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Gambling and poetry
A list of the most popular gambling poems with a brief description of why they are considered classics. Find out more about gambling poetry here.
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Is Stock Investing Gambling?
Are you curious about stock investing but think it might be too much like gambling? Find out if the two are really so different.
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Gambling Party Games to Play at Home
At your next party, make sure you have some great gambling themed party games. Here are the best ones!
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SiriusXM launches ‘TikTok Radio,’ a music channel featuring viral hits hosted by TikTok stars
If viral TikTok songs like Dr. Dog’s “Where’d All the Time Go?” or Bo Burnham’s “Bezos I” weren’t already stuck in your head on loop, now they could be. Today SiriusXM launched a TikTok Radio channel, which features TikTok creators as channel hosts. The station is designed to sound like a “radio version of the platform’s ‘For You’ feed,” Sirius XM said.
SiriusXM, parent company to Pandora, announced this music channel in May, teasing the launch with curated Pandora playlists from influencers like Bella Poarch, whose lipsync video of Millie B’s “Soph Aspin Send [M to the B]” is the most liked video on TikTok.
With its TikTok partnership, SiriusXM is looking to capture a younger audience — on the TikTok app itself, DJ Habibeats (@djhabibeats) and DJ CONST (@erinconstantineofficial) will each go live on TikTok each week while DJing on TikTok Radio. Other creator hosts on TikTok Radio — like Billy (@8illy), Cat Haley (@itscathaley), HINDZ (@hindzsight), Lamar Dawson (@dirrtykingofpop) and Taylor Cassidy (@taylorcassidyj) — will deliver “The TikTok Radio Trending Ten,” a weekly countdown of songs trending on TikTok. To promote the station during its first week, artists like Ed Sheeran, Lil Nas X and Normani will appear on air.
Music has such a strong footing in TikTok culture that it regularly influences the Billboard charts — Fleetwood Mac’s “Rumours,” originally released in 1978, appeared in the top 10 Billboard albums again in 2020 after it was featured in a viral TikTok. Even a Fortnite-themed parody of Estelle’s “American Boy” — originally uploaded in 2018 to YouTube — had a beautiful moment on TikTok.
“We’re so excited to launch TikTok Radio on SiriusXM, which opens up artists and creators like this amazing group of hosts to new audiences,” said Ole Obermann, TikTok’s global head of Music, in a statement. “Now SiriusXM subscribers will have a new road to discover the latest trends in music and get a first listen to tomorrow’s musical superstars. The channel captures song-breaking music culture that creates so much joy and entertainment on TikTok through video in an all-audio format.”
Though SiriusXM’s subscriber base continues to expand — it saw a 34% year-over-year growth from last year to now — it still dwarfs in comparison to streaming giants like Spotify, which has 165 million paid users. SiriusXM reported a total of 34.5 million subscribers as of Q2 this year, the most it’s ever had, but even Apple Music and Amazon Music have reported nearly double the subscribers. Pandora has 6.5 million paid subscribers. Over the last few years, SiriusXM and Pandora have struck deals with companies like SoundCloud, Simplecast and Stitcher to become more competitive in both music and podcast streaming.
Still, other streaming companies have also shown interest in the market of Gen Z-ers on TikTok who want to listen to full versions of the catchy songs they hear in short videos. Apple Music and Spotify both host curated “viral hits” playlists. But a full-time satellite music channel is taking the trend a step further.
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Homebase raises $71M for a team management platform aimed at SMBs and their hourly workers
Small and medium enterprises have become a big opportunity in the world of B2B technology in the last several years, and today a startup that’s building tools aimed at helping them manage their teams of workers is announcing some funding that underscores the state of that market.
Homebase, which provides a platform that helps SMBs manage various services related to their hourly workforces, has closed $71 million in funding, a Series C that values the company between $500 million and $600 million, according to sources close to the startup.
