TikTok owner ByteDance's 2020 revenue soars, net loss at $45 billion

BEIJING - TikTok owner ByteDance's total revenue more than doubled last year to $34.3 billion but its net loss widened to $45 billion, according to a company memo seen by Reuters.

The widening of the loss was partly attributable to accounting norms for share-based compensation of employees, a person familiar with the matter said.

Reuters has reported that ByteDance, one of the world's biggest private tech companies with an estimated value of about $300 billion in recent trades, had a revenue goal of around $30 billion for 2020.

ByteDance posted an operating loss of $2 billion and a gross profit of $19 billion, representing a 93 percent growth year over year, the company told employees in a staff meeting, upon which the memo was based.

Beijing-based ByteDance declined to comment on its financials.

It had 1.9 billion global monthly users in December 2020 for all its apps including TikTok, its Chinese version Douyin and news aggregator Jinri Toutiao.

In May, company founder Zhang Yiming unexpectedly announced that he will step down as CEO, a move that comes as Chinese regulators are increasing scrutiny of the country's biggest technology firms. 

-reuters-

Instagram dabbles with letting people hide ‘likes’

SAN FRANCISCO - Instagram on Wednesday said it is dabbling with letting users hide "like" counts in an effort to ease the pressure of seeking approval from others.

If an experiment at Instagram shows the option is a hit, it could be made permanent and even extended to Facebook, which owns the image-centric social network.

"In 2019, we started hiding like counts for a small group of people to understand if it lessens some pressure when posting to Instagram," a Facebook spokesperson told AFP.

"Some people found this beneficial but some still wanted to see like counts so they could track what’s popular."

Running tallies of how many people signal they like posts at social networks can be seen as status symbols or indicators of worth, raising mental health concerns

Some experts sy the insatiable quest for "likes" can be addictive and have devastating effects, particularly for younger people.

Instagram is letting a small number of users around the world decide whether to show "like" counts on their posts or see them on content shared by other people.

"We're testing this on Instagram to start, but we're also exploring a similar experience for Facebook," the spokesperson said.

Facebook said that it has been working with experts to understand how design tweaks such as the one being tested at Instagram can support well-being of users while providing control over how they engage with the service.

Agence France-Presse

YouTube brings TikTok-style Shorts to United States

YouTube on Thursday started rolling out an early version of its Shorts quick-clip feature in the United States, ramping up its challenge to TikTok.

The popularity of YouTube Shorts soared during testing in India, and it has been racking up more than 6.5 billion views a day by people tuning in overall, according to product lead Todd Sherman of the Google-owned video service.

"We're introducing our YouTube Shorts Beta to the United States starting today, as we continue to build the experience alongside our global community," Sherman said.

"We plan to introduce more features as we continue to build Shorts alongside creators and artists."

YouTube is also working on ways for people to make money from audiences at Shorts, according to Sherman.

The new service is the latest to challenge the fast-growing Chinese-owned TikTok, which has faced scrutiny over its ties to the Beijing government.

Netflix early this month added a "Fast Laughs" feature to its iPhone app, serving up comic clips in rapid fire, in a move taking on the popular video app TikTok.

Facebook-owned Instagram responded to TikTok's popularity with their own short video format called Reels last August. 

And in November, Snapchat launched Spotlight, a public feed of content produced by users.

Agence France-Presse 

YouTube back up after worldwide outage

YouTube, owned by Alphabet Inc's Google GOOGL.O, said late on Wednesday it had fixed a glitch that led to a worldwide outage of the video-streaming service.

DownDetector.com, a website which monitors outages, showed nearly 286,000 incidents of people reporting issues with the service.

The issue started at around 6:53 p.m. ET (23:53 GMT), according to Downdetector.com, with users complaining about trouble in watching videos on the platform.

"We're so sorry for the interruption. This is fixed across all devices & YouTube services," YouTube said in a tweet bit.ly/36r4sjz, without explaining what had caused the outage.

Google did not respond to a Reuters request for comment on the outage.

