British Teenagers Prefer TikTok Over TV, While YouTube Dominates American Teenage Users

The nature of content consumption has changed considerably these past few years, and there are two apps in particular that have contributed to this trend. The first of these apps is YouTube, with the video streaming platform quickly becoming a hub for content that is often available free of charge. YouTube also connects viewers directly to content creators and enables influencers to monetize their content by selling merchandise and receiving other forms of direct financial support.

Another app that has changing how people consume content is TikTok, and with all of that having been said and now out of the way it is important to note that the majority of British teenagers apparently prefer the short form content app to watching television. A study conducted by the British media regulator Ofcom showed that people between the ages of 15 and 24 spend 57 minutes a day watching content on TikTok, which is four minutes more than the same demographic spends watching TV shows.

What’s new in the nation’s media habits? Our study today found…🧵

📺 TV viewing among younger generations has fallen by two-thirds in 10 years to 53 mins per day

📈 TikTok reaches 35% of adults and 66% of 15-24s online.

🕐 Young adults spend almost an hour on TikTok each day

— Ofcom (@Ofcom) August 17, 2022

Additionally, streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime are replacing TV among younger users. These companies have seen their revenues increase by 27% year over year which is increasing the rate of cable cutting in the UK and other regions with all things having been considered and taken into account.

Coming back to YouTube, a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center showed the 95% of teenagers based in the US watch YouTube daily. Only 67% use TikTok, which suggests that the new app might not have the same level of dominance in America as it does in various other parts of the world.

Two apps that used to be really popular are Facebook and Twitter, but in spite of the fact that this is the case they have both seen dramatic declines in usage among younger demographics. Facebook’s usage has dropped from 71% in 2015 to just 36% in 2022, and Twitter’s decline, though less severe, is still concerning with it going from 33% to 23% in the same period. Teenagers are preferring different apps from older generations which might impact the social media landscape.

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by Zia Muhammad via Digital Information World

VPNs See Increased Popularity Among Russians in 2022

A virtual private network might seem gimmicky to those that live in nations with free internet access and no unnecessary restrictions, but in spite of the fact that this is the case it can be a useful tool for people who are suffering under authoritarian regimes. It turns out that Russians are using VPNs much more frequently in 2022 because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up helping them circumvent government attempts to restrict access to sites that might reveal the truth to their citizens.

The first half of 2022 is proving to be a watershed for VPNs. In 2021, it was estimated that around 3% to 9% of the Russian populations utilized VPNs. With all of that having been said and now out of the way, it is important to note that this proportion has increased to just under 24% in 2022, or 23.94% to be precise. 35 million Russians downloaded VPNs in the past six months with all things having been considered and taken into account.

A major event that might have sparked increased VPN usage among Russians is the blocking of social media sites in Russia following the invasion of Ukraine. Facebook and Instagram were both banned, so many Russians took to VPNs to maintain their connection with their social profiles.

Ukraine is also seeing rising VPN usage, joining the top ten rankings in 2022 with a market penetration of 9.62%. The country with the highest level of VPN usage is the UAE with 25.72% market penetration, although this oil rich nation has seen fewer users relying on them. In 2020, the majority of UAE residents, 61.61%, used VPNs due to the highly restricted nature of the web in that country. This has decreased a lot over the past two years.

The top ten list of VPN using countries contains a smattering of Middle Eastern nations, with Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Ukraine rounding off the bottom of the list and also being the only European nations in it. Russia is only surpassed by Qatar and the UAE in terms of VPN usage.

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by Zia Muhammad via Digital Information World

Enforcing Data Privacy Can Increase Revenues According to This Survey

Data privacy has become a hot button issue because of the fact that this is the sort of thing that could potentially end up ensuring that personal user data doesn’t end up in the wrong hands. TripleBlind recently did a survey that showed the financial benefits that firms could obtain by emphasizing improved privacy for all of their users. According to this survey, 94% of Chief Data Officers had the opinion that data privacy could boost their revenues for the quarter.

It is estimated that 25 billion gigabytes of data is generated each and every day with all things having been considered and taken into account. Businesses that receive this data have a duty to manage it responsibly, and with all of that having been said and now out of the way it is important to note that a majority of CDOs felt that proper data regulation protocols could help them become more competitive in the market.

Some experts suggest that privacy enhancing technology might allow businesses to share data without harming their profit margins, but in spite of the fact that this is the case CDOs seem hesitant to take the risk. Around 60% of CDOs stated that collaborators might be tempted to modify the data that they receive, and since they don’t have control over how they use the data they might prefer to keep it on their own servers instead of spreading it around.

This is an especially big concern for healthcare providers, with 86% of them raising concerns about how such sensitive data might be used if it is shared. However, one industrial sector that is a bit more positive about data sharing is the finance niche. Over half of respondents who work in this field felt that they could improve revenues by as much as 20% by sharing data, although they are in the minority when we take a wider view that incorporates various other sectors.

This goes to show that prioritizing user data is in a company’s own best interests, and it is rare to find consumer regard and the bottom line coinciding so perfectly.

Read next: Study shows shoppers are more likely to buy products from brands that offer a personalized experience
by Zia Muhammad via Digital Information World

YouTube is Trying Out A New Feature On The App That Will Help You In Navigating New Content

YouTube is trying out a new feature on the app that will help you explore new content according to your preference. Right now YouTube is only testing this feature that will replace the explore page with a navigation panel that will recommend you new content. When you click on the explore button on the top left side of your screen, a lot of recommended videos in different categories show up.

But when this explore button will change into a navigation panel that will show you videos in different categories such as trending, music, movies, sports, etc. only. This means you will not get random videos on the explore page, but instead only the categories from where you can choose what to watch.

