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Snapchat is now letting users share the music they’re listening to in real time via a new feature in Snap Map, TechCrunch has exclusively learned. Called “Now Playing,” the feature lets users link their streaming service account (starting with Spotify) and share what they’re currently listening to via Snap Map, and see the songs their friends are enjoying. The feature has been integrated with Spotlight videos, which are Snapchat’s TikTok-like short-form videos, too: You can save any songs you discover in a Spotlight video directly to Spotify, or visit the track’s page on the platform to do so. Users can choose who can see their listening activity, and the feature won’t show your last-played song or listening history, though sharing will remain active as long as you have opened Snapchat within the past 24 hours. If a user is inactive for more than 24 hours, sharing will be paused automatically, and only resumed when the app has been opened again. You can also pause sharing for three hours, 24 hours, or indefinitely. The new feature comes as social media platforms continue to embrace music discovery and sharing. TikTok, where viral trends often shape global music charts, lets users share songs from streaming services to the social network, and also save songs they come across. Instagram, meanwhile, allows users to share what they’re listening to through Notes, which are the short status updates that appear at the top of users’ DM inboxes. Even Spotify itself has leaned into social music sharing, launching a feature that allows users to share what they’re listening to with their friends in real-time. “Music is one of the most personal ways people express themselves, and it becomes even more meaningful when it brings friends closer,” Manny Adler, Snapchat’s head of music, said in an emailed statement. “Now Playing adds a new layer of expression and discovery to Snap Map, helping Snapchatters share the soundtrack to their day and find new music through the people they already know.” The integration adds another feature to Snap Map, which has more than 450 million monthly users. Launched in 2017, Snap Map was initially meant to be a way for users to see their friends’ locations and browse public Snaps from around the world. Over time, the feature has expanded to include local hotspots, activities, and now, music discovery. Snapchat says the new feature is rolling out to users in regions where both Spotify and Snapchat are available, with Canada coming soon. When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Aisha is a consumer news reporter at TechCrunch. Prior to joining the publication in 2021, she was a telecom reporter at MobileSyrup. Aisha holds an honours bachelor’s degree from University of Toronto and a master’s degree in journalism from Western University. You can contact or verify outreach from Aisha by emailing aisha@techcrunch.com or via encrypted message at aisha_malik.01 on Signal. View Bio

Vietnam is weighing the most unusual version yet of the youth social media bans that are sweeping the globe. Instead of kicking kids off platforms entirely, the country wants to let them stay logged in — just muted. Under a draft decree from Vietnam’s Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, reported on Friday by Reuters, users under 16 would keep their social media accounts but lose the ability to post, comment, or react to content. The proposal would require social media accounts for children under 16 to be registered under a parent, who would then be responsible for monitoring the content the child accesses and their time spent on the platforms. The platforms themselves would be required to deploy technical measures to identify which of their users are children and restrict them to age-appropriate content. Deputy Culture Minister Phan Tam said the goal isn’t to ban or excessively restrict children’s access to social media, but to ensure they’re in an age-appropriate environment when they do use it. The decree hasn’t been finalized and could still be revised before adoption. Vietnam is also considering separate restrictions on gaming, which would cap play for under-16 users at 60 minutes a day per game and apply the same parental registration requirement used for social media accounts. Over the past months, many countries have announced plans to restrict social media access for children and teens. Australia became the first to implement such measures at the end of last year, setting a precedent that other countries are closely watching. Along with Vietnam, France more recently announced such a measure. The regulations and proposals being brought forth by governments around the world aim to reduce the pressures and risks that young users may face on social media, which include cyberbullying, addiction, mental health issues, and exposure to predators. Of course, there are concerns about privacy regarding invasive age verification and excessive government intervention. Critics, including Amnesty Tech, have further said such bans are ineffective and that they ignore the realities of younger generations. Many nations are moving ahead with proposed legislation anyway. If you’re curious about the countries that are considering or have already moved forward with bans on social media for young users, read on. Australia Australia became the world’s first country to ban social media for children under 16 in December 2025. The ban blocks children from using Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, X, YouTube, Reddit, Twitch, and Kick. It notably doesn’t include WhatsApp or YouTube Kids. The Australian government has said these social media companies must take steps to keep children off their services. Companies that fail to comply may face penalties of up to $49.5 million AUD ($34.4 million USD). The government says these platforms should use multiple verification methods to ensure that people using their services are older than 16. It also notes that they can’t