Today’s headline, courtesy of Techcrunch, is that Snapchat has launched a search bar to make it easier to find friends, groups, Discover publishers and Stories.

Snapchat has previously been criticised for being confusing because of its unique layout and reliance on users knowing how to navigate their way around the app, so the launch could be seen as a way to make the platform more accessible.

Today’s headline, courtesy of Business Insider, is that a secretive new research division created by Facebook is developing "brain-computer interface" technology that sounds a lot like telepathy.

Several recent job postings listed by Facebook describe a project involving "neuroimaging" and "electrophysiological data" to create a "communications platform of the future."

Facebook has declined to elaborate on the job listings, but in 2015, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he hoped one day to “send full rich thoughts to each other directly using technology." Just in case you’re wondering, it is not April 1st.

Today’s headline, courtesy of Mashable, is that Snapchat is testing a feature in Snap Ads which will allow advertisers to take users directly into other apps. This means, for example, that a streaming music service could purchase a Snap Ad which takes users directly to their service after seeing a 10 second video. The new feature aims to make it easier for advertisers to meet sales, download and sign-up targets.

Today’s headline, courtesy of Recode, is that Facebook is going to trial a new ‘mid-roll’ ad format, which will allow video publishers to insert ads into their clips after people have watched them for at least 20 seconds.

For now, Facebook will sell the ads and share the revenue with publishers, giving them 55% of all sales. If the new ads take off, they could represent the first chance many video publishers have had to make real money from their Facebook content.

Hello and welcome to We Are Social’s headline of the day on Monday, 9th January.

Today’s headline, courtesy of Campaign, is that Facebook has appointed former CNN anchor Campbell Brown to strengthen the platform’s ties with news organisations. Brown will lead the Facebook team that liaises with media in each of its markets, but will not be in charge of content decisions. Her appointment follows criticism of the platform for not tackling so called fake news in the wake of the US Presidential Election.

Check back tomorrow for more updates on Amazon Echo or your favourite podcast player, or follow us on twitter @wearesocial.

Hello and welcome to We Are Social’s headline of the day on Friday, 6th January.

Today’s headline, courtesy of The Guardian, is that Facebook has refused to explain why a live torture video wasn’t taken down for 30 minutes. Their failure to remove the video meant a brutal attack of a young man in Chicago was broadcast and watched by 16,000 people. Facebook did eventually take down the video, but not before it had been copied and widely shared on YouTube.

Check back next week on Amazon Echo or your favourite podcast player, or follow us on twitter @wearesocial.

Hello and welcome to We Are Social’s headline of the day on Thursday, 5th January.

Today’s headline, courtesy of Techcrunch, is that Facebook has launched a free, automatic captioning tool for videos on all its US English language Pages. Powered by voice recognition software, the tool aims to take the hassle out of transcription, making it easy to edit the platform’s suggested subtitles.

The new captioning feature could potentially be rolled out to user-uploaded videos, but Facebook has not commented on future plans.

Check back tomorrow on Amazon Echo or your favourite podcast player, or follow us on twitter @wearesocial.

Wednesday 4th January 2016 by We Are Social 'Headline of the Day'

Tuesday 3rd January 2017 by We Are Social 'Headline of the Day'

Friday 23rd December 2016 by We Are Social 'Headline of the Day'