Twitter Increases Safety, Facebook Introduces its First App and YouTube Brings TV to the US - Social Media News – 3/3

Welcome to this week’s round-up of social media news. There have been lots of updates this week in the social sphere that when you initially read about sound like minor developments, but when you look into them more deeply have quite a large impact on the channels involved. Read on to find out what’s been happening in the world of social media and video this week!

Twitter Eggs

You may have noticed Twitter’s been adding more and more safety features recently to help protect users from harmful language and abuse, as well as trolls. A problem that Twitter has been lambasted for in the past. Their latest safety feature updates include filtering your notifications to block those from ‘egg accounts’ that are usually anonymous or fake; you can also choose to filter out any profiles that haven’t verified their accounts. To do this you just need to go into your settings and then select the option in ‘advanced filters’, simple as that.

YouTube TV

This week YouTube announced its very own streaming service which will offer viewers a mix of cable television channels, live broadcast streams along with the usual online videos – bringing more of the content you love straight to the sofa. The service will be a separate standalone app and will set you back a tidy $35 per month, oof! YouTube is hoping to target those who have never bought into the cable TV business, but maybe want access to channels such as ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC, which are to be offered on the app. Be prepared though, HBO is not offered on the app, probably as they have their own offering of HBO Go as well being featured on NOW TV in the UK via Sky Atlantic. There’s lots of things that are included or excluded across devices which are odd quirks, but we’re still not even sure when or if this app will make it to UK shores yet, so these exclusions may change.

Facebook TV App & New Suicide Prevention Tools

Facebook has launched its very first TV app – a dedicated video streaming offering for TVs – that has been launched across Samsung Smart TVs and now on Apple TV. The app basically allows easy access to Facebook videos and suggests videos based on ones you’ve already liked, those shared by friends and more. The app will also play host to live streaming on Facebook so that it is easier for viewers to watch the content on the big screen – I do wonder how Facebook will approach improving the quality of its live content though! The app is also said to be coming soon to Amazon Fire TV though there is no announced date yet.

Facebook also announced this week that they are introducing further suicide prevention tools – these were recently made available for friend’s status updates that had concerning content within them. Now, Facebook has added these tools to its ‘Live’ tool as an additional prevention method. Any live video reported as having suicide or self-harming content/keywords within its stream will pair up the streamer with live Messenger support from crisis support organisations. It will also send suggestions to the live streamer, such as contacting a help line, while offering resources that may help them in their moment of crisis. A great step toward helping those in need.

Instagram Stories Ads

Instagram Stories are to be untarnished by ads no more! In news that will excite all online marketers, Instagram has announced that you can now advertise within Instagram Stories. The targeting and reach capabilities are amazing thanks to the fact that Instagram is owned by Facebook. Selected brands have already been trying out the facility and seeing promising results in ad recall and brand recognition. You can start advertising in Instagram Stories now via Facebook’s Power Editor and Advert Manager tools; currently though these ads can only be optimised for reach, however they are looking to add in further objectives in the coming months. One thing that raises a red flag with us is how Instagram plans to place these ads; I don’t think a brand would be happy with competitor content appearing on their channel!

Periscope Closed Groups

And finally, Periscope has added new groups features. Following the addition of the groups tab on the app, the company has now added a closed group feature, along with a group invite feature, based on feedback from the community. Closed groups allows a user to become an admin of a closed group of people and that then means this person will be in control of who is let in or removed from the group as well as changing the name of the group.

The group invite feature allows users to accept or decline an invite into an open or closed group, rather than automatically being added to a group - how the app worked previously. Though to have this feature you will need to go to your settings and turn of the ‘auto-accept’ option.

That’s all this week! See you again next week!