Twitter, TweetDeck suffer global outage

Twitter has said that the social media website and its dashboard management platform TweetDeck was hit with an outage, with thousands of global users left in the dark. https://ift.tt/2nwYCuL

Visa, Mastercard reconsider backing Facebook's Libra as governments grumble: Report

Facebook's plans for Libra have meet with concern by governments and critics of the social network behemoth, whose reputation has been tarnished by its role in spreading fake information and extremist videos. https://ift.tt/2mROk84 https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

GoPro introduces Hero8 Black, Max cameras and Mods, price starts Rs 36,500

American technology company GoPro has introduced Hero8 Black, GoProMax and three new GoPro Mods. Hero8 Black comes at Rs 36,500 and GoPro Max is selling at Rs 47,000. https://ift.tt/2orKvqk

New DC Movie, Joker, Out Now in India in IMAX and 2D

"Is it just me, or is it getting crazier out there?" Well, it's time to find out for yourself. *Joker* - the standalone origin story for the DC villain, starring Joaquin Phoenix in the lead... https://ift.tt/2okUm1k

A feature that makes your messages disappear may come to WhatsApp: 9 things to know

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India defends e-cigarette ban in court with attack on Juul

Juul had aimed to launch its e-cigarette in India in late 2019 and had hired several senior executives in recent months. https://ift.tt/2nw9oRZ https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Joker Movie Review: Joaquin Phoenix Captivates in a Misguided Origin Story

In our Joker movie review, we look at how Joaquin Phoenix's phenomenal acting powers a DC villain origin story that doesn't give as much thought to what it's portraying. https://ift.tt/2mNd4hL

ETtech Top 5: Amazon trims India investment, Brands & ecomm discounts and more

A closer look at today's biggest tech and startup news and why they matter. https://ift.tt/2mMgBg9 https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Rumours fly as online bank transactions fail

Videos of the plight of PMC Bank victims went viral, creating panic. Bank users kept reporting that they were unable to pay rent, school fees and other dues on the first of the month. https://ift.tt/2opeTSA https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Canadian telecom Telus to buy local operations of US-based ADT for $527M in an effort to expand the home and security business (James McLeod/Vancouver Sun)

James McLeod / Vancouver Sun:
Canadian telecom Telus to buy local operations of US-based ADT for $527M in an effort to expand the home and security business  —  ‘... potentially they can offer more of a whole-home solution ...’  —  Telus Corp. announced Tuesday it is buying ADT Canada for $700 million …

Ecomm companies hand over discount baton to brands

The marketplaces asked companies to offer the lowest possible price to help revive demand, said senior executives of eight top brands, including those focused solely on ecommerce. https://ift.tt/2mRHxva https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

India’s NoBroker raises $50M to help people buy and rent without real estate brokers

An Indian startup that is attempting to improve the way how people in the nation rent or buy an apartment by not paying any brokerage just raised a significant amount of capital to further expand its business.

NoBroker said on Wednesday it has raised $50 million in a new financing round. The Series D round for the Bangalore-based real estate property operator was led by Tiger Global Management and included participation from existing investors General Atlantic. The five-year-old startup, which closed its previous financing round in June, has raised $121 million to date. The new round valued NoBroker at about $300 million, a person familiar with the matter told TechCrunch.

NoBroker operates in Bengaluru, Chennai, Gurgaon, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Pune cities in India. The startup has established itself as one of the largest players in the real estate business. It operates over 2.5 million properties on its website and is adding more than 280,000 new users each month, Amit Kumar, cofounder and CEO of NoBroker, told TechCrunch in an interview.

Real estate brokers in India, as is true in other markets, help people find properties. But they can charge up to 10 months worth of rent (leasing) — or a single-digit percent of the apartment’s worth if someone is buying the property — in urban cities as their commission. NoBroker allows the owner of a property to directly connect with potential tenants to remove brokerage charges from the equation.

The startup makes money in three ways. First, it lets non-paying users get in touch with only nine property owners. Those who wish to contact more property owners are required to pay a fee. Second, property owners can opt to pay NoBroker to have its representatives deal with prospective buyers — in a move that ironically makes the startup serve as a broker.

NoBroker also offers end-to-end services such as rent agreements and movers and packers, for which it also charges a fee. The startup says it uses machine learning to speed up the transactions and make it service low-cost.

The new financing round is oddly smaller than $51 million NoBroker had raised in June this year. Saurabh Garg, chief business officer of NoBroker, told TechCrunch in an interview that the founding team did not want to dilute their stake in the startup, hence they opted for a smaller round.

NoBroker is competing with a number of players including heavily backed NestAway, which counts Goldman Sachs and Tiger Global among its investors. NestAway operates in eight cities and has raised north of $100 million to date. Budget hotel startup Oyo, which has already become one of the largest hotel businesses in the world, also operates in NoBroker’s territory with Oyo Living.

But NoBroker’s Kumar said he does not see Oyo and other startups as competition. Instead, “these other players are some of its largest clients,” he said. India’s real estate industry is estimated to grow to $1 trillion in worth by 2030.

Intel's high-end desktop Cascade Lake-X CPU line gets a price drop of up to ~50% as AMD prepares to launch comparable Ryzen 9 3950X in November for $749 (Dr. Ian Cutress/AnandTech)

Dr. Ian Cutress / AnandTech:
Intel's high-end desktop Cascade Lake-X CPU line gets a price drop of up to ~50% as AMD prepares to launch comparable Ryzen 9 3950X in November for $749  —  With someone in the press having broken their embargo earlier today, Intel is lifting the lid earlier than planned …

India sent most takedown requests to social media firms: Report

The governments of India and Russia each accounted for almost 20% of the overall number of removal requests. The total number of requests sent by various countries to internet firms stood at 390,764 so far. https://ift.tt/2onb9AI https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Amazon has committed only a third of its 2018 funding to its India unit this year

This will be the first time that Amazon’s yearly investment in its India marketplace would have come down since it set up shop in 2012 https://ift.tt/2nskeIJ https://ift.tt/eA8V8J