The round has a number of big names in it that are as much a sign of how large VCs are valuing the SMB market right now as it is of the strategic interest of the individuals who are participating. GGV Capital is leading the round, with past backers Bain Capital Ventures, Baseline Ventures, Bedrock, Cowboy Ventures and Khosla Ventures also participating. Individuals include Focus Brands President Kat Cole; Jocelyn Mangan, a board member at Papa John’s and Chownow and former COO of Snag; former CFO of payroll and benefits company Gusto, Mike Dinsdale; Guild Education founder Rachel Carlson; star athletes Jrue and Lauren Holiday; and alright alright alright actor and famous everyman and future political candidate Matthew McConaughey.
Homebase has raised $108 million to date.
The funding is coming on the heels of strong growth for Homebase (which is not to be confused with the U.K./Irish home improvement chain of the same name, nor the YC-backed Vietnamese proptech startup).
The company now has some 100,000 small businesses, with 1 million employees in total, on its platform. Businesses use Homebase to manage all manner of activities related to workers that are paid hourly, including (most recently) payroll, as well as shift scheduling, timeclocks and timesheets, hiring and onboarding, communication and HR compliance.
John Waldmann, Homebase’s founder and CEO, said the funding will go toward both continuing to bring on more customers as well as expanding the list of services offered to them, which could include more features geared to frontline and service workers, as well as features for small businesses who might also have some “desk” workers who might still work hourly.
The common thread, Waldmann said, is not the exact nature of those jobs, but the fact that all of them, partly because of that hourly aspect, have been largely underserved by tech up to now.
“From the beginning, our mission was to help local businesses and their teams,” he said. Part of his inspiration came from people he knew: a childhood friend who owned an independent, expanding restaurant chain, and was going through the challenges of managing his teams there, carrying out most of his work on paper; and his sister, who worked in hospitality, which didn’t look all that different from his restaurant friend’s challenges. She had to call in to see when she was working, writing her hours in a notebook to make sure she got paid accurately.
“There are a lot of tech companies focused on making work easier for folks that sit at computers or desks, but are building tools for these others,” Waldmann said. “In the world of work, the experience just looks different with technology.”
Homebase currently is focused on the North American market — there are some 5 million small businesses in the U.S. alone, and so there is a lot of opportunity there. The huge pressure that many have experienced in the last 16 months of COVID-19 living, leading some to shut down altogether, has also focused them on how to manage and carry out work much more efficiently and in a more organized way, ensuring you know where your staff is and that your staff knows what it should be doing at all times.
What will be interesting is to see what kinds of services Homebase adds to its platform over time: In a way, it’s a sign of how hourly wage workers are becoming a more sophisticated and salient aspect of the workforce, with their own unique demands. Payroll, which is now live in 27 states, also comes with pay advances, opening the door to other kinds of financial services for Homebase, for example.
“Small businesses are the lifeblood of the American economy, with more than 60% of Americans employed by one of our 30 million small businesses. In a post-pandemic world, technology has never been more important to businesses of all sizes, including SMBs,” Jeff Richards, managing partner at GGV Capital and new Homebase board member, said in a statement. “The team at Homebase has worked tirelessly for years to bring technology to SMBs in a way that helps drive increased profitability, better hiring and growth. We’re thrilled to see Homebase playing such an important role in America’s small business recovery and thrilled to be part of the mission going forward.”
It’s interesting to see McConaughey involved in this round, given that he’s most recently made a turn toward politics, with plans to run for governor of Texas in 2022.
“Hardworking people who work in and run restaurants and local businesses are important to all of us,” he said in a statement. “They play an important role in giving our cities a sense of livelihood, identity and community. This is why I’ve invested in Homebase. Homebase brings small business operations into the modern age and helps folks across the country not only continue to work harder, but work smarter.”
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INKR draws in $3.1M to make more comics accessible to worldwide audiences
Digital comics platform INKR’s team
INKR is a digital comics platform that crosses cultural and language divides, enabling creators to reach global audiences with its proprietary localization technology. Previously bootstrapped, the company announced today that it has raised $3.1 million in pre-Series A funding led by Monk’s Hill Ventures, with participation from manga distributor TokyoPop founder and chief executive Stu Levy and VI Management managing director David Do.
