Social Media Sunday: Recycled Facebook Privacy Hoax, Twitter Beyond 140, & Snapchat's Big Ticket Ads
This week in social media, another privacy hoax took over Facebook. Meanwhile, it looks like interim CEO and co-founder Jack Dorsey will be taking over Twitter and Snapchat's new feature is an ad that costs almost a million dollars for one day.
It's time for Social Media Sunday!
Privacy Hoax, Again
It seems to be a cycle that no one can break: Every once in a while, a Facebook post written in fake legalese that supposedly reserving the data rights of the poster goes viral. Here's an example of one variation of this post, via Mashable
"As of September 28 2015 8:50 pm 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 1 308-1 1 308-103 and the Rome Statute)."
It happened again this week, and while the phenomenon is an interesting sign that Facebook users really worry about the rights they give the social media giant to their pictures, information, posts, and other content, the declaration does absolutely nothing, legally speaking.
The real rights you have on Facebook are spelled out in its terms of service, which states that you "own all of the content and information you post on Facebook" and you can control how it is shared through your privacy settings.
Profile Videos
Facebook began introducing a new alternative to the profile picture this week, as TechCrunch reported. It's a seven-second looping video -- basically a GIF -- that some users have been allowed to test on the network. Facebook is also adding the ability to pin Featured Photos to the top of the profile, temporary profile pictures, and a new 100 character Biography field.
Jack Dorsey, Permanent CEO?
Once again, this week tech watchers and investors got stirred into thinking Twitter was about to announce co-founder and interim CEO Jack Dorsey as the permanent CEO of the company, only to have that wish unfulfilled.
And investors weren't happy. As Quartz pointed out, share prices of Twitter dropped precipitously as the market moved from anticipation of an announcement to more anxiety about the social media company's future. Twitter's stock closed 8.4 percent down on Friday in yet another Wall Street hammering.
140 Characters or More?
Yet another piece of bad news -- this time to Twitter die-hards -- is that the company is building a new system that eliminates the only thing that remains Twitter-y about Twitter: the 140 character limit.
That's according to Re/code, which reported that "multiple people familiar with the company's plans" had said the new product would enable Twitter users to publish long-form content to the social network. Twitter hasn't officially said anything about it, but if true, the future of Twitter may be something closer to Tumblr.
Snapchat
Big Ticket Sponsored Features
Snapchat is planning to sell sponsored ad products it's calling "lenses" in the next few months. For users, it adds features similar to the new rainbow graphics that users can add to their snaps.
For the companies sponsoring the one-day feature, it drains almost a million out of their budget. According to the Financial Times (via AdWeek), a one-day sponsored "lens" for big holidays like Halloween will cost upwards of $750,000. Not-so-special days will reportedly still pull in $450,000 in revenue.
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