US will force Facebook to protect WhatsApp user privacy
When Facebook bought WhatsApp, some were worried that the messenger would go back on its promise not to collect swathes of personal data in the style of its new owner. Luckily for you, the FTC has other plans, and will only give its blessing to the $19 billion deal if both companies swear to respect WhatsApp’s original user agreement. In a letter to the pair, FTC consumer protection chief Jessica L. Rich has said that if WhatsApp pulls a privacy bait-and-switch , then Zuckerberg and co. will be in breach of section five of the FTC act, with harsh penalties to follow.
Filed under: Internet, Facebook
Via: WSJ
Sony’s Shuhei Yoshida loves that Facebook bought Oculus, says it helps validate PlayStation’s efforts
“I woke up that morning and saw the announcement,” Shuhei Yoshida tells us, remembering the day Facebook acquired Oculus VR. “And I was like, yeah!” Yoshida laughs and thrusts his arms in the air like an excited child. “For me, it was a validation for VR.” As head of Sony Computer Entertainment’s Worldwide Studios, virtual reality (and Sony’s Project Morpheus) has become important to Yoshida. He wants to see it, as a medium, to succeed.
“We meant to validate Oculus by announcing Morpheus, and the Oculus guys knew what we were working on. I think they were waiting for us to make the announcement, so it would be Sony and Oculus together,” he explains backstage at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA. “…but now Oculus being acquired by Facebook is helping to validate our efforts.” It’s big-picture thinking. Yoshida already liked the idea of Sony and Oculus calling attention to each other’s efforts, but adding the Facebook name to the mix broadens the duo’s exposure. “More people will know about VR!”
Oculus being acquired by Facebook is helping to validate our efforts.
Zuckerberg’s vision for the purchase intrigues him too. “Mark said be believes VR can be the next platform after mobile,” Yoshida said. “That’s big thinking, and kind of excites our thinking.” Sony’s team has already been exploring uses for VR outside of traditional gaming, he explains, but nothing as broad as Zuckerberg’s statements. “We’ve thought of doing virtual travel or something, but talking about a new platform? What does that mean?” Yoshida says it’s given him something to think about.
Of course, a broader platform for VR means the technology will see more use — and that technology still has several usability hurdles to conquer. “VR of the past, including our own prototype, has been very difficult to use in terms of getting headaches and becoming nauseated,” he said. “Those early prototypes had larger latency and the positional tracking may not have worked as well. I feel really sorry for people developing VR stuff! They have to test it! With the kit we have now, what we demonstrated at GDC, I think its the first time we can really provide developers with something and say, you can use ours, and you’ll be alright.”
Sony’s been talking to medical professionals about overcoming simulation sickness, Yoshida explains, and wants hardware to be comfortable and usable without adjustment. “The Oculus DK1 has lots of adjustments available, but the Morpheus just works, the optics design. We’ll continue to improve it.” Eventually, the company wants to create guidelines for how old users should be, and how long they should use it for, but it’s not quite there yet. Even Yoshida admits he hasn’t spent extended periods of time in virtual reality, usually keeping his sessions at under ten minutes.
The Oculus DK1 has lots of adjustments available, but the Morpheus just works
Yoshida’s plan for building those guidelines relies heavily on collaboration. “We need to share knowledge,” he explained. “We can’t just make the hardware, it’s the game applications that need to be designed well. We need time for developers to experiment and find the killer application, and at the same time we need to learn how VR applications should be designed.” Providing the Morpheus dev kit to developers, Yoshida says, is the first step.
Facebook wants to clean up spam in your News Feed
“1 like = $1.” “1 like = 1 Respect.” “If you don’t share this, you’re literally the devil.”
We’ll bet you’ve seen the above way too often on Facebook. Thankfully, the social network’s now showing these unwanted status updates less prominently on your feed, if the original posts were published by a Page account. The updated News Feed can identify three types of spammy posts and make sure they don’t drown out more relevant status updates. Those infamous “like-baiting” posts that gain more attention than usual by asking users to like, share or comment are the first in Facebook’s downgrade list. That’s followed by photos and videos that Pages have already uploaded in the past, and then by links that trick you into clicking through to websites chock-full of ads.
The social network says legit Pages that post quality content won’t have to worry about anything, but those that intentionally post spam “will see their distribution decrease over the next few months.” Unfortunately, Facebook friends fond of posting spam still get off scot-free, so you’ll just have to tell your gramps to turn it down a notch.
