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Recode Daily: High-profile VC Steve Jurvetson steps down from DFJ during a sexual harassment investigation

Plus, 30 governments — not just Russia — have been caught spreading disinformation online, Qualcomm rejects Broadcom’s takeover bid and Lord & Taylor throws in with Walmart.com.

Steve Jurvetson smiles at camera
Steve Jurvetson smiles at camera
Steve Jurvetson
dfj.com

Steve Jurvetson stepped down as a partner at his own venture capital firm after allegations of sexual harassment; he’s the highest-profile venture capitalist to be forced from his job amid an industrywide evaluation of how Silicon Valley treats women. Jurvetson helped start Draper Fisher Jurvetson in 1985; he is also on leave of absence from the boards of Tesla and SpaceX pending resolution of the allegations. [Theodore Schleifer / Recode]

It isn’t just Russia that’s spreading disinformation on Facebook, Google and Twitter in a bid to stir political unrest and silence critics around the globe. A new report from watchdog group Freedom House found that 30 governments — including the regimes in Turkey, Venezuela and the Philippines — are now “mass-producing their own content to distort the digital landscape in their favor.” Meanwhile, Facebook told the U.S. government that it would support limited federal rules requiring companies and campaigns to disclose more information about online political ads. [Tony Romm / Recode]

Qualcomm rejected rival chipmaker Broadcom’s record-breaking $103 billion takeover offer. Broadcom says it’s going to keep at it. [Vlad Savov / The Verge]

Silicon Valley investors and companies like Airbnb and Uber are beginning to mobilize against the U.S. Senate’s tax reform bill, primarily to stop a provision that would tax employees’ vested stock options. “We cannot overemphasize how essential stock-based compensation is to a startup’s ability to recruit and retain talent,” said a letter signed by more than 500 people from the tech industry, including Sam Altman, Dustin Moskovitz and Max Levchin. [Theodore Schleifer and Tony Romm / Recode]

Lord & Taylor, the country’s oldest high-end department store, has agreed to set up its own storefront on Walmart.com. The partnership will launch in the spring, and the move highlights — perhaps more than any recent retail hookup — the enormous shake-up in the department store world. [Jason Del Rey / Recode]

Lyft will launch in Toronto next month, its first market outside of the U.S. The ride-hailing company, which is in the middle of closing a $1 billion round from Alphabet, is in fast-growth mode, launching in at least 100 U.S. cities in the past few months. Lyft’s chief rival, Uber, is already in Toronto and other parts of Canada. [Johana Bhuiyan / Recode]

A new Web TV bundle gives you dozens of channels — but no sports — for $16 a month. Philo is backed by cable programmers including Discovery, Viacom and AMC, which are often excluded from other TV packages. [Peter Kafka / Recode]

Top stories from Recode

Blue Apron is the worst-performing major U.S. IPO this year.

It’s currently worth less than a third of its IPO value.

ESPN will produce a daily version of SportsCenter exclusively for Snapchat.

Katie Nolan will host the show multiple times per week, along with other ESPN talent.

SoftBank is insisting it could walk away from an Uber deal.

“By no means is our investment decided,” says SoftBank.

It was the White House that gave Elon Musk “verbal approval” to build a hyperloop — sorta.

Plus, how the Trump administration is looking to boost similar projects as part of infrastructure reform.

This is cool

With help from Facebook employees, a “No Pay Cafe” in Sonoma has been feeding thousands of Wine Country wildfire victims.


This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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