By Gary Briggs, Chief Marketing Officer

Every day people use Facebook to share moments with their friends. Today we’re introducing a marketing program to invite people to share and talk about events and moments that are happening in their communities and around the world.

Messages from Facebook will appear at the top of News Feed about a specific event or moment. Our goal is to:

Give people ways to connect and share with friends during holidays and events Help people discover fun and interesting cultural moments Celebrate moments in history that continue to make the world more open and connected

Here are some recent examples of moments that we’ve shared with people in the US:

Share a Holiday Card

Starting today, people will see a message from Facebook in their News Feed wishing them Happy Holidays. People will be invited to share a holiday card with their friends on Facebook and choose from a set of 18 custom-designed cards.

We care about our community and want to make their experience more delightful with the launch of this program. We hope to give people new ways to connect and share and be informed about events and moments happening in the world around them.

This is just the beginning and we’ll continue to work to make these messages better for our community around the world.

Happy Holidays!

By Adam Mosseri, VP, News Feed

A few weeks ago we previewed some of the things we’re working on to address the issue of fake news and hoaxes. We’re committed to doing our part and today we’d like to share some updates we’re testing and starting to roll out.

We believe in giving people a voice and that we cannot become arbiters of truth ourselves, so we’re approaching this problem carefully. We’ve focused our efforts on the worst of the worst, on the clear hoaxes spread by spammers for their own gain, and on engaging both our community and third party organizations.

The work falls into the following four areas. These are just some of the first steps we’re taking to improve the experience for people on Facebook. We’ll learn from these tests, and iterate and extend them over time.

Easier Reporting
We’re testing several ways to make it easier to report a hoax if you see one on Facebook, which you can do by clicking the upper right hand corner of a post. We’ve relied heavily on our community for help on this issue, and this can help us detect more fake news.

Flagging Stories as Disputed
We believe providing more context can help people decide for themselves what to trust and what to share. We’ve started a program to work with third-party fact checking organizations that are signatories of Poynter’s International Fact Checking Code of Principles. We’ll use the reports from our community, along with other signals, to send stories to these organizations. If the fact checking organizations identify a story as fake, it will get flagged as disputed and there will be a link to the corresponding article explaining why. Stories that have been disputed may also appear lower in News Feed.

It will still be possible to share these stories, but you will see a warning that the story has been disputed as you share.

Once a story is flagged, it can’t be made into an ad and promoted, either.

Informed Sharing
We’re always looking to improve News Feed by listening to what the community is telling us. We’ve found that if reading an article makes people significantly less likely to share it, that may be a sign that a story has misled people in some way. We’re going to test incorporating this signal into ranking, specifically for articles that are outliers, where people who read the article are significantly less likely to share it.

Disrupting Financial Incentives for Spammers
We’ve found that a lot of fake news is financially motivated. Spammers make money by masquerading as well-known news organizations, and posting hoaxes that get people to visit to their sites, which are often mostly ads. So we’re doing several things to reduce the financial incentives. On the buying side we’ve eliminated the ability to spoof domains, which will reduce the prevalence of sites that pretend to be real publications. On the publisher side, we are analyzing publisher sites to detect where policy enforcement actions might be necessary.

It’s important to us that the stories you see on Facebook are authentic and meaningful. We’re excited about this progress, but we know there’s more to be done. We’re going to keep working on this problem for as long as it takes to get it right.

 

Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth provides development and non-profit community with crucial tools that can enhance planning efforts and increase impact.

Purchase, December 14, 2016 – For organizations reliant on individual contributions, there has been a lack of information that could enable a better understanding of how, when and where donations are made.  This information gap keeps organizations from being able to develop efficient and effective fundraising efforts. To help, the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth is issuing its first edition of Donation Insights—a report based on anonymized and aggregated transaction data that provides an analysis of current and historical donation trends. 

“We recognized that the Center can play a powerful role through data philanthropy, leveraging data analytics and capabilities to advance social progress,” said Shamina Singh, president of the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth. “With Donation Insights, social good organizations and researchers can now better understand the underlying factors that impact giving over time and plan accordingly.”

Some key insights include:

Individual donations made through electronic payments have steadily increased over the last five years and are up 6.4% year-to-date through September 2016. Environmental and animal-related causes have become more popular, while disease & medical research causes have been losing ground in recent years. Election years are tough on charities – as the share in political giving rises, the share in charitable giving declines

“Donation Insights represents a leap forward in our understanding of the what, how much, where, and why questions of charitable giving practices in the United States and is a testament to the role of using corporate data to address knowledge gaps that can have broad social impact,” said Shena Ashley, director Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy at The Urban Institute.

The Center is also making the underlying anonymized and aggregated dataset available to organizations and researchers interested in developing their own findings and welcomes any new insights for potential publication.

“Data such as this can be used to supercharge the work of social change-makers giving them new insights and tools to reach more people in need, strengthen communities and ultimately make greater impact on society’s toughest challenges,” stated Jake Porway, founder and executive director of DataKind, a nonprofit whose mission is to harness the power of data science for good.

