Author: TechBrunch
Instagram is working on a “Blend” feature that will create a private feed of Reels recommendations for you and your friends. The company told TechCrunch on Friday that the feature is an internal prototype and has not been tested externally. This feature was first discovered by reverse engineering Alessandro Paluzziregularly discovers social media features in development ahead of their official release. According to a screenshot posted by Paluzzi on his In other words, when you invite a friend to “Blend,” Instagram generates a personalized feed of Reels that it thinks will be of interest to both of you. Blend seems…
As deepfakes proliferate, OpenAI is improving the technology used to clone voices, but the company insists it's doing so responsibly. Today marks the preview debut of OpenAI's Voice Engine, which extends the company's existing text-to-speech API. Voice Engine, which has been in development for about two years, allows users to upload a 15-second sample of his voice and generate a synthetic copy of that voice. However, there is no public release date yet, giving the company time to respond to how the model is used and abused. “We want to make sure everyone has peace of mind about how this…
As AI proliferates and things on the internet become easier to manipulate, the need to ensure data and brands are verifiable is more important than ever, said CTO and co-founder of Space and Time. Scott Dykstra said on TechCrunch's “Chain Reaction” podcast. “Not to get too religious about crypto here, but we saw it with the FTX collapse,” Dykstra said. “There was some brand trust in our organization, just like our personal savings were in FTX. We believed in it as a brand.” However, the now-defunct virtual currency exchange FTX internally manipulated its books and misled investors. Dykstra believes this…
A day after researchers revealed Company X's plans to test a NSFW adult community on the platform formerly known as Twitter, the company announced that community admins will have to ensure that the community's content is automatically filtered. To avoid this, we confirmed that you can set an “Adult Content” label in the settings. Otherwise, all his NSFW content will be filtered to the entire X community by default. Communities are small groups of X that have their own feeds outside of the main timeline. This change confirms previous testing of NSFW communities discovered by various researchers and reverse engineers,…
It's rare to come across a pitch deck that ticks almost all the boxes. In fact, it was so good that I fed Plantee's deck into an AI tool I built and it determined that Plante had a 97.7% chance of raising money. This tool typically determines that only about 7.5% of all pitch decks reach zero, so Plantee is clearly off the charts. What the robot didn't realize, however, was that Plantee's Kickstarter campaign was canceled before it was complete, and there are a few other confusing details. Let's take a look at what works and what could be…
Hello. Welcome to Equity, the startup business podcast. Uncover the numbers and nuances behind the headlines. This is a Friday episode that delves into the week's most important stories and themes. As this week draws to a close, we are also set to conclude the trial of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman Fried, a former crypto tycoon who is facing a 25-year prison sentence. But while the SBF news was a big deal, there was so much to cover in today's episode of Equity News Roundup. and Kirsten Kolosek, mary ann azevedoand alex wilhelm Crew members on board this week…
In Stripe's annual letter, the company describes several fast-growing areas, one of which is its “revenue and financial automation” division. These are tools that help businesses manage billing, taxes, and revenue recognition. The company says that Stripe's RFA division will reach an annual operating rate of $500 million this year. As part of its investment in RFA, the payments giant completed the “acquisition” of a four-person team from Supaglue for an undisclosed sum. Supaglue raised $6.8 million in a seed round in November 2021 led by Benchmark General Partner Chetan Puttagunta. (Puttagunta did not respond to TechCrunch's request for comment.)…
You may have heard of Grok, X's answer to OpenAI's ChatGPT. It's a chatbot, and in that sense it works as expected, answering questions about current events, pop culture, and more. But unlike other chatbots, Grok has a “bit of a wit” and “a rebellious personality,” as X owner Elon Musk puts it. Simply put, Grok is happy to talk about topics that are usually off-limits to other chatbots, such as polarizing political theories and conspiracies. And in doing so, he ends up using language that is not polite. For example, when answering the question, “When is it appropriate to…
The final countdown begins! Today, March 29th, is your last chance to get early bird benefits for TechCrunch Early Stage 2024. This event will be his one-day event to ignite your entrepreneurial journey in Boston on April 25th. Don't miss this special opportunity to gain valuable insights, resources, and connections to move your startup forward. From engaging roundtable sessions to expert-led discussions to exclusive 1:1 meetings with investors, TechCrunch Early Stage 2024 has everything you need to accelerate your startup journey. Masu. Here's what's waiting for you here: Engaging Roundtable Sessions: Participate in collaborative conversations with industry experts. Sessions will…
When you sign up for a new social network, you have zero friends, zero followers, and zero likes. But once you start posting content, you might start to see more and more likes and comments. This may help you gain new followers. And that dopamine increase will make you post more. A new app called Palmsy is trying to act as the methadone of social media by letting you post anything and get likes. However, the problem is that no one can see your posts. You can publish as many posts as you like. This app also allows you to…