Reporting by Maria Ponnezhath and Radhika Anilkumar in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich and Anil D’Silva

-reuters-

TikTok, Gates pledge $20 million to help Africa tackle COVID-19

LONDON - Social media platform TikTok and the philanthropic Gates Foundation donated $10 million each on Wednesday to the vaccine alliance GAVI to help fund efforts to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic in Africa.

GAVI said the funds would be used to distribute and deploy any new vaccines against COVID-19 once they are developed, trialed and licensed.

It would also help prevent "a potentially catastrophic impact on immunization programs across the developing world," GAVI Chief Executive Seth Berkley said in a statement.

GAVI is a public-private partnership backed by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the World Health Organization, the World Bank, UNICEF and others, which arranges bulk buys to reduce vaccine costs for poor countries.

Speaking to Reuters last week Berkley said he was encouraged by the sheer number of potential COVID-19 vaccines in the early stages of development around the world, which he said would slim down to a smaller number as some progressed and some failed.

"Today there are 76 vaccines on WHO website listed, of which six are already in clinical trials, but actually the number is substantially higher than that, it is well over 100," he said.

"That is really good, because what is bubbling up is science from around the world.

"The challenge is going to be now, once all of the science bubbles up, is to have some standardized criteria that one can narrow it down to a smaller number. And what is going to be important is being able to make those choices based on science and not politics."

GAVI said this month it planned to disburse $29 million to support health systems in 13 lower-income countries to fight COVID-19. 

-reuters-

Chinese movie to premiere online as virus closes cinemas

BEIJING -- Chinese movie fans can catch the premier of much-anticipated new comedy this holiday weekend under a 630 million yuan ($91.25 million) deal to issue the film over the internet, as fears of a deadly new virus keep audiences away from cinemas.

The Hong Kong-listed Huanxi Media Group announced on Friday an agreement with Beijing Bytedance Network to show its new movie "Lost in Russia" on Bytedance's online platforms.

Bytedance, which owns the popular TikTok video-sharing app and the news app Jinri Toutiao, said given the efforts to reduce the risks of big gatherings, it had secured the deal to let fans watch "Lost in Russia" for free on its apps.

"The film will keep the appointment to meet everyone on Jan. 25, but the meeting point has changed to your cellphone and television, instead of the cinema," the company said in a statement posted on Jinri Toutiao.

Huanxi Media's share price rose as much as 30 percent after the agreement was announced.

Neither ByteDance nor Huanxi responded to requests for comment on their agreement.

China has stepped efforts to contain the coronavirus, which has killed 25 people and infected more than 800, with public transport suspended in 10 cities and public gatherings discouraged across the country.

The week-long Lunar New Year holiday usually sees audiences flock to cinemas with distributors taking advantage of the crowds to launch films but the premieres of at least 7 movies, including "Lost in Russia," postponed. 

($1 = 6.9040 Chinese yuan renminbi)

source: news.abs-cbn.com

TikTok inks music deal as it sets up shop in California

TikTok on Thursday licensed a catalogue of independent music as it worked to build on the momentum of the social networking app specializing in video snippets.

The deal between TikTok and Merlin, a digital rights agency for independent music labels, is designed to help facilitate the use of the short-form video service for promotions.

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Merlin chief executive Jeremy Sirota said: "Merlin members are increasingly using TikTok for their marketing campaigns, and today's partnership ensures that they and their artists can also build new and incremental revenue streams."

London-based Merlin said its roster of members spans more than 60 countries and includes tens of thousands of independent record labels, distributors and artist management companies.

The news came as TikTok opened an office in Los Angeles to advance its ambitions in the US.

"Located between the innovative tech companies in Silicon Beach and the streaming content companies at Hayden tract (in Los Angeles), TikTok truly sits at the intersection of technology and entertainment, physically and figuratively," TikTok US general manager Vanessa Pappas said.

"While we are a global company, having a permanent office in LA speaks to our commitment to the US market and deepens our bonds with the city, and the talent and companies, that call it home."

