Snapchat’s found an answer to the revenue problem stemming from its halted growth: it will show its ads in other apps with the launch of Snapchat Ad Kit and the Snapchat Audience Network. And rather than watching as other apps spin up their own knock-off versions of its camera and Stories, it will let apps like Tinder and Houseparty host Stories inside their own products that users can share to from the Snapchat camera with Stories Kit. They’ll both be launching later this year, and developers interested in monetization and engagement help can apply for access.
Snapchat debuted the big new additions to its Snap Kit at its first-ever press event in Los Angeles, the Snap Partner Summit where it also announced a new augmented reality utility platform called Scan. Over 200 apps have already integrated the privacy-safe Snap Kit that lets users login to other apps with Snapchat, bring their Bitmoji, view Our Stories content, and share stickers back to Snapchat.
But later this year, developers will be able to earn money off of Snap Kit with Ad Kit. Developers will integrate Snapchat’s SDK, and then Snap’s advertisers will be able to extend their ad buys to reach both Snapchat users and non-users in other apps. Snapchat will split the ad revenue with developers, but refused to hint at what the divide will be, as it’s still gauging developer interest. The move is straight out of Facebook’s playbook, essentially copying the functionality and name of Facebook’s Audience Network.
There are still big questions about exactly how Snapchat will reach and track ad views of non-users, and how it will be able to provide brands with the analytics they need while maintaining user privacy. But simply by making Snapchat’s somewhat proprietary vertical vdieo ad units reusable elsewhere, it could prove it has a scale to be worth advertisers’ time. The lack of scale has often scared buyers away from Snapchat. But now Snap CEO Evan Spiegel says that “In the United States, Snapchat now reaches nearly 75 percent of all 13-34 year-olds, and we reach 90 percent of 13-24 year-olds. In fact, we reach more 13-24 year-olds than Facebook or Instagram in the United States, the UK, France, Canada, and Australia.”
To keep those users engaged even outside of Snapchat, it’s adding App Stories through Story Kit. Snapchat users will see an option to share to integrated apps after they create a photo or video. Those Stories will then appear in custom places in other apps. You’ll see Snaps injected alongside people’s photos when you’re browsing potential matches in Tinder. You can see what friends on group chat social network Houseparty are doing when they not on the app. And you can see video recommendations from explorers on AdventureAide.
Snap also has some other fun new integrations and big name partnerships. Bitmoji Kit will bring your personalized avatar off your phone and onto FitBit’s smart watches and Venmo transactions. Netflix will let you share preview images (but not trailers) from its shows to your Snapchat Story. A new publisher sharing button for the web will let you share articles from the Washington Post and others to your Story.
By colonizing other apps with its experience, Snapchat decreases the need for them to copy it. Instead they get the original, and a lot less development work. And the platform makes your Snapchat account more valuable around the web. These integrations might not grow Snapchat too much, but it could help it keep its existing users happy and squeeze more cash out of them.
Snapchat’s found an answer to the revenue problem stemming from its halted growth: it will show its ads in other apps with the launch of Snapchat Ad Kit and the Snapchat Audience Network. And rather than watching as other apps spin up their own knock-off versions of its camera and Stories, it will let apps like Tinder and Houseparty host Stories inside their own products that users can share to from the Snapchat camera with Stories Kit. They’ll both be launching later this year, and developers interested in monetization and engagement help can apply for access.
Snapchat debuted the big new additions to its Snap Kit at its first-ever press event in Los Angeles, the Snap Partner Summit where it also announced a new augmented reality utility platform called Scan. Over 200 apps have already integrated the privacy-safe Snap Kit that lets users login to other apps with Snapchat, bring their Bitmoji, view Our Stories content, and share stickers back to Snapchat.
But later this year, developers will be able to earn money off of Snap Kit with Ad Kit. Developers will integrate Snapchat’s SDK, and then Snap’s advertisers will be able to extend their ad buys to reach both Snapchat users and non-users in other apps. Snapchat will split the ad revenue with developers, but refused to hint at what the divide will be, as it’s still gauging developer interest. The move is straight out of Facebook’s playbook, essentially copying the functionality and name of Facebook’s Audience Network.
There are still big questions about exactly how Snapchat will reach and track ad views of non-users, and how it will be able to provide brands with the analytics they need while maintaining user privacy. But simply by making Snapchat’s somewhat proprietary vertical vdieo ad units reusable elsewhere, it could prove it has a scale to be worth advertisers’ time. The lack of scale has often scared buyers away from Snapchat. But now Snap CEO Evan Spiegel says that “In the United States, Snapchat now reaches nearly 75 percent of all 13-34 year-olds, and we reach 90 percent of 13-24 year-olds. In fact, we reach more 13-24 year-olds than Facebook or Instagram in the United States, the UK, France, Canada, and Australia.”
To keep those users engaged even outside of Snapchat, it’s adding App Stories through Story Kit. Snapchat users will see an option to share to integrated apps after they create a photo or video. Those Stories will then appear in custom places in other apps. You’ll see Snaps injected alongside people’s photos when you’re browsing potential matches in Tinder. You can see what friends on group chat social network Houseparty are doing when they not on the app. And you can see video recommendations from explorers on AdventureAide.
Snap also has some other fun new integrations and big name partnerships. Bitmoji Kit will bring your personalized avatar off your phone and onto FitBit’s smart watches and Venmo transactions. Netflix will let you share preview images (but not trailers) from its shows to your Snapchat Story. A new publisher sharing button for the web will let you share articles from the Washington Post and others to your Story.
By colonizing other apps with its experience, Snapchat decreases the need for them to copy it. Instead they get the original, and a lot less development work. And the platform makes your Snapchat account more valuable around the web. These integrations might not grow Snapchat too much, but it could help it keep its existing users happy and squeeze more cash out of them.
Point and shoot? No, point and interact. Snapchat can now help with your homework. The app’s camera is becoming the foundation of an augmented reality developer platform known as “Scan”. Snap today announced partnerships with Photomath to add the ability to solve math problems, and Giphy for detecting objects which then spawn related GIFs on screen. Scan will roll out to all Snapchat users soon, and developers interested in joining the platform can contact Snap.
Snapchat Scan spawns Giphy GIFs based on what’s around you
Previously, Snapchat’s camera could identify songs with Shazam and recognize objects so you could buy them on Amazon. But now instead of just offering a few scattered tools, Snapchat is crystallizing its plan to let you reveal hidden information about the world around you.
