Meta Releases New Bots With Web Crawling Capabilities That Gather Data For AI Models And Related Products

Tech giant Meta just rolled out a new array of bots with web crawling capabilities. The tools are known for sucking up online data which the company can use for various AI products.

The bots entail specific features that prevent website owners from blocking or securing their content and preventing it from getting scraped and collected. When asked to explain, Facebook’s parent firm shared how the first bot called Meta-ExternalAgent is designed for training purposes.

They can improve the firm’s AI offerings through direct indexing of content. On the other hand, the second bot dubbed Meta-ExternalFetcher has to do with the firm’s AI offerings. It can gather links to provide specific functional support.

The bots were first spotted last month as per startup Originality.ai. It’s an alarming finding because as we speak, Robots.txt was called out for similar actions. You can see it as a race where startup firms are working round the clock to create the most powerful chatbots.

To become a frontrunner, AI models need to be trained on the best data and that is where web crawlers come into play. One of the biggest ways to get this done is by sending bots on the web to scrape content from the internet. So far, bots from all leading tech giants have been identified. This includes Google, Anthropic, OpenAI, and more.

If any website wishes to block this from happening, they make use of robots.txt which stops scraping of content online. You can consider it as a small code that has been in use for the past decade, if not more.

Despite such rules in place, many AI giants have a growing thirst for more data for AI training purposes. A lot of companies were outlined for ignoring the robots.txt rule including OpenAI and Anthropic.

With the latest offering by Meta, it seems like this is the goal, although the company hoped to do it more discreetly to be less noticed. As it is, Meta has already warned the world that one of the two web crawlers has this capability and therefore could bypass the robots.txt regulations.

Not only can it collect data for AI training but also indexes content at the same time. Meanwhile, a lot of website owners can block Meta from this, only if they opt to stop their websites from getting indexed by Facebook’s parent firm. If that’s the case, fewer visitors will come to their page from Meta, which again is not good for revenue.

When you combine both of these offerings into a single bot, it’s harder to block. Today, just 1.5% of all leading pages block the bot. Another web crawler from Meta dubbed FacebookBot gets blocked by just 10% of leading pages. Yahoo and X are on the list. Interestingly, the other Meta bot called Meta-ExernalFetcher gets blocked by less than 1% of the top pages.

As per the head of Originiality.ai, companies like Meta need to give websites the chance to block onsite data as it’s their material. Nobody should be forced to give in to tech giants due to their growing power, only because they fear website visibility loss.

The news is alarming and clear proof that Meta fails at respecting other pages. While its older bots may have been mindful, the latest offerings are not. This can be a huge debate and controversial move for the company.

Image: DIW-Aigen

Read next: Google Under Fire as New Allegations Claim Its Sales Reps Advised Advertisers To Target Teens On YouTube
by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

Google Under Fire as New Allegations Claim Its Sales Reps Advised Advertisers To Target Teens On YouTube

Google’s sales representatives are being accused of breaking their own policies regarding minors.

A new set of allegations has accused the search engine giant's sales team of advising advertisers to target young audiences on the YouTube app. This is a clear violation of the platform’s own terms and conditions.

More details spoke about how reps informed several buyers about hitting the unknown category for users that mostly comprised youngsters. It’s not something new and was outlined to have taken place a while back, only to be found now.

Google and Meta were called out in the past for their controversial agreement of targeting users who fell in the 13 to 17-year age bracket. What’s even more shocking is how Google confirmed in 2021 that wouldn’t permit advertisers to target anyone below 18.

The unknown category being discussed includes those having demographics that are not familiar to Google. It’s a simple way for the company to target minors. Meanwhile, one advertiser did reveal how the sales rep from Google spoke about targeting those who were 16 years old and had a disposable income. Again, they fell into this unknown category.

One buyer shed light on the huge entertainment brand which convinced the company to upload information about teenagers so that targeting would become easier. Knowing that this was a violation of the policy, they still went ahead.

This is a very serious matter. It similarly raises a lot of questions about the Android maker and how it fails in terms of enforcing its own policies related to minor user targeting. We already have laws such as the Children’s Online Privacy Protection that are designed to restrict online ads to teens.

Advertisers really just want to make money at the end of the day. And if that comes at the cost of targeting minors, then so be it. With Google making their lives simpler by breaking policies, not a lot can be done here.

This is why Google is now being asked to justify the act after the allegations took center stage. On that note, the company says that it has always prohibited ad personalization for users below 18. After hearing the news, they vow to take strict and swift action. Similarly, they will be working closely with sales reps to investigate what went wrong here.

