Facebook Tests Auto-Play Videos For Newsfeed On Mobile Reuters | By Alexei Oreskovic Posted: 09/12/2013 5:07 pm EDT
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/13/facebook-videos_n_3916427.html SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Facebook Inc is testing videos that play automatically on mobile versions of its service, setting the stage to turn the 1.15 billion-member social network into an attractive venue for lucrative, television-like video ads. The videos will be silent when they appear in a Facebook user's newsfeed, but expand and play the audio when clicked, the company said in a post on its official blog on Thursday. Only videos posted to Facebook by individual users, celebrities or musicians will have the auto-play function during the test, Facebook said. But it noted that it would "explore how to bring this to marketers in the future." The test, which involves a small group of U.S. users, is likely to ratchet up expectations for Facebook video ads. According to several media reports in recent months, Facebook is planning to charge brand marketers $1 million to $2.4 million to show 15-second auto-play video ads on its social network. [snip] Auto-play videos will work on Facebook's mobile apps for smartphones running Google Inc's Android software and Apple Inc's iOS software. In internal tests so far, the auto-play ads did not seem to significantly reduce battery life, Zhou said. The videos stop playing once a user scrolls past them in the newsfeed, she noted, and users have the option of switching off the auto-play feature. Auto-play will work only with videos that users upload directly to Facebook. Videos from external websites such as YouTube will not work with the auto-play feature in the test. Facebook does not expect the auto-play videos to have a big impact on smartphone users' wireless data usage and monthly phone bills, Zhou said. ------------- Seriously? What does Zhou measure as 'big'? Melbourne, Victoria, Australia [email protected] Sooner or later, I hate to break it to you, you're gonna die, so how do you fill in the space between here and there? It's yours. Seize your space. ~Margaret Atwood, writer _ __________________ _ _______________________________________________ Link mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.anu.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/link
