SOCIAL
Reddit Launches Enhanced Video Tools, Announces Shutdown of Dubsmash

Reddit has announced that it will shut down the separate Dubsmash app, which it acquired last December, as it looks to merge the creative functionalities of Dubsmash into Reddit itself, and lean further into video engagement.
Dubsmash, which will still be available till February, enables users to create videos aligned with music clips, including effects and filters which can help your clips stand out in user feeds.

Reddit’s now looking to build those tools into the Reddit camera, with a view to capitalizing on rising video engagement in the app.
Indeed, Reddit notes that:
“To date this year (January 2021 to November 2021), video content has soared on Reddit. We’ve seen nearly 70% growth in overall hours watched, and a more than 30% increase in daily active video viewers.”
In addition to this, Reddit says that it’s seen a 50% increase in quarter-over-quarter short video viewership via its new, TikTok-like video feed option.

Given broader content consumption trends, it’s no surprise to see video rising on Reddit as well, and now, with the merging of Dubsmash, Redditors will get a new set of video creation and editing tools for use in the app.
The updated Reddit camera will provide recording speed options, video timers, the capacity to upload clips in both landscape and portrait mode, as well as new clipping options.
Reddit’s also adding its first AR lenses, featuring ‘Bread Cat’ and ‘Snoo’ effects.

Users will also be able to add stickers, use drawing tools and add voiceovers to their clips, expanding the creative options for Reddit videos.

Which could help to further improve video engagement in the app, and better align it with the latest trends – an important step as users continue to gravitate towards enhanced video engagement.
And while Reddit’s AR options are relatively basic at this stage, it may be just as relevant that the platform simply keeps up with the evolving AR landscape, which is set to become a much bigger consideration once fully-functional AR glasses become available sometime in the next two years.
That will also align with the rising metaverse shift, merging our physical and digital worlds.
No one knows exactly how that will work just yet, but AR looks set to play a key part, and the introduction of its own AR features will ensure that Reddit remains connected as this element evolves.
But for Dubsmash users, time will soon be up. The app, at one stage, was facilitating over a billion video views per month, and has been particularly popular among underrepresented communities.
Now, they’ll have to move over to Reddit instead, or find another app more aligned with their interests.
But that loss is Reddit’s gain, as it enhances its video tools to facilitate further growth in this area.
Reddit users can access the new camera features on both iOS and Android from today.
SOCIAL
TikTok spends $1.5B on Tokopedia JV to get around Jakarta social e-commerce ban

