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Recode Daily: Trump addresses Congress, Snap’s IPO eve, Uber’s CEO apologizes

Snap is expected to price its IPO today.

Donald Trump Delivers Address To Joint Session Of Congress
Donald Trump Delivers Address To Joint Session Of Congress
Jim Lo Scalzo - Pool/Getty Images

Trump addressed Congress and it wasn’t a disaster. He bragged, promised to keep his promises and foreshadowed big tax changes. Some said it was the most presidential he’s seemed yet. — [Sean Sullivan and Abby Phillip / Washington Post]

Snap is expected to price its IPO today, with trading set for Thursday on the New York Stock Exchange. Snap is reportedly eyeing to price its shares at $17 to $18 — above its projected range — which would value the company at $25 billion. Reminder: Snapchat turned down a $3 billion acquisition offer from Facebook three years ago. — [Leslie Picker / CNBC]

Also: Why is Snap going public? What could go wrong? Recode Senior Editor Kurt Wagner answered some of your burning questions in this video. — [Kurt Wagner / Recode]

Uber CEO Travis Kalanick apologized after Bloomberg posted a dashcam video of him speaking disrespectfully to an Uber driver. “It’s clear this video is a reflection of me — and the criticism we’ve received is a stark reminder that I must fundamentally change as a leader and grow up.” Uber’s culture — defined by Kalanick — has become a major liability ahead of its inevitable IPO. — [Johana Bhuiyan / Recode]

YouTube is launching a pay TV service similar to AT&T’s DirecTV Now, Sling TV and a forthcoming service from Hulu. The “skinny bundle” service, called YouTube TV, will cost $35 per month and include the four major broadcast networks plus a handful of cable channels, such as ESPN. Google is betting that it can offer a better service than competitors, and that YouTube is simply big enough that it can drive subscribers. — [Peter Kafka / Recode]

Apple’s next high-end iPhone might switch its Lightning port for a USB-C port, according to a Wall Street Journal report. If true, this would be a major change. But not so fast, says longtime Apple watcher John Gruber. “I have no inside dope on this, but it rings false to my ears.” More likely: The other, non-Lightning end of the charging cord would be USB-C, matching what’s built in to new MacBooks. — [John Gruber / Daring Fireball]

An outage at Amazon Web Services yesterday revealed just how much of the internet relies on Amazon’s cloud service. Beyond knocking parts of websites offline for hours, people reported things like connected lightbulbs — hooked up via AWS-hosted services like IFTTT — not functioning. — [Janko Roettgers / Variety]

Top stories from Recode

A software engineer was detained by U.S. Customs — and given a test to prove he’s an engineer. Welcome to America.

Drone startup Lily filed for bankruptcy as preorder customers await their refunds. Over 61,000 people preordered a Lily drone, but none actually shipped.

Jon Stewart to the media: ‘Take up a hobby. I recommend journalism.’ Also: A good dirty joke about Trump and Breitbart.

Internet Archive Chairman Brewster Kahle: The web is ‘not fun and games any more’ Kahle says preserving the web — and traditions of openness and net neutrality — is more important than ever under the Trump administration.

A new video shows Uber CEO Travis Kalanick arguing with a driver over fares. The driver asks why the CEO has “dropped the prices” on its UberBlack service.

This is Cool:

How many people are in space right now? Today I learned they’ve all been there for more than 100 days.


This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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