Daily Archives: March 24, 2020

Facebook is seeing an extreme spike in usage across the globe due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the company outlined in a blog post on Tuesday. But most usage is concentrated among private messaging and video calling, products the company does not monetize. As a result, the social media giant says its business is suffering while it struggles to keep its communication tools online and stable.

The blog post, penned by analytics chief Alex Schultz and engineering chief Jay Parikh, says total messaging across Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp in harder hit areas of the globe, like Italy, has increased by more than 50 percent. Video calling on Messenger and WhatsApp in those same areas has more than doubled, the post says.

The usage growth from COVID-19 is unprecedented across the industry, and we are experiencing new records in usage almost every day, the duo writes. Maintaining stability throughout these spikes in usage is more challenging than usual now that most of our employees are working from home.

Schultz and Parikh note that the spike in usage is not translating to a boon to its bottom line. Messaging services are not monetized like the Facebook News Feed or the standard Instagram feed, at the same time that digital ad spending is decreasing across the board in countries currently in lockdown to stem the spread of COVID-19. So Facebook is being adversely affected like many other businesses.

Much of the increased traffic is happening on our messaging services, but weve also seen more people using our feed and stories products to get updates from their family and friends, the post explains. At the same time, our business is being adversely affected like so many others around the world. We dont monetize many of the services where were seeing increased engagement, and weve seen a weakening in our ads business in countries taking aggressive actions to reduce the spread of COVID-19.

Were just trying to keep the lights on over here, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told The New York Times in an interview published today, noting that part of the companys struggles right now are because its keeping a vast majority of its 45,000-person workforce at home. Ive never seen anything like this before.

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Facebook says coronavirus is sending usage through the roof - The Verge

Social media has served up massive terabytes of useful information and commentary during the virus outbreak, offering a lifeline to millions of anxious users. It's also the biggest test of the digital venue since the World Wide Web came online in the 1990s because it's the first pandemic that can be tracked and discussed in real time. That power has benefits and liabilities because misinformation these days can cost lives.

Facebook, Inc.'s (FB) stock price hasn't benefited in recent weeks, even though it's likely that daily user metrics have gone through the roof as folks all around the world huddle together in the digital space, seeking guidance and comfort. The same story is playing out at Twitter, Inc. (TWTR), which withdrew first quarter 2020 guidance on Monday, joining thousands of U.S. companies affected by the pandemic.

As it turns out, these are highly cyclical issues that depend on advertising income to post healthy quarterly revenues and profits.Those income streams could take heavy hits in the second quarter, with a reduction in expected political ads as well as lower rates driven by the rapid economic contraction.As a result, these issues are moving in tandem with the vast majority of equities, swinging violently while the U.S. infection rates continue to rise.

Facebook stock carved a long series of higher highs and higher lows between 2014 and the summer of 2018, when the Cambridge Analytica privacy scandal triggered a massive gap and major decline, dropping the stock nearly 44% into December's two-year low. A three-legged advance completed a round trip into the prior high in January 2020, posting an all-time high just five points above the 2018 peak on Jan. 29.

The sell-off into March 18 posted a 39% loss, while the bounce into this week has added about 15 points. This short-term reversal has unfolded at the .786 Fibonacci retracement level, which marks a high-odds turning point, but it's unwise to expect a rapid recovery back to the January high. Price levels at $160 and $175 will mark key obstacles during a recovery wave, while the $180s could yield a final target if the bounce lasts longer than expected to work off oversold technical readings.

Twitter shares bottomed out in the mid-teens in 2016 after a brutal decline that that started in 2014 in the $70s. The stock built a basing pattern at new support and turned higher in 2017, entering an uptrend that posted a lower high at $47.70 in June 2018. It tested that resistance level in September 2019 and sold off, settling back at support in November. The stock completed a double top breakdown earlier this month, dropping to a two-year low last week.

