#content
Entertainment

Brush up on Mario Kart, celebrate 10 years of 'Lilyhammer' and get to know Razzlekhan

You've got 48 hours to kill before the Super Bowl. We've got you covered.

Brush up on Mario Kart, celebrate 10 years of 'Lilyhammer' and get to know Razzlekhan
Image: Netflix; Nintendo; YouTube

This week we’re getting nostalgic with “Lilyhammer,” honing our turtle-throwing skills and learning everything we ever wanted to know (and then some) about the self-proclaimed “Crocodile of Wall Street.”

Prepare for Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

Nintendo announced this week that Mario Kart fans will get a whopping 48 new and remastered courses in the coming months, starting with an eight-course DLC release on March 18. Time to practice your turtle-slinging skills!

Everything you need to know about Razzlekhan

The tale of Heather Morgan and Ilya Lichtenstein, accused by the DOJ of attempting to launder $3.6 billion worth of stolen bitcoin, will undoubtedly be made into a movie — if only for the fact that Morgan released countless songs and music videos featuring her rap star alter ego, Razzlekhan. Verge reporter Mitchell Clark listened to all of her songs, watched countless clips, read the articles she penned for Forbes and reviewed slides of a presentation she gave on scamming — and lived to tell the tale.

‘Raising Dion’ is good sci-fi for the whole family

“Raising Dion,” a family-friendly sci-fi show about a Black kid with superpowers whose best friends include a girl in a wheelchair and his former bully, is a true gem that doesn’t shy away from heavy subjects. Season 2 dropped on Netflix earlier this month, and it’s already become a Saturday night staple for my family.

A well researched response to the metaverse

The metaverse backlash is here! So far, though, it’s not very sophisticated, and mostly boils down to what I like to call the Sims argument (“We’ve all been doing this for years now”) and the 3D TV argument (“No one will ever do this”). Confusingly, some people even argue both. That’s why it’s extremely refreshing to see Some More News devote 44 well researched minutes to the subject, and raise some very good points. Plus, it’s very entertaining, even without Warmbo.

A decade of ‘Lilyhammer’

Time flies! It’s been 10 years since the release of Netflix’s first original show. No, we’re not talking “House of Cards,” but “Lilyhammer,” a mildly funny but fairly inconsequential comedy about a mob boss who finds himself in Norway to escape prison. You can read Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos' writing about the anniversary on the company’s website, or just give the show another shot, for old times’ sake.

A version of this story also appeared in today’s Entertainment newsletter; subscribe here.

Janko Roettgers

Janko Roettgers (Twitter, Mastodon) used to be a senior reporter at Protocol, reporting on the shifting power dynamics between tech, media, and entertainment, including the impact of new technologies. Previously, Janko was Variety's first-ever technology writer in San Francisco, where he covered big tech and emerging technologies. He has reported for Gigaom, Frankfurter Rundschau, Berliner Zeitung, and ORF, among others. He has written three books on consumer cord-cutting and online music and co-edited an anthology on internet subcultures. He lives with his family in Oakland.

netflixmario kartnintendometaverse#content
Fintech

Judge Zia Faruqui is trying to teach you crypto, one ‘SNL’ reference at a time

His decisions on major cryptocurrency cases have quoted "The Big Lebowski," "SNL," and "Dr. Strangelove." That’s because he wants you — yes, you — to read them.

The ways Zia Faruqui (right) has weighed on cases that have come before him can give lawyers clues as to what legal frameworks will pass muster.

Photo: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

“Cryptocurrency and related software analytics tools are ‘The wave of the future, Dude. One hundred percent electronic.’”

That’s not a quote from "The Big Lebowski" — at least, not directly. It’s a quote from a Washington, D.C., district court memorandum opinion on the role cryptocurrency analytics tools can play in government investigations. The author is Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui.

Keep ReadingShow less
Veronica Irwin

Veronica Irwin (@vronirwin) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol covering fintech. Previously she was at the San Francisco Examiner, covering tech from a hyper-local angle. Before that, her byline was featured in SF Weekly, The Nation, Techworker, Ms. Magazine and The Frisc.

cryptocurrencyblockchainbitcoinlawsuit
sponsored content
Sponsored Content

How is technological innovation breaking down barriers and increasing access to financial services?

