Match Group cuts 6% of staff as it shuts down livestreaming in dating apps
Match Group announced Tuesday that it has discontinued livestreaming services in its dating apps, resulting in a 6% reduction in workforce. The news was delivered during the dating app giant’s second-quarter earnings report. The move finds Match shifting its focus to other offerings, including generative AI. The decision to end livestreaming will directly impact dating apps Plenty of Fish (POF) and BLK, which launched a free livestreaming feature — “Live!” — in 2020. The offerings were a bid to encourage users to date virtually during the COVID-19 lockdown. Users could also purchase “Live Credits” to send virtual dates to streamers, similar…
Here’s how to disable X (Twitter) from using your data to train its Grok AI
X, formerly known as Twitter, has automatically activated a setting that allows the company to train its Grok AI on users’ posts. X enabled the new setting by default. The good news is that you can switch it off and also delete your conversation history with the AI. If the setting is turned on, X can “utilize your X posts as well as your user interactions, inputs and results with Grok for training and fine-tuning purposes,” according to the platform’s settings page. X goes on to note that “this also means that your interactions, inputs, and results may also be…
Travel startup Mindtrip’s new feature lets you build an itinerary from a screenshot, YouTube or TikTok video
AI travel agent startup Mindtrip on Tuesday released a feature that lets you save places or build an itinerary from several places around the web. Mindtrip lets you insert a link like a Reddit post or a blog and ask the AI assistant to build an itinerary based on the places mentioned. You can also see these places on a map and easily save them to favorites or a trip list. You can also use a YouTube, TikTok or Instagram link to populate the list of places mentioned in the video. Currently, the tool can only work with TikTok videos…
Apple reportedly working to bring AI to the Vision Pro
Apple’s AI plans go beyond the previously announced Apple Intelligence launches on the iPhone, iPad and Mac. According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, the company is also working to bring these features to its Vision Pro headsets. It’s not the most surprising move — if Apple Intelligence (a whole suite of features including an improved Siri, proofreading tools and custom emojis) is key to Apple’s future, why wouldn’t it be available on all the latest Apple gadgets? But for all that’s impressive about the Vision Pro, it remains an unusually pricey device with a limited audience (so far). Apple Intelligence won’t…
Apple signs the White House’s commitment to AI safety
Apple signed the White House’s voluntary commitment to developing safe, secure and trustworthy AI, according to a press release on Friday. The company will soon launch its generative AI offering, Apple Intelligence, into its core products, putting generative AI in front of Apple’s 2 billion users. Apple joins 15 other technology companies — including Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft and OpenAI — that committed to the White House’s ground rules for developing generative AI in July 2023. At the time, Apple had not revealed how deeply it planned to ingrain AI into iOS. But we heard Apple loud and…
Figma pauses its new AI feature after Apple controversy
Welcome back to TechCrunch’s Week in Review — TechCrunch’s newsletter recapping the week’s biggest news. Want it in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here. This week, Figma CEO Dylan Field said the company will temporarily disable its “Make Design” AI feature after it was accused of “heavily” training the tool on existing apps. The feature, unveiled at the company’s annual Config conference, aimed to jumpstart the design process by generating UI layouts and components from text prompts but faced criticism after it seemingly mimicked the layout of Apple’s Weather app. YouTube quietly rolled out a policy change this week…