rely on users simply entering their own age. Austria Austria said in late March that it will ban social media for children up to the age of 14. Draft legislation for the ban is expected to be finalized by June. Canada The Canadian government introduced a digital safety bill in early June that would ban social media for children under 16. Under the legislation, social media giants could sidestep the ban if they demonstrate they have policies to protect young users. Officials have said it could take a year for the bill to pass. Denmark Denmark is set to ban social media platforms for children under 15. The Danish government announced in November 2025 that it had secured support for the ban from three governing coalition parties and two opposition parties in parliament. The government’s plans could become law as soon as mid-2026, according to the Associated Press. The Danish digital affairs ministry is also launching a “digital evidence” app that includes a

WhatsApp is rolling out a suite of new features, including a revamped Apple CarPlay and Android Auto experience as part of the Meta-owned company’s broader push to make its app a more complete cross-device communication platform rather than one just used for mobile messaging. The platform is also launching the ability for users to sign up for WhatsApp directly from their iPad, share what they’re listening to, and open PDFs directly in the app. WhatsApp has also improved its integration with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto — apps that run on a smartphone and wirelessly communicate with a vehicle’s infotainment system. WhatsApp was accessible in CarPlay before, but users were limited to composing messages and placing calls. Now users can also hear and reply to messages, view their call history and access their favorite contacts. WhatsApp says that since launching WhatsApp for iPad last year, people have requested the option to create an account directly on their iPad without having to link to their phone. Now, users can register for an account directly through the iPad app and set up their account, the company says. It’s worth noting that you still need a phone number and the ability to receive the one-time passcode to register your account. After that, the app will work as a standalone account on your iPad and won’t be linked to a primary phone as a companion device, a WhatsApp spokesperson told TechCrunch. Additionally, users can now share a song straight from Apple Music or Spotify to their WhatsApp Status. WhatsApp says the idea behind the feature is to allow users to express themselves and make their status more unique. WhatsApp is now also making it possible to open PDFs directly within the app without having to download them. Once users open a PDF, they will be able to make lightweight edits, such as highlighting and annotating, right within the chat. This new capability is available on the web and desktop, WhatsApp says. The latest features announced on Wednesday add to the growing list of updates WhatsApp has rolled out in recent months. A few weeks ago, the company launched usernames to allow people to share their profiles without disclosing their phone number. In late May, Meta launched a subscription plan for the messaging app that unlocks extra features, like profile customization, super reactions, and story insights, and more. The WhatsApp Plus plan launched alongside similar “Plus” offerings for Instagram and Facebook. When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Aisha is a consumer news reporter at TechCrunch. Prior to joining the publication in 2021, she was a telecom reporter at MobileSyrup. Aisha holds an honours bachelor’s degree from University of Toronto and a master’s degree in journalism from Western University. You can contact or verify outreach from Aisha by emailing aisha@techcrunch.com or via encrypted message at aisha_malik.01 on Signal. View Bio

Over the past months, many countries have announced plans to restrict social media access for children and teens. Australia became the first to implement such measures at the end of last year, setting a precedent that other countries are now closely watching. France is now the latest country to announce such a measure. The regulations and proposals being brought forth by governments around the world aim to reduce the pressures and risks that young users may face on social media, which include cyberbullying, addiction, mental health issues, and exposure to predators. Of course, there are concerns about privacy regarding invasive age verification and excessive government intervention. Critics, including Amnesty Tech, have said such bans are ineffective and that they ignore the realities of younger generations. Despite this, many nations are moving ahead with proposed legislation. We’ve compiled a list of countries that are considering or have already moved forward with bans on social media for young users. Australia Australia became the world’s first country to ban social media for children under 16 in December 2025. The ban blocks children from using Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, X, YouTube, Reddit, Twitch, and Kick. It notably doesn’t include WhatsApp or YouTube Kids. The Australian government has said these social media companies must take steps to keep children off their services. Companies that fail to comply may face penalties of up to $49.5 million AUD ($34.4 million USD). The government says these platforms should use multiple verification methods to ensure that people using their services are older than 16. It also notes that they can’t rely on users simply entering their own age. Austria Austria said in late March that it will ban social media for children up to the age of 14. Draft legislation for the ban is expected to be finalized by June. Canada The Canadian government introduced a digital safety bill in early June that would ban social media for children under 16. Under the legislation, social media giants could sidestep the ban if they