This Week in Social is a weekly digest of some of the biggest stories in social media marketing news. These stories are the show notes for the Brave Ad World Podcast. Each story is discussed at a deeper level on the podcast.

Facebook May Soon Be Launching Camera App (Read more at The Wall Street Journal)

Facebook is working on a new app that will launch directly into a camera, similar to launching Snapchat or Periscope. The app will allow users to take photos and then easily share to Facebook or even start a live video stream.

Facebook has a bit of a problem on its hands, something it calls context collapse. Users are sharing less, despite its user growth. Facebook’s literally become a news feed, where people are consuming more content, but it’s content from publishers. Instead, users are going to these other platforms that do more to encourage content creation.

This app would take a cue from Snapchat and drop users into an experience that encourages content creation first. Facebook’s separate app launches have not been successful with examples including Rooms, Paper and Slingshot. This app, however, could serve as more of a test to see how it encourages sharing and then be rolled into the Facebook app, which focuses on the News Feed at the moment.

YouTube Launches Six-Second Ads (Read more at TechCrunch)

YouTube has launched Bumper ads that are only six seconds long. The goal is to have a pre-roll format suited for mobile video viewers, and YouTube is encouraging advertisers to view this as an add-on driven primarily by longer video ads. The Bumper ads simply reinforce the message in a way that’s simple, short and unskippable.

The ads may be beneficial in helping a message stick in the minds of consumers, but it will be important for brands trying to tell a story by having a holistic campaign backing these ads in most cases. But YouTube’s move is akin to Facebook’s three-second audition and mobile video in general. Get the message out there quickly and succinctly. Bumper ads will help do that.

Twitter Reports Q1 Earnings (Read more at AdWeek)

Twitter reported its 2016 Q1 earnings report. It was able to report that it now has 310 million users, up from 305 million the previous quarter, which Twitter credited to seasonality and marketing initiatives launched last year. It also saw revenue increase 36% over last year to $595 million. $531 million came from advertising, 88% of which was mobile. Despite the news, stock fell about 10% in after-hours trading.

Marketers are, overall, pleased with the results of their advertising initiatives on Twitter, but investors remain nervous about Twitter’s user numbers. Twitter does have a few positive things going for it, including the “enhanced timeline” algorithm it started to roll out. Only 2% of its users have opted out of the feature.

Video has also been productive for the platform. Video ads are showing twice the ad recall rate of traditional promoted tweets. They also have a 30% increase in ad association compared to promoted tweets. It plans to continue to capitalize in this by doing promoted video through Periscope and making the most out of its partnership with the NFL to live stream Thursday Night Football games starting this year.

Facebook Continues to be on a Roll in Q1 Earnings (Read more at AdAge)

Facebook’s Q1 2016 earnings report did not disappoint. The social network reported that it added 60 million new users in Q1, bringing it up to 1.65 billion monthly active users, 1.51 billion of which are mobile. Facebook also saw 82% of its ad sales come from mobile, up from 73% over last year. Ad revenue overall rose 57% over last year, totaling $5.2 billion.

Facebook hit on a few other points on the call, including its 10-year roadmap, which includes messaging bots, virtual reality and internet-beaming drones. It also sees live video being a major focus.

Facebook is a very different company than it was 10 years ago, and the next 10 years will show that it will be very different from today. The fact that it has four very successful platforms, including Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram allows Facebook to evolve and focus in a lot of different areas. And marketers show no signs of slowing down their investment in the platform to reach new users. If one thing is true, the next 10 years for Facebook will be less about News Feeds and more about pushing how we use technology.

Twitter Moves to News Section of iTunes (Read more at TechCrunch)

Twitter is no longer in the Social Networking category of iTunes. It has now moved to the News category, where it sits as the top free news app. It still sits in the “Social” section of the Google Play Store, however.

Twitter’s popularity has lagged behind competitors like WhatsApp, Instagram and other social apps. So the move makes sense for it to remain competitive and to get users’ attention. It’s also interesting because it may be foreshadowing for what Twitter will position itself as more and more—a news curation application for real-time breaking news. That’s always been one of Twitter’s main benefits, but that messaging may be even more emphasized in the future.

News Quick Hits

Snapchat has a new feature for its Face Swap photo filter. Now, users can swap their faces with photos in their camera rolls, meaning users can swap from faces in other photos and inanimate objects. (Read more at SocialTimes)
Twitter is allowing users to report multipledisparaging or otherwise unsavory tweets in a single report. The goal is to make it as easy as possible for users to communicate the extent of abuse simply and easily, so Twitter can more quickly resolve the issues. (Read more the Twitter Blog)
YouTube’s iOS and Android apps have gotten an update to include an improved recommendation engine that is based on the same machine learning technology used by Google’s search engine. The home page has also gotten an update to include larger images. (Read more at CNET)
Snapchat revealed its latest user stats to investors this week. Today, more than a third of Snapchat’s users create Stories on a daily basis, and users are watching about 10 billion videos per day. (Read more at AdAge)
LinkedIn’s Q1 earnings showed a 35% year-over-year increase to $861 million, most of which came from Talent Solutions with $558 million, followed by Marketing Solutions with $154 million and Premium Subscriptions with $149 million. (Read more at The LinkedIn Blog)
Periscope users can now draw pictures on their live streams. The sketches, which can be done in one of three primary colors, disappear after a few seconds. Along with the update, Periscope has improved viewer statistics that allow streamers to see how viewer count changed over the course of a stream. (Read more at SocialTimes)
Twitter cofounder Biz Stone’s initial launch of the app Jelly was not successful. But Jelly is back as a human-powered search engine with “a bit of AI” involved. The app is designed for users to search for the best answers to questions from real people (similar to Quora). The revamped app resembles a search engine a bit more, and no account is required to search for answers to questions. (Read more on Medium)