Facebook, Instagram Announce New Educational and Enforcement Measures for Commercial Activity

Facebook and Instagram announce a new educational measure. The article is below.

Facebook, at its heart, is about helping people connect and communicate. Because of the diversity of people and cultures on our services, we know that people sometimes post or share things that may be controversial or objectionable. We work hard to find a balance between enabling people to express themselves about topics that are important to them, and creating an environment that is safe and respectful.

This balance is important to how we view commercial activity on Facebook or Instagram. We have strict rules about how businesses can use our advertising tools. For example, we do not permit advertising for illegal drugs, tobacco products, prescription pharmaceuticals, weapons, and several other products and services, and restrict advertising for products such as alcohol, adult products, and gaming. In all cases, we have systems in place to review and remove advertising that violates our policies, is false, deceptive, or misleading.

Of course, most of our tools are free to use, and many people and organizations use them to establish a presence on Facebook, including to promote commercial transactions. While people can't use our services to actually sell things to each other, they can set up a Page or make an occasional post to their Timeline to find a roommate, sell a home, or solicit contributions for a church or nonprofit organization. Just like posting on a bulletin board at a supermarket or community center, these activities may be considered commercial, but we treat this type of sharing like any other type of sharing on our services - and we respond to reports when something violates our Community Standards.

People sometimes use our free tools to discuss products that are regulated or controversial. In some cases they promote these products for sale or use, even though it's not possible to complete a sale on Facebook or Instagram. While we've recently heard specific concerns from people about offers for the private sales of firearms, this is one of many areas where we face a difficult challenge balancing individuals' desire to express themselves on our services, and recognizing that this speech may have consequences elsewhere.

Today, we are introducing a series of new educational and enforcement efforts for people discussing the private sale of regulated items:

• Any time we receive a report on Facebook about a post promoting the private sale of a commonly regulated item, we will send a message to that person reminding him or her to comply with relevant laws and regulations. We will also limit access to that post to people over the age of 18.
• We will require Pages that are primarily used by people to promote the private sale of commonly regulated goods or services to include language that clearly reminds people of the importance of understanding and complying with relevant laws and regulations, and limit access to people over the age of 18 or older if required by applicable law.
• We will provide special in-app education on Instagram for those who search for sales or promotions of firearms.
• We will not permit people to post offers to sell regulated items that indicate a willingness to evade or help others evade the law. For example, private sellers of firearms in the U.S. will not be permitted to specify “no background check required,” nor can they offer to transact across state lines without a licensed firearms dealer.

We have worked with a number of individuals and organizations on the development of these efforts, which will be implemented and enforced in the coming weeks. We are grateful in particular for the advice offered by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, Americans for Responsible Solutions, Sandy Hook Promise, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, and Moms Demand Action, which helped us develop an approach for the private sale of firearms. We also appreciate the feedback provided by the Facebook Safety Advisory Board.

As always, we encourage people who see anything that violates our policies to report it to us using the tools found throughout our services. Facebook and Instagram will continue to remove content, and notify law enforcement where appropriate, when we are notified about things shared on our services that suggest a direct, credible risk to others’ safety. We will also continue to strictly enforce our advertising policies. 

We believe these collective efforts represent the right approach in balancing people's desire to express themselves while promoting a safe, responsible community.

Twitter Accidentally Sent Password Reset Emails

Emails sent from password@twitter.com told the Twitter users that their accounts "may have been compromised by a website or service not associated with Twitter." The email also instructed them to create a new password, saying that Twitter had proactively reset their login credentials.

Twitter (TWTR) confirmed Tuesday that those emails were sent by accident.

"We unintentionally sent some password reset notices tonight due to a system error," said Twitter spokesman Jim Prosser. "We apologize to the affected users for the inconvenience."

Prosser declined to comment about how many were affected, but thousands of Twitter users angrily tweeted about the incident Monday night.

The good news is there was no breach and the passwords were never actually reset.

Drones From Facebook Could Deliver Internet Everywhere

Facebook is reportedly in talks to take over an American-based aerospace company, and if so the social networking site could soon have its fleet of drones delivering the internet to currently unconnected people across the world.

TechCrunch was the first website to report this week on rumors that Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook is interesting in acquiring Titan Aerospace — a deal that is believed to be worth as much as $60 million.

But while that hefty sum isn’t exactly chump change, it’s just a fraction of what Facebook has spent on other acquisitions recently: Facebook bought mobile photo app Instagram for $1 billion in cash and stock in 2012, and only weeks ago forked over nineteen-times that to acquire the rights to the WhatsApp program.

This time, however, Facebook could be getting its hands on some drones, and ideally harnessing the abilities of those unmanned aerial vehicles to bring the internet to the estimated 2.7 billion people currently without access.

Titan Aerospace is responsible for making near-orbital, solar-powered drones, and TechCrunch says Facebook could be spending millions of dollars to acquire the company and get around 11,000 of those small UAVs in return.