“Our camera lets the natural light from our world penetrate the darkness of the Internet . . . as we use the Internet more and more in our daily lives, we need a way to make it a bit more human” said Snap CEO Evan Spiegel at the company’s first ever press event, the Snap Partner Summit. There it also announced it would launch an ad network and power Stories in other apps.
Scan with Photomath solves math problems
Others like Blippar have tried to build AR utility platforms, but they lacked the community and daily use necessary to already be top of mind when people want to scan something. But Snap CEO Evan Spiegel today revealed that “In the United States, Snapchat now reaches nearly 75 percent of all 13-34 year-olds, and we reach 90 percent of 13-24 year-olds. In fact, we reach more 13-24 year-olds than Facebook or Instagram in the United States, the UK, France, Canada, and Australia.”
The comparison data comes Facebook’s ad manager estimates which aren’t always totally accurate. Still, the stats demonstrate that amongst the audience likely to explore the world via augmented reality, Snapchat is huge.
When users tap and hold on the Snapchat camera, they’ll start to Scan their surroundings. Answers to math equations will magically appear. If you view a $10 bill, Hamilton will come alive and sing a song from the musical. Scan a slice of pizza and a dancing Giphy pizza slice appears. Users will also see the new Snapchat AR Bar with dedicated buttons to Scan, create a lens, or explore the 400,000 AR Lenses created by Snapchat’s community. 75 percent of Snap’s 186 million daily users play with Lenses each day, combining into 15 billion total plays to date. Scan was built off the acquisition of a startup called Scan.me, which until now has powered Snap’s QR Snapcodes that let people add friends or unlock Lenses.
Snap’s new AR Bar
Outside of utility, Snapchat is also adding a slew of new creative AR features to keep that audience entertained and loyal that are launching today. For example, it’s launching Landmarkers, which uses point cloud data from user submitted Our Stories of major landmarks to power animated AR transformations of famous places. Now the Eiffel Tower, Buckingham Palace, LA’s Chinese Theater, DC’s Capitol Building, and NYC’s Flatiron Building can spew rainbows, shoot lightning, and more.
Snapchat’s new Landmarkers
For developers and Lens creators using Snap’s Lens Studio tools, Snap is launching new Creator Profiles where they can show off all the Lenses they’ve contributed. They’ll all have access to new AR templates for hand, body, and pet effects that take care of all the hardcore computer science. Creators just add in their graphical assets like a mustache for dogs, fireballs that shoot out of people’s hands, or rainbows that appear over someone when they hold their arms out.
Snapchat’s new Lens Creator profiles
Snap will even surface relevant community Lenses in the Lens Carousel based on what its Scans pick up. One place it falls short though is there’s no direct monetization opportunities for independent Lens creators, beyond Snap occasionally connecting the best AR artists to brands for paid Lens development deals. Snapchat admits it will need to create better incentives long-term.
At a big press briefing yesterday, the company’s top execs explained that growth isn’t Snapchat’s success metric any more. That’s convenient considering the launch of Instagram Stories cut Snap’s growth from 17 percent per quarter to it actually losing users and only stabilizing this quarter. Instead he says deepening user engagement, and thereby the ad revenue users generate, is Snap’s path forward.
The more Snap gets users playing with augmented reality filters and the better development tools it provides, the more brands and devs will pay to promote their Lenses in the Lens Carousel or through video ads where users swipe up to try a Lens.
But that engagement is also critical to beating Facebook and Instagram to the next phase of AR. Instagram Stories might have 500 million daily users, but they’re mostly applying AR to their face, not to interact with the world. Snapchat needs as many fun AR entertainment experiences like Landmarkers as possible to normalize AR exploration, which will unlock the potential of the Scan platform. That could one day fuel affiliate fees from AR commerce sales and other revenue streams.
Plus, Snapchat says Lenses are coded to be compatible with not just iOS and Android, but future AR hardware platforms. To build the biggest repository of AR experiences, Snapchat needs help, as I wrote two years ago that Snap’s anti-developer attitude was an augmented liability. Now it’s finally building the tools and platform to harness a legion of developers to fill the physical world with imaginary wonder. “If we can show the right Lens in the right moment, we can inspire a whole new world of creativity” concludes Snap co-founder Bobby Murphy
Point and shoot? No, point and interact. Snapchat can now help with your homework. The app’s camera is becoming the foundation of an augmented reality developer platform known as “Scan”. Snap today announced partnerships with Photomath to add the ability to solve math problems, and Giphy for detecting objects which then spawn related GIFs on screen. Scan will roll out to all Snapchat users soon, and developers interested in joining the platform can contact Snap.
Snapchat Scan spawns Giphy GIFs based on what’s around you
Previously, Snapchat’s camera could identify songs with Shazam and recognize objects so you could buy them on Amazon. But now instead of just offering a few scattered tools, Snapchat is crystallizing its plan to let you reveal hidden information about the world around you.
“Our camera lets the natural light from our world penetrate the darkness of the Internet . . . as we use the Internet more and more in our daily lives, we need a way to make it a bit more human” said Snap CEO Evan Spiegel at the company’s first ever press event, the Snap Partner Summit. There it also announced it would launch an ad network and power Stories in other apps.
Scan with Photomath solves math problems
Others like Blippar have tried to build AR utility platforms, but they lacked the community and daily use necessary to already be top of mind when people want to scan something. But Snap CEO Evan Spiegel today revealed that “In the United States, Snapchat now reaches nearly 75 percent of all 13-34 year-olds, and we reach 90 percent of 13-24 year-olds. In fact, we reach more 13-24 year-olds than Facebook or Instagram in the United States, the UK, France, Canada, and Australia.”
The comparison data comes Facebook’s ad manager estimates which aren’t always totally accurate. Still, the stats demonstrate that amongst the audience likely to explore the world via augmented reality, Snapchat is huge.
When users tap and hold on the Snapchat camera, they’ll start to Scan their surroundings. Answers to math equations will magically appear. If you view a $10 bill, Hamilton will come alive and sing a song from the musical. Scan a slice of pizza and a dancing Giphy pizza slice appears. Users will also see the new Snapchat AR Bar with dedicated buttons to Scan, create a lens, or explore the 400,000 AR Lenses created by Snapchat’s community. 75 percent of Snap’s 186 million daily users play with Lenses each day, combining into 15 billion total plays to date. Scan was built off the acquisition of a startup called Scan.me, which until now has powered Snap’s QR Snapcodes that let people add friends or unlock Lenses.
