Casey Newton | Vox

Seven ways Obama can get the most out of joining LinkedIn

2016-06-20T22:54:56-04:00

There are just 213 days before Barack Obama leaves the White House, and our 44th president is turning his thoughts to the future. “In seven months or so, I’ll be on the job market,” he said at an economic summit today in Washington, according to The Hill. “And I’m glad I’m going to be here. I’m going to get on LinkedIn and see what comes up.” Everyone had a good laugh over that one, but what if Obama is serious? The ultimate thought leader on the ultimate professional network?

No one should join LinkedIn without a guide — particularly someone whose internet browsing time has been severely limited over the past eight years. With that in mind, we’ve put together a handful of tips for getting the most out of Microsoft’s new $26 billion employee directory.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Facebook considers letting users add a tip jar to make money from posts

2019-03-06T05:09:29-05:00

Facebook is exploring new ways for individual users to profit from their posts on the network, The Verge has learned. A user survey distributed this week hints at a broad range of ways that users could make money or promote a cause, including a tip jar, branded content and taking a cut of the ad revenue Facebook earns from posts. The survey also asked users to indicate their interest in a “call to action” button, a way to let followers make donations and a “sponsor marketplace” to match users with advertisers. It’s unclear whether Facebook is considering making these options available to all users; the language of the survey indicated it is targeted at verified users. The survey was spotted on the page of a verified user with a relatively small following. (Okay, it was me.)

Facebook does not currently offer individual users a way to earn money by posting on Facebook. It has allowed publishers to sell advertising inside its fast-loading Instant Articles format, and recently clarified rules allowing posts sponsored by brands to be shared by verified pages. Facebook is also testing ads within the suggestions that pop up after you watch a video, sharing money with publishers. But recently, the company has taken steps to make its publishing tools more widely available. In February, the company began letting anyone publish Instant Articles. “It’s still very early, but we’re committed to creating sustainable, long-term monetization models for our partners, and we’re listening to feedback,” a Facebook spokeswoman told The Verge.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Facebook swipes Regina Dugan, Google’s advanced research head, to lead a new hardware division

2019-03-06T05:36:41-05:00

Facebook is planning to invest hundreds of millions of dollars into building new hardware, the company said today, and it has hired a star to lead the effort: Regina Dugan, who leads the Advanced Technologies and Projects Group at Google. Dugan will lead the new group, to be called Building 8. She was previously the director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, where she focused on creating breakthrough technologies. Since 2012 she has worked at Google, developing technologies including tech-infused fabrics, modular smartphones and Project Tango.

Facebook provided few details about Building 8’s focus, other than to say it will develop “new hardware products to advance our mission of connecting the world.” Dugan will develop hardware powered by Facebook software, complementing the work of Facebook’s artificial intelligence and virtual reality divisions, the company said.

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Here are Dugan and Dennis Woodside, who headed Motorola under Google, being interviewed by Walt Mossberg at the D11 conference in 2013.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Google Is Making a Keyboard for the iPhone

2019-03-06T05:38:20-05:00

Google has been developing a third-party keyboard for iOS that would put the company’s search engine in a highly used part of the interface, The Verge has learned. The keyboard, which incorporates a variety of search options, has been in development for months, according to people familiar with the matter. It’s unclear whether or when Google plans to release it. The company declined to comment.

The Google keyboard incorporates a number of features meant to distinguish it from the stock iOS keyboard. Like its Android counterpart, the Google keyboard for iOS employs gesture-based typing, so you can slide your finger from one letter to the next and let Google guess your intended word. Tap the Google logo and you can access traditional Web search. It also appears to have distinct buttons for pictures and GIF searches, both presumably powered by Google image search.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Life and Death in the App Store

2019-03-06T05:15:25-05:00

As last year began, the app developer Pixite held its company retreat at a converted Old West movie set outside of Palm Springs. They spent a few days dreaming about the future while eating barbecue and sipping whisky in the sun. But 2015 was not a good year, and by last month the company’s dreams had narrowed to survival. This year’s retreat took place at the company’s office in San Diego, a handful of rooms perched above a hair salon. The printer was broken, so the agenda was distributed by email.

“I’m sorry it’s called a retreat and we’re still in the office,” says Eugene Kaneko, one of the company’s co-founders, as the daylong meeting begins. The company’s six employees frown at their laptops, where the numbers in a Google Doc chart a steady decline. “If money were better, we’d be in the desert. Unfortunately — that’s not the case.”

