📡 Scrolling 💩👀
Hello and welcome to this week’s Pulse — the weekly techie/businessy newsletter from @perspectiveix. I’m your host, Ben, and I’d like to thank you for being here.
How do you feel about the news section being back at the top? Let me know (reply to this email).
Now, let’s get scrolling… but not too much, k?
🗞 NEWS
iOS 14 exposing Instagram bug [link], Elon Musk’s DMs [link], and TikTok to block QAnon hashtags [link]
Antitrust hearing postponed, Made in India iPhone 11, and NBA fans are coming back [link]
Twitter hack gets darker, Woz suing YouTube, and TikTok [link]
iPhone’s new camera, Sony’s new wearable, and Gmail’s new anti-phishing measure [link]
Apple going carbon neutral, Video podcasts from Spotify, and LinkedIn cutting jobs [link]
SpaceX breaking record, COVID19 vaccine trials, and Adobe’s new camera app [link]
Even more on Twitter hack, Disney stopping ads on Facebook, and Trump pushing for TikTok ban [link]
🧠 INSIGHTS
Credit: Austin Distel on Unsplash
Being informed is a virtue. It helps us make better decisions and encourages us to take action.
Getting hooked on an endless scroll of media inputs is not the same as being informed. There’s long been a business model of urgent news (“man bites dog!”), but now it’s been leveraged, amplified and optimized to suck people in for hours at a time. And division is much easier to sell than progress.
If it’s not helping you take action to make things better, what’s it for?
from Seth Godin’s Blog.
📊 STATISTICS
Mailchimp's Year in review — 2019
Lots of stats on email from MailChimp annual review. They sent 3.2 billion emails last year. Their customers have 4 billion unique email addresses on file.
Read more on MailChimp.
Global App Revenue and Downloads Continue to Grow
Global consumer spend on Apple’s App Store and Google Play grew by 23.4% year-over-year (y-o-y) in H1 2020 to reach $50.1 billion, per new data from Sensor Tower Store Intelligence. Based on Sensor Tower’s estimates and projections, the recent figures indicate growth across the board and highlight the potential impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on consumers’ interaction with mobile apps.
Read more on MarketingCharts.
Netflix Sees Unprecedented Growth Amid Pandemic
While no one in their right mind would wish for a global health emergency/economic crisis, it’s hard to make a list of companies that might profit from the current situation and not have Netflix on that list. A global crisis that forces people to stay home for weeks? Movie theatres, bars, restaurants, and gyms shuttered? No live sports on TV? What else are people supposed to do but cuddle up and watch Tiger King?
Netflix’s latest quarterly results seem to confirm that notion, as the streaming giant added more paid subscribers over the past six months than ever before in its history. Nearly 16 million people signed up for the service in the first quarter alone, with another 10 million subscribers added by the end of June. That brings Netflix’s global paid memberships to 193 million, up 26 million since the beginning of 2020. To add some perspective, Netflix added just 12 million subscribers in the first half of 2019 and less than 28 million in the entire year.
Read more on Statista.
📱 TOOLS & APPS
Slazzer: Remove image background automatically in just 5 seconds.
tested it, and it’s actually really good!
Whiteborb: A free mobile-friendly shared whiteboard
say hi! 👋
Sitechecker: Toolkit to measure and track website SEO performance
always useful to know more about your website’s performance
🔍 SPOTTED
Twitter is working to integrate the “Request verification” option also in the app [link]
Twitter is working on “Block or report” button for DM Requests [link]
Instagram is working on new Messaging Controls options for when the integration with Facebook Messenger will be available [link]
Instagram keeps working on the animated text feature for the Story Text Tool [link]
🐦 TWEETS of the WEEK
If you’re writing for followers, your followers are worthless.
Matthew Kobach (but a Fastronaut)
It’s not always about knowing more, sometimes it’s about thinking differently
I’m going to take a break from social media for my mental health. I will see you all in 2 minutes.
“Innovation is the child of freedom and the parent of prosperity.” — @mattwridley
😂 FUN STUFF
don’t get ducked. it does not look fun.
Credit: Skynada/Reddit
Concept: isolation tent for open concept offices https://t.co/e08EketsQw
That's all for this week...
this was the 99th Pulse... next week? see you 🤞