YouTube will also change the way you will open the navigation panel. Right now, to explore different videos you have to click the "explore" button on the top of the app. But YouTube will change it into a three horizontal bars button and you can either click on it or swipe from the left towards your right to get to it. This navigation panel will only function when you are on the home page.

When you open the navigation panel, you will see different categories being lined up. They consist of trending, music, movies, live, gaming, and sports. You will have to click on them to see videos of the relevant category. This feature will be initially available on YouTube for android. The users are yet to say anything about this feature as it is not available for use now and is only being tested by UI on android.

As YouTube is one of the best apps on android, YouTube is also working on other features that will make their users' experiences on the app more fun. The final decision to make this feature permanent on the app will only be based on users' remarks. YouTube is hoping for a good response as they have many other new features up their sleeves. Last month, YouTube also added a "looping a video chapter" on the app and another thing they added was the "video zoom feature" for its premium users. This feature lets users zoom the video up to 8 times.

H/T: AC / Telegram

Read next: YouTube Launches Automated Watermarks For Shorts Content To Limit Reposts On Other Apps
by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Snapchat’s paid service sees a drop in August after a successful debut a month before

A few days earlier, Snap Inc. launched a premium subscription service for its users to avail extraordinary features within Snapchat. Since the launch of Snapchat plus (paid service) in late June, it has recorded over a million users in just six weeks. This is exceptional in terms of revenue and the amount is quite affordable that everyone can pay. Right now, per month subscription charges of Snapchat + are 3.99 dollars.

Moving on forward, the app intelligence platform, Appfigures estimated 634,000 dollars of net revenue in just one day, and surprisingly, the revenue reached approximately 7 million dollars in its initial month. After one-time subscription consumers have to repeatedly pay in the coming months to avail of the service. So, according to Appfigures, the revenue hit only $300,000 in August. Comparing the figures from July when the revenue crossed 600,000 dollars it can be said that the peak is no more.

The exact cause of such low figures is not known. However, Snapchat+ is an opportunity for people to enjoy the amazing features of the app. For instance, it enables you to see who rewatched your Snap stories and allows you to change the app icon as well. Furthermore, some handy features are also ready to be rolled out for the paid subscribers which includes story replies, enabling Snapchatters' response more prominent when replying to the stories of public figures (Snap Stars). In addition to it, unique backgrounds, and new and improved Bitmoji characters are also on the way to providing an amazing app experience. Among many other features, the most important one is the launch of Snapchat for desktop, especially designed features for paid subscribers.

Above all, Snapchat Plus is a bundle of diversified features for users and with the paid service, Snapchat aims to generate more revenue than it did ever before. Still, the month isn’t over yet, but looking at the growth of revenue trend in the previous month, revenue had significantly dropped after that peak, so it won’t be difficult to predict that the rest of August would make a difference.

Well, this is certainly not a piece of shocking news for Snap as the initial month of a new service seems appealing to most people and to be very honest it’s not that costly due to which it got so much attention from those who are just curious about this. So, let’s hope in a couple of months, Snapchat will get more subscribers and more people will renew the service once they are used to the features that are exclusively provided to the paid users.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Snapchat has conducted a survey on what internet privacy means to users on the internet

The internet is a vast place full of opinions, points of view, and judgments. On the internet, a user is subjected to all of them and thrust into their world. On social media apps like Snapchat people are even more variations of the internet and try to maintain privacy settings over their socials so that they can avoid the scrutiny of their peers.

The new rise of private groups on WhatsApp and Facebook provides a testament to this. Also, on Instagram people have started using IG Direct more than tagging people in comments or stories.

With all this happening it makes sense for most of the sharing to go on behind the scenes rather than being the star of the show. But, the real question that comes up is what exactly are the privacy apprehensions of users, and what are the exact key tension points for the users?

Snap Inc. set out to find the answer to this question with their new survey in which more than 13,519 daily social media users were questioned across 11 different markets that belonged to the age group of 13-40.

According to the data released in the report, the key findings of the study were;

77% of respondents consider online privacy as important, while only 72% of respondents are happy with the current level of online privacy that our fav social media apps have to offer.

90% of social media users have it as a priority that the apps they use care about their privacy while they engage on their platform.

Last but not the least, the platform should release features that help the users communicate better all while still having some control as to what information of theirs is available is a huge factor in building the company-consumer trust bridge.

Read next: 7 in 10 consumers feel uncomfortable if their online activity gets leaked to someone they are familiar with
by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World

Microsoft’s Bing Says It Comes Across Billions Of ‘Unseen URLs’ On A Daily Basis

A new report by Fabrice Canel has gone on to shed light on a very interesting finding regarding Bing. And that’s related to how it manages to come across billions of unseen URLs on a daily basis.

That’s clearly a significant amount of new URLs for anyone to notice in just one day, what do you think?

However, the world wide web is huge and there is plenty of content out there. It’s not necessary that everything you see is of the same standard. Some are definitely far more superior than others and that’s why you’ll even find junk, AI content, gibberish, and just things that no longer make sense anymore.

The news was explained through Fabrice’s Twitter social media handle, which claims that most of these types of content are beyond useless. He even went about enlisting examples that comprise duplicated material, things scraped upon the surface and those things that are simply generated through automated means.

Some of the URLs pertain to spam, junk, and more. And while Bing Searches are definitely coming across billions of such URLs on a daily basis, we’ve got great doubts on whether or not it actually indexes them or not at all.

Fabrice agrees that most of it is pretty useless and as you can expect, the news did manage to get plenty of viewers commenting on how Bing struggles with regular tasks and this would only make things worse.

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by Dr. Hura Anwar via Digital Information World