Tag: tech

Better.com CEO lays off 900 employees weeks before Christmas

On By Kendra FranklinIn TechnologyLeave a comment

Imagine you are invited to a work Zoom meeting a few weeks before Christmas. You take a pause from gift shopping for your children and spouse to log onto the meeting. Within three minutes of the meeting’s beginning, you are told that you are being laid off, effective immediately.

This was reality for 900 Better.com employees (9% of the company’s staff) on Wednesday, December 1. A recording of the shocking meeting went viral on TikTok, starting with Better.com CEO Vishal Garg saying “I come to you with not great news.”

Better.com is a digital mortgage start-up valued at $7 billion. Garg founded the company in 2014 with the hope to ease and lower the cost of homebuying. The layoffs came within days of a $750 million cash infusion. According to CNN, among the fired were Better.com’s diversity, equity, and inclusion team.

Garg attempted to show empathy to the “unlucky” employees by stating that the last time he cried the last time he laid off an astronomical amount of employees, hoping that he would be “stronger” this time around.

“If you’re on this call, you are part of the unlucky group that is being laid off,” Garg said in the video. “Your employment here is terminated effective immediately.”

Laid-off employees will receive one month’s pay and three months of benefits, NBC News reported.

The abrupt and unfortunate timing of this decision had many criticizing Garg and how he handled the situation, stating that this was cruel and unethical.

Garg’s reputation has received a hit before, as Forbes obtained an agressive email from Garg to employees. “You are TOO DAMN SLOW. You are a bunch of DUMB DOLPHINS and…DUMB DOLPHINS get caught in nets and eaten by sharks. SO STOP IT. STOP IT. STOP IT RIGHT NOW. YOU ARE EMBARRASSING ME,” Garg wrote.

After the video went viral, Garg sent an apology to the laid-off employees. The letter was leaked by one of the fired employees online. “I failed to show the appropriate amount of respect and appreciation for the individuals who were affected and for their contributions to Better,” Garg wrote. “I own the decision to do the layoffs, but in communicating it I blundered the execution. In doing so, I embarrassed you.”

The controversy has led to several executive staff members resigning, like the VP of communications, head of marketing, and head of public relations, TechCrunch reported.

Tesla safety concerns: video games on the road?

On By Kendra FranklinIn TechnologyLeave a comment
Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

A Tesla driver discovered one day last year that he was able to play video games on his car’s dashboard as he was driving. The driver, Vince Patton, tested the limits of what he could do while in motion, playing solitaire, browsing the web, and playing a game called Sky Force Reloaded, AP reported.

Anxious that this feature will result in distracted driving, Patton filed a report to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). On Wednesday, the NHTSA stated that they have started to look into this issue, stating that they are in communication with the manufacturer.

“The Vehicle Safety Act prohibits manufacturers from selling vehicles with design defects posing unreasonable risks to safety,” wrote the NHTSA in an email to Bloomberg. According to AP, the agency has not opened a formal investigation yet, which would entail document requests.

According to Business Insider, the NHTSA stated that vehicle manufacturers are meant to create their in-device systems without the option to perform distracting tasks while driving. For many vehicles with touchscreen dashboards, this means a disabling of certain features when the car is in motion. The NHTSA stated that all visual-heavy secondary tasks are supposed to be tested to see they can be performed without distracting the driver. Anything too distracting must be disabled while driving.

Tesla’s video games require players to confirm that they are passengers before gameplay, but Tesla does not verify if this is true, allowing drivers to lie and play while on the road.

With the rise of car dashboards with Internet features, the NHTSA’s concerns about distracted driving have intensified. According to the agency’s car crash statistics, distracted drivers accounted for “3,142 or 8.7 percent of all fatalities in 2019.” With this in mind, the idea of drivers being able to play games while driving is even more concerning.

Though it is still early, Tesla has yet to comment on the situation.

Trouble With the Apple Card Leads to Trending Topic

On By Kendra FranklinIn Brand, TechnologyLeave a comment
Source: Apple Inc.

Apple unveiled their new iPhone 13 line on Friday, with pre-order sales opening at 8 a.m. that morning. For over an hour and a half after of the opening, customers were raising concerns about trouble ordering their new iPhone using the Apple Card, with many unable to purchase using their iPhone Upgrade Program.

Though users were able to purchase using other card payment options, this option takes away from some of the main benefits if getting an Apple Card, like 3% cash back and payment plans.

Users took to Twitter to express their frustrations about not being able to order an Apple product despite using an Apple service, eventually making “Apple Card” a trending topic on Twitter that day.

Some dealing with the issue expressed frustration.

Others, however, used humor to cope with the inconvenience.

Apple addressed the issue on their system status page, stating that “some Apple Card customers are not able to make iPhone Upgrade Program purchases.” The company updated the system status page at 12:36 p.m., claiming that the issue was resolved. The problem lasted for over four hours before Apple was able to address it.