Apps

EdgeDB raises $15M ahead of the launch of its cloud database service • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 7, 2022Posted in Accel, Apps, EdgeDB, Enterprise, funding, Nava Ventures, relational database, startup, StartupsNo Comments

EdgeDB, the startup looking to modernize databases for cutting-edge apps, today announced that it raised $15 million in a Series A round led by Nava Ventures and Accel. The new capital brings the startup’s total raised to $19 million, which CEO Yury Selivanov said will be used to boost headcount and launch the previously announced hosted version of EdgeDB’s database solution, EdgeDB Cloud. “Cloud, which in our case is a database-as-a-service, requires significant investment upfront to build a reliable and scalable infrastructure,” Selivanov told ZebethMedia in an email interview. “We plan on eventually introducing turn-key integrations with Vercel, Netlify, GitHub, GitLab, Sentry, DataDog and many other services, making EdgeDB Cloud the key component of future application stacks.” Selivanov co-founded EdgeDB with Elvis Pranskevichus in 2022, after co-launching a software development consultancy called MagicStack in Toronto in 2008. As they began to create bespoke tooling for clients, the founders came to the realization that they wanted to lead a purely product-driven company as opposed to a consulting firm. And so EdgeDB was born. EdgeDB’s product is fundamentally a relational database, or a collection of data items with predefined relationships between them. But Selivanov makes the case that EdgeDB “reinvents pretty much every concept” about relational databases, introducing its own high-level data model, a query language called EdgeQL, a low-latency network protocol and a set of tools to handle day-to-day operations like installing the database and making backups. Image Credits: EdgeDB “EdgeDB’s extensive feature set was always guided by solving the real pain points we observed the industry has with databases,” Selivanov said. “Technical decision-makers appreciate the low friction of building with EdgeDB compared to most other relational database products on the market.” EdgeDB competes with PlanetScale, Supabase and Prisma for dominance in the relational database market. At least one forecaster believes it could be worth $18.8 billion by 2026, growing nearly 40% from 2021. It’s been a rockier-than-anticipated road to revenue — while Selivanov told ZebethMedia in April that he expected EdgeDB would be generating revenue in Q4 2022, he now expects it won’t be until “late Q1 2023.” Selivanov blames that on the delayed launch of EdgeDB Cloud, which was originally set for 2022. But he stresses that EdgeDB’s 14-person team is heads-down, continuing to build out the database’s architecture and query language. “After successful launches of EdgeDB v1.0 and v2.0, we could easily demonstrate that people love the product and now is the right time to focus on the hosted version. Raising money at that point felt like the natural next step,” Selivanov said. “In the next release we plan to introduce a visual constructor for queries and a visualization UI for explaining queries performance … We will also be expanding the list of programming languages we natively support.” EdgeDB also has the advantage of backing from notable angels in the software dev space, including ex-GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, GitHub co-founder Tom Preston-Werner, Firebase co-founder James Tamplin, ex-IBM CEO Samuel J. Palmisano, Netlify co-founder Mathias Biilmann and Sentry co-founder David Cramer. OpenAI co-founder and CTO Greg Brockman is another supporter, having invested in EdgeDB’s seed round this spring.

Airbnb will soon show prices inclusive of all fees in search results • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 7, 2022Posted in Airbnb, Apps, travelNo Comments

Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky said today that the company is refining its search to show users’ charges inclusive of fees like cleaning fees. The company will roll out this feature through a toggle next month and will also prioritize the total charges (before taxes) for your trip in search instead of the nightly price. Chesky said that once you turn on the toggle, you will see the total price (excluding taxes) in search results, map listings, price filters, and listing pages. Plus, users will be clearly able to see the breakdown of fees, services charges, discounts and taxes for the property and the trip. Despite these changes, it’s still annoying that you won’t know how much taxes do you have to pay until you reach the last step in the booking. I’ve heard you loud and clear—you feel like prices aren’t transparent and checkout tasks are a pain. That’s why we’re making 4 changes: 1. Starting next month, you’ll be able to see the total price you’re paying up front. pic.twitter.com/58zodrzU3g — Brian Chesky (@bchesky) November 7, 2022 It’s not clear why the company is making the price inclusive of all fees an opt-in experience through a toggle rather than making it the default search parameter. We started as an affordable alternative to hotels, and affordability is especially important today. During this difficult economic time, we need to help our Hosts provide great value to you. — Brian Chesky (@bchesky) November 7, 2022 The company is making these changes as customer complains about cleaning fees and other hidden charges that have grown in recent times. After customer outrage. A report published by Nerdwallet in June surveying 1,000 U.S. rental properties on Airbnb said that 34% of listings had a clearing fee in the 20-30% range of the base fee. Airbnb published a blog post last year saying it transparently displays all fees on all listings. But clearly, that wasn’t enough and the travel company was forced to make these changes. If Hosts have checkout requests, they should be reasonable and shown to you before you book. — Brian Chesky (@bchesky) November 7, 2022 Along with these new search tweaks, Airbnb is also rolling out pricing and discount tools for hosts that will let them set competitive final prices that are inclusive of all fees. This will help hosts attract more guests as they might want their property to get listed under a certain price filter when it comes to total fees. Airbnb registered $2.9 billion in revenue for Q3 2022 — up 29% year-on-year. This also beat the analysts’ estimate of $2.8 billion for the quarter. The company said that nights and experiences booked grew 25% year-on-year for Q3. In Europe, the company and its rivals have been asked to share booking data with the European Commission as there are growing worries about the short-term rental economy creating a housing shortage by pushing out low-income residents.

Unity and IronSource’s $4.4B merger is now complete • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 7, 2022Posted in Apps, Gaming, IronSource, unityNo Comments

Unity‘s proposed merger with IronSource has formally concluded, with the two companies coming together to create an end-to-end platform for developers to build and monetize games. Unity, which is best known for its eponymous general purpose game engine, and IronSource, an adtech company that serves developers with tools for integrating ads, cross-channel marketing, and more, first announced plans to join forces in a $4.4 billion all-stock deal back in July. The two publicly-traded companies had seen their stocks fall by around 75% and 50% respectively through 2022, and their decision to merge was driven somewhat by the economic downturn, but also — as at least one analyst pointed out — by Apple’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) framework which rolled out last year. Both Unity and IronSource rely on developers buying advertising to garner new users, and ATT created friction on that front, so by pooling their collective resources, this goes some way toward addressing their respective declines. “The driving force behind this industry-changing merger is to create more value for developers across the entire development journey,” IronSource CEO Tomer Bar-Zeev said in a press release. “We are very excited about the road ahead as we begin integrating our product portfolios more deeply and strengthening the feedback loop between creating great games and growing them into successful businesses. In doing so, we’ll be able to create a world where more creators are more successful than ever before.” It’s worth noting that in the intervening weeks since Unity and IronSource first announced their plans, AppLovin entered the conversation in a big way when it tabled a $20 billion offer for Unity, on the condition that Unity ended plans to merge with AppLovin’s rival, IronSource. After consideration, Unity ultimately rejected that offer, with its board noting that AppLovin’s offer wasn’t a “superior proposal.”

After laying off half of its staff, Twitter might be asking some employees to come back • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 7, 2022Posted in Apps, elon buys twitter, Layoffs, TwitterNo Comments

