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998 'Facebook' stories December 2010 - October 2014

Facebook is the most popular social media service in the world with 2.32 billion monthly active users as of December 31, 2018

Facebook is the most popular social media service in the world with 2.32 billion monthly active users as of December 31, 2018. It also averages 1.52 billion daily active users as of December 2018.

Facebook was launched in February of 2004 (as The Facebook) for college students and then rapidly grew as it opened the service to more than those with a .edu email address. It was the subject of the 2010 movie called “The Social Network“.

In 2012, the social media giant offered its IPO and Facebook earned the title of the fastest company to grow to $250 billion market capitalization in the S&P 500.

In recent years, the company has been at the center of attention related to its role in the Russian interference in the 2016 US election. Since then, it’s been a continual stream of negative news for the company. They recently had all of their enterprise certificates for iOS revoked after it was discovered they had repackaged Onavo VPN as a ‘Research’ app and were paying teens $20/month to sneakily sideload it.

In early 2019, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a “privacy shift” for the company. He outlined a detailed vision for the future of the social media platform, specifically its messaging services. Notably, in contrast to how the company operates today, he says the future of the platform will be privacy-focused with features like end-to-end encryption, interoperability between its various apps like Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, reducing how long it holds data, secure storage of personal data, and more.

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Creators of ‘Room’ say Facebook copied their chatroom app, threaten legal action

Jordan Kahn Oct 24 2014 - 12:36 pm PT

16 Comments

Facebook’s new ‘Rooms’ app Room Inc’s ‘Room’ app

Following the launch of Facebook’s new “Rooms” app for iPhone, the company behind a similar piece of software called “Room” is claiming the social media outlet copied its intellectual property. The Room application, which like Facebook’s app allows users to create and invite others to chatrooms while remaining anonymous, was first released on the App Store back in September.

The company’s Damien Rottemberg, Co-Founder and CTO of Room, sent over the following statement on the situation:
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Facebook releases ‘Rooms’ for iPhone, a chat room app that lets you go anonymous

Jordan Kahn Oct 23 2014 - 10:52 am PT

12 Comments

Facebook is today unveiling the latest app being released under the company’s Creative Labs project that recently released the new Paper, Slingshot, and Mentions apps. The new app, called Rooms, is described by Facebook as a meeting place inspired by early Internet chatrooms and web communities: Rooms lets you create places for the things you’re into, and invite others who are into them too.
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Facebook updates Paper app for iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, fixes issues

Mike Beasley Oct 20 2014 - 10:04 pm PT

10 Comments

Facebook has pushed out an update for its popular alternative client, Paper, that adds support for the larger displays on the new iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. It also addresses issues that could arise with the keyboard and video playback. Finally, a few stability issues have been fixed to keep the app from crashing.

The new Paper 1.2.4 update is available for free on the iOS App Store.

Facebook adds Safety Check feature to iOS app to reassure family & friends during disasters

Ben Lovejoy Oct 16 2014 - 3:53 am PT

3 Comments

[vimeo 108971365 w=800 h=450]

Video has no commentary

Facebook has added a nifty new feature that hopefully you won’t need to use too often: notifications of nearby disasters, and a one-touch means of letting family and friends know that you’re ok …
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Facebook and YouTube release iPhone 6/Plus app updates

Zac Hall Oct 15 2014 - 10:43 am PT

13 Comments

After more than a month since the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus screen sizes were announced, Facebook has released an updated version of its iPhone app to take advantage of the bigger screens. The new app features a smaller navigation bar and shows more content on the screen. Facebook had previously updated its Messenger app for the new iPhones, although its alternative Facebook Paper app is still awaiting an update.

YouTube also released an updated version of its iPhone app today optimized for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus screen sizes. This means you can see more video suggestions from the main page as well as well favorites and subscriptions from the side bar.

The status bar and keyboard are also native to the larger iPhone models versus the previously scaled up versions on the new iPhones with the old app. YouTube 2.13 for iPhone and iPad also includes a number of bug fixes for the app:

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Apple to join Facebook in paying for female employees to freeze eggs to defer child-raising

Ben Lovejoy Oct 15 2014 - 4:41 am PT

13 Comments

NBC is reporting that Apple will offer female employees up to $20,000 to cover the costs of freezing their eggs if they want to defer having children until later in their career, following the example of Facebook which recently introduced the same employee benefit.

Fertility specialists advise that women who want to freeze eggs in order to have children later in life should freeze at least 20 eggs, which will typically take two rounds of treatment at a cost of $10,000 each. The $20k fertility benefit offered by both Apple and Facebook should cover this – though there can be storage costs on top amounting to several hundred dollars per month.

