Tag: social media

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Good guy Elon Musk threatens to lay off Twitter employees following acquisition

Elon Musk had some not very reassuring words for Twitter employees during a recent internal Q&A regarding his acquisition of the company.

During the presentation, Musk said that the company “needs to get healthy” financially as “right now costs exceed revenue,” according to employees. Per The New York Times, in a pitch deck given to potential investors, employee cuts were also hinted at.

However, Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal told employees that job cuts were not in their plans “at this time,” suggesting that layoffs are not confirmed yet.

That said, it appears that if Musk’s deal to buy the social media service does go through, at least some employees will be cut from the social media company.

The deal could result in Twitter slashing its workforce of over 7,000 employees. The same investor pitch deck says that Musk wants to increase Twitter’s employee count, before cutting 900 jobs and resuming growth.

Twitter’s annual revenue increased to $5.08 billion USD (about $6.5 billion CAD) in 2021, a shift from 2020’s annual revenue of $3.72 billion USD (about $4.8 billion CAD). As for losses, the social media company experienced a loss of $221 million USD (roughly $286 million) in 2021 which is better than its 2020 loss of $1.14 billion (approximately $1.4 billion CAD).

Source: The New York Times Via: The Verge

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Canadians targeted by pro-Russian information on Twitter: study

Canada has been the target of a misinformation campaign by Russia to influence public opinion through social media.

University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy analyzed 6.2 million tweets since January 2022 and found the pro-Russian narrative is coming from two large communities: those influenced by U.S. sources and those affected by international sources from Russia, Europe, and China.

The tweets focus on five main narratives, including NATO using Ukraine as a proxy against Russia and promoting mistrust of the Liberal government and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

To pinpoint these tweets, the authors collected profile information from accounts tweeting and re-tweeting content associated with the war in Ukraine and applied a location filter to limit the tweets to Canada. They built a network establishing connections between accounts and divided them into “communities of similar profiles,” applying an algorithm to categorize the narratives of these communities.

About 25 percent of the tweets discussed on Canadian Twitter spread pro-Russian narratives.

Accounts scoring high as promoting pro-Russian ideology. Source: University of Calgary/ School of Public Policy

Jean-Christophe Boucher, one of the study’s authors, told The Canadian Press some of the accounts spreading misinformation are bots with ties to external influences, but they’re not doing it alone.

The main U.S.-influenced accounts promoting a pro-Russian narrative belong to right-wing figures in the U.S., including Tulsi Gabbard and Jack Posobiec. Canadian figures associated with the right are also on the list, including Rupa Subramanya and Maxime Bernier.

Image credit: Twitter

Source: The School of Public Policy Via: The Canadian Press 

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Elon Musk threatens to pulls out of Twitter deal

Elon Musk is threatening to pull out of his $44 billion USD (roughly $55 billion CAD) agreement to buy Twitter.

Through a letter, Musk’s lawyers accused Twitter of refusing to provide information pertaining to the number of spam-bot accounts on the platform.

If you recall, the saga started last month when Musk said bot accounts could represent 20 percent of the platform’s users. Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal said this figure is less than five percent but couldn’t share details showing how Twitter got to this figure publicly.

The recent letter says Musk doesn’t believe in Twitter’s “lax testing methodologies” and needs the information to run his own analysis. The letter, included in a filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Monday, goes on to say the information requested is part of the agreement, and not providing it is “causing further suspicion,” leading way for Musk to walk away from the acquisition.

“This is a clear material breach of Twitter’s obligations under the merger agreement and Mr. Musk reserves all rights resulting therefrom, including his right not to consummate the transaction and his right to terminate the merger agreement,” the letter from Musk’s lawyers says.

Image credit: Shutterstock

Source: U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Via: The New York Times

Categories
Mobile Syrup

TikTok unveils new subscription comedy series

TikTok has unveiled a comedy series with Pearpop that’s hosted by creator Jericho Mencke (@jercho1).

The series, called Finding Jericho, is exclusive to the social media platform, and is available through a $5 USD (approximately $6.29 CAD) subscription for all eight episodes, though the first two will be free.

The series will begin airing on TikTok on June 2nd at 12am ET/9pm PT with each episode running roughly 30 minutes. Subsequent episodes will be released on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 12am ET/9pm PT.

