“One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” are some of the most recognizable words in human history. If it wasn’t for technology, we wouldn’t have landed on the moon and we would have never even dreamed of colonizing on Mars (looking at you Elon). Although none of our tech news this week is directly space-related, get ready for a tech roundup filled space-puns that are out of this world.

Lyft off

In a few of our previous roundups, we wrote about Uber’s troubles and even included the rideshare app in our 2017 year in review post. Now, it looks like Uber’s biggest competitor, Lyft, is in a sticky situation of their own. The company is currently investigating allegations that Lyft employees have been misusing customer information. According to The Information, in an anonymous post online, an employee of Lyft stated that employees had tracked rides taken by their romantic partners and pulled information about celebrities including Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. Lyft insists the only people who are able to pull this data are Lyft employees assigned to do so and this misbehavior will result in termination. 

If you Tweet in space, will anyone see it?

Twitter is hoping to join Snapchat and Instagram in the photo-sharing game. Apparently, Twitter is looking to add an easy-to-use camera to its app to enable users to more easily share what’s going on around them. There is a working demo out there, but the final product won’t be ready for some time. We don’t know about you, but we’re excited to add Twitter to our Instagram vs. Snapchat debate!

Sputnik, we (do not) have a problem.

Earlier this week, Twitter, Google and Facebook told Congress they don’t believe Russia interfered with elections in Virginia and New Jersey last year. According to these platforms, there was no detection of Russian agents using these social platforms to gather or sway information during the elections. This is a change from the 2016 presidential election where Google and Facebook stated that they found Russian trolls and agents buying ads to steer voters to certain events, ideas and protests. With the midterm elections coming up in November 2018, it will be interesting to see the precautionary measures these companies take to prevent foreign meddling.

“To infinity and beyond!” – Amazon to Prime Users on Member Fees

If you’re a Prime user like the BIGteam, you probably got an email over the weekend letting you know Amazon is raising their monthly subscription from $10.99 to 12.99. This brings the total cost per year to $156 (if you pay yearly it remains $99 and $49 for students). The uptick in member fees also does not apply to those who are offered reduced membership rates as a part of the program to aid low-income families. We are most certainly switching to the yearly membership – $57 buys you a lot of Cosmic Brownies!

What was your favorite tech story? Let us know in the comments or tweet us @BIGfishPR!