I thought December would be a quiet month, but people were talking this week about Hangouts and Google’s chat app strategy, Tumblr’s sudden ban on adult content and much more.
- At the beginning of this week 9to5Google kicked off a storm by reporting that 2019 would be the last year you could use Hangouts, based on information from an unnamed source. This provoked a response from Scott Johnston, product lead for Hangouts, who called it shoddy reporting. Google subsequently released an article with an overview their messaging services strategy. The bottom line: “classic” Hangouts users will eventually be transitioned to Hangouts Chat and Hangouts Meet, which are designed for enterprise and are currently only available to G Suite users. There is no timeline for when that will happen, and “Google is fully committed to supporting classic Hangouts users until everyone is successfully migrated to Chat and Meet.”
- But while Hangouts will still be around, Google also announced that “smart messaging app” Allo will be shut down in March 2019. Allo was launched in 2016 with cool features like smart replies and built-in Google Assistant. Many of those features have been been brought into Android Messages, which is Google’s new focus. Both Allo and Messages let you communicate using your phone number as an identifier, rather than having to sign in to a Google account. But Messages is also the default text messaging app on Google phones, and it supports RCS, an “upgraded” version of SMS that supports rich text, group chats and other features. Google is working with the mobile industry to try to get an RCS standard working everywhere.
- Duo, Google’s 1-to-1 mobile video calling app was also launched in 2016. Unlike Allo, it is still being developed and won’t be going anywhere. If you are keeping score, Messages + Duo are Google’s consumer messaging apps, while Hangouts Meet and Hangouts Chat are the business-focused services (with Classic Hangouts sticking around until Meet and Chat are available to consumers).
- Skype is now offering live captioning and subtitles during video calls, and in the coming weeks they will be offering translations in 20 languages. It seems like Google should be able to offer this in Hangouts Meet, as they offer live captioning during Google Slides presentations,
- The annual “YouTube Rewind” video was released this week, with popular YouTubers and spoofs and homages to the past year’s popular videos and memes. This is a promo for YouTube - there’s even an interlude discussing using the platform for “good” - but fans are annoyed that popular controversial stars like Logan Paul weren’t included. I suspect YouTube would like the media and advertisers to forget the controversies even happened.
- Ariana Grande launched her latest music video as a YouTube Premiere, and had 829,000 unique viewers watching and participating live at its peak. “thank u, next” also broke two more records: most views in 24 hours and fastest time to 100 million views.
- If you are using WordPress for your blog or website, sign up to beta test Google’s new Site Kit WordPress plugin. It shows metrics and insights for your site from Search Console, Analytics, AdSense, and PageSpeed Insights.
- In a surprise move, Tumblr announced that on December 17th - just two weeks after their announcement - they will begin enforcing a new policy that prohibits adult content.. The policy change off to a rocky start, with the algorithm Tumblr is using to automatically flag images with nudity or sexual acts frequently flagging innocuous content. And considering sexual content - especially non-mainstream erotica and porn - is what Tumblr’s known for, so some are suggesting this may be the first step in Tumblr’s demise
2018 in review
Read on for links, tips and updates for YouTube creators, webmasters, the best of 2018 and more.
Image: The Pantone color of the year for 2019 is “living coral” (PANTONE 16-1546, HEX FF6F61, RGB 255 111 97). This photo by thecuratedsoul on Pixabay captures that tone.
Image: The Pantone color of the year for 2019 is “living coral” (PANTONE 16-1546, HEX FF6F61, RGB 255 111 97). This photo by thecuratedsoul on Pixabay captures that tone.
Upcoming
- December 11: Google Webmaster Central Office Hours Hangout
- December 11: Google’s DevFest OnAir (register now!)
