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Hello, geeks! | Welcome to this week's Geekout! | To kick things off this week… | Ever wanted to be Mark Zuckerberg (without the Senate hearings)? | Check out this new card game. It's wild! 😮 | Also | Transform that boring LinkedIn '#OpentoWork profile frame into something less… cringe… with this free tool. ✨ | __________
| Meta Moderation Madness Strikes Again…! | Another week, another bizarre Meta moderation decision on my account. | This time, Meta decided to remove one of my posts from 2018! | I'm not sure if this is a slight against Rihanna, my taste in music, or the Meta AI's nipple fears. | | Fortunately, Meta's PR pitbull Andy Stone stepped in, notifying me (via Threads) that it was a mistake (obvs!) and the post had been reinstated. | | But he didn't respond to my follow up comment about the seemingly increasing frequency of ridiculous content moderation decisions the companies platforms keep making. 🤔 | | _________
| Watch me look awkward on stage in Kosovo… 😬 | I recently travelled to Kosovo to speak at the Growth Tank Event. | I spoke about my unconventional career path into social, the challenges of working in social with ADHD, the state of social media in 2024, what happens next to TikTok, X, Threads, Bluesky, and more. | I have uploaded it to YouTube for you to watch for free, if you're interested. |  | Growth Tank 2024 - Matt Navarra // The State of Social Media in 2024 |
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| __________ | DON'T MISS THIS… | This 100% FREE playbook for social media managers and marketers is a must-download. | The analytics experts at Measure Studio have pulled together a guide to social media metrics, to help you take make data-driven content decisions that boost engagement. | Check it out! 👇 |
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Tired of Vanity Metrics? Unlock Explosive Engagement with Data-Backed Social Strategy 🔥 | | Why do some of your social posts bomb, while others fly? Let's fix that! | Balancing gut instincts with data-driven decisions is tough, but the right approach can unlock more consistent social media success. | Measure Studio's FREE playbook will teach you how to… | 🚀 Unlock viral potential: Master the art of A/B testing
📊 Decode the data: Learn to tell a compelling story with your metrics
🎯 Use benchmarks: To supercharge your social strategy
🚫 Ditch the vanity metrics: Focus on data that drives real results | Stop second-guessing your content — this FREE playbook breaks it all down for you. [AD] | |
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🔥 GEEKOUT HOT 5 | Geekout's pick of the hottest headlines in social this week: |  | #Xodus: Bluesky Hits 20M Users as People Continue to Flee X | Bluesky is currently adding nearly 1 million users per day. |
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| Australia launches 'landmark' bill to ban social media for children under 16 [RESTRICTING] Texas AG opens investigation into advertising group that Elon Musk sued for 'boycotting' X [SCRAMBLING] Instagram will now let you 'reset' your recommendations algorithm, TikTok style [REFRESHING] UK Government to summon Elon Musk to testify about X's role in UK summer riots [GRILLING]
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🚨 EVERYONE'S TALKING ABOUT… | Bluesky seems to have "the juice" |  | Bluesky hits 20 million users |
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| It started last week, but this week it became a phenomenon - Bluesky is really taking off. | It blazed past 20 million users this week, and while X and Threads are still way ahead, it's notable how many prominent X accounts have shifted over to Bluesky. | Publishers are now launching on Bluesky, while some journalists say X is "no longer a useful tool" for reporting. It's worth noting that publishers aren't leaving X though, just adding another platform to their social repertoire. | So what's the appeal? For some, engagement feels more real than X because it focuses on your followers rather than pushing your posts to randos who don't get your jokes, like Threads does, or who want to lob abuse at you, like on X. | While it still has way more users, it looks like Threads is feeling the heat. It's launched Bluesky-style custom feeds and is tweaking its algorithm to focus more on followers than engagement from beyond your own network. | But despite the hype, do you need Bluesky? The UK Prime Minister certainly says he doesn't… yet. And while some celebrities on Bluesky are real, fake accounts have caught people out. In the world of UK politics, there was excitement among journalists when right-wing firebrands Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage appeared to sign up. Neither was a real account. | Some argue it still needs more normies, but for now it's a fun place to hang out and pretend it's still 2011 and the world is a calmer place. The vibes are generally good, and it turned out to be a good place to have fun around this week's ridiculous Jake Paul v Mike Tyson boxing match. | Still, Bluesky has a tiny team of around 20, so features like a proper verification system to help stop those fake accounts might be a long way away. Connecting up your domain as your username is fiddly, and anyone could buy a similar domain to fool 90% of people. | And as for whether it's "billionaire proof" as CEO Jay Graber claims… well, we'll just have to see how soon its recent investors from the crypto world want a return. |
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✨ NEW & NOTEWORTHY | Everything else you need to know from the past seven days… |
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Meta 👥 |
 | Messenger's new AI background feature for video calls |
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Instagram ✨ |
 | Instagram's 'New Year' style font for Stories and Reels (not yet available) |
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WhatsApp 💬 / Threads 🧵 |
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 | X's new 'Pinch to Zoom" video feature |
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YouTube 📺 / TikTok 📱 |
 | YouTube's new 'Hype' creator amplification feature |
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Snapchat / LinkedIn / Pinterest / More… 👻 |
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🔥 Want to see more hot NEW features spotted in the wild this week?
