Google bakes NotebookLM, its research tool, into Gemini

Posted on 09/04/2026 by Mariella Moon

Google has fully integrated NotebookLM, its AI-powered research tool, into the Gemini app. The company launched a standalone NotebookLM app last year, but as it said in its announcement, “keeping track of everything can be a challenge.” It added NotebookLM as a source in the Gemini app last year, but now you can create notebooks right inside the chatbot.

You can now find the option to create a new notebook in Gemini’s side panel and then select “Add sources” that the tool can use, such as PDFs, documents, website URLs, YouTube videos and even copy-pasted text. NotebookLM will use information from those sources to create a searchable repository of information for you, and you can ask Gemini to create things like reviewers, infographics and video and audio overviews that turn your uploaded information into an easy-to-understand format. Take note, however, that Google warns users within the NotebookLM interface that it can be inaccurate, and that it’s best if you double-check information it puts out.

The company is rolling out NotebookLM’s full integration into Gemini this week for Google AI Ultra, Pro and Plus subscribers on the web. It will be available on mobile, in more locations and to free users over the coming weeks.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/google-bakes-notebooklm-its-research-tool-into-gemini-101850634.html?src=rss

Flipboard’s ‘social websites’ are a new spin on decentralized social media

Posted on 02/04/2026 by Karissa Bell

Flipboard has been one of the biggest boosters of decentralized social media. Now, the company, which is known for its social news reading app, is rolling out its latest experiment, "social websites."

The project offers publishers and creators an easier path into what's often called the "open social web," which includes the fediverse, as well as other protocol-based platforms like Blueksy. The company says it could also help creators of all stripes wrest back control of their audiences from mainstream social media platforms and other "walled gardens."

In practice, social websites are essentially microsites that allow creators and publishers to bring together posts from decentralized platforms and RSS feeds into a single place where people can browse blogposts, newsletters, podcast episodes alongside relevant commentary from Bluesky, Mastodon and other federated services. It's also the first web-based offshoot of Surf, Flipboard's reader app designed for the open social web.

The company has already teamed up with a handful of publishers and creators who have made their own "social websites" on top of Surf. For example, Rolling Stone created a dedicated site for its political coverage, which features posts from its writers alongside news stories. Creator David Rushing created a site called "All Net" inspired by the NBA fan community on Threads. All Net features Bluesky, Threads and Mastodon posts, alongside clips from NBA podcasters and creators on YouTube. Fans can not just follow along the feeds of these social websites, but can join in the conversation around the posts from disparate platforms in a single space.

"The social web is really promising and really awesome, but it is kind of complex and it's hard to use," Flipboard CEO Mike McCue tells Engadget. "What we're trying to do is actually make it [so] like in 15 minutes you can make one of these communities."

Eliminating complexity is definitely something the wider protocol-based social web could benefit from. And the Surf website is refreshingly free of words like "protocol" and "federation." You can see content from Mastodon, Pixelfed (the fediverse version of Instagram), PeerTube (fediverse YouTube) without ever having to log in and figure out how to use those platforms.

But there's also a lot of upside for individual publishers and creators, according to McCue. He's had a front-row seat to the years of volatile dynamics between publishers and social media platforms thanks to Flipboard. "They are really done with investing in yet another audience on yet another billionaire's platform where the discovery is totally black-boxed," he said. "Creators and publishers are looking for some way to basically take social media back, to own their own communities and their own relationships with their audience."

Whether this experiment will result in meaningful traffic to publishers is less clear. The rise of Twitter alternatives hasn't always resulted in traffic gains to websites, which are also grappling with increasing pressure from AI search. For now, Flipboard has just ten social websites from publishers, though anyone can now start to tinker with the site and make their own.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/flipboards-social-websites-are-a-new-spin-on-decentralized-social-media-150000323.html?src=rss

Meta is testing an Instagram Plus subscription service with exclusive features

Posted on 30/03/2026 by Karissa Bell

Meta is testing a new subscription service for Instagram that offers users "exclusive" features like the ability to post Stories for longer than 24 hours. Screenshots promoting "Instagram Plus" have been spotted by users in the Philippines and Mexico in recent days.

According to screenshots shared by social media consultant Matt Navarra, a subscription to Instagram Plus comes with a number of Story-focused features not otherwise available to Instagram users. This includes the ability to create multiple "audiences" for Stories posts, see info about who has rewatched your Story, search the list of people who have viewed your Story, preview Stories posts, extend Stories longer than 24 hours and create "spotlight" Stories. It also mentions something called “super hearts” for reacting to Stories.

A spokesperson for Meta confirmed the test to Engadget, saying that Instagram Plus is currently available in “a few countries,” but didn’t say which. A dedicated help page on Meta's website says that this feature is not available to everyone right now.” The spokesperson confirmed the feature list shown below, and added that “preview” would allow people to see some of another user’s Story without “showing up as a viewer” and that Stories posts could be extended for an additional 24 hours. “Our hope from these tests is to understand what’s most valuable to people in a premium feature set,” the spokesperson said.

A list of features that come with Instagram Plus subscriptions.