Image: DIW-Aigen

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• New Study Reveals People Feel More Bored When They are Continuously Scrolling Through TikTok/YouTube Videos
by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

New Study Reveals People Feel More Bored When They are Continuously Scrolling Through TikTok/YouTube Videos

Dr Katy Tam at the University of Toronto Scarborough led a study which found out that when we continuously browse through different videos, we feel more bored. We all watch videos on YouTube and TikTok. But since there are different types of content, we keep switching between them and cannot get engaged to only one video. So, we keep scrolling in hopes of finding something more interesting but it just keeps increasing our boredom.

The researchers of the study surveyed 1200 participants. The first group of 140 participants reported switching between videos because they found the content they were watching more boring, while the second group of 231 participants reported that they switch a video or skip it in hopes that it would make their scrolling less boring.

The study found that this wasn't the case as a survey of 166 undergraduate participants showed that they felt more bored when they had an option to skip a video instead of an option of not skipping. 159 undergraduate participants reported feeling more bored when they had an option of watching different five-minute videos they could switch between than when they were given a single ten minute video to watch.

On the other hand, when the same survey was done among participants of broader age range, the researchers didn't find any reported boredom during either of the options, i.e., switching between five-minute videos or watching a single 10-minute video. 174 undergraduates experienced less boredom when they were allowed to pick videos of their choice from YouTube.

The researchers said that feelings of boredom while watching videos can also depend on different ages. People from different age groups have different watching and switching video habits. But there needs to be more extensive studies about this to find out why people feel bored when they are scrolling online.

Image: DIW-Aigen

Read next: How to Customize YouTube Kids for a Safer Viewing Experience: A Step-by-Step Guide
by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Meta’s Ad Business Earnings Reach New High Thanks To AI-Driven Improvements

A new report is sharing the business earnings for Meta during the first half of 2024. It’s safe to say the company is on a roll, thanks to the adoption of more AI-driven improvements.

On average, every employee of the company accounted for revenue that went beyond the $1M mark, a clear record for Facebook’s parent firm.

The news is major considering where Meta was coming from. Remember, it made a series of firings in the latter part of 2022 and the early part of last year. It’s easy to think that this would have really affected the business’s growth. However, that’s not the case.

Meta has AI to thank as the company’s recommendation system for social media as well as its advertising platform is generating a lot of income. While Meta did suffer at the hands of Apple’s decision to introduce app-tracking changes, it’s slowly but surely recovering from the phase.

There was a time when the company had warned investors about Apple’s changes negatively impacting the company but three years from that day, business is bigger and better than before.

Meta did struggle in terms of adapting to new changes. It rolled out all kinds of tests including VR and paid subscriptions. However, it cannot be denied that ads are where the majority of its revenue comes from. For instance, advertising is responsible for 98% of the company’s overall revenue for the second quarter of this year.

The company’s advertising was more focused on desktops until the arrival of smartphones. This is where the ad business for mobile phones became the biggest revenue generator. Again, Apple’s changes to privacy meant a huge setback. Advertisers couldn’t track users for ad-targeting purposes on Facebook.

This led Meta to think outside the box. It’s created a new set of ad tools using AI technology.

Today, nearly all of its clients make use of the tool dubbed Advantage + and the figure has hit one million. The tool is designed to select specific targets and optimize placements easily and more efficiently.

Meanwhile, one study commissioned by Meta showed how clients generated more revenue than anticipated. There has been a 12% rise in business since the start of 2022.

Furthermore, the study has proven how AI-based recommendations keep increasing users’ engagement and driving more ad business. All the ad impressions throughout Meta’s family of platforms keep increasing by the day. It’s a 10% YOY rise during Q2 of this year.

It’s also interesting to note that more than half of the content that you see on Instagram is driven by AI recommendations. And the fact that Reels make up more than 50% of viewership says a lot.

A new update by Meta also spoke about how it will be testing a new feature that enables AI-embedded chats for businesses. This makes it simpler for them to sell products and get the leads they need for growth.

We agree that while Meta might have seen several challenges in the past, thanks to Apple, it’s well on the way to attaining success. Thanks to AI tools, Meta’s ad business is performing its best. This might be one of the main reasons why the company is planning to invest big in generative AI for the future.

As explained by CEO Mark Zuckerberg in the latest earnings call to investors last month, AI is big on the agenda and after seeing the results, we can only imagine why that’s sensible.

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Read next: OpenAI Allows Developers To Customize GPT-4o Models For Specific Uses
by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

OpenAI Allows Developers To Customize GPT-4o Models For Specific Uses

Tech giant OpenAI just unveiled a revolutionary feature for its flagship GPT-4o models. This includes the ability to fine-tune them, giving developers the chance to curate customized versions.

This means specific models can be designed for specific uses, the company has confirmed. It’s a huge move as the models are currently capable of producing replies in real time. This can be video, text, or audio-based. Moreover, it has the tendency to generate replies to various vocal inputs as well.