Just head to the 'More news' section below! |
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🤖 SOCIAL A.I. | The newest social media A.I. features spotted this week: | |
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💬 YOU CAN QUOTE ME ON THAT | When I'm quoted in the news, you'll find it here: | Will BlueSky eventually dethrone X as the global town square? I gave my thoughts to The National: | | Also: | |
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😆 LOL | | Amazon Prime Video's social media manager is living their best life… They hit publish on this… delightful… Instagram Reel. | Tap the image below to watch in full: 😳 😆 | | primevideo |  |
|  | View more on Instagram |
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📈 MEMES | You probably hate it, but the Jaguar rebrand certainly got people meme-ing this week… |  | HARD FACTOR @HardFactorNews |  |
| | Replying to@Dexerto | Jaguar design team coming up the logo update | |  | | | 10:04 PM • Nov 19, 2024 | | | | | | 20.8K Likes 179 Retweets | 32 Replies |
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| | |  | | agencyprobs | | Add a comment... |  |
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🪧 BRANDS | So yes, the Jaguar rebrand has been a hot topic this week. | It's either a massive screwup or the best ragebait campaign of all time. | People are talking about the Jaguar brand for the first time in years. Maybe the new brand will make sense when they reveal a new car that suits the brand? And maybe getting people upset about the death of the old brand is part of the lead-up to that? | If that's the plan, it's really working… | | |
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🙊 WHAT DID YOU SAY?! | "I quit Twitter. Eleven years, man. It really changed. Grew dark." | – Author Stephen King announces he's moving to Threads | Also this week… | Bluesky: "This is the kind of competition and innovation that's been missing from social for the last decade." – Bluesky responds to Threads copying custom feeds
Bluesky CEO Jay Graber says X rival is "billionaire proof" 🤔
Meta lobbyist turned EU regulator, Aura Salla, says big tech rules have gone too far
Instagram chief Adam Mosseri says Threads has "many times" as many daily active users as Bluesky has total signups, contradicting Similarweb's estimate
A social media ban for UK under-16s "not on the cards" for now, the minister for technology has said
Elon Musk criticised Australia's proposed ban on social media for children
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😮 WTF?! | "The BBC wanted to ask Logan Paul serious questions about his crypto dealings. Logan Paul sent a lookalike to the interview." |  | Logan Paul Trolls The BBC By Sending Lookalike To Answer Questions About His Crypto Dealings |
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| Also: | |
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📲 NEW APP | BlueArk will scrape all your tweets from Twitter and import them to BlueSky. But a quote to move my 151,000 tweets and media was $85.90! | | Also: | |
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👌 PRO TIPS |  | LinkedIn Shares Notes on Posting Do's and Don'ts |
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🪦 RIP | Social media features heading for the graveyard: |  | Instagram Is Removing the Option To Follow Hashtags | Does this mean that hashtags are no longer important? |
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| Also heading to the social media graveyard this week: | LinkedIn is retiring Audio Events, its social audio feature. Google's DeepMind and YouTube built and shelved 'Orca,' a 'mind-blowing' music AI tool that hit a copyright snag
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🤦♂️ #FAIL | I mean, we've described this as a FAIL, and it is for Musk. But Grok is quite accurate here! |  | X User Asks Elon Musk's AI Who Spreads 'The Most Disinformation' on X and Gets Back Unexpected Answer: Elon Musk |
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| Also this week: | |
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👔 YOU'RE HIRED! | Hot new social media jobs worth checking out this week: | | |
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📊 SOCIAL STATS | 238% | – The increase in retweets of Elon Musk's posts on X. Starting around July 13th
Elon Musks' posts X began receiving 138% more views and 238% more retweets than before that date 🤔 | Bluesky vs. X: One expert says Google treats Bluesky as 10x more important than X Mastodon says downloads have increased by 47% on iOS and 17% on Android, and its monthly active users grow to 894,000 across all Mastodon servers TikTok parent ByteDance reportedly values itself at $300 billion Creator Economy: The percentage of Bank of America customers earning income as content creators has continued to decline and is now 0.20%, down from its 2021 peak of 0.25% YouTube is the most cited source for Google's AI Overviews LinkedIn: More marketing jobs are being advertised on LinkedIn (up 76%)
