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Podcast Outlets Gimlet And Anchor Acquired By Spotify

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Streaming has become a massive outlet for media over the years, turning into the premiere method of listening to various music and podcasts all over the world. While the music download industry has been taken over by the likes of Apple iTunes, music and media streaming is ruled by another company: Spotify. And starting today, the popular streaming service is opening its doors for two podcasting companies, Gimlet Media and Anchor, to broaden its scope even more.

Gimlet — a premiere podcasting company offering tons of exclusive, top-tier shows — and Anchor — a podcast creation outlet for rising podcasters — are now a part of the Spotify family in a move that looks to expand the streaming brand. Music streaming has already been the company’s trademark feature, but now with shows like Reply All, The Pitch and Conviction are added to the service.

“These acquisitions will meaningfully accelerate our path to becoming the world’s leading audio platform, give users around the world access to the best podcast content, and improve the quality of our listening experience as well as enhance the Spotify brand” — Spotify CEO and co-founder, Daniel Ek

The press release from Spotify noted its fourth quarter earnings of 2018, and with the profit increase exceeding expectations came these two big acquisitions. By beefing up their podcast library with Gimlet and adding a source for future podcasters to start-up their own shows with Anchor, Spotify doesn’t seem content with being the world’s leader in music streaming; but in podcasting, as well.

By purchasing Gimlet, Spotify offers listeners the exclusive options of enjoying hit shows that expand through their impressive library of content. Podcasts have blown up in the previous half decade, making the move to become a powerful name in the future of engaging media an all-too important one for the multi-million dollar company.

And with landing Anchor, Spotify is now one of the leading sources in allowing content creators a space to chase their podcasting dreams. Anchor provides an easy-to-use program and tool kit that allows beginners and expert creators the chance to have their shows heard, with the added possibility of earning some dough while they’re at it. If you’re just hopping into the podcasting business, it’s might benefit you best to start with Anchor.

Spotify CEO, Daniel Ek, doesn’t appear to be slowing the expansion train anytime soon, either. Spotify is eyeing more acquisitions later in the year looking to spend somewhere between $400 and $500 million dollars in future assets. Edging itself to stay ahead of the pack in terms of new podcasting applications, Spotify is lining itself up to stay on top for quite a while.

With the future of audio seemingly comfortable to stay in the arms of the convenient streaming platform, Spotify is making bold moves to stay ahead of the pack as an industry leader — similar to how Netflix is leading the way for video streaming services. Spotify continues its growth with rising numbers of both its regular subscribers, as well as premiere members. If the fourth quarter earnings of 2018 is anything to go by, Spotify is making the right moves in securing its spot at the top of the streaming industry. And adding quality podcasting programs only looks benefit Spotify in the near future.

 

Source: Spotify Press, (2)

Writer and avid gamer, Chris will put together an article to keep the reader engaged, informed and moderately happy for a solid 4 minutes. That my friend, is no easy feat.

Apps

Mobile apps from Threads make profile switching easy

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Twitter rival, Threads, owned by Meta, now allows account switching without logging out.

This Thursday, the social networking app announced that users can swap accounts on its mobile apps by long pressing the bottom right profile icon. Tap “Add profile” after the long press to add a profile.

Users can easily switch between work and personal profiles. Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri did not say if the profile-switching feature allowed you to add a limit of accounts.

 

Threads profile switching

On the same day as Facebook allowed multiple personal profiles on Blue, the text-based social networking app announced its profile feature.

Threads keeps adding features three months after its launch. It began testing full-text search in New Zealand and Australia late last month. The company launched global search this month.

Threads added 24-hour post notifications and web quote functionality in September.

Threads’ competitors ship features in a competitive social media landscape. Mastodon released version 4.2 this week with improved profile and post search, automatic quick action suggestions in the search box, a new web interface with thread indicators and article previews, and a Privacy and Reach settings tab.

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Elon Musk said X will collect ‘a tiny monthly payment’ for its service

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X owner Elon Musk suggested today that Twitter may no longer be free. Musk said the business was “moving to a small monthly payment” for the X system in a live-streamed meeting with Netanyahu on Monday. He suggested such a tweak to address platform bots.

Musk said, “It’s the only way I can think of to combat vast armies of bots.” According to him, bots have a high effective cost due to their low cost (a tenth of a penny), even though they require a few dollars. Each bot creator needed a new payment method to make another bot.

Musk said the new subscription price would be a “small amount of money.”

Musk also announced that X now has 550 million monthly users and 100 to 200 million daily postings. Musk’s stats may include automated accounts, either good bots like news feeds or malicious bots like spammers.

This figure couldn’t be compared to Twitter’s pre-Musk user base, which was computed using mDAU, Twitter’s own metric. This earlier statistic identified Twitter users who may be monetized by adverts. Twitter reported 229 million mDAUs in Q1 2022.

Musk did not specify when he would charge for X. Since Musk took over the network last year, it has been pushing users to subscribe to X Premium (formerly Twitter Blue). This $8 per month or $84 per year subscription service lets you modify posts, reduce the ad load, prioritize search and conversation rankings, make lengthier posts, and more.

X doesn’t divulge its paying subscribers, but independent research shows X Premium doesn’t attract most customers. X Premium has 827,615 subscribers, according to one estimate.

Musk has considered charging everyone for X. In fact, Platformer claimed last year that Musk was considering a Twitter paywall.

Though hate speech on X came up, Musk and Netanyahu discussed AI technologies and regulation today. Musk called himself “against antisemitism” and “anything that promotes hate and conflict.” Musk threatened to sue the Anti-Defamation League, which has accused Musk and X of antisemitism, in his latest fight.

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X launches government ID account verification

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For paid users, X, formerly Twitter, has implemented government ID-based account verification to prevent impersonation and provide “prioritized support.”

Social media partner Au10tix provides identity verification solutions from Israel. The ID verification pop-up says the Au10tix can store this data for 30 days.

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X’s verification support page says ID verification is available in “numerous countries,” but not in the EU, EEA, or UK. The region’s strict data protection laws likely explain this.

ID-based verification seems unnecessary and rarely beneficial. The company may age-gate content based on ID age.

“X currently focuses on account authentication to prevent impersonation and may explore additional measures, such as ensuring users have access to age-appropriate content and protecting against spam and malicious accounts, to maintain platform integrity and healthy conversations,” it said.

Users who pass the verification badge will receive a government ID verification note. Only clicking the blue checkmark on the profile page shows it. The company said ID-verified users will get “prioritized support from X Services,” but this is unclear.

The company allowed paid users to hide checkmarks from their profiles last month.

X plans to speed up checkmark reviews if users verify their IDs. Plus, they can frequently change their names, usernames, and profile photos without losing the checkmark.

Only paid users can use ID-based verification. Ironically, X promotes impersonation and spam reduction but doesn’t offer verification tools to all users.

Twitter discontinued legacy verification and removed account checkmarks in April. However, the company reinstated the top account checkmark after much chaos.

The social network added biometric data, education, and job history to its privacy policy last month.

“This will additionally help us tie, for those that choose, an account to a real person by processing their government-issued ID,” X told Bloomberg. “This will also help X fight impersonation attempts and secure the platform.”

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