We Are Social’s Monday Mashup #405

Mashup
hannah.markus
Facebook looks to expand its sports content with new deals
Facebook has won a £200 million bid to broadcast the Premiere League, as of the 2019-2020 season, to audiences in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Laos – countries with a huge British football following. The platform is also in discussions with Cristiano Ronaldo about creating a docu-series for Facebook Watch. It’s unsurprising that Facebook is keen to create more sports content, as sports-related programming such as “Ball in the Family” (a reality show following LaVar Ball and his family) has done particularly well out of the first Facebook Watch original shows. With Facebook increasing its live broadcasting of sports (it has previously livestreamed MLS and La Liga matches), along with the growing popularity of its Facebook Watch sports series, the platform could become a one-stop-shop for sports fans’ viewing needs.



Save it for later with Facebook Stories archive
Facebook is rolling out an option to archive Stories, much like the update that arrived on Instagram last year. The feature could encourage brands to engage more with Stories on Facebook and invest more time into them, as there will now be the option to re-use Stories or to post them onto other platforms, rather than losing their content after 24 hours. The archive will mean that users can re-post their best performing Stories, or simply keep them in the archive to see which posts perform well and which don’t. Seems like Stories are pretty unstoppable if you ask me!

How Facebook's Stories archive works in three shots

Instagram releases new “You’re all caught up” notification
Instagram is rolling out a “You’re all caught up” message, telling users that they have seen all new posts from the past two days. The feature is an effort to help Instagram users stop endlessly scrolling through days and days worth of posts in search of those that may have been lost in the algorithm, assuring them that they aren’t missing anything.



Facebook and Instagram trial new features to cut down on overuse
Along with Facebook, Instagram will also be trialling a “Do Not Disturb” feature that will allow users to turn off notifications from the apps for a selected period of time. The update is an attempt to discourage users from disabling their accounts while also allowing them to take a break from the platforms. It seems that platform bosses are really dedicated to helping users to ensure that the time they spend on them is valuable, with Usage Insight dashboards coming to both Facebook and Instagram. These screens will show you how much time you’ve spent on their apps per day, and will allow you to set a daily limit after which you’ll receive a notification reminding you to look up from your screen. I’m pretty sure I need this, but I’m afraid of what the dashboard is going to tell me…

Hello, Moves and tbh just aren’t doing well enough, to be honest
Facebook has announced that it will be shutting down Hello – an app that syncs Facebook accounts to phone numbers, so that you can see who is calling you and whether you want to answer; Moves – an activity tracking app; and tbh – an “anonymous compliment” app for teens. Facebook reported that the apps just weren’t “keeping up”, and that all user data from the apps will be deleted within 90 days. This isn’t the first time that the platform has axed “low usage” apps; other examples of defunct apps include M, Lifestage, and Groups. Facebook has said that the process is a necessary one, as “it’s only by trial and error that we’ll create great social experiences for people.”



Take on tennis queen Serena Williams with Snapchat’s new Lens
Ok, so obviously Queen Serena’s tennis skills are an insurmountable goal for us mere mortals, but Snapchat is giving users a chance to take on the icon with a new interactive 3D Bitmoji Lens. Williams collaborated with the platform to roll out the game in honour of Wimbledon, and, as she says, “It’s so fun because how often do you get to play against me?” Try it, lose graciously, and bow down to Her Royal Highness.