Battle of the venture funds, Bird gets the boot, and Tinder goes "ultra premium"

And we are on the move (onto the couch). Hope you have a terrific weekend. 

Note: We didn't have time to record a typical podcast for you this week because of Disrupt, which was covered here yesterday by KTVU, whose team swung by as we were wrapping up things. (In short, the event was good for San Francisco, which is great.) Luckily, we did talk with two charismatic investors this week -- Reed Jobs and Katie Haun -- on stage at Disrupt. If you happened to miss either/both, you might check out the newest StrictlyVC Download to catch these. 

Giant thanks to this week's sponsor Affinity, a relationship intelligence platform for dealmakers, whose own event -- its second annual Campfire Conference -- takes place next week, September 28, in San Francisco's historic Presidio. Check it out if you'd like to hear investors from 8VC, Pear VC, and Lightspeed Venture Partners, among others.

It looks like Microsoft's $69 billion acquisition of Activision may happen after all. 

Yes, you have to update your Apple devices again, because spyware is bad.

The White House is considering enacting a regulation to require cloud companies to disclose when customers purchase computing resources beyond a certain threshold. The move is an apparent attempt to identify potential AI threats. 

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JURA Bio, a six-year-old Boston startup that says it is developing immune-based therapeutics using machine learning and synthetic biology, raised a $16.1 million round led by Michael Chambers, John Ballantyne, Fontus Capital, and Josh Elkington. More here.

Mammaly, a three-year-old Berlin startup that produces pet supplements, raised a $14.9 million Series A round co-led by IRIS Ventures and Five Seasons Ventures. GlobalPETS has more here.

Secoda, a two-year-old Toronto startup that is developing what it describes as an AI-powered data search and cataloging platform, raised a $14 million Series A round led by Craft Ventures and including Abstract Ventures. The company has raised a total of $16 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Allocate, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that aims to supply investors with a streamlined way to invest and manage private investments, raised a $10 million round. Gopher Asset US, Intera Investments, and M13 Ventures all invested. The company has raised a total of $33.5 million. More here.

GiftPack, a three-year-old New York startup that says it uses AI to streamline the corporate gifting process, raised a $4.3 million seed round led by Chang Hai Lin, with participation from Tech Coast Angels. More here.

Rain, a four-year-old startup based in Alameda, Ca., that uses autonomous aircraft to analyze and suppress wildfires, raised a $9.7 million seed round led by DBL Partners, with VoLo Earth Ventures, Kapor Capital, and Convective Capital also chipping in. More here.

Rocket.Chat, a seven-year-old based in Wilmington, De., that provides an open-source chat platform, raised a $10 million Series A round co-led by Alexia Ventures, Endeavor Catalyst, Endeavor Scaleup Ventures, RedHat founder Bob Young, NEA, and Valor Capital Group, with Greycroft, Monashees, DGF, and Graphene also contributing. More here.

It’s time to gaze into the crystal ball. The team at Affinity are asking leaders across the investment community to share their perspectives about the year ahead. Answer these short, multiple choice questions to help them gather insights for their 2024 Investment Predictions Report. Bonus: You’ll get first, exclusive access when it goes live! Take the survey.

Astanor Ventures, a Belgium-based venture capital firm, raised €360 million ($384 million) for its second fund focused on agriculture and food technology companies. AgFunderNews has more here.

The winners and losers in Instacart's IPO.

Vitalik Buterin, the man behind ethereum, talks crypto and the U.S. crackdown.

Instacart named former chief financial and operating officer Ravi Gupta to its board of directors today, formalizing a move after the grocery technology company went public earlier this week. Gupta worked at Instacart for four years until joining Instacart investor Sequoia Capital in 2019.

Elon Musk wrote on his X platform this morning that he will contribute $100,000 to defeat San Francisco's city’s most progressive supervisor in the 2024 election. The tweet came in reply to Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan, who noted in a post that he contributed $50,000 to the “Dump Dean PAC,” a committee dedicated to defeating Supervisor Dean Preston.

Battle of the funds: do VC specialists outperform generalists?

It happened. The formerly high-flying electric scooter outfit Bird was just delisted from the NYSE.

Tinder goes "ultra-premium," offering a $499-per-month subscription tier to the app's most active users.

In its pursuit to build out crypto derivatives offerings worldwide, Coinbase reportedly explored an acquisition of FTX’s European entity following the exchange’s November bankruptcy.

Naming rights for Harvard Medical School are up for sale. The price? A mere $1 billion.

Residents of a Vermont have had it with leaf-peeping Instagrammers.

The IRS is going to know if you sold Taylor Swift "Eras" tickets.

Haha. “The two empty frames is actually a representation of the concept. So more important than the absence of money is that I’ve taken the money.”

A chore jacket for people who probably hire other people to do their chores.

The folks behind Iceland's Blue Lagoon have opened a new hotel designed for off-the-grid bliss.

A human dog bed.