TikTok, launched by Chinese company ByteDance in September 2017, has quickly become one of the most popular social networks in the world, with young people its main market.

In November, the app hit 1.5 billion downloads worldwide, outperforming Instagram.

Users typically post short clips of themselves performing skits, lip-syncing and dancing.

But TikTok has come under scrutiny recently over whether it censors content deemed sensitive by China's authoritarian rulers.

TikTok said in a statement in October its operations were not influenced by the Chinese government.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

YouTube bans 'implied' threats

SAN FRANCISCO - YouTube broadened its anti-harassment policies on Wednesday to include a ban on "implied" threats along with insults based on race, gender identity or sexual orientation.

"We will no longer allow content that maliciously insults someone based on protected attributes such as their race, gender expression, or sexual orientation," global head of trust and safety Matt Halprin said in an online post.

"This applies to everyone, from private individuals, to YouTube creators, to public officials."

YouTube already bans explicit threats, but now "veiled or implied" threats will be barred as well, according to Halprin.

"This includes content simulating violence toward an individual or language suggesting physical violence may occur," Halprin said.

"No individual should be subject to harassment that suggests violence."

The changes stem in part from YouTube's July pledge to crack down on "creator-on-creator harassment," the Washington Post reported.

The platform was berated for leaving up videos from Steven Crowder, a right-wing commentator who regularly insulted gay Vox producer Carlos Maza based on his sexual orientation and Cuban heritage. 

Maza's video montage of insults from Crowder over a period of years -- including "lispy sprite" and "angry little queer" -- went viral, prompting a YouTube investigation that concluded they didn't violate its hate speech policies.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

TikTok sued in US over alleged China data transfer

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - A university student in California has filed a class-action lawsuit against video app TikTok, which she accuses of harvesting large amounts of user data and storing it in China.

"TikTok clandestinely has vacuumed up and transferred to servers in China vast quantities of private and personally-identifiable user data," the court filing said.

Misty Hong, a student in Palo Alto, California, filed the suit against the Chinese-based app in California federal court last week, according to a report in The Daily Beast on Monday.

The video platform, which is hugely popular with teenagers around the world, was launched by Chinese company ByteDance in September 2017.

"TikTok also has surreptitiously taken user content, such as draft videos never intended for publication, without user knowledge or consent," the lawsuit alleges.

"In short, TikTok's lighthearted fun comes at a heavy cost," it said.

The suit marks the latest legal battle for the app. In early November, the US government opened a national security investigation into TikTok, according to the New York Times, potentially looking into whether the app was sending data to China.

Hong alleges that the app retrieved her data without permission -- including videos that she had created but not shared online -- and transferred them to servers run by companies that cooperate with the Chinese government.

She filed the suit on behalf of the approximately 110 million US residents who have downloaded the app.

TikTok did not immediately reply to AFP's request for response.

In November, it said it could not comment on a possible US investigation but emphasized that the respect of US users and regulators was its highest priority.

TikTok has distanced itself from Chinese authorities, maintaining that its servers are located outside of the country and that its data is therefore not subject to Chinese law.

In November, the app hit 1.5 billion downloads worldwide, outperforming Instagram.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

TikTok accused in California lawsuit of sending user data to China

SAN FRANCISCO - A California college student has accused popular video-sharing app TikTok in a class-action lawsuit of transferring private user data to servers in China, despite the company's assurances that it does not store personal data there.

The allegations may deepen legal troubles in the United States for TikTok, which is owned by Beijing ByteDance Technology Co but operates entirely outside of China and has developed an especially devoted fan base among U.S. teenagers.

The company is already facing a U.S. government national security probe over concerns about data storage and possible censorship of political sensitive content.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California last Wednesday and originally reported by The Daily Beast, alleges TikTok has surreptitiously "vacuumed up and transferred to servers in China vast quantities of private and personally-identifiable user data."

TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the allegations, but maintains that it stores all U.S. user data in the United States with backups in Singapore.

