In the news this week – Twitter unveils new API, McDonalds take CVs via Snapchat and Facebook’s AI guy confirms robots won’t seek world domination…
Facebook’s campaign to help people spot fake news
Facebook in launching an educational campaign to help people understand, identify and limit the spread of fake news. For three days a link to an article on “Tips to Spot False News” will appear on the top of users’ news feeds. Beginning today (07/04/2017) users will be able to see and click the link to the tips article. These tips include studying an article’s URL, investigating sources and being sceptical of sensationalist headlines.
Will it be enough? BBC tech correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones thinks not. He said “…one has to suspect that it will be read in the main by people who are already suitably sceptical about hoaxes and propaganda. So I’m not convinced that this will be seen as a game changer in the battle to make Facebook a place you go to find the truth, rather than wallow in your friends’ prejudices.”
One in five Facebook videos is now live
After a suitably rocky start riddled with controversies, it seems Facebook Live is beginning to entrench itself as the go-to for live streaming social media. According to the network, Live now accounts for one-fifth of video content shared on the network. Fidji Simo, the company’s head of video also claims that Live broadcasting daily watch time has quadrupled in the past year:
“…Now, one in every five Facebook videos is a live broadcast – and over the past year, daily watch time for Facebook Live broadcasts has grown by more than 4x. Every day, we get to enjoy new use cases for Live that we would never have thought about.”
Twitter unveils new API to try and win back developers
Twitter is trying to rekindle it’s relationship with developers by releasing a new API platform with a focus on transparency. The social network unveiled it’s vision for the platform in a blog post, stating their goal as “to create an integrated Twitter API platform that serves everyone, from an individual developer testing a new idea to Twitter’s largest enterprise partners.”
For the first time, Twitter have made public their roadmap for what is planned. Historically, Twitter has had a fairly poor relationship with its developer community, one which lacked consistency and coherence and constantly went back on permissions. Their new API is clearly an attempt to clear the air and win them back.
McDonalds Australia is now taking job applications via Snapchat
McDonalds Australia is asking potential applicants to apply using Snapchat. It has created a McDonald’s themed lens – complete with cap and employee badge – that users can try on and send a 10-second video “snaplication”. Once reviewed, applicants are redirected to the digital careers hub where they can download an application form.
McDonald’s Australia COO Shaun Ruming explained “we’re the largest employer of youth in the country, so we’re trying to look for new and innovative ways to recuit crew people… it certainly won’t replace a thorough face-to-face interview, but we’ll obviously take it into account.”
Facebook’s head of AI confirms robots won’t seek world domination
Yann LeCun, head of Facebook’s artificial intelligence lab, is pretty big in the world of AI. His contributions have helped put self-driving cars on the road. Facebook is increasingly using AI in its products – from image recognition to voice controlled assistance to in-depth learning algorithms. In response to questions about machines taking over in a recent interview, he said this:
“We have a lot of checks and balances built into society to prevent evil from having infinite power. Most companies are not either working for good or evil—they’re just maximizing profits. But we have all sorts of rules and laws to prevent our economy from going haywire.
It will be the same thing for AI. Learning to build AI systems that are safe—not because they’re going to take over the world, but because you want them to work reliably—is going to take some time, similar to how long it took people to figure out how to build airplanes that don’t crash.”