It seems that early versions of the service are priced fairly cheaply, with the prices in the Philippines landing at 65 PHP (about $1.07 in USD) a month and in Mexico at $39 MXN (about $2.15 in USD) a month. Meta is also offering prospective users a free one-month trial of the service.

The idea seems to be closely modeled after Snapchat+, which also offers bonus features to the app's power users. Launched in 2022, the service has racked up more millions of subscribers and has become a significant driver of non-advertising revenue for the company.

Now, Meta is looking to boost its subscription revenue too. The company said earlier this year it would test new types of subscriptions, including those focused on AI features. Elsewhere, Meta has also been pushing its Meta Verified subscriptions more aggressively. Over the last several weeks, I've repeatedly seen promotions for discounted Meta Verified plans with an initial one-month trial starting at $1 (the cheapest Meta Verified plans typically start at $14.99/month). The company has also recently tested link-sharing features in Instagram captions for subscribers and limits on link-sharing on Facebook for non-subscribers.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/meta-is-testing-an-instagram-plus-subscription-service-with-exclusive-features-181215180.html?src=rss

X moves the ashes of TweetDeck behind its $40 Premium+ subscription

Posted on 26/03/2026 by

X Pro, the feature most users would recognize as TweetDeck, has been removed as a benefit of the social network's Premium subscription. It is now only part of the Premium+ tier, which costs $40 a month.

TweetDeck was rebranded to X Pro in 2023 following Elon Musk's renaming of Twitter to X. It became a subscription feature shortly after. The tool offered a popular interface for showing multiple timelines, feeds and lists in a single interface.

Engadget staffers using X Pro at the Premium level didn't find any advanced notice that the feature would be changing subscription tiers, so people may be in for an unpleasant surprise when they next go to access their accounts. The feature appears to be gone no matter when you last paid up for the service, which might feel pretty scummy for people who just re-upped to have such a key feature lost.

At least some of the X support documentation currently describes X Pro as only available under Premium+. It's listed as such under the help center page listing different X Premium plan benefits, but at the time of publish, there's currently no mention of the limitation on the dedicated X Pro page. Here's what Grok had to say when a confused subscriber asked about the change:

Hi Nadine, X updated X Pro (TweetDeck) access today—it's now Premium+ only, per the official help page. The Creator Hub table hasn't refreshed yet, causing the mix-up. Upgrade via settings or contact Premium support for details.
— Grok (@grok) March 26, 2026

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/x-moves-the-ashes-of-tweetdeck-behind-its-40-premium-subscription-210601250.html?src=rss

Jury rules against Meta and YouTube in social media addiction case

Posted on 25/03/2026 by Karissa Bell

A jury in Los Angeles has found that Meta and YouTube were negligent in a closely-watched trial over social media addiction. The companies were ordered to pay $6 million in damages to the woman who said she was harmed by their addictive features as a child.

The case was brought by a 20-year-old woman, named in court documents as “K.G.M,” who sued Meta, YouTube, TikTok and Snap, saying that she had been harmed by the platforms as a child due to addictive features. TikTok and Snap reached a settlement ahead of the trial.

According to NBC News, Meta was ordered to pay 70 percent of the $3 million in compensatory damages with YouTube taking on the remaining portion. The jury awarded an additional $3 million in punitive damages. “We respectfully disagree with the verdict and are evaluating our legal options,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement. “We disagree with the verdict and plan to appeal.,” Google spokesperson José Castañeda said in a statement. “This case misunderstands YouTube, which is a responsibly built streaming platform, not a social media site.”

The weeks-long trial has been closely watched because it's the first of many court cases in which plaintiffs have argued that social media platforms harmed minors due to how they were designed. Meta's lawyers and executives have disputed the idea that social media should be considered an "addiction." CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified that the company wants Instagram to be "useful," and repeatedly accused the plaintiff's lawyer of "mischaracterizing" his past statements.

“This is the first time in history a jury has heard testimony by executives and seen internal documents that we believe prove these companies chose profits over children,” Joseph VanZandt, one of K.G.M.’s lawyers, said in a statement to The New York Times,

For Meta, it's the second legal setback in as many days. The verdict comes one day after a jury in New Mexico ruled against Meta in a trial over child safety issues. The company was ordered to pay $375 million in penalties; the company said it would appeal.

Update, March 25, 2026, 11:22AM PT: Added a statement from Google.

Update. March 25, 2026, 2:05PM PT: Added details about punitive damages.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/jury-rules-against-meta-and-youtube-in-social-media-addiction-case-181344860.html?src=rss

Meta is letting creators fill their Reels with shopping links

Posted on 24/03/2026 by Karissa Bell

It's about to get a lot easier for creators on Facebook and Instagram to push products to their followers. Meta will now allow creators to include clickable shopping links for products directly in their Reels.

Brand partnerships and affiliate links, in which creators earn a portion of sales generated by their recommendations, are central to how creators earn money from Facebook and Instagram. But Meta has limited the ways in which they can direct their followers off-platform. As a result, creators often rely on third-party "link in bio" services for managing links to the stuff they endorse.

