Recent deadly protests in Charlottesville continue to reflect negatively on the embattled US President Donald Trump as top Silicon Valley tech leaders have condemned the violent rally, with Apple CEO Tim telling troops in a company-wide email that “hate is cancer”.
Facebook has begun rolling out a brand new Trending News section within its iPhone and iPad app for users in the United States, TechCrunch reported on Monday.
We've seen jailbreak tweaks that let you designate favorite emojis, but none so far that allow you to block emojis you don't like seeing from appearing in apps.
If you dislike certain emojis, or a friend of yours uses them too often in messaging or social media, then a new jailbreak tweak called Nomoji by iOS developer PoomSmart will come in clutch.
As part of celebrating its two billion monthly active users milestone, Facebook on Monday unveiled new video chat features for its mobile Messenger app, such as the beautifully animated reactions, interactive filters, masks and effects. “Video chats with your friends and family in Messenger just got a whole lot more fun,” said the firm.
You can use these new video features in one-on-one video calls, as well as in your group video conversations. The new capabilities let you easily share your emotions during a video call with one of the five Facebook reactions, alter your appearance (how about making your friend laugh with a bear mask?) by taking advantage of the many built-in filters and much more.
I like how reactions animate onto the screen and then disappear.
Many reactions have different versions, depending on whether your face is on or off the screen. For instance, tap the love reaction when the camera is facing you, then tap it again when the camera is facing outward to see the difference.
A variety of in-call filters are now available to Messenger users, ranging from subtle lighting tweaks to color changes, like black and white, red or yellow. Each one has a live preview so you can test it on yourself before letting others see it. Many new masks are available for video calls, too, including some with hidden effects that react to your facial movements.
From the Facebook blog:
We have also added animated effects, like falling hearts and twinkling stars, to give your video chats expressive flair. Check out what happens when you wave your arm in front of the camera while using one of those effects! Unlike reactions, masks and effects stay on the screen for the duration of the video chat (or until you take them off or switch to another one).
One of the best new in-call video features is the screenshotting ability.
During an one-on-one or group video call with one or more friends, tap the camera icon at the bottom to take a screenshot of your time together and share it with other friends via Messenger Day or other social media accounts
The image of your video conversation will be saved to your iPhone's Camera roll. Plus, you can quickly send the screenshot to the person or group that you’re video chatting with.
Check out the new Messenger video features in Facebook's video embedded below.
Earlier today, Microsoft started rolling out a much redesigned Skype for iPhone with a Snapchat-like Stories feature, dubbed Highlights.
Moreover, Skype for iPhone now lets you talk to Cortana and other chat bots, as well as post message and in-call reactions by adding huge emoticons, live text and photos with drawings to an overlay that appears on top of the call.
Facebook Messenger is available free on App Store.
Facebook yesterday announced that more than two billion people are now actively using the service every single month. This is a significant milestone that will further solidify Facebook's position as the dominant social network and online identity system.
“We’re making progress connecting the world, and now let’s bring the world closer together,” said CEO Mark Zuckerberg. “It’s an honor to be on this journey with you.”
According to Facebook, more than 175 million people share a Love reaction daily.
On average, more than 800 million people like something on Facebook while over one billion people use Facebook Groups every month.
To celebrate bringing the world closer together, they've created a new personalized video which will appear in your News Feed.
You can also see it by visiting facebook.com/goodaddsup, where Facebook is featuring fun facts about how people are contributing to the community.
I visited the link and was greeted with the following message: “Your video isn't quite ready yet, but we're working on it”. I guess I better check back later.
Facebook added that its mobile app will now thank users for sending Love reactions, happy birthday wishes and creating groups as part of the milestone celebration.
The automatically generated thank-you message will appear in your News Feed.
Mark Zuckerberg recently communicated his company's brand new mission statement.
Speaking last week in Chicago at Facebook’s first Communities Summit, he said, “For the last decade we’ve been focusing on making the world more open and connected.”
He then introduced the company’s new mission statement: Facebook, he said, is a place “to give people the power to build community to bring the world closer together.”
Twitter today announced a major overhaul, making the app feel lighter, faster and easier to use with faster navigation via a new side menu, bolder headlines, revamped icons and more.
The new side navigation menu lets you quickly access your profile, accounts, settings and privacy. As a bonus, you can now add filters and stickers on your profile image, if you'd like.
Tweets now update dynamically with Reply, Retweet and Like counts so that you can easily see conversations as they’re happening, in real-time. The app now features support for opening links to articles and websites in Safari’s in-app viewer.
This lets you log in to websites using your saved Safari passwords and enjoy articles in the browser's Reader mode, all within the Twitter app.
New switches in Twitter's settings interface let you turn on increased color contrast, decided whether or not you'd like links to open in Safari's Reader View and more.
Accessibility settings are now in a more prominent location.
So fresh. So clean. So live.
