Daily Crunch: Musk pauses Twitter buy until platform proves less than 5% of users are spambots

We are currently in the midst of a crisis, and we are all a little bit dishonest with ourselves.

Mobility kicks off tomorrow. The last chance to buy saloon tickets is Wednesday and Thursday.

The TechCrunch Top 3

• Spambots holding up Twitter deal: Elon Musk doubled down on his previous tweets this morning, basically saying that if Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal is unable to back up claims that the number of spam and/or fake accounts is around the 5% the company says, Musk’s deal to acquire Twitter will not move forward. It would be a shame, really, after we’ve devoted so much effort in following the story, for it to not go through.
• The Twitter choice is up to you: Which then begs the question: “Does Elon Musk really even want to buy Twitter?” Alex does a deep dive into this very question, and when he resurfaces, he finds that perhaps Musk wants to get out of the deal for a couple of reasons, one being it was not the company he thought it was.
• Where dem dollas at?: Enabling other companies to offer financial products continues to be a hot area for venture capital investors to put their dollars. The latest is Unit, which is now a unicorn after closing on a $100 million Series C round. What’s interesting about what Unit does is that anyone, even those in the freelance or creator economy, can do it, too.

Startups and VC

The instructions not to fly too close to the sun were ignored by Icarus. According to its Q1 earnings call, a similar situation is causing Bird to change course and drop vehicle sales in pursuit of profitability.

Greenlight, which focuses on bank accounts for kids, just launched a new credit card that helps parents save for college for their kids. The purpose of the card is reflected in the way it is being marketed, but it functions the same as any other credit card that offers cash back to users.

All startup, all the time.

• Own a doorknob and a window: Giving regular investors the chance to invest in fractional home ownership, Mary Ann reports that Arrived raised a $25 million Series A. 
• Content goes in, pages come out: Storyblok raised $47 million to make it easier for nontechnical users to use a “headless” CMS that decouples content from the presentation layer of a site, Ingrid reports. 
• When it all comes crashing down: Encouraged by a $46 million round of fresh capital, Instabug aims to broaden its purview, offering more services than just fixing bugs plaguing your software, Mary Ann reports. For one, the company expanded its focus from bug and crash reporting to building out application performance monitoring software “to capture everything around mobile performance.”
• I want it all, I want it now: With the popularization of real-time database technologies, stale data might soon become a thing of the past. Investors seem to believe the sales pitch, at least, Kyle reports, with Imply raising $100 million at a $1 billion+ valuation. 
• Well, print me sideways: Days after MakerBot and Ultimaker announced merger plans, one of the companies’ most well-regarded competitors is making its own moves. Prague-based Prusa Research is acquiring Printed Solid, Brian writes. 

How to evolve your DTC startup’s data strategy and identify critical metrics

The same major platforms and tools are used by most e-commerce startups to gather data for their dashboards that measure the health of their businesses.

Most direct-to-consumer companies make the same mistakes when it comes to refining raw transactional data according to Michael Perez, director of growth and data at M13.

The calculation errors hardwired into platform data can lead teams to miscalculate key metrics.

He identifies two common data mistakes: creating metrics at the wrong level of granularity and using downstream metrics that create data silos.

Plug-and-play business intelligence tools won't scale with your business.

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How to evolve your DTC startup’s data strategy and identify critical metrics

Big Tech Inc.

Want to know your company's carbon footprint? Microsoft has something for that. The tech giant is joining other tech giants in offering sustainable tracking products. In Microsoft's case, it will gather a bunch of data companies can use to eventually reduce that footprint.

More features are a new target for Robinhood. One way to make it easier for users is to allow them to manage their own wallets. Make sure you don't leave the private key in the custodial accounts.

There are a lot of Apple news today. We'll give you the short- short version, with new rules that will let apps raise subscription prices automatically. Harry Styles will perform on a live stream on Apple Music, as well as testing out E Ink's outer display as it designs a foldable device.

There are others for your afternoon jam session.