Social media platforms are bringing in new features to push the agenda of staying at home among their users. Facebook-owned Instagram, for instance, has launched a new feature that will let its users view Instagram posts along with their friends over a video chat.
Called ¡®Co-watching¡¯, the new feature is meant to help friends stay connected over the app during the Coronavirus lockdown. Those interested can start a video chat with their friends using the video chat icon in their Direct message inbox. Once the video call begins, users can view saved, liked, or suggested photos and videos by simply tapping the photo icon in the bottom left corner of the ongoing video chat.
In addition to Co-watching, Instagram has also brought in new stickers for Instagram stories. These stickers enable users to share recommended practices around the fight against COVID-19 with their peers through the Instagram stories. The stickers range from reminders to wash hands, stay at home and maintain a social distance to work from home gifs. A simple search for Corona or Coronavirus in the stickers gallery will bring up all these stickers and gifs, ready to use.
On a serious note, the photo-sharing app is also working towards removing any fake information through posts, stories and misleading ads found on the platform around the virus outbreak. The fight against fake news is a part of a global agenda for online platforms. Read about what Facebook, Google and others are doing for the same here.
In a recent blog post, Instagram also mentioned its efforts towards providing the right information to its users. ¡°Over the past few weeks we've added a notice at the top of feed for countries affected by COVID-19. The notice includes reliable resources from expert health organisations. In addition, we've been highlighting resources from these organisations when people view related hashtags,¡± the blog post reads.
Interestingly, Instagram has also enabled its Donation sticker to more countries to let its users across the globe donate funds to nonprofits organisations in the fight against COVID-19. In addition, the app has promised to lower the quality of videos on it to lessen the already heightened burden on Internet bandwidth across the globe.??
Instagram is not the only platform to have brought in changes catered to fight the ongoing pandemic. WhatsApp recently tied up with the World Health Organisation to launch a bot based messaging service for its users to get the accurate information on COVID-19. Similarly, Facebook partnered a deal with developers to provide their service to such government organisations to create an app or a platform for the spread of credible information on the Coronavirus.
As the global struggle continues, tech giants have taken their responsibility whole heartedly and it is good to see such endeavours being pursued for the larger good through such platforms. To their users, a simple appeal is to stick to the verified sources of information and of course, follow the guidelines to stay safe.