Check out our new look.https://t.co/ClWbwi8CEH pic.twitter.com/nR27POQkEi
— Twitter (@Twitter) June 15, 2017
Here's an overview of the new features and design:
Profile, additional accounts, settings and privacy—all in one place. A new side navigation menu and fewer tabs at the bottom of our app=less clutter and easier browsing. You told us you loved this change on Android last year and we’re excited to now bring it to iOS. Links to articles and websites now open in Safari’s viewer in the Twitter app so you can easily access accounts on websites you’re already signed into (iOS only). We’ve refined our typography to make it more consistent and added bolder headlines to make it easier to focus on what’s happening. Also, rounded profile photos make it clearer to see what’s being said and who’s saying it. More intuitive icons make it easier to engage with Tweets—especially if you’re coming to Twitter for the first time. For example, people thought the Reply icon, an arrow, meant delete or go back to a previous page. We switched to a speech bubble, a symbol most know and love. We also made the icons lighter for more seamless interaction Tweets now update instantly with Reply, Retweet and Like counts so you can see conversations as they’re happening, live (not available on twitter.com and Twitter Lite).The aforementioned changes are rolling out across twitter.com, Twitter for iOS, Twitter for Android, TweetDeck, and Twitter Lite over the coming days and weeks.
Twitter for iOS is a free download from App Store.
Facebook today announced that users of its mainland mobile app can now use animated GIFs in comments. This sought-after feature has been enabled for all people on Facebook globally.
“We know people love communicating with GIFs on Messenger and we’re also making it easier to use GIFs on Facebook,” said the social network. When making a comment in Facebook for iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, tap the new GIF button to spice up your message with animations.
Additionally, Facebook rolled out some new and exclusive GIFs they’ve created featuring some of the Internet’s biggest stars, including DNCE, Logan Paul, Amanda Cerny, DREEZY, Patrick Starr, Violet Benson, Wuz Good, Brandi Marie and Landon Moss.
To use them, search #GIFparty when sharing a GIF on Facebook or Messenger or visit GIPHY.com/Facebook.
Since rolling out support for animated GIFs on Messenger back in 2015, users have sent nearly thirteen billion GIFs in the last year alone via the messaging app, or nearly 25,000 GIFs every minute. GIF sends on Messenger have tripled in the past year and New Year’s Day 2017 was the most popular day ever for GIF sends on Messenger, with more than 400 million GIF sends.
Facebook for iOS is available at no charge in App Store.
Facebook is working on a new feature to permit users to subscribe to news publications directly from its mainland mobile app. According to a report this morning from The Wall Street Journal, many details remain up in the air as discussions are currently underway.
The company is allegedly leaning toward a model that would let you read certain articles for free every month, before being prompted to pay. There's a catch: Facebook is said to limit this to the stories published natively through its Instant Articles service.
With that in mind, it may be no coincidence at all that Facebook recently launched new tools to help publishers make their Instant Articles compatible with the Apple News format as well as with Google's Accelerated Mobile Pages system.
This new functionality could roll out by the end of 2017, sources said. People familiar with the matter pointed out that the upcoming feature has long been requested by publishers.
While users currently can follow different news organizations, the rumored feature would permit them to use their credit card information on file with Facebook to directly subscribe to a news publication and have any subscriber-only content delivered to them through the app.
The development, if true, should pose some additional challenges to Google News platform as more and more people turn to Facebook for their daily news.
Image: Facebook's recent redesign of Trending pages.
Chances are you'll see a photo or video you like as you peruse various social networking apps on your iPhone from time to time, but not all services will let you save them to your device.
A new jailbreak tweak called Social Downloader by iOS developer Elias will grant you access to saving just about any image or video from various social networking apps.
Facebook has been adding Snapchat-like features to its mobile apps over the last several months, but new reports now point towards yet another app that could help make Facebook the go-to service for teenage users.
A good chunk of Twitter users use Tweetbot instead of the stock Twitter app because it has a unique appearance and a bevy of useful features. Nevertheless, some would say it could be better.
A new free jailbreak tweak called SaveBot by iOS developer iTheGentle expands upon Tweetbot’s functionality by empowering users with the ability to save videos directly from their timelines.
Twitter is rolling out a new inbox section which it says is designed to separate direct messages from people you do and don’t follow, making it easier to accept or delete unsolicited chats.
“If you’ve opted-in to get Direct Messages from anyone, messages from people you don’t follow will go into Requests in the Messages tab,” wrote the company in a tweet yesterday.
New group chats you’re added to by people you don’t follow will also appear in Requests.
Upon entering the chat, you'll be asked to either Delete or Accept the message. Accepting the chat moves it to your inbox, allowing you to continue the conversation with that person.
“Please note that they will not know you have seen the message until you have accepted their request,” said Twitter. All media will be hidden prior to accepting the message.
If you wish to view any hidden media, tap the View Media option.
https://twitter.com/Twitter/status/869608493548011520
Conversely, deleting the message removes it from the inbox although that account is still able to message you in the future unless you block or report it. These new features are available on the mobile Twitter app for iOS and Android and on twitter.com.
TUTORIAL: How to find Messenger chats you didn't know existed
Facebook-owned Messenger introduced a similar feature back in October 2015, replacing the “Other” inbox with a Message Requests section that brought all the messages from people you’re not friends with on Facebook in one central place, separate from your regular chats.
Grab Twitter for iOS for free from App Store.