The documents identify the plaintiff as Misty Hong, a college student and resident of Palo Alto, California, who downloaded the TikTok app in March or April 2019 but never created an account.

Months later, she alleges, she discovered that TikTok had created an account for her without her knowledge and produced a dossier of private information about her, including biometric information gleaned from videos she created but never posted.

According to the filing, TikTok transferred user data to two servers in China - bugly.qq.com and umeng.com - as recently as April 2019, including information about the user's device and any websites the user had visited.

Bugly is owned by Tencent, China's largest mobile software company, which also owns social network WeChat, while Umeng is part of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group.

The lawsuit also claims that source code from Chinese tech giant Baidu is embedded within the TikTok app, as is code from Igexin, a Chinese advertising service, which security researchers discovered in 2017 was enabling developers to install spyware on a user's phone.

The legal documents did not provide evidence of the data transfers or the existence of Baidu or Igexin source code in the app. Hong and her legal representatives could not immediately be reached for comment.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Instagram begins letting users report misinformation

Instagram on Thursday added a way for users to easily report deceptive posts at the photo and video-oriented social network owned by Facebook.

A new tool being rolled out out lets Instagram users tap a "report" option on-screen when they see a post they deem dubious, then tap a "false information" tag to prompt review by third-party fact-checkers, according to Facebook spokeswoman Stephanie Otway.

The option was expected to be available to all Instagram users by the end of this month.

Such prompts will be one of several "signals" used to determine whether content should be scrutinized by fact-checkers, who will determine their veracity.

"Starting today, people can let us know if they see posts on Instagram they believe may be false," Otway said.

"We're investing heavily in limiting the spread of misinformation across our apps, and we plan to share more updates in the coming months."

The world's biggest social network has been cracking down on fraudulent influence campaigns and bogus posts as pressure has mounted for online platforms to defend against efforts to manipulate online conversations.

User-reported Instagram posts found to be bogus but not in violation of the service's policies will not be deleted, but won't appear when users use "explore" or hashtag searches to discover content.

"Explore and hashtags allow people on Instagram to find content they haven’t already chosen to follow, and by filtering misinformation from these places, we can significantly limit its reach," Otway said.

Feedback from the new tool will be used to train artificial intelligence software to scan for, and rate, fake posts without waiting for them to be reported, according to Facebook.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

How big is YouTube? It’s still anyone’s guess

YouTube probably generates $16 billion to $25 billion in annual revenue, making the video service big enough to crack the top half of the Fortune 500.

But that is just a guess. Even though financial analysts on Wall Street think YouTube makes about as much money as the Gap, General Mills or Netflix, the video service’s financial results are a secret. They are lumped in with the rest of Google, an even larger internet company that last year generated $137 billion in revenue.




That secrecy has led to growing frustration among analysts and investors, who will be looking for more details about YouTube when Google’s parent company, Alphabet, reports results for its second financial quarter on Thursday. Three months ago, Alphabet executives pointed to issues with YouTube as a factor in disappointing financial results in the first quarter.

“I think their reticence to provide information borders on paranoia, as if they would be admitting failure if they allowed us to discover whether one of their businesses was performing more poorly than expected,” said Michael Pachter, an analyst at Wedbush Securities.

Big tech companies have been under pressure from regulators and lawmakers to provide more insight into how their businesses operate. The lack of disclosure around YouTube’s finances is a reminder that some of them have actually made understanding how they make money more difficult over the last year.

In November, Apple announced it would stop disclosing iPhone sales figures. The company had been providing that data for a decade. But now that iPhone sales are slowing, Apple argues that they are no longer representative of the strength of the company’s overall business.


In July, when Facebook reported slower than expected growth in users for its main service, the company’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, disclosed a new, more positive metric: 2.5 billion people used at least one of the company’s apps — Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp or Messenger — in June.

The obfuscation of information that investors want more of has become a “foundational practice” by tech companies, said Gene Munster, a managing partner at Loup Ventures, a venture capital firm, who was a financial analyst for 20 years. “Companies change the disclosures to change the narrative and make it more difficult to get to the things investors want to know.”

