April 1-2023: 10 Things That Happened in The Digital Space This Week

Happy new month!

What happened in the social media digital space this week?

Welcome to my weekly newsletter, where I curate and aggregate social media features updates, tech news, digital trends, and weekly insights to keep you updated and informed!

To begin with, on Thursday, Twitter CEO Elon Musk surpassed former US President Barack Obama to become the most followed person on Twitter. Also, Elon Musk and others urge AI pause, citing 'risks to society. YouTube CEO says YouTube is not a social media platform but a place where you come to consume all things videos. Agree?

While you ponder that, let us look at other key stories in the digital space this week.

NB:?Click on the links to read more about the story from the main sources

Meta

1.Meta is really putting more focus on Reels. Instagram is now testing the ability to share full Reel video in the story, 60 seconds max, instead of getting the first 15 seconds. See the video below.

2. Facebook is removing its code generator. Is the script similar to Twitter? Twitter removed SMS two-factor authentication (2FA) and limited it to Twitter Blue

ICYMI, Meta now has paid subscription Meta Verified at $14.99/month on the phone and $11.99/month

This week I chatted with Faustine Ngila, 4IR from Quartz Africa, on the state and future of Metaverse. You can read my view in this article Meta, Microsoft, and Disney are reversing their bets on the metaverse.

Also, #Instagram NFTs Will Be Deactivated on April 11th

TikTok

3. Amidst the global ban for #TikTok looming and its partial ban in the US, UK, EU, NATO and Newzland, TikTok leads the market towards the greatest spend and download in Q1 2023.

TikTok moved up a place to replace Instagram as the world’s most downloaded app. Read the full report by data.ai

On Friday, TikTok introduced Effect House Branded Effects, a new solution that allows brands to work directly with TikTok effect creators to produce custom Branded Effects

Twitter

4. Twitter?is doing away with Legacy Blue on 1st April 2023. What next? Organizations and businesses will be required to pay $1,000 USD (KSh 131,300) per month plus another $50 (KSh 6,570) per month for affiliated accounts like customer care or employees' accounts. Click here for specific pricing for each country.

NB: For individual accounts, the Twitter Blue checkmark goes for $8/month on the Web and $11/month on iOS and Android

5. Twitter reveals some of its source code, including its recommendation algorithm for For You Timeline. Here is a diagram from Twitter's repository on Github on how the Twitter Recommendation Algorithm work.

You can also listen to Twitter open-source Spaces discussion recording where Elon Musk was answering questions

Twitter announces new API pricing, posing a challenge for small developers and apps who can't pay $42,000 per month. The tiers announced are:

• Free (v2) access for write-only use cases and those testing the Twitter API with 1,500 Tweets/month at the app level, media upload endpoints, and login with Twitter.
• A new Basic (v2) access for hobbyists with 10,000 GET/month and 50,000 POST/month, 2 app IDs, and log-in with Twitter for $100/month.
• Enterprise tier to get managed services, complete streams, and access that meets your specific needs. It goes for?$42,000 per month

Alphabet

6. YouTube expands the "Analytics for Artists" tool by adding YouTube Shorts-related data to the Total Reach metric. This new metric shows how many people your music is reaching across all formats, according to the YouTube blog

7. Google launches a new Ads Transparency Center to help you quickly and easily learn more about the ads you see on Search, YouTube and Display

• In 2018 they launched in-ad disclosure
• In 2020, introduced advertiser identity verification
• In 2022 rolled out My Ad Cente globally

With the Ads Transparency Center, you'll be able to understand:

• The ads an advertiser has run
• Which ads were shown in a certain region
• The last date an ad ran, and the format of the ad.

Pinterest

8. Pinterest is testing ways to integrate?Shuffles collage content?into Pinterest, starting with shopping. Shuffles is Pinterests collage tool that allows you to create, publish and share visual content; that launched to the general public last November

Generative AI

9. Microsoft is “exploring” putting ads in the responses given by Bing Chat, its new search agent powered by OpenAI’s GPT-4. According to an image shared by @debarghya_das on Twitter, the sponsored response is labeled as "Ad"

Also, on Friday, Italy temporarily blocked ChatGPT over data privacy concerns. Italy is the first Western country to take such action against the popular artificial intelligence chatbot.

10. Midjourney shutters free trials of its AI image generator due to 'extraordinary' abuse. An attempt to generate an image on a free trial gave me the error "Job action restricted." It was fun playing with different prompts!

The basic plan is $8 per month.

Additional resources:

1. Report: Top 100 Beauty Brands on Social Media

2. De-Influencing: All You Need to Know About the New TikTok Trend

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