As we head into October, we’re taking a look at what has been making the news in the digital world.
Rivals react to major Facebook outage
With yesterday’s major outage affecting Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp for over six hours, many people headed to alternative platforms to find out information, or to poke fun at the social media giant. At one point at least five of the top trends on Twitter were related to its rival’s difficulties, and it appears that Twitter itself could not avoid a little bit of gloating.
While full details of the cause of the outage are emerging, with Facebook blaming a configuration change to routers, the company has assured users that no data was compromised.
Instagram puts its kids’ platform on hold… but for how long?
Plans have been underway for a’ ‘kid-friendly’ version of Instagram for some time now, but it seems that we may have to wait a little bit longer – that’s if it happens at all. Concerns have been raised over the mental wellbeing of potential young users if this was to go ahead, which given the nature of the main platform are well founded. Instagram has said it will take time to listen to "parents, experts, policymakers and regulators", but this is one development that is going to continue to attract backlash, so don’t expect to see it launch anytime soon.
Read more here >>https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-58707753
Twitch introduces new safety features
One platform that is taking steps to keep its users safe is video streaming platform Twitch. New safety features being introduced by the video streaming platform which saw 97% YOY growth in Q1 of 2021, include phone verified chat. With these new tools, creators can set email or phone verification requirements for accounts that fall under certain age limits or following lengths. The rollout comes after a number of Twitch users have experienced abuse, in so called “hate raids”, leading to a coordinated social media effort from creators, under #twitchdobetter and #adayofftwitch, to draw attention to the problem.
Learn more here >> https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/29/22700937/twitch-safety-tools-verification-phone-hate-raids
Facebook and Instagram Group Chats
In its latest move to make its apps more integrated, Facebook has announced that you will now be able to have group chats across Facebook and Instagram – but you’ll need to opt in. Facebook say though that 70% of users chose to opt in when cross app chat, on a one-to-one basis, was first announced. It will be interesting to see how this move affects numbers across both platforms, many users may currently only retain profiles on both accounts for chat purposes.
Read the full announcement here>> https://messengernews.fb.com/2021/09/30/new-group-chat-experiences-cross-app-chats-chat-themes-polls-and-watch-together/
And finally…Tik Tok NFTs
We’ve talked about NFT’s, or non-fungible tokens to give them their full name, in previous round ups - take a look to remind yourself how much Jack Dorsey sold the very first tweet for. Now TikTok has joined the trend, with the release of a creator-led collection of digital assets, inspired by the platforms trending videos, each one celebrating the cultural impact made by its creator.
Find out more here >> https://www.thedrum.com/news/2021/10/01/tiktok-lets-top-creators-sell-trending-videos-nfts
