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Robotic Automations

Twitter co-founder Biz Stone joins board of Mastodon's new U.S. non-profit | TechCrunch

April 29, 2024 8:54 PM0


Biz Stone, a Twitter co-founder, is among those who have joined the board of directors of Mastodon’s new U.S. non-profit, Mastodon CEO Eugen Rochko announced over the weekend. Mastodon’s service, an open source, decentralized social network and rival to Elon Musk’s X, has gained increased attention following the Twitter acquisition as users sought alternatives to X’s would-be “everything app” that felt more like the old Twitter of days past.

Mastodon only somewhat fits that bill. Though the service resembles Twitter in many ways, it’s underpinned by different infrastructure. As part of the “fediverse” — or the open social web made up of interconnected servers communicating over the ActivityPub protocol — Mastodon benefits users who no longer want to be locked into a centralized social network that can be bought and sold to new billionaire owners, like Musk.

Though Mastodon was already established as a non-profit in Germany in 2021, the creation of a 501(c)(3) non-profit in the U.S. will allow the company to receive tax-deductible donations and other financial support. The change also comes as Mastodon has inexplicitly lost its non-profit status in Germany.

“…we have received a notice from the same tax office that our non-profit status has been withdrawn,” wrote Rochko on the Mastodon blog. “This came with no advance warning or explanation. Earlier this year we went through a successful tax audit, which in fact resulted in some favourable adjustments as we’ve been paying too much tax. Our tax advisor immediately submitted an appeal to the decision, but so far, we have no new information,” he said.

Mastodon’s day-to-day operations were unaffected by this change, as most of its income comes from the crowdfunding platform Patreon. It also received donations from Jeff Atwood and Mozilla at $100K apiece, which allowed the company to hire a third full-time developer this year.

However, being established as a non-profit enables Mastodon to communicate how it differs from other social media businesses. While becoming a non-profit in the U.S. will help Mastodon regain its status, it wants to remain based out of the EU.

In addition to Biz Stone, other board members include Esra’a Al Shafei, a human rights advocate and founder of Majal.org; Karien Bezuidenhout, an advocate for openness and experienced board member across sustainable social enterprise; Amir Ghavi, a partner at law firm Fried Frank, where he’s the co-head of the Technology Transactions Practice; and Felix Hlatky, the Chief Financial Officer of Mastodon since 2020, who originally incorporated the project as a non-profit LLC in Germany and helped it raise additional funds.


Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

Curio raises funds for Rio, an 'AI news anchor' in an app | TechCrunch

April 26, 2024 11:37 PM0


AI may be inching its way into the newsroom, as outlets like Newsweek, Sports Illustrated, Gizmodo, VentureBeat, CNET and others have experimented with articles written by AI. But while most respectable journalists will condemn this use case, there are a number of startups that think AI can enhance the news experience — at least on the consumer’s side. The latest to join the fray is Rio, an “AI news anchor” designed to help readers connect with the stories and topics they’re most interested in from trustworthy sources.

The new app, from the same team behind AI-powered audio journalism startup Curio, was first unveiled at last month’s South by Southwest Festival in Austin. It has raised funding from Khosla Ventures and the head of TED, Chris Anderson, who also backed Curio. (The startup says the round has not yet closed, so it can’t disclose the amount.)

Audio journalism app Curio can now create personalized episodes using AI

Curio itself was founded in 2016 by ex-BBC strategist Govind Balakrishnan and London lawyer Srikant Chakravarti; Rio is a new effort that will expand the use of Curio’s AI technology.

First developed as a feature within Curio’s app, Rio scans headlines from trusted papers and magazines like Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, The Washington Post and others, and then curates that content into a daily news briefing you can either read or listen to.

In addition, the team says Rio will keep users from finding themselves in an echo chamber by seeking out news that expands their understanding of topics and encourages them to dive deeper.

Image Credits: Curio/Rio

In tests, Rio prepared a daily briefing presented in something of a Story-like interface with graphics and links to news articles you could tap on at the bottom of the screen that would narrate the article using an AI voice. (These were full articles, to be clear, not AI summaries.) You advance through the headlines in the same way as you would tap through a Story on a social media app like Instagram.

Curio says Rio’s AI technology won’t fabricate information and will only reference content from its trusted publishers partners. Rio won’t use publisher content to train an LLM (large language model) without “explicit consent,” it says.