When it reports financial results, Alphabet groups YouTube with other Google properties like search, the Google Play app store and Gmail. Analysts who follow the company say putting everything under Google makes it hard to parse out the performance of YouTube, especially because search remains the biggest business at the company.

YouTube does not disclose revenue, profitability, how many ads it runs alongside videos, user numbers and how often those users visit the site — all metrics that would help an investor “understand the health of the business and its growth trajectory,” said Pachter.

“I don’t think the company provides anything that helps us understand the business,” he said.

More details around YouTube’s business may confirm that it does not compare favorably to Facebook in key metrics for gauging its popularity, such as how long users stay on the site and how frequently they visit, Pachter said.

An Alphabet spokeswoman, Winnie King, declined to comment.

When Alphabet last reported quarterly earnings in April, the company stunned investors as revenue came in $1 billion below Wall Street expectations.

In response to a question from a financial analyst about the company’s first-quarter shortfall, Ruth Porat, Alphabet’s chief financial officer, said growth in clicks for YouTube ads had “decelerated” because of tighter restrictions in early 2018 on what videos could carry advertising. Porat said YouTube had made “important” and “strong” contributions to revenue, but was not more specific.

When Sundar Pichai, Google’s chief executive, spoke about YouTube in the call, he announced new features or policy changes that for the most part had already announced. The new information he did reveal — such as viewership of Super Bowl commercials was up 60 percent on YouTube — was a narrow sliver of YouTube’s business.

Companies in the United States have significant leeway in determining what information is considered “material” and has to be disclosed in financial results reported to regulators.

In 1976, the Supreme Court in TSC Industries v. Northway established the definition of material as information that would have been considered important to a reasonable investor. The definition, however, was vague, and companies have generally been allowed to make their own decisions about what would be important to a reasonable investor.

When big tech companies have offered more insight into their far-flung operations, it has been well received by Wall Street.

When Amazon disclosed revenue and profit for its high-margin Amazon Web Services unit in 2015, it eased concerns about the company’s ability to turn a profit.

Last year, Google surprised analysts on an earnings call by announcing that its Google Cloud business had surpassed $1 billion in quarterly revenue. At the time, Google had been fighting the perception that its cloud business was struggling to make inroads against AWS and Microsoft’s cloud-computing competitor, Azure.

“Companies usually pull back disclosure when items turned negative, and then they try to offset with more positive disclosure,” said Mark Mahaney, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets who follows Alphabet and other internet companies.

He said he did not expect Alphabet to change its disclosure for YouTube anytime soon. But Mahaney said — frustration aside — that he did not believe more detail about YouTube’s business would alter investors’ perception of Alphabet.

Investors generally see YouTube accounting for about 20 percent of Google’s revenue. There are more questions around YouTube’s profitability, but he said the general view was that it was “modestly profitable but not dramatically so.”

Starting in July 2017, the Securities and Exchange Commission sent three letters to Alphabet asking, among other things, for an explanation on why it does not need to break out YouTube from Google.

In its response, Alphabet said that since Larry Page, its chief executive, did not receive weekly updates on how YouTube’s business performed to assess the performance of Google, the disclosure requirement was “not applicable.”

Alphabet also said detailing its advertising revenue by different product areas was unnecessary because its goal was to sell one product — online advertising — regardless of how a customer paid for it or where that ad appeared.

In January 2018, the SEC said it completed its review with no further action.

Marcia Narine Weldon, a lecturer in law at the University of Miami who specializes in compliance and corporate governance, said the arguments made by Alphabet to the SEC for not disclosing YouTube separately “don’t hold water.”

“I’m surprised that the SEC hasn’t pressed it more,” said Narine Weldon. “It’s a legitimate question for shareholders given the size of the business.”


