Author: GT

Snap is launching new Lens Studio tools that AR creators and developers can use to build Bitmoji games, the company told TechCrunch exclusively. The company is also releasing a Bitmoji Suite as well as new assets for games. With Lens Studio 5.10, the new games assets offer developers new ways to build dynamic games Lenses, the company said. We’re getting a turn-based system to enable back-and-forth gameplay, as well as the ability to Snap and respond to a challenge or turn in the same game. There’s also a new customizable Character Controller that supports different gameplay styles, including third-person, first-person,…

Last week, Chinese lab DeepSeek released an updated version of its R1 reasoning AI model that performs well on a number of math and coding benchmarks. The company didn’t reveal the source of the data it used to train the model, but some AI researchers speculate that at least a portion came from Google’s Gemini family of AI. Sam Paech, a Melbourne-based developer who creates “emotional intelligence” evaluations for AI, published what he claims is evidence that DeepSeek’s latest model was trained on outputs from Gemini. DeepSeek’s model, called R1-0528, prefers words and expressions similar to those that Google’s Gemini…

TikTok is rolling out AI-powered Smart Keyword Filters to allow people to limit content they don’t want to see on their For You page, the company announced on Tuesday. While TikTok already allows users to use keyword filters to restrict specific content from appearing in their feeds, the new Smart Keyword Filters will use AI to additionally limit content that contains similar keywords, such as synonyms. The tool will show you which additional keywords are being filtered in addition to your original one. For example, if you choose to filter out “remodeling,” TikTok will also filter out “renovation” and “renovations.”…

Meta announced Tuesday morning that it was paying billions of dollars to keep an Illinois nuclear power plant running through 2047. The social media company will buy all the “clean energy attributes” of Constellation Energy’s Clinton Clean Energy Center, a 1.1 gigawatt nuclear power plant in central Illinois, starting in June 2027. Electricity will still flow to the local grid, so Meta’s purchase won’t directly power one of its data centers, though the company does have one about two hours north of Clinton in DeKalb. Rather, the deal is a bit of carbon accounting to lower the company’s overall climate…

Reddit on Tuesday announced a new feature that will offer its users more privacy when it comes to what’s shared on their user profiles. The company says it’s rolling out an update that will introduce a “Content and Activity” setting that allows users to decide which content from the subreddits they participate in will appear on their profiles. This includes both their posting and commenting history. By default, all posts and comments will remain visible, as before. However, the new setting allows users to hide all their public posts and comments, including those made directly on their profiles. Alternately, users…

Dating apps have developed a bad reputation lately. People ghost others, which means they simply stop responding to someone they once shared frequent correspondence with. There appear to be slim pickings, despite living in big cities like New York. And did we mention a lot of these apps now cost money?  At the inaugural SXSW London, TechCrunch caught up with Jackie Jantos, the CMO and president of Hinge, to talk about how the company is marketing itself to a new generation in what has become a listless dating scene.  “This is a generation that has grown up with a deep…

As global trade evolves, there’s an increasing demand for diverse cross-border payment options. That’s why an Irish-based fintech startup called Nomupay has raised a $40 million Series C round from SB Payment Service (SBPS), a subsidiary of Japanese telco giant SoftBank Corp, at a valuation of $290 million. Nomupay makes it easier for merchants to process cross-border payments across the fragmented payment system in Asia, as well as for merchants and their customers in Europe, MENA, and the U.S. The latest Series C funding round comes roughly five months after its previous $37 million Series B funding round at a…

TikTok announced on Tuesday that it’s officially launching TikTok for Artists, a new music insights platform that is designed to help artists build their careers. The official launch comes two months after TikTok was spotted testing the platform in select countries. The tool is built to help artists and their teams better connect with fans, improve their promotional efforts, and inform content creation on TikTok. The platform gives artists, their labels, and their teams access to data about the performance of the artist’s music and posts and TikTok. These metrics include the number of views, posts, and creator engagements per…

Joby Aviation has reached a tentative deal with investor and Saudi Arabian conglomerate Abdul Latif Jameel (ALJ) to distribute up to 200 electric aircraft valued at about $1 billion over the coming years.  If finalized, the partnership could provide Joby with a fast path to monetizing its electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicles in Saudi Arabia.  “A question that folks have asked is, how are you going to monetize, and how quickly is that going to happen?” Paul Sciarra, the executive chairman of Joby’s board who’s most known for co-founding Pinterest, told TechCrunch. “And I think what this shows is…

Anna Barclay | Getty ImagesPresident Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform moved a step closer to having a bitcoin exchange-traded fund available to everyday investors. NYSE Arca, the all-electronic arm of the New York Stock Exchange that handles most ETF trading, filed on Tuesday to list a bitcoin fund linked to the president’s media company, the latest sign of Trump’s expanding push into the crypto world. Known as a 19b-4 form, the filing is required before regulators can decide whether to allow the fund to launch and trade on a U.S. exchange.Called the Truth Social Bitcoin ETF, the fund is designed…