Yahoo’s AI push isn’t slowing down anytime soon. The company, also TechCrunch’s parent, recently announced new AI-powered features for its Yahoo Mail service. These features include their own version of Gmail’s Priority Inbox and AI-generated summaries of emails. And now, Yahoo is expanding its AI efforts to its Yahoo News app.
The technology behind this AI push comes from the company’s latest acquisition, Artifact. The successful startup, created by Instagram’s founders, developed a popular AI news app that ultimately shut down due to limited reach. However, Yahoo is using their expertise in AI to enhance their Yahoo News app.
But the AI advancements don’t stop there. Yahoo is also testing a new AI summaries feature on their website. This feature is designed to quickly summarize news articles for readers, eliminating the need to read them in full.
“Our AI summaries on the web have been in testing for a few months,” Yahoo confirmed. “But they are currently only available on a small percentage of article pages on the Yahoo News website.”
This explains why many visitors to the Yahoo News site may not have encountered the AI summaries yet. The code used to implement this feature isn’t revealing much about the technology behind it. However, it appears to be presented to site visitors in a “lightbox,” a type of web component.
Yahoo has not revealed when this feature will launch publicly, nor have they shared details about the underlying technology. However, it’s worth noting that Yahoo does have a partnership with OpenAI for their Yahoo News mobile app, indicating a larger focus on AI across their platforms.
With the addition of AI-powered features on Yahoo Mail and the revamp of Yahoo News, it’s evident that Yahoo is using AI to breathe new life into their older web products and services. However, whether these efforts will attract a new audience remains to be seen.
