on to invest in startups through his venture capital firm, fight against federal bills that would have stifled internet innovation, and marry tennis superstar Serena Williams.Â
Here's how Ohanian got his start and helped build one of the cornerstones of the internet.Â
ConnectLeader CEO Senraj Soundar has bootstrapped his company to over $10 million in revenue. We love stories like this that reinforce our philosophy: “Do not go to VCs as beggars, go as kings!”...
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It all started with an email from a customer: “Do you know why Bain Capital Ventures is reaching out to me about Clockwise?”
That email would mark the beginning of a journey toward closing $18 million in new funding that will dramatically accelerate my company, Clockwise . It would require getting to know a partner in lockdown, long nights assembling a pitch deck and many bleary-eyed Zoom calls with some of the best VCs in the world.
Here’s how Ajay Agarwal from Bain Capital Ventures and I established trust online, how I made high-stakes decisions in extreme economic uncertainty and how we were able to turn the pandemic’s constraints into opportunities.
Let’s start at the beginning.
Clockwise was founded in late fall of 2016. We realized that, as personal as time is, our schedules inside modern work environments are intertwined by a network of calendar events and attendees. People schedule meetings without considering the preferences of colleagues by simply hunting for any available “white space” (read: time to do real work). The net effect is that our most valuable resource, time, is easy to take and almost impossible to protect.
More than two years later, in June of 2019, we launched Clockwise to the public. After years of experimentation and refinement, we delivered to the world an intelligent calendar assistant that frees up your time so you can focus on what matters. Workers soon confirmed our hunch that they’re hungry for a tool that gives them more productive hours in their day. Our rapid user growth carried throughout 2019.
By January of 2020, we were on fire. Since January 1, our user base has grown by more than 90%, expanding at a clip of well over 5% week-over-week. As people sought remote tools during shelter-in-place, our rate of growth accelerated even further.
Our growth, incredible team, top-tier existing investors (Accel and Greylock) and strong cash position meant we didn’t need to raise additional capital until the fall of 2020. While COVID-19 certainly sent shock waves through the community, I was in regular communication with a few highly engaged investors who still seemed eager to invest in the future of productivity. I felt cautiously confident more capital could wait.
But, you know, best-laid plans.
If you love TV get ready to binge-watch, because HBO's nine-part 'Watchmen' series is free to stream and available On Demand starting Friday, June 19 through Sunday, June 21.
The show's free release comes at a pivotal moment in the US as protests and activism continue nationwide after the police killing of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man who died after a white officer knelt on his neck for more than eight minutes.
'Watchmen,' which received critical acclaim, is based on the famous graphic novel and deals with timely topics such as police, race, and racism through nuanced storytelling. The beginning of the show is set in Tulsa, Oklahoma and depicts the 1921 massacre where a mob of white Americans killed black residents and destroyed Black-owned businesses in the Greenwood District.
"Set in an alternate history where masked vigilantes are treated as outlaws, Watchmen embraces the nostalgia of the original groundbreaking graphic novel of the same name while attempting to break new ground of its own," the show is described on HBO's website.
The free streaming is "an extension of the network's content offering highlighting Black experiences, voices and storytellers," HBO said in a statement.
You can access the free episode over at HBO, which also details TV listings, or watch a trailer for the series below.
Â
Building a business is hard; about 50% of businesses fail in the first five years. The early years of an entrepreneur’s journey can be difficult and lonely. When starting my digital services firm Fearless, I convinced my wife to rent out our home and move in with my mother so we could have an extra income while I built Fearless in my mother’s basement.
That was 10 years ago — Fearless now has over 115 employees.
That story of struggling to build a tech company and working out of a basement or garage until you “make it” is pretty common, but the barriers facing Black entrepreneurs make it harder to find success and support.
Research by the University of California, Santa Cruz states that minority-owned startups have access to less capital than their white counterparts. The right investors can offer more than just funding to early-stage companies; the connections those in the venture capitalist world have can bring an entrepreneur the new business, mentorship and employees needed to grow.
