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Digital Bytes

It’s developer conference season, with Facebook’s F8 wrapping up and Apple’s WWDC happening in June. Expect more tech announcements and news during the summer! Below are a few key takeaways from F8.

• The News Feed is on shaky ground. Besides testing new hate speech identification software the day before F8, Facebook generally ignored the News Feed and focused on Instagram, AI and VR technologies at F8. This is leading some to believe the News Feed is close to dead. It continues to be a big money maker for Facebook, so I can’t imagine they would remove the News Feed all together — but it does seem to be less of a focus area now.
• Nonprofits, take note: Facebook is focusing on Instagram and curating smaller, more tightly connected communities. If you haven’t thought through a Facebook Groups or Stories strategy as a way to harness this shift, now is the time to do so.

In other news …

• Change your Twitter password!
• Twitter continues to tweak its timeline to prioritize news. If someone you follow posts a news article, it will group other tweets with that same news article (even if you don’t follow the handles) underneath.
• The fight over where audiences listen to podcasts continues with NPR, WNYC Studios, WBEZ Chicago and This American Life acquiring Pocket Casts.
• Snapchat’s no good, very bad redesign is continuing to lose advertisers and users.
• Spotify released its first earnings report this week, and it wasn’t great.

Fun Resource

Need a refresher on what those pesky social media algorithms are up to? Read Social Media Today’s Current State of Social Media Algorithms.

Finally …

Notice how I did not talk about Facebook’s announcement of a new dating app during F8? Yeah, that’s because it was met with some jokes. Enjoy. ?