Twitter is reaching out to some employees to come back after it engaged in a mass layoff last week, according to multiple reports. The company’s new owner Elon Musk laid off 3,700 people from Twitter — almost half of its staff — after he completed the takeover. A Bloomberg report cited sources saying that the company asked some folks to return as they were laid off “by mistake.” It also noted it was calling some other employees back as they were critical for building features for the platform Musk envisions. In addition to this, several posts on the anonymous app Blind also indicated that Twitter might have called a few employees back. Casey Newton also reported in a thread that on internal slack, remaining employees were asked to make a list of potential candidates that could be called back. From Twitter Slack: “sorry to @- everybody on the weekend but I wanted to pass along that we have the opportunity to ask folks that were left off if they will come back. I need to put together names and rationales by 4PM PST Sunday. — Casey Newton (@CaseyNewton) November 6, 2022 The company had dismissed people across multiple departments including human rights, accessibility, machine learning ethics, transparency and accountability, advertising, marketing, communications, engineering, and curation. So it is not surprising that it realized some of those folks might be critical to keep the platform running smoothly and working on new features. Within weeks of taking over the company, Musk has promised a bunch of new features like revamped verification process and a new Twitter Blue experience priced at $8. The Tesla CEO has also set very tight deadlines for these feature rollouts. With a ton of people laid off across functions, it might be tough for the remaining employees to get things done in time. Last week, a bunch of former Twitter employees filed a class action lawsuit against the company for not giving them adequate notice before dismissing them from their jobs. The case alleged Twitter of violating worker protection laws like the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act as well as the California WARN Act — both require 60 days of advance notice before a mass layoff. Job cuts haven’t been the only chaotic thing at Twitter after the Musk takeover. The product rollout has also been a mess. Over the weekend, several folks received notifications on their iOS device that the company is rolling out the blue checkmark to people who are ready to pay $7.99 a month. However, Esther Crawford, a product lead at Twitter clarified that these notifications were just a part of a test. Over the weekend, Twitter reportedly shelved the plan of rolling out the new verification system until after Tuesday’s midterms elections in the US. Twitter didn’t comment on the story, but maybe because the whole communication staff was laid off. You can contact this reporter on Signal and WhatsApp at +91 816-951-8403 or im@ivanmehta.com by email.

After 40 million app downloads, PhotoRoom raises $19 million • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 7, 2022Posted in Apps, Generative AI, photo app, photo editing, PhotoRoom, StartupsNo Comments

French startup PhotoRoom has raised a $19 million Series A funding round. The company develops a popular photo editing app for e-commerce vendors and small businesses. In particular, it helps you remove the background behind objects you are about to sell so that your photos look more professional. Balderton Capital is leading the Series A round with angels from Facebook, Hugging Face and Disney+ also participating. Existing investor Adjacent is also putting more money in the company. PhotoRoom isn’t the only app that helps you remove photo backgrounds. Another popular app in the “Graphics & Design” category on the App Store is Pixelcut. More generic apps, such as Picsart also have background removal features. But PhotoRoom has focused on one niche in particular — small businesses reselling objects on eBay, Poshmark or Depop. In just a few taps, these marketplace experts can process a batch of photos and create images that are ready to be used. It can help them save a lot of time and sell more products. Behind the scenes, PhotoRoom uses deep learning to identify different objects and elements on a photo. A flat photo becomes a multi-layer images, which means that users can delete the photo background, blur it or replace it with something else entirely. The same technology can be used to retouch image and remove unwanted objects. PhotoRoom has a large library of background templates and helps you export images in different formats with each platform constraints in mind. And it’s been working remarkably well as the company managed to attract 40 million downloads on iOS and Android. There are 7 million monthly active users and hundreds of thousands of users pay a subscription fee to unlock all the features in the app. It currently costs $9.99 a month or $69.99 a year. Up next, PhotoRoom wants to bring generative AI to its app, starting with Stable Diffusion. That’s why it is raising money as the company has been profitable with its current team. “Until now, we grabbed an object and we erased the background. But then users have been looking for a background to put the object back in front of a template,” co-founder and CEO Matthieu Rouif told me. With a text prompt, PhotoRoom will generate a marketing product photo based on your object. The feature will be available in beta for some users at first. It will be rolled out to all users progressively. “By focusing intently on user needs, Matthieu and Eliot have created a product that stands out from the rest. The importance of online photography is immense and PhotoRoom has both the traction and the ambition to become a market leader,” Balderton Capital partner Bernard Liautaud said in a statement. Image Credits: PhotoRoom

Amazon introduces a $7.3 annual Prime Video subscription tier in India • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 7, 2022Posted in Amazon, Amazon Prime Video, Apps, india, Media & Entertainment, prime videoNo Comments

