Twitter has demonstrated its commitment to artificial intelligence and machine learning by splashing a reported $150m on London-based Magic Pony Technology. The aim is to use the company's advanced technology to improve Twitter's live and video experiences.

Jack Dorsey describes Magic Pony Technology as a 'company that has developed novel machine learning techniques for visual processing'. Thus far this has been used to sharpen blurry images, create computer-generated images from scratch, and to learn to recognize objects.

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There comes a time when the company behind a popular product feels the need to do more, probably because it has reached a point where there is little that can be done to improve what has made it such a success in the first place. That is also the moment when things tend to go south as far as the user experience is concerned.

Facebook Messenger has reached that point. The social network has one of the most-popular messaging apps today, boasting over 900 million active users every month, but instead of keeping things simple it is now trying to turn Messenger into what I can only describe as a social coach.

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In the lives of many consumers, social networks have begun to replace traditional news outlets as their primary source of news, making it much more difficult for publishers who still rely on a more traditional business model to earn revenue from their stories.

In its annual report on digital news, the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (RISJ) highlights the rise of Facebook, YouTube and Twitter and how they transformed the way news media is consumed today. The institute conducted a study across 26 countries that found that over 50 percent of all the Internet users turned to social media to get their news.

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Major tech companies rarely manage to surprise us, but Microsoft did it earlier this week when it announced the acquisition of LinkedIn. The software giant is spending an enormous sum -- $26.2 billion, to be exact -- to get its hands on the popular business-focused social network. The new Microsoft likes to take chances, and this high-profile purchase is certainly proof of that.

CEO Satya Nadella says that buying LinkedIn will allow Microsoft to "change the way the world works", but what is its motivation behind the purchase, how does it tie into its current strategy, and what do the two companies stand to gain from it?

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Facebook has announced that an updated batch of suicide prevention tools are being rolled out globally. It's a feature that has been available in some parts of the English-speaking world for a little while, but now the social network has decided to offer them up to everyone.

The aim is to make it easier for people to reach out to friends who they believe may be either suicidal, or at risk of self-harming. The tools have been developed in conjunction with people with experience of suicide and self-harm, as well as mental health charities. In addition to giving Facebook users the chance to reach out to those they may be concerned about, Facebook is also providing a round-the-clock worldwide team to whom concerns can be voiced.

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In the US, Facebook has been hit with accusations of having a anti-conservative bias in its news coverage. In the UK, the social network stands accused of being pro-Brexit in the upcoming EU referendum.

The Brexit-related accusations came about after it was noticed that Facebook offered a readymade status update proclaiming to be "in favour of leaving the EU", but didn’t have a balancing pro-remain option as easily accessible. Despite this, Facebook categorically denies any form of bias.

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Timing is everything, particularly in business marketing tactics. Surely it's no coincidence that hours before Apple's big developer conference, where questions about iPhone's future and product innovation loom large, that Microsoft announces plans to buy social network LinkedIn. Hehe, how do you like them apples?

The merger will split tech news and analysis coverage this fine Monday and spill over to tomorrow, robbing Apple of the attention it needs now to subdue rising negative perceptions about the future. Global smartphone sales are slowing and iPhone accounts for 65 percent of total revenues. Meanwhile, the fruit-logo company hasn't perceptually lifted the innovation meter since before cofounder Steve Jobs died nearly five years ago. Apple needs to deliver wow and have bloggers and reporters giggle with glee all over the InterWebs.

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In a surprise announcement, Microsoft has said that it is to buy LinkedIn for $26.2 billion in cash. The $196 per share deal is expect to close by the end of this calendar year having been unanimously approved by both companies' Boards of Directors.

Following the acquisition, LinkedIn will retain its current branding and Jeff Weiner will remain on as CEO, reporting to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. LinkedIn will become part of Microsoft’s Productivity and Business Processes segment.

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Following a massacre at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, Facebook has been prompted to activate its Safety Check feature in the US for the first time. 50 people lost their lives in the attack on the LGBT nightclub.

Previously used following natural disasters around the world as well as a man-made tragedy, Safety Check gives people in a trouble spot to let friends and family know that they're OK. The deadliest mass shooting in American history ended up being the trigger for the first activation of the feature on US soil.

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Not content with forcing people into using its Messenger app, Facebook is continuing its aggressive tactics and driving users to install its photo-sharing app, Moments. The social network has warned users that their photos face deletion if they fail to use the Moments app.

Unsurprisingly, this has led to a huge surge in interest in the app, pushing it to the top of the download charts. Facebook has announced that it is going to delete Synced Albums and Synced Photos if Moments is not installed by July 7, sending warning emails to a number of users.

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In recent days the internet has been abuzz with news that credentials for millions of Twitter accounts have been put up for sale on the Dark Web. Despite the online chatter about what many people assumed to be a security breach, Twitter chose to remain silent. Now the company has spoken out after an investigation and denies that the password leak was the result of Twitter being hacked.

Dismissively referring to the "purported Twitter @names and passwords", the company says that the leak is probably a combination of data gathered from previous breaches as well as credentials gathered by malware. Twitter has identified a number of accounts directly affected by the leak and has reset the passwords to protect the owners.

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For quite a while, I was hesitant to embrace Facebook because of privacy concerns. While that is still a worry, I have softened a bit, coming to like its Messenger app in particular. While the logic Facebook uses to list content in my timeline still eludes me (what's wrong with chronological?), it is a satisfying experience overall.

Believe it or not, the ability to leave comments and reply to posts using video was not previously available on Facebook. This is probably because video cannot be text-mined, but I digress. Today, the social network announces that video commenting is now a reality. Want to try it yourself? It is actually very simple.

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Interactivity is the name of the game these days, as illustrated by the explosion of interest in VR. Facebook may not have gone quite as far as bringing virtual reality to your newsfeed, but it does now support 360-degree photos -- or 360 Photos as it has been dubbed.

Starting tomorrow, you'll be able to upload either 360-degree photos, or panoramic photos. On the web, these become interactive images that you can scroll around using a mouse, but on a smartphone you have a couple of options. You can either tap and drag your way around an image, or hold up your phone and move it around, taking advantage of the accelerometer. If you want to get really fancy, you could don a Samsung Gear VR headset.

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The amount of time people spent in apps of social media networks in the first three months of 2016, in nine major countries in the world, has dropped "dramatically", a new report by digital market intelligence company SimilarWeb says.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat have all seen significant drops in the amount of time people in the US, UK, Germany, Spain, Australia, India, South Africa, Brazil and Spain have spent in Q1 2016, compared to the same period a year before.

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GovInsider recently did an interview with Ben Terrett, the former head of design at the UK Government Digital Service (GDS), about the GDS’s success in the digital realm. The two discussed mobile apps, why websites are better, and what needed to be done in order to have a successful digital project.

Terrett said the problem with mobile apps is that they are a huge undertaking -- not only is it expensive to make an app (or multiple apps, or an app ecosystem) but also to support it and update it following various software changes.

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