Analysis: Facebook Upping Its Game
With all the recent privacy issues and data leaks happening with Facebook, the social media network has been under attack by governments, the media and everyone else involved. However, none of these attacks stop the social media king from going after its rivals with new features and developments…
With its most recent launch, fb.gg, Facebook is now going after Twitch. The new gamers’ hub enables people to find gaming content that’s been streamed on the platform. The home page will feature streams from players a user follows, either by liking a page or group, and a selection of featured creators and other gaming industry-centric content. It will mainly help gaming enthusiasts find new streamers to watch and discover new games without having to go through the crowded News Feed.
It doesn’t all end here… The social media king is also opening up its new monetisation option to more gamers with the launch of the Level Up program. Available in the next few months, those who have access to Level Up will be able to take monetary tips from their stream viewers in the form of virtual currency. Although the monetisation program first launched in January, the virtual currency now has a name: Facebook Stars.
So, what is Facebook trying to achieve by aggressively ramping up its gaming features? According to research conducted by Limelight Networks, ‘on average, young gamers (ages 18-25) worldwide spend an average of 3 hours and 25 minutes each week watching other people play video games online’. You see where I’m going with this stat, right? This is too large a number for Facebook to overlook and not take an action on.
Additionally, research suggests that YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat are the most popular online platforms among teens, Facebook continues losing ground in the 13-to-17 year-old demographic. It seems like the social media platform realised no matter how much it copies Snapchat, it still needs to up its game (quite literally) to make a younger audience stick around.
This Week’s Top Social Stories
Facebook will be removing its Trending news topic section – citing that it accounts for less that 1.5% of clicks to news publishers. Read more.
Two years after switching its algorithm from chronological to personalised, Instagram has finally revealed how it calculates which posts appear in your feed. Read more.
Facebook has announced a new slate of exclusive news programming on Watch, including content from ABC News, CNN and Fox. Read more.
In its latest foray into e-commerce, Snapchat has integrated with SeatGeek to allow users to buy game and concert tickets directly through the app. Read more.
Twenty months since launching, Facebook has finally announced plans to monetise Marketplace through brand and user ads. Read more.
Winner
It’s officially Pride Month and to mark the occasion Facebook, Instagram and Twitter have released a suite of new tools to celebrate its LGBTQ community. On Facebook there are much-loved Pride frames for profile pictures, on Instagram there is a new rainbow Type mode, and on Twitter there are hashtags with automatically trigger a Pride emoji.
Loser
American popstar Demi Lovato was slammed on Twitter this week after she posted about pranking her body guard with a ‘lady of the night’: “She walked into his room without permission and grabbed him in his ‘area’ and he freaked the fuck out hahahahaha!” Users quickly identified the ‘prank’ as sexual abuse, prompting Demi to delete the tweet.
Creative
It is a momentous month for Saudi Arabia, where the ban on women’s driver’s licenses will be lifted for the first time since the 1950s. To mark the moment, Shell has released a new campaign in which Saudi men are asked their opinions on female drivers – with heart-warming results. The video has been 3.6 million views since being published last week.
