apps News of 11/23/19

Facebook Prototypes Favorites For Close Friends Microsharing

Facebook prototypes Favorites for close friends microsharing image Facebook is building its own version of Instagram Close Friends, the company confirms to TechCrunch. There’s a lot people that don’t share on Facebook because it can feel risky or awkward since its definition of “friends” ...

The Top 1% Of App Store Publishers Drive 80% Of New Downloads

The top 1% of app store publishers drive 80% of new downloads image The current app store ecosystem doesn’t favor the indie developer. According to new data from Sensor Tower , the top 1% of publishers globally accounted for a whopping 80% of the total 29.6 billion app downloads in the third quarter of 2019. ...

Splice Teaches AI To Sell Similar Sounds As Users Double

Splice teaches AI to sell Similar Sounds as users double image Splice is blowing up like a hit song. The audio sample marketplace has doubled revenue and user count in a year, and now reaches 3 million musicians. 70% of those visit weekly to hunt down the freshest and trendiest sounds that give their tracks ...

Adobe Details Feature Roadmap For Photoshop On The IPad, Subject Selection Coming In 2019

Adobe details feature roadmap for Photoshop on the iPad, subject selection coming in 2019 image Adobe has taken quite a bit of heat for its release of Photoshop on the iPad, mostly because it’s not as feature-complete as a lot of users were hoping, given that this is meant to be a full version of Photoshop on par with the desktop ...

Twitter Rolls Out Its ‘Hide Replies’ Feature To All Users Worldwide

Twitter’s radical “Hide Replies” feature, one of the biggest changes to how Twitter works since the invention of the Retweet, is now available to Twitter’s global user base. The company says the feature will roll out to all ...

Route’S App Auto-Tracks All Your Packages, Raises $12m

Route’s app auto-tracks all your packages, raises $12M image Between Amazon, FedEx, UPS, and indie merchants, it’s easy to lose track of when your online purchases will be delivered. And if you’re buying something pricey or important, a lack of shipping insurance can leave you anxious and constantly ...

Bandit Opens A ‘Mobile-Only’ Coffee Shop In New York

Bandit opens a ‘mobile-only’ coffee shop in New York image If you wander into the Bandit coffee shop in Midtown New York, you won’t be able to just walk up to the counter and order something. Instead, you’ll need to download a mobile app. I experienced it for myself yesterday afternoon, when I ...

Smart Compose Is Coming To Google Docs

At its Cloud Next event in London, Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian today announced that Smart Compose , the AI-powered feature that currently tries to complete phrases and sentences for you in Gmail, is also coming to G Suite’s Google Docs ...

Email App Spark Receives Update With New Design

Email app Spark receives update with new design image Spark , the popular email app from Readdle , has been redesigned on iOS and Android. The interface has always been a bit busy in the mobile app. That’s why the updated app now features a cleaner design and a handful of new features. On the ...

Bunch, The Discord For Mobile Games, Raises $3.85m From Supercell, Tencent, Riot Games

Growing up, Selcuk Atli spent a good deal of his free time playing video games with his friends. And when I say with his friends, I mean actually with them. They’re called LAN parties, where everyone brings over their consoles and the group ...

India’S Swiggy Bets Big On Cloud Kitchens

Can cloud kitchens take off in India? Swiggy, one of the country’s largest food delivery startups, is betting on it. The Prosus Ventures-backed startup said on Wednesday it has established 1,000 cloud kitchens for its restaurant partners in the ...

Facebook’S Latest Experiment Is A Meme Creation App, Whale

Facebook’s NPE Team, a division inside the social networking giant that will build experimental consumer-facing social apps, has now added a third app to its lineup with the launch of meme creation app Whale . Currently, the app allows users to ...

Spotify Turns Its Personalization Technology To Podcasts With Launch Of Your Daily Podcasts

Spotify is taking the personalization technology that powers its music playlists, like Discover Weekly and Daily Mix, and turning it to podcasts. The company announced this morning the launch of a new podcast playlist called Your Daily Podcasts, that ...

SocialRank Sells Biz To Trufan, Pivots To A Mobile LinkedIn

SocialRank sells biz to Trufan, pivots to a mobile LinkedIn image What do you do when your startup idea doesn’t prove big enough? Run it as a scrawny but profitable lifestyle business? Or sell it to a competitor and take another swing at the fences? Social audience analytics and ad targeting startup ...

India Says Law Permits Agencies To Snoop On Citizen’S Devices

The Indian government said on Tuesday that it is “empowered” to intercept, monitor, or decrypt any digital communication “generated, transmitted, received, or stored” on a citizen’s device in the country in the interest of national ...

Xiaomi Integrates Earthquake Alert System Into MIUI OS, Unveils Xiao AI 3.0 Digital Assistant

Xiaomi integrates earthquake alert system into MIUI OS, unveils Xiao AI 3.0 digital assistant image Xiaomi today unveiled a new iteration of its virtual assistant Xiao Ai and shared a new feature of Android -based MIUI operating system as the publicly listed Chinese technology group pushes to expand its internet services ecosystem. The ...

Mubi Launches Streaming Service In India

Mubi launches streaming service in India image Mubi, a 12-year-old on-demand movie streaming and rental service, has arrived in India. Like other streaming services giants such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+ and Disney’s Hotstar, Mubi is offering its service at a slightly lower ...

Apple Launches A Dedicated Mobile App For Its Developer Community

Apple launches a dedicated mobile app for its developer community image Apple today is introducing a new resource for the over 23 million registered members of its developer community, with the launch of a dedicated Apple Developer mobile app. The new app is an expansion on the existing WWDC app for Apple’s ...

Google Maps Tests A Social Networking Feature With The Ability To ‘Follow’ Local Guides

Google Maps tests a social networking feature with the ability to ‘follow’ Local Guides image Google Maps will soon begin testing a new feature that’s more common to social networks like Facebook, rather than a maps app: the ability to find and follow other users. In Google Maps’ case, it’s specifically rolling out the ...

Microsoft Winds Down Its Bigger Plans For Cortana With Mobile App Shutdown

At Microsoft’s Ignite conference this month, the company announced a new vision for its personal productivity assistant, Cortana — one which aimed to make it more useful in your day-to-day work, including email, but one which also saw ...