Filed under: Internet, Facebook
Source: Facebook
Facebook is trying to save you from embarrassing posts
One of the first things I do before I post anything on Facebook is to make sure I know exactly who will see it. If it’s a vacation photo of me and my husband, I restrict it to friends and family. If it’s just a link to something funny on the internet, I might post it for all the world to see. It’s fairly obvious, to me at least, what’s meant to be public and what’s not. However, that’s because I took the time and energy to navigate through Facebook’s privacy settings and learn how to protect my updates. Not everyone has the foresight or the luxury to do that — especially if you joined in college, when such issues might not have mattered so much. It turns out Facebook is all too aware of this problem, and is trying to hammer out some possible solutions.
At a session with reporters on Tuesday, Facebook revealed that based on thousands of surveys per day, a significant number of its users are surprised when their posts are seen by people they don’t know. This, the company realizes, is a problem. “When people have an unpleasant surprise like this,” said Mike Nowak, Facebook’s privacy product manager, “It’s bad for them, and it’s bad for us.” When asked even further about what it is about the current system that confuses its users, a spokesperson attributes it to potential cultural differences, and simply the need for more education.
Therefore, rather than introducing even further privacy controls, Facebook has decided that the right approach is to give its existing ones more visibility. In a recent update to Facebook’s mobile app, the “audience selector” (a drop-down menu that shows who can see your updates) was moved from the lower right corner to the very top so that it’s the first thing people see. Further down the road, the company hopes to roll out a test to its desktop users that will spell out exactly what “Public” and “Friends” mean (see above for a preview). Even more than just increased visibility, Facebook also wants its users to be more aware of who can see their posts. In the near future, the company hopes to roll out a “Privacy Checkup” box to simply make sure people are sharing updates with their intended audience. The same goes when a friend reshares a post — there’ll be a notification letting you know it’ll be seen by his or her friends as well.
While these tweaks may seem rather straightforward at first glance, it’s in Facebook’s best interest to make sure its privacy controls are crystal clear. After all, Facebook’s issues with privacy have been well-documented. From accidental breaches to targeted advertising, the public has every reason to be fearful and skeptical of a company maligned by complicated privacy settings and a post setting that’s public by default. It’s all made even more crucial by the fact that Facebook encourages you to use your real name and that your profile photo along with your cover photo are always public. The reason is “to disambiguate you from other people in the world,” said Raylene Yung, a Facebook privacy engineering manager. Publicly available information such as your name allows your friends to find you, she says, and it’s arguably one of the core functions of Facebook. That said, the company does plan to let you restrict older cover photos to a limited audience in the next few weeks.
“Our goals haven’t changed,” said Yung. “We want people to be aware and be comfortable with sharing with the right people all the time.”
Daily Roundup: Fire TV review, our first time on the web and more!
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours — all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
My First Time on the World Wide Web
Do you remember the first time you cracked open the treasures of the World Wide Web? Our editors sure do. Read on for a look into the lives of Engadget’s biggest nerds and their first experience with the “internet.”
Amazon Fire TV review: the set-top that tries to do everything
Is it a gaming console? Is it a media streamer? Well, Amazon’s Fire TV is a little of both. Sure, the $99 set-top box is lightning fast thanks to its “ASAP” technology. But in an ecosystem all to its own, will the Fire TV be able to attract enough development and content to stay afloat in an already saturated market?
Dropbox brings the popular Mailbox email app to Android and desktop
Today, Dropbox is bringing its popular iOS Mailbox app to Android for an attractive price of $0 — and it’s got a few exclusive features to boot. The company also teased a glimpse of a desktop client, which it’s offering as a limited beta for the extra curious.
Facebook app ditches chat, moves to a standalone Messenger
Pretty soon, you’ll have to use Facebook’s standalone Messenger app to continue chatting with your friends. Zuckerberg and Co. are officially dropping message functionality within the company’s mobile app.
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Filed under: Misc
Facebook app ditches chat, moves to a standalone Messenger
Facebook has been testing new features inside its standalone Messenger app for months, and now the social network is pulling the chat feature from primary offering. The outfit has included messaging functionality in its main apps for some time now, but late last year Mark Zuckerberg announced that the company would eventually pull the plug. For a few months now, users that have both apps installed have been linked out to the Messenger software when accessing chat in the regular ol’ version. The switch will take place over the next two weeks, and TechCrunch reports that Facebook has begun notifying users of the change.