Venture capital firms like Harlem Capital and Black Angel Tech Fund are focused on changing the faces of entrepreneurship by diversifying their portfolio, but traditional venture capitalist funding is not the only way to grow your business.
There are other avenues and opportunities to get the support, financial and otherwise, to help build a successful company:
Equity crowdfunding: Similar to crowdfunding campaigns like GoFundMe or Kickstarter, equity crowdfunding allows nontraditional investors to support businesses and receive equity. Enabled through Title III of the 2012 JOBS Act’s Regulation CF, equity crowdfunding allows all companies to sell securities, whether in the form of equity in the company, debt, revenue shares, convertible notes and more. Equity crowdfunding platforms include WeFunder and LocalStake.
Mentor programs: Fearless was lucky enough to be accepted into the DoD Mentor-Protégé program early in our growth. As the oldest continuously operating federal mentor-protégé program in existence, the DoD program helped us establish and expand our footprint in the federal government contracting space. NewMe and Black Girl Ventures are two programs that specialize in mentorship for early-stage companies.
Become 8(a) certified: The federal government has a goal of awarding at least 5% of all federal contracting dollars to small, disadvantaged businesses each year. These businesses fall under the 8(a) classification. To qualify for the program, you must be a small business with 51% of ownership and control from U.S. citizens who are economically and socially disadvantaged and the owner’s adjusted gross income for three years is $250,000 or less.
The full definition of what counts as being economically and socially disadvantaged can be found in Title 13 Part 124 of the Code of Federal Regulations. Fearless has been classified as an 8(a) company for several years and we have been able to secure several contracts through the certification.
Tap into Small Business Administration resources: More than a million users visit SBA.gov to utilize tools like the SBA Business Guide and Lender Match site. By using the SBA website and reaching out to your local SBA office, you can make full use of the programs available and connect with business owners who can offer advice and mentorship.
Identify supportive bankers: Your business is your top priority and the people you engage with should view your company as a priority too. You need someone vested in your success who will advocate for you when you need them. If you meet with a banker and get a sense that you would be an account number instead of a person, then find another one. If you don’t have your banker’s personal cell phone number, and they aren’t willing to visit you at your business, then take a pass and find a true partner who supports you.
I am putting the call out to business owners and entrepreneurs who are further along in their journey to mentor and invest in Black-owned businesses. Think back on the support you received, and be that model for someone else. Or be the mentor that you wished you had when you were starting out. Take time to invest in other Black-owned tech companies or fund the programs that do. Share your knowledge and experience with Black tech leaders.
If there isn’t a resource hub for Black entrepreneurs in your city, create one. Fearless is a small company and we have still managed to help 13 new companies get off the ground through our accelerator program, Hutch.
Hutch is an intensive 12-month program that gives entrepreneurs a blueprint for building successful digital service firms, by empowering them with the tools, mentorship and peer support they need to have a lasting impact. We think of this program kind of like a home base for our entrepreneurs, providing them with a foundation of support so they can grow without getting lost amongst bigger companies in the industry.
Help create the spaces in your community that will foster innovation and business growth.
As businesses across the United States have gradually begun to reopen, a growing number of companies are investing in camera technology powered by artificial intelligence to help enforce social distancing measures when people may be standing too closely together.
"[If] I want to manage the distance between consumers standing in a line, a manager can't be in all places at once,"Â Leslie Hand, vice president of retail insights for the International Data Corporation, told Business Insider. "Having a digital helper that's advising you when folks are perhaps in need of some advice is useful."
Businesses throughout the country have started operating again under restrictions, such as enforcing social distancing measures, requiring customers to wear masks, and reducing capacity. New York City, which was the epicenter of the virus' outbreak in the US, is set to enter Phase II of its reopening plan on Monday.
