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Steve Huff
Steve Huff is an Editor and Reporter at dot.LA. Steve was previously managing editor for The Metaverse Post and before that deputy digital editor for Maxim magazine. He has written for Inside Hook, Observer and New York Mag. Steve is the author of two official tie-ins books for AMC’s hit “Breaking Bad” prequel, “Better Call Saul.” He’s also a classically-trained tenor and has performed with opera companies and orchestras all over the Eastern U.S. He lives in the greater Boston metro area with his wife, educator Dr. Dana Huff.
Snapchatters frustrated with login issues began flooding social media with complaints early Tuesday.
Users were tweeting about the issue around 6 am PT, noting that Snapchat was freezing for some while others were automatically logged out — if they could access the app at all. The problems were reflected on uptime monitoring sites like Down Detector and Services Down. Both sites showed significant spikes in outage complaints beginning in the early morning and lasting past noon Pacific Time.
The majority of reports focused on logging in. Santa Monica-based Snap’s support account tweeted about 90 minutes after the problems first surfaced that they were “aware of an issue preventing some Snapchatters from logging in” and asked users to “Hang tight, we are looking into it and working on a fix!”
The outage, unusual for the relatively reliable service, was prolonged and widespread enough to get traction on Twitter. In a survey released by ToolTester.com in September 2021, Snapchat was no. 10 among the top 30 most outage-prone sites, according to data from DownDetector.com — and problems were usually related to sending and receiving messages. The social site most often flagged by Down Detector was Discord, Instagram was no.3.
About four hours after acknowledging the login issues, Snapchat Support tweeted that the problem had been fixed.
dot.LA reached out to Snapchat for more information about the outage and will update if the company responds.
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Steve Huff
Steve Huff is an Editor and Reporter at dot.LA. Steve was previously managing editor for The Metaverse Post and before that deputy digital editor for Maxim magazine. He has written for Inside Hook, Observer and New York Mag. Steve is the author of two official tie-ins books for AMC’s hit “Breaking Bad” prequel, “Better Call Saul.” He’s also a classically-trained tenor and has performed with opera companies and orchestras all over the Eastern U.S. He lives in the greater Boston metro area with his wife, educator Dr. Dana Huff.
steve@dot.la
Photo by James Opas | Modified by Joshua Letona
“Moves,” our roundup of job changes in L.A. tech, is presented by Interchange.LA, dot.LA's recruiting and career platform connecting Southern California's most exciting companies with top tech talent. Create a free Interchange.LA profile here—and if you're looking for ways to supercharge your recruiting efforts, find out more about Interchange.LA's white-glove recruiting service by emailing Sharmineh O’Farrill Lewis (sharmineh@dot.la). Please send job changes and personnel moves to moves@dot.la.
Viracta Therapeutics, a precision oncology company, appointed Mark Rothera as president and chief executive officer. Rothera previously served as president and CEO of Silence Therapeutics.
Software and data company VideoAmp tapped CTO Tony Fagan to expand his responsibilities to oversight and evolution of VideoAmp’s product, engineering and research and development (R&D) departments.
Short-term rentals platform AvantStay welcomed Ankur Jain as chief financial officer. Jain recently served as BPF’s CFO.
SimplePractice, a health and wellness management platform, added Ian Knox as chief product officer. Knox most recently served as the head of mobile product at Compass and was previously vice president of product for Expedia.
Dan Serrano joined COPE Health Solutions as principal and senior vice president. Prior to this role, Serrano was SVP of finance at CareAbout.
Fintech digital operations software company Docupace hired Nouman Jan as director of information technology (IT) and site reliability engineering (SRE). Jan served as an executive director for the Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS).
Golden State Foods, a supplier to the food service and retail industries promoted senior director, operations Shane Blanchette to group vice president, continuous improvement, quality custom distribution (QCD).
Peter Roussak joined electronics manufacturing company Interlink Electronics as vice president and general counsel. Roussak has served as general counsel and co-founder of several companies, including Exhibit Consortium LLC and Xanadu Entertainment Partners LLC and Mandeville Partners, LLC.