Since Kaneko founded the company with Scott Sykora in 2009, Pixite has released eight applications dedicated to photo editing and design. Each has been featured by Apple as a Best New App; photo editor Tangent and design tool Assembly won year-end awards from Apple. Between 2013 and 2014, downloads of Pixite apps jumped from 395,472 to 3.1 million, and annual revenue doubled to $943,000. Pixite grew along with its cash flow, expanding from two to six employees as it explored ways to link its apps together and grow a loyal base of customers.

Then the bottom fell out. Last year downloads flattened, and Pixite’s revenues plunged by a third, to $629,000. Suddenly, a company that needed to bring in $2,000 a day to break even found itself making $1,000 or less. Pixite has no reserves of venture capital to fall back on; aside from a $50,000 seed investment from a Carnegie Mellon fund for alumni entrepreneurs, Pixite has funded itself.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Here’s How Twitter’s New Algorithmic Timeline Is Going to Work

2019-03-06T05:11:37-05:00

Twitter went into an uproar Friday after a BuzzFeed report that the social network was on the brink of tossing its traditional timeline for a Facebook-style feed. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey tried to calm fears this morning in a series of tweets, but he did not deny the substance of the report. High-profile users have threatened to abandon the service, and the changes reportedly could arrive as soon as this week. The Verge has now seen the redesigned timeline and can share new details about how it’s going to work.

So, how will your new Twitter timeline look? With the caveat that some things could change in the final shipping version: A lot like the old timeline.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Twitter’s Updated Mac App Wasn’t Made by Twitter

2019-03-06T06:07:31-05:00

Twitter’s oft-neglected app for Mac got a much-needed update today, adding support for inline GIFs, videos, quote-tweets and other features that mobile users have had for ages. But while many users were glad to see the app getting attention, others criticized it for performance issues: Laggy scrolling, the new-notification dot failing to disappear after clicking and login issues. If the app doesn’t appear to be totally in harmony with Twitter’s efforts on mobile apps, here’s one possible reason: Twitter didn’t build it.

Development of the Mac app was outsourced to a third-party developer, said Jonathan Wight, a former Twitter employee, in a tweet. The Verge confirmed that the app’s development was outsourced with other people familiar with the matter. One of those people said the developer is Black Pixel, a well-regarded digital studio based in Seattle. Black Pixel’s other clients have included ESPN, Starbucks and the New York Times, according to its website.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Yahoo Finally Relaunches Messenger as an App Aimed at Families and Groups

2019-03-06T06:06:25-05:00

When Marissa Mayer became CEO of Yahoo in 2012, one of her first tasks was to modernize the company’s suite of mobile apps. The company brought hundreds of engineers into its then-tiny mobile division, and then lavished attention on its most-used apps. Weather, Flickr, Mail and the flagship Yahoo app all received significant overhauls, and combined with the acquisition of Tumblr pushed Yahoo to be able to claim one billion mobile users every month. But one big product never got that upgrade, even as its category exploded in popularity around the world. This spring, Yahoo Messenger was pulled from app stores.

Today it’s coming back. Yahoo Messenger, as the app is still called, is launching on Android, iOS, and the Web. You can also find it inside Yahoo Mail, where it pops up as a Gmail-style talk widget. When you log in to the app using your Yahoo account, you’ll find a clean, modern messaging app with a couple of nice twists.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Twitter Is Testing Multiple Emoji Reactions to Tweets

2019-03-06T05:44:24-05:00

The heart’s reign of terror as the only emoji-based reaction to a tweet may be coming to an end.

Twitter user _Ninji noticed the ability to select multiple emoji from the heart, including the frown, the grimace, the party noisemaker and the 100. “I can’t believe they’re finally letting me (100) tweets,” _Ninji wrote. A screenshot showed three full tabs of possible reactions.

In response to questions from The Verge, the user said the emoji reactions were part of a developer build accessed through a jailbroken version of the app, and that the feature seemed far from complete. Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Google Tests Who’s Down, an App for Broadcasting Your Total Alienation

2019-03-06T06:04:52-05:00

You’re a teen, and you’re down. But how is anybody else supposed to know that? Enter Who’s Down, a new invite-only app from up-and-coming social networking company Google, Inc. The app, which is more or less a direct rip of Danny Trinh’s Free, lets you broadcast your down-ness to fellow teens by tapping a toggle to signal your immediate availability for whatever. If your friends continue ignoring you, you can invite them to specific categories of hangouts, either by choosing from a Google recommendation (“Anyone down to grab tacos?”) or proposals of your own (Netflix and chill?)

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This article originally appeared on Recode.net.