What can you expect from this year’s F8 conference? Considering it’s Facebook, the possibilities are endless. Aren’t they? It seems that they have their hands in all of the pots. Or maybe that’s just me. But it appears that they have gone from being a social network, to trying to be everything you could ever want in a platform. Which I’ve written about a few times over the last several days, and I think its relevant in this case as well. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t new. This has been happening for several years, but it makes you wonder what Facebook is, and what the plans are for the future.
Given today’s political climate, it’s expected that we will start to see Facebook attempting to put a stop to some of the less appealing aspects of the platform. The spreading of fake news, for example. It seemed that many of the alternative facts that we saw during the 2016 Presidential election spread through Facebook. Now one might argue that it’s not their problem. They are merely the information delivery system, but they themselves do not own the information or take any responsibility for disseminating it. And that’s a valid point, but how do you stop the spread of fake news? By not supporting a system that allows it to happen. Again, I’m not blaming Facebook by any stretch, but I think it’s their responsibility to figure out a way to stop this. And I think we will see that this week.
Facebook Messenger rolled out better security features in 2016. In the age of Donald Trump, it’s likely that we will see further enhancements to the security of the messaging application. Why? Because no one wants to share their private conversations with anyone. Including Facebook. And this seems to be the way we are going in the world. Not just in this case, but we are always trying to protect our own information and data. So why wouldn’t Facebook seize the opportunity to be included as a “secure” messaging platform?
It was reported, this morning, that it took Facebook 3 hours to take down a video of a murder that took place in Cleveland. Maybe they want to use this as a learning opportunity to ensure that these types of videos don’t get posted in the first place? But this isn’t the only time we’ve seen this. Earlier this month, a girl was sexually assaulted and it was live streamed through Facebook. Again, I am not placing the blame on Facebook themselves, but there has to be some kind of better safe guards in place to ensure that these types of videos or images aren’t being released.
I recently heard that the number of dead (yes, non-living) Facebook users will out weight the number of living users. Doesn’t that kind of creep you out? I don’t mean to sound like I’m being morbid, but why are there so many dead users on Facebook? Should they be there? Is this something that Facebook should be taking care of? It seems that there are a lot of holes in the platform. And I don’t mean from a security perspective. I think Facebook should be looking at their platform from a social media perspective. That’s how it started. A way to connect people together. And while it’s commendable that they want to change with the times, I think they need to make the current system better for users. And focus less on new products and additions.
After all, do we really have the appetite to watch these videos? Or stand for the spread of fake news? My guess is that many of you will agree with me on this one. But the bigger question remains – what will come out of the F8 conference this week? Stay tuned, as we should have more information tomorrow.
[…] post What to Expect from the Facebook F8 Conference This Week appeared first on Saintel […]