The move is likely to be a controversial one, seen by some as a means of supporting women who want to advance their career to a senior level before taking time off for children, and making a tech career more appealing to women, while others see it as a message that women are expected to put their career first and family life second.

Apple recently announced a range of improvements to its employee benefits program, including increased time off for parental leave, reimbursements for educational classes, a Student Loan Refinancing Program for U.S. employees and a matching program for charitable donations by employees.

Photo credit: Lex Van Lieshout/AFP/Getty Images

Facebook Messenger may soon let you pay your friends, code leaks reveal

Benjamin Mayo Oct 6 2014 - 2:23 am PT

3 Comments

A modified version of the Facebook Messenger has revealed that person-to-person payment interfaces and other elements are already integrated into the app. The discovery was made by iOS developer Andre Aude.

Just like sending a message or sending a photo, Facebook’s payments implementation is integrated into the chat window. The idea being, that if you talk to a friend about getting coffee, you can pay your half of the bill in the same place. A history of payments appears in the settings pages.

Facebook has not confirmed that the feature is coming any time soon. Zuckerberg has floated the idea of Facebook tying mobile payments before, but warned it was a long way off.

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Kindle & Facebook Messenger updated for iPhone 6 support

Zac Hall Sep 29 2014 - 11:57 am PT

4 Comments

The list of updated apps for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus is still somewhat small since developers only learned of the new iPhone display resolutions earlier this month. The Kindle iPhone app from Amazon is joining that short list today, though, with a new version optimized for the iPhone 6.

That means that like iBooks, text you read in Kindle’s iPhone app won’t be fuzzy or scaled up. If you prefer the zoomed up version, however, iPhone 6 users do have that option to make every app larger using the Display Zoom feature found in the accessibilities section of the Settings app on iOS.

Kindle’s previous added a handy widget in Notification Center’s Today view for quickly accessing books you’re reading. Kindle for iOS is available for free on the App Store.

Facebook Messenger has also been updated for the new iPhone models. Notably, the chat app has beat the primary app for the social network in updating for the new iPhones.

Instagram’s Hyperlapse video shooter adds support for front camera & iPhone 6/6 Plus

Zac Hall Sep 25 2014 - 10:23 am PT

2 Comments

Last month Instagram launched a new video shooting app for iPhone and iPad that combines effects like time-lapse and cinema stabilization called Hyperlapse. Today Instagram is introducing what they call the “selfielapse” by adding support for shooting Hyperlapse videos with the front facing camera on your device using the same features previously only available on the back camera…

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Adobe announces Photoshop and Premiere Elements 13 with ‘Guided Edits’ and more

Mike Beasley Sep 23 2014 - 9:32 pm PT

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Image via Engadget

Adobe has announced its next major upgrades to its popular Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements applications, with each being bumped up to version 13.

Both apps add new editing features, such as “photomerge compose” for lifting subjects from one photo and quickly moving them into another with proper lighting and other effects. New cropping tools allow you to automatically compose perfectly cropped by detecting faces and other details and determining how to best frame them in the shot.

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WhatsApp Messenger for iPhone updated w/ photo captions, slow-motion video sharing, more

Zac Hall Sep 8 2014 - 1:56 pm PT

30 Comments

The latest update to the popular, Facebook-owned WhatsApp Messenger app for iPhone hit the App Store with a long list of new features for users including the ability to share slow-mo videos from the iPhone 5s and trim clips down right in the app without having to edit the video in the Photos app.

Chatting with photos also received improvements with the ability to add captions and snap and share photos even faster added. Improvements and changes to location sharing, app wallpapers, and new notification tones are included. The latest version also allows users to move chat logs and contact groups away to an archive. Complete list of changes below…
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Opinion: After the celebrity hacks, the vulnerability that still exists and what needs to be done

Ben Lovejoy Sep 3 2014 - 7:39 am PT

61 Comments

There are still many unknowns surrounding the leaked celebrity nudes. While Apple appears to have ruled out a theory that a Find My iPhone vulnerability allowed easy brute-force password attacks, some commentators are suggesting that the wording was sufficiently vague that this may indeed have been one route in. (Apple might be arguing that it’s not a breach if the correct password was required.)

But one thing does now appear clear: rather than a single hacker gaining wide access to iCloud, the photos were instead amassed over time by a number of different individuals likely using several different approaches. Phishing was doubtless one of them – some of the claimed emails from Apple are reasonably convincing to a non-techy person – but another was almost certainly to exploit one of the greatest weaknesses found in just about every online service, including iCloud: security questions.