Image Credits: Curio/Rio

Beyond the briefing, you can also interact with Rio in an AI chatbot interface where you can ask about other topics of interest. Suggested topics — like “TikTok ban” or “Ukraine War,” for example — appear as small pills above the text input box. We found the AI was sometimes a little slow to respond at times, but, otherwise, it performed as expected.

Plus, Rio would offer to create an audio episode for your queries if you want to learn more.

Co-founder Balakrishnan said that Curio users had asked Rio over 20,000 questions since it launched as a feature in Curio last May, which is why the company decided to spin out the tech into its own app.

“AI has us all wondering what’s true and what’s not. You can scan AI sites for quick answers, but trusting them blindly is a bit of a gamble,” noted Chakravarti in a statement released around Rio’s debut at SXSW. “Reliable knowledge is hard to come by. Only a lucky few get access to fact-checked, verified information. Rio guides you through the news, turning everyday headlines from trusted sources into knowledge. Checking the news with Rio leaves you feeling fulfilled instead of down.”

It’s hard to say if Rio is sticky enough to demand its standalone product, but it’s easy to imagine an interface like this at some point coming to larger news aggregators, like Google News or Apple News, perhaps, or even to individual publishers’ sites. Meanwhile, Curio will also continue to exit with a focus on audio news.

Curio is not the only startup looking to AI to enhance the news reading experience. Former Twitter engineers are building Particle, an AI-powered news reader, backed by $4.4 million. Another AI-powered news app, Bulletin, also launched to tackle clickbait along with offering news summaries. Artifact had also leveraged AI before exiting to TechCrunch’s parent company, Yahoo.

Rio is currently in early access, which means you’ll need an invitation to get in. Otherwise, you can join the app’s waitlist at rionews.ai. The company tells us it plans to launch publicly later this summer. (As a reward for reading to the bottom, five of you can use my own invite link to get in.)

 

Former Twitter engineers are building Particle, an AI-powered news reader, backed by $4.4M




Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

Despite complaints, Apple hasn't yet removed an obviously fake app pretending to be RockAuto | TechCrunch

April 26, 2024 10:49 PM0


Apple’s App Store isn’t always as trustworthy as the company claims. The latest example comes from RockAuto, an auto parts dealer popular with home mechanics and other DIYers, which is upset that a fake app masquerading as its official app has not been removed from the App Store, despite numerous complaints to Apple.

RockAuto co-founder and president Jim Taylor was first alerted to the situation when customers began complaining about “annoying ads” in its app — something he said “surprised us since we don’t have an app.”

Fake RockAuto app on the App Store. Image Credits: Apple (screen capture by TechCrunch)

“We discovered someone placed an app in the Apple App Store using our logo and company information — but with the misspellings and clumsy graphics typical of phishing schemes,” he told TechCrunch.

On closer inspection, the fake app doesn’t look very legit, but it’s easy to see how someone could be fooled. Its App Store images show a photo of a truck with the word “Heading” across the image as if a template was hastily used and the work was unfinished. In addition, despite being titled “RockAuto” on the App Store, the app refers to itself as “RackAuto” throughout its App Store description.

What’s more, it promises customers that “Your privacy is a top priority” and that “all your data is securely stored and encrypted, giving you peace of mind.” That’s not likely, given the nature of this app.

The issue is not only concerning because of the app’s ability to fool at least some portion of RockAuto’s customers but also because it undermines Apple’s messaging about how the App Store is a trusted and secure marketplace — which is why it demands a cut of developers’ in-app purchase transactions. The tech giant has been fighting back against regulations like the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), by claiming these laws would compromise customer safety and privacy. Apple believes that customers will be at risk if they conduct business outside its App Store with unknown parties. But, as these cases show, bad actors can too easily infiltrate its own app marketplace as well.

Image Credits: Fake RockAuto app on the App Store. Image Credits: Apple (screen capture by TechCrunch)

Apple has so far ignored RockAuto’s requests to remove the fake app, which were all sent through proper channels, according to documentation the company shared with TechCrunch.

While searching for a solution to this problem, RockAuto came across our coverage of a similar situation with LastPass. The password manager was also the victim of a similar scheme when a fake app pretending to be LastPass was live on the App Store for weeks. LastPass eventually had to warn its customers publicly in a blog post, as Apple had not yet taken the fake app down until after the press coverage and LastPass’s own post went live.

