The co-founders who sold their last startup to Spotify are working on a new project: an AI-powered educational startup called Oboe backed by a $4 million seed investment. The new company, hailing from Nir Zicherman and Michael Mignano, aims to democratize access to learning the way that their prior startup, Anchor, made it possible for anyone to create a podcast. That is, Oboe intends to produce a user-friendly interface that helps people accomplish the task at hand — in this case, expanding their knowledge via a combination of AI technology, audio, and video.

“This idea is something that Mike and I have been talking about for a long time now, because we have both felt for a while that there is a really big opportunity in the education space — much bigger than I think a lot of people realize,” Zicherman says.

After taking a brief period to recharge after leaving Spotify in October 2023, Zicherman was soon ready to roll up his sleeves and build something new with a small team, he says, similar to Anchor’s early days. He also took inspiration from his work at Spotify, where he had spent the last few years building out its audiobooks business and scaling it to more markets.

“One of the big things … that drew me to audiobooks, as a business, and as a product, was this idea of enabling so many more people than ever before to get access to incredible, high-quality content, including educational content and making that really ubiquitous,” he notes.

Oboe looks to expand on that mission, but not via audiobooks.

Instead, the team envisions a product that would allow more people to engage with “active learning journeys,” as the company calls it, by offering learning tools that optimize the development of a curriculum and personalize those to the way the individual user learns most effectively.

The tools offered will be available across platforms and will involve native applications, similar to existing online learning services.

However, the startup intends to differentiate itself from others in the space by leveraging AI to both customize the curriculum materials and enable an interactive experience. For instance, synthetic AI voices will be a part of the offering. Meanwhile, machine learning combined with Oboe’s back-end architecture will help to personalize how the material is presented and will improve over time.

Because AI tends to hallucinate or cite bad information, part of Oboe’s secret sauce will be focused on ensuring the content is accurate, high-quality, and scalable.

In part, Oboe will rely on third-party foundational AI models, but the team is also undertaking a “significant” amount of work in-house to build its data architecture and optimize the curriculum on a per-user basis, Zicherman says.

“This product is not one of these thin wrappers around existing LLMs. There’s a lot more happening under the hood,” he teases.

In addition, access to the material will be made available across different formats. When you can’t look at a screen — like if out for a jog or driving to work — you could tune in via audio. Other times, you may be watching videos, using an app, or engaging with a website.

Initially, Oboe will target just a few verticals, ranging from someone teaching themselves programming to a college student supplementing their classroom experience with more materials, for instance. These debut courses will focus on learners older than the K through 12 demographic, but Oboe’s eventual goal is to fulfill its mission of “making humanity smarter.” (A tall order, indeed.) That includes the K through 12 and higher-ed space, as well as those upskilling for their careers, or just engaged on their own to learn something new, like playing a new instrument. (Fun fact: Not only is the oboe the instrument an orchestra tunes to, but it’s also the root of the Japanese word meaning “to learn.”)

New York-based Oboe isn’t yet ready to share much more in terms of product details, but it has raised funding from a crowd of investors, including those who have worked with Zicherman and Mignano previously. Mignano will remain a full-time partner at Lightspeed but will serve on the board of this new company and support Zicherman in his role of CEO, he says.

“In my co-founding role at Oboe, Nir and I have worked closely together to set the company up for success through its initial strategy and product direction,” Mignano tells TechCrunch. “My partners at Lightspeed are super supportive of me being both investor and founder — there’s a long history of our investors starting or incubating their own companies. Nir and I were thrilled to raise this initial round from a number of amazing seed funds and angels — many who backed us previously at Anchor,” he adds.

Oboe’s $4 million seed round was led by Eniac Ventures — the VC firm that led Anchor’s seed. The round also includes investment from Haystack, Factorial Capital, Homebrew, Offline Ventures, Scott Belsky, Kayvon Beykpour, Nikita Bier, Tim Ferriss, and Matt Lieber.

Android 16 may come with a new “Rich Ongoing Notifications” feature that lets developers keep persistent notifications in the Android status bar, according to Android 15 beta code discovered by Android Authority’s Mishaal Rahman, who frequently dives into code to surface coming features.

Right now, the code enables adding a pill-shaped icon with custom text and background color to the Android status bar. Some mock notifications Rahman created show how it could be used for things like telling you when to expect your Uber to arrive. Android has already had a feature like this since Android 12 that lets you know how long you’ve been on a phone call, Rahman notes.

It looks similar to the iOS Live Activities feature, which surfaces things like timers, sports scores, and delivery ETAs on users’ lock screens and at the top of notifications. On the iPhone 14 Pro and up, they appear as widgets that are a glance away in the Dynamic Island cutout while you’re doing other things on your phone.

I’d love to have something just like that on my Pixel 6 phone. Live Activities have been a great way to keep from forgetting about a parking meter I paid for via my city’s parking app, or quickly checking on when a food delivery will arrive. Having something similar on Android would be one less barrier to me switching back to the platform in the future.

After Apple’s reveal of the M4 chip earlier this year, and its significant performance improvements (which we discuss at length in our M4 iPad Pro review), all eyes are now on what the company has in store for its Mac and MacBook devices, which at the moment are still using M3 chips.

We’ve just had the biggest hint yet that M4-powered Macs are about to drop thanks to Apple’s VP of Worldwide Marketing, Greg Joswiak, who teased on X that an upcoming ‘week of announcements’ is set to kick off on Monday, October 28. Along with recent rumors surrounding production of the M4 MacBook Air, it looks like it could be a very exciting week for Apple fans – so here’s what we expect to see.