- December 14: Google Webmaster Central Office Hours Hangout
- December 21: Google Webmaster Central Office Hours Hangout (if you’re in Zurich, you may be able to join in person)
YouTube and Video Creation
- YouTube Rewind 2018 (YouTube)
- YouTube Rewind hides its community’s biggest moments to appease advertisers (The Verge)
- YouTube is rolling autoplay on the Home feed in the mobile app (YouTube Help)
- As of November 9th, YouTube stopped supporting using Google+ Circles to manage hidden commenters (YouTube)
Go Live
- How Ariana Grande’s ‘Thank U, Next’ Became a viral video ‘Event’ in the streaming era (Billboard)
- A letter from Twitch CEO Emmett Shear about Article 13 (Twitch)
Social media
- Twitter’s top tweets of 2018 (Twitter)
- Reddit year in review 2018 (Reddit)
- Nearly 250 Pages of Devastating Internal Facebook Documents Posted Online By UK Parliament (Motherboard)
- Internal Facebook documents show how the company makes deals for data (The Verge)
- Mark Zuckerberg personally approved cutting off Vine’s friend-finding feature (The Verge)
- Facebook knew Android call-scraping would be ‘high-risk,’ new documents reveal (The Verge)
- Facebook touts new hate-speech technology, but users still post about shooting immigrants (The Daily Dot)
- Facebook’s 2018 year in review (Facebook)
- Facebook’s collections are becoming shareable, just in time for the holidays (TechCrunch)
- Facebook bans the sale of Community groups (BBC)
- “Facebook Is Built on Inequality” (Colin Horgan)
- A quiet war rages over who can make money online (WIRED)
Google Photos and Mobile Photography
Google for businesses
- Google My Business Communications Managers are being converted to "Site Managers" with the ability to post and update (Google My Business)
- Reserve With Google – Which Categories & Services Are Eligible? (Mike Blumenthal)
Bloggers and Webmasters
- Beta test the Google Site Kit WordPress plugin: Search Console, Analytics, AdSense, and PageSpeed Insights data (Google Webmasters)
- AMP for WordPress plugin v.1.0 launches
- WordPress 5.0 “Bebo” with big upgrades to the editor (WordPress)
- Google Search update: rich results expands for Question & Answer pages (Google Webmasters)
- Google to redirect old Search Console reports to new ones Dec. 13 (Search Engine Land)
- A better, more positive Tumblr (Tumblr’s spin)
- Rest in peace, Tumblr (The Next Web)
- Tumblr’s adult content ban will devastate its most vulnerable communities (The Daily Dot)
- Tumblr’s new algorithm is flagging innocent posts as NSFW (The Next Web)
- Tumblr’s porn ban is going about as badly as expected (Ars Technica)
- The fallout from Tumblr’s porn ban (The Verge)
AdSense and advertising
Hangouts and Messaging
- The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts (Matt Klainer Google blog)
- Re: Hangouts Classic (Hangouts forum)
- 2019 is your last year to use Google Hangouts ‘classic’ if you haven’t moved on already (9to5Google)
- Hey @hallstephenj I run Hangouts and this is pretty shoddy reporting (Scott Johnston on Twitter)
- Smart Reply now available in Hangouts Chat (Google Cloud blog)
- Verizon brings next-gen RCS messaging to Pixel 3 and 3 XL (Android Police)
- Skype introduces live captions and subtitles; translation coming soon (Skype)
Made by Google, Android, Google Fi
- Google bridges Android and iOS development with Flutter 1.0 (Ars Technica)
- Bringing eSIM to more networks around the world (Google Blog)
- Announcing Google Play’s “Best of 2018” (Google Blog)
- Celebrating the developers behind the best apps and games of 2018 (Android Developers)
- ASPIRE to keep protecting billions of Android users (Google Security blog)
- 22 apps with 2 million+ Google Play downloads had a malicious backdoor (Ars Technica)
- Google’s call screening transcripts are live and they’re pretty rad (Android Police)
Productivity
- Measuring the "Filter Bubble": How Google is influencing what you click (DuckDuckGo)
- Google Says Their Personalized Results Do Not Create Filter Bubbles (SEO Roundtable)
- Google Translate is trying to reduce gender bias by providing both feminine and masculine translations for some gender-neutral words (Google Blog)
- Stable Channel Update for Desktop (Chrome 71) (Chrome Releases)
- Microsoft Edge is officially switching to Chromium in 2019 (The Next Web)
Privacy and Security
- In the new fight for online privacy and security, Australia falls: What happens next? (EFF)
- Adobe Fixes Zero-Day Flash Player Vulnerability Used in APT Attack on Russia (Bleeping Computer)
- 100m Quora users’ data stolen by hackers (The Next Web)
- Oath agrees to pay $5M to settle charges it violated children’s privacy (TechCrunch)
- ASPIRE to keep protecting billions of Android users (Google Security blog)
- 22 apps with 2 million+ Google Play downloads had a malicious backdoor (Ars Technica)
- Tackling ads abuse in apps and SDKs (Google Online Security blog)
More around the web
- I tried Predictim AI that scans for “risky” babysitters (Gizmodo)
- The friendship that made Google huge (The New Yorker)
- Proposed copyright rules: bad for small publishers, European consumers and online services (Google Blog)
- An art gallery in your pocket: See Vermeer’s paintings in augmented reality (Google Blog)
- Waymo One, Waymo's commercial self-driving car service, launches in Phoenix (Waymo)
- The history of online harassment before and after Gamergate with Caroline Sinders (The Verge)
- The Joy of Cooking, vindicated: Journal retracts two more Brian Wansink papers (Retraction Watch)
- The CRISPR baby scandal gets worse by the day (The Atlantic)
- Announcing the PANTONE color of the year 2019: Living Coral (Pantone)
Updated March 2019 to remove Google+ links
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Spam and personal attacks are not allowed. Any comment may be removed at my own discretion ~ Peggy