Apple didn’t respond to requests for comment at the time. The company wasn’t immediately available for requests for comment about RockAuto’s complaint either.

Apple pulled a fake app masquerading as password manager LastPass from the App Store

Taylor says that RockAuto’s Customer Service manager initially reached out to Apple to resolve the situation. When he didn’t get a response, Taylor got involved.

“It’s mostly one-way since the only replies we’ve had from Apple are ‘you shouldn’t have emailed, go use the online form’ and ‘upload screen prints of the app store listing and your trademark registration,’” Taylor explains, both of which RockAuto had already done, its documentation indicates.

“Neither the uploaded documents nor the online form submissions produced any response at all,” Taylor noted, “not even the promised ‘case number in 24 hours’ despite multiple submissions,” he said.

Since filing the complaint on April 18, 2024, RockAuto has shared its trademark registration with Apple, emailed the company, called the number provided on Apple’s copyright infringement page, sent a DMCA Takedown request and filled out Apple’s required forms.

It has not received anything other than automated responses and the fake app remains live as of the time of publication.

Apple’s reluctant, punitive compliance with regulators will burn its political and developer goodwill


Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

Despite complaints, Apple hasn't yet removed an obviously fake app pretending to be RockAuto | TechCrunch

April 26, 2024 8:49 PM0


Apple’s App Store isn’t always as trustworthy as the company claims. The latest example comes from  RockAuto, an auto parts dealer popular with home mechanics and other DIYers, which is upset that a fake app masquerading as its official app has not been removed from the App Store, despite numerous complaints to Apple.

RockAuto Co-Founder and President Jim Taylor was first alerted to the situation when customers began complaining about “annoying ads” in its app — something he said “surprised us since we don’t have an app.”

“We discovered someone placed an app in the Apple App Store using our logo and company information — but with the misspellings and clumsy graphics typical of phishing schemes,” he told TechCrunch.

On closer inspection, the fake app doesn’t look very legit, but it’s easy to see how someone could be fooled. Its App Store images show a photo of a truck with the word “Heading” across the image as if a template was hastily used and the work was unfinished. In addition, despite being titled “RockAuto” on the App Store, the app refers to itself as “RackAuto” throughout its App Store description.

What’s more, it promises customers that “Your privacy is a top priority” and that “all your data is securely stored and encrypted, giving you peace of mind.” That’s not likely, given the nature of this app.

The issue is not only concerning because of the app’s ability to fool at least some portion of RockAuto’s customers but also because it undermines Apple’s messaging about how the App Store is a trusted and secure marketplace — which is why it demands a cut of developers’ in-app purchase transactions. The tech giant has been fighting back against regulations like the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), by claiming these laws would compromise customer safety and privacy. Apple believes that customers will be at risk if they conduct business outside its

App Store with unknown parties. But, as these cases show, bad actors can too easily infiltrate its own app marketplace as well.

Image Credits: Fake RockAuto app on the App Store

Apple has so far ignored RockAuto’s requests to remove the fake app, which were all sent through proper channels, according to documentation the company shared with TechCrunch.

While searching for a solution to this problem, RockAuto came across our coverage of a similar situation with LastPass. The password manager was also the victim of a similar scheme when a fake app pretending to be LastPass was live on the App Store for weeks. LastPass eventually had to warn its customers publicly in a blog post, as Apple had not yet taken the fake app down until after the press coverage and LastPass’s own post went live.

Apple didn’t respond to requests for comment at the time. The company wasn’t immediately available for requests for comment about RockAuto’s complaint either.

Apple pulled a fake app masquerading as password manager LastPass from the App Store

Taylor says that RockAuto’s Customer Service manager initially reached out to Apple to resolve the situation. When he didn’t get a response, Taylor got involved.

“It’s mostly one-way since the only replies we’ve had from Apple are ‘you shouldn’t have emailed, go use the online form’ and ‘upload screen prints of the app store listing and your trademark registration,’” Taylor explains, both of which RockAuto had already done, its documentation indicates.

“Neither the uploaded documents nor the online form submissions produced any response at all,” Taylor noted, “not even the promised ‘case number in 24 hours’ despite multiple submissions,” he said.

Since filing the complaint on April 18, 2024, RockAuto has shared its trademark registration with Apple, emailed the company, called the number provided on Apple’s copyright infringement page, sent a DMCA Takedown request, and filled out Apple’s required forms.

