WhatsApp Status, Shorter Youtube Ads, Instagram Multiple Uploads and New Facebook Profile Frames - Social Media News

Hi guys, Rhodri here giving you this week’s fill of social media advancements and updates. Enjoy!

WhatsApp status

Facebook-owned WhatsApp have created an ‘updated status’ feature similar to Snapchat stories that allows users to share end-to-end encrypted content with each other.

WhatsApp has actually always had a status feature in the app but up until now it only allowed users to enter a short message in text. The update, that was rolled out earlier this week, lets users share photos and videos with each other which will then disappear after 24 hours. You can even control who sees your updates by changing your privacy settings. This is most likely another attempt by Facebook to take more of Snapchat’s users away from the app. The difference between platforms here comes in the form of higher security with the end-to-end encryption that may interest those with concerns about their privacy.

YouTube’s ads will become shorter in 2018 At the moment, advertisers can make their videos un-skippable if they are under 30 seconds in length on YouTube – something which YouTube are keen to expand on. The planned change comes as good news for many as there are likely very few people who will say that they actually enjoy YouTube’s non-skippable advertisements. YouTube are aware of this and have decided to phase this out going into 2018. It will instead use shorter ads, which users will prefer, and advertisers will hopefully benefit from this too as attention levels don’t drop as easily. YouTube is going to begin this transition in 2017/2018, with 30 second ads soon to become a thing of the past.

Instagram introduces multiple photo uploads in a single-post feature

We mentioned this feature as a potential up and comer a few weeks ago in our social media round-up and now it has been rolled out for everyone to use. You can now share up to 10 photos and videos in a single post on the platform. When uploading, there is a new icon that allows users to select the multiple images or videos they wish to upload. You can easily change the order in which the pictures will appear and edit them all simultaneously to have the same look, or do them individually if you wish. When users are viewing other people’s profiles, they will notice the initial photo or video will have an icon on it which will indicate that there is more to see, with symbols below to indicate how many images or videos there are to scroll through.

Although many have been awaiting a feature like this from Instagram, many online have been quick to bad-mouth the update saying it goes against the carefully selected image ethos of Instagram. Some believe there is no need for this because stories has been created for this purpose and the app may now soon become full of unwanted holiday albums etc. Others think it makes sense and should have been incorporated a long time ago. Quite simply, if you don’t want to view the photos, you don’t have to, so you can make your own mind up.

Facebook updates its Profile Frames

Facebook has revamped their Profile Frames page and introduced a load of new frames for people to use. The way users can search and edit these has also changed; previously there was a list of all the frames that users could use when selecting which one they wanted, whilst now there is a search bar to simplify the process. The new feature also alerts users to which frames their friends are using, potentially encouraging more people to use them. One of the updates that is expected to be one of the most popular is the addition of over 200 national flags to the tool, allowing them to represent their country. This expansion possibly comes as some sort of attack on Snapchat’s Geofilter feature, although it is not as similar a copy as stories.

Give it a go here: https://www.facebook.com/help/1476775522631878