Amazon has introduced a new price tier for Prime Video in India, making the on-demand video streaming service even more affordable as it races to win more customers in the South Asian market where it competes with giants including Disney’s Hotstar and Netflix. The e-commerce group said it will offer the yearly subscription to Prime Video Mobile Edition, an affordable tier it introduced last year, at 599 Indian rupees, or $7.3. At this price, it’s the cheapest way to subscribe to Amazon’s on-demand video streaming service in the country. Prime Video Mobile Edition limits viewing to mobile devices and caps the video resolution at standard definition. “India is one of our fastest growing and most engaged locales worldwide. Our success in the country can be attributed to innovations that are focused on creating an exceptional entertainment experience for customers,” said Kelly Day, VP of International at Prime Video, in a statement. “In fact, India is turning into an innovation hub for Prime Video. An initiative like Prime Video Mobile Edition, that had its genesis in India, is now being rolled out across multiple countries in Latin America and South East Asia. We are confident that the new Prime Video Mobile Edition annual plan will further help accelerate the growth of our India business and give an even larger customer base access to the high-quality content on the service. With this launch we look forward to entertaining every Indian with our popular on-demand entertainment content and live sports.” (More to follow)

Puzzle Tales’ with new gameplay • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 6, 2022Posted in Apps, Gaming, Media & Entertainment, Netflix, Stranger ThingsNo Comments

Netflix is bringing the “Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales” game to its platform with new gameplay based on the content from Season 4 of the show. Users will be able to play as new characters features in Season 4 in this no-ads game as the company continues its push towards gaming. Users have to solve puzzles in this game to beat enemies like Demogorgons and other supernatural monsters. In the process, they can collect up to 50 versions of characters from the show. The company describes the game’s graphics as “nostalgic 1980s Saturday morning cartoon art style.” “Stranger Things: Puzzle Tales” was first released in 2021 and it was removed from the App Store and Play Store in August after Netflix acquired the game’s publisher for $72 million. At that time, the streaming service announced that it is working on revamping the game and moving it to Netflix exclusively. Users can download the updated game starting today using this link. This release of the title joins other Stranger Things games like “Stranger Things: 1984” and “Stranger Things 3: The Game.” The game also builds on Netflix’s efforts to let fans engage with the show in various ways. Earlier this year, the streaming company partnered with Reddit for Stranger Things-based customized avatars and teamed up with Spotify for personalized playlists. At ZebethMedia Disrupt, the company’s VP for gaming Mike Verdu said that Netflix is exploring avenues to get into cloud gaming. He added that the streaming giant is also opening its second gaming studio in California after establishing its first studio in Helsinki in August. The company also launched game handles that can be used across exclusive titles in September. While the company making a lot of efforts into making gaming a success, it hasn’t seen stellar results. According to a report from Apptopia published in August, Netflix games were only averaging 1.7 million daily users. During its Q3 2022 earnings, the company announced that it now has 223 million subscribers.

Elon Musk’s Twitter Blue subscription with verification may launch in India in ‘less than a month’ • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 6, 2022Posted in Apps, Asia, Elon Musk, india, Social, Twitter, twitter blueNo Comments

Twitter may extend its subscription service to India in “less than a month,” its owner and chief executive Elon Musk said, offering a glimpse at just how aggressively he plans to roll out Twitter Blue to the larger world. Twitter launched Twitter Blue in four markets — US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand — last year. The Elon Musk-owned firm plans to launch a revamped version of the subscription service in those four markets on Monday. Musk has ramped up Twitter Blue’s offerings, promising a verified checkmark to anyone who subscribes, among other features, including long form video content and having to sift through fewer ads. Those who already have the verified checkmark will need to subscribe to Twitter Blue over the coming months to retain it, Musk said in another tweet. He has previously said that Twitter Blue, which is priced at $7.99 a month in the U.S., will be more affordable in some countries to account for local purchase parity. “Power to the people,” Twitter’s iOS app update note said in anticipation of Monday rollout. “Your account will get a blue checkmark, just like the celebrities, companies, and politicians you already follow.” Musk is betting on turning the subscription service into a major revenue driver for Twitter, which he acquired last month for $44 billion — $13 billion of which he lent from banks. Musk needs to pay more than $1 billion a year in interest payments. The company this week laid off roughly half the company’s workforce, or about 3,700 jobs. In a series of tweets over the weekend, Musk offered a few more updates on Twitter Blue. He claimed the company “can beat” YouTube’s ad-revenue split to creators, and that fixing the search functionality on Twitter “is a high priority” for the firm. Twitter will soon allow users to attach long-form texts to tweets, he said. Many users who have wished to post longer texts have over the years posted screenshots of texts written on a note app. Musk said the new revamp will end such “absurdity.”