The breakdown violated the .618 Fibonacci retracement level of the 2017 into 2018 uptrend before tagging the .786 retracement last week. Unfortunately, heavy resistance now lies just a point or two above this morning's opening print, advising bottom fishers and dip buyers to stand aside because that level is unlikely to be breached for more than a few sessions without a downturn in pandemic casualties.

Social media use is skyrocketing during the pandemic, but that isn't benefiting shares of Facebook or Twitter, which are highly dependent on advertising revenues that could fall precipitously in coming months.

Disclosure: The author held no positions in the aforementioned securities at the time of publication.

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Social Media Surge Fails to Benefit Facebook and Twitter Stocks - Investopedia

My relationship with social media? Its complicated, to say the least.

I have a Facebook account, but I rarely use it. I need consistent mental health breaks from Twitter, though I criticize myself for not being one of those writers who seems to thrive on the platform. I have an on-again-off-again relationship with Instagram, downloading the app when Im lonely and bored, and deleting it after spending hours scrolling through pictures of perfectly plated pastas.

But like many people who are now isolated at home, anxious, afraid and far from family and friends, Im spending a lot of time on social media these days. Im messaging friends on Instagram and WhatsApp and streaming live videos. Im grateful for these tools but I squirm every time I see the subtle but conspicuous From Facebook at the bottom of the login pages. I wonder how much valuable information tech companies are mining about our psyches right now. What it means to them that usage is up and were relying on them more than ever.

For a couple months before the pandemic started, I was catching up on a term that had been circulating for some time: surveillance capitalism. Popularized by a Harvard researcher, Shoshana Zuboff, its the idea that the current and perhaps final frontier of capitalism is human experience and, in particular, predictions of human experience. Its that technology pioneered by the likes of Google and Facebook that surveils us, often without our consent, to generate invaluable information about what we will do today, tomorrow and in the future. And its a lucrative model thats making a select group of people mostly men rich; men who understand the tools of the trade and how theyre being used.

It is, in essence, the business of collecting, buying and selling our personal data, and its producing what Ms. Zuboff calls epistemic inequality: a dangerous situation whereby the invaluable knowledge and information these technologies collect about us is held by the few, who also just happen to be the increasingly powerful.

The urgency of Ms. Zuboffs message has been resonating with me this past week as people lose their livelihoods and their lives and analysts recommend Zoom, Facebook, Amazon and Netflix as the companies to invest in right now. Although CNBC reports Big Tech lost some $1.3 trillion in value last week, some see the industry as particularly poised to rebound.

One analyst on SeekingAlpha.com predicts Facebook will be exceptionally well positioned to survive from this crisis and thrive in and around the aftermath, while others see Facebook and Amazon as worthy of making their investment committees best ideas list.

I thought of surveillance capitalism as I opened Zoom for a webinar and saw a box pop up, asking me if I wanted to opt out of Zoom sending my information to third parties. I clicked yes, but I wondered how many people would understand what it would mean to click no. I also thought about what else Zoom might be doing to compromise our privacy; according to some, it might not be good. I joked with colleagues about how much Zoom stock must be worth right now. (Up more than 19 percent on Monday morning, according to CNBC.) And I debated with my partner over whether we should pre-order toilet paper on Amazon.

We already knew our world depended on social media and Big Tech, but this moment is proving just how true that is. Its a reminder of how different things are from past pandemics. In 1918 the so-called Spanish flu killed somewhere between 50 million and 100 million people worldwide. But knowledge and communication about the virus was limited by the technologies of the era; telegrams and printing presses were the norm, radios only just emerging.

When it comes to the options we have today to connect to each other in times of crisis, the reality couldnt be more different. And those brave souls who have decided to opt out of social media altogether might be finding themselves feeling more and more alone.

To exist in this world feels challenging in the best of times; to exist in this world without the technologies weve come to rely on even if theyre exploiting us feels downright impossible. In an ideal world, we would have dealt with the problem of big technology companies earlier. More governments would have passed laws regulating their activities and giving us a right to our privacy and our data. Big tech remains mostly unchecked and perhaps worst of all, unfathomable to the majority of us still struggling to make sense of what it means to code.