Snap’s new AR Bar
Outside of utility, Snapchat is also adding a slew of new creative AR features to keep that audience entertained and loyal that are launching today. For example, it’s launching Landmarkers, which uses point cloud data from user submitted Our Stories of major landmarks to power animated AR transformations of famous places. Now the Eiffel Tower, Buckingham Palace, LA’s Chinese Theater, DC’s Capitol Building, and NYC’s Flatiron Building can spew rainbows, shoot lightning, and more.
Snapchat’s new Landmarkers
For developers and Lens creators using Snap’s Lens Studio tools, Snap is launching new Creator Profiles where they can show off all the Lenses they’ve contributed. They’ll all have access to new AR templates for hand, body, and pet effects that take care of all the hardcore computer science. Creators just add in their graphical assets like a mustache for dogs, fireballs that shoot out of people’s hands, or rainbows that appear over someone when they hold their arms out.
Snapchat’s new Lens Creator profiles
Snap will even surface relevant community Lenses in the Lens Carousel based on what its Scans pick up. One place it falls short though is there’s no direct monetization opportunities for independent Lens creators, beyond Snap occasionally connecting the best AR artists to brands for paid Lens development deals. Snapchat admits it will need to create better incentives long-term.
At a big press briefing yesterday, the company’s top execs explained that growth isn’t Snapchat’s success metric any more. That’s convenient considering the launch of Instagram Stories cut Snap’s growth from 17 percent per quarter to it actually losing users and only stabilizing this quarter. Instead he says deepening user engagement, and thereby the ad revenue users generate, is Snap’s path forward.
The more Snap gets users playing with augmented reality filters and the better development tools it provides, the more brands and devs will pay to promote their Lenses in the Lens Carousel or through video ads where users swipe up to try a Lens.
But that engagement is also critical to beating Facebook and Instagram to the next phase of AR. Instagram Stories might have 500 million daily users, but they’re mostly applying AR to their face, not to interact with the world. Snapchat needs as many fun AR entertainment experiences like Landmarkers as possible to normalize AR exploration, which will unlock the potential of the Scan platform. That could one day fuel affiliate fees from AR commerce sales and other revenue streams.
Plus, Snapchat says Lenses are coded to be compatible with not just iOS and Android, but future AR hardware platforms. To build the biggest repository of AR experiences, Snapchat needs help, as I wrote two years ago that Snap’s anti-developer attitude was an augmented liability. Now it’s finally building the tools and platform to harness a legion of developers to fill the physical world with imaginary wonder. “If we can show the right Lens in the right moment, we can inspire a whole new world of creativity” concludes Snap co-founder Bobby Murphy
Viva la revolution! And by that we mean the tech revolution taking place in mobility and transportation. If you’re an early-stage startup founder in either field, don’t miss your chance to demo your company in front of top influencers at TC Sessions: Mobility 2019. It’s a prime opportunity to showcase your tech startup in front of a very large, very targeted audience — the mobility and transportation industry’s movers and shakers. Why wait? Book a demo table right now.
TC Sessions: Mobility 2019 takes place on July 10 in San Jose, Calif. More than 1,000 members of the mobility community — founders, technologists, engineering students and investors — will gather for a day-long intensive event featuring speakers, panel discussions, demos, workshops and world-class networking.
TechCrunch editors will interview some of the best minds and makers in this rapidly evolving field. They’ll challenge assumptions and deflate the hype to provide a clearer understanding of the current state of mobility — and what the future holds.
Exciting as it may be, mobility raises complex issues and challenges — from human impact and infrastructure to regulatory concerns and capital investment. We won’t shy away from the big issues — we’ll dig in and hear from the people who are making it happen.
Case in point, we recently announced our first speaker — Dave Ferguson, the CEO of the autonomous delivery startup Nuro. An early pioneer of self-driving vehicle technology, Ferguson has worked on robotics and machine learning for nearly 20 years, owns more than 100 patents and served as the machine learning and computer vision team lead on Google’s self-driving program (now known as Waymo).
The auto industry alone is undergoing a seismic shift toward investing in car sharing, ride hailing, on-demand shuttles and even subscription services. Traditional paradigms around producing, selling and buying cars are changing and — along with a serious uptick in electric vehicle ownership — creating huge opportunities for tech startups.
Things start to get exponential when you add breakthroughs in AI, robotics, drone technology and autonomous delivery bots. What started as the horseless carriage may soon be a flying taxi. TC Sessions Mobility 2019 is the place to explore the intricacies of these topics and connect with the best minds in your community.
We’re still building our agenda and adding to our roster of speakers, many of whom will demonstrate their technology on our stage. Here’s a radical thought. If you want to be considered for a spot — or nominate someone else — submit your application right here. We’ll announce the participants of our fireside chats, panels and workshops in the coming weeks.
TC Sessions: Mobility 2019 takes place on July 10, and this is your chance to showcase your early-stage mobility startup in front of mobility’s best and brightest founders, investors and technologists. Reserve your demo table today.
Looking for sponsorship opportunities? Contact our TechCrunch team to learn about the benefits associated with sponsoring TC Sessions: Mobility 2019.
Last month, it became widely known that Myspace has lost much of the user data uploaded to it before 2016, including potentially millions of music tracks from between 2003 to 2015. This is a significant loss for people who may not have used the site anymore, but took for granted that it would remain an online scrapbook of the years when Myspace was the go-to social network, including for musicians promoting their work. A new collection of MP3s hosted by the Internet Archive, however, may help some users recover lost music (and memories).
ANNOUNCING THE MYSPACE MUSIC DRAGON HOARD, a 450,000 song collection of mp3s from 2008-2010 on MySpace, gathered before they were all “deleted” by mistake. https://t.co/oIunuHF7wc includes a link to a special custom search and play mechanism that lets you search and play songs. pic.twitter.com/aGkFPDBN7r
Called the MySpace Music Dragon Hoard, the collection contains 450,000 songs. While this is just a small percentage of the tracks reportedly lost (according to estimates, up to 53 million songs from 14 million artists were deleted), it contains early work from now-famous artists including Donald Glover and Katy Perry, as Twitter user @pinkpushpop discovered:
This is so cool! I’ve already found early clips from Donald Glover, 2 Chainz, Katy Perry, Nicki Minaj, Jeffree Star, Rza, Pitbull and others.