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📈 CHARTED | Bluesky overtook Threads in daily website visits in both the US and UK this week, according to Similarweb 📈 | Note that this is web visits so perhaps not surprising, as people Google Bluesky to find out more about it. | | |
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 | MORE META NEWS |
|  | Meta Loses German Court Fight Over Global Data Leak in 2021 | (Bloomberg) -- Meta Platforms Inc. risks being on the hook for compensation claims from thousands of German users after it lost a top court ruling over the 2021 global leak of half a billion people's private data. |
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| | New features and tests: | Facebook: | | Instagram: | Instagram is testing a new icon for Reels. [@ihammod_oh] Updated and more customisable avatar designs are rolling out on Instagram. [@yassermasood] Instagram Notes now lets you add music to Spotify. [@jonahmanzano]
| Messenger: | Messenger has added a new 'Channel invitations' section. [@oncescuradu] Messenger will now show a stacked deck of photos in chats when you share multiple images, just like Instagram [Social Media Today]
| Threads: | Threads is testing a file upload progress bar. [@oncescuradu] Threads is rolling out a QR code for sharing your profile. [@jonahmanzano] Threads seems to be moving away from the Instagram-branded colour scheme by adopting its own splash screen. [@oncescuradu] Threads is experimenting with a new floating action button placed in the "Search" section. [@oncescuradu]
| WhatsApp: | WhatsApp is testing a new sticker creation feature, "With camera". [@oncescuradu] WhatsApp is rolling out an updated call log management feature. [WABetaInfo] WhatsApp is testing animated confetti for New Year's Eve. [@wabetainfo]
| The rest: Creator Studio / Adtech / Quest and more: | |
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 | MORE TIKTOK NEWS |
|  | Chinese tech groups build AI teams in Silicon Valley | Alibaba, ByteDance and Meituan seek to poach top talent from US rivals despite Washington's chip curbs |
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| | New features and tests: | TikTok now displays the total number of likes gained by an account, in TikTok Search. [@oncescuradu] TikTok now lets you use Face ID or Touch ID to unlock the Activity Center. [@jonahmanzano]
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💥 EVEN MORE SOCIAL MEDIA NEWS & UPDATES |  | No 10 seeks influencers to spread Starmer's word on social media | A new unit being set up in Downing Street will try to reach voters who shun traditional news sources |
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| Snap has accused New Mexico of intentionally friending alleged child predators, then blaming the company. [The Verge] The Kremlin denies it is behind recent disruptions to YouTube in Russia. [Reuters $$$] Tech giants are leaning on culture-war issues to splinter bipartisan support for the Online Kid Safety Bill. [Wall Street Journal $$$] The UK government is vague on how its new theoretically encryption-busting powers might be used. [The Register] Elon Musk has criticised Australia's proposed ban on social media for children. [NBC News] Roblox is the latest target of state kids online safety bills. [The Verge] Turkey has fined Twitch 2 million lira for a data breach. [Reuters $$$]
| New features and tests: | |
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📰 WEEKEND READS | Geekout's pick of the best longer reads to sink into over the weekend: |  | Next Gen Creators 2024: 15 Rising Influencers Who Are Taking Social by Storm |
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😳 AND FINALLY… | This is giving me vertigo just looking at it! 😬 | "A Facebook page, which began among a few friends, has grown into a popular photo collection of hazardous stairs." |  | Take the 'Death Stairs' if You Dare |
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📅 BACK NEXT WEEK… | …And that's a wrap for this week's Geekout. | Don't trip (down the stairs) on your way out! | I'm heading off to make a start of my Christmas shopping. 🎄🎁 | I dread it every year, and always leave it to the last minute! | But at least I can celebrate getting it done in time this year… Maybe. | | Goodbye, geeks! | | p.s. This newsletter is edited by Martin SFP Bryant |
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