The White House's employer guidelines for all phases of reopening include developing policies informed by best practices, particularly social distancing. And some experts believe smart cameras can help retailers and other companies detect whether such protocols are being followed.Â
"There's some technology coming out on the horizon that will be able to be incorporated into the nuts and bolts that you already have in your store," Barrie Scardina, head of Americas retail for commercial real estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield, said to Business Insider.
Some companies have already begun experimenting with such technologies. Amazon said on June 16 that it developed a camera system that's being implemented in some warehouses to detect whether workers are following social distancing guidelines. The company's so-called "Distance Assistant" consists of a camera, a 50-inch monitor, and a local computing device, which uses depth sensors to calculate distances between employees.Â
When a person walks by the camera, the monitor would show whether that person is standing six feet apart from nearby colleagues by overlaying a green or red circle around the person. Green would indicate the person is properly socially distanced, while red would suggest the people on camera may be too close together. Amazon is open-sourcing the technology so that other companies can implement it as well.Â
Motorola Solutions also announced new analytics technology in May that enables its Avigilon security cameras to detect whether people are social distancing and wearing masks. The system uses AI to collect footage and statistical patterns that can be used to provide notifications to organizations about when guidelines around wearing face masks or honoring social distancing measures are being breached.Â
Pepper Construction, a Chicago-based construction company, has also begun using software from a company called SmartVid.io to keep an eye on where workers may be grouping, as Reuters reported in late April.
Scardina offered some examples illustrating how smart cameras can help retailers enforce social distancing. Workers can use such technologies to see where customers are clustering so that they can make decisions about how to arrange furniture and fixtures within the store. If a table needs to be moved further away from another display because customers don't have space to stand six feet apart, AI camera technology can help retailers spot this.
As far as how widespread that technology will become in stores, Scardina says it will depend on factors such as a retailer's budget and the size of the shop.Â
While more companies may be investing in either developing or implementing new camera technologies, there will inevitably be challenges that arise when putting them into practice, says Pieter J. den Hamer, senior director of artificial intelligence for Gartner Research.
Not only could implementing such tech raise privacy concerns, but there are also practical limitations. A camera may not know if two people standing close together belong to the same household, for example.
All 50 states have reopened at some capacity, putting an end to stay-at-home orders that had been in effect since March to curb the coronavirus' spread, and some states are now seeing a spike in cases. The New York Times recently reported that at least 14 states have experienced positive cases that have outpaced the average number of administered tests.
The coronavirus has killed at least 117,000 people in the US and infected more than 2.1 million as of June 18, according to the Times, and experts predict there will be a second wave. But President Trump has said the country won't be closing again.Â
"It's a very, very complex debate full of dilemmas," den Hamer said. "Should we prioritize opening up the economy, or should we prioritize the protection of our privacy?"
Morgan Mercer is more self-aware than most. At least, that's how she describes herself at professional meetings with new customers and investors. But outside the boardroom, she's more likely to say she is "woke."
As a biracial woman and self-taught technologist, Mercer is not the average Silicon Valley founder and CEO. But she hopes that will change as diversity becomes a priority for the dominantly white and male industry. In fact, her company, Vantage Point, exists to help startups and tech companies better address sensitive but widespread issues like discrimination and harassment.
"We are in a space right now where we're having an awakening to how much we don't know or understand, but at the same time there are a lot of people saying they don't know what to do," Mercer told Business Insider. "I see a lot of companies and VCs publishing statements in support of Black Lives Matter or allocating money to causes, and I think it's all well intentioned, but we are in a space that people don't really know how to act."
Vantage Point offers anti-bias training sessions with an unusual component: Participants put on virtual reality headsets made by Facebook division Oculus, and "experience" interactions that require them to respond. The training sessions are entirely virtual, walking users through specific scenarios in which they choose among various actions. After the scenario is completed, the employee gets a call that provides direct feedback on each decision, and training groups meet to discuss where they could improve or how specific instances made them feel. That emotional element of the training is key to implementing real change moving forward, according to Mercer.Â
"We spend so long explaining feelings in these trainings, but feelings are rooted in personal context," Mercer said. "When I say I'm scared and explain how a situation makes me feel scared, you can only relate to it in how you feel scared even if it's an entirely different sensation. We inherently have a different lens through which we are looking at the problem, and we just don't get it."