There’s even some that you can’t find anywhere else, that would have been lost to the interwebs. This is amazing!
Jason Scott of the Internet Archivesaid on Twitter that the set was compiled by “an anonymous academic group who were studying music networks and grabbed 1.3 terabytes of mp3s to study from MySpace in roughly 2008-2010 to do so.” After learning about the data loss, they offered the collection to Scott.
Amazon is officially joining the race to create a network of satellites in low earth orbit that will provide high-speed terrestrial internet services.
The company has filed its first papers with the U.S. government for approval to launch a network of 3,236 satellites through a subsidiary called Kuiper Systems LLC, according to a report in GeekWire.
“Project Kuiper is a new initiative to launch a constellation of Low Earth Orbit satellites that will provide low-latency, high-speed broadband connectivity to unserved and underserved communities around the world,” Amazon confirmed in a statement. “This is a long-term project that envisions serving tens of millions of people who lack basic access to broadband internet. We look forward to partnering on this initiative with companies that share this common vision.”
Space satellite orbiting the earth. Elements of this image furnished by NASA.
Named for an astronomer who’s considered “the father of modern planetary science“, Gerard Kuiper; Kuiper Systems is the latest foray into space-based internet networking by a U.S. tech giant.
In February, OneWeb, another company that’s expecting to create a network of satellites to provide high-speed internet access successfully launched its first satellites. The company has raised at least $3 billion, according to CrunchBase, from investors including Virgin, Coca Cola, and the Bharti Group — and they’re not the only company to raise several billion dollars to develop these services.
In December, the company set out to raise another $500 million to support its Starlink program, which would create a network of 11,000 satellites to cover the globe with internet connectivity. To date, the company has launched just two prototype satellites, even though earlier reports stated SpaceX, at one time, projected it would have 400 satellites in orbit by the end of 2018.
Finally, the social networking giant, Facebook has been working on satellite capabilities of its own. In a May report, the IEEE Spectrum laid out how Facebook had set up a small subsidiary called PointView Tech, which was developing a new satellite called “Athena” that could deliver data ten times faster than SpaceX’s Starlink satellites.
Amazon’s journey Kuiper satellite service compliments the work that another Jeff Bezos company, Blue Origin, is conducting on the design, development and production of launch vehicles to take payloads into orbit.
Blue Origin has already signed contracts for a multi-launch agreement with Telesat — another company that’s . developing a low earth orbit constellation of satellites that will deliver fiber-like broadband services across the globe.
Tonal is today announcing its series C financing that it hopes will allow the company to bring its at-home gym to even more homes. The funding round shows investors’ excitement around the new generation of personal exercise equipment that combines on-demand training with smart features. Tonal, like Peloton, offer features previously unavailable outside of gyms and with this injection of capital, the company expects to build new personal features and invest in marketing and retail experiences.
L Catterton’s Growth Fund led the $45 million series C round and included investments from Evolution Media, Shasta Ventures, Mayfield, Sapphire Sport, and others also participated. This financing round brings the total amount raised to $90 million.
Tonal is based out of San Francisco, CA and was founded by Aly Orady in 2015. The company launched its strength-training product in 2018. The wall-mounted Tonal uses electromagnetism to simulate and control weight, allowing the slender device to replicate (and replace) a lot of weight-lifting machines.
The Tonal machine costs $2,995, and for $49 a month, Tonal offers members access to personal training sessions, recommended programs and workouts. Since launching, CEO Orady tells TechCrunch there have been virtually no returns. He says their customer care teams proactively work with members to ensure a good experience.
Orady is excited to have L Catterton participating in this financing round, saying their deep network and unparalleled experience building premium fitness brands globally is an incredibly exciting new resource for the company. The Connecticut-based investment firm helped fund in Peloton, ThirdLove, ClassPass, and The Honest Company.
“As the fitness landscape continues to evolve, we have seen a clear shift toward personalized, content-driven, at-home workout experiences,” said Scott Dahnke, Global Co-CEO of L Catterton said in a released statement. “Tonal is the first connected fitness brand focused on strength training and represents an opportunity to invest behind an innovative concept with tremendous growth potential. We look forward to leveraging our deep knowledge of consumer behavior and significant experience in the connected fitness space to bring Tonal’s dynamic technology and content platform to more homes across the country.”
Tonal shares a market with Peloton, and Orady says a significant amount of Tonal owners also own Peloton equipment. Yet, feature-by-feature, Peloton, and Tonal are different. While they’re both in-home devices that offer on-demand instructors, Peloton targets cardiovascular exercises while Tonal is a strength-training machine. Orady states his customers find the two companies offer complementary experiences.
“The common thread with our members is that they understand the value of investing in their fitness and overall health,” said Aly Orady, “All of our members are looking to take their fitness to the next level with strength training. Tonal offers the ability to strength train at home by providing a comprehensive, challenging full body workout without having to sacrifice quality for convenience.”
This is an enormous market he says the company can rely on for years to come. The majority of Tonal’s customers are between 30 and 55 years old and live in, or adjacent to, the top 10 major metro US markets. There’s an even split, he says, between male and female members.
Tonal is similar to Mirror, another at-home, wall-mounted exercise device that costs $1,495. While Tonal focuses on strength training through resistance, Mirror offers yoga, boxing, Pilates and other exercises and activities with on-demand instruction and real-time stats. Mirror also launched in 2018 and the company has raised $40 million.
Going forward Tonal expects to expand its software to provide new personalization features to its members. The hope is to build experiences that motivate users while serving up real-time feedback. This includes building new workout categories and additional fitness experiences even when users traveling and do not have access to their Tonal machine.
The company sees it expanding its retail and marketing presence. Right now, just eight months after the product’s debut, customers have very limited access to try the Tonal machine. It’s only on display at Tonal’s flagship San Francisco store and is coming to a pop-up store in Newport Beach, California.
Orady tells TechCrunch the company needs new talent to help the company achieve its mission. Tonal is hiring and looking to hire in hardware, software, design, video production, and marketing.