According to TechCrunch, Facebook’s new arsenal would be composed of Titan’s “Solara 60” UAVs, an aircraft that can carry a payload of 250 pounds apiece.

On the Titan website, the company explains that these drones can be used for anything from weather monitoring to disaster recovery to earth imaging, and provides customers with “easy access to real-time high-resolution images of the earth, voice and data services, and other atmospheric-based sensor systems.”

“Titan Aerospace is revolutionizing near-earth applications for dozens of industries,” they claim. “The ability to park a stationary payload directly above a point is opening dramatic new possibilities and is redefining the landscape. Titan goal is to create products that not only deliver groundbreaking functional benefit but also deeply inspire us on an emotional level.”

Without a doubt, though, most remarkable is that each aircraft is outfitted with solar panels that are capable of generating enough energy to keep a single drone in the sky for five full years. TechCrunch says that Facebook would likely be pursuing the project since it is already heavily involved in the Internet.org initiative, “a global partnership between technology leaders, nonprofits, local communities and experts who are working together to bring the internet to the two thirds of the world’s population that doesn’t have it,” and could likely do as much with the help of internet-ready drones.

“If Facebook could project weak but free Internet to developing nations via Titan Aerospace drones, it could then make a basic version of WhatsApp available to those users. They may not be able to send or view photos, but they likely could send messages and view status updates, even if they only had a weak, slow connection,” Sarah Perez and Josh Constine wrote for TechCrunch on Monday.

“If Facebook can use Titan’s drones to be someone’s first experience on the Internet, they’re likely to get deeply hooked into the social network’s service and eventually become a lucrative lifetime user,” they wrote.

Facebook and the Internet.org initiative aren’t the only ones aiming to increase web access across the world, though. As RT reported last month, New York’s Media Development Investment Fund (MDIF) is bankrolling an “Outernet” project that, if successful, would rely on tiny, orbiting satellites, or “CubeSats,” to beam down the internet to users with similar, high-flying devices. Until the engineers there receive around $12 billion in desired funding, however, that project isn’t likely to get off the ground.

Yahoo Stopping Access Of Facebook And Google

Reuters is reporting that Yahoo Inc will stop letting consumers access its various online services, including Fantasy Sports and photo-sharing site Flickr, by signing-in with their Facebook Inc orGoogle Inc credentials.

The change, which will be rolled out gradually according to a Yahoo spokeswoman, will require users to register for a Yahoo ID in order to use any of the Internet portal's services.

The move marks the latest change to Yahoo by Chief Executive Marissa Mayer, who is striving to spark fresh interest in the company's Web products and to revive its stagnant revenue.

"Yahoo is continually working on improving the user experience," the company said in a statement, noting that the new process "will allow us to offer the best personalized experience to everyone".

The first Yahoo service to require the new sign-in process is Yahoo Sports Tourney Pick'Em, a service focused on the NCAA college basketball tournament which begins later this month. News of the change to Yahoo's Tourney Pick'Em sign-in process was first reported by the technology blog Betanews.

Since Mayer took the reins in 2012, the company has rolled out new versions of many of its key products, including Yahoo Mail and Yahoo Finance. Last year, Yahoo announced a program to recycle inactive Yahoo user IDs, letting new users claim email addresses that have not been used for more than 12 months.

In eliminating the Facebook and Google sign-in features, Mayer, a former Google executive, is effectively reversing a strategy that Yahoo adopted in 2010 and 2011 under then CEO Carol Bartz.

The change to the Tourney Pick'Em sign-in process began on Monday, the Yahoo spokeswoman said, noting that users could still access other services with Google or Facebook IDs.

The sign-in buttons for Facebook and Google will eventually be removed from all Yahoo properties, the Yahoo spokeswoman, though she declined to provide a timeframe.

Google+ And Business

This is a great read from Navneet Kaushal. This shows the power of Google+ and their climb up the social networking ladder.

SEO Strategies that Work for Google Plus:
Google Plus is more than just a social networking site. It can be a way to boost your business and traffic to the website. Most of the Internet marketers are using social networking platform as the way to share information, get attention, reach out to potential business, and get success in the business.

Google Plus 2013 Statistics: An Overview:
Google Plus is the second largest social networking site after Facebook with 540 million monthly active users. Seeing the constant popularity of the social network, it comes as no surprise to us that 40% of the Internet marketers are using Google Plus and +1 button more than 5 billion times per day. With 1,203 million visits per month, the social network has dominated the monthly visits of Twitter and Facebook also.

Google Plus is a social network with a huge potential and it won’t be wrong to predict that it could be the next big thing in the world of social networking. If you still haven’t made Google Plus a part of your online marketing strategy, make no further delay.

While Google has clarified that number of +1s does not impact search rankings, Google Plus pages & profiles can increase your chances of getting targeted visitors from organic search. So, you ought to have an SEO Strategy for Google Plus.


