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THE HEADLINES
Estimated Read Time: 4 minutes and 6 seconds
SORRY, NOT SORRY
Mark Zuckerberg’s marathon Congressional testimony has come to a close, and for the most part, Zuck emerged from the hallowed halls of Capitol Hill unscathed. But it isn’t as if there were no juicy nuggets to be had on day two …
- Zuck himself was part of the Cambridge Analytic breach
- Facebook collects up to 29k data points per user
- Zuck uses a booster seat at Congressional hearings (and presumably restaurants)
- Zuck may not be smarter than the average bear (spoiler: he left his notes unattended). Rookie mistake.
But it wasn’t all about the Facebook Chief Executive this week. We also found out that our elected officials don’t know how Facebook makes money and don’t understand the internet in general.
Congress is likely to revisit personal data privacy regulation and the power of large tech firms.
Water Cooler Talking Point: “Now that the game is over it’s time to hit the film room. But it wouldn’t be fair to break down the tape without comparing one young, eccentric, tech billionaire defending his revolutionary idea to be a bunch of old white dudes to another, right? Roll the Bill Gates footage …”
GOING GREEN
John Boehner is joining the Board of Directors of one of the nation’s largest multi-state cannabis corporations, Acreage Holdings. Formerly known as High Street Capital Partners, the company grows, harvests, and distributes marijuana products. Reefers.
Seeing a former politician advocating for the marijuana industry isn’t so unusual, but Boehner vehemently opposed decriminalization of marijuana laws during his time as the House Speaker. Maybe something he’s done since then has caused him to forget.
To defend himself, Boehner has said that his “thinking on marijuana has evolved.” Sounds like Johnny Cannabis is cashing in on the opportunity to go green.
Water Cooler Talking Point: “This sounds a lot like that time my parents confiscated my, uh, I mean, my brother’s weed in high school and I got grounded for a month, only to find out years later they smoked it with my uncle.”
AN APPLE SUBSCRIBER A DAY …
Apple’s music streaming service recently surpassed 40M subscribers, making it the second largest streaming service behind Spotify. They also went out and got a new boss.
Oliver Schusser will be DJing Apple’s office parties from here on out as the new VP of Apple Music & International content. Schusser previously led all App Store efforts outside the US, including the iTunes Store and iBooks.
The news seems to have spooked Spotify investors, as stocks fell on Wednesday. The rival service still has 30M more subscribers than Apple, but Steve Jobs’ disciples are on pace to surpass the Swedish streamers by this summer.
Water Cooler Talking Point: “The race for streaming supremacy is heating up and I am SO amped about it. I’d much rather listen to streaming services fight over the rights to the new Quavo EP or how many free skips is too many, rather than hear world leaders bicker over the price of soybeans.”
IN OTHER NEWS
- Spotify will roll out a new partnership with Hulu. Users will have access to both services for $12.99/month, or $4.99/month less than subscribing to each service individually. Look at Hulu outkicking their coverage.
- Oil prices hit their highest level since December 2014 after Donny Politics tweeted that he may or may not be going all “bombs over Baghdad” in Syria.
- Fidelity will be changing the way they charge customers for financial advice, based on how much they have invested.
- Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson gave away HQ Trivia’s largest prize ever ($300k) last night. And you thought ‘Baywatch’ was rock bottom.
- US indices were down yesterday:
- DOW: -0.90%
- S&P 500: -0.55%
- NASDAQ: -0.36%
INSIDER INFORMATION
Why you should actually be doing even less work: It took Morten Hansen five years to confirm what we’ve known since we met a majority of our co-workers: some people are better at work than others. But Hansen’s findings (and new book) claim to help you be better while doing less. Take my money.
How to respond somewhat intelligently during a meeting: Since faking sudden, acute illness isn’t always an option, there’s Google research on how to manage the spotlight.
What has spreadsheet jockeys in a frenzy: Google Sheets just launched an update so that users can record macros.
Why you should expect a new tactic from headhunters: Apparently the LinkedIn Premium members got together and decided LinkedIn messaging was missing something: GIFs.