This comes after TikTok rolled out a monthly subscription tool for creators 18 or older with a minimum of 1,000 followers, including fan perks like subscriber badges, custom emotes and subscriber-only chat.

MobileSyrup has reached out for Canadian pricing and availability.

Image credit: Pearpop

Source: The Hollywood Reporter, TikTok Via: Engadget

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Instagram users in Canada will soon be able to see AMBER Alerts on their feed

Meta is bringing AMBER Alerts to the photo-sharing app Instagram for the first time.

The update will allow users, including those in Canada, to see and share alerts about missing children in their area.

“With this update, if an AMBER Alert is activated by law enforcement and you are in the designated search area, the alert will now appear in your Instagram feed,” the company stated in a blog post.

Instagram will use several signals, including the city listed on users’ profiles and IP addresses, to determine if there’s an active search in the area.

The alert will include the missing child’s photo, description, location of abduction, and any other information available at the time. Users can share the alert with their followers.

Meta is partnering with several organizations, including the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children in the US, the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children, the National Crime Agency in the UK, the Attorney General’s Office in Mexico, and the Australian Federal Police.

The update will also be available to Instagram users in Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Bulgaria, Ecuador, Greece, Guatemala, Ireland, Jamaica, Korea, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Malta, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Romania, South Africa, Taiwan, Ukraine, the UK, the United Arab Emirates and the U.S.

More countries will be added as the program continues to expand.

Image credit: Instagram

Source: Instagram

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Instagram is down, users report trouble logging in

If you’ve been facing issues loading Instagram Stories, posts, or DMs, fret not, you’re not alone.

Outage tracking service Downdetector displays that users of the Meta-owned application have been facing issues logging in, along with connectivity issues since 12pm ET/9am PT.

Image credit: Downdetector

It’s worth noting that other Meta-owned services, including Facebook and WhatsApp, don’t seem to be affected.

Instagram hasn’t released an official statement about the update yet. Back in October, the Meta-owned photo-sharing app said that it is testing a feature that will let alert users of outages or technical difficulties directly in the app. It seems as though the feature is still in testing because the app has no mention of an outage currently.

It’s unclear what the cause of Instagram’s technical difficulty is. The last time the photo-sharing app had an outage was on October 4th, 2021, when it went down alongside Facebook and WhatsApp.

Image credit: Shutterstock

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Musk aims to significantly increase Twitter’s revenue by 2028

We already know that Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk plans to cut jobs and costs over at Twitter, if and when the acquisition is complete. Now, according to a new report from The New York Times, the world’s richest man aims to quintuple (5x) Twitter’s revenue by 2028.

According to the report, Musk recently had a word with Twitter investors where he outlined his plans for the social media company’s financial targets moving forward, with a target of $26.4 billion USD ($34.2 billion CAD) to be achieved by 2028, compared to the company’s $5 billion USD ($6.4 billion CAD) revenue in 2021.

Musk plans to achieve the targets primarily by cutting down the reliance on generating revenue through advertising. Up until now, 90 percent of Twitter revenue came through advertising, and Musk wants to bring this down to 45 percent. On the other hand, subscriptions would become an integral revenue driver, according to Musk. “In 2028, advertising would generate $12 billion in revenue and subscriptions nearly $10 billion, according to the document. Other revenue would come from businesses such as data licensing,” reads the report.

This adds credibility to a recent report that said commercial and government Twitter users might soon have to pay to tweet.

The report also suggests that in addition to Twitter Blue, the social media company will launch a new subscription tier, though nothing about it was mentioned. Musk said he’s aiming for the new tier to rack in nine million sign-ups in the first year, with a target of 104 million sign-ups by 2028.

Additionally, Twitter’s payment business, which includes tipping and shopping, will be expanded to generate an estimated revenue of $15 million USD (about $19.5 million CAD) by next year, and $1.3 billion USD (about $1.69 billion CAD) by 2028.

With all of the above changes, Musk expects to increase the average revenue per user from $24.83 USD (about $32.27 CAD) as of 2021 to $30.22 USD (about $39.26) by 2028.

These are big promises, though Musk’s commitments as CEO of his other two companies are already bearing major fruits, so it wouldn’t be prudent to doubt him. On the other hand, Musk has no prior experience running a social media company, and since the news came out about him taking over Twitter, and his stance about free speech on the platform, users have been flocking away from the social media service.