SEO Strategy for Google Plus: We Recommend

Building Content Relevancy:
Content marketers as well as bloggers are using Google Plus profiles to attain authorship. For this, they write high quality content on subjects related to their business. To help search engines identify your authorship, here are a few tips to build content relevancy


Optimizing Google Plus Profile:
To make your Google Plus Profile more revealing to your followers, it is important that you optimize it. Complete all the required fields in your profile such as website URL, profile image, business details etc. Getting your page verified by Google will further add to the credibility.


Linking Google Plus Page to Website & Social Extensions:
Add Google Plus page directly to your website so that search engines can easily associate both. You should use the snippet of the code for the Google Plus page and connect it to the AdWords campaign and your social extensions.

Posting High Quality Content Consistently:
Your followers will loose interest if you will not stay in constant touch with them. This is done by posting high quality & useful content. The next step is to make the content dynamically engaging. You must offer solutions to readers’ problems and stay highly active in the comments section.

Google Plus Page and Snippet:
Google Plus Page is essential for a business of all sizes. However, keep in mind that a Google Plus page is not the same as a Google Plus profile. It offers you unique benefits of targeted messaging, multiple admin capability, direct interaction with fans, and connection to your website for improved search engine visibility. Once you have created a Google Plus page, optimize your Google Plus snippet, as this is crucial to drive traffic to the page. The benefits of optimization are:

It helps you in building more credibility on your authorship and content
It is a good tool for personal branding
It can capture the attention of searchers, resulting in more clicks and a growing number of followers



Google +1 Button:
Users can share the content in their social media network as well as encourage others to like it with one single click on the Google +1 button. Each time, the content is +1 users, it is shared within their networks. When more people +1, search engines get a signal that the content is relevant & worth sharing. As a result, your authorship gets a boost and so does your search engine ranking.

Google Plus Circle:
Follow influential and like-minded people related to your business field will enhance your Google Plus SEO strategy. If your Google Plus network is large, you will influence more search results of people who have you in their Google Plus circles.

Including Keyword in the Description:
Adding appropriate keywords in specially the first line of the description of your Google Plus post will help in driving traffic to your website/blog. Using Google Plus feature such as Spark to add videos & information related to the shared content automatically will further help in search engine rankings.

Google Communities:
Google Communities are a nice way of strengthening your authority. The more you will engage yourself in Community activities, higher will be the favor from search engines.

New Campaign Structure on Facebook

A Few Business changes from Facebook. Read Below.

On March 4, we’ll begin rolling out a new campaign structure that will make it easier for advertisers of every size to organize, optimize and measure their ads.

Up until now, Facebook’s campaign structure has consisted of two levels — campaigns and ads. Our new campaign structure consists of three levels: campaigns, ad sets and ads.

Campaigns correspond to each of your advertising objectives, like building brand awareness or driving web traffic. They’re designed to help you optimize and measure your results for each objective across multiple ad sets and ads.

Each campaign can feature multiple ad sets, each of which has its own budget and schedule. You can also organize each ad set to represent audience segments, like people who live near your store. This will help you control the amount you spend on each audience, decide when they will see your ads, and measure their response. The ad delivery system will optimize delivery for the best-performing ad in an ad set.

Within each ad set, you can have multiple ads, each of which can feature different images, links, video or text. You’ll still control the creative, targeting and bidding at the ad level.

Using the new campaign structure

Let’s say you’re the owner of a small hotel chain. You may have a few different advertising objectives:

1. Drive traffic to your website to increase reservations
2. Increase brand awareness
3. Promote weekly offers

With the new campaign structure, you’ll begin by creating a campaign for each objective. Next, you can create ad sets representing the audiences you want to reach in each campaign. For instance, in the campaign built around driving traffic to your website, you might want to create one ad set for people who are on your email list, and another for people who’ve expressed interest in attractions near your hotels.

Finally, you’d create ads for each ad set. You can create multiple ads within each ad set, making sure each ad is targeted to the same audience while delivering different images, links, video or ad copy. This can help you learn which ads are resonating with each audience and, in turn, create better-optimized campaigns.

Availability

The new campaign structure will be reflected worldwide across all ad interfaces, including the Ads Create Tool, Ads Manager and Power Editor, as well as third-party ad interfaces built by Preferred Marketing Developers. Though these updates won’t begin rolling out until March 4, we want to make sure all our advertisers and partners know in advance that this helpful change is coming.

When the new structure is rolled out to your ad account, all your campaigns will be migrated automatically to the new structure. The migration will not impact the delivery, spend or performance of your existing ads, and you’ll still have access to historical data for any of your existing campaigns and ads.

Facebook Updates Its Group Discovery Page

Catherine Shu from Techcrunch.com states that Facebook made good on recent promises to highlight its group features, and unveiled anupdated groups discovery page today.

As reported by AllFacebook, the page now features suggestions for groups to join, as well as open and closed groups your friends are members of and groups based near you. The social network recently beganencouraging administrators to start adding tags in order to make their groups easier to find.

Though Facebook’s groups feature is relatively low-profile, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in the company’s recent earnings call that more than 500 million people use the feature. He also told Businessweek that Facebook Creative Labs might create a standalone app for groups.