Spotify has launched an in-app dedicated Merch Hub that will offer personalized purchase recommendations based on listening habits. Previously, the music streamer’s shopping opportunities were through artist profile pages as well as via the Now Playing view and new release pages. Now, “instead of having to browse artist by artist, this update makes it easier than ever to access all artist merch in one place,” Spotify says. Last year, the streamer reported “the highest-grossing merch sales week for artists in Spotify history” in its annual Wrapped report. Continue reading Spotify Offers ‘Merch Hub’ for Recommendations and More

YouTube has introduced three dozen new features that do everything from improve mobile playback and search to expand creator tools. When the words “like and subscribe” are uttered by creators, the buttons will respond with animations. Bigger preview thumbnails and a “lock-screen” feature designed to prevent mishaps are also in the new toolset. The improvements build on the “new look and feel” YouTube debuted last year, adding “more modern design elements and features that helped our viewers feel more immersed,” the company says. Some of the improvements target smartphones and connected TVs, while others are for the web app. Continue reading YouTube Adds Dozens of Mobile Playback, Creator Controls

NBC Sports Next has launched a subscription amateur sports streaming service geared toward the youth market. SportsEngine Play will also offer a free tier for live and on-demand content centered on its target audience. The service leverages the technology acquired with Rapid Replay, a streaming startup purchased by NBC in September 2022. The new service is among a dozen related brands NBC has purchased over the years, including a specialty software company called Sports Ngin that the company bought in 2016 to make apps for youth sports organizations and leagues. Continue reading NBC Streamer SportsEngine Play Targets $37B Youth Market

Captions, which leverages AI to help its customers produce “studio quality videos directly from their mobile devices,” has launched a new app called Lipdub that automatically translates and dubs content into 28 languages. The free download lets user dub anyone “and experience familiar voices and faces in a suite of new languages.” Lipdub’s translations not only duplicate what the company says is “the subject’s exact voice,” but also syncs lip movements to match. It also incorporates dialects and idioms, with options like Gen Z and Texas slang. Continue reading Captions Debuts AI Lipdub with Translation and Gen Z Slang

Swedish fintech company Klarna, whose online payments platform claims to work with 500,000 merchants worldwide, is debuting an AI-powered shopping lens. As with in-app lens tools from Google and Amazon, the Klarna lens lets shoppers snap pictures of items or styles then use its app to find out where to buy using a “search and compare” filter. Klarna claims its camera feature can visually identify over 10 million items and match them with more than 50 million store offers. “Klarna uses AI to translate the image into a search term,” turning it into “a shoppable item,” the company explains. Continue reading Klarna AI Image Search Takes Aim at the E-Commerce Space

BBC Studios, which first entered the FAST space in 2019, announced a deal with ad-supported video-on-demand streamer Amazon Freevee, which will exclusively provide five new FAST channels for U.S. audiences starting October 17. The editorially-curated FAST channels will feature more than 1,000 hours of content across categories including comedy, science fiction, game shows, travel and crime dramas. Thus far, BBC has launched 17 FAST channels in the U.S. Freevee content is available via its Android and iOS apps in addition to Fire TV, Prime Video and numerous smart TVs and delivery platforms. Continue reading BBC Studios Offers Five FAST Channels on Amazon Freevee

Earlier this year, Google introduced support for passkeys as part of a larger initiative to improve security and eventually eliminate the need for passwords. Since the launch, consumers have begun using passkeys across Google apps such as Search, YouTube and Maps. As the next step in establishing “a simpler and more secure way to sign into your accounts online,” and following positive feedback from early users, the company is offering passkeys as the default option across personal accounts. When signing into accounts, users will receive prompts for creating passkeys. Additionally, Google account settings will feature a toggle that reads “skip password when possible.” Continue reading Google Makes Passkeys Default Option on Personal Accounts

Yahoo is spinning out its Vespa platform, which leverages AI and data online at scale. The move is being positioned as an effort to make Vespa more widely available to third parties. After supporting Yahoo’s needs for 16 years, the unit in 2021 began serving external customers including Spotify, Wix and OkCupid for needs such as “searching millions of documents within a global organization, serving better data-driven online ads, or allowing AI-based language apps the ability to scale.” Yahoo says it will continue to invest in Vespa and remain its largest customer even after the split. Continue reading Yahoo Spins Out Big Data Unit Vespa AI as Independent Firm