2019 New York Times News Service

TikTok app fined in US for illegally gathering children's data

WASHINGTON -- The fast-growing, Chinese-owned video sharing network TikTok agreed to pay a $5.7 million fine to US authorities to settle charges that it illegally collected personal information from children, officials said Wednesday.

The Federal Trade Commission said the penalty by the social network, which had been known as Musical.ly, was the largest ever in a children's privacy investigation.

The social network, which has been surging in popularity with young smartphone users and taking over from rivals like Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat, failed to obtain parental consent from its underage users as required by the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, FTC officials said.

"The operators of Musical.ly -- now known as TikTok -- knew many children were using the app, but they still failed to seek parental consent before collecting names, email addresses, and other personal information from users under the age of 13," said FTC chairman Joe Simons. 

"This record penalty should be a reminder to all online services and websites that target children: We take enforcement of COPPA very seriously, and we will not tolerate companies that flagrantly ignore the law."

TikTok claimed some 500 million users worldwide last year, making it one of the most popular worldwide apps.

Owned by China's ByteDance, it expanded its reach in the US with the merger with Musical.ly.

Teens have been flocking to the service, which allows them to create and share videos of 15 seconds.

According to the FTC, the company required users to provide an email address, phone number, username, first and last name, a short biography, and a profile picture.

The consumer protection regulator said 65 million accounts have been registered in the United States.

Officials said the company knew that many of its users were under 13 and should have taken greater precautions.

"In our view, these practices reflected the company's willingness to pursue growth even at the expense of endangering children," said a statement from FTC commissioners Rohit Chopra and Rebecca Kelly Slaughter.

"The agency secured a record-setting civil penalty and deletion of ill-gotten data, as well as other remedies to stop this egregious conduct."

TikTok has faced criticism around the world for featuring sexually suggestive content inappropriate for children.

TikTok said in a statement it would create a "separate app experience" for younger users with additional privacy protections as part of its agreement with regulators.

"It's our priority to create a safe and welcoming experience for all of our users, and as we developed the global TikTok platform, we've been committed to creating measures to further protect our user community -- including tools for parents to protect their teens and for users to enable additional privacy settings," the statement said.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Instagram back up after partial outage

Facebook Inc's photo-sharing social network Instagram said on Monday the service was fully functional after an issue that caused an outage for some users was resolved.

Instagram did not specify the number of people or the regions affected.

Users took to Twitter to complain about the outage, tweeting jokes and comments along with the #instagramdown hashtag.

"Hi five! If you come to twitter and checking if the Instagram is down," @kneelonyeahtea tweeted.

DownDetector.com, a website which monitors outages, showed that there were over 32,000 incidents of people reporting issues with Instagram at its peak but that figure quickly dropped to about 500 reports.

Instagram had started having issues at 7:21 p.m. on Monday, according to the web site.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

YouTube star apologizes for viral suicide video

Actor and YouTube celebrity Logan Paul apologized for posting a video of a suicide victim in Japan that reportedly was viewed by six million people before being deleted.

Paul, who gained notoriety on social media and has a popular video blog or "vlog" on YouTube, filmed the video in Aokigahara, which is known as "the Japanese Suicide Forest" because of its reputation.

According to media reports, the video showing a man who had hanged himself, received six million views before being removed amid a firestorm of outrage on Twitter.

Adding to the anger were outtakes of the video -- which remained in circulation on Twitter -- in which Paul is seen laughing and joking about the incident.

"When my brother found my sister's body, he screamed with horror & confusion & grief & tried to save her," actress Anna Akana tweeted.

"You do not walk into a suicide forest with a camera and claim mental health awareness."

Another Twitter user wrote, "i'm truly sickened by this logan paul situation. i lost my brother to suicide... my brother took his own life by hanging himself... how insensitive and sick can you be to film someone in that state."

In his apology, Paul said he had posted the video in a mistaken effort to draw attention to the problem of depression and suicide.

"It's easy to get caught up in the moment without fully weighing the possible ramifications," he said in the statement.

