Today's SNAP from Meta, Twitter, Instagram, Disney and Binance
Meta Lay offs, New Twitter verification system, Instagram's new web version, Disney's Rising sub numbers and Binance's FTX aquisition
Over 11,000 workers will be laid off by Meta.
- Meta is reducing the size of its workforce by about 13 percent and letting more than 11,000 of its employees go in the first mass layoffs in the company's history.
- Mark Zuckerberg has announced the move in a message to employees, which Meta shared on its Newsroom.
- Meta says it has already removed system access for those being let go today, given the amount of sensitive information it has access to.
- Although Meta and Twitter are laying off a sizable number of employees, they are not the only prominent digital companies to do so recently.
The updated Twitter verification system will include two checkmarks, one of which isn't for sale.
- It turns out that Twitter's new verification strategy will really consist of two tiers.
- A additional "official" designation will be used for "select" users in addition to the blue checkmarks.
Not all previously verified accounts will get the “Official” label and the label is not available for purchase. Accounts that will receive it include government accounts, commercial companies, business partners, major media outlets, publishers and some public figures.
— Esther Crawford ✨ (@esthercrawford) November 8, 2022
- The label has previously been seen on internal Twitter builds, but this is the first time a business representative has acknowledged its presence.
- The strategy appears to be intended to address some of the criticisms that Musk's concept for Twitter Blue and verification has received.
- Specifically, paying for authentication can provide fraudsters and spoofers access to conversations and opportunities to promote misinformation.
- Both the enhanced verification and the "official" branding are anticipated to go live soon.
The online version of Instagram has been updated for big displays.
- The most recent upgrade brings a refreshed user experience that makes greater use of huge displays rather than being a bigger version of the mobile app.
- It is now made to take use of large-screen monitors and is cleaner, quicker, and simpler to use.
- According to 9to5Mac, the new UI makes Instagram easier to use on the web, but an iPad app is still not in the works.
- Mosseri claimed earlier this year that the iPad was "not big enough" to justify the development of a specific Instagram app.
Disney has now equaled Netflix's subscriber count across all of its services.
- For the company's fourth fiscal quarter, Disney+ received 12.1 million new customers, which, according to Yahoo Finance, is 3 million more than analysts had predicted.
- A total of 14.6 million new Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+ customers were added by Walt Disney, increasing the company's overall number of streaming subscribers to about 236 million.
- In its most recent financial report, Netflix said that it has about 223.09 million customers.
- Disney's operational loss for streaming climbed from $0.8 billion to $1.5 billion during the quarter, despite the remarkable expansion in subscriber numbers.
Following a very public battle, cryptocurrency powerhouse Binance is acquiring its competitor FTX.
- Following a brief but extremely public dispute, Binance intends to purchase its rival FTX.
- In reaction to a CoinDesk story that FTX was experiencing a liquidity crisis, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao sold around $529 million in FTX's native token on November 6th.
- According to CryptoQuant, FTX's net holdings of crypto assets had fallen by 83 percent in the last two days alone.
- In the last two weeks, the company's stablecoin reserve has decreased by 93%, and associated withdrawals had almost reached zero by today morning's early hours.
- However, if successful, the purchase might upend the cryptocurrency market by removing Binance's major rival.