Xumo, a joint venture between Comcast and Charter Communications, has begun rolling out its Xumo Stream Box to Charter’s Spectrum customers, with plans to bring it to Comcast’s Xfinity homes soon. The Xumo Stream Box is powered by Comcast’s Entertainment Operating System (EOS), designed to simplify the process of finding content, regardless of where it resides. “Xumo is streaming simplified, bringing a live TV experience together with all the top apps,” Charter President of Product and Technology Rich DiGeronimo said of the new device. Xumo Stream Box can be used to find, discover and select content on-demand using voice control. Continue reading Comcast-Charter Venture Starts Shipping Xumo Stream Box

Zoom Communications kicked off its Zoomtopia 2023 confab with innovations underpinned by artificial intelligence. It’s showpiece, Zoom Docs, is a collaboration tool built from the ground up around AI. The modular workspace integrates with Zoom and third-party apps as a way to streamline teamwork, manage projects and stay organized. Scheduled for general release in 2024, Zoom Docs combines traditional document functionality with AI assists for things like adding content generated from Zoom Meetings to docs, summarization and search. Zoom Docs leverages the power of the previously announced Zoom AI Companion, a GenAI assistant that just got whiteboard capability. Continue reading Zoom Reveals Upcoming Collaboration Tools Powered by AI

Web-based design app Canva has raised the curtain on its AI-powered Magic Studio as part of the company’s 10-year anniversary outreach. Canva is positioning Magic Studio as collecting diverse AI tools to provide a “comprehensive AI-design platform” for business and home users that want to automate labor-intensive tasks like creating and editing images and outputting to different formats using generative artificial intelligence. Created for “the 99 percent of the world without complex design skills,” Canva’s Magic Studio offers many of the features now being built-in to smartphones and software suites, but easier and “all in one place.” Continue reading Magic Studio from Canva Offers AI Design for All Skill Levels

LinkedIn is unveiling new AI features to improve job hunting, marketing and sales tools for its nearly 1 billion users. The Recruiter talent sourcing platform, LinkedIn Learning and more are all getting AI assists. A central use of AI is “to take on some of workers’ day-to-day drudgery, freeing extra time for the more people-centric, strategic aspects of their job,” according to the social business platform, which just wrapped its 12th annual Talent Connect Summit. The proliferation of evolving generative AI tools is triggering new workflows for recruiters, job hunters and employees. Continue reading LinkedIn Taps OpenAI to Upgrade Business Marketing Tools

Microsoft would like to make OneDrive “the center of your files experience in Microsoft 365.” Sixteen years after the cloud-based storage platform was launched, it “hosts trillions of files, with nearly 2 billion more files added every day,” the company says. The result is OneDrive source files sprawling across the entire Windows ecosystem — extending to SharePoint libraries, traveling as attachments and exchanged through Teams chats. Now Microsoft is adding AI Copilot integration and AI and, overall, making it easier to find things in what it calls the next generation of OneDrive. Continue reading OneDrive 3.0 Aspires to Become Main Windows File Manager

Adobe has officially added Photoshop on the web as one of its Photoshop plans. The web version is geared to Photoshop newbies and comes complete with Adobe Firefly generative AI features including Generative Fill and Generative Expand. Adobe called it “a major milestone” since introducing Photoshop on the web in beta two years ago, starting with “an early preview of image editing capabilities.” Features now available for commercial use on the web include the ability to easily add or remove elements from any image, change a background, expand the frame, and create visuals using text-based prompts. Continue reading Adobe Launches Web Version of Photoshop with AI Features

AMC Networks has begun rolling out an ad-supported version of its flagship AMC+ streaming service. Initial availability will be on AMC’s own direct-to-consumer platform and apps, with third-party platforms and channel providers added in the coming weeks. Priced at $4.99 per month, the ad-supported tier includes less than five-minutes per hour of sponsored messages and the same content that comes with the $8.99 per month ad-free plan (or $83.88 annually). Chief Commercial Officer Kim Kelleher says the new product offering is “bringing ads to the only piece of our distribution ecosystem that wasn’t already ad-supported.” Continue reading AMC Offers a New Commercial Tier for Its Streaming Service