About Donation Insights:

Donation Insights is a report based on anonymized and aggregated transaction data that can provide a better understanding as to when people give, what factors impact their giving, how they donate, and the regional breakdown of donations. To assist organizations, it includes indices for U.S. total donations and nine categories using the National Taxonomy of Exempt Entities (NTEE) system by leveraging anonymized and aggregated donation activity on the Mastercard payment network.  The research does not model up for all forms of payment, but does make adjustments based on estimates for share shifts within electronic payments. The Center is providing access to the dataset in addition to the report with a donation amount index, and year-over-year growth rates for the number of donations and average donation size by category. You can download the report and dataset HERE.

About the MasterCard Center for Inclusive Growth

The MasterCard Center for Inclusive Growth focuses on promoting equitable and sustainable economic growth and financial inclusion around the world. As an independent MasterCard subsidiary, it combines data, expertise and technology with philanthropic investments to empower a community of thinkers, leaders and innovators on the frontlines of inclusive growth.  Follow us on Twitter @CNTR4growth.

Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth Communications Contact
Ryan Erenhouse
914.249.3176
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Original author: Ryan Erenhouse

By: Stephane Taine, Product Manager, Messenger

As we close the year, we’re thrilled to launch the most requested Messenger feature ever – the ability to video chat in groups. Group Video Chat in Messenger makes it simple and seamless to stay connected face-to-face. Starting today, Group Video Chat is rolling out to Android and iOS devices, and the desktop version of Messenger, worldwide.

More and more people use messaging in groups for lots of different reasons like keeping everyone up to date, planning a family vacation or to share a few jokes. With 245 million people making video calls in Messenger every month, now we’re bringing everyone on Messenger the ability to turn group chats into face-to-face conversations no matter where you are – whether you’re down the street or halfway across the world. Chatting face-to-face live as a group is perfect for those spontaneous moments when text just isn’t enough… or when you have a major case of FOMO. It’s the best way to share the news you just got a job (or into college), have your kids wish grandma a happy birthday, tell a funny story to the people you love or just see your friends live while wearing fun 3D masks (iOS only for now – Android coming soon) to an everyday conversation.

Here’s how it works

Group Video Chat is super easy to use (and, of course, free over wifi!). You can see up to six people at a time … but don’t worry if your group is a little larger because up to 50 friends can join in and choose to just listen in and join via voice, or be on camera. Once more than 6 people are on the call, just the dominant speaker is shown to all participants.

To get started, you’ll need the latest version of Messenger. All you have to do is jump into an existing group conversation, or create a new one. Then tap on the video icon on the upper right of the screen to enter the video chat and everyone in the group will be notified. Each person can join when they are ready with just one tap. For an extra nudge, you can also directly ring just a few people or the whole group.

This is the time of year to tell our friends and family how much we care about them and send best wishes for the year ahead. We’re delighted to bring you the ability to chat face-to-face with those who matter to you most, wherever they are. We look forward to hearing what you think.

Fast Camera, Unique Art and 3D Special Effects

By Peter Martinazzi, Product Manager, Messenger

Today we are excited to launch a brand new, faster and easier-to-use camera with art and special effects to help make your conversations better than ever. Rolling out globally over the coming days, we hope you’ll be as happy as we are with the new experience in your favorite messaging app. We’ve seen that the way people are messaging is becoming much more visual. In fact, over 2.5 billion emojis, photos, stickers and videos are sent every day on Messenger.

In some ways the camera is now replacing the keyboard. As more people use Messenger in their everyday lives, we wanted to make it faster, simpler and more fun to send photos and videos — so we built the new Messenger camera.

What’s New?

It’s even quicker and easier to capture and share moments as they happen. Imagine the Messenger camera as a powerful new tool that lives just behind your inbox. It’s always one tap away — whether you’re already in a conversation or have just opened up the app. You will see the shutter button center in the screen (we’ve dressed it up for the holidays!) a tap takes photo, a long press records a video.

We’re also introducing a place to find new art and special effects. We are especially excited to debut 3D masks and special effects, which make it super easy to apply an artistic filter to your full screen photo and to turn your world into a work of art. Try them out — you can take a selfie and transform into a reindeer or play with falling snow or even just ask someone how they are doing — it’s the perfect way to spread a little happiness in your messages.

We’ve also added thousands of stickers, frames, masks and effects to choose from too — and you can personalize exactly how you use it. We’ve worked with artists and influencers all over the world and these artists have added their own touch to the customization tools you can now use in Messenger.

And there’s more! Unique to Messenger we’ve also created a place where you can make your text messages even more fun. Check out the palette icon by the shutter and it will take you to a blank canvas where you can add art and stickers to your text. We’re making it super easy to add more delight to the conversations you’re having about what you’re doing, how you’re feeling and the plans you are making.

Of course, if you just want to send a message with only text, you can still do that too. All of the features that you know and love in Messenger are just the same. We can’t wait to hear your thoughts about our new Messenger camera!

By Antigone Davis, Head of Global Safety

Today we are launching the Facebook Parents Portal, featuring new resources for parents on Facebook. Our goal is to help foster conversations among parents and their children about staying safe online. Visit the new site at facebook.com/safety/parents.

Keeping you and your information safe is at the core of everything we do. Whether you have a personal account or your teen does, we’ve compiled some basic information and tips to help you get the most out of your experience and help your child navigate theirs. We’re also pleased to connect you with online safety organizations around the world that offer additional resources specifically for parents.

The new site includes step-by-step videos and is available in over 55 languages around the world. We hope that you find these resources useful and that Facebook helps you and your children connect to the people and things that matter to you most.