 |
|
|
|||||
Copyright lawsuits and ethical debates have led some to say the AI industry in its Napster era. Now, Napster itself is now reentering the chat with its own AI bet. Last month, the former dot-com darling launched a conversational AI platform with dozens of AI companions trained with topical expertise to help users learn, collaborate, create, and problem-solve. Napster also unveiled the View, a 2.1-inch display that attaches to a laptop as a second screen for two-way 3D holographic video chats. Unlike in the ’90s, the file-sharing pioneer is no longer a first mover. The nostalgia-laden brand joins an already crowded field of AI agents and competing devices from both giants and startups. Napsters platform used frontier AI models from OpenAI and Gemini to develop a new “large persona model” (LPM) trained on 30 psychometric characteristics mined from organizational psychology, says Napster chief technology officer Edo Segal. Each companion embodies some sort of profession as a topical expert, along with therapists, doctors, nutritionists are chefs, architects, engineers, and educators. Business-minded offerings help with everything from financial planning and tax strategy to legal issues and public policy. The goal is to allow users to explore endless customizable personalities, each with distinct voices, Segal tells Fast Company: We’ve made it possible to effectively explore building these endless universes of these personas.” Napsters platform is based on tech developed by Touchcast, a startup founded by Segal that Infinite Reality acquired for $500 million this spring. AI comparisons to Napster’s early woes aren’t lost on Napster execs. Segal says its an apt metaphor, adding that early clashes with the music industry echo more current debates about how tech giants control consumers content, data, and audiences. Decades later, Napster wants to be seen as an ethical alternative to Big Tech. One way it’s doing that: Promising users it won’t share, well, or wall off their data or audiences. There was a lot of controversy around what Napster did, but you cant argue it wasnt user-focused, Segal says. At a time like this, with AIs profound impact on society, its useful to have a brand with a north star that puts the user first. . . . That’s the important lesson to take. Obviously, we don’t want the outcome to be similar to the last time around.” Gartner expects 80% of enterprise software to be multimodal by 2030, up from less than 10% last year. However, analysts predict a third of AI video generation providers could fail by 2028 because of reputational, ethical, and legal issues. Napsters plan involves letting people create and customize new avatars or even make one in their own likeness. Its already working with London’s Imperial College, where professors can create avatars for students to talk with outside office hours that come with transcripts of interactions afterward. Another early adopter is the Portuguese soccer club Benfica, which created an immersive 3D version of its e-commerce site and a way for fans to chat with an AI Companion about the team, jerseys, and related topics. “What makes people feel heard and seen?” Napster’s AI pivot is the latest in a series of attempts by various owners to ride its brand cachet during emerging tech waves. In March, it sold for $207 million to Infinite Reality, an immersive digital media and e-commerce company, which also rebranded as Napster last month. Since 2020, other owners have included a British VR music startup (to create VR concerts) and two crypto-focused companies that bought it to anchor a Web3 music platform. Napsters launch follows a growing number of attempts to drive AI adoption beyond smartphones and laptops. Startups like Humane, Rabbit, and Bee have either flopped or at least failed to gain much traction. Giants like Meta and Google are moving forward with their AI-enabled smart glasses. (And then there are other still secret projects like whatever OpenAIs making with former iPhone designer Jony Ive.) What makes Napster think it can succeed where others havent? Part of the strategy is charging people a low subscription fee starting at $19 per month or to bundle it with the Napster View for $199. The trick is moving Napster beyond its music legacy. Some experts are skeptical if holographic avatars are even needed. Voice and text will see adoption much faster unless there’s a specific need for video, says Gabo Arora, founder and CEO of the immersive tech startup Lightshed. Thats the crucial thing, says Arora. You know its fake, but you dont want to feel too self-aware of this. The broader thing with all this is that we are now in the intimacy economy. What makes people feel heard and seen and connected? Despite its controversial origin story, Napster still was a really good brand known for being disruptive and innovative, says Napster president and chief marketing officer Karina Kogan. Infinite Reality had spent years buying companies related to AI, virtual reality, and