Just two months ago, ByteDance-owned TikTok abruptly closed its shopping platform in Indonesia to comply with surprise regulations from the Southeast Asian country’s government. Jakarta ordered social media companies like TikTok and Facebook to stop selling goods on their platforms, demanding a separation of social media and e-commerce services.
TikTok now seems to have found a way to revive its e-commerce dreams in Indonesia by spending billions to start a joint venture with Indonesian tech giant GoTo. On Monday, the two companies announced that TikTok Shop will now be available on GoTo’s Tokopedia platform.
“Tokopedia and TikTok Shop Indonesia’s businesses will be combined under the existing PT Tokopedia entity in which TikTok will take a controlling stake. The shopping features within the TikTok app in Indonesia will be operated and maintained by the enlarged entity,” TikTok said in a statement Monday.
TikTok will invest over $1.5 billion into Tokopedia, taking a 75% stake in the platform. GoTo will remain an ecosystem partner to Tokopedia and receive an “ongoing revenue stream from Tokopedia commensurate with its scale and growth,” but will not be required to continue funding the platform. Further funding from TikTok also won’t reduce GoTo’s remaining 25% stake.
Getting back into the Indonesian ecommerce market will be a win for TikTok. Indonesia, which is the platform’s largest market outside of the U.S., is key to Tiktok’s online shopping aspirations. In June, CEO Shou Zi Chew pledged to “invest billions in Indonesia and Southeast Asia over the next few years.”
ByteDance wants to replicate its Chinese e-commerce successaround the globe. Last year, consumers spent in China 1.41 trillion yuan ($196 billion) on products sold on Douyin, the version of TikTok for the Chinese market, The Information reported in January. ByteDance, through TikTok, is expanding its online shopping services in both Southeast Asia and the U.S. Yet the company is struggling to win over American consumers: The Information reported in August that U.S. shoppers are spending just $4 million a day, equivalent to $1.4 billion over a whole year, on goods sold on the social media platform. (TikTok officially launched TikTok Shop in the U.S. in September, though sellers have complained about a flood of low-quality products on the platform).
Before Indonesia imposed its ban in September, the country’s president, Joko Widodo, complained that social media platforms were threatening local micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises. Government officials also accused TikTok of engaging in predatory pricing.
GoTo’s deal with TikTok means the Indonesian tech giant is giving up its majority ownership of Tokopedia . Tokopedia started in 2008 and grew to be one of Indonesia’s largest e-commerce platforms. The company merged with ride-hailing startup GoJek in 2021, becoming GoTo Group. The company debuted on Jakarta’s stock exchange in April last year.
Yet the company has struggled to wow investors since then. GoTo has yet to make a profit since becoming a public company. The tech firm reported 2.4 trillion Indonesian rupiah ($147 million) in net losses last quarter, significantly less than the 6.7 trillion rupiah ($428 million) it lost this time last year.
Investors do not appear to be thrilled by the news of GoTo’s TikTok partnership. Shares fell by over 19% by 2:30pm Indonesia time on Monday, erasing gains made late last week as rumors began to build of the new partnership.
SOCIAL
How to Train ChatGPT to Write in Your Brand’s Tone of Voice [Infographic]
![How to Train ChatGPT to Write in Your Brand’s Tone of Voice [Infographic] How to Train ChatGPT to Write in Your Brand’s Tone of Voice [Infographic]](https://articles.entireweb.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/1702266964_How-to-Train-ChatGPT-to-Write-in-Your-Brands-Tone.jpg)
Are you looking for ways to improve your ChatGPT output? Want to train it to write in a more unique tone of voice, in order to better suit your branding?
The Creative Marketer shares his ChatGPT prompt tips in this infographic. To enact these, add “Write like [INSERT CHARACTER]” at the start of your ChatGPT instructions.
TCM breaks things down into the following categories:
- Innocent
- Sage
- Explorer
- Ruler
- Creator
- Caregiver
- Lover
- Hero
- Everyman
- Magician
- Jester
- Outlaw
Check out the infographic for more information.
A version of this post was first published on the Red Website Design blog.
SOCIAL
Elon Musk reinstates far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on X

Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones has been reinstated on X, formerly known as Twitter, by company owner Elon Musk – Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File Joe Buglewicz
Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X, on Sunday reinstated far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on the social media platform, a year after vowing never to let him return.
Jones, who claimed that a December 2012 school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut that killed 20 children and six educators was a hoax, was banned from the platform — then still known as Twitter — in 2018 for violating its “abusive behavior policy.”
He was also sued by families of the victims of the Sandy Hook school shooting and ordered by a judge in the case to pay up more than a billion dollars in damages last year.
Musk had himself promised never to let the Infowars host back on the social media platform, which he bought last year for $44 billion.
But following a poll Musk conducted on X asking whether Jones should be reinstated, to which some two million users responded, he flipped that decision.
“I vehemently disagree with what he said about Sandy Hook, but are we a platform that believes in freedom of speech or are we not?” the SpaceX founder said on X.
But Shannon Watts, founder of the group Moms Demand Action group which pushes for tighter gun laws, said that “defamation is not free speech.”
Musk’s decision comes the same week that the Sandy Hook families commemorate the 11th anniversary of the December 14 shooting, which Jones alleged was staged to allow the government to crack down on gun rights.
Jones’ followers harassed the bereaved families for years, accusing parents of murdered children of being “crisis actors” whose children had never existed.
It also came a week after Musk had responded to advertisers pulling out of X because of far-right posts and hate speech, including an apparent endorsement by Musk himself of an anti-Semitic tweet.
Asked whether he would respond to the advertising exodus, Musk said in an interview with journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin that the advertisers could “go f*** yourself.”
Jones, who has a million followers on X, returned to the site with his first post re-tweeting Andrew Tate, the controversial former kickboxer facing rape and human trafficking charges in Romania, in which he hailed Jones’ “triumphant return”
US media reported that as of Sunday, the account of Jones’ controversial show Infowars was still banned.
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