At-home exercise equipment is a massive market and Tonal offers a unique set of features and advantages that should allow it to stand apart from competitors. This isn’t just another treadmill. Tonal is a strength-training super machine the size of a thick HDTV. Challenges abound but the company seemingly has a solid plan to utilize its latest round of financing that should allow it to reach more customers and show them why the Tonal machine is worth the cost.
If you’re an avid traveler and you haven’t heard of Airbnb before, you’re missing out on one of the best travel accommodation sites out there. Airbnb can be a great financial benefit, whether you’re saving money on your next trip or earning some with your own property!
Let’s take a look at how Airbnb works and how you can save (or make) money with it.
What Is Airbnb?
Airbnb aims to match two kinds of people together; those who have empty beds or houses that aren’t being used, and those who need a place to stay while on holiday.
Airbnb isn’t really designed for people who want a bed for a night—while it can accommodate those kinds of people, you may find a hotel will suit you better. What Airbnb does offer, however, is a place to stay if you’re looking to stay for several days or weeks in a row.
At the same time, if you have some extra space in your home (or even an entire home) that you’re not using right now, you can loan it out to people who need somewhere to stay for a few nights.
That’s not to say Airbnb is the only website that offers this service. We’ve covered plenty more websites on our guide to high-quality alternatives to Airbnb.
What Is Airbnb Plus?
Airbnb Plus is the luxury option for travelers. Homeowners with a very high reputation on Airbnb can apply to have their residence marked as an Airbnb Plus. This is an extra level of authenticity that lets travelers know that these accommodations are of a very high standard.
How Airbnb Can Be Better Than a Hotel
While Airbnbs are not always better than hotels, there are practical reasons why you’d want to use one over the other.
For starters, Airbnb allows you to personalize your location. Why stay at a soulless hotel when you can rent a home at your destination? By living like the locals do, you can experience how it feels to live in the country.
It also means you can explore the local shops and food stores while you’re on your trip. Why settle for a hotel breakfast when you can hit up the local cafe for an authentic start to the day? Being in an Airbnb gives you plenty of opportunities to mingle more with the local scene.
Airbnb also has a larger selection on offer. Not all of them will be strictly cheaper than a hotel, but with the variety of places to stay, you’re more likely to find a home that suits your budget level compared to a hotel. This makes it the perfect choice for someone who wants to save some extra cash for spending on the local shops!
For property owners, Airbnb can be a great way to rent out unused space temporarily. If you have a vacant property, a holiday home, or just a spare bedroom, you can talk to travelers and do short-term rentals to accommodate them during their trip.
The best part is, you get to set the price for your lodgings per night. This means you can set a price that you deem fair for your accommodation, and be matched with people who want to pay you that much to stay at your residence.
There are some cities and countries cracking down on Airbnb usage. This is because the service Airbnb provides is technically short-term renting, and with it comes its own web of legal issues.
As such, it’s worth double-checking if the destination you’re going to is okay with Airbnb before renting. Some unfortunate homeowners have met legal trouble after they unknowingly let out their properties without realizing it’s illegal in their city to do so.
How to Book a Place With Airbnb
Getting a place is very easy. Simply head over to the main site at airbnb.com, then enter the location, date of stay, and amount of people on the trip. Airbnb will then show you a list of every residence that’s available for that time.
When you find a place you like, click on it to see more details. Here, you can see all the charges that come with the residence, the amenities that come with it, and reviews of previous tenants. You can use all this information to gauge whether the residence is right for you or not.
Once you’ve found a place, you can get in contact with the owner. You can then arrange the details of booking the place to stay on your arrival.
How to Host Your Place on Airbnb
Listing a place is a little more complex than booking one, but it isn’t too tricky. When you’re on the main site, click the Host a home text at the top right. Then, log into the site to begin the listing process.
The site will ask you questions about the property, so it’s a good idea to prepare the details beforehand. It will ask you what the property type is (house, flat, etc), the address, the number of bedrooms and bathrooms in it, if it’s a dedicated guest house or if you own belongings there, and other details. You should also get photos ready so that your potential guests know what the location looks like.
You can set your schedule. This allows you to dictate when people are allowed in your residence. For example, if you only want to let it on weekdays, or you have family using the residence for a specific week, you can forgo it on the calendar. That way, if people look for properties for a period that crosses over your forbidden dates, your property won’t appear in their search.
Is Airbnb Safe?
This is the big question for first time renters and travelers. Airbnb is an aggregator, so experiences around the world vary. But in general, Airbnb comes with several benefits.
Airbnb Safety for Renters
Before you rent a home on Airbnb, you should ask yourself one question; are you totally fine with living in a strangers house for a few days? If the answer is no, or you feel unsure, Airbnb is not for you!
Airbnb is a great way to pair up travelers with strangers who have places to stay, but that’s just who they are; strangers. You may find you’re staying in a spare room owned by someone you don’t trust.
When you feel like that, getting a place in a hotel can be safer. You have doors which you can lock yourself and you’re not obligated to meet anyone past the receptionist.
Even if you rent a house where the owner is out (such as an out-of-season holiday home), the house itself may not abide by safety regulations. Problems such as mold and mildew could be lurking without your knowledge.
Airbnb Safety for Homeowners
At the same time, Airbnb isn’t perfectly safe for homeowners either. It takes one bad egg to enter your home and cause serious property damage. Though, Airbnb does provide Host Protection Insurance against unexpected damages.
But it’s a good idea to not let out any home you can’t really afford to maintain. While Airbnb can be a great income maker, your property can also drain your finances as you keep the place running.
From accidental breakages to deliberate theft, there’s a lot that can happen while someone is staying in your property. It’s up to you to decide how often you’ll let guests stay and for how long.
Get Smart With Your Travel Plans
If you want a more personal and cheaper residence to stay at while you travel, Airbnb is a good choice. Of course, it’s not perfect, so be sure to exercise your own diligence when using the service!
For any kind of trip, it’s always better to plan before you travel with all the tools available on the web.
unRAID is one of the operating systems that is used by some of the biggest names in the tech YouTube industry such as MKBHD and LinusTechTips. But what makes it so special?
In this article, we’ll cover unRAID’s unique way of storing data and why it’s so efficient. We’ll also cover some of the other core features that make it the best home NAS and media server.
1. unRAID Keeps Your Data Safe
unRAID is unlike traditional RAID for a few reasons. In most RAID cases when you write a file to a RAID array more than one disk will spin up, and data is striped across several drives. So even a single file could exist on more than one drive.