I know that throughout this crisis, Im giving Facebook invaluable information. I have no doubt my Instagram messages are being scanned and my Zoom meetings recorded. Data is being collected on how I act when Im afraid, when Im irreverent and when Im looking for a distraction. I know this, but I struggle to stop using these tools in the best of times, let alone the worst.

How our political and medical systems fare through this pandemic remains to be seen. But one thing that seems certain is that Big Tech is going to benefit from our time of need.

I know Facebook is watching me. And this whole relationship we got going on? Its complicated, but its a relationship of convenience. Social media is like a bad habit I go back to in times of desperation, a terrible boyfriend I cant shake. So I guess our relationship is begrudgingly back on. Ill use tools like Facebook and Instagram to help me get through this crisis, even as I keep learning about the profoundly unequal price we pay for those tools. And our reckoning with Big Tech? Thats for another day.

Melissa J. Gismondi (@melissajgismond) is a journalist working on a book about the differences between Canadian and American culture and identity.

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Facebook, Dont Exploit Us in Our Time of Need - The New York Times

Never ask a barber whether you need a haircut, the old proverb goes. An updated version, considering new information in a lawsuit against social media giant Facebook (NASDAQ:FB): Never ask Facebook whether you should advertise on Facebook.

Advertisers who turned to Facebook for the massive reach of its platform have been bamboozled by a faulty metric that executives have known about for years, according to an amended complaint filed last week in a lawsuit originally filed in 2018. The "potential reach" metric, supposed to estimate an ad's target audience, is misleading because it could include fake and duplicate accounts, according to the filings.

The filings allege the potential reach metric for certain U.S. states and demographics exceeded U.S. census figures, a clear case of inflation. For example, in every state, the true population between 18 and 34 years old was lower than the potential reach Facebook reported.

The amended lawsuit claims that Facebook was aware it was misleading customers as early as 2015. Chief Operating Office Sheryl Sandberg and Chief Financial Officer David Wehner were named in the filings, but their remarks and actions were mostly redacted.

Image source: Getty Images.

Not redacted were some key communications from Facebook employees regarding the metric. A Facebook product manager was well aware of the issue in late 2018, writing that the inflated metric was "a lawsuit waiting to happen."

According to the filing, another employee wrote, "My question lately is: How long can we get away with the reach overestimation?"

The inflated audience metric doesn't affect how much an advertiser pays for running an ad, since it doesn't affect actual views or clicks. However, by overstating the size of the potential audience for an ad, Facebook was making its platform appear more attractive to advertisers relative to the competition.

Facebook has had issues with inflated metrics in the past. In 2016, the company disclosed it was overestimating viewing times for video ads. Facebook settled the related lawsuit, although it blamed a calculation error and denied any wrongdoing.

While Facebook's revenue growth has slowed in recent years, it probably has more to do with its size than any negative impact from that scandal. In 2019, the company reported revenue of $70.7 billion, up 27% from 2018.

The amended lawsuit over the potential reach inflation makes a stronger case that Facebook was aware of the problem, but it also seems unlikely to drive advertisers away.

There is one wild card in all of this: The global novel coronavirus pandemic. With heavy advertisers like the travel industry in tatters, Facebook and all advertising platforms will probably see lower demand from certain advertisers in the coming weeks and months. With Facebook needing to fight for advertising dollars amid a global recession, its questionable actions could come back to bite it.

It now seems clear Facebook took the low road as it worked to maximize its revenue. Only time will tell whether any of this will affect its gigantic advertising empire.

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Facebook Knew Audience Metric Was Bogus for Years, Amended Lawsuit Claims - The Motley Fool

The founder and CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg speaks during the 56th Munich Security Conference in Munich, southern Germany, on February 15, 2020.

Christof Stache | AFP | Getty Images

Facebook has introduced new paid time off programs that will allow employees to take up to a month away from work to care for sick relatives in light of the coronavirus outbreak, a spokeswoman for the company told CNBC on Monday.

