Yahoo has announced the acquisition of Artifact, an AI-powered news app from Instagram’s co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger.
The company, while announcing the deal in a release, said that Artifact will no longer be available as a stand-alone app; instead, in the coming months, its exclusive AI-powered personalisation engine and other features will be incorporated into other Yahoo apps, such as the Yahoo News app.
When Artifact first launched in January of last year, it gained some traction because of its strong discovery feature, which presented articles that people were generally interested in reading.
Over time, the app sought to enhance its customised news feed. It integrated other AI-powered features, such as news summaries, and as per experts’ opinion, did a good job at it.
But the app’s success wasn’t quite as rapid as Instagram’s. Even with the addition of social features like voting in comments, profiles, and other things, Artifact’s user base was insufficient.
Although Systrom and Krieger had stated in January that they intended to close Artefact, they continued to manage it independently for a while before selling it.
Despite having begun as a straightforward news app, Artifact ended up looking more like a Twitter substitute.
There is already fierce rivalry in that market from a wide range of players, such as Meta’s Threads.
“Artifact has become a beloved product and we’re thrilled to be able to continue to grow that technology and further our mission of becoming the trusted guide to digital information and the best curator connecting people to the content that matters most to them,” said Kat Downs Mulder, SVP and General Manager of Yahoo News, in a press release.
Over ten years ago, Summly, an app that employed AI to summarise news, was acquired by TechCrunch’s parent company, Yahoo.
Likewise, it closed that app and integrated Summly’s technology into other offerings.
