Hello and welcome back to the Week in Review, where we recap the biggest stories of the week. If you want this in your inbox every Saturday, subscribe here.
Greg Kumparak is still on vacation, but don’t worry! He’ll be back at the helm next week to bring you our biggest stories. Until then, I’ve got you covered.
First for some quick business. TechCrunch + is having an Independence Day sale, helping you 50% off annual subscription. Need more? TC + Editor-in-Chief Alex Wilhelm give you all the reasons to dive in here.
Okay, let’s go to the moon! Yes, the moon. Some space junk has landed on the Moon’s surface this week, leaving some enthusiastic observers scratching their heads. Is that from SpaceX? Is it from a rocket launched by China’s National Space Administration in 2014? We still don’t know, but Devin Coldewey had a chat with Darren McKnight from LeoLabs, which built a network of debris-tracking radars, to get some more insight.
Image credits: NASA / Goddard / Arizona State University
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Speaking of space: Have you ever wanted to stare into the depths of the universe and really have something staring back? This is supposed to happen in two weeks when the James Webb Space Telescope will release its first images. “This is further than what humanity has ever seen before,” NASA administrator Bill Nelson said during a media briefing this week. Maybe the truth To be out there.
Tesla Autopilot layoffs: The automaker this week laid off 195 employees at two offices in its Autonomous Driving division. Those who have been fired take on the roles of supervisors, labelers and data analysts. Questions remain about the impact of the layoffs on Tesla’s more extensive advanced driver assistance system. The remaining 81 employees on the Autopilot team will be moved to another office, as the San Mateo office will be closed.
SPAC subpoena: A New York-based federal grand jury has subpoenaed the Digital World board, which is preparing to acquire Trump Media & Technology Group, Donald Trump’s media group responsible for Truth Social. . According to the SEC filing, the subpoena is an attempt to obtain more information about “Digital World S-1 Records, communication with or about multiple individuals, and information related to Rocket One.” Capital”.
Deepfake job application: The FBI this week issued a warning that deepfakes are being used alongside stolen information to apply for jobs. Part of this even involves video interviews. “In these interviews, the interviewee’s actions and lip movements on camera are not fully coordinated with the person’s sound. Sometimes, actions such as coughing, sneezing, or other auditory actions are inconsistent with what is visually presented,” the FBI said in a statement releasing the disturbing news.
Party spoilers: Welp, an indefinite ban from 2020 on unauthorized parties at Airbnbs is now permanent. This means that no parties are invited to open and no parties have attendees over the age of 16. The company said in a blog post that since it enacted the ban two years ago, the party’s reporting rate has dropped by 44 percent year-on-year. There’s no partying, Garth.
Image credits: Image DrAfter123 / Getty
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Above Podcast Network TechCrunchChristine Tao, founder of Sounding Board, joined Darrell and Jordan on Found to talk about the difficulties she and her co-founder faced when raising funds and how they established the type of client base to scale. scale.
And in the fourth episode of Equity, Natasha Mascarenhas asked a question inspired by a recent post written by TC’s Rebecca Szkutak herself: What’s in the fine print for today’s term sheets and that What does it tell us about who will be in control during a recession?
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Want more TechCrunch? Head over to the aptly named TechCrunch+, where we can dig a little deeper into the topics our subscribers tell us they care about. Some of the good stuff this week includes:
The SEC has rejected a spot bitcoin ETF again. So what now?
The SEC decisions are not the first for the industry; government agency that has rejected more than a dozen spot bitcoin ETFs in the past year while approving a number of bitcoin-based ETFs going forward, Jacquelyn Melinek report.
Reveal your Scope 3 emissions, coward
Tim De Chant takes on companies that claim they are serious about their carbon footprint. In short, if they were serious, they would estimate Scope 3 emissions and not undermine efforts to make Scope 3 disclosures the norm.
Pitch Deck Teardown: Wilco .’s $7 million seed deck
Haje returns with another tear on the pitch, this week from Wilco, a company that sponsors him mention last week. He’s pretty excited about Wilco’s deck, as he says, it’s 19 slides that tick all the boxes.
Image credits: Wilco (Opens in a new window)
