It's All Fun And Games Until Someone Gets Hurt... Then It's A Job
Facebook has activated it’s Safety Check feature for the Orlando Mass Shooting that occurred at the Pulse nightclub.
Based on my friends who marked themselves as “safe” the feature appears to have been active as early as 11:30am EDT, but may have been activated earlier. You can see the page and check on the status of your own friends by clicking here.
Yesterday Facebook launched Reactions, an upgrade to the “Like” button. In addition to the traditional Thumbs Up “Like“, there are now Heart “Love“, Smiley “Haha“, Smiley “Wow“, Smiley “Sad“, and Smiley “Angry” to properly convey your emotional feelings towards the post.
Reactions are accessible by hovering your mouse over the “Like” button on the desktop platform or pressing down and holding the “Like” button for mobile.
I expect that engagement with content rates will dramatically increase. This is the time for content creators to run a gamut of different posts and see the types of Reactions they get with each type of content. With that knowledge, you can start gearing your creation towards the reactions you want to evoke.
As of right now every Reaction will be considered the same as a “Like” was for engagement purposes. This will undoubtedly change over time and analysis by Facebook. It could mean that one day when you “Love” something Facebook will show you more of it, while if you show that you are “Sad” then you may see less of it. On one hand I think that’s a great way to have a more positive Facebook experience, but then on the other hand I don’t necessarily want my feed to be all kittens and rainbows.
Let me know what you think about the new Reactions in the comments and please, as always, “Love” this post…
For the second time in less than one week Facebook has activated the network’s Safety Check feature.
The last activation was on 11/13 for the Paris Terrorist Attacks.
I’m glad to see Facebook recognizing that Safety Check is actually an asset and spending time on further developing it as well as the criteria for its deployment. I hope they either release what that criteria will be or reach out to the Emergency Management community to see what they should focus on.
While I could hope that it would be used on a more granular level for localized events, I realize that right now it will only be truly useful for high-level events. With over 1.5 billion reported active users, Facebook has truly become a global entity despite the localization of our news feeds.
Gizmodo has a look at Facebook’s Safety Check deployment during the 11/13 Paris Attacks.
An easy way from Facebook to tell people you're safe
Posted by io9 on Friday, November 13, 2015
At just over a year old, Facebook Safety Check was originally trumpeted as a tool for natural disasters. The use of it during a terrorist attack as vast as this still only appears to be is a natural evolution of the product.
The only drawback to this toolset is it seems to depend on Facebook for deployment. I would really like to see the set of criteria an event needs to meet in order for it to be activated. I think that the other social networks would benefit from developing either similar systems or… and here’s a novel idea… maybe they could all work together on one “I’m Safe” check-in system.
Although there has been a lot of talk and hype regarding a decline in both usage and users, Facebook remains as a common place that people turn to in times of disaster to check on loved ones whether they have been active or dormant on the network. With this in mind they have launched a new feature called “Safety Check“ for all users.
During a major disaster, Safety Check will help you:
- Let friends and family know you’re safe
- Check on others in the affected area
- Mark your friends as safe
Only your friends will see your safety status and the comments you share.
Check out the video…
This is really the kind of toolset that we like to see Social Networks create. It’s fundamentally simplistic, solves a problem, and does so with a minimal barrier to entry. The only real caveat here is whether or not you have internet service in the disaster area.
Despite the privacy issues, data collection, and general creepiness the social network offers regularly this kind of occasional feature provides a real value… just so long as you don’t mind sharing your location with said creepers….