It has not received anything other than automated responses and the fake app remains live as of the time of publication

Apple’s reluctant, punitive compliance with regulators will burn its political and developer goodwill


Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

Bluesky backs a project that would let Mastodon apps, like Ivory, work with its network | TechCrunch

April 25, 2024 10:38 PM0


Social networks Bluesky and Mastodon may soon be accessible from within a single app — at least, that’s what Bluesky hopes. The new decentralized social network, originally incubated inside Jack Dorsey-run Twitter, is backing a project that would connect — or “bridge” — Mastodon requests into Bluesky requests so that consumer apps, like Ivory, would be compatible with Bluesky, too.

The project, dubbed SkyBridge, was among the recipients of a small distribution of $4,800 in grant funding from Bluesky, distributed across projects. SkyBridge was the second-largest recipient in this current cohort, with $800 of the total.

Bluesky had announced last month that it would use some portion of its funds to fuel efforts in the developer ecosystem via the AT Protocol Grant program. From a financial standpoint, the program is fairly insignificant, as it’s only doling out $10,000 in grants, with $4,800 already distributed. That’s not enough to found a new company in this space, but it represents a way to encourage developers who may have wanted to dig into the new AT Protocol anyway. It also serves as an early signal of the kind of development work Bluesky supports — something that could help drive adoption among developers who have been previously (and repeatedly) burned by Twitter and its changing priorities.

Other program recipients are doing valuable work as well.

For example, Blacksky Algorithms is building a suite of services to provide custom moderation services for Bluesky’s Black users. Others are building Bluesky consumer apps, developer tools, analytics resources and more.

But SkyBridge is particularly interesting because it could potentially open up the small startup to a wider audience.

Twitter’s restrictive API may leave researchers out in the cold

Unlike Mastodon and other decentralized apps powered by the older ActivityPub protocol, Bluesky is developing a new, decentralized social networking protocol. Unfortunately, for end users who have begun exploring the open-source social networks broadly known as the “fediverse,” Bluesky’s decision to build on a different protocol means users have to switch apps to access Bluesky’s network. They can’t use their preferred Mastodon app to browse Bluesky content, that is.

If successful, SkyBridge could change that as it would be able to translate Mastodon API calls to Bluesky API calls. The bridge is currently being tested on Ivory on iOS and Mac; it’s the Mastodon app from the company that previously developed a popular third-party Twitter app, called Tweetbot. Notes SkyBridge’s developer @videah.net on Bluesky, the project is currently undergoing a significant rewrite from Dart to Rust, which is why its GitHub repo hasn’t seen much activity lately.

Still, he thinks the work is promising.

“It’s already proving to be much more stable, hoping to show it off soon,” videah posted on Bluesky when sharing the news of the grant.

Today, Bluesky has nearly 5.6 million users, while the wider ActivityPub-backed fediverse has over 10 million users. Instagram Threads (which is integrating with ActivityPub) now has more than 150 million monthly active users, Meta announced this week during earnings.

The move to bridge Bluesky and Mastodon has been the subject of some debate as of late. People have disagreed about how bridging should be done, or whether a bridge should be built at all.  Another software developer, Ryan Barrett was the recipient of some backlash on GitHub when building another bridge called Bridgy Fed, which would be opt-out by default — meaning Mastodon posts would show up on Bluesky even if the post’s author hadn’t opted into this. He readjusted his plans to build a discoverable opt-in instead, which would allow users to request to follow accounts on the different networks.

With its backing of SkyBridge, Bluesky is signaling a desire to blur the lines between Mastodon and Bluesky.

Eventually, people may not need to think about what protocol an app runs on, just like no one thinks about their email client using SMTP, POP3 or IMAP. And in an ideal outcome, people could connect to friends on any social network, regardless of its underpinning, and see their friends’ replies in return, too.

Bluesky and Mastodon users are having a fight that could shape the next generation of social media


Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

RevenueCat raises $12M Series C as it expands its subscription management to the web | TechCrunch

April 25, 2024 8:41 PM0


RevenueCat, a top subscription management platform for apps that monetize via in-app purchases, is now flush with new capital as it expands to the web. The company has closed on a $12 million Series C led by Adjacent, following the launch of a new product, RevenueCat Billing, that allows web app developers to integrate subscription purchases into any website. Later, it will also support Roku.

