The Latest from Josh Constine
Facebook Stories adds funky AR drawing and Instagram’s Boomerang
You’ll soon be able to draw on the world around you and shoot back-and-forth Instagram Boomerang GIFs with the Facebook Camera. Bringing additional creative tools to the Facebook Camera could ma
Instagram will let you download your content after criticism about portability
Yesterday we reported that Instagram lacked data portability, knocking the app for the absence of an equivalent to Facebook’s Download Your Information too. Now an Instagram spokesperson tells m
Zuckerberg owns or clones most of the “8 social apps” he cites as competition
Mark Zuckerberg’s flimsy defense when congress asked about a lack of competition to Facebook has been to cite that the average American uses eight social apps. But that conveniently glosses over
Zuckerberg’s boring testimony is a big win for Facebook
Mark Zuckerberg ran his apology scripts, trotted out his lists of policy fixes and generally dulled the Senate into submission. And that constitutes success for Facebook. Zuckerberg testified before t
Zuckerberg admits it was a mistake not to ban Cambridge Analytica’s ads
Facebook didn’t ban Cambridge Analytica when it found out in 2015 that it had received user data from Dr. Aleksandr Kogan, and Zuckerberg called that a mistake during his testimony before the Se
Zuckerberg confirms Facebook has been interviewed by Mueller’s special counsel
Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into the 2016 election interference has interviewed at least one employee of Facebook, CEO Mark Zuckerberg confirmed today during his testimony bef
Instagram traps data without a Download Your Information tool
It’s hard to #DeleteFacebook with no viable alternative, but at least you can export all your data. There’s no such option on Instagram . That lack of data portability puts users at the me
Instagram rolls out Focus portrait mode for videos and photos
Instagram is one-upping Apple with a portrait mode feature that runs on a wider variety of phones and works with video, not just photos. Last month, TechCrunch reported about a Focus feature buried i
Tribe combines arcade games with group video chat
Sick of chatting but want to stay connected? Tribe‘s app lets you play clones of Space Invaders, Flappy Bird, Fruit Ninja, Name That Tune and more while video chatting with up to seven friends o
First look at Instagram Nametags, its clone of Snapchat QR codes
Instagram is preparing to launch a feature called Nametags that lets you create a special image that people can scan with the Instagram Stories camera to follow you. TechCrunch broke the news of Namet
Facebook shut down Russian APT28 trolls before the 2016 U.S. election
The most interesting part of Mark Zuckerberg’s prepared testimony for Congress that was released today shows that Facebook has been fighting Russian election interference since before the 2016 U
Snapchat brings back chronological Stories feed for some
Snapchat has undone its controversial redesign’s most significant change in an update to some users today. A tab that shows Stories in reverse chronological order, replacing the redesign’s algorit
Facebook demands ID verification for big Pages, ‘issue’ ad buyers
Facebook is looking to self-police by implementing parts of the proposed Honest Ads Act before the government tries to regulate it. To fight fake news and election interference, Facebook will require
Facebook plans to let everyone unsend messages, will stop Zuckerberg until then
TechCrunch reported last night that Facebook retracted Facebook messages sent by Mark Zuckerberg and other executives from their recipients’ inboxes. That’s an ability normal Facebook user
Facebook retracted Zuckerberg’s messages from recipients’ inboxes
You can’t remove Facebook messages from the inboxes of people you sent them to, but Facebook did that for Mark Zuckerberg and other executives. Three sources confirm to TechCrunch that old Faceb
Tap Bio’s mini-sites solve Instagram’s profile link problem
You only get one link on Instagram, but Tap Bio lets you point that to a customized landing page full of all the sites you want to share. Rather than constantly changing your Instagram profile URL, yo
3 tests show Facebook is determined to make Stories the default
Facebook isn’t backing down from Stories despite criticism that it copied Snapchat and that Instagram Stories is enough. Instead, it’s committed to figuring out how to adapt the slideshow
Highlights and audio from Zuckerberg’s emotional Q&A on scandals
“This is going to be a never-ending battle,” said Mark Zuckerberg. He just gave the most candid look yet into his thoughts about Cambridge Analytica, data privacy and Facebook’s swee
Cambridge Analytica denies accessing data on 87M Facebook users…claims 30M
Cambridge Analytica is refuting a report by Facebook today that said Cambridge Analytica improperly attained data on up to 87 million users. Instead, it claims it only “licensed data for no mo
Zuckerberg says Facebook will offer GDPR privacy controls everywhere
Mark Zuckerberg refuted a Reuters story yesterday that said Facebook would not bring Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation privacy safeguards around the world. “Overall I think regul