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 Warns Group Admins to Maintain Activity, or They’ll Be Replaced
Facebook has been notifying some group admins that they need to be more active in moderating their groups, or Facebook will assign another group member to the job instead. Facebook’s warning says that admins either need to be more attentive, or it’ll find someone else, within a week. According to Meta’s listed policy, it will put the group on ice if no admin is present, but there’s no mention of automatically adding a replacement.
2. TikTok Announces ‘Global #BookTok Challenge’ to Encourage Literary Engagement
TikTok has launched a new campaign to celebrate National Book Lovers Day (August 9th), which aims to highlight the growing #BookTok community, and encourage literary engagement around the event. To get more people reading, TikTok’s running its first-ever “Global #BookTok Challenge”, which calls on users to share book recommendations in the app for a chance to share in a range of rewards.
TikTok will be encouraging users to share their favorite books and their top underrated reads, while also sharing support for local bookshops, and other related small businesses in the app. TikTok will also call on users to share “hacks and knowledge” from books that people can apply in daily life, like cooking tips, fashion notes, etc.
3. TikTok Adds New Required Labels for AI-Generated Content
TikTok has become the latest app to launch new rules around AI disclosure, with the platform now notifying users that they’ll need to tag AI-generated content in the app, or risk having it removed by moderators. TikTok is now directly prompting users to tag AI-generated content that depicts “realistic scenes”.
This is being seen by many as TikTok trying to get ahead of the expected wave of AI deepfakes, by enforcing its rules around related disclosure. TikTok actually updated its rules on this element back in March, but it’s now stepping up its enforcement, with a dedicated tag for AI-generated content that creators can activate within the upload flow.
4. TikTok Launches New Push to Boost In-App Shopping Activity in the UK
TikTok’s latest effort in in-stream shopping is a new “Fulfilled by TikTok” program in the UK, which will see TikTok itself act as the intermediary, to ensure that products are shipped faster to UK shoppers. This way, TikTok itself becomes the store, with merchants providing their products to TikTok’s fulfillment center in order to streamline delivery.
TikTok will then facilitate all orders direct, with additional charges for warehousing, shipping and other services (labelling, pre-packing and inserting leaflets). The program offers same-day fulfillment for all orders made by 7pm, Monday to Saturday.
5. Instagram Tests New Collaborative Posting Option to Encourage Participation
Instagram is experimenting with a new option that would enable users to add their own images and videos to an existing post, facilitating more direct collaborations in the app.
The new option would enable post viewers to submit their own addition for consideration. Any additions would not be displayed until approved by the creator, essentially enabling curated group photo albums and shared experiences in the app.
6. Snapchat Rolls Out New ‘After Dark’ Element to Encourage Participatory Sharing
Snapchat has launched its new ‘After Dark’ element, which will enable Snapchatters to post exclusive content for their friends after 8pm, which only those that have also posted on their Stories will be able to access.
‘After Dark’ will appear as a separate Snap Story, and will be a collection of Snaps from your friends overnight. As per the description, in the morning, you’ll be able to check in on the Snaps that your friends have shared, so long as you’ve shared one back. That forms a sort of interactive highlight reel of what all of your connections were up to the night before, which could be a good way to boost engagement among younger users.
7. Australia’s National Broadcaster Abandons X Citing Negative Changes Under Elon Musk
Australia’s national broadcaster the ABC has announced that it’s shutting down all but four of its X/Twitter accounts due to changes at the app as a result of Elon Musk’s leadership.
The ABC has been mulling this decision for some time, with the broadcaster shutting down several of its biggest X accounts earlier in the year to measure the impact on engagement. It found that the reduction in account actually drove more traffic to its other X profiles, mitigating any loss, and resulting in reducing posting workload, without any significant impact.
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.
Comments