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  • Facebook Closed in Papua New Guinea for a Month

    Facebook Closed in Papua New Guinea for a Month

    Papua New Guinea’s Communications Minister Sam Basil has stated that Facebook is to be shut down in the country for a month. This time, Basil said, will be used to investigate the propagation of fake news and pornography on the site.  

    Facebook In Hot Water… Again 

    This news comes on the heels of Zuckerburg’s European apology tour related to the numerous scandals the site has been involved in recently. Firstly, the company was the center of the Cambridge Analytica data breach. Secondly, the investigation of the Donald Trump campaign found that Russian organizations used the social media platform to influence the election.  While the news out of Papua New Guinea isn’t directly tied to these incidents, they help add some context for the decision.

    Recent advertisements by Facebook attempt to make light of this, promising to make the site “fun” again. Facebook’s content algorithm continues to generate countless debates. The amount of comments, reactions and buzz around controversial posts makes them rise in the news feed. This leads to a feedback loop and causes the platform to be rife with arguments and fake news.  

    Papua New Guinea 

    Basil’s statements echo these fears. The Communications Minister even went so far as to suggest the country should develop its own social media platform. While Facebook is down in the country, the government will investigate its use and userbase. Fake profiles used to disseminate fake news are of particular note to the investigation. 

    A Facebook representative has stated “We have reached out to the Papua New Guinea government to understand their concerns.” It seems as though this contact hasn’t stopped Papua New Guinea’s government from going ahead with the shutdown, though. In the meantime, Facebook’s has cemented its place in the ongoing debate over fake news. It will likely remain there for the foreseeable future, as well.  

  • Facebook Wants to Help You Find Love

    Facebook Wants to Help You Find Love

    Are you one of the 200 million Facebook users who listed themselves as “single”? Soon, you’ll be able to try out their new matchmaking feature. After all, Facebook knows more about you than all but your closest friends, so the company may have a better shot at introducing you to the love of your life than, say, your coworker or an acquaintance from book club.

    The new feature was announced by CEO Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook’s annual F8 developers conference. Considering that Zuckerberg originally created Facebook to rank the relative hotness of his female classmates, it seems only fitting that the social media platform would make a foray into online dating.

    How It Works

    Although we don’t yet have a firm release date for Facebook Dating, we have an idea of how the service will work. According to the official announcement, it will “mirror the way people meet in real life — through the experiences they have in common.”

    Once the feature becomes available, users can opt in by creating a profile. This will be quarantined from the rest of your social media presence so that your friends and family won’t know that you’ve signed up. You also won’t be matched with anyone already on your friends list. Instead, you’ll be able to browse Groups and Events in your area to find other Facebook Daters and browse their profiles.

    If you find someone you like, you can exchange messages through a text-only system, meaning that you won’t be able to exchange pics—wanted or otherwise. The communication system will be separate from Facebook Messenger.

    Tinder Stock Plummets

    Although it uses some of the same mechanics as hookup apps like Tinder, Facebook Dating is more focused on matchmaking for long-term relationships. Despite this, Tinder’s parent company Match Group saw their shares drop by 17 percent following Zuckerberg’s announcement.

    It’s not clear yet whether Facebook users will embrace the dating feature. On the one hand, it could be an effective way to meet like-minded singles in your area. But on the other hand, do you really want to give Facebook even more influence over your life and the data collected about it?

    Concerns Over Safety and Privacy

    Facebook is still trying to do damage control over the Cambridge Analyitca scandal, and many people are already wary about the way the company handles personal data. It doesn’t help that in April, Grindr was discovered to have shared sensitive information—including HIV status—with its advertisers.

    Beyond concern over how Facebook will use the information it gathers, there’s also a question of how safe those who opt in to the dating service will be from creeps and stalkers. Facebook Dating profiles will show your first name as well as the city you live in, and potentially your workplace. Determined stalkers could easily use that information to find you.

    Zuckerberg did not address these privacy concerns at F8, but the company should be very careful as it proceeds to ensure that its users are protected. Otherwise, it’ll be Cambridge Analytica all over again.

  • Facebook Is Rolling Out a Downvote Button

    Facebook Is Rolling Out a Downvote Button

    Facebook is experimenting with a downvote button in certain markets. But before you get excited, it’s not the same thing as a dislike button. We’re still waiting for a thumbs-down react option, but in the meantime, there will be a new way to rank comments so that the “best” content appears first.

    Follow the Arrows

    In addition to the set of emoji reacts—like, love, haha, wow, sad, and angry—you’ll soon be able to hit an up or down arrow to show whether a comment was helpful, insightful, or relevant to the discussion.

    This new feature mimics other platforms like Reddit or the commenting system Disqus, used by many sites around the web. After the hits Facebook’s reputation has taken recently, the move can be seen as part of an overall strategy to make the social media site a more appealing place to spend your time. By downvoting comments that are disrespectful, hateful, or off-topic, users have more control over the content that’s displayed.

    Fostering Communication

    The goal with the downvote option is ultimately to clean up the comments with less hate and fake news. “People have told us they would like to see better public discussions on Facebook, and want spaces where people with different opinions can have more constructive dialogue,” a Facebook spokesperson said. “Our hope is that this feature will make it easier for us to create such spaces, by ranking the comments that readers believe deserve to rank highest, rather than the comments that get the strongest emotional reaction.”

    Limited Trial Run

    For now, the feature is only available in New Zealand and Australia. Assuming everything goes well there, the social media giant intends to extend the downvote feature to other territories. No word on when it will arrive in the US, but you can probably expect to see the upvote/downvote options sometime this year. As for how Facebook plans to deal with potential abuse of the system…well, we will have to wait and see.

  • The Best Facebook Apps for Smartphones – Android Edition

    The Best Facebook Apps for Smartphones – Android Edition

    The most popular social media service on the planet offers official apps for nearly every platform. But unfortunately for users, those official apps don’t always cater to their needs, or they may drain battery or slow down older Android devices. Luckily, there are some alternatives to the official apps – here are our top five!

    Friendly – Free / $1.99

    Friendly is a newer Facebook app that comes with some nice filtering options if you are annoyed by Facebook clutter. You can customize your news feed, filter out keywords, set a theme and use Facebook chat.

    The Pro version will cost you $1.99 to unlock. We think Friendly is well worth the cost, especially if filtering is appealing to you.

    Fast – Free / $1.49

    Fast has been around for a long time and it has evolved into a very full-featured Facebook app. With Fast, you can post, comment, share and access Groups and Pages. It even supports chat in the app, unlike the official Facebook app itself.

    There is a Pro version available for $1.49 and a Lite version that provides more basic Facebook access.

    Metal – Free

    Metal supports both Facebook and Twitter and has been gaining a lot of popularity. The app is actually a web-wrapper, which means it runs a mobile version of the Facebook/Twitter websites inside the app. There are some UI tweaks, themes and more. Although Metal is free, there are no ads. Definitely worth trying out!

    Simple – Free / $1.49

    Living up to its name, Simple is another web-wrapper app for Facebook that includes all of the basic features that you expect. You can interact with posts, upload photos and video and chat through Facebook Messenger.

    The free version is ad supported, but you can purchase the full version for $1.49 to remove them.

    Puffin for Facebook – Free

    If you have an older Android device and other Facebook apps are too slow and clunky, then consider giving Puffin for Facebook a try. It’s a browser app that is made specifically for Facebook, created by the developers of Puffin Browser. This app features some data compression tricks that lets you use less data and works great on slow network connections. If an old device or a slow connection is your situation, check out Puffin.