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FridaySocial: Vine Camera, Jarvis & Facebook Live Audio

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Our Friday Social 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  – @nathanbrush #FridaySocial

Instagram creative tools update

Hot on the heels of the appearance of Instagram Stories in August, the network this week unveiled stickers, which are also strikingly similar to a features available on Snapchat. Users can overlay location-specific graphics on their stories to display place names, time, weather and more. There are seasonal-specific graphics for Christmas and Hanukkah, as well as the ability for users to save their last 24 hours of uploads to their camera roll. Furthermore, users can get creative by adding more than one text box to a story, while musicians can use both hands to perform via the one-touch, hands-free recording option. Instagram has so far refused to comment on whether stickers will open up new advertising revenue streams.

Zuckerberg reveals home AI

Throughout the year, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been teasing information about Jarvis, the AI he has been coding to control various features of his home. The light-hearted video he released this week shows Jarvis making him toast, welcoming guests and firing him a signature grey t-shirt – pretty impressive for something he says he has been working on in his spare time. It was not all smooth sailing however, with a follow-up video showing how Zuckerberg’s wife Priscilla got to know the new member of their household. It is worth noting that theses videos are “fun summaries” not live demos, but Mark goes into a lot more detail about the process in this blog post.

Social media obsession makes users unhappy

A University of Copenhagen study has concluded that too much browsing through social media feeds at Christmas is more likely to make users feel miserable than festive. Researchers claimed “regular use of social networking such as Facebook can negatively affect your emotional well-being and satisfaction with life”, and particularly warned against excessive browsing without interacting with anyone. In contrast, actively engaging with people and entering into conversation is seen as a generally positive experience. The other extreme – to give up social media altogether – is also said to improve well-being. More than 1,300 (mostly female) Facebook users took part in the experiment.

Vine lives on

Twitter revealed this week that its six-second video sharing app – Vine – will not disappear completely, despite reports to that effect in October. Instead, it will become Vine Camera and users will be able to produce similar looping videos; the difference being that these videos must be posted directly to Twitter or saved to your camera roll, meaning there will be no community on Vine itself. In a bid to retain its user numbers, Twitter is rolling out a special follow button to encourage Vine users to follow their favourite video producers on Twitter instead.

Facebook live audio

It is safe to say 2016 has been the year of live video, with Facebook leading the charge. A sign of the times perhaps, but only now is Facebook testing live audio. Working with a select group of media organisations, including BBC Worldwide and LBC, broadcasters can go live via the Facebook API or “by adding a still image to accompany their audio content.” The broadcast limit is 4 hours, opening up a wide range of content opportunities. Reportedly, only Android users will be able to use other apps while listening to live audio, while iOS users must stay with the Facebook app itself. The news follows other recent announcements, including the introduction of 360 video and Oculus integration.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from everyone at Umpf – see you in 2017!