Twitter begins rolling out $7.99 Twitter Blue plan with verification, fewer ads • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 5, 2022Posted in Apps, Elon Musk, Media & Entertainment, Social, social media, Twitter, twitter blueNo Comments

Just days after newly minted Twitter CEO Elon Musk floated changes to Twitter’s system for verifying user accounts, including charging $8 per month for the privilege, Twitter appears to have begun rolling out a new tier of Twitter Blue, its premium subscription service, that reflects some of the changes that Musk has proposed. According to an in-app iOS notification viewed by ZebethMedia, the upgraded Twitter Blue, starting at $7.99 per month, will add the blue verification checkmark previously reserved for accounts that applied through Twitter’s free verification process. Other benefits include “half the ads” seen by non-paying Twitter users as well as ostensibly “twice as relevant” ads, and the ability to post longer videos to Twitter (although it’s not clear just how long; the notification doesn’t specify). Image Credits: ZebethMedia The new, pricier Twitter Blue will also offer priority ranking for “quality content,” promising to boost subscribers’ visibility in replies, mentions and search. Twitter’s making the claim that this will help “lower the visibility of scams, spam and bots,” but time will time will tell whether that’s truly the case. Image Credits: ZebethMedia Musk earlier claimed that Twitter, which recently ended support for ad-free articles offered under Blue, would create a new program for bypassing paywalls for publishers willing to work with the company. But if he intends to follow through with the proposal, the program doesn’t appear to have made it into the new Blue — at least not at launch. Available in the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the U.K. on iOS to start, the new Twitter Blue arrives after mass layoffs at Twitter affecting roughly half of the company’s staff, including employees on key human rights, accessibility, AI ethics and curation teams. Musk has claimed that the cuts — along with the introduction of new paid features — are necessary to bring Twitter to profitability, as the company faces an estimated $1 billion a year in interest payments on $13 billion in debt. It’s likely to be an uphill battle. Data from analytics firm Sensor Tower suggests that Twitter’s app has generated only $6.4 million in in-app purchases to date, with Blue being the top purchase. Musk’s management of Twitter doesn’t appear to have instilled much confidence in major advertisers, however, many of whom have paused campaigns on the platform. In a tweet on Friday, Musk blamed a “massive drop” in Twitter revenue on “activist groups pressuring advertisers,” likely referring to an open letter sent Tuesday by civil society organizations urging Twitter advertisers to suspend their ads if Musk didn’t commit to enforcing safety standards and community guidelines.

Twitter chaos, Mastodon grows and WhatsApp launches Communities • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 5, 2022Posted in Apps, This Week In AppsNo Comments

