We Are Social’s Monday Mashup #568
Instagram’s chronological feed returns
Instagram’s feed is getting a refresh, with users now able to choose between three different feeds. Announced by Instagram head Adam Mosseri in a tweet, the platform now has two new options, Favourites and Following, which sorts content chronologically A third ‘home’ option offers the algorithmically sorted feed that users currently experience. Favourites allows users to view updates from a small cluster of friends and family. Users can still find posts from everyone else they follow in the Following view. These changes to the feed are expected to roll out over the next few weeks, with a finalised version of the chronological feed expected in the first half of the year.
Testing Feed Changes 👀
We’re starting to test the ability to switch between three different views on your home screen (two of which would give you the option to see posts in chronological order):
– Home
– Favorites
– FollowingWe hope to launch these soon. More to come. ✌🏼 pic.twitter.com/9zvB85aPSp
— Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) January 5, 2022
TikTok tests a ‘Repost’ button
The retweet is making its way onto TikTok, with the platform testing a ‘Repost’ button. The button allows users to amplify videos on the platform by sharing them with their own followers. Currently, the app allows its users to share videos to friends through messages, texts and social media posts, yet the new Repost button will allow users to promote videos to their friends on TikTok. However, the video won’t appear on your profile, instead sending the content out to your friends’ For You pages. The shiny new button is being tested amongst a small group of users, so keep an eye out in case you’re one of the lucky few being trusted with the exciting new tool.
Twitter is testing Tweet reaction videos
Reactions are killing the content game on social, and Twitter has taken notice. The platform is testing a feature called ‘quote tweet with reaction’, where you can embed a copy of a tweet into a photo or video, rather than just replying to it with text. Currently being tested on iOS, the feature is similar to TikTok’s video replies, which have proven popular among the app’s users. One of Twitter’s product leads did a reaction quote tweet to the announcement, which shows how the reactions will appear to users.
Meta is testing a new meta privacy control centre across apps
Meta is making changes to how it tells users about its privacy options. The company is centralising some privacy FAQs and controls in one place across its family of apps. The new Privacy Centre can be found in the privacy section of Facebook’s Settings menu. The Centre will break things down into five categories; Security, Sharing, Collection, Use and Ads, making it easier for users to navigate through this plethora of information. Currently being tested to some US-based Facebook desktop users, the Centre is expected to roll out to more users and apps in the coming months.
TikTok content branches out from the small screen
TikTok has partnered with Atmosphere, allowing the app to roll out its content to screens other than our smartphones. Atmosphere provides licensed, curated streamed video content in more than 18,000 venues, in locations such as airlines, bars, casinos, gyms and more. This is the first time TikTok content will be used for an out-of-home offering, a big step for the platform in branching out beyond the small screen. So how will it work? The Atmosphere team will have access to a library of select TikTok content and they’ll choose videos that they believe best fits its channel. Is this the start of something new for TikTok? Time will tell.
Ones to watch
Instagram is testing private likes on Stories.