The financial technology transformation is driving competition, creating consumer choice, and shaping the future of finance. Hear from seven fintech leaders who are reshaping the future of finance, and join the inaugural Financial Technology Association Fintech Summit to learn more.

Keep ReadingShow less
FTA
The Financial Technology Association (FTA) represents industry leaders shaping the future of finance. We champion the power of technology-centered financial services and advocate for the modernization of financial regulation to support inclusion and responsible innovation.
sponsoredsponsored content
amazon web services
Enterprise

AWS CEO: The cloud isn’t just about technology

As AWS preps for its annual re:Invent conference, Adam Selipsky talks product strategy, support for hybrid environments, and the value of the cloud in uncertain economic times.

Photo: Noah Berger/Getty Images for Amazon Web Services

AWS is gearing up for re:Invent, its annual cloud computing conference where announcements this year are expected to focus on its end-to-end data strategy and delivering new industry-specific services.

It will be the second re:Invent with CEO Adam Selipsky as leader of the industry’s largest cloud provider after his return last year to AWS from data visualization company Tableau Software.

Keep ReadingShow less
Donna Goodison

Donna Goodison (@dgoodison) is Protocol's senior reporter focusing on enterprise infrastructure technology, from the 'Big 3' cloud computing providers to data centers. She previously covered the public cloud at CRN after 15 years as a business reporter for the Boston Herald. Based in Massachusetts, she also has worked as a Boston Globe freelancer, business reporter at the Boston Business Journal and real estate reporter at Banker & Tradesman after toiling at weekly newspapers.

awsamazon web servicescloud computinganalyticsdata analyticsadam selipsky

Farewell from Protocol

Image: Protocol

We launched Protocol in February 2020 to cover the evolving power center of tech. It is with deep sadness that just under three years later, we are winding down the publication.

As of today, we will not publish any more stories. All of our newsletters, apart from our flagship, Source Code, will no longer be sent. Source Code will be published and sent for the next few weeks, but it will also close down in December.

Keep ReadingShow less
Bennett Richardson

Bennett Richardson ( @bennettrich) is the president of Protocol. Prior to joining Protocol in 2019, Bennett was executive director of global strategic partnerships at POLITICO, where he led strategic growth efforts including POLITICO's European expansion in Brussels and POLITICO's creative agency POLITICO Focus during his six years with the company. Prior to POLITICO, Bennett was co-founder and CMO of Hinge, the mobile dating company recently acquired by Match Group. Bennett began his career in digital and social brand marketing working with major brands across tech, energy, and health care at leading marketing and communications agencies including Edelman and GMMB. Bennett is originally from Portland, Maine, and received his bachelor's degree from Colgate University.

machine learning
Enterprise

Why large enterprises struggle to find suitable platforms for MLops

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, and as larger enterprises go from deploying hundreds of models to thousands and even millions of models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

Photo: artpartner-images via Getty Images

On any given day, Lily AI runs hundreds of machine learning models using computer vision and natural language processing that are customized for its retail and ecommerce clients to make website product recommendations, forecast demand, and plan merchandising. But this spring when the company was in the market for a machine learning operations platform to manage its expanding model roster, it wasn’t easy to find a suitable off-the-shelf system that could handle such a large number of models in deployment while also meeting other criteria.

Some MLops platforms are not well-suited for maintaining even more than 10 machine learning models when it comes to keeping track of data, navigating their user interfaces, or reporting capabilities, Matthew Nokleby, machine learning manager for Lily AI’s product intelligence team, told Protocol earlier this year. “The duct tape starts to show,” he said.

Keep ReadingShow less
Kate Kaye

Kate Kaye is an award-winning multimedia reporter digging deep and telling print, digital and audio stories. She covers AI and data for Protocol. Her reporting on AI and tech ethics issues has been published in OneZero, Fast Company, MIT Technology Review, CityLab, Ad Age and Digiday and heard on NPR. Kate is the creator of RedTailMedia.org and is the author of "Campaign '08: A Turning Point for Digital Media," a book about how the 2008 presidential campaigns used digital media and data.

mlopsaimachine learning
Latest Stories
Bulletins