YouTube announced a new feature today aimed at helping creators make money while connecting with their fans during a live stream: Super Chat. The addition is reminiscent of streaming site Twitch’s Cheering feature, which allow viewers to pay real money in order to have their messages stand out in the chat stream through the use of emotes (animated icons.) In YouTube’s case, fans instead are able to highlight their message in a bright color, and have their comment pinned on the stream.
Though the implementation is different from Twitch’s, the goal is the same: it’s a means of allowing fans to pay real money in exchange for attention. (It’s also not all that different from technologies porn cam sites have used in their own chat systems for years, which typically involve the purchase of tokens.)
As YouTube explains in its blog post announcing the new feature, Super Chats will remain pinned to the top of the chat for up to five hours, which gives the message a lot of airtime.
Creators, of course, benefit from the feature not only by being able to better connect with their bigger fans, but also because it’s another means of generating revenue from their videos.
Along with the launch of Super Chat, YouTube is debuting an API that will allow developers to access real-time purchase data from the system. This API will replace the Fan Funding API, which will be shut down.
The launch follows a number of changes for YouTube aimed at bettering the experience for creators and viewers alike. Earlier this week, YouTube announced it would begin showcasing new talent on a weekly basis on its Trending section, while last year it rolled out a new Creator Hub , benefits program, improved support, and others tools, and launched a social network of sorts with YouTube Community.
Super Chat is launching today into beta with top YouTubers, including iHasCupquake , Great Library (buzzbean11) and Alex Wassabi. It will roll out more broadly at month end for creators in 20 countries and viewers in more than 40 countries, the company says.

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Insiders with Windows 10 Mobile devices may have felt a bit left out of all the excitement lately – after all, the last Insider Preview for phones in the Fast ring came over a month ago , while PCs have had two Fast ring builds this week alone.
Today, though, Microsoft rolled out Windows 10 Insider Preview build 15007 for both PCs and phones, including a whole bunch of new features for both sets of devices , as well as some new features specifically for phones. But along with those additions, build 15007 also brings its share of fixes and known issues – you can find information on those for PCs here.
Let’s first take a look at the fixes for Windows 10 Mobile devices in this new build:
And before you install build 15007, make sure that you have a good look through the list of known issues – especially if you’re mad enough to install Fast ring builds on your primary, everyday handset (not recommended!!):
Since this is the first build for Windows 10 Mobile devices in six weeks, expectations will no doubt be high among Insiders. If you’re installing it today, let us know what you think of Insider Preview build 15007 in the comments below.
Source: Windows Blog

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The browser market has seen some major upheavals recently. However, the look and feel of modern browsers have been more or less the same since Chrome came along. Opera intends to change that.
With a concept browser, Neon, Opera has decided to challenge the status quo. Neon brings a long-awaited refresh to the drab UI of current generation browsers. It its announcement , Opera considered some parts of web browsers to be “nothing more than tributes to the last millennium”. With their latest experimental browser, Opera is giving us a peek into what a future browser might look like.
Neon provides a fluid experience with neat animations that make it look a lot more robust without affecting speed. It has an intuitive design which uses your desktop background as its start page giving it a near-transparent look. The start page consists of rounded floating icons and a sidebar.
In Opera’s own words, these are the ‘new’ features that lack in current browsers:
Other features include video pop-out, snap-to-gallery, and split screen mode. As the name suggests, video pop-out lets you play videos outside the scope of the website, snap-to-gallery allows you to snap and crop your screen without any hassles, and split screen mode makes it easier to browse and chat at the same time.
However, Opera Neon is still an experimental browser so you might run into a few issues. While it may not immediately replace your default browser, it does bring a slightly new take to the browsing experience. If you want to give Opera’s concept browser a try, you can download it for PC and macOS here.
Source: Opera via Windows Central

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Nintendo shares slumped Friday as investors were left disappointed by the high-end starting price of its much-awaited next-generation gaming system, Switch, which will go on sale globally on March 3.
The Switch will be priced at $299.99 in North America and 29,980 yen in Japan, Tatsumi Kimishima, president of the Japanese gaming giant, told reporters at an event on Friday. He did not specify a standard price for the European market.
Nintendo shares tumbled 5.75 percent to 23,750 yen at the close of trade, and commentators said the higher than expected retail price of the console fanned concerns over the product’s viability. Given the fierce competition in the console market, pricing is a key factor for the success of the Nintendo Switch, Jefferies analyst Atul Goyal told CNBC’s ” Squawk Box ” on Friday before the announcement.
Goyal had expected a retail price of $250. Though the Switch costs about $50 more than what the market expected, the Switch’s pricing is in line with its competitors. The Sony PS4’s starting price is also $299.99, while Microsoft ‘s Xbox One starts at $249.
Other factors were at play as well for the stock slump.
Seth Fischer, founder and CIO at Hong Kong-based Oasis Management, told CNBC’s ” Capital Connection ” that it was likely a case of “buy(ing) the rumor, sell(ing) the fact” and that investors were still likely interested in the stock.
Switch is a hybrid gaming system that is part gaming console, part handheld device and part tablet.
It allows users three different styles of play: first, they can set the Switch console in a dock and connect it to their television sets for the more traditional type of TV mode gaming. They can stand the console up with a kickstand and play using the Joy-Con controllers in the Tabletop mode. The Joy-Con controllers can also be attached on either side of the console for the handheld mode.
When Nintendo initially announced Switch – previously called the NX – there was a lot of buzz around the so-called Joy-Con controllers, which can be split into two separate gaming controllers. They come with motion control sensors, including an infrared camera on the right Joy-con that can sense the shape, motion and distance of objects before the controller.
This opens the possibility of a new form of player-versus-player gaming as Nintendo demonstrated with two new game titles 1,2 Switch and Arms. In 1,2 Switch, players take control of each Joy-Con controller and can play out scenarios like quick draw shooting and sword fighting without needing to look at the screen, with their movements determined by the motion control features in the controller.
The Joy-Con controllers also come with wrist straps that make the grip easier and are available in black, red and blue.
The Switch’s battery life varies on the games, but Nintendo said it could be expected to last in a range between 2.5 to 6.5 hours. The console can be charged using a USB-C charger.
In the mobile gaming space, which the Japanese company entered as late as 2015 with a partnership with DeNA, Nintendo found success in 2016, first with the successful launch of the Niantic-developed Pokemon Go mobile game. That was followed by Nintendo’s in-house developed Super Mario Run game that was rolled out on the iOS platform last December and garnered about 40 million downloads in 4 days.
Analysts have previously said that one of Nintendo’s biggest competitive advantages is the vast intellectual property it possesses. Fischer agreed that titles available on the Switch, along with the console’s functionality, could make it a big hit among gamers.
At the Tokyo event, Nintendo announced there were 80 games in development for the Nintendo Switch from over 50 companies.
Among the notable names showcased were Splatoon 2 and Super Mario Odyssey, which is set to be released during the holiday season later in the year, and role-playing game titles such as Xenoblade Chronicle 2, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – launching on Mar. 3 – and a tease for Fire Emblem Warriors.
Third party games such as Bethesda’s Skyrim and EA Sports’ FIFA will also be available.
Nintendo also announced an online, paid subscription service for the Switch, with pricing details set to be announced later. Some analysts felt Nintendo’s move into a subscription service was a little late.
Serkan Toto, CEO of Japanese gaming consultant Kantan Games said, “Microsoft and Sony have had this for years…they were giving away free games on a monthly basis for years. ”
— CNBC’s Arjun Kharpal contributed to this report.
— Follow CNBC International on Twitter and Facebook .

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