Headquartered in Singapore with an office in Ho Chi Minh City, INKR was founded in 2019 by Ken Luong, Khoa Nguyen and Hieu Tran. The company says that since it launched in October 2020, its monthly average users have grown 200%. It currently partners with more than 70 content creators and publishers, including FanFan, Image Comics, Kodansha USA, Kuaikan, Mr. Blue, SB Creative, TokyoPop and Toons Family, and has more than 800 titles so far, including manga, webtoons and graphic novels.
Luong, INKR’s CEO, told TechCrunch that the platform will focus first on translated comics from top global publishers, but plans to open to small and indie creators in 2022.
At the heart of INKR’s platform is its localization technology, which the company says reduces the time spent on preparing comics for different markets from days to just hours.
“Comics localization is more than just translation. It is a time-consuming process with many steps involving many people—file handling, transcription, translation, typesetting, sound effects, quality control, etc,” Luong said.
Some of the titles on INKR
In addition to language, publishers also have to take into account the differences between comic styles around the world, including Japanese manga, Chinese manhua, Korean manhwa, American comics. For example, comics can be laid out page-by-page or use vertical scrolling. Some languages read from left to right, while others go from right to left.
Luong says INKR’s proprietary AI engine, called INKR Comics Vision, is able to recognize different formats and elements on a comic page, including text, dialogue, characters, facial expressions, backgrounds and panels. INKR Localize, its tool for human translators, helps them deliver accurate translations more quickly by automating tasks like text transcription, vocabulary suggestions and typesetting.
Since localization is performed by teams, including people in different locations, INKR provides them with browser-based collaboration software. The platform supports Japanese-English, Korean-English and Chinese-English translations, with plans to add more languages. Some publishers, like Kuaikan Manhua and Mr. Blue, have used INKR to translate thousands of comic chapters from Chinese and Korean into English.
INKR provides content creators with a choice of monetization models, including ad-supported, subscription fees or pay-per-chapter. Luong says the platform analyzes content to tell publishers which model will maximize their earnings, and shares a percentage of the revenue generated.
INKR is vying for attention with other digital comics platforms like Amazon-owned Comixology and Webtoon, the publishing portal operated by Naver Corporation.
Luong said INKR’s competitive advantages include the the diversity of comics is offers and the affordability of its pricing. Before launching, it also invested in data and AI-based technology for both readers and publishers. For example, users get personalized recommendation based on their reading activity, while publishers can access analytics to track title performance based on consumption trends.
In a statement, Monk’s Hill Ventures general partner Justin Nguyen said INKR’s “proprietary AI-driven platform is addressing pain points for creators and publishers who need to go digital and global—localizing for many languages quickly and cost-effectively while also helping them improve reach and readership through analytics and intelligent personalized feeds. We look forward to partnering with them to quench the huge demand for translated comics globally.”
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LiveControl raises $30M to help venues livestream events
One thing seems certain: The past year-and-a-half has fundamentally transformed the world of live events. The pandemic left plenty of venues scrambling for alternative revenue streams and, in many cases, shutting down for good.
On the flip side, it’s been a massive driver for those companies working to expand the reach of in-person events. Take LiveControl, which just raised a $30 million Series A led by Coatue and featuring existing investors First Round Capital, Box Group, Susa Ventures and TriplePoint. The round brings the So Cal company’s total funding to $33 million, on the heels of a $3.2 million seed led by FRC last August.
The company offers a production suite that’s a sort of plug and play solution for venues. “What if you could snap your fingers and an entire video product crew would appear, for just $150?” CEO Patrick Coyne asked, extremely rhetorically in a comment offered to TechCrunch.
Image Credits: LiveControl
LiveControl says its technology has been deployed in “hundreds” of spots in the U.S., everywhere from music venues and comedy clubs to Broadway theaters and religious institutions. With its device agnostic software and support, the company also provides third-party camera hardware as part of a package, for a more out-of-the-box solution.
The latest funding round will go toward accelerating its technology and expanding employee headcount from 40 people to 120 over the next year and a half. LiveControl and its investors are clearly bullish on the possibilities here. But there remain broader questions around how much audience members’ interest in remote viewing regresses to the mean once venues reopen across the country and world.