M4 MacBook Pro

With Apple’s M4 Pro and Max chips yet to be unveiled, this upcoming showcase could be the ideal opportunity to show off the powerful M4 variants, especially as the M4 MacBook Pro 14-inch and 16-inch models will almost certainly be revealed, with Apple hopefully highlighting the major performance leap from the previous M3 Pro and Max chips.

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on Friday announced that Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla is chosen to fly on the upcoming Indo-US mission to the International Space Station (ISS). Shukla is designated as the prime astronaut to fly on the mission, while Group Captain Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair will be the backup astronaut. 

In an official release, the ISRO said its Human Space Flight Centre has entered into a space flight agreement with US’ Axiom Space Inc. For the mission, the National Mission Assignment Board has recommended two ‘gaganyatris’. 

The Board has “recommended two ‘gaganyatris’ (space travellers) –Group Captain Shukla (prime) and Group Captain Nair (backup),” read the statement. 

“The assigned crew members will be finally approved to fly to the International Space Station by the Multilateral Crew Operations Panel (MCOP). The recommended gaganyatris will commence their training for the mission from the first week of August 2024,” said ISRO.

Group Captain Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair | X

The ‘gaganyatris’ will be undertaking selected scientific research and technology demonstration experiments on board the ISS and engage in space outreach activities, it added.

“The experiences gained during this mission will be beneficial for the Indian Human Space Programme and it will also strengthen human space flight cooperation between ISRO and NASA,” the Indian space agency said.

A joint statement issued by ISRO and NASA IN June last year had envisioned a joint ISRO-NASA mission to the space station. The decision was announced after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s official state visit to the US. 

Who is Group Shubhanshu Shukla? 

Born in Uttar Pradesh’s Lucknow in 1985, Shukla is an alumnus of the National Defence Academy. He was commissioned on June 17, 2006 in the fighter stream of the Indian Air Force (IAF). 

He is a Fighter Combat Leader and a test pilot with approximately 2,000 hours of flying experience. He has flown a variety of aircraft including Sukhoi-30MKI, MiG-21, MiG-29, Jaguar, Hawk, Dornier, and An-32, among others.

Who is Group Captain Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair? 

Born in Kerala’s Thiruvazhiyad on August 26, 1976, he is also an alumnus of the National Defence Academy and a recipient of the Sword of Honour at the Air Force Academy. He was commissioned on December 19, 1998 in the fighter stream of the IAF. 

Group Captain Nair is a Category-A flying Instructor – the highest that a pilot can achieve, and a test pilot with approximately 3,000 hours of flying experience. He has also flown several aircraft including Sukhoi-30MKI, MiG-21, MiG-29, Hawk, Dornier and An-32.

He is an alumnus of the United States Staff College and a Directing Staff at the Defence Services Staff College, Wellington and the Flying Instructors School, Tambaram.

Netflix is starting to pick up the pace of its original movies again as 2024 winds down. The problem is that not all of them deserve to be counted among the very best. Netflix has always favored quantity over quality, and that’s exactly what it gets. Sometimes, the bad Netflix originals far outweigh the good ones.

This month, Netflix did very well with It’s What’s Inside, a sci-fi thriller that goes to some dark places. Romance lovers may enjoy Lonely Planet, which offers a more dramatic take on the genre than Netflix normally uses.

There’s a robust selection of titles from all genres in our roundup of the best Netflix original movies right now. You can find the rest of our picks below.

If you don’t find what you’re looking for here, try our other lists of the best movies to stream this week, the best Netflix movies, the best Hulu original series, and the best Amazon Prime original movies.

Related Topics: Netflix | Hulu | Amazon Prime | More Streaming Services

Yesterday, OnePlus officially announced OxygenOS 15, the next big update to its custom Android skin for phones and tablets. The company showed off the main new features that the new firmware will bring, highlighting the arrival of multiple AI-powered features. Now, OnePlus has updated the information with the rollout schedule for the Android 15-based beta update, confirming that some models will have to wait until 2025.

According to the official rollout schedule, the OxygenOS 15 open beta will be available for the first eligible devices as early as October 30. However, the last models will get it in February next year.

Android 15 rollout schedule to eligible OnePlus devices for 2024 and 2025

Starting October 30, users of the OnePlus 12, OnePlus 12R, and OnePlus 12R Genshin Impact Edition will be able to install Android 15 beta. This is great news for users of said devices, as they are just a few days away from enjoying early access to the new features and improvements. Then, sometime in November, users of the OnePlus Open and OnePlus Pad 2 will be able to do so.

Starting in December, the OnePlus 11, OnePlus 11R, and every model in the OnePlus Nord 4 series will gain access to the beta program. The first OnePlus Pad is also on the list for the last month of the year. Next, in January 2025, Android 15 beta will be available to owners of the OnePlus 10 Pro, OnePlus 10T, and OnePlus Nord 3. Lastly, the OnePlus 10R and OnePlus Nord CE 3 will receive the open beta starting in February 2025.

Some key OxygenOS 15 improvements

OxygenOS 15 will bring a set of nice improvements and new features to users of eligible devices. There are a number of new AI-powered features for image editing and enhancement. The artificial intelligence will also enable grammar checks, suggested answers, and summaries. There’s also an AI Toolbox 2.0 sidebar that will offer direct access to the AI features available for each app. The company is even polishing the OxygenOS UI and redesigning its icons.