[Update: Tim Cook has confirmed these were the two methods used] …

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Netflix for iOS now lets you privately recommend content to select Facebook friends

Zac Hall Sep 2 2014 - 7:19 am PT

2 Comments

Netflix today announced a new way to recommend movies and TV shows to your friends from your iPhone or iPad. The recommendation feature works using Facebook, but it’s selective and private so you don’t end up spamming everything with the embarrassing movie you just watched that you and two of your friends may like but others not so much. The feature allows you to connect your Facebook friends list to your Netflix account, then recommend videos you just watched to specific friends from Facebook.

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Instagram details the technology behind its new Hyperlapse app

Zac Hall Aug 27 2014 - 11:40 am PT

3 Comments

As you can see above, Instagram’s new Hyperlapse app that debuted yesterday is one of the most simple apps on the surface. It does two things: shoots video in either portrait or landscape and changes speed from 1x to 12x for a time-lapse effect. There’s not very much other user interface aside from the record button and speed slider (and the share screen after you save a video), but under the hood there’s a lot of really smart stuff going on with Hyperlapse.

For those interested in all the under-the-hood work that went in to Hyperlapse’s video stabilization and time-lapse features, Instagram’s engineers behind the app have published a blog post detailing the technology that makes it all work.

The blog post goes into Hyperlapse’s approach to video stabilization, time-lapse stabilization, and adaptive zoom to detail how it all works under the surface. Below is a snippet including a chart describing one of the algorithms used by the app.

Video stabilization is instrumental in capturing beautiful fluid videos. In the movie industry, this is achieved by having the camera operator wear a harness that separates the motion of the camera from the motion of the operator’s body. Since we can’t expect Instagrammers to wear a body harness to capture the world’s moments, we instead developed Cinema, which uses the phone’s built-in gyroscope to measure and remove unwanted hand shake.

The diagram below shows the pipeline of the Cinema stabilization algorithm. We feed gyroscope samples and frames into the stabilizer and obtain a new set of camera orientations as output. These camera orientations correspond to a smooth “synthetic” camera motion with all the unwanted kinks and bumps removed.

If you’re interested in the wonkier side of capturing video and software, give Instagram’s post a read and check out Hyperlapse for iPhone and iPad on the App Store.

Apple’s iPad business at-a-glance as CEO Tim Cook plots breaking out of “speedbump” slump

Ben Lovejoy Aug 27 2014 - 5:34 am PT

13 Comments

Tim Cook hinted at significant developments to the iPad line in describing the recent 16 percent drop in year-on-year sales yesterday as “a speedbump” in an interview with Re/code.

“We couldn’t be happier with how we’ve done with the first four years of the iPad. I’d call what’s going on recently a speed bump, and I’ve seen that in every category” …

He made that same comment before during the last earnings call and obviously that’s not the whole story…

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Instagram introduces Hyperlapse to stabilize and speed up your video

Zac Hall Aug 26 2014 - 8:22 am PT

6 Comments

Facebook-owned Instagram is introducing a new video capturing app for iPhone and iPad (and Android soon) called Hyperlapse. The photo (and video) sharing social network recently soft launched a new app called Bolt in Singapore, South Africa, and New Zealand that focused on quickly photo messaging friends, but Hyperlapse is more like an advanced feature that could have been found within Instagram. Hyperlapse offers up a unique way to capture and edit video using processor smarts to make panning shots smoother and add a time-lapse effect similar to the iOS 8 camera app.

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Facebook 13.1 released for iOS, boasts crash rate reduction of over 50 percent

Mike Beasley Aug 12 2014 - 10:21 pm PT

1 Comment

Facebook released version 13.1 of its iOS client today with a rather uninteresting change log noting that the app had received “bug fixes” and nothing more. However, over on Facebook’s engineering blog the company has outlined what exactly went into this fix, and it turns out the update contains a significant fix that will resolve over 50% of reported crashes.

According to the blog post, the issue arose from a file corruption error that appeared in iOS’s Core Data system:

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Mac users can now develop apps for Oculus Rift Virtual Reality Headset

Mark Gurman Aug 12 2014 - 1:09 pm PT

4 Comments

Mac users who want to start developing software for the Facebook-owned Oculus Rift Virtual Reality Headset platform can now do so. Oculus today released an update to their software SDK that opens up support for users on OS X:

Notably, the Oculus SDK is now available for Mac OSX, along with a version of the Oculus Runtime and Unity Tuscany Demo for Mac. There’s no word on when Linux support will be ready.

Mac display drivers are unavailable, so users will need to use Extended Display mode on the Mac. To make full use of the software platform, eager developers will need to gain access to the Oculus Hardware Development Kit, which is a $350 online pre-order item.

