Technology

X Raises Premium+ Prices by 37.5%, Affects Some Markets More Than Others Posted: December 22, 2024 Image Credits: TechCrunch Price Hike Effective Immediately in the U.S. X has raised prices for its top-tier subscription service, Premium+, by a significant 37.5% to $22 per month. This is the largest price increase since Elon Musk acquired the platform in 2022. The new pricing will first affect users in the United States, with prices increasing from $16 to $22 effective December 21. Annual Subscriptions Also See an Increase In addition to the monthly rate hike, annual subscriptions for Premium+ have also climbed to $229 from $168. Existing subscribers will be grandfathered into current rates until January 20, allowing them to enjoy their current pricing for a few more weeks before being requ...

Recent developments in the electric vehicle (EV) market have been chaotic, and Ford has capitalized on this chaos by building out its secretive low-cost EV team. According to a review of LinkedIn data by TechCrunch, Ford has grown this team to around 300 employees over the last year. Hiring from Rival Companies The team's growth is evident in the number of new hires from rival companies. Approximately 50 employees have joined from Rivian, more than 20 from Tesla, and a dozen from cash-strapped Canoo. Ford has also hired around 10 employees from Lucid Motors and a handful from Apple's recently disbanded EV team known as Project Titan. Senior Aerodynamicists Join the Team Ford has also brought on board two senior aerodynamicists who previously worked for Formula 1 teams to work on the projec...

In the world of wearables, smartwatches are often the first thing that comes to mind when people think of innovation. However, 2024 was a relatively quiet year for smartwatches, marked by iterative updates rather than groundbreaking new features. This is not uncommon in a maturing category like smartwatches, where the focus shifts from experimenting with new ideas to refining and perfecting existing products. The Rise of Smart Rings However, it seems that the innovative energy that once drove the development of smartwatches has finally started to bubble up again – this time in the form of smart rings. While not a new concept, 2024 saw a mini renaissance in the smart ring category, with several companies introducing their own versions. Samsung's Galaxy Ring: A Game-Changer? In February, Sam...

A Year of Growth: Netflix's Resurgence A year ago today, [1] Netflix reported its largest quarterly loss ever, with 970,000 subscribers dropping the service. The company has since crawled out from under the rubble. In a remarkable turnaround, Netflix revealed on Wednesday that for the second quarter of 2023, the streaming giant saw a jump (or should we say leap) in 5.9 million global subscribers, bringing the total to 238.4 million subs. The subscriber addition far exceeds industry guidance; analysts forecasted an increase of 1.7 million subs. Netflix ended Q1 with 232.5 million users. A Significant Boost from Paid Sharing Rules Netflix's quarterly earnings results arrive a few hours after news broke that the streamer dropped its basic plan in the U.S. and the U.K. New subscribers can no l...

Among the many exciting changes coming with iOS 17, Apple is introducing a game-changing feature that will revolutionize the way content publishers interact with their subscribers. The new feature allows users to connect their existing content subscriptions to Apple Podcasts, enabling them to access exclusive benefits and content. The Problem with Previous Setup In the past, if a publisher wanted to offer exclusive podcasts to its subscribers, it would have had to launch a separate Apple Podcasts subscription. This setup was cumbersome for both publishers and subscribers alike, as it required paying customers to pay yet again for exclusive podcast content. The New York Times (NYT) is a prime example of this complication, having launched its own audio streaming app last month to offer its p...

A Creative Tool for a Natural Look Lux Optics, the company behind the popular iOS app Halide, has launched its new version with a feature that is set to revolutionize the way photographers take snaps. Introducing Process Zero, a game-changing option that doesn't use AI in image processing. This innovative feature allows users to skip the standard image processing and work directly on a single exposure RAW file. What is Process Zero? In a departure from the norm, Halide's Process Zero takes advantage of a fast processing pipeline to give users a 10-25x speed advantage over Apple's ProRAW capture. This means that photographers can now enjoy faster image processing without sacrificing quality. The new feature also incorporates natural sensor grain and slight color aberrations, which are less ...

A recent panel discussion at SIGGRAPH in Denver brought together experts from the filmmaking and VFX industries to share their insights on the potential impact of generative AI models on the media creation process. The consensus among Nikola Todorovic (Wonder Dynamics), Freddy Chavez Olmos (Boxel Studio), and Michael Black (Meshcapade, Max Planck Institute) was that while these tools may not revolutionize filmmaking in the short term, they have the potential to bring about radical changes in the long term. The Limitations of Current Generative Models One of the first topics discussed was the impractical nature of today's video generators. Todorovic noted that there is a "misperception of AI" that it can produce high-quality VFX shots with just one click. However, he emphasized th...

OpenAI Launches Sora, a Video-Generating Tool, but Holds Back on Key Feature On Monday, OpenAI launched its video-generating tool, Sora, which allows users to create videos using text prompts or images. However, the company has decided not to release a key feature for most users pending further testing. The Held-Back Feature: Using Real People as References The feature in question generates a video using an uploaded photo or footage of a real person as a reference. OpenAI says that it will give a "subset" of Sora users access to this feature, but it won't roll out the capability broadly until it has had a chance to fine-tune its approach to safety. Potential for Misuse OpenAI is taking a cautious approach to this feature because of the potential for misuse. The company wrote in a...

The State of Mobile: A Year of Growth and Innovation After a brief slowdown in 2022, the app economy has picked up pace again in 2023. According to the latest report from data.ai, consumer spending on apps saw a modest 3% increase year-over-year to reach $171 billion across the App Store, Google Play, and third-party Android app stores in China. A Growing Market for Non-Game Apps One of the most significant trends of 2023 is the growth of non-game apps. Consumer spending on these types of apps grew 11% year-over-year to reach $64 billion. This growth can be attributed to social apps and the creator economy, which are driving innovation in the app market. TikTok's Success TikTok has been a major contributor to the growth of non-game apps. The short-form video-sharing app has seen significan...

Microsoft's recent announcement of Correction, a service that attempts to automatically revise AI-generated text that's factually wrong, has raised eyebrows and sparked skepticism. Understandably so, given the complexities of AI-generated content. The Problem with Hallucinations Generative AI models are notorious for producing inaccurate or fabricated information, often referred to as "hallucinations." These models don't actually "know" anything; they're statistical systems that identify patterns in a series of words and predict which words come next based on the countless examples they've been trained on. Why Hallucinations Happen A model's responses aren't answers but merely predictions of how a question would be answered were it present in the training set. As a cons...