New Logos to Censorship Scandal: What’s New in Social Media this Week?

There’s never a quiet week when it comes to social media, from unwelcome changes to security fears; every day brings something new. This week has been a particularly busy one when it comes to social scandals and speculations:

Instagram changes its logo

The biggest news this week was the change of the Instagram logo and layout. Love it or hate it, opinions have ranged from celebrating the futuristic and cleaner new version, to comparing it to a PowerPoint slide background. Moving from its retro, hipster vibe to a much more modern one, it’s certainly not been well received but with Instagram continuing to grow as one of the most popular social media apps for young people and boasting over 400 million users, I’m sure they aren’t too worried.

Periscope security fears after suicide streamed live

With previous concerns over the ease of streaming anything live without security, including the sexual assault of a girl in Ohio, once again Periscope have been at the centre of attention after a French teenager live streamed her suicide on the app. With no way to get any information to help, be it name or location of the victims, there is little watchers can do and led to nearly 1,000 people watching the event unfold. It has over 10 million users on the app, and obviously not every video can be monitored, but the controversy has called for privacy fears to be looked at, with some even suggesting an emergency button needs to be added.

Facebook accused of censoring right wing news

With so many social media channels out there distributing news, it’s now emerged that Facebook’s news feed isn’t created by algorithms that push out the ‘trending’ news as previously stated but are instead curated by editors, leading to complaints of supressing conservative news. Now it’s worth noting that even algorithms can be manipulated and are never fully impartial, but it’s an interesting point to take note of when people in the industry are realising certain news is never promoted no matter how many likes it gets, and sheds light on the bias in media.

Twitter to remove links and photos from word count

It’s not all doom and gloom however, as there’s some great news for brands using Twitter! The most recent change to the social channel is that images and links will no longer be included in the Twitter character count. Previously a hindrance and meaning you had significantly less words to play around with, it now means much more flexibility and personality when using the full 140 characters. We can hardly wait!

By Kara Godfrey