“The reason why we’re doing that is we found that having it as a second-class thing inside the Facebook app makes it so there’s more friction to replying to messages, so we would rather have people be using a more focused experience for that,” Zuckerberg told TechCrunch in November. This means you’ll have to download that Messenger app if you want to keep that direct line of communication open with your Facebook pals, unless you have an Android device that can’t run it, use the mobile site or keep your talks confined to the outfit’s Paper reader.
Filed under: Internet, Software, Mobile, Facebook
Source: TechCrunch
Momondo helps you prioritize your relationships by proximity and climate
Sure, it’s easy to plan out trips to visit your friends, but Momondo believes it can add a bit of fun to that process. The travel search engine’s app now features something called “friend compass” that shows your friends’ locations all over the world while you spin around. Since Momondo’s service shows the cheapest flights and hotels you can book, each friend that appears on the compass comes with info on the most affordable flight available — and yes, you can book one from within the app. If that travel itch has gotten so bad, you can also use the compass to find out which friend lives in the coldest or the hottest locations, the nearest or the farthest places and the ones who’ll cost you most and and least money to visit. The friend compass works using Facebook’s API and a smartphone’s GPS, so suffice it to say, it’ll only only show people in your Facebook list. Bummer.
Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile
Source: McCann London
Facebook Messenger updated with group chat, other features
Facebook has updated its Messenger application for Android devices, tying in a feature already available in the iPhone version. First and foremost, the app now lets users create group chats, tag them with images, and save them. What’s more, users can place shortcuts to said group conversations on the home screen of their device. Also, the app now allows for forwarding of messages from one user or conversation to another. As always, Facebook Messenger is free to download.
The post Facebook Messenger updated with group chat, other features appeared first on AndroidGuys.
Jaunt VR wants to capture the real world and put it in an Oculus Rift
When Mark Zuckerberg bought Oculus VR last month, he was looking beyond gaming. “Imagine enjoying a court side seat at a game,” he said. “or consulting with a doctor face-to-face.” Oculus’ developing VR headgear can do more than transport us to virtual worlds — it can help us experience the real one, too. The trick, however, is you have to figure out how to capture the world in 360-degrees before you can share it. Turns out, there’s a company working on that; it calls itself Jaunt.
“We’re basically trying to create the methodology for making content like this,” Jaunt CEO Jens Christensen explains. “We call it cinematic VR.” Christensen’s company is hoping to build the foundation that stereoscopic 3D VR filmmaking will stand on — a full-stack solution for creating cinema-quality virtual experiences. This amounts to specialized camera hardware, computational photography algorithms, specialized plugins for popular editing suites and purpose-built software. “It’s actually very hard,” the CEO joked with us. “You can’t have a camera man, he’d be in the shot.”
Peering through an Oculus Rift at the company’s test footage, we can see what he means. Jaunt’s prototype camera captures a sweeping 360-degree view, and sees everything except for a small area just below the viewer’s feet. Our hosts point out a tree in a scene of monks practicing kung fu, outing it as the director’s cover. The scenes are convincing and immersive, but imperfect — the majestic view of San Francisco’s Golden Gate is a little less breathtaking when you can see where the separate bits of footage are stitched together. Christensen explains that the camera, software and algorithms are all still in the prototype phase. “This is a new problem, shooting in this media. You can’t just attack one part of it.”
Jaunt hopes to make its tools available for VR-minded filmmakers later this year, but wouldn’t tell us specifics about who it’s partnered with or how VR films, once made, would be distributed. Either way, funding won’t be a problem: the company announced today that it has secured $6.8 million in venture capital to refine its end-to-end production solution.
Filed under: Gaming, Internet, Facebook
Source: Jaunt VR
Facebook Messenger for Android lets you pin chats right to your home screen
Facebook’s big-spending CEO presumably has a grand plan for Messenger, now that he’s gone to such great lengths to own WhatsApp. For the time being though, his company is continuing to focus on subtle but useful changes to its homemade apps, with the Android version of Messenger just receiving an update to version 4.0. In line with the last week’s iOS update, one of biggest new features is the ability to bunch your friends into groups and then pin these gatherings to a dedicated Groups tab, so you can quickly bombard the right people all at once. Unlike iOS, however, you can now also add a shortcut to any group or conversation directly from your Android home screen, letting you open up a floating chat head with a single tap, with no need to navigate through the app. That’s the sort of convenience that reminds us why a dedicated Facebook phone was always so unnecessary.
Filed under: Cellphones, Tablets, Internet, Mobile, Facebook
Source: Google Play Store
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