HTC announces a totally-not-gimmicky blockchain phone, Instagram will help you track your usage and the White House eliminate a key cybersecurity role. All that and more in The Daily Crunch for May 16, 2018.

1. Yes, HTC is working on a 'blockchain phone'

The Taiwanese company announced at the Consensus blockchain conference that it's creating "the world's first phone dedicated to decentralized applications and security."

HTC says Exodus will support Bitcoin and Ethereum, among other cryptocurrencies, courtesy of a universal wallet, secure hardware and decentralized apps. It's also outlined plans to create a native blockchain network.

2. Instagram CEO confirms upcoming "time spent" Usage Insights

Instagram is jumping into the time well spent movement. This followed Google announcement of new time management controls last week.

3. White House sheds cyber coordinator role

The White House has opted to eliminate the cyber coordinator role on the National Security Council, in what some see as a step back in strong cybersecurity policy. The duties formerly performed by the coordinator will be taken up by the other two senior directors of the NSC's cyber team.

4. To make Stories global, Facebook adds Archive and audio posts

Today, Facebook will start rolling out three big Stories features in India, which will come to the rest of the world shortly after. Those features include allowing audio posts and introducing an Archive similar to Instagram Stories that automatically saves your clips privately after they expire.

5. Lemonade wants to rewrite the insurance policy itself

Lemonade uses AI and bots to sell insurance, and has flipped the business model to ensure that the company is never in conflict with customers filing insurance claims. Now the company is re-writing the actual insurance policy from scratch.

6. Circle raises $110 million (or 13,300 BTC)

It's hard to describe Circle in a few words because the company has been active on all fronts. For a really long time, it pitched itself as a social payment company. But Circle is more focused than ever on cryptocurrencies.

7. Dashdash, a platform to create web apps using only spreadsheet skills, nabs $8M led by Accel

The dashdash platform looks and acts like a spreadsheet up front, but behind the scenes, each "macro" links to a web app computing feature, or a design element, to build something that ultimately will look nothing like a spreadsheet.