Now, Meta says it will allow eligible creators to link to up to 30 distinct products in a single Reel. the feature will be available on both Instagram and Facebook, though Facebook creators are limited to tagging products from marketplace partners like Amazon.

The change could be a boon for lifestyle creators and others who rely on their followers regularly buying the stuff they recommend. It brings Meta’s apps up to par with TikTok and YouTube Shorts, both of which have had affiliate shopping features for years. It will also make shopping content a lot harder to ignore, which could risk alienating some people if creators go overboard.

For Meta, the change will give it new insight into what its users are buying. A Meta spokesperson says the company isn't taking a cut from creators' sales via these links for now, though it's probably safe to assume the company will use the data gleaned from them to bolster its ad business.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/meta-is-letting-creators-fill-their-reels-with-shopping-links-232406681.html?src=rss

Billionaire OnlyFans owner Leonid Radvinsky has died from cancer at 43

Posted on 23/03/2026 by Lawrence Bonk

Leonid Radvinsky, the billionaire owner of OnlyFans, has died. He passed "peacefully after a long battle with cancer" at age 43, according to a statement from the platform published by Forbes. He was born in Ukraine, but grew up in Chicago.

Radvinsky didn't create OnlyFans. He purchased it back in 2018, though is largely credited with transforming it from a niche website to a gigantic porn empire. The platform became so huge that reports have indicated that Radvinsky personally made nearly $2 million every day in 2024. His net worth at the time of his death grew to $4.7 billion, which had more than doubled since 2021.

Leonid Radvinsky, the owner of OnlyFans, has died at 43 after a battle with cancer.

“We are deeply saddened to announce the death of Leo Radvinsky,” an OnlyFans spokesperson said in a statement to Variety. “Leo passed away peacefully after a long battle with cancer. His family… pic.twitter.com/xJetAcTZmU
— Variety (@Variety) March 23, 2026

It has been reported that he was in talks to sell OnlyFans in a deal valued at $8 billion. It's long-been rumored that he bought a controlling stake in the platform for around $30 million back in 2018, though that number has never been officially confirmed.

Radvinsky was famously secretive and avoided giving interviews, but his history is not without controversy. He built his fortune with websites that were much shadier than OnlyFans. Radvinsky founded a similar site called MyFreeCams back in 2004 when he was in college, which has been involved in numerous scandals.

He also founded a website called Cybertania, which provided links to various pornograpy sites. Some of these links claimed to direct users to illegal content involving children and animals.

Forbes did a deep dive into this and found that the site didn't actually lead to the offending content, but it's still likely that Radvinsky and the platform made money by getting people to click on the links. Records also indicate that Radvinsky held domain names like "websyoungest.com" and "aretheylegal.com" until 2014. It's currently unknown what those sites hosted.

He's also been sued for everything from spamming users to impersonating large companies like Microsoft and Amazon to direct traffic to his pornography sites. These cases were all settled outside of court for undisclosed sums of money.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/billionaire-onlyfans-owner-leonid-radvinsky-has-died-from-cancer-at-43-163211324.html?src=rss

Twitter turned 20 and I feel nothing

Posted on 21/03/2026 by Karissa Bell

Twitter is officially 20 years old. In another reality, that might make me kind of nostalgic. I've been lurking and scrolling and tweeting for 16 years; most of my adult life. There was a time when Twitter was a place where some internet strangers became my IRL friends, when I was excited to "live-tweet". When my infinitely more well-adjusted friends would send me memes, I would smugly say "I saw that on Twitter days ago."

Twitter stopped being that place a long time ago, but I don't have any nostalgia for it. I don't really feel anything at all, actually.

Because I can already hear the comments: Yes, I'm still on X. I don't spend as much time there as I did a decade ago, but it's still quite a lot of time, an unhealthy amount, if I'm being honest. My job is to report on social media companies, so I keep (doom)scrolling. That's what I tell myself anyway.

A few of my favorite posters are still around. Dril's still got it. The memes are still, occasionally, good, even though X's recommendation algorithm seems to prefer pointing me toward endless AI slop, boring hot takes from thirsty mid-tier tech execs and blatant engagement bait. X's algorithm — what little we can learn about it, anyway — now relies on Grok's predictions about what you'll like.The same Holocaust-loving Grok that has spewed racism and referred to itself as MechaHitler and declared Elon Musk "the single greatest person in modern history." The same Grok that allegedly generated thousands of images of child abuse material. Hey @grok is that true?

X is not Twitter but it's also not not-Twitter. Last year, an online marketplace startup bought the 560-pound Twitter bird that once adorned the company's San Francisco office and blew it up in a Nevada desert surrounded by Tesla CyberTrucks as part of an elaborate publicity stunt. Dumb? Yes. But also a somehow fitting adieu for "Larry."

just setting up my twttr
— jack (@jack) March 21, 2006

It's been 20 years since Jack Dorsey sent the first-ever tweet, which was never even a good tweet anyway. It's been five years, by the way, since he turned that tweet into an NFT (remember NFTs??) and auctioned it for nearly $3 million. It's now functionally worthless. Another chapter in Dorsey's confusing, complicated legacy.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/social-media/twitter-turned-20-and-i-feel-nothing-140000602.html?src=rss