Because RAID uses more than one drive in the reading and writing of data, there is a performance benefit. RAID also offers a degree of safety. RAID5 can sustain the loss of a single drive, with RAID6 being able to cope with the loss of two drives.
RAID is still susceptible to catastrophic failure. If you were to lose two drives in a RAID5 array, you might not be able to get any of your data back. This is because the entirety of the data is dependent on the other disks. If you took out a single drive from a RAID5 array and plugged it into a computer, you won’t be able to see anything meaningful because the data is striped.
Another consideration with RAID is that the smallest drive limits the size of the array. This can limit how you can upgrade the size of a RAID array. Additionally, it may not be possible to add a single drive and increase the size of the array.
unRAID’s Storage Method
A network share in unRAID can span multiple disks, but it manages the data quite differently compared to traditional RAID. unRAID can be configured to have up to two parity drives. Similar to traditional RAID this will prevent data loss if up to two drives die keeping your data safe.
When you write a file to a share in unRAID, only a single disk spins up along with the parity disks to write the data. So a single file will always only exist on a single drive. Because the data isn’t striped across multiple drives, you can take a single drive that was in an unRAID array, plug it into a computer and see what was on that drive.
There is a trade-off with storing the data in this method in that the performance for reading and writing data is limited to the speed of a single drive. However, unRAID mitigates against this by allowing you to use an SSD as a cache drive.
In unRAID if one of your disks had to die, you could plug in another drive, and it will rebuild the data that was on that drive. However, if you were to lose more than one drive, you could still plug the remaining drives into a computer to retrieve what’s there.
This gives unRAID the edge for keeping your data safe.
2. unRAID Is Efficient
unRAID may not be as performant as traditional RAID, but it’s far more efficient. There is a huge reduction in power consumption because all the drives aren’t spinning to read and write data.
unRAID is also efficient in how you can expand the size of the array. You can add a drive of any size, and it will increase the size of the array by that size, even if it doesn’t match the size of the other disks. As long as you make sure that your parity drive is equal to or larger than the biggest drive in your array, your data will be safe.
unRAID’s base configuration requires only 2GB of RAM and a 1GHz processor. At idle, barely any RAM or CPU are used. The above image shows resource usage on a server with an Intel i7-4770 processor and 16GB of RAM.
Under regular usage, like a video playing and a file being written simultaneously, unRAID still barely bats an eye. This shows how efficient unRAID is at managing its resources.
3. Virtual Machine Support
You may have found yourself in a situation where you need a PC and a NAS but just have the budget for one of them. Well, unRAID allows you to have your cake and eat it!
Fortunately, unRAID has native support for virtualization so any remaining resources your computer has can be used to run a virtual machine. unRAID also has native support for IOMMU groups.
These allow you to give a virtual machine direct access to a device connected to unRAID such as a GPU. This means you could create a virtual machine used for hardcore gaming and have near bare-metal performance as if it were running directly on your hardware. unRAID makes it possible to start your home lab or get into gaming using a single machine.
4. unRAID Has Excellent Application Support
unRAID has been built from the group up with Docker support. In a nutshell, Docker is a container platform which allows applications to run in a secure environment of their own. It’s currently the most widely adopted container platform by millions of developers globally, and it provides unRAID with access to thousands of apps.
Fortunately, many vendors provide Docker versions for their apps. This is important because it means you won’t have to rely on an independent developer to provide updates to future versions of the software as the companies themselves will maintain them.
Having Docker support also means you’re not locked into any proprietary applications. Many popular apps are already available such as:
Plex
Emby
OpenVPN
Owncloud
You’re able to turn your NAS into a powerful media server, private cloud-based storage, or file sharing downloader with just a few clicks. Docker on unRAID works seamlessly and provides an unparalleled level of versatility.
5. Your Hardware, Your Budget
One of the most significant advantages with unRAID is that it runs on regular PC hardware. This means that there’s no limit to how powerful you’d like to make your build as long as you’ve got the budget to match. If you require a NAS without virtualization or resource intensive apps, you may even be able to repurpose an older computer that you own.
Off the shelf NAS systems like QNAP and Synology can be difficult to upgrade or source replacement parts for. This is another advantage of using regular PC parts, as they’re more widely available.
You can even build a custom machine with used parts to squeeze a more powerful NAS out of your budget. Just be sure to check unRAID’s hardware requirements and compatibility before making your purchases.
Not Sold on unRAID? Check Out FreeNAS
There is one aspect that puts people off unRAID; there is a cost attached to it. But it is excellent value for money, and there is a 30-day trial you can use to try it for yourself. unRAID has an excellent community forum that you can use for both support and advice for your build.
You’ve thought of an idea, decided on a name, and you’re ready to get your site online. But first, you need to buy a domain name.
The problem? There are hundreds of domain registration companies out there. Which one should you choose?
If you want to know where to buy a domain name, keep reading. We’re going to look at some of the best domain name registrars on the web.
How to Buy a Domain Name
If you’re new to the process, the whole thing can sound a little scary. Domain names? Hosting Providers?
It’s easy to buy a domain name. Firstly, decide which of the best domain name registrars you’re going to use, then head to their site, create an account, enter the domain name you want.
Often, you will receive a discount if you purchase a multi-year registration. And make sure you keep an eye out for discount coupons. You can find coupons for many well-known domain registrars with a quick Google search.
After you’ve registered a domain, you’ll need to purchase hosting if you want to get your site online. Two options worth checking out are InMotion Hosting and Bluehost.
After its founding way back in 1997, GoDaddy has become the most recognizable brand in the sector.
GoDaddy offers one of the widest selections of top-level domains among the mainstream providers (for example, .com, .org, or .gov). Currently, 484 are available, including more than 150 country codes.
The availability of lots of country codes shouldn’t be underestimated—I’ve personally struggled to find domain registrars that accept .mx in the past.
GoDaddy also makes it easy to find the domain you want. There’s a bulk search service (allowing you to search for up to 500 domains at once) and a domain broker. The domain broker lets you make bids for domains owned by other people.
Even if you don’t want to create a website, GoDaddy lets you create an email address at your domain for an extra fee.
While GoDaddy’s 484 top-level domains might compare favorably with many of its mainstream competitors, it doesn’t come close to the amount on offer at 101domain.com.