The timing of the product’s launch is notable, as it arrives amid the implementation of the E.U.’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) regulation, which is forcing Apple to open up the iPhone and the App Store to new completion. As a result, Apple initially blocked iPhone web apps (Progressive Web Apps, or PWAs) in the E.U., likely fearing developers would abandon its App Store, before reversing that decision under regulatory pressure.

For RevenueCat, however, the changes ahead for iOS — not to mention Apple’s refusal to cut its default 15%-30% commission rate — mean there are now more developers who are looking to the web to monetize their apps.

“It could be for progressive web apps or any kind of customer that wants to take payments outside of the App Store,” explains RevenueCat CEO Jacob Eiting, of the new web billing product. “It’s going to play within all the new [DMA] rules…it’s going to be a pretty significant product expansion for us,” he said.

The company says it moved in this direction because of the inbound interest from developers. Even if they didn’t have a web app, many developers wanted to shift their customers to the web to pay.

Though Stripe already enables this functionality, what developers were lacking was a system that’s specifically designed for consumer subscription apps. Now, even if developers are processing payments through Stripe or others, they’re getting their data and insights in the same format and within the same dashboard where they already manage their in-app purchase data. This makes it easier for them to focus on how their subscription apps are monetizing, overall, regardless of where the payment comes from — web or mobile.

Though Apple has historically not allowed app developers to steer customers to the web from inside their iOS apps, it has permitted steering from other channels — like the developer’s website or emails to customers. The E.U.’s DMA rules should also permit developers to steer customers to the web from inside their mobile apps, too.

With RevenueCat Billing, essentially a web SDK, developers can accept subscription payments from any website. It joins other recent product releases like Paywall, Targeting, and Experiments, which are all designed to help developers grow their revenue. Today, RevenueCat powers subscriptions in over 30,000 apps and handles over $2 billion in subscriptions annually, it says.

The new Series C from Adjacent (led by Nico Wittenborn — a Series A investor, now board member) totals $12 million. Other investors include Y Combinator, Index Ventures, Volo Ventures, and SaaStr Fund. Ahead of this round, RevenueCat had raised $56 million, bringing its total raise to $68+ million.

In addition to fueling its new products, the fundraise will help RevenueCat expand to new markets, including Japan and South Korea.

“Our main competitor is ‘cobbling together monetization technology yourself’,” said RevenueCat CTO and co-founder Miguel Carranza, in a statement about the fundraise and expansions. “In the U.S., we’ve done a good job at educating developers, product people, marketers, and CEOs on the challenges of building in-house. In many other regions, it’s unfortunately still the default for businesses to sink valuable resources into something that provides zero differentiation or value for that business’s end users. We’re investing in those regions by expanding our support for languages and local currencies later this year, deepening our relationships with local technology partners and agencies, as well as hiring in-market where possible,” he added.

Image Credits: RevenueCat

RevenueCat is not yet a profitable company, but Eiting says that profitability is always on the horizon. The company still has the money it raised in 2021 and now has over $40 million in the bank in addition to around $20 million in ARR. It has also halved its burn rate since last summer.

“There’s so much stuff we can build by deploying capital and doing it on a profitable basis would just slow us down right now. So while there’s access to capital, which isn’t always the case…the best thing for our customers and investors is to take more capital and deploy it faster,” he told TechCrunch.

“RevenueCat is too important to too many apps to risk the company driving towards a financial cliff. This may be counter to the prevailing narrative of how venture-backed companies should be built, but our investors are aligned with us and know that Miguel and I are leading the company to maximize the value for developers. Investors make more money when developers make more money,” the CEO added in a blog post. “To that end, we’re still aiming to take the company public in this decade,” he said.




Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

Exclusive: Indaband's new app lets you create music with people around the world

April 25, 2024 12:02 AM0


A new social media app called Indaband lets musicians and vocalists collaborate with others and make music with people all over the world. The app is designed to make people who usually play an instrument on their own feel like they’re part of a worldwide band (get it, Indaband?). Record a video of yourself playing an instrument and others can stitch in videos of themselves playing their own instruments on top of your original recording.

All you need to get started on Indaband is a pair of headphones and a smartphone to record yourself. You can choose to upload prerecorded files as new tracks or open the app’s recording booth to record your tracks on top of someone else’s. You can record and mix unlimited video tracks in different sessions using the app’s multitrack video studio and share them with your community. Indaband notifies you when someone collaborates with one of your tracks, so you can see how they added their own take on your content.

