Facebook will soon autoplay video ads in Messenger

Facebook has admitted in the past that it no longer has room in its main app for ads. What’s their solution? Putting it in its other apps like Messenger and Marketplace. You may or may not have already noticed ads on Messenger and tried to ignore them. But now you might no longer be able to with Facebook’s plans to rollout autoplaying video ads to integrate alongside your messages.

When asked if users might find this obnoxious, Stefanos Loukakos, who run’s Messenger’s ad business, acknowledges this possibility and said they’re monitoring user behavior to see if these ads will turn people off. He said that when they started integrating basic ads to the service, it “didn’t show any changes with how people used the platform or how many messages they send.” He adds, “Video might be different, but we don’t believe so.” Facebook will start testing this with some of its users starting Monday. Let us know what you think if this hits your inbox.

Source: Recode

Facebook product director joins Uber as head of driver product

Under Uber’s current CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, the ride-hailing service has placed heavy emphasis on its drivers. But the company has been without a head for its driver product division since December, when Aaron Schildkrout left after the company wrapped its 180 days of change driver campaign. That just changed as former Facebook product director for video and Facebook Live, Daniel Danker, joins Uber. He will serve as a senior director and head of driver product. Danker will be in charge of planning, strategy, and execution for the said division. He has been working in Silicon Valley for a while already. Between 2000 and 2010, he worked in a couple of roles at Microsoft and left when he was a director of development and operations. He found his way to BBC in 2010 and then went to Shazam where he served as chief product officer for almost three years.

“Drivers are the heart of the Uber experience, and Daniel’s passion for our mission and deep product knowledge will ensure we continue to improve and innovate on their behalf,” Uber Head of Product Manik Gupta told TechCrunch in a statement.

Facebook bundles its ‘On This Day’ updates into new Memories section

Facebook is hoping its new feature will get users to share more personal posts on its site. Called Memories, it revamps the “On This Day” feature a bit and adds some new (or should we say old) stuff into the mix. Aside from On This Day, the section also shows you the friends you’ve made on that day, seasonal or monthly recaps of your memories, and “memories you may have missed” (if you don’t check this section regularly). People who like looking fondly at their past might love this new feature but of course not all memories are pleasant and some might think this could just unearth some horrible past events. If you’re the latter, then it’s best to stay away.

You can access the Memories section on the desktop on the left-hand side menu. Meanwhile, in mobile you can access this through the “More” menu. These throwbacks are also accessible through facebook.com/memories.

Facebook promises to scale back on ‘you are now connected’ Messenger reminders

With digital health and phone addiction a hot button item right now, things like constant notifications popping up are seen as ways to prolong use of apps and services. Facebook is seen as a bit of an offender in this respect. With two separate apps—for Messenger and the main Facebook app—we get tons of notifications from them, and some, as some users have complained, are “useless.” An example is the “You are now connected on Messenger” alert. It seems Facebook is hearing the complaints of users and are saying they’re going to cut back on these unnecessary reminders with the help of machine learning.

"We've found that many people have appreciated getting a notification when a friend joins Messenger." A representative said to TechCrunch. "That said, we are working to make these notifications even more useful by employing machine learning to send fewer of them over time to people who enjoy getting them less."