Image used with permission by copyright holderOn June 26, the Supreme Court helped change people’s lives and the color of their social media profile pictures with the national legalization of same sex marriages, and a few million minds. According to data from social intelligence company Wayin, over 2.5 million positive tweets were sent in support of marriage equality.
Wayin analyzed public profiles on Twitter and Facebook, filtering through more than 160,000 public Facebook posts and over 3.9 million tweets. Overall, Twitter embraced the news of marriage equality better than Facebook with 66 percent of the responses on Twitter being positive compared to 56 percent positive messages on Facebook. But, in the battle of the sexes, women were more supportive than men. The data revealed that 10 percent more women support gay marriage on social media than their male counterparts. On Facebook, 72 percent of women supported marriage equality compared to 54 percent on Twitter.
WayinImage used with permission by copyright holder
Only 45 percent of men on Facebook sent positive messages about marriage equality. On Twitter the ratio is better, at 63 percent of men. According to Wayin’s heat map of the twitter activity surrounding marriage equality, the vast majority of chatter occurred on the east coast with most of the midwest and South displaying relatively timid activity.
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Wayin analyzed millions of tweets and Facebook comments in real-time with the ability to discern intangible details such as sentiment. The company’s technology has been used by The Weather Channel to help the network input weather photos from their viewers’ social media accounts on live television in real-time.
While the positivity shined through, Facebook and Twitter’s abundance of negative user comments have got them in trouble in recent history. Last September, The Association for Progressive Communications’ Women’s Rights Program gave both Facebook and Twitter “F” grades for their “public commitment to human rights standards,” according to a statement. Less than three months later, Twitter announced improved measures to prevent cyberbullying including easier response time for reporting abuse. Facebook also altered its cyber bullying policies months after the grade.
Bluesky barrels toward 1 million new sign-ups in a day
Social media app Bluesky has picked nearly a million new users just a day after exiting its invitation-only beta and opening to everyone.
In a post on its main rival -- X (formerly Twitter) -- Bluesky shared a chart showing a sudden boost in usage on the app, which can now be downloaded for free for iPhone and Android devices.
Sometimes, whether you're chatting with friends or posting on social media, words just aren't enough -- you need a GIF to fully convey your feelings. If there's a moment from a YouTube video that you want to snip into a GIF, the good news is that you don't need complex software to so it. There are now a bunch of ways to make a GIF from a YouTube video right in your browser.
If you want to use desktop software like Photoshop to make a GIF, then you'll need to download the YouTube video first before you can start making a GIF. However, if you don't want to go through that bother then there are several ways you can make a GIF right in your browser, without the need to download anything. That's ideal if you're working with a low-specced laptop or on a phone, as all the processing to make the GIF is done in the cloud rather than on your machine. With these options you can make quick and fun GIFs from YouTube videos in just a few minutes.
Use GIFs.com for great customization
Step 1: Find the YouTube video that you want to turn into a GIF (perhaps a NASA archive?) and copy its URL.
I paid Meta to ‘verify’ me — here’s what actually happened
In the fall of 2023 I decided to do a little experiment in the height of the “blue check” hysteria. Twitter had shifted from verifying accounts based (more or less) on merit or importance and instead would let users pay for a blue checkmark. That obviously went (and still goes) badly. Meanwhile, Meta opened its own verification service earlier in the year, called Meta Verified.
Mostly aimed at “creators,” Meta Verified costs $15 a month and helps you “establish your account authenticity and help[s] your community know it’s the real us with a verified badge." It also gives you “proactive account protection” to help fight impersonation by (in part) requiring you to use two-factor authentication. You’ll also get direct account support “from a real person,” and exclusive features like stickers and stars.