Image credit: Shutterstock

Source: The New York Times

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Twitter might get mix-media tweet support and a pronoun field

Despite being acquired by Elon Musk, Twitter is rumoured to be working on several new features.

The leak information includes Twitter for Android supporting the ability to add pictures and videos in the same tweet, tweet-related awards and a new field for pronouns.

Well-known developer Dylan Roussel spotted the new mixed media features within the Twitter for Android app. The feature allowed him to add a picture and one video in the same tweet.

Additionally, there will reportedly be an option to award tweets, according to 9to5Google. The feature appears as a gift icon below a tweet, next to the retweet and like/share buttons. It’s unclear what the feature is for. There’s a possibility it could be a new method of monetizing or functionality tied to the platform’s subscription service, Twitter Blue.

There’s also a new field for users to include their pronouns. Many people already have their pronouns included in their bio or their display name, so it’s unclear where the feature will officially appear on profiles.

9to5 goes on to say that it uncovered more information about the previously leaked Twitter Status feature. The ability to “discover” or “join” a status could be on the way, though it’s still unclear what this feature will actually do.

Source: @evowizz, 9to5Google

Categories
Mobile Syrup

Twitter begins testing its Circle feature, limiting tweets to a group of up to 150 people

Twitter is testing its new Circle feature, which enables users to tweet to a specific group of up to 150 people.

Twitter’s new feature is reportedly available to a “small group” of users across iOS, Android and the web. Once active, a user can select up to 150 other users who can see and interact with a tweet. This feature is close in relation to Instagram’s Close Friends feature, which enables users to share Stories with specific users.

As Twitter Saftey suggests, Circle support enables users to control “who can see your Tweets when you want to share with a smaller crowd.” Likewise, Twitter offers a feature to control who is able to reply to a public tweet. It appears as though Twitter wishes to give more ownership to the user on who is able to interact with their tweets.

However, as it’s been pointed out, there are some red flags regarding the social aspect of the feature. Users have been quick to note that this may incite echo chambers to form on the platform. The Twitter Circle feature could diminish some larger discussions. Although, it’s far too early to know the ramifications Twitter Circle may have on the platform.

Earlier this year, Twitter’s Circle feature was reported to be called ‘Flock.’ It appears as though Twitter has changed the name, dropping the association to birds in the process.

It’s not yet known when Twitter aims for a larger rollout of Twitter Circle. From the looks of it, testing is primarily within the U.S. Though, testing may migrate to Canada if it hasn’t begun already.

Source: Twitter Saftey Via: Engadget

Categories
Mobile Syrup

How to delete your Twitter account

The ongoing Twitter acquisition by Elon Musk has left many worried.

Musk’s adamancy about transforming the platform into a hub that supports free speech is a noble idea in theory, but comes with unforeseen consequences, with sudden follower fluctuations, the spread of misinformation and rampant abuse being a few main concerns.

Since the news about Musk’s acquisition came out, popular left-wing figures have experienced a relentless drop in followers, whereas those with right-wing ties are enjoying follower growth. For example, former President Barack Obama, the most followed user on Twitter, has lost more than 300,000 followers in recent days, whereas Jair Bolsonaro, a popular right-wing figure, gained about 100,000 followers. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis saw his Twitter follow increase by roughly 100,000 as well.

According to Twitter, the growth and shrinkage of followers are entirely organic and are owed to people leaving or joining the platform in abundance.

If you think its time for you to pull out of the platform, here are a few simple steps you can follow:

You can deactivate your Twitter account regardless of the device you’re using it on. This means that, unlike Instagram, you can deactivate your Twitter account either from the Android or iOS mobile app or on the web. The steps for all three devices are the same, though the example below has been illustrated on the web version of Twitter.

  • Click on ‘More’ on the left-aligned dashboard and head to ‘Settings and privacy.’
  • Navigate to ‘Your account’ and then ‘Deactivate your account.’
  • Read the parting message and click on ‘Deactivate’

You’ll then be asked to enter your password one last time and your account will be deactivated. Follow the screenshots below for visual reference.

It’s worth noting that deactivating your account doesn’t mean that it is entirely deleted. Your account will live in Twitter’s database for the next 30 days, within which you can reactivate your account simply by signing in as you normally would.

If you’re absolutely sure that you want to leave Twitter in the past, don’t attempt to login in during the 30-day window and your account will be permanently deleted.

Image credit: Shutterstock