Friday Social: Facebook’s Updates and Downtime, QuizUp IRL and Buy via Twitter

Our #FridaySocial is a weekly round-up of the key social media news stories from the previous seven days.  Let us know your thoughts in the comments or via Twitter – @Umpf / @GrittAlessandra

Big Changes to Facebook Profiles

Facebook has announced a series of updates to user profiles this week.

Updates include the ability to add a seven-second looping video as your profile picture, or pin up to five Featured Photos to the top of your page. Facebook also announced that after 26 million users added the rainbow Celebrate Pride filter to their pictures, it will now allow users to set a ‘temporary’ profile picture that will revert back to the usual snap at a scheduled time.

Facebook suggests that this will let users ‘support your team in the week leading up to the big game, commemorate a special milestone like a birthday or vacation or show off a great #tbt picture’.

Users also now have more control over the information visible on their profile. Facebook has created a customisable ‘bio’ area at the top of each profile where you can choose which About fields appear and add a one-liner to convey whatever you want to those that visit your profile.

That Facebook Hoax. Again.

It’s that time of the year again – Facebook hoax season. You might’ve seen users in your News Feed sharing something along the following lines:

‘Better safe then sorry! Now it’s official! It has been published in the media. Facebook has just released the entry price: $5.99 to keep the subscription of your status to be set to “private”. 

‘If you paste this message on your page, it will be offered free (paste not share) if not tomorrow, all your posts can become public. Even the messages that have been deleted or the photos not allowed. 

‘After all, it does not cost anything for a simple copy and paste. Channel 13 News was just talking about this change in Facebook’s privacy policy. 

‘As of September 26th , 2015 at 01:16 a.m. Eastern standard time, I do not give Facebook or any entities associated with Facebook permission to use my pictures, information, or posts, both past and future.

‘By this statement, I give notice to Facebook it is strictly forbidden to disclose, copy, distribute, or take any other action against me based on this profile and/or its contents. 

‘The content of this profile is private and confidential information. The violation of privacy can be punished by law (UCC 1-308- 1 1 308-103 and the Rome Statute).’

Facebook has responded to the rumours with a light-hearted post…

 

Quiz Up in Real Life

Remember Quiz Up, the app that pits your knowledge against both friends and strangers? American broadcast network NBC has announced that it’s creating a new trivia show based on the popular social app.

The new interactive game show will let users at home compete alongside TV contestants to win up to $1 million. You’ll need to qualify through the app to become one of the at-home players, but anyone can play along regardless of getting through this process.

QuizUp has been revamped in recent months, with the ability for users to create their own content. What would your category of choice be?

Buy via Twitter

After introducing its Buy Now buttons last year, Twitter has announced that it’ll be rolling out the e-commerce options to more retailers.

The button is now available via even more merchant platforms that power e-commerce sites, allowing brands such as Best Buy and Adidas to join those already selling via Twitter.

The option is currently only available to US-based merchants.

Facebook’s Downtime

Facebook’s app and website have been unavailable for many users three times during September, for as long as 40 minutes each time.

Users trying to access the site during these times received the ‘Sorry, something went wrong’ message – seemingly a small blip, however during one of these occasions Facebook’s share price dropped around 4%.
Facebook’s status page recorded the events as a ‘major outage’, and a spokesperson told Mashable that the source of the outage was ‘a configuration issue’.