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Facebook Paper gets a speed boost and design improvements

Mark Gurman Aug 11 2014 - 10:57 am PT

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Facebook Paper got a small, but important update today. The social network boosted the app’s speed and says that the design is sharpened:

• Speed and stability updates: To help you get the most out of your Paper, we’ve been working hard to make all your sections, stories, photos and videos load faster and more reliably.
• Design improvements: We’ve sharpened details to make your Paper even more appealing.

A more significant update with improved photo management and trending news sections arrived last month.

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Facebook tells its iOS users to continue expecting app updates every 4 weeks

Mark Gurman Aug 1 2014 - 9:52 am PT

15 Comments

If you’re an avid Facebook user on the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch, the social networking giant has some good news for you. In yesterday’s 13.0 update, Facebook informs users that app updates with speed and performance enhancements will be arriving every four weeks. That’s about monthly. New features and other enhancements will come along the way, Facebook says, and those changes will be noted appropriately. Facebook seems to want users to get the latest iOS app updates as soon as possible, so it is recommending that users enable iOS 7’s Automatic Downloads feature via the iOS Settings app. A couple of years ago, Facebook said it would be bringing new updates to its mobile applications every 4-8 weeks, but this marks the first time that Facebook is actively notifying users of this development approach. Facebook seems to have begun monthly updates around February, but at least we now know the company has no intention of stopping that pattern.

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The 12 reasons Apple employees love working for the company

Ben Lovejoy Aug 1 2014 - 5:31 am PT

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Business Insider did some trawling through the employee reviews site Glassdoor to find out what Apple employees love about working for the company.

Perhaps unsurprisingly in a company co-founded by a man who saw his mission as changing the world, the feeling that you have a chance to do just that topped the list. It’s the philosophy reflected in the memo Apple gave to new employees on their first day, saying that people who join the company want their work “to add up to something … something big … something that couldn’t happen anywhere else.”
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Facebook’s photo messaging app Slingshot updated w/ easier reactions, My People tab, more

Zac Hall Jul 31 2014 - 1:21 pm PT

1 Comment

After first launching earlier this month, Facebook has today released a feature update to its new photo messaging app Slingshot.

The new version allows users to reply with a reaction to photos without having to first reply with another photo. The launch version structure was a bit more convoluted as it required you to respond with a new photo as well. The new version allows you to respond with a photo, video, or just text.

The update also allows you to connect with your contacts and Facebook friends with inviting more people to use the app, and a new My People section shows you other Slingshot users. The update also features the following under-the-hood improvements:

• Shoot crisp, clear videos even faster than before
• Improved reliability for sign-up confirmation codes
• Plus, a bunch of bug fixes and other tweaks to keep things running smoothly

In addition to launching Slingshot earlier this month, Facebook-owned Instagram released a quick-photo messaging app called Bolt in a select few countries earlier this week.

The latest version of Slingshot is rolling out now in the App Store.

Facebook’s now required Messenger gets full screen videos and images

Zac Hall Jul 31 2014 - 12:04 pm PT

2 Comments

Facebook released version 9.0 of its Messenger app for iOS today bringing an improvement to how photos and videos are viewed. Previously trapped to a smaller section when shared, photos and videos in messages can now be viewed full screen like you would expect.

It’s a small improvement to Facebook Messenger, but now that the social network is stripping messaging functionality out of its primary Facebook for iPhone app, you can expect to see even more focus in this space in the future. For example, Facebook recently released a dedicated version of Messenger for iPad after years without it.

You can grab the latest version of Facebook Messenger for iOS on the App Store.

AeroPress Timer app completely revamped to help you make the perfect cup of coffee

Ben Lovejoy Jul 30 2014 - 5:15 am PT

2 Comments

The freemium companion app to the amazing and popular $25 Aeropress Coffee and Espresso Maker has been completely redesigned, with new gesture-based navigation, brewing tips, a timer that tells you exactly when to add water, two-cup recipes and the ability to share recipes and photos on Twitter and Facebook.

AeroPress Timer is the perfect companion for the AeroPress. AeroPress Timer allows you to explore the versatility of the AeroPress with a catalog of carefully curated recipes.

[Version 2.0.1 introduces a] completely redesigned interface. We started from scratch with every screen and made AeroPress Timer more functional and beautiful.

We moved to a completely gesture-based navigation. We feel this is best way to navigate through AeroPress Timer. Who needs back buttons?

The app itself is free, with a choice of two in-app purchases, each priced at $1.99. The Championship Pack includes nine selected recipes from the 2014 AeroPress World Championship, and the Roaster Pack a further seven recipes “from some of the world’s best roasters.”

The revamped app is available on iTunes.