CrunchGov
Where Silicon Valley meets governance
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Cory Booker And The Silicon Valley Makeover Of The Democratic Party
Newark Mayor Cory Booker cruised to victory in New Jersey’s special election tonight. As a long-term presidential hopeful, he’ll instantly become one of the Democratic Party’s most powerful voices. Booker represents a permanent shift in how Silicon Valley is trying to give an ideological overhaul to the Democratic Party. Booker is a world-class tweeter, co-founder to an ailing… Read More
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LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman On Two Realistic Outcomes Of Teaching Everyone To Code
On a regular basis, we get pitched with major tech industry initiatives to broaden computer science education. A day after Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates signed on to a new initiative from Code.org to inspire 10 million new computer programmers, education startup General Assembly launched a new tool for self-taught coding. And just a few weeks earlier, Square CEO Jack Dorsey sat down with House… Read More
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Wikileaks In A Box: SecureDrop Is WhistleBlower Communication Tool For Media
In an effort to protect government whistleblowers from unprecedented levels of surveillance, the Freedom of the Press Foundation has launched SecureDrop, an anonymous submission tool for secure communications between sources and journalists. SecureDrop accepts encrypted documents and tips from sources and facilitates communication without putting journalists in jeopardy of having to reveal sources… Read More
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To Get Around US Law, The NSA Collects Email Address Books And Chat Buddy Lists From Foreign Locations
The Washington Post broke news this afternoon that the National Security Agency (NSA) is collecting huge numbers of email address books and chat buddy lists for both foreign individuals and United States citizens. It appears that the NSA lacks Congressional authority to collect buddy lists and address book information in the way that it currently does. As the Post rightly points out, address… Read More
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NSA “Is Harvesting Hundreds Of Millions Of Contact Lists,” Reports WaPo
The National Security Agency has been secretly "harvesting hundreds of millions of contact lists from personal e-mail and instant messaging accounts around the world, many of them belonging to Americans," reports the Washington Post from documents obtained by whistleblower on the lam, Edward Snowden. Read More
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Boxer
- Size $3M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Sutter Hill Ventures
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Depop
- Size $1M
- Round Seed
- Investors Red Circle Investment, Luca Marzotto
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Wishberg
- Size Not available
- Round Unattributed
- Investors India Quotient
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Smart Checkout
- Size $2M
- Round Seed
- Investors Prostor Capital
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Conversio Health
- Size Not available
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Heritage Group
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Refinery29
- Size $20M
- Round C
- Investors Stripes Group
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SAGE Therapeutics
- Size $20M
- Round B
- Investors ARCH Venture Partners, Third Rock Ventures
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Samanage
- Size $5M
- Round B
- Investors Carmel Ventures, Gemini Israel ventures
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GamePlan Technologies
- Size Not available
- Round B
- Investors Invest Nebraska
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UXPin
- Size Not available
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Andreessen Horowitz, IDG Ventures, Innovation Nest, Gil Penchina, Mansour ... See More
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Scratch Wireless
- Size $5M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors CommonAngels
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MapBox
- Size $10M
- Round A
- Investors Foundry Group
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URX
- Size $3.1M
- Round Seed
- Investors First Round Capital, Maverick Capital, Google Ventures, SV Angel, betaworks ... See More
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Hippocampus Learning Centres
- Size $5M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Not available
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Fancred
- Size $1.5M
- Round Seed
- Investors Militello Capital, Star Power, Atlas Venture, Howard Brodsky, Ed Godin ... See More
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Kii
- Size $7.3M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Fenox Venture Capital
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G1 Therapeutics
- Size $12.5M
- Round A
- Investors MedImmune Ventures, Hatteras Venture Partners, Mountain Group Capital
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PlayArt Labs
- Size $100K
- Round Angel
- Investors Not available
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Rhapsody
- Size Not available
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Telefonica
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Toushay
- Size Not available
- Round Private_equity
- Investors Not available
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xTV
- Size Not available
- Round Angel
- Investors Archimedes Labs
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Usermind
- Size $7.6M
- Round A
- Investors Andreessen Horowitz
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Seragon Pharmaceuticals
- Size $30M
- Round A
- Investors Not available
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Justworks
- Size $1M
- Round Seed
- Investors Index Ventures, Daring Journey Ventures
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THERAVECTYS
- Size $18.9M
- Round D
- Investors Tethys BioScience
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Clinical Ink
- Size $4.3M
- Round B
- Investors FCA Venture Partners
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Minted
- Size $41M
- Round C
- Investors Allen & Company, Jeremy Stoppelman, Julia Hartz, Marissa Mayer ... See More
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Inceptus Medical
- Size $4.7M
- Round A
- Investors Versant Ventures, U.S. Venture Partners
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TaKaDu
- Size Not available
- Round Private_equity
- Investors 3M New Ventures
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Osprey Medical
- Size $14M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Not available
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Study: Facebook Comments Are More Civil Than Newspaper Website Comments
Hypothesis: A person is less likely to accuse a complete stranger of being a socialist demon hell-bent on killing babies with free health insurance, when their friends can see him being a complete asshat. Read More
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Judge Gives Google An Early Christmas Present, Declares Privacy Suits Must Prove Harm
