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According to the most popular social media platform around the world, one out of five videos shared on its network are now Live videos. And as pointed out by Fidji Simo, the head of video at Facebook, the Live broadcasting watch time on a daily basis has increased four fold in the past twelve months.
Meerkat had sort of ignited the market for live video streaming about a couple of years ago, prompting other companies to join in on the fun, especially Twitter with its Periscope offering, and Facebook with Live. Fast forwarding to 2017, live video streaming has indeed caught on. But Facebook had to go through some challenges in the last few years, including investing a hundred million dollars to pay for broadcasters, launching an ambitious advertising campaign, and even dealing with untoward incidents related to live streaming.
Back in August of 2015, Facebook conducted the first trials of Live with various celebrities, and by January of the next year, it had expanded the feature to all iPhone devices in the United States. Along the way, it the social media giant discovered something interesting -- a full three fourths of all users of Live were either high school kids or college students. Facebook then recalibrated its focus in order to cater to this specific demographic, in the hopes of competing against Snapchat.
Facebook had attempted to acquire Snapchat a few years back, but no deal ever happened, and Facebook was forced to watch as Snapchat struck gold with its Stories feature. Although Facebook has since joined in on the Stories fun, many were thinking that it could never really catch up to Snapchat. But in terms of live video streaming, Facebook still has a decent chance of dominating.
Of course, there were some obstacles that needed to be dealt with. Perhaps the most obvious one was Twitter’s Periscope. Although Twitter is a social media giant in its own right, it has since been completely overshadowed by the might of Facebook (who continues to evolve in so many ways). In terms of social media posts, Twitter could never catch up to Facebook. But its Periscope live video streaming could. Facebook had no choice then but to make sure its Live offering becomes a hit.
It goes without saying that offering a live video streaming feature is easier said than done. The technical aspects notwithstanding, it was a bit tricky to exercise some control over the content being streamed, even more so when Facebook users began streaming videos of violence and other objectionable content.
With Facebook being Facebook, it is confident that it can eventually sort out the content quality and safety issues related to its Live feature. The company has always been about looking ahead, and if live streaming is where social media is headed, then Zuckerberg and his crew are in a good position to succeed.
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