Apps

Tumblr loves GIFs. So now it's making it even easier to create and post GIFs....

Periscope added GoPro support earlier this year, allowing drone owners to mount one of the cameras and live stream to the service. If you own one of the more recent DJI drones though, Periscope will now natively connect to the drone's remote to broadcast footage live. In an app update this week, the new feature will let you switch between the drone's camera and your iPhone camera, and even sketch on the video to highlight points of interest....

This week's list includes an app to schedule Uber rides, a new email app with a built-in assistant and a new messaging app.

BBM on Android and iOS now has video chat.

Twitter cofounder Biz Stone takes a second shot with Jelly, which he described as a failure in its first iteration.

Twitter co-founder Biz Stone is ready to take the wraps off Jelly 2.0, a reimagining of his failed Q&A app that's now less social network and more search engine. The product, now live for iOS and available on the web, allows you to ask questions anonymously and the app will then route the query to someone who will answer it. In a Medium blog post out today, Stone says his team is using artificial intelligence to get the question to someone Jelly thinks can answer it....

Talkshow, a new iOS app out today, wants people to open up the act of texting from a closed-door conversation to a public chat anyone can view. Created by former Twitter exec Michael Sippey, the app lets anyone create a "show" and start talking with friends. The thread, which operates much like a chat room, is viewable by anyone on Talkshow who follows you, but only those who are invited to the show may participate in the conversation. The idea is not too novel, but it is reacting to a specific desire:...

Earlier this month, TechCrunch reported that Yik Yak would soon be introducing a new feature designed to help the floundering app boost its user retention numbers: private chat. Today, the company confirmed the feature is now going live, along with the introduction of a new “Safety Center,” which will provide resources and tips focused on having a positive experience in the app.

Airtime, the group video-chatting service started in 2011 by Napster co-founder Sean Parker, is relaunching today as a free iOS and Android app. The app lets you create a room, invite others to join it, and then drop in any kind of media you like to experience it collectively with the group. After its short-lived existence as a website, Airtime is now putting its focus on competing with messaging products like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Snapchat, as well as the video-chat incumbents Skype and...

Social networks make us lonely, and messaging feels transactional. There’s still no vibrant, real-time place to hang out with friends online. That’s why four years after Sean Parker’s chat roulette website Airtime fell flat, he’s reviving it as a mobile chat room where friends can share photos, music, and videos that they all experience simultaneously.Launching on iOS…

Rolltape is a voice messaging app that’s supposed to help you share personal, emotional moments with friends. Now, with the launch of Rolltape Radio, it can help you share those stories on a broader scale.The change is pretty straightforward. Previously, Rolltape messages (which are recommended to be five minutes or less, but have no hard limit) could only be shared with friends…

This week's list includes Yahoo's new esports app, an app that tracks TV shows for you and an app that lets you put your face on celebrities' heads.

The social network wants you to get your news from Facebook instead of Twitter.

Apple on Thursday launched "Apps for Earth," an App Store promotion which will direct all of the proceeds from a small collection of apps and in-app transactions to the World Wildlife Fund during the month of April.

The gaming giant's first iOS offering is… a pseudo-social network?

If you’re a book lover, Litsy might be the social app for you.The startup was founded by Todd Lawton and Jeff LeBlanc, who previously launched the book-themed clothing company Out of Print. Lawton told me the idea for Litsy came from connecting with Out of Print fans at events like book festivals and comic book conventions.“We realized that there’s a really passionate…

Miitomo is now available to everyone. Today Nintendo released its first smartphone app — a quirky social network built in collaboration with Japanese mobile studio DeNA — globally, after it made its debut in Japan earlier in March. The app was downloaded more than one million times in its first three days of availability, causing Nintendo's stock to jump more than eight percent in Japan....

Which apps and wearables will get the best out of your fest.

Good news for people with boring friends — Facebook has once again hidden a minigame inside its Messenger app, this time to celebrate college basketball's March Madness tournament. To play, make sure you have the latest version of Facebook Messenger, then simply send a friend the basketball emoji. Once sent, press the ball, and be transported away from your conversation to a wonderful world where there's no baby photos, relationship drama, or Candy Crush invites â€” just a white screen, a basketball,...

Most social media platforms deter users from creating multiple profiles to prevent shenanigans like harassment and fraud. Galaxia, however, wants people to create a new profile (which it calls a “persona”) for each facet of their identity. Created by photo-sharing network Mobli, the new iOS app (an Android version is in the works) acknowledges that people present different faces to…

In situations where you might not feel threatened enough to call the police, but where you do want to reach out to a friend and say ‘something’s not right here’, freshly launched app Guardian Circle has your back. The idea is simple: you add your friends & local contacts to an alert list on the app. If something happens, you can send out an alert with various degrees…

No one else ever sees most of your camera roll. But if you’re brave enough, your close friends might enjoy peeking at every photo, video, and screenshot, not just the best ones. So call it creepy or the next frontier in social media, but that’s what Shorts does. It’s the new iOS app from the makers of Highlight, the hyped location app startup of 2012 that fizzled out and is…

A new app from David Barnard, the developer behind the popular Launch Center Pro, promises to be the cure for boredom. Rando, as the app is called, offers a crazy twist on our carefully curated online personas – instead of allowing you to choose a photo or GIF to share with friends, Rando will just randomly pick one for you. You can also share random text quotes, then post them to…

Two new, recently launched applications, Daycap and VideoSlam, make it easy to summarize your day in the format of videos or GIFs, which can then be shared out to social media. Do you need these apps on your iPhone? No. Are you totally going to download them on your lunch break because it’s Friday, they sound fun, and those TPS reports can wait? Yep!DaycapThe first application…

You want to reach out to your crush, but what do you say? Do you start with "u up?", or go for something less thirsty? Who knows?! Messaging apps may be the most popular pieces of software in the world, but good luck getting them to do much work on your behalf. It's 2016 and we're still gawking at our phones like animals, tapping out words and hoping they resonate with the person on the other end. No wonder we're single! Well not anymore, gang. Because Rando is here, and it says whatever the hell it...