If you register your domain with the company, you can choose from an incredible 1,830 different TLDs. That gives the company one of the largest selections in the world and means 101domain is definitely one of the best domain name registrars.
You can choose from city domains (.barcelona, .vegas, or.sydney), regional domains (.asia, .kiwi, etc.) religious domains, sports domains, employment domains, and a whole lot more.
Like GoDaddy, 101domains offers a bulk search tool.
Lots of people decide to register a new domain with the same company that they use for their hosting—especially if they’re only operating a single site.
The main benefit of this approach is the convenience factor. You have fewer accounts to manage, and billing is more straightforward.
Bluehost is one of the best hosting providers, so you could consider registering your domain there too. Some of Bluehost’s hosting plans will even let you register a new domain for one year for free.
On the downside, Bluehost’s domain services aren’t as feature-rich as other companies; there’s no bulk search or brokerage.
Another of the most highly-recommended hosting providers is InMotion. And like Bluehost, the company gives you a free domain name or free domain name transfer if you sign up for any of its 12- or 24-month hosting plans.
You might be wondering why we haven’t spent too long talking about price.
In truth, there’s not a great deal of difference between the different providers. The amount you pay for a specific domain name is going to be fairly similar everywhere (though many domain registrars offer frequent discounts, especially for new customers).
Instead, you need to base your decision on factors such as ease-of-use, support, and TLD choice.
With that in mind, Namecheap is also a great place to buy a domain name. Only a couple of hundred TLDs are available, but there’s a domain name marketplace where you can purchase domains from other people, as well as integrated Whois Lookup so you can find the name of the person who owns any given site.
Netim is another site which offers a vast number of TLDs; more than 800 are available.
The company is notably smaller than the giants like GoDaddy and Namecheap. It only has around 100,000 domain numbers under its management compared with the millions you will find with other companies.
We’ve included it in our list due to its cost. Although we just said the price isn’t a major consideration, if you really want to save a few cents, Netim is a service worth checking out. It frequently offers cheaper domain name renewals than you will find elsewhere.
Netim is also one of the few domain name registrars that accept Western Union payments, in case that’s a service you require.
HostGator is our final pick. Again, it’s a solid option if you want to register your domain and buy your hosting with the same company.
The company offers very competitive packages for newcomers, especially if you’re happy with an entry-level site that doesn’t have significant traffic. Some packages—which include hosting, email, and a domain name—are available for as little as $3.
There’s also an easy-to-use tool that lets you transfer a domain from another registrar. If you want HostGator to handle the transfer, it will cost $7.95.
The seven companies we have discussed in this article are all among the best domain name registrars on the web. Make sure you leave your favorite domain registrars in the comments.
And remember, once you’ve made your decision, registered a domain, and bought your hosting, it’s finally time to build your site. There are enough tutorials available that can guide you through this.
There are many well-paid and exciting careers in technology. The fastest growing niche is data science, with Linkedin reporting 150,000 unfilled roles in the US last year. If you want to break into this lucrative niche, the Complete Big Data Master Class Bundle should be your starting point. This learning library includes nine in-depth courses and over 37.5 hours of video tutorials. You can get the bundle now for just $35 at MakeUseOf Deals.
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RØDE, one of the largest companies in the world of high-end microphones, has just revealed the smallest digital wireless microphone and receiver on the market.
The device, which is called Wireless Go, will be on display at NAB 2019 in Las Vegas. However, we have some information available on the microphone now, and it looks quite exciting for anyone who creates content.
RØDE Wireless Go Features
The company has revealed a pretty exciting set of features for the new wireless microphone and receivers.
RØDE specifically cites filmmakers, vloggers, newsgatherers, on-camera presenters, and content creators of all disciplines as people who will enjoy the microphone. The key
According to RØDE, the system comes in two parts. First, there’s the receiver, which it calls RX. Then, there’s the transmitter, which it calls TX. The two parts work together to create tons of quality sound in a package that’s super tiny.
The receiver is incredibly tiny, measuring only 44mm x 45.3mm x 18.5mm and weighing just 31g. The transmitter is similar in size, coming in with dimensions of 44mm x 46.4mm x 18.5mm and weighing just 31g.
It can serve as a quick and easy clip-on microphone with its built-in omnidirectional condenser capsule, or it can act as a tiny wireless transmitter for a lavalier microphone.
The transmitter is meant to be easy to carry around since it’s so tiny. When compared to most other transmitters on the market, it’s absolutely tiny. It’s designed to sit on a camera’s shoe mount or clip onto an article of clothing, which makes it quite versatile for a wide range of shooting situations.
Other features:
3-stage output pad: 0, -6dB and -12dB
Series III 2.4GHz digital wireless transmission with 128-bit encryption
Up to 70m range (line-of-sight)
TX and RX have built-in rechargeable batteries, charged via USB-C
Up to 7 hours on a full charge
RØDE Wireless Go Price and Release Date
The company plans to ship the device in April, though it hasn’t revealed pricing information just yet. RØDE did cite “unmatched price accessibility,” though, which means it should be reasonable for content creators to get their hands on a set.
If you’re tired of hearing the standard Google Assistant voice you can now make Google Assistant sound like John Legend. If you’re now wondering who John Legend is you may want to click away to another article right about now. But everyone else should read on…
How to Enable John Legend’s Voice in Google Assistant
At Google I/O 2018, Google Assistant gained the ability to converse more naturally with users. Google also announced that Google Assistant was getting six new voices, including John Legend. It has taken longer than expected, but Legend’s voice is finally available.
Google is referring to John Legend’s voice as “a cameo”. This is because he hasn’t recorded every single response you might elicit from Google Assistant. Instead, he’ll answer certain questions, with the standard voice still doing the donkey work.
These questions include, “Are you John Legend?”, “What’s your favorite type of music?”, “Who is Chrissy Teigen?”, “What’s the temperature outside?”, and “Why is the sky blue?”. You can also ask, “Are we just ordinary people?” and instruct him to “Serenade me”.
According to The Keyword, you can enable John Legend’s voice in Google Assistant in two different ways. Either say, “Hey Google, talk like a Legend” or go to Settings > Assistant Voice, and select John Legend. This is currently only available in English in the U.S.
What Celebrities Should Google Ask Next?