"I'm often reminded of how big a reach I truly have & with great power comes great responsibility... for the first time in my life I'm regretful to say I handled that power incorrectly. It won't happen again."

Google-owned YouTube indicated the video was removed because it violated the terms of services of the video-sharing platform.

"Our hearts go out to the family of the person featured in the video," a Google statement said.

The statement added that YouTube prohibits "violent or gory content posted in a shocking, sensational or disrespectful manner" and that such content is allowed only "when supported by appropriate educational or documentary information."

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Is Instagram doing a Snapchat?

MANILA -- Instagram, the popular Facebook-owned photo-sharing mobile app, just released a feature called Instagram Stories. With it, Instagram users can share photos and videos that would stay up for only 24 hours, to be seen only by the Instagram users’ friends and followers.

Those who use multiple photo-sharing apps may see some strong semblance with an existing feature of another multimedia sharing mobile software: Snapchat Stories.

Even the name is the same.

But unlike Snapchat Stories, which has a number of filters, Instagram Stories still has a limited amount of filters to compete with Snapchat’s.

It seems apparent that Facebook, the company that was said to have wanted to buy Snapchat in 2013, is taking a jab at Snapchat by emulating one of its most important features on its own image messaging app.

Instagram still enjoys a hefty amount of popularity among photo and video sharers globally with over 300 million active users daily and over 95 million photos and videos being shared per day.

However, Snapchat takes the lead with 10 billion video views a day. That is a number even Facebook couldn’t deny being envious about.

By incorporating the highly coveted disappearing post feature, Instagram intends to cut into Snapchat’s market.

The big question now is, will Snapchat users be wooed to move to Instagram knowing that the very feature that made Snapchat popular is now on another platform?

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Instagram tests new features vs trolls

MANILA -- In an effort to combat online trolls and hate messages, photo-sharing social media app Instagram is quietly launching new features that apparently filter custom keywords out of the comments section of posts.

Another feature is to shut off entirely comments on these posts.

As reported by Agence France-Presse (AFP), these new features are initially intended for use by “high-profile” accounts, although there is the possibility of having these rolled out to other users as well in the coming weeks when the test is successful.

"Our goal is to make Instagram a friendly, fun and, most importantly, safe place for self expression," according to an Instagram message to an AFP inquiry.

The introduction of filtering features on Instagram, which is owned by social media giant Facebook, comes at a time when celebrities have started to complain about harassment and cyber-bullying on their social media accounts.

American actress Tia Mowry, model Ashley Graham, and singer Taylor Swift were recent victims of harassment on their Instagram accounts.

One of the more recent cases of cyber harassment was that of “Ghostbuster” actress Leslie Jones, who left Twitter after allegedly being targeted.

Instagram is one of the biggest social media apps with 500 million active users who share at least 95 million photos in a day.

The company was acquired by Facebook in 2012 for a whopping $1 billion.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

You can now watch YouTube videos offline

MANILA - The world's largest video sharing site YouTube on Thursday launched a new feature in the Philippines, which will allow mobile users in the country to view videos offline.

Available to both iOS and Android devices, the ad-supported feature will let users save videos from the site using either a Wi-Fi connection or their data plans.

The saved videos will then be available for viewing without an Internet connection for the next 48 hours after going offline.

"We want to make sure we are making YouTube as enjoyable as possible for our growing base of mobile users in the Philippines," said YouTube vice president of engineering John Harding in a statement.

"By launching a new offline feature for YouTube today, we hope to help people move past the challenges of data connection, speed and cost to enjoy a smooth, buffer-free version of YouTube," he added.

According to Google Philippines country marketing manager Ryan Morales, the new offline feature will help make video content more affordable and accessible in the country.

"By making these popular videos available for temporary offline viewing, our partners will help fans connect more easily with their favorite content, while also helping bring more viewers to their videos," he said.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

How full-time YouTube users are making profit

MANILA – There are a lot of things YouTube users can do to maximize their own channels.

This is what the speakers from the popular video-hosting website YouTube said during a workshop held at the Mind Museum in Bonifacio Global City on Thursday.

