by Erik Sass on Apr 30, 9:52 AM
In a surprising turn of events, anonymous social sharing app Secret has decided to shut down because it no longer adheres to its founder's original "vision," just 16 months after it launched -- and not so long after it raised $25 million in a round of funding that valued the company at $100 million. Secret's demise was announced in a (fittingly, somewhat mysterious) blog post by co-founder David Byttow.
by Erik Sass on Apr 29, 3:12 PM
This may not surprise anyone who is familiar with the Internet, but social media is not exactly trustworthy when it comes to communicating, you know, facts. That's according to a new study by the American Press Institute's Fact-Checking Project, which surveyed Twitter posts and found that incorrect or misleading tweets outnumber attempts to correct them by a ratio of at least three to one.
by Erik Sass on Apr 28, 1:09 PM
The social media arms race is escalating yet again, with Facebook's introduction of free mobile video calling as part of its mobile Messenger app, putting it in direct competition with Skype and Apple's FaceTime. Previously, Messenger allowed users to make voice calls; the new feature comes as other social media platforms have unveiled new capabilities including video calling.
by Erik Sass on Apr 27, 4:35 PM
According to the latest survey about social media usage among teens from Piper Jaffray, the winners include Instagram -- named as the most important social network by 32% of teens this year, up from 30% last year. But the biggest winner was Snapchat, which came out of nowhere (or at least no data) in 2014 to become the top choice for 13% of teens.
by Erik Sass on Apr 24, 1:21 PM
Facebook is planning to give its notifications a major makeover, converting it into a central hub for news from across the site, according to Mashable, which first reported the news this week. Facebook is currently testing the new notifications tab and will begin rolling it out to mobile users sometime in the near future, per the same report.
by Erik Sass on Apr 23, 1:13 PM
Publicis agency SapientNitro has formed a strategic partnership with Adaptly, giving it access to the latter's social media advertising technology in North America. The alliance will help SapientNitro expand its capabilities and streamline delivery of social ad campaigns on platforms including Facebook, Twitter, and Kik.
by Erik Sass on Apr 22, 1:25 PM
Following years of speculation that insurers might use information drawn from social media profiles to evaluate the potential risks presented by their customers, the insurance industry is getting its first official social media risk-scoring service courtesy of Social Intelligence. The new Social Media Risk Scoring tool is intended for use by insurers in the property and casualty category.
by Erik Sass on Apr 21, 10:41 AM
Facebook is the clear leader in social media logins for Web sites and mobile apps that allow users to connect their accounts to social profiles, according to customer management firm Gigya, which surveyed over 300,000 sites and apps using its login technology. Facebook accounted for roughly two-thirds of all logins that rely on social media profiles for authentication in the first quarter of 2015, up 3% from the fourth quarter of 2014. That compares to 21% for Google+, 6% of social logins for Twitter and 5% for Yahoo.
by Erik Sass on Apr 20, 12:35 PM
A large majority of American adults use mobile devices or computers while watching TV, and a big part of this multiscreen activity is devoted to social media -- much of it related to the TV programs, according to a new study from the Interactive Advertising Bureau. The study results come from a survey of 651 U.S. adults conducted by Vision Critical's Media & Entertainment Practice on behalf of the IAB in January.
by Erik Sass on Apr 17, 12:58 PM
You can file this one under "hurtful" but also "hilarious:" a third of young adults in the UK have stopped using a social network because their parents started using it, according to a survey of 2,003 Brits conducted by the Halifax Digital Home Index in February. Unsurprisingly, the trend has gathered speed as more older adults have joined the networks, rendering them unfit for habitation by normal people with a plague of sheer oldness.