demonstrate they have policies to protect young users. Officials have said it could take a year for the bill to pass. Denmark Denmark is set to ban social media platforms for children under 15. The Danish government announced in November 2025 that it had secured support for the ban from three governing coalition parties and two opposition parties in parliament. The government’s plans could become law as soon as mid-2026, according to the Associated Press. The Danish digital affairs ministry is also launching a “digital evidence” app that includes age verification tools that may be used as part of the ban. France France passed a law on July 21 banning access to social media for anyone under 15. The law could go into effect as soon as September 1. The law will also ban the use of cellphones in high schools, extending a ban already present in primary and middle schools. Germany In early February, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservatives discussed a proposal to bar children under 16 from using social media, Reuters reported. However, there were signs that his center-left coalition partners were hesitant to support an outright ban. Greece Greek prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced in April that the country is going to ban access to social media for children under 15 starting January 2027. Mitsotakis says the move is aimed at tackling rising anxiety and sleep problems among children, as well as the addictive design of social media. Indonesia Indonesia said in early March that it’s banning children under the age of 16 from using social media and other popular online platforms. The country plans to start with platforms such as YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, Bigo Live, and Roblox. Malaysia The Malaysian government said in November 2025 that it plans to ban social media for children under 16. The country plans to i

Meta is bringing parental supervision tools to Threads, the company announced on Tuesday. With the new tools, parents and guardians will be able to view their teen’s time spent on Threads, set daily time limits, adjust sleep mode, and manage their privacy settings through Family Center, Meta’s hub for parental controls across its apps. The rollout follows growing pressure on Meta from regulators and lawmakers to better protect young users online. The company has spent the last several years expanding parental controls across its apps in response to concerns over excessive screen time, harmful content, and teen safety, and is now bringing similar controls to Threads. It’s also worth noting that Meta, alongside other social media giants, is currently facing numerous lawsuits related to child safety. Given these factors, it’s not surprising that Meta is finally introducing parental supervision tools to Threads, a platform with 500 million monthly users. The rollout comes three years after Threads’ launch in July 2023. Image Credits:Meta Parents and guardians will now be able to view how much time their teen spent on the platform each day for the past week, including their average daily time spent for the week. They will also be able to set a daily time limit and block access during select days and hours. If a teen uses Threads across multiple devices, like their phone and laptop, the time limit will apply to the total time spent using Threads. Additionally, parents can limit or block their teen’s access to Threads at night, with notifications muted and auto-replies already on by default for all teens from 10 PM to 7 AM. Parents also have the option to control who can tag their teen in posts on the platform. Meta notes that teens on Threads already have built-in protections like private accounts and limits on the content they see. However, parents can now decide if teens under 16 can change any of these automatic settings to be less strict, the company says. The parental supervision controls are rolling out next week in the U.S. Meta is planning to bring parental supervision on Threads globally by the end of the year, a spokesperson told TechCrunch. When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Aisha is a consumer news reporter at TechCrunch. Prior to joining the publication in 2021, she was a telecom reporter at MobileSyrup. Aisha holds an honours bachelor’s degree from University of Toronto and a master’s degree in journalism from Western University. You can contact or verify outreach from Aisha by emailing aisha@techcrunch.com or via encrypted message at aisha_malik.01 on Signal. View Bio

On Tuesday, Meta launched “Muse Image,” a new AI image generation feature that allows users to create original images, edit existing photos, and even generate custom ads directly within its apps. But one capability has quickly become the center of controversy. Muse Image allows users to generate AI images using photos from public Instagram accounts. As long as a person’s profile is public, another user can tag that account and use their images as part of an AI-generated creation. (Only private accounts and accounts belonging to users under 18 are automatically excluded from the feature.) One huge concern is consent. Users may have no idea that their public photos can be incorporated into AI-generated images by strangers, and they aren’t even notified when someone reuses their public content. Plus, making it easy to manipulate people’s images opens the door to misuse, harassment, impersonation, and non-consensual image editing. If you’re looking to opt out of this, here’s how you can do it: Head to your profile and click the three horizontal lines in the top-right corner. Select “Sharing and reuse.” Then look for the option that says, “Allow people to create with and reuse your content.” Toggle it off for both posts and reels. Muse Image arrives at a time when AI tools are being increasingly integrated into social media platforms. As tech companies race to roll out new generative AI features, many experts argue that stronger privacy protections and greater transparency