"Facebook understands we are in uncharted territory with the COVID-19 pandemic," the spokeswoman said in a statement. "We want to support our people with navigating their needs during this time. Therefore, we have launched a number of initiatives forour employees and their families."

Among these initiatives is a paid emergency care leave program that offers 30 working days of leave to employees who need to care for a sick family member, or if they need to travel to another country or state to care for a family member.

For shorter-term needs, Facebook is also offering paid admin leave, which gives employees 20 days of leave for caregiving that can be taken in one-day increments. Additionally, the company is offering flexibility to its employees in terms of work schedules, allowing them to "use alternative working hours or go offline in time chunks that work for them without taking" paid-time off, the spokeswoman said.

Since the outbreak of the coronavirus, Facebook has been one of the most proactive companies in terms of offering benefits and support to employees.

The company has sent the vast majority of its nearly 45,000 employees to work from home. It has also given them $1,000 bonuses to spend on their work-from-home setups and costs for childcare. Facebook has also offered its Portal video-calling devices to employees who request them. Additionally, the company has said it is going to give every employee "exceeds expectations" performance ratings for the first half of 2020. This will result in each employee receiving more than their full bonus for the six-month period.

Around the world, there are more than 367,400 cases of the coronavirus with at least 16,100 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University. In the U.S., there are at least 41,500 cases, with at least 499 deaths.

-- CNBC's Jennifer Elias contributed to this report.

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Facebook is offering employees up to a month of paid leave to care for sick family members - CNBC

The founder and CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg speaks during the 56th Munich Security Conference in Munich, southern Germany, on February 15, 2020.

Christof Stache | AFP | Getty Images

Facebook is reducing video streaming quality in Europe to avoid straining the internet, as more people are forced to stay at home due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The company said it would temporarily lower so-called bit rates which measure how much data is being transferred in the continent, following similar moves from YouTube, Netflix and Amazon.

"To help alleviate any potential network congestion during the #COVID19 crisis, we will temporarily reduce bit rates for videos on Facebook and Instagram in Europe," a spokesperson for the company tweeted late Sunday.

Thierry Breton, an EU industry official, has called on media platforms to switch their video streams to standard definition to help cope with the uptick in internet usage as more people work remotely due to the spread of COVID-19. People across the region are being told to stay at home and adhere to social distancing measures with some countries in total lockdown to curb the spread of the deadly disease.

Disney has also committed to reducing strain on the web in Europe by lowering bandwidth utilization for its soon-to-be-launched streaming service, Disney+, by at least 25%. Streaming video can account for over 60% of data transmitted from internet providers to consumers.

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Facebook joins YouTube and Netflix in reducing video quality in Europe amid virus pandemic - CNBC

Its emerging as one of the more promising and potentially controversial ideas to slow the spread of the coronavirus: collecting smartphone data to track where people have gone and who theyve crossed paths with.

The White House has discussed the notion, and several companies are reportedly in talks with the Trump administration to share aggregated user data. Researchers in the U.K. are working on one such app, and a team led by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is building another, with an eye toward protecting user privacy. China and South Korea developed their own smartphone surveillance systems to try to clamp down on their own outbreaks, though their approaches likely wouldnt be palatable in countries with greater expectations of privacy.

Then theres Facebook, which collects data from its users around the world who opt in to sharing their location when using its smartphone app. Facebook does not share this information with governments. But in recent weeks, the social media giant has been sharing these data in aggregated and anonymized form with academic and nonprofit researchers analyzing the spread of the coronavirus.

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Among the universities where Covid-19 researchers are harnessing Facebooks data: the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan, University of Pavia in Italy, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

The idea is to study where people move and how often they encounter each other, in the hope of better understanding the virus spread and which places are likely to soon see a spike in cases.

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We aggregate up all of the signals into a picture of flows of people and then the likelihood that groups of people from a neighborhood or a town are going to come into contact with groups of people from a nearby neighborhood or town, said Laura McGorman, policy lead for Facebooks Data for Good team, which is sharing the data with Covid-19 researchers as part of its yearold Disease Prevention Maps program.

