Meta is shutting down a video speed-dating service it had tested over a good part of last year, the company informed the service’s users via a recent email. Last April, the company formerly known as Facebook confirmed it was testing a new dating service called Sparked, which was developed by its in-house incubator, the NPE […]
Music app AmpMe lowers pricing after accused of being an App Store scammer
Around the same time Apple was touting its sizable App Store revenue growth this week, developer and noted App Store critic Kosta Eleftheriou brought to light what appeared to be yet another App Store scammer hiding in plain sight. On Twitter, Eleftheriou documented the earnings for a music syncing app called AmpMe, which claims to […]
Apple paid out around $60 billion to App Store developers in 2021
Despite facing numerous antitrust lawsuits and tighter regulations in certain markets, Apple today reported new figures indicating record App Store growth in 2021. The company in a press release said it has now paid out more than $260 billion to app developers since the App Store first launched in 2008, a number that’s up from […]
How the mobile app ecosystem adapted to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact the mobile app ecosystem, according to an annual retrospective released today by app intelligence firm Sensor Tower. In the early days of the pandemic, a number of apps saw rapidly increased usage — like that focused on online shopping, entertainment, business and education, for example. Though much of the […]
Tinder is developing a feature called ‘Swipe Party’ that invites friends to join your swiping sessions
Tinder confirmed it’s exploring the development of a new feature called Swipe Party which offers a way to make sorting through possible matches a more social experience. According to details spotted in the Tinder mobile app’s code, Swipe Party requires access to the phone’s camera and microphone so your friends can “see and hear you […]
Meta’s Oculus VR companion app gained ~2M downloads since Christmas
Consumers worldwide have downloaded Meta’s Oculus app, the mobile companion for Oculus VR devices including the Quest 2, roughly 2 million times globally since Christmas Day, according to new data from third-party app intelligence firms, Apptopia and Sensor Tower. Already, had been some indication that the Quest 2 was a popular holiday gift after the […]
TikTok to rank as the third largest social network, 2022 forecast notes
A new forecast has dubbed TikTok as the world’s third-largest social network, just behind Facebook and Instagram. In its inaugural forecast on TikTok’s global install base, Insider Intelligence — the firm previously known as eMarketer — predicts that TikTok will reach 755.0 million monthly users in 2022, after seeing 59.8% growth in 2020, followed by […]
Amazon fixes its broken Appstore on Android 12 devices, which caused issues with apps launching
Amazon says it has fixed an issue with its Amazon Appstore that was causing issues with app launches for customers who had upgraded to Android 12 on their mobile devices. Earlier this month, reports began to circulate that Amazon’s Appstore was still not functional on Android 12 following its fall release. Users reported that not […]
This Week in Apps: Apple’s App Privacy Report arrives, Google details Android 12 Go edition, Instagram tops 2B users
Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry continues to grow, with a record number of downloads and consumer spending across both the iOS and Google Play stores combined in 2021, according to the […]
Spotify acquires podcast tech company Whooshkaa which turns radio broadcasts into on-demand audio
Spotify is continuing its investments in podcasts with today’s news that’s it’s acquired another podcast technology company, Whooshkaa, an Australia-based all-in-one platform for hosting, managing, distributing, promoting, monetizing and measuring podcasts. The deal follows Spotify’s earlier acquisitions in the podcast technology market, including last year’s deal for hosting and ad company Megaphone, and, more recently, […]