A federal judge dismissed a class-action lawsuit against Google, finding no evidence that the search giant’s Internet tracking harmed users. Plaintiffs alleged that Google had “tricked” Apple’s Safari browser into accepting digital “cookies”, which allow companies to track browsing behavior and sell it for targeted advertising. Avoiding a multi-million-dollar… Read More
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Thiel Fellows Program Is “Most Misdirected Piece Of Philanthropy,” Says Larry Summers
Two years after billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel announced an experiment to pay bright high schoolers to drop out of college for $100,000, the Thiel Fellowship program hasn't won over education leaders. "I think the single most misdirected bit of philanthropy in this decade is Peter Thiel's special program to drop out of college," said former Harvard President Larry Summers at the… Read More
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Democracy.com Launches Plug-And-Play Web Presence For Political Campaigns, Aims At Building A Social Network
Few political candidates have the chairman of Google on their digital advisory board; most are tiny one-man startup shops with little technical expertise and even less time to figure out the messy world of social media. A new startup, Democracy.com, is launching a service for the 98 percent of local politicians with an average of $2,500 for the whole campaign (numbers according to… Read More
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Freedom Of Information Requests At The NSA Are Up 1,054% Year-Over-Year
According to leaked emails, freedom of information requests at the National Security Agency (NSA) have skyrocketed more than 1,000 percent this year, following revelations from Edward Snowden that detailed the agency’s mass surveillance programs. MuckRock, which attained the emails relating to freedom of information requests, reports that the NSA received 3,382 requests this year during a… Read More
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Unfurlough.us Helps Shutdown Victims Find Freelance Work With A Google Doc-Turned-Website
The Internet has collectively put their brains together to help furloughed federal employees weather the shutdown. unfurlough.us is a crowdsourced spreadsheet of freelanace gigs for out-of-work employees was a joing project by the clever folks at Washington D.C. startup incubator, 1776, and Blen Corp–which is entirely powered by open source software. After the original public Google doc… Read More
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Innovation Can’t Fix Partisanship, So Silicon Valley Doesn’t Fight The Shutdown
Silicon Valley's deep-pocketed lobbyists and outspoken netizens are conspicuously absent from the debate over a government shutdown that could cripple the U.S. economy. Activists from the tech industry fight for immigrants, startups, gay rights, voter turnout, scientific funding, education, presidential hopefuls and national disaster victims. So, why not get involved in the shutdown fight? Read More
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The Internet Costs 30% Of Monthly Wages In Some Nations. Google Wants To Help.
Internet access is astonishingly expensive in some parts of the world. The International Telecommunications Union estimates that fixed broadband costs 30 percent of the average monthly wage within the developing world [PDF]. To address this, Google, Facebook, USAID and a host of top-tier tech companies have teamed up to make the Internet universally affordable. The newly launched Alliance for… Read More
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Disconnect Search, Built By Ex-Google And Ex-NSA Engineers, Lets You Use Google, Bing And Yahoo Without Tracking
Started as a side project by then-Googler Brian Kennish back in 2010 to cut out ad tracking during a person's Facebook browsing session, Disconnect has gone on to raise funding (twice), to work on multiple browsers and sites, and create apps for specific users (e.g., kids), and take on more engineers, including two more from Google and one from the NSA. With its apps now used by 1 million people… Read More
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Silk, A Cloud-Based App To Visualize Data, Launches Its First Paid Product For Teams, Gets Another $1.6M From NEA
Since Silk first came out of stealth mode in 2011, there have been 300,000 interactive pages created on its cloud-based, web data-crunching platform designed for non-technical "knowledge workers". Taking less easy-to-read data sets and making them more digestible, results have ranged from the Guardian newspaper in the UK creating graphics of which countries have the most asylum seekers, through… Read More
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ITU: 6.8B Mobile Subs By End Of 2013, Nearly As Many People As There Are On Earth; 2.7B Internet Connections
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the UN agency that oversees IT and communications development, today released its latest annual report charting how well we are doing as a planet in getting everyone connected. Mobile is the topline success story: the ITU projects that by the end of this year, there will be 6.8 billion mobile connections, equal to the number of people living on… Read More
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The Already Abysmal NSA Surveillance Panel Is Now On Hold Due To The Government Shutdown
Under-promise, and then under-under-deliver is the name of this game. The panel to vet the NSA set up by President Barack Obama, and nurtured by current Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, is now on hiatus, its funds being frozen as part of the larger governmental shutdown. The panel, one of the president’s small promises in the wake of sweeping leaks concerning the actions of… Read More
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Student Tablet Hardware Melts, District Suspends $30 Million Amplify Program On Safety Concerns
A North Carolina school district has suspended the use of 15,000 tablets after reports of multiple hardware issues, including the device’s charger melting at home. Guilford County Superintendent Maurice “Mo” Green has suspended the $30 million program on safety concerns. The recall is a major sting for NewsCorp’s Amplify, which released details of its digital-first… Read More
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White House’s Deputy Tech Advisor Turns To Bartending Amid Shutdown
Here's a novel way to spend some mandatory vacation time: serve your fellow co-workers top-shelf alcohol. The government shutdown has most of Washington's public sector furloughed, so Tom Power -- the White House's Deputy Chief Technology Officer -- decided to take up bartending. Washington D.C.'s shutdown is like a Catholic school prom: all that pent-up frustration has finally been set loose. Read More
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Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian Explains How He Built A Web Empire
You don't need to be a cut-throat jerk to be successful in the business of capitalism. Alexis Ohanian doesn't stand out in a room; other than being tall enough to play NBA defense, he's usually the unassuming guy in a corner making new friends with a big smile and a buddy-buddy attitude. Ohanian also happens to have founded one of the most influential websites in existence: Reddit.com, a popular… Read More
