1/ 👋 Excited to share what we’ve been building at https://t.co/GOQJ7LjQ2t + we are going to tweetstorm our progress every week!

Week 1 highlights: getting shortlisted for YC W2019🤞, acquiring a premium domain💰, meeting Substack's @hamishmckenzie and Stripe CEO @patrickc 🤩

2/ So what is Brew?

brew / bru : / to make (beer, coffee etc.) / verb: begin to develop 🌱

A place for you to enjoy premium content while supporting your favorite creators. Sort of like a ‘Consumer-facing Patreon’ cc @jackconte

(we’re still working on the pitch)
3/ So, why be so transparent? Two words: launch strategy.

jk 😅 a) I loooove doing something consistently for a long period of time b) limited downside and infinite upside (feedback, accountability, reach).
cc @altimor, @pmarca
4/ https://t.co/GOQJ7LjQ2t domain 🍻

It started with a cold email. Guess what? He was using BuyMeACoffee on his blog, and was excited to hear about what we're building next. Within 2w, we signed the deal at @Escrowcom's SF office. You’re a pleasure to work with @MichaelCyger!
5/ @ycombinator's invite for the in-person interview arrived that evening. Quite a day!

Thanks @patio11 for the thoughtful feedback on our YC application, and @gabhubert for your directions on positioning the product — set the tone for our pitch!
6/ Dinner at Stripe HQ. Thanks for having us, @andylouisqin! It was an amazing coincidence to meet @patrickc. We look up to you, not just for what you’ve built at Stripe, but for your thoughts on immigration, rationalism, internet economy, etc. + please do more podcasts :)
7/ 💡 There are ~15mm creators (US only) spending a significant amount of time creating great content.

They have more distribution than ever before (thanks, youtube, instagram, medium, tumblr, twitch, 500px, deviantart, soundcloud, podbean et al.).
8/ 👎 Now the sad economics of the internet fame — $1 is the avg earnings per 1000 views (RPM).

Imagine a stadium full of people and the performer making 50 bucks from that ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
9/ Given most types of content can’t even make money from ads without scale (podcast, newsletter, photography, etc.)

What’s worse, creators are forced to optimize for maximum eyeballs (not quality), incentivising clickbait titles and fake news.
10/ So, will people pay?
— we are increasingly paying for good content
— online payments has become frictionless
— we love supporting small creators
— podcast is a $7B market in china, driven by subscriptions. US in comparison does $300mm, mostly from - you guessed it - ads
11/ https://t.co/GOQJ7LjQ2t will launch as invite-only for creators. We’ll give early access to the 30k creators on https://t.co/7zcGHHtYGM <3 If it wasn’t for listening to them, there would be no Brew.

Attaching some screens, lmk if you like it (and especially so if you don’t).
12/ Next week:
a) Brew sneak peek 👀
b) top lessons we learned building https://t.co/7zcGHHtYGM
c) why it’s incredibly important to democratise Paywall tech (NYT is set to do $600mm 😲, while most publishers can’t even afford to set up a paywall https://t.co/WGJbd501YA).
13/ Since you're here: we accept support in likes, RTs, feedback ([email protected]) and internet karma ❤️✌️

And thanks @joannapedrina for assuring me that this tweetstorm thing is not a crazy idea 🙌 #brewingup

More from Tech

I could create an entire twitter feed of things Facebook has tried to cover up since 2015. Where do you want to start, Mark and Sheryl? https://t.co/1trgupQEH9


Ok, here. Just one of the 236 mentions of Facebook in the under read but incredibly important interim report from Parliament. ht @CommonsCMS
https://t.co/gfhHCrOLeU


Let’s do another, this one to Senate Intel. Question: “Were you or CEO Mark Zuckerberg aware of the hiring of Joseph Chancellor?"
Answer "Facebook has over 30,000 employees. Senior management does not participate in day-today hiring decisions."


Or to @CommonsCMS: Question: "When did Mark Zuckerberg know about Cambridge Analytica?"
Answer: "He did not become aware of allegations CA may not have deleted data about FB users obtained through Dr. Kogan's app until March of 2018, when
these issues were raised in the media."


If you prefer visuals, watch this short clip after @IanCLucas rightly expresses concern about a Facebook exec failing to disclose info.
Recently, the @CNIL issued a decision regarding the GDPR compliance of an unknown French adtech company named "Vectaury". It may seem like small fry, but the decision has potential wide-ranging impacts for Google, the IAB framework, and today's adtech. It's thread time! 👇

It's all in French, but if you're up for it you can read:
• Their blog post (lacks the most interesting details):
https://t.co/PHkDcOT1hy
• Their high-level legal decision: https://t.co/hwpiEvjodt
• The full notification: https://t.co/QQB7rfynha

I've read it so you needn't!

Vectaury was collecting geolocation data in order to create profiles (eg. people who often go to this or that type of shop) so as to power ad targeting. They operate through embedded SDKs and ad bidding, making them invisible to users.

The @CNIL notes that profiling based off of geolocation presents particular risks since it reveals people's movements and habits. As risky, the processing requires consent — this will be the heart of their assessment.

Interesting point: they justify the decision in part because of how many people COULD be targeted in this way (rather than how many have — though they note that too). Because it's on a phone, and many have phones, it is considered large-scale processing no matter what.

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Viruses and other pathogens are often studied as stand-alone entities, despite that, in nature, they mostly live in multispecies associations called biofilms—both externally and within the host.

https://t.co/FBfXhUrH5d


Microorganisms in biofilms are enclosed by an extracellular matrix that confers protection and improves survival. Previous studies have shown that viruses can secondarily colonize preexisting biofilms, and viral biofilms have also been described.


...we raise the perspective that CoVs can persistently infect bats due to their association with biofilm structures. This phenomenon potentially provides an optimal environment for nonpathogenic & well-adapted viruses to interact with the host, as well as for viral recombination.


Biofilms can also enhance virion viability in extracellular environments, such as on fomites and in aquatic sediments, allowing viral persistence and dissemination.