are needed, so users fully understand how their photos and personal data are being used. Public skepticism around AI is already high. According to a Pew Research Center survey, 35% of respondents said they’re more concerned than excited about the growing use of artificial intelligence. Additionally, Meta’s track record on user privacy has also fueled skepticism surrounding its latest AI feature. In 2019, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) imposed a $5 billion fine against Facebook, concluding that the platform had violated a 2012 consent order by misleading users about how much control they had over their personal information. This followed a high-profile scandal where political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica gained access to data from up to 87 million Facebook users through a personality quiz app. Facebook’s platform policies at the time allowed developers to collect information about those users’ friends without their knowledge or explicit consent. When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Lauren covers media, streaming, apps and platforms at TechCrunch. You can contact or verify outreach from Lauren by emailing laurenf.techcrunch@gmail.com or via encrypted message at laurenforris22.25 on Signal. View Bio

WeWard, an app that offers users rewards for logging their steps, is launching a feature called “Walking Mode” that allows users to restrict their use of chosen apps until they hit a certain step count. The feature is supposed to motivate people to walk while also helping them reduce their screen time, if that’s something they’re looking to do. If a user wants to scroll less on TikTok or Instagram while also making sure they make time for a daily walk, they could restrict access to the apps until they walk 3,000 steps, for example. The step goals and apps locked are customizable. Until now, WeWard encouraged users to go on a walk by awarding them “Wards,” an in-app currency that can be exchanged for cash, gift cards, or donations. There’s also a gamified leaderboard feature, so you can engage in some gentle competition with your friends. But the addition of screen time reduction features makes sense for the app, since many users are looking for new ways to limit unnecessary phone and social media use. Image Credits:WeWard With funding from tennis star and angel investor Venus Williams, the France-based app says that it has 30 million users across 29 countries, including 4 million U.S. users. The platform also says it has been shown to increase walking time by almost 25%. “We believe the next generation of products should be designed to create healthier behaviors in the real world, not simply capture more attention,” WeWard co-founder Yves Benchimol told TechCrunch. “Walking Mode is our contribution to that vision, and we hope it inspires a broader conversation about mindful design and how the industry defines success.” WeWard says that users spend only a few minutes per day in the app, which it considers a positive statistic, since the app isn’t trying to monopolize attention. While some rewards apps fund their payouts by collecting and selling user data to third parties, WeWard says that it does not engage in these practices. Instead, it makes money from in-app purchases, affiliate marketing, premium subscriptions, and advertising. When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence. Amanda Silberling is a senior writer at TechCrunch covering the intersection of technology and culture. She has also written for publications like Polygon, MTV, the Kenyon Review, NPR, and Business Insider. She is the co-host of Wow If True, a podcast about internet culture, with science fiction author Isabel J. Kim. Prior to joining TechCrunch, she worked as a grassroots organizer, museum educator, and film festival coordinator. She holds a B.A. in English from the University of Pennsylvania and served as a Princeton in Asia Fellow in Laos. You can contact or verify outreach from Amanda by emailing amanda@techcrunch.com or via encrypted message at @amanda.100 on Signal. View Bio

Meta and Snap rolled out new smart glasses last month, the latest sign that the industry is racing to put a camera and an AI assistant onto users’ faces. As the fast-growing market heats up, upstarts like Even Realities are muscling in on the giants. Even Realities, a three-year-old Shenzhen-headquartered startup, has raised $150 million in a pre-Series B round led by Meituan and previous backer Tencent; the round valued the startup at $1 billion valuation. Founder and CEO Will Wang told TechCrunch that while rivals chase camera-equipped devices built around content capture and AI, his company is betting on display-first glasses that beam information straight into the wearer’s line of sight without giving up privacy. Even’s earlier backers are mostly high-profile China names — Hillhouse, Sequoia China, and Northern Light Venture Capital. Even was started by ex-Apple engineers in 2023. CEO Wang worked on the Apple Watch and iPhone; other co-founders came from tech, and two came from luxury eyewear companies, including Lindberg. The startup moved quickly, launching its first product, the G1, in 2024 as what Wang calls the lightest waveguide smart glasses then on the market. Even blew past its own 10,000-unit target to become the first company in the category to sell more than 10,000 pairs, according to the company CEO. It raised money faster than expected, and swelled from 30–40 staff in 2024 to 300–400 today. The startup’s latest flagship, the G2, hit the market last November and skips the camera entirely. Instead, a heads-up display built into the frames feeds information to the wearer, controlled by a companion ring, the Even R1, that users tap and swipe to navigate. Removing the camera is an important part of Even’s privacy philosophy, though not the entire story, Wang continued. Smart glasses, he said, are probably the most personal computing device people will ever wear. Worn on the face all