other metaverse-related industries. After buying Napster, it seemed like a way to unite them all under a recognizable name. [Napsters brand] feels like an accelerant to getting us into the market versus trying to build a lot of equity into Infinite Reality, Kogan says. As a marketer, the challenge is which challenge would I rather take on: Is it harder to drive awareness or change perception? . . . How do we make people experience Napster as more than a music service or more than what it was like 20 years ago? “We have a massive product road map” While Napster is selling the idea of customizable AI avatars as helpful, the reality is more nuanced. While some researchers have found people resist the AI broader companion category for its lack of inauthenticity, other recent findings suggest AI companions can reduce loneliness. Theres still growing concern that constant AI conversation could dull critical thinking, foster dependency, provide inaccuracies, and even lead to disturbing psychological effects. When asked about its plans for adding safeguards to protect users, execs say they have bans in place against certain types of harmful answers. Chats also come with a disclaimer that says “AI can make mistakes. Check important info.” Whether people even want an infinite array of options to choose from is a question. Companies tend to drive adoption of new tech by copying platforms that have worked in the past, says Samantha Wolfe, a professor at New York University who teaches a class on AI avatars. She thinks Napsters platform seems amost like an app storeinstead of merely creating AI avatars to chat with based on celebrities or other parasocial relationships. It feels like theyre skinning AI applications, says Wolfe. Its nice having apps on your iPhone in a way that each has its own expertise. [Napsters AI Companions] are like theyre all individual people-apps.” Voice capabilities could strengthen interactions with AI companions, says marketing professor Stefano Puntoni, codirector of the Wharton Human-AI Research at the University of Pennsylvania. He also notes research suggests anthropomorphic cues can influence customer responses. People often avoid adopting AI companions because they dont believe that these are ‘true’ relationships, says Puntoni, who studies the ways AI chatbots impact on areas like loneliness and consumer habits. The interesting thing is that at the same time, people do acknowledge that AI can fulfill many of the concrete aspects of relationships. Knowing if people want holographic AI experts could determine Napsters ability to find a niche through its new metaverse-minded home. Its also just one of Infinite Realitys many bets: In the past year, its spent at least $1 billion buying companies specializing in generative AI (Touchcast), avatars (Action Face), game development (LandVault) and spatial web experiences (Ethereal Engine). The challenge will be tying it all together. We’re putting products into the market and looking for feedback and signals, Kogan says. Sometimes the thing you think is going to hit isn’t the thing that hits . . . There’s obviously more strategy behind our decisions. We have a massive product road map.
Category:
E-Commerce
Prices are falling for the popular obesity treatments Wegovy and Zepbound, but steady access to the drugs remains challenging.The medications still amount to around $500 per month for those without insuranceout of reach for many patients. And even for people with insurance, coverage remains uneven.“The medications should be available, the question is at what price and can people sustain that,” said Matt Maciejewski, a Duke University professor who studies obesity treatment coverage.Doctors say the situation forces them to get creative in treating patients, but there’s hope that prices may fall more in the future. The drugs are still in high demand Wegovy and Zepbound are part of a wave of obesity medications known as GLP-1 receptor agonists that have soared in popularity.Zepbound brought in $2.3 billion in U.S. sales during this year’s first quarter, making it one of drugmaker Eli Lilly’s best sellers.Novo Nordisk says Wegovy has about 200,000 weekly prescriptions in the U.S., where it brought in nearly $1.9 billion in first-quarter sales. Insurance coverage is increasingfor some The benefits consultant Mercer says more businesses with 500 or more employees are adding coverage of the injected drugs for their workers and family members.And Novo says 85% of its patients who have coverage in the U.S. pay $25 or less per month.Plus some patients with diabetes can get coverage of the GLP-1 drugs Ozempic and Mounjaro from Novo and Lilly that are approved to treat that condition.But most state and federally funded Medicaid programs don’t cover the drugs for obesity and neither does Medicare, the federal program mainly for people age 65 and older.Even the plans that cover the drugs often pay only a portion of the bill, exposing patients to hundreds of dollars in monthly costs, said Dr. Beverly Tchang.Drugmakers offer help with these out-of-pocket costs, but that assistance can be limited.