“Video is now table stakes for most organizations, venues and creators,” says Coyne. “We’re only seeing it accelerate, and everyone is forward leaning to make bigger investments to improve their video quality.”
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Roblox partners with Sony Music to connect artists with money-making activities in the metaverse
Video game platform Roblox announced this morning it has partnered with Sony Music Entertainment on a deal that will allow the two companies to work together to create music experiences for the Roblox community, including opportunities that would give Sony Music artists a way to reach new audiences and generate revenue.
The announcement follows last month’s news of a $200 million lawsuit filed by a group of music publishers who alleged Roblox was allowing creators to build virtual boomboxes inside their games that streamed copyrighted music without artists’ permission or any payment.
The publishers in the lawsuit included Universal Music Publishing, Big Machine Records, Concord Music Group, Downtown Music Publishing, Kobalt Music Group and Hipgnosis Songs Fund. Roblox responded to the litigation by saying it was “surprised and disappointed” by the action, which represented a “fundamental misunderstanding of how the Roblox platform operates.”
It claimed it doesn’t tolerate copyright infringement and uses filtering technology to prohibit unauthorized recordings. It also said it responds to valid Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown requests by removing any infringing content.
However, the company’s deal with Sony Music indicates Roblox is aware of the value in partnering in a more official capacity with a music company.
Roblox didn’t fully detail what sort of “commercial activities” it has in mind for Sony Music artists and their fans, but it had worked with the music company on past events, including its first-ever virtual concert with Lil Nas X in November 2020, and this May, a virtual Zara Larsson Launch Party. The concert was attended by over 36 million players, while the launch party attracted over 4 million visits — the highest for any launch party on Roblox to date.
The Roblox platform, generally speaking, allows artists to reach fans through a variety of activities, including virtual concerts, merchandise sales, and other integrated in-game activities. We understand the agreement will not include access by Roblox developers to Sony Music Entertainment artists’ recordings, however.
“Sony Music artists have been at the forefront of engaging the millions of music fans in Roblox’s massive user community with forward-looking initiatives like Lil Nas X’s industry-first virtual performance on the platform, and Zara Larsson’s recent listening party event,” said Sony Music Entertainment President of Global Digital Business and U.S. Sales, Dennis Kooker, in a statement. “With this new agreement, we look forward to expanding our successful partnership with the Roblox team to further unlock commercial opportunities at the intersection of music and gaming. Immersive online environments represent a meaningful opportunity for reaching a growing number of fans who want to use virtual communities to enjoy shared music experiences,” he added.
The deal comes at a time when Roblox’s audience is aging up. the company in its Q1 2021 earnings reported a 128% increase in engagement from users over the age of 13 — a time when music is becoming a more important part of young people’s lives and they’re interested in connecting more directly with favorite artists. The gaming company’s daily active users also grew 79% to reach 42.1 million during the quarter while revenue climbed 140% to $387 million.
“Sony Music has been a fantastic partner and I am pleased to deepen and lengthen our relationship. They truly understand the massive opportunity that the metaverse presents for their artists, and we are committed to helping them unlock new creative and commercial opportunities on Roblox,” said Jon Vlassopulos, Vice President and Global Head of Music at Roblox.
This is not Roblox’s first music label partnership. Last month, the company announced a similar deal with BMG, also focused on future collaborations and revenue-generating opportunities for artists and songwriters.
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Common Sense Networks launches Sensical, a free, hand-curated streaming service for kids
Common Sense Media has made a name for itself among parents as a useful resource for vetting entertainment and technology in terms of its age-appropriateness. Now, the organization’s for-profit affiliate, Common Sense Networks, is taking inspiration from those kid-friendly recommendations with the launch of a new streaming service called Sensical. The service offers age-appropriate, entertaining, and educational videos for children ages 2 through 10.
At launch, the free, ad-supported service includes over 15,000 hand-curated videos and over 50 topic-based channels for children to explore. And unlike other platforms, like Netflix or YouTube, Sensical doesn’t use algorithms to make content recommendations. Instead, kids are encouraged to follow their own interests and passions across over 50 topic-based channels. This includes things like Adventures, Animals, Arts & Crafts, Music, Science, Sports, Video Games, and other sorts of kid-friendly topics.
