# Platform Verticalization, AI Automation, and Decentralized Web Discovery

**Podcast:** TechCrunch Daily Crunch
**Published:** 2026-06-04

## Transcript

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TikTok announced on Wednesday that it's launching a new standalone app in the U.S.
dedicated to cultural milestones like the upcoming FIFA World Cup.
The new app called TikTok Pro Events allows users to engage with other fans, explore trending videos, and access curated creator feeds.
Users aged 18 and above can earn stars, which can be redeemed for exclusive benefits by completing fan-focused activities within the app, such as searching for trending hashtags, visiting the FIFA World Cup hub, and sharing content.
Now, these exclusive benefits include official FIFA World Cup merch through a dedicated in-app redemption store, TikTok shop coupons, or the opportunity to direct TikTok-funded charitable donations through a partnership with Feeding America.
By launching a dedicated app for global cultural moments outside of its main platform, TikTok's competing with other apps for user attention while also giving creators and advertisers access to a more focused audience.
So Meta is turning WhatsApp into a viable piece of workflow software for small and medium businesses.
You see, the company on Wednesday said it's making its customer support AI bot, now known as Meta Business Agent, available globally within WhatsApp.
The launch comes as Meta has spent nearly two years testing AI agents and WhatsApp business for customer support in countries like India and Mexico.
Meta said the AI agent can answer customer questions, recommend products, book appointments, qualify sales leads, and reroute queries to a person if needed.
The company is also making the bot available within Instagram DMs.
And finally, as searches become increasingly dominated by AI summaries and commercial content, people, well, they're experimenting and coming up with ways to make the web feel more human.
like it used to, building everything from small web search engines to decentralized social networks.
Now, one of the newer efforts in that direction is Wander Console, an open-source, self-hosted web console that gives website visitors a way to explore other interesting sites and webpages recommended by a community of indie website owners.
Susam Paul, the London-based developer of the project, says he was inspired to build the small decentralized tool after he saw Kagi's small web search tool that limits searches to certain types of content, like blogs, webcomics, and YouTube channels.
But that still wouldn't surface the kind of small websites that are maintained by indie developers, like Paul himself, nor web projects, mini-apps, or games.
That led Paul to create...
Wander, which puts website recommendations back into the hands of users.
Wander has its roots in older ideas, like the web rings that once connected independent websites and blogs, or website discovery tools like StumbleUpon, which offered serendipitous recommendations as you clicked its Stumble button to discover new websites.
It also has elements of blog roles, as site owners can recommend other websites.
And folks, that's your Daily Crunch.
Today's stories were reported by Sarah Perez, Aisha Malik, and more awesome TechCrunch journalists.
We'll see you here tomorrow.
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