How to adjust video auto-play settings in the Facebook app

Facebook changes a lot of things on us automatically, whether it's on the web or on your phone, and one of the more annoying "features" turned on automatically is auto-play videos. From Facebook's perspective auto-play videos seem great — videos are loaded in the background so they play instantly, and as you scroll through your timeline they catch your eye since they're playing without your interaction.

What's best for Facebook may not be best for how you use the service, though, so we're going to show you how to turn off auto-play videos in the Facebook app. Read along and find out how — it only takes a few taps.

Just like most Facebook features, the ability to manage your video auto-play settings is quite buried in the app but simple once you get there. Tap or swipe over to the app menu by hitting the menu button, which is in the top right corner of the Facebook app, then scroll down and tap App Settings. Once in the App Settings, you'll want to scroll down until you find Video Auto-play and tap it.

Chances are by default the app has set auto-play video to "on," which will let the app download videos in the background when it sees fit so they're ready to go whenever you open the app (note: sound does not automatically play with the video until tapped). This causes higher data usage from the Facebook app, and we wouldn't recommend leaving this setting on. You can go all the way to "off" so videos are never downloaded ahead of time nor do they play in your timeline as you scroll by — also a good option. The healthy middle ground is "Wifi only," which as it sounds will only download videos in the background while on Wifi, meaning there will be no hit to your mobile data. Once downloaded videos will still play automatically in the timeline, but at least you aren't wasting mobile data on videos you'll never watch.

There's just that one simple setting to toggle, but it can make a world of difference in terms of how the Facebook app acts on your phone. You can always toggle between the three options as you see fit, but knowing where they are and how to use it is the important part.

Facebook's testing a 'Lite' app for emerging markets

Facebook has quietly launched a new and small version of its app called, appropriately enough, Facebook Lite. However, the app has been made and is currently only available, for a few emerging markets and is targeting low-end Android devices that are stuck on slower 2G networks where bandwidth conservation is a priority.

Facebook Lite is only 252k in size, and apparently only available, at least for now, in just eight countries in Africa and Asia: Bangladesh, Nepal, Nigeria, South Africa, Sudan, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Zimbabwe. Facebook Lite is based on the company's Snaptu-built feature phone client, it does have some Android-specific features like push notifications and camera integration.

Overall, this new app would seem to be an effort by Facebook to expand its user base even more. It's seeing limited testing markets at the moment, but we wouldn't be surprised to see it expanding to more markets in the coming months. If you happen to live in one of those countries, check it out on Google Play and let us know what you think.

Source: TechCrunch

Facebook at Work: It's Facebook, but for business

Facebook has just launched a limited pilot program for its new Facebook at Work service. It will offer businesses a way to give their employees collaboration and messaging tools with familiar Facebook features.

We contacted Facebook for more information and received this statement from a spokesperson:

Facebook at Work is a separate experience that gives employees the ability to connect and collaborate efficiently using Facebook tools — many that they're likely already using such as News Feed, Groups, messages and events. Co–workers can stay in touch with each other in the same way they stay in touch with friends and family via Facebook: Facebook at Work offers the familiar look and feel as Facebook and has the same tools.

Note that Facebook at Work was created completely for use within a company – that means employees' Facebook at Work info is safe, secure, confidential and completely separate from their personal Facebook profile. The info shared among employees is only accessible to people in the company.

So far there's no word on when Facebook at Work will get an expanded launch, nor is there any information on the prices, if any, for the service. It will have to compete with a number of already established business collaboration services such as Slack, Microsoft's Yammer and Google Apps for Business.

Facebook discussed investing in Xiaomi, ended up not doing that

A new report claims that Facebook held investment discussions in late 2014 with China-based smartphone company Xiaomi. However, those talks did not result in a formal deal between the two companies.

Reuters, citing unnamed sources, claims that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg met for dinner in October 2014 with Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun while Zuckerberg was visiting China. The story says that while the two men discussed a possible investment deal, they never went beyond that informal dinner. Xiaomi later announced it had raised $1.1 billion in new funding from a variety of other financial sources, which gives the company a market value of $45 billion.

This new report may show that Facebook is actively looking to break into the Chinese market. However, the social network itself is currently banned in China and Reuters' story claims that Lei was fearful that a Facebook investment could cause unwanted political issues with China's government. He also reportedly didn't want to hurt Xiaomi's current relationship with Google.

Source: Reuters