The app is the brainchild of CEO Daniel Murta, CTO Andrews Medina, Head of Engineering Helielson Santos and Design Leader Emerson Farias. The co-founders came up with the idea for the app when they were working at a legal technology company called Jusbrasil, which Murta co-founded.

Image Credits: Indaband

They all used to get together to play music during happy hours after work, and once the pandemic hit, they came up with the idea for Indaband so they could still play music together while in quarantine. The group then spent their weekends working on Indaband and eventually ended up leaving Jusbrasil to focus on Indaband full-time.

“Music creation is very hard and involves complex software. So, the whole idea was to redesign this process from scratch and make it simple and out of your smartphone,” Murta told TechCrunch. “The idea was that we would unlock musical expression to a different level to make it simple to collaborate and co-create music.”

Indaband helps users discover songs and jam sessions with daily curated playlists that dive into different genres, like rock, jazz, hip-hop and EDM. Users can like and comment on videos and repost them to their followers.

Indaband plans on launching a new feature called “Circles” that Murta compares to clubs on Strava. Circles will allow users to build their own communities on the app and possibly even hold live events. Indaband may also develop a Patreon-like feature within Circles that would allow established creators to offer paid content. For instance, an established musician could offer virtual lessons on an instrument that they have mastered.

Image Credits: Indaband

While Indaband’s early adopters are skilled musicians who are comfortable sharing their music and recording themselves, Indaband eventually plans to target musicians and singers who are just starting out.

“We want to be known as a place where the musical community flourishes,” Murta said. “There is no place for musical communities right now. So the idea is to be known for that, and our strategy is to make it easy to create, and allow everyone to join the creation process.”

Indaband raised $7 million in seed funding in late 2021. The funding round included several angel investors, including Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger and former Megadeth guitar player Kiko Loureiro. The round also included funding from several Latin American VC firms, including Monashees, Astella and Upload Ventures.

The app is free and is available on iOS and Android.


Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

Reddit is making it easier to navigate conversations on its mobile apps | TechCrunch

April 24, 2024 10:30 PM0


Reddit is rolling out a few new updates to its iOS and Android apps to make it easier for people to locate and take part in conversations on the platform. The company announced on Wednesday that it’s launching a new unified media player, along with instant comment loading and a direct shortcut to conversations. Given that a large part of Reddit’s appeal is based on its ability to foster conversations across numerous topics, it makes sense for the platform to take a conversation-first approach to its mobile apps.

In a bid to create a more seamless flow across post types on Reddit, the company is introducing a unified media player that users can swipe through to look at the comments and see new content. Users can access the new media player by clicking on an image or video. Reddit says conversations can’t flow easily if the way to get to them differs by post type, which is why it’s launching consistent conversation navigation across post types.

Image Credits: Reddit

Plus, now when users click on the comments button on a post in feed, they will be taken directly to the top of the comments. In the past, users had to scroll through the post page to reach the comments. Reddit also introduced a context bar that sticks to the top of the page, allowing users to return to the post or dive into the content with a single tap.

The launch of the updates comes a week after Reddit CPO Pali Bhat told TechCrunch that the company’s product roadmap includes faster loading times, additional tools for moderators and developers, and an AI-powered language translation feature.

Reddit stock closes up nearly 48% on its first day of trading


Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

X is launching a TV app for videos 'soon' | TechCrunch

April 23, 2024 9:48 PM0


X, the company formerly known as Twitter, is launching a dedicated TV app for videos uploaded to the social network soon. X CEO Linda Yaccarino announced on Tuesday that the new app will bring “real-time, engaging content to your smart TVs.” The app’s interface looks quite similar to YouTube’s, as seen in a teaser video shared by Yaccarino.

The app will feature a trending video algorithm that is designed to help users stay updated with tailored popular content, along with AI-powered topics that will organize videos by subject. The app will also support cross-device viewing, which means you can start watching a video on your phone and then continue watching it on your TV.

Yaccarino says the app will feature enhanced video search and be available on “most smart TVs.” Although there isn’t an official launch date for the app, the executive says it will be available “soon.”

The upcoming app launch is part of Yaccarino’s efforts to turn the social media site into a free-speech “video first” platform. The social network currently features an original show hosted by former congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard and another by former Fox Sports host Jim Rome. Last month, Musk canceled a talk show deal with former CNN anchor Don Lemon after he was interviewed for the first episode of the show.

