Twitter catches up to photo sharing standard

I have always been a fan of Twitter and have made that very well known in my previous posts. In the initial stages Twitter did not attempt to take social media ideas from other popular sites like Facebook or Instagram. Instead, those sites adopted hashtags. However recently, Twitter took a few concessions and finally folded to the strengths of those sites.

Screenshot from mobile app.
Courtesy- Levi Warner (CC)

Twitter added the ability to tag other users in photos posted on the service. It is important to note that these tags do not count against the already brief 140 character limit. Up to 10 users can be tagged in a single photo and the service is going to add a feature that creates a 4-photo collage. You may recognize tagging as a Facebook innovation and the collage feature is one of the most popular functions on Instagram.

I think it's great that Twitter added these functions but I don't think I'll find them very useful. I only post photos on Twitter of immediate situations that I find humorous. I personally share photos such as my frozen pool photo or the time a semi got stuck on a side street near my house. Never group photos. I see the new features going unused in the foreseeable future.

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-By: Levi Warner-

Facebook Drops Major Cash on WhatsApp

Well this bit of news is huge today in the social media department. Facebook paid $19 billion for the rapidly growing app, WhatsApp. This is more of a move to eliminate competition so I wonder what the future of WhatsApp is to be.

Courtesy of Lobo Studios, Hamburg. (CC)

There are several options here. Facebook could literally fire the entire staff, dissolve the company, and make Whatsapp die. This is obviously least likely.

A more likely option is that Facebook attempts to combine the mobile version of their service with that of WhatsApp's existing platform.

But what will likely happen is that Facebook will take a couple interesting concepts that Whatsapp uses, then ultimately reject the company. The app itself might stay in existence for a short while but I doubt Facebook will put any real work into improving the service when they want to boost their personal brand. Co-branding doesn't really work in the billion dollar businesses.

-by Levi Warner

Twitter will replace Facebook

I've been thinking about the rise of Twitter and how the website seems to be growing in popularity lately. Of course I will unload my own opinion on the matter but I have evidence. First is this article that details the recent rise of the 140 character blog site. 

Twitter recently updated their mobile apps.

The Bloomberg article details the initial public offering [IPO] of Twitter, Inc. and describes its recent successes. I think that Twitter has been more popular recently because of the rapid death of Facebook.

Facebook just isn't cool anymore. My mother is on Facebook and that means I can't share any details of my life besides work and maybe school. That is the most boring part of my life.

Twitter has gone to great lengths to include a young and social audience. It just allows me to reach out to my friends in my own language, unfiltered and with the ability to share it with everyone.

--Levi Warner

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