TechCrunch – Page 10

Humane’s AI Pin is dead, as HP buys startup’s assets for $116M

Humane announced on Tuesday that most of its assets have been acquired by HP for $116 million. The hardware startup is immediately discontinuing sales of its $499 AI Pins. Humane alerted customers who have already purchased the Pin that their devices will stop functioning before the end of the month — at 12 p.m. PST on February 28, 2025, according to a blog post. The news brings an end to the short-lived, buzzy hardware startup. Humane made a splash in April 2024 by launching its AI Pin, which it positioned as a smartphone replacement. The Bay Area startup, founded by ex-Apple employees Bethany Bongiorno and Imran Chaudhri, raised more than $230 million to create the device.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/02/18/humanes-ai-pin-is-dead-as-hp-buys-startups-assets-for-116m/

Adobe launches subscriptions for Firefly AI

Previously, Adobe offered many of Firefly’s AI tools within its existing Creative Cloud subscriptions, letting users try the new tools for no added cost. Users could upgrade to pricier plans if they wanted more access to Firefly, but they didn’t have to. That system worked well for Adobe: Firefly’s generative fill feature, added to Photoshop in 2023, has become one of the company’s most popular new features of the last decade. Now, Adobe wants to see if users will also pay up for its Firefly AI models.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/02/12/adobe-launches-firefly-ai-subscriptions/

TikTok influencers are wearing Apple Watches on their ankles

A report from The New York Times over the weekend highlights the small — but apparently growing — trend of users wearing their Apple Watches on their ankles. What’s becoming something of a viral sensation on social platforms like TikTok is the result of a pragmatic decision. Some Apple Watch owners’ wrists are simply too small to get a proper read with on-board sensors like heart-rate monitoring.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/02/10/tiktok-influencers-are-wearing-apple-watches-on-their-ankles/

Deepfake videos are getting shockingly good

According to the ByteDance researchers, OmniHuman-1 only needs a single reference image and audio, like speech or vocals, to generate a clip of an arbitrary length. The output video’s aspect ratio is adjustable, as is the subject’s “body proportion” — i.e. how much of their body is shown in the fake footage.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/02/04/deepfake-videos-are-getting-shockingly-good/

Supreme Court upholds TikTok ban

The Supreme Court has upheld the law that will effectively ban TikTok on Sunday, January 19. The decision marks the end of TikTok’s months-long legal fight against a law that essentially forces the ByteDance-owned app to shut down unless it divests its U.S. operations on national security grounds. As of Sunday, it will be illegal for app stores and internet hosting services to distribute the social network. TikTok has warned that the app will simply “go dark” on Sunday, but it’s unclear what exactly will happen once the ban takes effect.
https://techcrunch.com/2025/01/17/supreme-court-upholds-tiktok-ban/