“Coverage is not the same as access,” said Tchang, a New York-based doctor who serves as a paid adviser to both Novo and Lilly. But coverage remains inconsistent Bill-payers like employers are nervous about drugs that might be used by a lot of people indefinitely.Some big employers have dropped coverage of the drugs due to the expense. Pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, also are starting to pick one brand over the other as they negotiate deals with the drugmakers.One of the nation’s largest PBMs, run by CVS Health, dropped Zepbound from its national formulary, or list of covered drugs, on July 1 in favor of Wegovy.That forced Tchang to figure out another treatment plan for several patients, many of whom took Zepbound because it made them less nauseous.Dr. Courtney Younglove’s office sends prospective patients a video link showing them how to check their insurer’s website for coverage of the drugs before they visit.“Then some of them just cancel their appointment because they don’t have coverage,” the Overland Park, Kansas, doctor said. Cheaper compounded drugs are still being sold Compounding pharmacies and other entities were allowed to make off-brand, cheaper copies of Wegovy and Zepbound when there was a shortage of the drugs. But the U.S. Food and Drug Administration determined earlier this year that the shortage had ended.That should have ended the compounded versions, but there is an exception: Some compounding is permitted when a drug is personalized for the patient.The health care company Hims & Hers Health offers compounded doses of semaglutide, the drug behind Wegovy, that adjust dose levels to help patients manage side effects. Hims says these plans start at $165 a month for 12 months, with customers paying in full upfront.It’s a contentious issue. Eli Lilly has sued pharmacies and telehealth companies trying to stop them from selling compounded versions of its products.Novo recently ended a short-lived partnership with Hims to sell Wegovy because the telehealth company continued compounding. Novo says the compounded versions of its drug put patient safety at risk because ingredients are made by foreign suppliers not monitored by US regulators.Hims says it checks all ingredients to make sure they meet U.S. quality and safety standards. It also uses a third-party lab to verify that a drug’s strength is accurately labeled. Prices have dropped Both drugmakers are selling most of their doses for around $500 a month to people without insurance, a few hundred dollars less than some initial prices.Even so, that expense would eat up about 14% of the average annual per person income in the U.S., which is around $43,000.There are some factors that may suppress prices over time. Both companies are developing pill versions of their treatments. Those could hit the market in the next year or so, which might drive down prices for the older, injectable doses.Younglove said some of her patients save as much as 15% by getting their doses shipped from a pharmacy in Canada. They used to get them from an Israeli pharmacy until the Canadians dropped their prices.She says competition like this, plus the introduction of pill versions, will pressure U.S. prices.“I think price wars are going to drive it down,” she said. “I think we are in the early stages. I have hope.” The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Tom Murphy, AP Health Writer
Category:
E-Commerce
TikTok is building a new version of its app for users in the United States ahead of a planned sale of the app to a group of investors, The Information reported on Sunday, citing unnamed sources. This comes as U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday he will start talking to China on Monday or Tuesday about a possible TikTok deal. He said the United States “pretty much” has a deal on the sale of the TikTok short-video app. TikTok has developed a plan to launch the new app to U.S. app stores on September 5, the report said. Last month, Trump extended to September 17 a deadline for China-based ByteDance to divest the U.S. assets of TikTok. The report added that TikTok users will eventually have to download the new app to be able to continue using the service, although the existing app will work until March of next year, though the timeline could change. TikTok did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Reuters could not immediately confirm the report. A deal had been in the works earlier this year to spin off TikTok’s U.S. operations into a new U.S.-based firm, majority-owned and operated by U.S. investors. That was put on hold after China indicated it would not approve it following Trump’s announcements of steep tariffs on Chinese goods. Trump said the United States will probably have to get a deal approved by China. Mrinmay Dey, Reuters
Category:
E-Commerce
All news |
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||