Kids can star these channels, or individual videos or series, in order to keep up with their favorite content in a dedicated Favorites section within the app.
They will see a selection of these channels based on their age, but the company is working to expand the channel lineup so there will be even more specific categories in the future. For example, instead of just “sports,” there could be channels like “soccer” or “gymnastics.” Instead of “Arts,” there could be “drawing” or “origami.” Instead of just “science,” it could include channels like “geography” or “robotics,” and so on.
Image Credits: Common Sense Networks
The app also features a Live TV section, which is programmed throughout the day with kid-friendly content, so kids don’t have to browse to find something to quickly watch.
While other streaming services on the market offer kid-friendly content — as that’s a huge selling point for subscribers — it’s not always organized in a way that makes sense. Sometimes, all the content gets lumped into a general “Kids” category where videos for little kids are mixed in with content for older children. Sensical, meanwhile, curates the content recommendations into three different experiences, including preschool (2-4), little kids (5-7), and big kids (8-10).
What the child sees is based on how parents configure their profiles. Plus, parents can use the service’s ParentZone in-app dashboard to set screen-time limits, extend limits as needed, and view daily reports on what the child has watched.
The service’s best feature, however, is that the content is assured to be age-appropriate — even the ads.
This is possible because the curation approach Sensical takes is very different from YouTube Kids. YouTube’s app for kids leans on algorithms to filter out adult content from YouTube’s broader library, but the company doesn’t manually review all the videos it includes. It warns parents that some inappropriate content could slip through. (And it has.)
Common Sense Networks, meanwhile, says dozens of trained child-development experts view, vet and rate “every single frame of video” that goes live on its service using its proprietary IP and patent-pending process. This system involves tagging content with specific child-developmental benefits, too.
Sensical also vets its advertising, which is how the service is supported, with similar direct oversight. Its experts review the sponsor’s content to ensure it’s appropriate for children — an area that’s often overlooked on other services.
Image Credits: Common Sense Networks
To fill its library, Common Sense Networks partnered with dozens of studios and distribution partners, as well as digital-first creators.
Studio and distribution partners include CAKE (Poppy Cat), Cyber Group Studios (Leo The Wildlife Ranger), The Jim Henson Company (The Wubbulous World of Dr. Seuss, Jim Henson’s Animal Show with Stinky and Jake), Mattel (Kipper, Pingu, Max Steel), Raydar Media (Five Apples’ limited series, Apple Tree House), Superights (Bo Bear, Handico), WildBrain (Teletubbies, Rev & Roll), Xilam Animation (Learn and Play with Paprika, Moka’s Fabulous Adventures), ZDF Enterprises (Lexi & Lottie, School of Roars), Zodiak Kids (Mister Maker, Tee and Mo), ABC Commercial, CBC & Radio-Canada Distribution, Jetpack Distribution, Nelvana, 9 Story Distribution International, Sesame Workshop, Serious Lunch, and Studio 100.
Digital creators, meanwhile, include ABCMouse, Aaron’s Animals, Alphabet Rockers, batteryPOP, California Academy of Sciences, GoldieBlox, The Gotham Group’s Gotham Reads, Guggenheim Museum, Howdytoons, Kids’ Black History, MEL Science + Chemistry, N*Gen, Pinkfong, Penguin Random House’s Brightly Storytime, Studio71 (Parry Gripp, Maymo, Hyper Roblox), Tankee, Ubongo Kids, Vooks, Bounce Patrol, Hevesh5, Mother Goose Club, StacyPlays, Super Simple Songs and The Whistle.
The service abides by the U.S. children’s privacy laws (COPPA), and is certified by the kidSAFE Seal Program.
Image Credits: Common Sense Networks
Having briefly toyed around with the mobile app, it appears Sensical works as described. If I had any complaints personally, it would only be that the experience could be dismissed as “baby stuff” by older kids approaching their tween years, due to the cute pictures and youthful iconography used in the app’s design. Kids in older age groups take issue with being treated as if they’re younger — and they take particular notice of anything that does so.