It’s nearly like you’re speaking to another individual and can be done during the entire video streaming process.

For those who might not be aware, the process will adjust pre-trained versions to produce a certain task. As it is, these models have a lot of in-built data. It’s usually taken from a broader range of data that entails several subjects. Hence, you can consider it to be a jack of all trades without specifications.

To get that, models can carry out specific commands or be customized for a certain use. It’s quite like you’re training workers for certain tasks and enhancing their efficiency to suit a professional role.

With this latest feature, developers can carry out specific training using customized data to attain greater performance at cheaper costs. It would be for a specific use so that the model’s behavior or tone could be altered.

For instance, models can be customized to behave as a coder for college-level programs. In this way, it would have the specific details of the school’s offerings and can help with assignments and quizzes. It’s certainly a useful feature.

During the testing phase, OpenAI did confirm how GPT-4o models could be fine-tuned to enhance the quality of results generated. It’s partnering up with other companies for data training to get this unique feature, it explained.

Various examples were provided where models trained on exclusive data were found to produce better results. Did we mention how the accuracy jumped to 71%? In the same manner, it excelled in terms of offering a wide array of responses that were specific to certain tasks, something that couldn’t have been possible before.

Fine-tuning options for the GPT-4o and its mini versions are currently available on the company’s paid tiers. On average, it’s a costly task for the company to indulge in. However, OpenAI will certainly be spending to better the lives of developers, making it the best fine-tuning feature of the range.

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Read next: Survey by Qustodio Shows Which Apps Are Popular Among Kids and Teens in the USA
by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World

Survey by Qustodio Shows Which Apps Are Popular Among Kids and Teens in the USA

A report by Qustodio surveyed 180,000 US families with children between ages 7-18 to find out what social media apps kids and teens are using the most nowadays and why they are so popular among them. According to the report, the most popular apps among 7 to 9 years old are YouTube and Roblox. There are also some apps like X and Reddit, which seems a little concerning. Qustodio says that kids use these apps to know more about the games they are playing. Either parents do not know much about these apps or do not block them from their children, even though both of these apps can lead children to a lot of explicit and harmful content.

YouTube and Roblox are also the most popular apps among kids of ages 10 to 12. Some social apps also become a part of their lives as they are transitioning from kids to teens. TikTok and Snapchat are also some popular apps among 10-12 years old. Facebook also seems to be of some importance to these kids.

As they grow into teens (16 to 18 years old), TikTok becomes the most popular app, among other apps like Snapchat, Instagram and YouTube. As teens get older, they want to connect with other people and look for content that is engaging and interesting.

Some common apps that can be seen among all age groups in the survey are YouTube and Amazon Shopping. YouTube is by far the most used app, no matter what your age is. Kids and teens love buying new things and that is the reason most of them can be seen using Amazon Shopping.

While there are some concerning trends amongst kids and teens who are using different kinds of apps, brands can look for where to target their customers. The full report is names “Apps Through the Ages” and can be read on Qustodio’s website.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Starlink vs. Fiber: Satellite Internet Emerges as Rural Favorite

According to a survey by Recon Analytics, Starlink customers are more satisfied with internet services than fiber network users. The founder of Recon Analytics, Roger Entner, says that their organization has been tracking Starlink for 2 years and now it has over 1.4 million subscribers in the USA. SpaceX's internet service, Starlink, has started making an impact now, with many users highly recommending its services.

Users of Starlink have given +42 points to the complete Starlink experience, the highest score among many big wireless services like cable, 5G and DSL. It also has highest scores in video streaming (+44) and maintaining Wifi connection (+37). The survey also found out that 85% of Starlink users live in rural areas in the USA and now the residents of these places are enjoying satellite internet service. Only 15% of Starlink users are from urban or suburban areas.

Most of the Starlink users are from areas where there were limited broadband services or no access to internet services at all. 11% of the Starlink users said that they have never subscribed to any internet service before, while some users said that they only used broadband services through small ISPs. This shows that most users didn't have any alternate option before subscribing to Starlink.

Even though Starlink received a lot of positive feedback, its users weren't happy with its customer service and billing support. Starlink received -1 score on its Billing Support, -3 on Technical Support and -17 in In-Store Experience. Users said that they don't get why Starlink has to be sold at big box retailers while its hardware is available at Target, Walmart and Best Buy. Cable, DSL and Fiber also had poor In-Store Experience scores.

On the other hand, Fiber Network users rate its services positively, but they are not quite satisfied with it. High-speed fiber has a high cost which can go from $60 to $100 per month. Most users said that they think Fiber is a better option than Starlink but if we talk about its cost, this option doesn't seem too alluring.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World