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    Here we go again: ABBA records first new songs in 35 years

    By SHOOTUpdated:No Comments742 Views
    LONDON (AP) --

    Mamma Mia! The members of ABBA announced Friday that they have recorded new material for the first time in 35 years.

    The Swedish pop supergroup said it had recorded two new songs, including one titled "I Still Have Faith in You."

    The news was announced in an Instagram statement from Benny Andersson, Bjorn Ulvaeus, Anni-Frid Lyngstad and Agnetha Faltskog.

    ABBA won the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest with "Waterloo" and had a sequin-spangled string of hits including "Dancing Queen" and "Take a Chance on Me" before splitting up in 1982.

    The band's statement said the members reunited to plan a virtual tour featuring digital avatars, and decided to go back into the studio.

    ABBA said "it was like time had stood still and that we had only been away on a short holiday. An extremely joyous experience!"

    "I Still Have Faith In You" is due to be performed by the group's holograms in a December TV special broadcast by the BBC and NBC. There was no word on when the second track will be released.

    Ulvaeus revealed earlier this month that digitally created virtual band members — "Abbatars" — would perform in a television show in 2018, followed by a tour in 2019 or 2020.

    The band members have performed together just once since the 1980s, at a private party in 2016, and have long said they will never tour live together again.

    Tags:ABBA



    Growth Brings Growing Pains–and Bots–To Bluesky

    Sunday, December 22, 2024

    Bluesky has seen its user base soar since the U.S. presidential election, boosted by people seeking refuge from Elon Musk's X, which they view as increasingly leaning too far to the right given its owner's support of President-elect Donald Trump, or wanting an alternative to Meta's Threads and its algorithms.

    The platform grew out of the company then known as Twitter, championed by its former CEO Jack Dorsey. Its decentralized approach to social networking was eventually intended to replace Twitter's core mechanic. That's unlikely now that the two companies have parted ways. But Bluesky's growth trajectory — with a user base that has more than doubled since October — could make it a serious competitor to other social platforms.

    But with growth comes growing pains. It's not just human users who've been flocking to Bluesky but also bots, including those designed to create partisan division or direct users to junk websites.

    The skyrocketing user base — now surpassing 25 million — is the biggest test yet for a relatively young platform that has branded itself as a social media alternative free of the problems plaguing its competitors. According to research firm Similarweb, Bluesky added 7.6 million monthly active app users on iOS and Android in November, an increase of 295.4% since October. It also saw 56.2 million desktop and mobile web visits, in the same period, up 189% from October.

    Besides the U.S. elections, Bluesky also got a boost when X was briefly banned in Brazil.

    "They got this spike in attention, they've crossed the threshold where it is now worth it for people to flood the platform with spam," said Laura Edelson, an assistant professor of computer science at Northeastern University and a member of Issue One's... Read More

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