For example, a researcher might use Facebooks tool to estimate the probability that residents of Prince Georges County, Md., and Washington, D.C. a popular commuting route will encounter each other. Researchers can also rank the communities with which, say, Prince Georges County residents are most likely to come into contact.

Facebooks data offers researchers a significant advantage compared to many traditional transportation datasets, the most readily accessible of which measure connectivity between states and countries. Datasets like Facebooks that reflect movement between or even within counties are rarer.

In addition to the user location data, the Disease Prevention Maps tool also pulls in other data from other non-Facebook sources, including modeled census data and satellite imagery. Facebook is sharing the data with academics under a license and at no charge.

Facebook has not disclosed how many of its 2.5 billion users share their location with the company on their smartphones. But the data is highly variable by country.

Depending on where you are in the world, it can either be a very representative sample probably rather representative for a place like California but not so representative if youre trying to look at the spread of something like Ebola in the DRC, where we probably have very few people with smartphones using Facebook with location history enabled, McGorman said.

Facebooks data is beginning to show up in projects and papers about the coronavirus.

In a working paper released on March 10 that has not yet been peer-reviewed, researchers in Seattle tried to project scenarios about how many cases Washington states King and Snohomish counties will have by April 7. They cited Facebooks data, noting that the dataset showed a stable 50% reduction in incoming traffic to Seattle and a nearby suburban area over a span of several days as residents had increasingly stayed home.

Facebooks data is also proving helpful to Direct Relief, a Southern California-based nonprofit focused on mobilizing medical resources to help people in crisis situations. The group has been working on Covid-19 response since the end of January, first in China and now increasingly at U.S. health centers.

Andrew Schroeder, Direct Reliefs vice president of research and analysis, said his nonprofit is using Facebooks data to better understand population movement and in turn, inform decisions about resource allocation in free clinics, community health centers, and intensive care units.

One of Direct Reliefs goals, Schroeder said, is to make sure that we can get resources in place for where the risks are likely to be most significant and were pretty convinced thats going to be a pretty localized and uneven phenomenon.

So it really, really helps to have these types of disaggregated spatial movement pictures, he added.

Shenyue Jia was already familiar with Facebooks data. The researcher at Chapman University in Southern California had previously used it to study the risk of wildfires in California; that was under a related Facebook program known as Disaster Maps started in 2017. Now, Jia is using Facebooks data to analyze movement between communities affected by Covid-19 outbreaks with the goal of providing useful insights for public health workers trying to determine which interventions can have the biggest impact.

Jia recently built an interactive map of Hong Kong visualizing the commercial center known as Causeway Bay, as well as the strength of its connections with other neighborhoods. That work makes clear that distance matters and also the strength of the link matters, she said.

These days, Jia is focusing her efforts on using the data to study the escalating situation in the U.S.

In sharing such aggregated data with academics and nonprofits, Facebook has not been hit with widespread privacy concerns. Thats a welcome change for the company: Over the past few years, Facebook has struggled with a series of privacy controversies, most notably the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which a political firm harvested raw data from millions of Facebook profiles.

If more tech companies start sharing their user data with authorities to aid the fight against Covid-19, they may face pushback from critics concerned that the government would be tracking the movements of individuals. The size of that backlash may hinge on whether individuals can be identified in the datasets, where that information gets stored, and whether users have a say about whether their data gets passed over to officials.

In the coming days, other companies might also start sharing their troves of location data in some form. In a statement last week, a Google spokesperson said the company is exploring ways that aggregated anonymized location information could help in the fight against Covid-19. For example, the spokesperson said, such data could be used in helping health authorities determine the impact of social distancing, similar to the way we show popular restaurant times and traffic patterns in Google Maps.

The Google spokesperson added that the work would follow our stringent privacy protocols and would not involve sharing data about any individuals location, movement, or contacts.

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Can location data from smartphones help slow the spread of coronavirus? - STAT