It’s Friday, August 12 and this is a story that could only happen in today’s tech world. See if you can follow me here. Facebook got tired of ad-blockers stripping ads from its users’ feeds, so it created a way for ads to not look like ads to ad-blockers, essentially working right around them. So the folks at Adblock Plus created their own workaround around Facebook’s workaround, which was only meant to remove ads.
The problem is Adblock Plus’ little trick doesn’t work so well – it’s apparently stripping out legitimate posts from users’ friends and liked pages. This makes Facebook unhappy. You don’t just unblock Facebook’s ad-blocking unblocking features! So, according to a report from Techcrunch, Facebook is firing back with — are you ready for this? — an Adblock Plus anti ad-blocking unblocker blocker.
Are you lost yet? It’s true: Facebook is having to create a feature which blocks Adblock Plus from trying to work around it’s own feature designed to defeat Adblock Plus, proving that, in today’s age of the internet, sometimes beating someone down once isn’t enough. You might have to kill them twice.
Instagram Stories is a hit
Remember when we reported last week that Instagram was blatantly and unapologetically copying Snapchat with its new Stories feature? Well, turns out, Stories is working like a charm.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Media Firms are falling over themselves to get on board with stories, and many of them are also part of an exclusive set of publishers commissioned to create content for Snapchat Discover. Apparently CNN, Food Network, People, Comedy Central and others have been busy posting stories on Instagram, and they are getting hundreds of thousands of views.
That’s probably just the beginning. Instagram has got to be doing a serious happy dance right now, and Snapchat is sure to be disgusted. Something tells me this will be fodder for the next season of Silicon Valley.
No surprises for iPhone 7
Finally, all those iPhone 7 rumors that have been swirling around? They’re all true. Well, that is, if some recently leaked documents are legit, anyway.
French tech site NowhereElse which has a reputation for its iPhone-related leaks has offered up images with schematics that pretty much confirm everything we thought we knew, including a single antenna strip, dual rear cameras and, yes, a conspicuous lack of headphone jack … get ready for lightning headphones and lightning headphone adapters.
It’s just so hard to keep a secret these days. Just ask Volkswagen.