HyperDraft, an AI-powered legal automation platform, added LegalZoom security executive Steven Singer to its advisory board.
Energy marketplace platform VECKTA Corporation welcomed Leading Lotus founder Uma Gopaldass as its newest board member.
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Decerry Donato
Decerry Donato is a reporter at dot.LA. Prior to that, she was an editorial fellow at the company. Decerry received her bachelor's degree in literary journalism from the University of California, Irvine. She continues to write stories to inform the community about issues or events that take place in the L.A. area. On the weekends, she can be found hiking in the Angeles National forest or sifting through racks at your local thrift store.
Ebay 2.0? Whatnot's $50M Bid To Take Auction Excitement to Livestream Video
09:00 AM | May 25, 2021
Photo by Thimo Pedersen on Unsplash
A few years ago, you went to eBay to bid on limited edition sports cards or out-of-print comic books. Then, livestreaming came to town.
Two weeks ago, one Pokemon collector dropped $17,500 on a Skyridge Charizard Holo card during a broadcasted event streamed live on Whatnot.
What began as a social app for collectors to swap stories and photos has ballooned into a digital stage for live auctions and unboxing videos. Since January, the Los Angeles tech startup has hired some 40 employees and leased a 10,000 square-foot office space in the Marina Arts District.
And on Tuesday — just a few months since its last big boost — the startup closed a $50 million Series B round.
Whatnot recently closed a $50 million Series B round.
"It's probably one of the fastest growing marketplaces we've ever seen," said Y Combinator's Anu Hariharan, who led the round.
It's been over a year since consumers moved online in droves and investors are still sinking millions into retail technology —livestream shopping especially.
L.A.-based Popshop Live was valued at $100 million last fall after an investor bidding war to lead its Series A. Talkshoplive, which hosts celebrities livestreaming about their memoirs and latest albums, scored seed capital in February from a venture firm backed by eBay's founder.
One Pokemon collector dropped $17,500 on a 1st Edition Shining Charizard card during a broadcasted event streamed live on Whatnot.
What gives? Hariharan said U.S. ecommerce has only embraced video in the last three to five years, and now it's everywhere. Even retailers like Home Depot introduced livestream demos and workshops during the pandemic.
Grant Lafontaine, the CEO and co-founder of Whatnot, brought the technology to a niche, well-connected community of online shoppers. He founded the company in 2019 with Logan Head, a former product manager at the online sneaker marketplace GOAT.
Their users are 18 to 32-year-old collectors who spend hours browsing eBay listings but crave something more interactive.
"They're on eBay because they're buying the collectibles, they're on Instagram to show them off," Lafontaine said. "They come to Whatnot because they can do both."
The company got its start as a social platform and marketplace — sans video livestreaming. That function came later, after a steady pool of users made checking Whatnot a daily habit.
"I was the first person to go live," Lafontaine said. "I sold out $5,000 worth of collectibles in two-and-a-half hours. The experience kind of spoke for itself. Anyone who saw it wanted to use it."
Other investors include Andreessen Horowitz, Animal Capital, musicians Ryan Tedder and DJ Skee with Min 10 and NFL players DeAndre Hopkins, Bobby Wagner and Jeremy Padawer. The company has raised $75 million to date.
Whatnot now boasts 15 categories of collectibles, from FunkoPops to sports cards (the most popular category on the app) to a few newer experimental verticals like vintage clothing. Within the next year, Lafontaine said he hopes to hit 30.
"For a young startup, it's always important to start with one or two categories, not with everything," said Hariharan. "What Whatnot has done really well in collectives will help them scale pretty much any product."
The app, she said, is on its way to becoming "eBay 2.0."
A previous version of this story stated Whatnot closed a $40 million Series B Round. The correct amount is $50 million.From Your Site Articles
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Francesca Billington
Francesca Billington is a freelance reporter. Prior to that, she was a general assignment reporter for dot.LA and has also reported for KCRW, the Santa Monica Daily Press and local publications in New Jersey. She graduated from Princeton in 2019 with a degree in anthropology.
https://twitter.com/frosebillington
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