The announcement comes a week after Truth Social, the social media platform owned by Donald Trump’s media company, also unveiled its plans to launch a live TV streaming platform. The platform will focus on “news networks” and “religious channels,” along with “ content that has been canceled” or “is being suppressed on other platforms and services,” the company had said.

Trump’s Truth Social plans to launch a live TV streaming platform




Software Development in Sri Lanka

Robotic Automations

Two widow founders launch DayNew, a social platform for people dealing with grief and trauma | TechCrunch

April 23, 2024 5:33 PM0


After losing their husbands in devastating and unexpected ways, Karine Nissim and Eloise Bune D’Agostino discovered there were no suitable places where people could go to face all the challenges that surface during the grieving process, including daunting tasks such as organizing a funeral ceremony and donating belongings, as well as scouring the internet for support groups.

Being seasoned entrepreneurs themselves—Nissim having sold her startup DogVacay to Rover in 2017 and Bune D’Agostino, who co-founded Tentrr and Handwriting.io—the two widow founders decided to take matters into their own hands and build what they call a “360 healing” platform that provides a range of services and resources to help with grief and other hardships like divorce, illness, and trauma.

Now available on the App Store, Google Play Store, and the web, DayNew is a new grief support platform, social community, educational hub, and task manager app wrapped up into one, user-friendly package. At its core, DayNew aims to be a safe space for users to connect with others, share their stories, and receive support from the community.

“From hospice centers to bereavement groups to online therapy, regular therapists and psychiatrists, to funeral homes to all of the other services, there was not one place that we could go that could hold the whole journey for us,” Nissim told TechCrunch. “So, we set out to create a customized roadmap that is really highly tailored to each person based on their trauma type… When you come to DayNew, we are ready to meet you with organizational, emotional, and social support.”

Some people find it hard to ask for help because they don’t want to feel like a burden to their family and friends. DayNew’s Community feed acts as a dedicated space for users to be direct about what they want from supporters, whether it be money to buy groceries, a place to sell and donate belongings, or a job listing for a babysitter.

“[Eloise and I] got lots of flowers and casseroles. While that’s beautiful, generous and thoughtful, we also got a lot of comments like ‘Whatever you need,’ and we were always ill-equipped on how to answer that or didn’t feel comfortable… The community page takes the ickiness of the ask out. It also takes the ickiness out of the supporters’ side because now they actually know what you need, and they don’t feel like they’re bothering you.” Nissim said.

There’s also a “Find a Buddy” feature for users to get one-on-one support from people who are going through similar tragedies. Users can search for others with the same hashtags in their profiles, including #partnerloss, #parentloss, #cancerloss, #covidloss, and so on.

Similar to other grief support platforms (Grief Refuge, Untangle, and Grief Works), DayNew has a Journal feature where users can vocalize how they feel by either answering prompts or freehanding an entry that speaks from the heart. The company compares the prompts to homework from a therapist, asking tough and thought-provoking questions such as “What’s something about grief you never knew before?” and “What’s something you wish you could tell your younger self?” Depending on comfort level, the journal entry can be kept private or shared publicly on the Community feed.

Additionally, there’s a daily mood tracker component for users to check in with themselves and log their moods on a scale of 1 to 10.

Image Credits: DayNew

DayNew offers various other features to assist users throughout their journey, including personalized lists for users to check off overwhelming tasks (sell assets, get life insurance, apply for widow social security benefits, and so on) at their own pace, a ChatGPT-powered AI tool that provides emotional advice, and a “Learn & Grow” page with educational and motivational content.

Nissim explained that the platform is also launching virtual workshops and in-person events to bring people together and teach them the benefits of “grounding and meditation” in order to promote healing. The online classes cost around $36 and feature special guests like experts, scientists, and psychologists. The first session is on May 21 and will be hosted by the founders themselves. In mid-July, there will be an in-person retreat in Mexico for about $1,800.

In the next iteration of the platform, DayNew plans to introduce a gifting feature where friends and family members can purchase classes to give to a loved one.

DayNew is free to join but it also offers a $5 per month subscription for users who want to access premium features, including the “Find a Buddy” service, direct messages, and being able to comment on public community posts.

In the digital age, users are embracing grief-related products and services to cope with death. What once was considered a taboo topic, grievers can now openly discuss loss and be reassured that they’re not alone. However, it’s important to realize that these services shouldn’t replace proper therapy and counseling but should act as an additional outlet to express their feelings.

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