The first ever Philippine YouTube Pop-Up Workshop aims to explain to YouTube users how they can effectively attract more subscribers and make a living just by uploading videos on their channels.

YouTube Philippines Content Partnerships Manger Trixie Canivel said that YouTube is a great platform for Filipinos because it is accessible to everyone.

“Anyone can be on YouTube. A lot of people get on Youtube because they want to create videos about doing stuff that they love,” she said.

Canivel cited the story of now-popular YouTuber Lloyd Cadena, whose series of video blogs online has attracted more than 175,000 subscribers. Cadena’s videos prominently tackle topics related to romance, schooling and the local lesbian, gay bisexual and transgender community, among others.

She also said that what YouTube users do not know is that they can actually make profit just by posting videos on their channels.

“What a lot of people don’t know is that actually, you can turn that [your videos] into a business by turning ads on and monetizing your videos and working with sponsors to be able to really turn it to a viable opportunity for you,” Canivel said.

An example of YouTube users who have enjoyed the monetizing feature of the website is real-life couple Jamvhille Sebastian and Paolinne Michelle Liggayu or more popularly known as “Jamich”. During the workshop, the couple admitted that during a one-month period, they are able to make a six-digit revenue out of the videos they upload.

Canivel, meanwhile, stressed that in order for YouTubers to attract more subscribers, they must work on developing their channels. For starters, YouTubers must establish authentic and unique channels which should be maintained on a regular basis. This, according to Canivel, is a sure way to build a strong fan base.

Following the workshop, a panel which consists of popular YouTube users and channel heads spoke before the members of the press. They include ABS-CBN YouTube Channel Strategies Head Dennis Lim, Jamich, PaperbugTV Channel representatives Jako de Leon and Marco Ho (more popularly known as comedian Bogart the Explorer), and Filipino-Canadian YouTube sensation Mikey Bustos.

YouTube – still a growing platform

Google Philippines Country Marketing Manager Ryan Morales claimed that with over one billion subscribers every month, YouTube is now one of the most influential online platforms in the world.

“If you fit the Internet and the denominator, [that is] almost one out of every two people. So 50% of the entire internet population watches YouTube on a monthly basis. And if you are to make YouTube a country, it will be the third largest country next to China and India,” he said.

Morales revealed that in the Philippines, YouTube is gradually gaining followers among mobile users who opt to watch videos on their mobile devices.

“But the one thing you might not know is in the Philippines is actually hype. That almost a third of YouTube’s traffic in the Philippines is through mobile devices,” he said.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Instagram unveils private video, photo messaging

NEW YORK - Instagram on Thursday unveiled a new service, allowing its 150 million members to send private photo and video messages to friends and loved ones.

The Instagram Direct launch comes ahead of the holiday season just two days after rival Twitter rolled out updated mobile software allowing smartphone users to send pictures in direct, private messages.

The founder of the smartphone photo-sharing service, Kevin Systrom, made the announcement in Manhattan, fielding questions from journalists on site and those following all over the world.

"I would like to introduce Instagram Direct, a simple way to send photos and videos to your friends and family," he said.

"Sometimes there are moments that are meant for one person, or a few close friends: an inside joke among friends, or a picture sent to someone you love just to say hello," Facebook-owned Instagram said .

The new service, which is available to download immediately in Apple's App Store, and on Google Play.

The feature allows people to send a photo or video to up to 15 friends and loved ones. Systrom said the app had been designed to foster intimacy.

The new service will compete against a number of rivals which allow person-to-person photo or video message, notably Snapchat, which reportedly rejected a $3 billion takeover bid from Facebook last month.

"We really wanted to make this about moments you wanted to share with your friends. The people you really care about," Systrom told the news conference. "It's not about spamming everyone you know."

Last month Instagram began displaying ads, as Facebook moved to start making money from the service it bought in a billion-dollar deal last year.

Systrom said there were currently no plans to introduce advertisements to Instagram Direct.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com