Apple launches an affiliate program for paid podcast subscriptions

Apple last month unveiled its plans for paid podcast subscriptions in a newly redesigned Apple Podcasts app. Now, it’s introducing a new program that will help podcast creators grow their subscriber base: affiliate marketing. The company’s “Apple Services Performance Partner Progr

Snap brings partner-centric Layers to its social map used by 250 million people

Snap wants users to get a more personal view of the world around them. While products like Google Maps and Apple Maps have long-relied on data partners to juice the quality of their contextual insights, Snap is hoping it can give users a more hands-on approach to mixing and matching third-party tie

Snap announces Story Studio, a new standalone app to edit stories

During Snap Partner Summit, Snap announced a brand new app focused on creators. Named Story Studio, this standalone iOS app gives you several editing tools so you can make your content look as professional as possible. Story editing tools are still in Snapchat — nothing is changing on this front.

Twitter to revamp user profiles with About tab, support for pronouns, ‘confirmed’ status and more

Alongside news that Twitter is relaunching its account verification system to the public, the company previewed a slate of changes that will soon come to Twitter profiles. In addition to your name, photo, banner, bio and other features available today, the new Twitter profile will include an “

Twitter opens account verification applications to the public under new guidelines

The coveted blue badge may soon be within your reach. Twitter announced today it will begin rolling out its new verification application system, which allows public figures and other accounts of high public interest to distinguish themselves with a checkmark that indicates they are who they say the

Spotify expands into the audiobooks market by partnering with Storytel

Spotify is further expanding into audiobooks — but not in the way you may think. The company today announced a new partnership with audiobooks platform Storytel, which will allow existing Storytel subscribers to connect their account through Spotify to access their audiobooks within Spotify&#

OMG is Canada's startup answer to the local news crisis

Local news has been battered over the past two decades. The rise of the internet shredded some of the long-held monopolies of newspapers and local TV stations on news and classified ads, while social networks like Facebook, Nextdoor and Citizen have increasingly pulled in reader attention for neigh

TikTok rolls out tools to bulk delete and report comments, block users

TikTok today is introducing a feature that will allow creators to deal with online abuse in an easier way. The company is launching new tools that will allow creators to bulk delete comments and block users, instead of having to moderate comments one-by-one. The update may be somewhat controversial

A new tip line invites anyone to name and shame companies for dark pattern designs

You may not be familiar with the term “dark patterns” but the manipulative design phenomenon is ubiquitous in the apps and services we use every day. Dark patterns nudge consumers to make choices that enrich companies, usually at their own expense. That can look like misleading wording

Google revives RSS

Chrome, at least in its experimental Canary version on Android (and only for users in the U.S.), is getting an interesting update in the coming weeks that brings back RSS, the once-popular format for getting updates from all the sites you love in Google Reader and similar services. In Chrome, users

Spotify launches a virtual concert series with The Black Keys and more

The past year has been utterly devastating to the music industry generally, and live music in particular. Artists who make a living touring have been forced to find alternative ways to make ends meet, while those among us who once frequented live events have been looking for ways to plug the hole c

Upstream, a Miami-based professional networking platform, raises a $2.75M seed round

If you're reading this, there's a pretty good chance you have a LinkedIn profile with your digital resume and hundreds — if not thousands — of professional connections. But how many of those people do you actually know well, and, more importantly, do you ever connect with them a

India tells WhatsApp to withdraw its new policy terms

The Indian government is not pleased with WhatsApp's new privacy policy. The nation's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has once again directed the Facebook-owned company to withdraw the planned update. In a letter to WhatsApp on Tuesday — which was read to Te

Android TV OS reaches 80M monthly active devices, adds new features

Google offered an update on its TV platform, Android OS, at its Google I/O developer event on Tuesday. The company said its Android TV OS now reaches over 80 million monthly active devices, including through its new experience Google TV for Chromecast, as well as other platforms like smart TVs. The