Yahoo has announced acquiring Artifact, an AI-powered news aggregation and recommendation app developed by Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger. That would be a strategic move from Yahoo to help bolster its digital offerings. The deal closes the shutdown of the innovative app concluded last week; its technology will be integrated into Yahoo’s suite of products, including Yahoo News. The acquisition represents another big step forward for Yahoo in the company’s deployment of AI to create better, easier content discovery and personalization for their users.
Embracing AI for enhanced news discovery
Artifact, a project of Systrom and Krieger launched in January of the previous year, was supposed to revolutionize user relationships with news content. Artifact used AI technologies to provide personalized news feeds that reflected users’ preferences and ensured a story mix that corresponds to different interests from gaming to breaking news and architecture.
Moreover, Artifact failed to get as popular as Instagram, even though it had a better discovery system in place with advanced features added to the platform, including news summaries and social interaction tools. Yahoo’s decision to integrate Artifact technology with its products simply reflects the increased trend by technology companies that are turning to AI to improve the delivery of content. AI personalization technology from Artifact is expected to improve the capability of Yahoo News to give relevant content, thus improving engagement and experience by its users.
Strategic implications and future directions
The terms of the acquisition were not disclosed, but the move is seen as a valuable addition to Yahoo’s portfolio. The two founders, Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, are going to help in the transition as advisers to make sure that the technology gets easily assimilated.
The deal is yet more proof of the focus of Yahoo on innovation and trying to show the way in the adoption of the latest technologies in the digital news space. This acquisition comes following the purchase of the Summly app by Yahoo in the past, which was also based on AI technologies for the summarization of news. In the past, Yahoo had even closed Summly to apply technology in its other products. This pattern seems to speak volumes for Yahoo’s strategic approach toward enhancing content delivery and personalization features by making some specific acquisitions.
Yahoo News to benefit from advanced AI capabilities
With Artifact technology backing it, it’s a good bet these features for the future will be well-received by Yahoo News users. Hence, these AI-based features should function in a way that dynamically adapts to the preferences of the user, which brings the content much closer to his reading habits and individual interests. The move is part of a bigger plan by Yahoo to engage AI in a bid to develop superior user experiences and deeper content engagement.
Artifact CEO Kevin Systrom said his company’s AI technology could be in really good hands at Yahoo when asked to comment on the acquisition. “AI has given us the ability to give users a better experience finding great content that they love,” Systrom said. “Yahoo has recognized that opportunity, and there is not a team in the world who is better-positioned than we are to tackle this challenge and deliver on the promise of what AI can enable for journalism in the 21st century.”
The future of news personalization
The acquisition of Artifact by Yahoo signals a significant moment in the evolution of digital news consumption. So, for this purpose, the news organizations that wish to stay in the competitive and relevant run should surely have up-to-date AI technologies that enhance better delivery of personalized content for the users as individuals.
Yahoo integrating AI capabilities from Artifact into the news service is, in many ways, a follow-on enterprise to a visionary move that propels a company to the front of a shift. In conclusion, Yahoo’s acquisition of Artifact represents a pivotal development in the media and technology landscape. Powering AI, Yahoo was the first to redefine the user experience with digital content through news aggregation and personalization. These technologies will add maturity to an even sharper, personalized, JSON, and relevant experience in the process of consuming news, hence consolidating further Yahoo’s leadership in the digital space for news.
Original Story From https://www.engadget.com/yahoo-bought-ai-powered-news-app-artifact-from-instagrams-co-founders-140040172.html
