BEST NEWS BEAT : BITE SIZE

TIKTOK Viral Sensation :

More than 1 billion + people now use TikTok for bite size entertainment and more, making it the biggest existing threat to the longtime titans of the social media world. 

TikTok eclipsed YouTube's average U.S. watch time last year, and it had more U.S. downloads during the first half of 2021 than rivals Instagram and Snapchat.

Responding to criticism, TikTok on the past year developed an incubator for Black creators, announced additional teen safety features, and launched SoundOn, a service to help music creators monetize their labor.

Recently, it has become a source of unfiltered - and often inaccurate - news about Ukraine. Its next challenge : wartime content moderation. 

[ Raisa Bruner ].

PAXFUL Crypto For All :

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, advocates and argue, make it easier for people in emerging economies to buy, spend, and move money, even without access to traditional financial infrastructure.

Paxful, a peer-to-peer cryptocurrency-exchange platform with 6 million + users globally, is helping make that possible.

Users can freely transact in crypto with anyone across the world, and the company recently launched  crypto education centers in Nigeria and EI Salvador with the goal of financially empowering local communities.

'' When used as a means of exchange, Bitcoin can bridge economies and expand opportunities for the billions of unbanked,'' says the CEO. 

[ Jared Lindzon ]

TWIGA FOODS Cheaper Staples :

The typical Kenyan household spends more than half its disposable income on groceries, largely because inefficient supply chains lead to high prices.

Kenyan e-commerce outlet Twiga Foods has a solution : it lets retailers place orders via mobile device and grants them 48 hours of interest-free credit, giving them time to sell what they order to customers before the bill comes due.

'' This means our clients can buy what their customers want, not just the goods they can afford,'' says CEO and co-founder Peter Njonjo.

To further cut costs, Twigs is now growing some of its fastest selling products - including onions, tomatoes and watermelons. - [ Any Baker ].