Fans of John Legend will obviously lap this up. And everyone else can rest assured that Google is very likely to be adding more celebrity voices in the future. This may be a novelty, but it’s a novelty most people will appreciate to some degree.
WhatsApp has launched a new feature that prevents people adding you to group chats without your permission. Previously, anyone could add you to a group unless you blocked the group’s admin. Now, however, WhatsApp has put the power back in your hands.
In countries such as India and Brazil, WhatsApp has been used to spread misinformation quickly and easily. So, in response, in January 2019, WhatsApp placed limits on message forwarding. And now it is rolling out new privacy settings for groups.
The New Privacy Settings for WhatsApp Groups
According to the WhatsApp Blog, users have been asking for new ways to control their WhatsApp experience. And WhatsApp has listened. So from now on you’ll be able to choose one of three options with regards to privacy settings for groups.
These three options are “Nobody,” “My Contacts,” and “Everyone”. To enable this feature, update WhatsApp to the latest version, then go to Settings. Next, click Account > Privacy > Groups, and select which one of the three options suits you best.
“Everyone” keeps things as they are at the moment, with anyone able to add you to a group. “Nobody” means you’ll have to approve joining any group to which you’re invited. And “My Contacts” limits it to users you have in your address book.
These privacy controls aren’t particularly granular. WhatsApp could, for example, have let you choose particular contacts rather than lumping them all in together. However, this still represents an improvement over the former system where it was a free-for-all.
WhatsApp Fights Back Against Fake News
The ability to control who adds you to groups is the latest in a line of new WhatsApp features to combat fake news. And it’s unlikely to be the last. Fake news is causing real problems in the real world, so any attempt to fight it should be applauded.
If you have lots of locally saved media on your computer, Plex is a must-have piece of software. Unlike Kodi, it’s easy for beginners to set up and has apps available for every major operating system and media streaming device.
The other significant difference between Plex and Kodi is pricing. While Kodi is entirely free, Plex offers a paid tier. Called the Plex Pass, this paid tier introduces several additional features.
But do you actually need a Plex Pass? Is a Plex Pass worth it?
What Is a Plex Pass?
The basic Plex app is free on every platform, whereas the Plex Pass has three price tiers. You can pay $4.99/month, $39.99/year, or $149.99 for a lifetime subscription.
As you’d expect, there are numerous Plex Pass benefits that are unavailable on the free version of the app.
The most useful additions are arguably the Plex live TV and DVR offerings. If you add an antenna and tuner to your setup, you can watch and record any over-the-air channels in your area through the Plex app.
The Plex Pass also includes mobile syncing for offline viewing, support for multiple users, parental controls, movie trailers, and music features such as “mood mixes” and lyrics.
Clearly, these are all great features. However, for most users, they’re totally unnecessary. In fact, there’s a lot of misinformation out there. Many people believe you need a Plex Pass to perform certain tasks when the reality is different.
Do You Need a Plex Pass Subscription?
Here are five complex tasks you can perform without a Plex Pass.
1. Remote Streaming
One of Plex’s best attributes is its remote streaming function. It allows you to view all your media from anywhere in the world as long as you have the Plex app installed on the device you want to watch on.
This is especially useful for keeping the kids entertained when you’re away from home or if you spend a lot of time bouncing around hotels as part of your job. After all, there’s only so long you can watch MTV and international news channels before you start pulling your hair out.
However, the perception is that you need a Plex Pass to watch remotely. It’s not true. All users can stream remotely providing you’ve configured your Plex Server correctly. Head to Settings > Remote Access > Enable Remote Access to set it up.
In this regard, the Plex Pass is only useful if you’re going to be in a place with no internet—it lets you save content directly onto your device.
2. Use Plex on Mobile
If you want to access remote streaming on mobile rather than on a laptop, you’ll need to install the appropriate Plex app.
The app is free but has some restrictions. Each video and music file is limited to one minute of playback, and your photos will have a watermark added.
To remove the restrictions, you’ll be asked to pay a one-time fee of $4.99. It’s a fraction of the cost of a full Plex Pass. Of course, you don’t get access to any Plex Pass features, but if you just want to watch content on a tablet a few times per year, it’s more than adequate.
You can also access your Plex server using your mobile device’s web browser if you don’t want to pay the fee for the app.
3. Share Media Libraries
Are you the tech guru in your household? If you are, there’s a good chance you’ll want to share the benefits of Plex with the rest of your family.
But setting up Plex on lots of different devices is time-consuming. And, unless you’re willing to continually add new media to other people’s computers, it’s almost impossible to keep everyone updated.
Luckily, Plex lets you share your library with anyone. They don’t even have to be on the same network as you. Best of all, the feature doesn’t require a Plex Pass—all the other person needs is a free Plex account.
To share your library with friends and family, open your Plex Server app and make sure you are signed in, then go to Settings > Family and Friends> Sharing > Invite Friend. Fill in the person’s Plex credentials, and they will receive an invite in their email inbox.
4. Sync Content on Mobile
There’s an ongoing misconception about how mobile syncing works. As mentioned earlier, you need a Plex Pass if you want to download content onto your mobile device for offline viewing. That’s clear.
However, if you have a Plex Pass, anyone who you have shared your server with does not need a Plex Pass. As long as the server is registered against your account, they can download content for offline viewing. The upshot is that you probably only need a single Plex Pass per household (or even per family).
There’s just one catch. The other user will need to pay the aforementioned one-time fee of $4.99.
To allow other users to sync your content onto their device, open the Plex Server and navigate to Settings > Users > My Home > [Username] > Restrictions > Allow Sync.
5. Non-Mobile Plex Apps
All non-mobile Plex apps are entirely free to download and use. That includes the native apps for Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Roku, Xbox, PlayStation, and where applicable, smart TVs.
If you’re using the app on your local network or if you want to use a streaming dongle while you’re traveling, you don’t need a Plex Pass to access the benefits.
You can also access your Plex server from any Plex media player app without charge.
A Plex Pass Supports the Developers
You don’t need a Plex Pass to access any of the five features discussed above. However, if you love Plex, use it every day, and share your library with lots of other people, you should consider buying a Plex Pass anyway.
In addition to the extra functionality we discussed at the start of the article, you’re also helping to support the developers and fund the app’s long-term future. Remember, even the free version of Plex doesn’t include any ads; the Plex Pass is the company’s only form of income.
