WE ARE SOCIAL’S TUESDAY TUNEUP #234
Gotta catch ’em all… City Spirits Go
Charles Caleb Colton once said, “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery”. Pokemon fans in these 42 countries can now be the very best – like no one ever was – in China, with City Spirits Go – a Pokemon Go clone.
Charles Caleb Colton once said, “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery”. Pokemon fans in these 42 countries can now be the very best – like no one ever was – in China, with City Spirits Go – a Pokemon Go clone.
City Spirits Go is now the top free game on the Chinese iOS App store. While AR is not integrated within the game, it still requires players to move around to discover and capture the creatures around them. According to reviews, most players are happy to hunt down Pokemon-inspired creatures in this Pokemon Go-esque game.
In the meantime, us plebs with no access to either Pokemon Go or even, City Spirits Go will have to make do with our Pokemon video games on our trusty game consoles.
Throwing it back on Snapchat
Snapchat rolled out its latest feature, Memories, which allows users to save snaps, upload old photos from their camera roll, and send them all out again! Users no longer need to worry about saving those amazing snaps at the party last night or that unbelievable concert they went to three weeks ago.
While it’s a relief to not have to be kancheong (Cantonese for panicky) about saving every single awesome snap made, some users have their grouses about this new feature.
Teething issues I’m sure, but it seems like a lot of people are having difficulties controlling where their snaps are going.
I WANNA SAVE IT TO MY CAMERA ROLL NOT SNAPCHAT MEMORIES
— Dory (@Dory) July 14, 2016
Ok can I just say I hate this new snapchat memories function — Jemimah James Wei (@jemmawei) July 15, 2016
In the meantime, RT to save a life guys…
@meanpIastic RT to save a life pic.twitter.com/loqXbdQDGL
— ari (@arianajaraa) July 14, 2016
Singapore government to build chatbots
Microsoft announced that it will work with the Singapore government to build prototype chatbots for selected public services. The project, “Conversations As A Platform” was announced by Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister-in-Charge of the Smart Nation Initiative at the World Cities Summit. The city state aims to be the world’s first Smart Nation, one where people are empowered by technology to lead meaningful and fulfilled lives.
During a discussion at the event, Dr Balakrishnan said: “If you ask most people today, most of their interactions with their friends and peers are through mediums such as instant messaging. Now, the question is, why shouldn’t the same capability be available for the Government?”
And why shouldn’t it? Socially awkward creatures such as myself would love having our questions and requests answered at the tap of our fingers, and most importantly, without having to open our mouths.
T-minus soon to a platform like this for Government services? YAASSSS PLZ.
Instant Articles Hit Facebook Messenger
Sharing article links with your friends via Facebook Messenger just got a whole lot easier. Instant Articles technology, conveniently housed in-app, allows for users to quickly read news articles without having to open a separate browser!
Sharing article links with your friends via Facebook Messenger just got a whole lot easier. Instant Articles technology, conveniently housed in-app, allows for users to quickly read news articles without having to open a separate browser!
The benefits of this nifty feature are aplenty when compared to traditional web links:
- Articles load up to 10 times faster
- Less data usage when loading posts (which is great news for countries where data is priced at a premium)
- 20% more articles are read on average
- 70% of readers are less likely to abandon their articles.
- 30% more shares of Instant Articles
- Include immersive creative features
Fast, easy and interactive, what’s there not to love?
Not all publishers have jumped on yet, but you can tell which articles are of the Instant variety by the small lightning bolt placed in the top right hand corner of embedded links. This feature has rolled out on Android, and is slated to be released for iPhone in the coming weeks.