Social Media Buzz Weekly: Roundup of Social Media Updates
- ClickInsights
- 1 hour ago
- 6 min read
Welcome to Social Media Buzz Weekly, your weekly bulletin of the latest social media updates. With the social media landscape evolving with each passing day, it can be challenging to keep a tab on the rapid developments. Well, not anymore, as we have taken it upon ourselves to keep you abreast of every happening in the social media space.
So, without any further ado, let’s look at some of the most significant developments from the last week in the world of social media.
1. Meta Says It Has Removed 540K Teen Accounts in Australia
Meta has shared an update on its efforts to align with Australia’s new teen social media ban, which puts the onus on social platforms to keep all teens under the age of 16 off their platforms, or face significant financial penalties.
The new law went into effect on December 10th, and thus far, Meta says that it’s removed access to almost 550k accounts that it believes belong to underage users. Australia’s social media law, which is the first significant restriction of social media access based on age in a Western nation, aims to better protect kids from harmful exposure online, by ensuring that young teens are not being shown adult content, or being negatively influenced by social platform algorithms.
2. Meta Appoints Former Trump Staffer as VP
Meta has continued its trend of employing Trump-aligned staff to senior leadership roles, with former Republican staffer Dina Powell McCormick joining the company as President and Vice Chairman.
Powell McCormick has been on Meta’s Board of Directors since April last year, giving her a level of experience in seeing Meta’s shift towards AI development. Now she will take a more direct role in enacting that shift, with her new responsibilities set to put her at the forefront of negotiations over AI infrastructure acquisition and development.
3. TikTok Launches Calendar To Help Parents Manage Screen Time
TikTok has launched a new calendar template that’s designed to help children and families better coordinate and manage their weekly online and offline activities.
TikTok’s new “For You Calendar” aims to help families coordinate their lives, and include time for family connection, all in one simple template. The calendar was designed by TikTok creator Linda Tong.
4. TikTok Announces New Partnership With FIFA World Cup
TikTok is clearly making sports a priority this year, with the platform announcing another sports partnership, this time with FIFA, which will see TikTok hosting exclusive content around the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
TikTok says that its original programming will be hosted in a FIFA World Cup 2026 hub, which will also include highlights, match ticket and viewing information, as well as participation incentives, including custom stickers and filters. TikTok will also host a creator collaboration program, which will provide a select group of global TikTok creators with access to behind-the-scenes moments. In addition to this, TikTok creators will also be able to co-create using FIFA archival footage.
5. TikTok Phases Out Its Custom Identity Option for Advertisers
TikTok is phasing out its Custom Identity option, which enables advertisers to run ads without linking to an official account, in early 2026.
When that happens, all TikTok advertisers will then need to be creating ads via a verified TikTok profile in order to continue running ads in the app. TikTok’s Custom Identity option, which has already been removed for some advertisers, enables you to run ads without a verified TikTok profile, using Custom Identity as an alternative option.
6. TikTok Adds Channel Sales Experts To Marketing Partners Program
TikTok is expanding its Marketing Partners Program once again, this time with a new “Channel Sales Partner” element, which will connect prospective TikTok advertisers to platform expertise that’s aligned with their specific business requirements.
TikTok’s Marketing Partners Program includes a broad range of recognized experts, ranging from creative to measurement, with its new “Channel Sales Partners” to help to drive SMB adoption, by providing additional assistance and insight to power in-app campaigns. TikTok will initially have six Channel Sales partners listed, with C-4 Analytics, Diginius, LocaliQ, Logical Position, Opteo and Scorpion.
7. Instagram Denies Speculations of Any Data Breach
Instagram has clarified that there had been no data breaches from its database after several users received emails prompting them to reset their email info, which indicates that somebody had been trying to log into their account.
Some reports had suggested that this was connected to a 2024 data breach, in which the details of 17.5 million IG accounts were released on the dark web, but Instagram has reported that this was not a breach, that no info has been stolen, and that the issue has been addressed.
8. Pinterest Announces New CTV Show
Pinterest is launching a new TV-like series on Roku TV, which will feature a range of well-known creators partnering with Pinners to help bring their Pinterest boards to life.
The new “Bring My Pinterest to Life” series will look to turn people’s Pin ideas into real-life experiences and items, which they can then incorporate into their life. Pinterest has been working to align with the broader video trend, by incorporating more video into the app, while it also acquired CTV advertising platform tvScientific last month.
9. xAI Raises an Additional $20B
Elon Musk’s xAI has announced that it has completed its latest funding round, raising an additional $20 billion, and putting xAI’s valuation up to around $230 billion in total.
Elon’s AI project, which he launched seemingly in retaliation for being booted out of OpenAI, has burned through billions already, as it’s constructed several massive data centers in the U.S. Elon reportedly has plans to expand xAI’s capacity on this front to 50 million H100 equivalent units within five years, so there is some vision for a much bigger boost to xAI’s operating systems.
10. X Faces Bans in Several Regions Over Grok-Produced Images
X is currently under scrutiny in several regions due to xAI’s Grok chatbot producing sexualized images, of anyone, young or old, at the request of X users.
X could be facing full bans, in several markets, including France, Malaysia, and Indonesia. In the U.K. specifically, Prime Minister Kier Starmer has noted that “all options are on the table” in addressing concerns with X’s latest controversy, including a full ban of the app if a solution is not provided.
11. X Pledges To Publish Latest Algorithm Code
X owner Elon Musk announced that X will soon publish all of the algorithmic code for X’s news feed and ads, so that it can provide more transparency around how its systems decide what each user sees in the app.
Back in 2023, shortly after taking over at the app, Elon Musk published Twitter’s feed algorithm in GitHub, and vowed to keep the code updated, so that anyone could see how posts are ranked and displayed. Except, Twitter (now X) wasn’t as transparent as it could be, with various elements not included in the published data, while the code info itself was never updated, despite Musk and team making various changes to it over time.
12. X Launches Antitrust Lawsuit Against Music Industry
Igniting quite the controversy within the world of social media and music publishing, Elon Musk platform X Corp has filed an antitrust lawsuit against the National Music Publishers’ Association (NMPA) and 18 other major music publishers.
Taking the matter to court, X accused various publishers of colluding to force the platform into costly, industry-wide licensing deals. X also claimed that they were pressured with a coordinated wave of DMCA takedown notices rather than addressing genuine copyright concerns.
13. LinkedIn Expands AI Job Discovery to More Languages
LinkedIn is expanding access to its AI-powered job search tools to more languages, with Spanish, German, French and Portuguese-speaking users now able to utilize the platform’s advanced AI job assistant features.
Originally launched in May last year, LinkedIn’s AI-powered job search process enables users to describe their dream job in basic terms, which LinkedIn’s system is then able to match to actual roles and opportunities. LinkedIn says that this process more closely mirrors a discussion with a career advisor, enabling users to get more accurate, valuable search results, via a simplified discovery process.
Wrapping Up
And that was a wrap of this week’s Social Media Buzz. We’ll be back next week with more news and updates for you from the social media world. Till then, stay tuned!
If you want to read more on the latest developments taking place in the social media space, take a look at ClickInsights’ Social Media Buzz, wherein we bring to you monthly reports on everything going on in social media, ranging from platform updates to policy changes that influence the way we market.
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