Articles about Facebook

I know plenty of people who -- literally -- spend their lives on Facebook, sharing everything they do, and obsessively reading and reacting to every post made by their friends.

But here’s the thing. Despite all of the hours they put into being on the site, they probably only know a fraction of what it has to offer. There are a lot of features tucked away that they -- and you -- might never encounter. Think you know Facebook? Think again...

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There are many cloud storage providers nowadays, but I choose to give Dropbox my money. While there are alternatives that are free, I'd rather spend money on quality, and to support a company that supports Linux. Not to mention, Dropbox is secure, available on many platforms, and the company is constantly introducing new features.

Speaking of new features, today, the company announces that its cloud storage is now officially supported by the wonderful Facebook Messenger. Users of the chat program can now directly share files from Dropbox on both Android and iOS. You must have both the latest version of the Dropbox and Facebook Messenger apps installed for it to work.

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Corporate leaders, especially those considered thought leaders, have a firm right and assumed expectation to voice their opinion on public policy. As such, I've got no inherent issues with Facebook's founder and chief, Mark Zuckerberg, proclaiming his positions publicly -- even if I happen to blatantly disagree with them.

Mark and other leaders of their respective industries have something very intrinsically unique that most others do not. That comes in the form of the power of the pulpit. It places their opinion in a position which bring inherent weight and reach which many could only dream of. Yet, this advantage comes with a social responsibility so as to not abuse or otherwise misuse the privilege.

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Outlook is without a doubt one of the most powerful email apps available on Android and iOS. It supports all the major email providers, works with popular cloud storage services, gives you access to contacts, and integrates your calendars. On top of all this, Outlook is also optimized for use in the enterprise, so it can be a great app for work too.

Microsoft is now making Outlook even better as it launches Calendar Apps. This is a new feature that is designed to give you access to more calendar sources, with Evernote, Facebook and Wunderlist being the first available services.

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Just a few days ago, WhatsApp trumpeted the roll out of end-to-end encryption for its messaging service. The world rejoiced. With events such as the battle between Apple and the FBI turning attention to encryption, the announcement was well-timed to ride the crest of the wave. But it seems that for all of the bluster and bravado, the news about extra protection may not be quite as good as it seems.

Analysis of WhatsApp's privacy documentation reveals that the Facebook-owned company retains a huge amount of data about messages that are sent. If this all sounds familiar, it's because the retention of metadata is precisely what the NSA was (is?) up to, trawling web communications and upsetting Edward Snowden and privacy advocates around the world. WhatsApp's encryption and policies mean that those who are concerned about their privacy should not rest on their laurels.

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WhatsApp may have a billion users, but Facebook Messenger isn't far behind: Mark Zuckerberg says "900 million people now use Messenger every month". Nowadays, Facebook is about much more than people sharing pictures of breakfast and bitching about their friends, it's also a valuable tool for businesses.

With this in mind, Facebook is adding a number of features to Facebook Messenger that it says will make it easier for businesses to connect and converse with their customers. Usernames will make it easier for people to identify businesses, while Messenger Links and Messenger Codes (just think QR codes with a fresh lick of paint) are being rolled out to make it quicker and easier to start conversations.

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Facebook is a great way to keep in touch with friends both past and present. You can post something on another person’s wall, or spark up a chat through Messenger.

For the most part, holding a conversation on the social network is easy. If someone is a friend they’ll be able to send you a private message, and anyone who isn’t currently connected to you will be able to get in touch by sending a message request. But what you probably don’t know is Facebook has a secret inbox which may well contain messages you never even knew you’d been sent.

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As a PC builder, Newegg is a website on which I spend a lot of time. Not only does this online retailer offer great prices, reliable customer service, and a large amount of available products, but it is a great resource for learning too. Even if you aren't looking to spend money, you can "window shop" at the new offerings, as a way to stay up-to-date on the latest trends and technologies.

Today, Newegg enables a new feature that is really cool and forward-thinking. You can now interact with the retailer's customer service using Facebook Messenger. In other words, the social network's messenger service has value that expands beyond casual chatting -- it is also a legit business tool, dubbed "Messenger for Business".

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Facebook Live may have started life as a celebrity-only feature, but it soon spread to all users, giving them the opportunity to share their own live video streams. Today the social network unveils a number of new features with the aim of making it easier to find and share live broadcasts, as well as personalizing and interacting with video.

Live video is all about bringing together a community of people to share an experience, so it's little surprise that the first of today's announcements sees the arrival of Facebook Live to Facebook Groups and Facebook Events. Building on the Reactions feature that rolled out recently, live video now also benefits from Live Reactions. But the laundry list of new features doesn't end there.

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In another blow for Mark Zuckerberg's free internet service, Facebook Free Basics has been banned in Egypt. The Egyptian government made the decision after Facebook refused to allow it to use the service to spy on users.

The shutdown comes just five months after Facebook Free Basics launched in Egypt, having proved controversial in other countries for contravening net neutrality rules. But Facebook's refusal to permit government surveillance of users means that the service has been banned this time for political reasons.

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Facebook's Memories feature can be a nice way to start the day. Fire up your phone first thing in the morning, and you can wax nostalgic as you look at your status updates and photo uploads from years gone by. But the On This Day look-back is not always warm and fluffy; Facebook isn't just about the fun aspects of your life.

In response to feedback from users who were unhappy to be cheerily reminded of the death of a loved one or some other tragic event which they might prefer to put to the back of their minds, Facebook has introduced On This Day preferences making it possible to filter out content involving certain people, or from a particular date range.

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Any time a social network makes a change, it upsets a lot of people. Facebook has done it countless times -- just look at the vocal outpourings that followed the launch of reactions, for instance -- and Twitter recently irked many users with a new algorithm timeline, albeit one that can be disabled. Now it's the turn of Instagram.

The image- and video-based social network is currently testing an algorithm-driven timeline, much like Twitter and Facebook. Instagrammers are not happy. Not one bit (hence the appearance of the #boycottinstagram hashtag). The primary concern among users -- the narcissistic blighters! -- is that their posts will not be seen and will instead be buried in the noise of their followers' timelines. But all is not lost.

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Over the Easter weekend a suicide bomber blew himself up in Lahore, Pakistan. The explosion killed dozens of people and Facebook enabled its Safety Check feature to make it easier for those in the area to let loved ones know they were OK.

But as well as asking people in Pakistan whether they were safe, Facebook also activated the feature and sent messages to people in other unaffected parts of the world. Facebook users in New York, Hong Kong, Cairo and numerous other places received messages asking "Have you been affected by the explosion?" with no reference made to Pakistan or Lahore. Facebook has issued an apology for any unnecessary worry this may have caused.

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Sometimes sharing a plain old image just isn't enough. Sometimes you might feel the need to adorn an otherwise dull image with clipart-style graphics. Sound like you? If so you're going to love the sound of a new image tool Twitter is testing... if not, brace yourself for an influx of irritation in you timeline.

Currently being referred to as Stickers (sound familiar?) -- although names including Stamptags, Taptags or Stickits are also in the running -- the tool is undergoing testing with a select group of tweeters. It allows users to add graphic overlays to photos and also introduces some extra social features in a bid to stand out from other tools available elsewhere. Meme creator, anyone?

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Facebook is the number one channel for people looking to get answers from retailers’ customer service in the UK, a new study shows.

According to the Eptica Multichannel Customer Experience study, Facebook is the channel through which retail customer service answers most frequently and most accurately, followed by email. Twitter came in third, with pretty poor results.

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