Hasta La Gadget!

Twitter is now offering a yearly discount on its Blue subscription service, according to a new support page spotted by The Verge. Web users can now sign up for $84 per year ($7 per month) and save a buck over the monthly $8 price. Similar discounts are available in other countries that offer Twitter Blue, including the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. 

Until now, Twitter Blue users only had the option of an $8 per month subscription via the web, or $11 month on iOS (passing Apple’s 30 percent fee onto the user). However, iOS users can still sign up on the web to save the extra $3. In that case, the new yearly subscription would save them 36 percent compared to signing up directly on iOS. 

A Twitter Blue subscription offers a number of perks, including a blue “verified” checkmark, higher ranking replies, 60-minute video uploads and more. Users can also undo and edit tweets, customize app icons, themes and navigations, bookmark tweets and more. You’ll need a phone number to sign up, and Twitter is supposed to verify your account to assure it’s not fraudulent or fake — something it failed at recently. 

The Elon Musk-owned social media network seems to need as many subscriptions as possible. According to a recent report on The Information, more than 500 of Twitter’s advertisers have paused spending on the site, and daily revenue on January 17th was down 40 percent compared to last year. 

In the first quarter of 2022 before Musk’s acquisition was finalized, Twitter reported sales of $1.2 billion, with $1.1 billion of that in advertising, and subscriptions (plus other revenue) making up the rest. 

TikTok is expanding its use of labels for state-run media accounts, the company announced. The app is now bringing the tags, which identify “accounts run by organizations whose editorial output or decision-making process is subject to control or influence by a government,” to dozens of markets.

The company is relatively late to adopt such labels compared with most of its counterparts. YouTube added similar labels in 2018, while Meta and Twitter adopted them in 2020. TikTok only began labeling state-run media accounts last March, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But the labels, which the company described as a “pilot,” only applied to accounts from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.

Now, TikTok says it has formalized its policy and “will begin applying our state-controlled media label in a phased approach, starting immediately with over 40 markets across multiple regions.” And while the company’s announcement doesn’t name specific countries, a TikTok spokesperson confirmed the labels will appear on accounts run by Chinese state media outlets.

TikTok

That’s notable as TikTok has long been viewed with suspicion by lawmakers and government officials over concerns about the company’s perceived ties to the Chinese government. Though TikTok has long pushed back on claims that its service could be a national security threat, the issue has proved to be a rare source of bipartisan agreement, and the app has recently been banned on federal government devices and some college campuses. Congress has also introduced bills for more sweeping bans, though their future is uncertain.

But by finally expanding its state-run media labels, TikTok can now claim it’s treating accounts affiliated with Chinese government entities the same as other state-controlled media organizations. Of course, the labels alone are unlikely to dispel critics’ suspicions of the company. TikTok has partnered with Oracle to review its recommendation and content moderation systems. Oracle has also partnered with the company on a broader effort, known as Project Texas, to restrict employees’ access to US user data.

Aston Martin may be retiring the DBS line, but it’s doing so in an awesome way with the DBS 770 Ultimate. We have all the details for you here.

“You have to love the irony. And the audacity, quite frankly,” Gregory Morey-Parker told the CNN anchor.

The animal was shot dead by another resident in the rural western village of Wales.