day, they have to feel comfortable to both the wearer and those around them, so privacy is designed into both the hardware and the software. Voice features like translation transcribe audio into text rather than storing recordings; user data is encrypted, and the infrastructure is built to meet Europe’s strict privacy standards, Wang added. Even’s power users lean hard on Conversate, a copilot that reads a conversation in real time, explaining unfamiliar jargon or feeding follow-ups on the fly, then syncing a summary to their phone. Still, Even has invested most heavily in optics (the display and overall optical performance), which Wang says is what separates smart glasses from other consumer electronics. “With a phone or a watch, the display is just a conventional OLED or LCD screen. Smart glasses are the first product category to rely on optical displays, which require an entirely different technology stack; you have to design the microchip, the optics, and the waveguide together. That’s where we’ve invested the most,” Wang said. The company developed a proprietary optical technology called Even HAO, or Holistic Adaptive Optics, an end-to-end design that integrates the microchip, waveguide and prescription support from the start, rather than combining components designed separately. More than half of Even’s users sit in the U.S. — its fastest-growing market — and so does the bulk of its developer community. The company doesn’t sell in China yet, even though it manufactures there across several factories; its main markets are the U.S., Japan, South Korea, the Middle East, and Europe. “The demand there is significant, so we want to make sure we’re prepared first,” Wang said. Even sells near the top of the category on price and still moves real volume, making it a profitable player in the space, Wang said. “Most of our customers are male professionals between 30 and 50 years old. We ran a survey and found that about a third of our users are company executives,” he added. The frames retail for $599 before tax; prescription le

AOL is public again — sort of. Its owner Bending Spoons, the 13-year-old Italian company that has been quietly acquiring beloved but ailing Internet brands for the past decade, went public on the Nasdaq today, opening at an over $18 ​billion valuation, with the stock then popping 40% by market close. Headquartered in Milan, Bending Spoons applied some of the private equity playbook to a long series of acquisitions — Meetup, Eventbrite, Vimeo, WeTransfer, and many others. But it is not a flip-and-sell scheme: it wants to transform these companies with tech and then hold onto them. “We want to place ourselves as an operator that takes beloved brands and makes them much better,” its cofounder and chief product officer, Matteo Danieli, told TechCrunch. The ‘how’ has generated controversy over the years, especially around layoffs. But the company also drove revenue growth, even more so with AI. “In the past year and a half, we’ve witnessed an incredible acceleration in the pace at which we were able to ship new features and create value for users,” Danieli told TechCrunch. That may be the right thing to say when investors, public and private, have much more appetite for AI than for aging SaaS businesses. But Bending Spoons has a case: its F-1, the equivalent of S-1 forms for foreign companies, includes a chapter called ‘AI before it was cool’ — a nod to its roots. Before Bending Spoons, there was Evertale, “a product that would automatically create a diary of your life by leveraging what you would call AI today, and that we called machine learning then,” Danieli said. That startup failed, but it taught lessons to the cofounders and team members who now lead Bending Spoons — Luca Ferrari, Francesco Patarnello, Luca Querella, and Danieli himself. “It sparked a reflection around the fact that you don’t always find perfect correlation between how talented entrepreneurs are and the success they have, especially from zero to one. Luck is a very big component of that equation. So we developed an obsession for finding a strategy that would, as much as possible, reduce the role that luck plays in growth and success,” Danieli said. The company also mentioned this philosophy in its F-1 with such lines as, “Luck plays a big role in finding product-market fit,” and “luck is irrelevant when pursuing operational excellence.” Those mantras show up in areas like pricing its products. “We try to leverage the sophisticated data tracking, analytics infrastructure and experimentation toolkit that we’ve developed.” According to Danieli, this sometimes leads the company to release more features for free to drive word of mouth. But it has also led to price increases that sparked complaints from long-term subscribers. Despite this, however, he says customer retention has been “remarkably stable.” One acquisition was particularly scrutinized. “Evernote may be the first product we acquired that was genuinely loved by users, so we had very strict judges.” That’s the one he’s most proud of — including its AI-heavy v11 update. He said the company eventually won over users with its changes that were praised by many subscribers, including Evernote cofounder Phil Libin. Bending Spoons itself started getting more support over the years. Valued at $11 billion in a private equity round before its IPO, it had both VC firms and VIPs on its cap table, including big names from tech and entertainment. In its earlier years, however, VCs struggled to understand its approach. “We’ve got a lot of ‘you’re crazy’ reactions throughout the years,” Danieli recalled. That’s also captured by the company’s tagline, “Impossible. Maybe.” Focusing on talent was also one of the lessons that Bending Spoons’ founders learned from their Evertale days, and hiring became a focus. The co-founder Ferrari “invested the best part of the first two or three years working on culture and hiring processes. We believe we now excel at spotting talent, especially when young and when they don