*By Madison Alworth*
Instagram launched its new long-form video content platform on Wednesday, a bid to take on YouTube and Snapchat and introduce a kind of viral element that made the now-defunct Vine so popular.
"It's mobile first. It's simple, and it's quality," said CEO Kevin Systrom at the press event introducing the new feature, dubbed IGTV.
Cheddar's Alex Heath, who was at the launch, said the new app targets a very specific audience.
"This is Instagram's teen plan," he said. "If I were to summarize the announcement, it would be all caps: TEENS."
The opportunity for growth is significant. While Instagram unveiled at the event that it broke the 1 billion monthly active user mark, a recent [PEW study](http://www.pewinternet.org/2018/03/01/social-media-use-in-2018/) found that just 71% of those aged 18 to 24 use Instagram, compared to 94 percent on YouTube.
The Facebook-owned company hopes creating a platform with the same kind of premium video content will help close that gap. While anyone can publish to the platform, Instagram is also courting internet celebrities with big teen followings to create content. It's already brought on the likes of [Fortnite champion Tyler "Ninja" Blevins](https://cheddar.com/videos/ninja-on-fortnites-future-in-esports), Selena Gomez, and Kim Kardashian.
IGTV will exist both within the Instagram app and as a standalone product and can host vertical videos up to 60 minutes in length.
And while there are no current plans to monetize that content, Roger Cheng, executive editor at CNET, said that the longer format will be much more attractive to advertisers than Instagram's previous offerings, which were too short and incompatible for things like pre-roll ads.
"You imagine that ads will start seeping into this service," Cheng said in an interview with Cheddar. "You can't monetize \[the previous\] business. So that's why you see Instagram investing into that long-form content, because that is where ad dollars are going."
For the full interview, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/instagram-launches-igtv-platform-for-long-form-video).
Waymo's self-driving taxis have been in the spotlight for both negative and positive reasons. This week, the automated ride-hailing taxis went viral after a San Francisco woman gave birth inside a Waymo taxi while on her way to the hospital. A Waymo spokesperson on Wednesday confirmed the unusual delivery. It said the company's rider support team detected unusual activity inside the vehicle and alerted 911. The taxi arrived safely at the hospital before emergency services. Waymo's popularity is growing despite heightened scrutiny following an illegal U-turn and the death of a San Francisco cat. The company, owned by Alphabet, says it is proud to serve riders of all ages.
OpenAI has appointed Slack CEO Denise Dresser as its first chief of revenue. Dresser will oversee global revenue strategy and help businesses integrate AI into daily operations. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently emphasized improving ChatGPT, which now has over 800 million weekly users. Despite its success, OpenAI faces competition from companies like Google and concerns about profitability. The company earns money from premium ChatGPT subscriptions but hasn't ventured into advertising. Altman had recently announced delays in developing new products like AI agents and a personal assistant.
President Donald Trump says he will allow Nvidia to sell its H200 computer chip used in the development of artificial intelligence to “approved customers” in China. Trump said Monday on his social media site that he had informed China’s leader Xi Jinping and “President Xi responded positively!” There had been concerns about allowing advanced computer chips into China as it could help them to compete against the U.S. in building out AI capabilities. But there has also been a desire to develop the AI ecosystem with American companies such as chipmaker Nvidia.
The end of 2025 is almost upon us. And it’s time to unpack Spotify Wrapped. On Wednesday, the music streaming giant delivered its annual recap — giving its hundreds of millions of users worldwide a look at the top songs, artists, podcasts and other audio they listened to over the past year. Spotify isn’t the only platform to roll out a yearly glimpse of data collected from consumers’ online lives. But since its launch about a decade ago, Wrapped has become one of the most anticipated. And Spotify is billing the 2025 edition to be the biggest yet, with a host of new features it hopes may also address some disappointments users had last year.
Elon Musk’s X unveiled a feature that lets users see where an account is based. Online sleuths and experts quickly found that many popular accounts, often posting in support of the U.S. MAGA movement with thousands or hundreds of thousands of followers, are based outside the U.S. This raises concerns about foreign influence in U.S. politics.
