Let’s say you got Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation to vastly overpay for your upstart social networking site, thus giving you the option of cashing out and retiring early. You’d be probably be pretty proud of yourself, so much so that you’d scoff at all the poor suckers who still have to do real work for a living. And per BusinessInsider, that’s precisely what MySpace founder Tom Anderson did this week when he described himself on his Twitter feed as “the guy who sold myspace in 2005 for $580 million while you slave away hoping for a half-day off.” Anderson’s tirade was in response to criticism from one of his Twitter followers who mocked Anderson for not being “able to keep a social network alive.”
Watch out, Facebook (FB): Your reputation for shadiness could soon approach MySpace levels. The Verge reports that Facebook is now testing out a new system in which “people will pay to get in touch with those they aren’t Facebook friends with.” In other words, the creepy guy that keeps trying to “friend” you on Facebook could soon be able to pay an as-yet-undetermined amount of money and get to send messages directly to your inbox. The Verge says that Facebook may be considering this new option as both a monetization tool and as a way to reduce spam by erecting a monetary barrier for people who send out notices about Viagra and Rolex watches through the social networking platform. On the other hand, it could also open the door for enterprising public relations firms to send tech bloggers unwanted messages about their exciting NoSQL database solutions, so there’s definitely the potential for a major backlash here.
UPDATE: Business Insider reports that Facebook will charge just $1 for each message sent, which means that my Facebook page will be loaded with press releases for important new SIP trunking solutions within seconds if this new policy goes into effect.
Your Facebook (FB) News Feed is about to get more annoying. The social network is getting ready to populate feeds with video ads according to AdAge. Why now? To “attract big swaths of ad dollars from TV advertisers.” By April, Facebook will reportedly have video ads airing on its desktop site and smartphone and tablet apps. Each ad will likely be around 15 seconds and will automatically play, although whether audio will be auto-triggered is uncertain at this point. AdAge’s Facebook sources say that advertisers can display their ads up to three times to a single user across any platform in a day and on the desktop ads will “grab a user’s attention by expanding out of the news feed into webpage real estate in both the left and right columns — or rails — of the screen.” Facebook’s foray into video ads will look to “grab big chunks of money … millions of dollars” according to the Facebook sources.
It was only nine months ago that Twitter announced it had reached 140 million monthly active users serving a total of 340 million tweets per day. But on Tuesday, the social network announced via a tweet on its official account that “There are now more than 200M monthly active @twitter users. You are the pulse of the planet. We’re grateful for your ongoing support!” In recent years, Twitter has played a major role from breaking news to helping rally voters for presidential campaigns. Tweeting is now as common as sending a text message or making a phone call and as the company continues its push to become a media company with photos and videos, its importance as a means of communication will continue to grow and evolve.
The beauty of Instagram is its simplicity and lack of advertisements. But if comments made by Carolyn Everson, Facebook’s (FB) vice president of global marketing solutions are accurate, advertisements could be coming to Instagram in the near future. When asked if Facebook would put ads on the photo-sharing app and micro social network, Everson said that “eventually we’ll figure out a way to monetize Instagram.” Given Instagram’s explosive growth since Facebook acquired it in April for $1 billion, it makes sense for the social network to expect a return on its investment. Everson didn’t mention a specific timeframe for when Facebook plans to monetize Instagram, but said that many brands are using the platform to engage with followers and that monetization was definitely “going to happen.”
Facebook (FB) is planning another round of privacy changes with a focus on making it easier to control what’s shared and what’s not, according to The New York Times. Sam Lessin, Facebook’s director of product told the publication that a new always-visible button called “Privacy Shortcuts” will be added that will let users quickly change settings for what they share. Users will also finally be able to block other users they don’t want to have any interaction with. More →
Is Facebook (FB) preparing to compete with Google (GOOG) in online advertising? According to AllThingsD and BusinessInsider’s sources Facebook might be taking steps to build its own advertising network for online websites. AllThingsD says that rather than build a new advertising network from scratch, Facebook could just buy Microsoft’s (MSFT) Atlas Solutions platform “that already delivers billions of ad impressions a day.” More →
Facebook (FB) announced on Tuesday that it will begin opening Facebook Messenger to consumers who do not have a Facebook account, starting in countries like India and South Africa, and later rolling out the service in the United States and Europe. This is a belated acknowledgement of a staggering strategic mistake Facebook made two years ago. That is when the messaging app competition was still wide open and giants like Facebook or Google (GOOG) could have entered the competition. WhatsApp, the leading messaging app firm, had just 1 million users as late as December 2009. By the end of 2010, that number had grown to 10 million. Right now, it likely tops 200 million, though there is no current official number on the matter. More →
Like it or not, Facebook (FB) has become a mainstream communication channel, much like Twitter has become more than just a place to tell the world what you’re having for lunch in 140 characters or less. In an effort that is sure to bolster Facebook Messenger adoption, Facebook is cutting itself out of the picture — sort of. The social network announced on Tuesday that its Facebook Messenger app for Android no longer requires a Facebook account. All that’s needed to get chatting with buddies who do have a Facebook account is a name and a phone number. Make no mistake, the messages are still being sent through Facebook’s backend; you just won’t need to log on with an account if you’re irked by its growing privacy concerns. There’s no mention of the iOS Messenger app getting the same treatment, but Facebook’s decision to make its Messenger app more universal feels like reaffirmation that it’s still committed “to make the world more open and connected.”
Don’t worry, Facebook (FB) users: The company may take away your power to vote down proposed changes to its Statement of Rights and Responsibilities and Data Use Policy, but it will only be because you told them it was OK. The Next Web reports that Facebook has caved to user anger at proposed changes to its site governance documents that would, among other things, take away users’ ability to vote on future document changes. Or as The Next Web puts it, “you’re effectively voting on whether to keep voting.” The voting process will be open for the next seven days. At the time of this writing, Facebook users are choosing to strike down the website’s proposed changes by a count of around 3,600 to 600.
Are you one of more than a billion people around the world who use Facebook (FB)? According to Google (GOOG), you’re trapped in the past. While speaking during a Business Insider conference in New York on Wednesday, Google’s vice president in charge of Google+ called Facebook the “social network of the past,” noting that Facebook’s ads are annoying and intrusive. “I’m trying to communicate in that sacred space of social connection,” Horowitz said. “It doesn’t matter if I like the sandwich, it doesn’t matter if it’s personalized with my favorite mustard, that is the wrong moment to try and dangle in front of me.” He continued, “there is a time and place for sandwiches, it’s called lunch, at a restaurant.” The obvious solution for those in agreement, Horowitz suggests, is to switch to Google+.
Recent changes to Facebook’s (FB) Edgerank, the algorithm that’s responsible for displaying items on a user’s Newsfeed, have angered privacy groups who say the new policy will actually produce more spam than reducing it. According to Forbes’ Jeff Bercovici, Facebook’s VP of global marketing solutions Carol Everson said on Tuesday that the social network is reducing spam by using “Suggests Posts” – “non-connected page posts” that show a brand’s ads even if a user and their friends don’t “like” or support them. Bercovici argues that Facebook’s new approach to targeting brands at users contradicts its claims of reducing spam by doling out spam that users don’t connect with. More →