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly ZebethMedia series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. Global app spending reached $65 billion in the first half of 2022, up only slightly from the $64.4 billion during the same period in 2021, as hypergrowth fueled by the pandemic has decreased. But overall, the app economy is continuing to grow, having produced a record number of downloads and consumer spending across both the iOS and Google Play stores combined in 2021, according to the latest year-end reports. Global spending across iOS and Google Play last year was $133 billion, and consumers downloaded 143.6 billion apps. This Week in Apps offers a way to keep up with this fast-moving industry in one place, with the latest from the world of apps, including news, updates, startup fundings, mergers and acquisitions, and much more. Do you want This Week in Apps in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here: techcrunch.com/newsletters Twitter is dying, long live Twitter? Has it really only been a week since Elon Musk bought Twitter? It seems like a lifetime. The Tesla and SpaceX exec has wasted no time making the bird app his own, beginning with the almost immediate layoffs of the Twitter executive team, including CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal, General Counsel Sean Edgett and Head of Legal Policy, Trust and Safety Vijaya Gadde, before moving on to cut upper management, and then the widespread layoffs of staff. (Which he’s now being sued over, in fact, as the required 60 days legal notice wasn’t given.) Twitter is expected to cut 50% of its staff, or some 3,700 jobs. The roles being cut span areas large and small, from the mission-critical moderation, trust & safety, ethical AI and curation teams — just ahead of a major election, worryingly — as well as those working on more experimental features, like Communities, and in all sorts of business and tech areas like marketing, sales, policy, research, partnerships, accessibility, data science, machine learning, social good, communications and more, including core engineering. Twitter’s Developer Platform lead is out and the developer conference Chirp was also canceled. Employees are already warning that such significant cuts combined with cost-cutting in areas like cloud hosting will lead to difficulties in maintaining Twitter’s infrastructure, The Verge reports. Advertisers are growing worried about what the significant job cuts in key areas mean for brand safety and began putting their campaigns on pause until they know how this all shakes out. Twitter’s chief customer officer, Sarah Personette, who managed the company’s relationships with advertisers, also departed last Friday as a result of the takeover. Musk, of course, blames “activist groups” pressure for the advertiser situation and not his own actions. The Twitter product is also rapidly undergoing a change, as Musk plans to cut new features like Revue and Notes, and revamp the Twitter Blue subscription to make the blue check now a paid feature. He’s also been thinking about rebooting Vine. To say the changes are coming at a chaotic pace is an understatement. Employees were let go via emails and often still working when suddenly their access to Twitter’s internal resources was cut. (Not being able to log in was a clue to go check their personal email to find out if their job was eliminated.) Musk never communicated with staff before the layoffs, reports said. But his message, nonetheless was clear: Twitter is being reformed and it’s not going to be the same place it was ever again. The question now is, will users stay for it? Mastodon benefits from the Twitter exodus As it turns out, some people decided they won’t be sticking around for whatever Twitter is turning into. The open source, decentralized social network Mastodon is one platform that has benefitted from the Twitter takeover. In addition to seeing a record number of downloads for the Mastodon mobile app this past weekend, the nonprofit company also this week announced a new milestone. In a post on Twitter — where Mastodon has been successfully marketing its app to those now considering leaving the service — it noted that 230,000 people have joined Mastodon during the last week alone. Thanks to these new sign-ups, as well as people returning to old accounts they had set up previously, the network now has 655,000 active users, the post said. This is the highest number of users Mastodon has seen to date and follows on news that the network had gained over 70,000 new sign-ups on Friday, October 28 — the day after Musk’s deal to acquire Twitter had closed. From Friday through Sunday, the Mastodon mobile app also saw around 91,000 new installs, third-party data from Sensor Tower indicated — a 658% increase from the 12,000 installs it saw the three days prior. This rapid growth had some downsides as the largest service mastodon.social experienced lags and outages due to the sudden influx of new users. Plus, some users came to Mastodon without a full understanding of how a decentralized social network works and have found the process confusing or overly technical. They may have already given up and moved on to another platform, despite how this week was the prime opportunity to convince them of decentralization’s perks — like how Mastodon can’t be sold to a person like Musk. Soon, another decentralized social app will come for Twitter’s user base. Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey is launching Bluesky, a decentralized social protocol and app that intends to build a Twitter-like product in a different way. But the open source community has been frustrated with the Silicon Valley exec’s decision to go his own way with Bluesky, instead of using established protocols like ActivityPub, which powers Mastodon and others. Then there’s the fact that @Jack sold Twitter to Musk to begin with, so would anyone ever trust him again? Substack takes aim at Twitter, too Another company hoping to capitalize on Twitter’s upheaval is the newsletter platform Substack. The company openly