YouTube Live is getting some new features, including automatic captions. “As you can imagine, adding automated captions to livestreams is a huge undertaking, as it requires real-time speech recognition and rendering to ensure the on-screen words are synchronized with the sounds as neatly as possible,” VentureBeat notes.

The BBC is apparently testing a new chatbot tool with which reporters can insert reusable bots into their articles, Nieman Lab reports. “In a few minutes, a BBC reporter can input the text of an article, define the questions users can click, and publish the bot, which can then be reused and added to any other relevant article,” it writes. “BBC reporters can even repurpose existing Q&A explainers into bot-based conversations.”  

Chinese social giant Momo just bought Chinese dating app Tantan for about $600 million in cash, TechCrunch reports. “With 5 billion matches to date, Tantan is China’s biggest dating app, and the country’s closest comparison to Tinder,” TC notes. “The deal puts the company's overall valuation at $735 million in total,” it writes, citing Bloomberg.

Google Assistant is adding more languages this year, 9To5Google reports. “Earlier this month, Google revealed at a conference that the Assistant is set for a wider international rollout in 2018,” it notes. “The company has confirmed that by year’s end it will be available in more than 30 languages (up from eight).”

Facebook just opened its first in-house incubator, based in London, VentureBeat reports. “The company first announced LDN_LAB back in December when it opened its new HQ in the U.K. capital,” VB notes. “The incubator will launch three 12-week courses throughout 2018, and seven U.K. startups will participate in the inaugural program, which kicked off on Monday.”

Allowing for the continued proliferation of fake and misleading news, Facebook is not yet allowing fact-checkers to flag offending videos, images, or memes. At the moment, fact-checking partners like Snopes “can only flag them if the falsity in question is a link,” Poynter reports. “When asked to comment on the inability of fact-checkers to flag memes, a Facebook spokesperson told Poynter in an email that they are working with their partners to understand how to improve the tool.”  

Despite reporting mixed fourth quarter financial results, Pandora beat Wall Street expectations for revenue, CNBC reports. “The company reported a 63 percent bump in subscription revenue, an important metric for the music streaming company, bringing the yearly total to $97.7 million,” it writes. “Pandora also tallied 5.48 million subscribers, a 25 percent increase from the previous year.”  

Due out some time this year, Apple’s next AirPods will reportedly come connected to Siri. “In the world of headphones, popular models can go years without being updated, but in the world of Apple, fast and regular iteration is the more expected cadence,” The Verge writes. The news of Apple’s earbuds hooking with its voice assistant was first reported by Bloomberg.

Vox Media plans to cut about 50 employees, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Targeting their social video teams, Vox properties including Racked and Curbed are expected to be most affected. Initiatives around native social video, while “growing successfully and surpassing audience growth goals, won’t be viable audience or revenue growth drivers for us relative to other investments we are making,” Vox CEO Jim Bankoff said.

On Twitter, people are posting fake accounts of being beaten by black teens at screening of the “Black Panther.” As The Wrap reports, “One fake post grabbed 400 retweets with a picture of a bloody towel and sink -- something that was quickly shown to be a Flickr image from 2009.” In response, Twitter is suspending the accounts of offending posters.