When it comes to customer service, Facebook is notoriously difficult deal with, which is why people go searching on Google and elsewhere for any sort of reliable contact information for the site. But beware: There’s a scammy phone number lurking on the internet, passing itself off as “Facebook customer service.” [More]
Facebook Testing Ads In ‘Messenger’ App
By 1.26.17
The ads, they’re coming for you. Or at least they are if you use Facebook’s Messenger app to communicate with your friends. [More]
Facebook’s “Trending Topics” Will Now Be The Same For Everyone Nearby, List Story’s Publisher
By 1.25.17
In an effort to deal with its unwieldy fake news problem, Facebook is tweaking its “Trending Topics” algorithm: instead of stories dynamically populating individual users’ feeds based on their interests, everyone in the same geographical area will see the same news items. [More]
Federal Prosecutors: Drug Ring Sold Heroin Through Facebook, Snapchat
By 1.19.17
Legitimate businesses aren’t the only people using social media to reach customers, and online drug sales apparently aren’t relegated to darknet markets. Federal prosecutors say an alleged drug ring operating in Atlanta took advantage of various social platforms to advertise and accept heroin orders. [More]
North Pole’s Santa Claus Returns To Facebook After Proving His Identity
By 12.30.16
Is Santa Claus real? Yes, Virginia, but he had to prove that to Facebook before the company would restore his social media account. [More]
Snapchat Promising Potential Investors It Can Be The Next Facebook
By 12.29.16 — Updated: 12.30.16
Remember how Snapchat’s parent company quietly, and without fanfare, filed paperwork last month preparing to launch a $25 billion IPO? Well, to sell those public offerings initially, you need investors to want what you’ve got. So Snapchat is out to convince everyone that it can take the world by storm, just like its older internet cousin. [More]
State Files Consumer Protection Lawsuit Against Man Accused Of Using Facebook To Trick Women Into Sex
By 12.21.16
Washington state prosecutors are using state consumer protection laws to go after a man — already facing multiple criminal charges of rape — that they claim spent years misleading women about his job, and even his gender, with the goal of misleading women into sleeping with him in exchange for a non-existent shot at stardom. [More]
Facebook To Work With Fact-Checkers, Let Users Flag Fake News Stories As “Disputed”
By 12.15.16
If you’re sick of seeing your friends from high school sharing outrageously untrue news items that are clearly hoaxes, or originally posted on websites with names like “HawtClikzNowAmerica!” or “biznoosclickstore.nz.bike,” you may soon have a new tool to help flag this sort of nonsense. [More]
Even Facebook Apparently Wants To Be Netflix Now
By 12.14.16
When you want to watch an original comedy or drama series, you may cue up Netflix, Amazon, or even (gasp!) broadcast or cable networks. When you want to watch a livestream of some bored news editors trying to make a watermelon explode, or a press conference, or someone’s dog being silly, you might turn to Facebook Live video. But now it seems Facebook is jumping on the bandwagon everyone else is these days, and wants a chance to get scripted series and sports in front of your face too. [More]
Facebook Discovers, Improves Another Ad Metrics Problem
By 12.9.16 — Updated: 12.12.16
Facebook makes money from monetizing your political arguments with your former roommate’s great-aunt, and advertisers want statistics that show what they’re getting for their ad dollars. That’s why it’s of note that Facebook recently told advertisers that it’s been overestimating how many people a given ad is going to reach. [More]
Should You Be Able To Serve Divorce Papers Through Facebook?
By 12.9.16
If you so choose, you can use the internet to avoid virtually all person-to-person contact; sign contracts electronically, transfer funds from account to account, transact business, order dinner and a movie, but can you use Facebook to sidestep the awkward — and sometimes difficult — process of serving divorce papers on your estranged spouse? Not always, says one judge. [More]
Google’s New ‘Trusted Contacts’ App Lets Users Keep Tabs On Friends, Family
By 12.5.16
Two years after Facebook added a safety check feature to let users notify family and friends they were safe after a disaster or public tragedy, Google is following suit, launching its own standalone personal safety app. [More]
Facebook’s Robot Army May Soon Determine If Your Live Video Is Offensive
By 12.1.16
Facebook — the company whose artificial intelligence has had a wee bit of trouble distinguishing between fake and authentic news sources — believes that its machine censors can be deployed to determine if a users’ live video stream is too naughty or offensive. [More]
Is It Time To Get Serious About Cracking Down On Stealth Instagram Ads?
By 11.30.16
If you’ve used Instagram, you’re almost certainly familiar with apparently real people touting tummy-flattening tea, an array of subscription boxes, the benefits of some multilevel marketing scheme, or the latest in fashion, beauty, and electronics. If these people are being paid to shill these products, then they have to clearly be flagged as ads. Though the Federal Trade Commission has pledged to get serious about going after advertisers who taint your Instagram feed with these stealth ads, some consumer advocates say the FTC simply isn’t doing enough. [More]
Study: Students “Easily Duped” By Fake News, Sponsored Content
By 11.22.16
You might assume that a child raised on online content may be better positioned to tell when news and information is coming from legitimate sources and when that source is a fake or an ad. However, the results of a new study appear to indicate that this always-connected generation is no better equipped to sort fact from fiction online. [More]
Facebook Says It Found More Mistakes In Metrics Reported To Advertisers
By 11.16.16
So, remember that whole thing about Facebook mistakenly telling advertisers for two years that users were watching videos much longer than they actually were? It turns out that wasn’t the only advertising metric the social media company got wrong. [More]
Google, Facebook To Fight Fake “News” Sites By Blocking Them From Ad Money
By 11.15.16
Google and Facebook are, hands down, the two most common ways for basically everyone to find information: either you’re searching for links on one, or browsing your news feed on the other. They’re also the two biggest advertising companies in the world, which gives them some leverage to feed or starve some content. And when it comes to totally bogus news, both are now going to take the “starve” approach. [More]
Facebook Briefly Killed A Lot Of People This Afternoon
By 11.11.16
Are you okay? For a brief but deeply weird period this afternoon, Facebook killed a substantial part of its user base, telling their friends to “remember” them. These people were, to be clear, mostly alive. [More]
