After adding 15 hours of free audiobooks listening to its subscription plan late last year, Spotify today is introducing a $9.99 per month option that will allow its free users to also access its audiobooks collection.
With the addition, free Spotify users will able to continue to stream music and podcasts via its ad-supported service, but pay to listen to audiobooks without having to buy a Spotify subscription.
However, the move could allow Spotify to upsell audiobooks to customers who aren’t as interested in its music service, or who regularly use another app for that.
15 hours is fairly generous, as it often encompasses more listening time than one audiobook alone, if not two shorter books.
The company today also offered an update on the interest that free users have for audiobooks, noting that since launching audiobooks for its Premium subscribers, it’s seen a 45% increase in free users searching for and interacting with audiobook content each day.
Telegram CEO and founder Pavel Durov announced today that the company is launching its ad platform next month, allowing channel owners to receive financial rewards.
In March, the Telegram Ad Platform will open to channel owners in nearly one hundred countries, marking a major shift toward content monetization.
“Similar to our approach with Telegram usernames on Fragment, we will sell ads and share revenue with channel owners in Toncoin.
YouTube offers a 55% share of ad revenue to creators in the YouTube Partner Program, while X started offering revenue sharing to users in July 2023.
Telegram has more than 800 million monthly active users around the world, and Telegram users generate over 500 billion views in broadcast channels every month.
Media streamer Plex’s long-delayed plans to launch a marketplace for TV and movie rentals are finally being realized after multiple false starts.
The media startup originally announced its plan to expand its streaming service to include rentals just ahead of the Covid-19 pandemic, which impacted launch plans alongside other technical concerns.
Then, at CES a year ago, Plex said the rentals market was due for a second-quarter launch.
With those headaches behind it, the rentals service is finally nearing launch — for real this time, Plex says.
In addition to the TVOD store, the report noted Plex’s plans for the year ahead included a redesign and additional social features, too.
That’s up to your Spotify Daylist, an algorithmically-generated playlist inspired by your listening habits, which changes several times per day.
With the sudden uptick in posts about Spotify’s Daylists, you’d think that the feature only just came out, but it actually launched in September.
The Instagram template positions Daylists as a new, more specific form of astrology, which is apt, because astrology and Daylists have the same appeal.
Spotify’s hyper-personalized, algorithmic features — from Spotify Wrapped to Daylists — are capitalizing on this same impulse.
And yet, time and time again, Spotify’s corporate leadership proves that it’s not in it for the love of music, nor podcasts.
OpenAI is launching a new subscription plan for ChatGPT, its viral AI-powered chatbot, aimed at smaller, self-service-oriented teams.
Aptly called ChatGPT Team, the plan provides a dedicated workspace for teams up to 149 people using ChatGPT as well as admin tools for team management.
ChatGPT Team also lets people within a team build and share GPTs, custom apps based on OpenAI’s text-generating AI models.
ChatGPT Team is priced at $30 per user per month or $25 per user per month billed annually — higher than ChatGPT Plus, OpenAI’s individual premium ChatGPT plan, which costs $20 per month.
ChatGPT Team seems tailor-made for small- and medium-sized business customers who want team-oriented ChatGPT features without having to pay top dollar for them.
Apple Music Classical to launch in China, Japan, Taiwan and more on Jan 24Starting on January 24, Apple Music Classical will be available in China, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau.
Apple’s classical music app launched in most countries in March 2023, except for select markets like the above six countries.
Additionally, Apple Music Classical was originally only an iOS-only app but arrived on Android devices this past summer.
Apple Music Classical gives Apple Music subscribers free access to over five million tracks, more than 700 curated playlists, exclusive albums, high-quality audio and more.
A standard Apple Music subscription costs $10.99 per month in the U.S., whereas a student plan costs $5.99 per month, and the Family tier is priced at $16.99 per month.
Audiobooks.com offers a 30 day free trial that comes with three free audiobooks.
The platform lets you download titles for offline reading and listening, and allows you access titles across four devices.
Spotify has started giving Premium members 15 hours of free audiobook listening every month.
Many best sellers fall under 15 hours, which means you can enjoy a free audiobook every month.
Libro.fmLibro.fm is an interesting audiobook app because it lets you buy audiobooks while supporting your local bookstores.
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