The same complaint goes for the Live TV programming, which was clearly aimed at littler kids when we checked it out, despite testing the app as a child profile whose age was set to “10.”
I also think it would be nice if there were a better way to track Favorite channels and see when they’re updated with new videos, as kids moving to Sensical from YouTube will want to “feel” like they’re still connected to new and fresh content and not a library. But Sensical isn’t YouTube. There’s a trade-off between hand-curation and timeliness, and Sensical is favoring the former.
Sensical had been first introduced this spring during a closed beta, but is now publicly available to stream across web and mobile on iOS, Android, Roku, Amazon Fire TV and Apple TV. This summer, it will expand to more distribution platforms, including VIZIO.
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Twitch introduces Animated Emotes for their 10th anniversary
Twitch announced today that it will release major updates to its Emotes this month to celebrate its 10th anniversary. These new features will include Animated Emotes, Follower Emotes and a Library for Emotes.
Since the origin of the livestreaming platform for gamers, Emotes — Twitch’s version of emojis — have been a key component of Twitch culture. They’re micro memes, and images like Kappa, TriHard and PogChamp have come to carry meaning in the greater gaming world, even off the Twitch platform.
“Emotes are a language that transcends countries,” said Ivan Santana, senior director of Community Product at Twitch. “Anywhere you are in the world, they mean the same thing for us.”
The Amazon-owned platform regularly adds new global Emotes, which can be used on any streamer’s channel. Individual creators can make custom Emotes for their own community, which paying subscribers can use across the platform. But the ability to add animated gifs as Emotes is something that the community has been asking for since Santana can remember.
“I’ve been at Twitch for four years, and it’s something people have been asking for since before I joined,” Santana told TechCrunch. “It’s certainly been a very, very long time.”
Streamers who lack animation skills need not worry. While the more tech-savvy among us can upload custom gifs, Twitch will provide six templates for streamers to choose from, which can animate their existing Emotes. These animations include Shake, Rave, Roll, Spin, Slide In and Slide Out. Viewers who are sensitive to animations will be able to turn off the feature in their Chat Settings.
Image Credits: Twitch
Twitch is also beta testing Follower Emotes, which will be available to select Partners and Affiliates. This feature creates a fun, free incentive for viewers to hit the follow button on a channel they might be checking out for the first time. When viewers follow a channel, they’ll be notified when the creator is streaming, which can lead to an eventual subscription. Twitch takes 50% of streamers’ subscription money, creating a valuable revenue stream for the company.
In Q1 of 2021, Twitch viewership hit an all-time high, growing 16.5% since the previous quarter. Twitch viewers watched 6.34 billion hours of content in Q1, making up 72.3% of the market share. That’s double the total hours watched on Twitch in Q1 of 2020. Facebook Gaming and YouTube Gaming earned 12.1% and 15.6% of viewership in the sector, respectively.
“For a long time, creators have been asking for better ways to attract and welcome new viewers into their channel,” said Santana. “The idea is generally to create a lot of excitement around that community, and more feelings ultimately of community.”
Creators with beta access will be able to upload up to five Emotes for their followers, but unlike Subscriber Emotes, followers won’t be able to use these across other channels. There’s no guarantee that Follower Emotes will be here to stay — Santana says it’s a feature Twitch is “experimenting” with — but if all goes well, the feature will roll out more widely later in the year.
Finally, the Library function will make it easier for creators to swap Emotes in and out of subscription tiers without having to delete and reupload them each time. This builds upon an upgrade that launched in January, which centralized channel-specific icons into an Emotes tab on the Creator Dashboard. As usual, new Emotes have to be approved by Twitch before they’re put into use. The Library will roll out soon to all Partners and Affiliates, staggered over a few months to account for an expected increase in volume of new Emotes.
“As Twitch has scaled, we now have millions of communities across many different cultures across the world,” Santana said. “We can hand over more of the controls of our Emote language to our community, and let them sort of evolve in a way that we never could imagine that ultimately serves them in their unique ways.”
Twitch teased that there’s more in the works to celebrate the platform’s 10th anniversary, including an official 10-Year celebration.
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