Instagram founders shut down AI news app Artifact a year after release

Artifact

Artifact, the AI news app created by Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, is shutting down less than a year after its launch. The app's basic news reading features will work until the end of February, but the ability to comment and publish content has already been disabled.

Here's What We Know

In addition to its distinguished team of creators, the app stood out for its artificial intelligence-focused features, as well as commenting and posting capabilities similar to Reddit. Artifact was praised by journalists for its reporter-friendly tools like personal author pages and gained prominence in the Apple and Google app shops.

After a year in business, however, Systrom and Krieger appear to have run into the same problems as the creators of other popular news apps before them.

"We have built something that a core group of users love, but we have concluded that the market opportunity isn’t big enough to warrant continued investment in this way." - Systrom stated.

Without revealing his future plans, Systrom hinted that he may take on a new AI-centric project at some point. In the meantime, Artifact fans have a few more weeks to read news on the app before it ceases to exist for good.

Source: Artifact