Mercer said that Vantage Point has raised $3.75 million since she started the company in 2017, and has worked with over a dozen companies in 11 different industries to provide immersive, on-site training. At first, Vantage Point focused on training programs to combat harassment in the workplace, but in an instance of fortuitous timing, the company had launched broad-based diversity, equity, and inclusion training programs earlier this year.
"I don't believe these problems exist in a vacuum because they're really all related," Mercer said. "For example, gaslighting is something we cover in the harassment training, and it maps back to the racism and bias training. None of these issues exist independently of one another."
Mercer's one-stop-shop approach breaks from the more traditional model of training that many tech companies have relied on over the past decade. Amid a broader push towards transparency, and the dismal results of company diversity reports, many tech giants and startups have hired outside vendors to hold day-long workshops covering the issues that most related to their workforces. Perhaps the most popular, and most vague, was the implicit bias training designed to help managers, engineers, and recruiters understand and recognize where their biases are, so they can be aware of them and act accordingly.
But that siloed approach apparently isn't cutting it. Research suggests that implicit bias training only has a marginal impact on hiring efforts and diversity statistics. And with a nationwide reckoning with racism and inequality banging down Silicon Valley's door, Mercer thinks incremental solutions will finally get sidelined in favor of larger-scale fixes.
"It's okay to not know, and I think we've criminalized not knowing so people are so scared to admit what they don't know," Mercer said. "People are so scared to be called racist or privileged, but literally everyone who is not a Black person in America has privilege. We need to be willing to let go of that fear and have those hard conversations."
The doctor will see you now â but it likely won't be in person.
The COVID-19 pandemic has forced hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare organizations to move much of their medicine online in recent months in an attempt to reduce the density of patients at hospitals and slow the spread of the coronavirus. Doctors have turned en masse to messaging services and videoconferencing apps to treat their patients.
Now, the shift to telemedicine could prove permanent. But cybersecurity experts warn that remote healthcare could pose unprecedented threats if not implemented carefully, and hospitals whose budgets have been stretched thin by COVID-19 and shutdowns are uniquely vulnerable to ransomware attacks.
Sentara Healthcare is one organization embracing the shift to telemedicine. In the past three months, the not-for-profit network â which runs 12 hospitals in North Carolina and Virginia and brings in roughly $7 billion annually â has undertaken the herculean task of transitioning much of its 30,000-person workforce to remote work.
Now, the majority of Sentara's appointments could remain remote for the foreseeable future, according to Sentara Chief Information Security Officer Dan Bowden.
"We're looking harder at the tools we provide," Bowden told Business Insider. "And there's a new conversation for security professionals in healthcare, which is, how do we respond to this?"
Sentara conducts telemedicine using its own in-house video call application, and Bowden said the company has implemented multi-factor authentication to verify the identities of patients new to the service. Meanwhile, it relies on a combination third-party security software from Tenable, Microsoft, and Amazon Web Services to protect patients' data.
Bowden says another part of the response has involved educating Sentara's workforce â especially other executives â about the tactics hackers use to target healthcare providers. Cyberattacks against hospitals have been on the rise for years, typically involving ransomware: Hackers take down healthcare computer systems and threaten to destroy them unless hospitals pay a price.
But remote work also provides new inroads for hackers, who could target the home devices of employees or patients with phishing scams. Cybersecurity firm CynergisTek told Business Insider in April that it had already seen a spike in threat actors targeting medical institutions since the onset of COVID-19 shutdowns.
Bowden said it's crucial for hospitals and security providers to share best practices and insights regarding the threats they face in order to plan for potential attacks and build resilience.
"Yes, there are more threats now, but we also have better threat intel," Bowden said. "It's something going forward in healthcare that we're all going to need to learn to manage."
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