What’s Hot?
This week, we’re tweeting about the Olympics, not auditioning for Love Island, joining the club, celebrating a dogs 90th birthday, and enjoying stories going global…
Twitter x Olympics
The stadium might be empty but social media is not! Twitter is famous for rolling out fun new features for major events, so we thought we would round up our favourite updates for Tokyo2020!
- Hashflags – specialist hashtags with flags for each country, so by posting #USA, you’ll see stars and stripes
- Specialist explore tab – an explore tab just for the Olympics (on desktop) to stay up to date on all sports (can I get one for Love Island please (see our next What’s Hot reference…))
- #Expert Engine – by tweeting the Olympics handle, #ExpertEngine and a sport e.g., #Soccer, you’ll have a reply with facts, stats and clips on that sport. Perfect for those of us who are, erm, less athletically minded but don’t like missing out
Why you won’t see me on Love Island
Yes, this is the worst ever season of Love Island (fact. We will not be taking questions on this statement), but no, I will not stop talking about it. This year it’s definitely not islanders’ antics that keep us watching, but rather the tweets, memes and tweets that become memes.
Our favourite from this week? The “reasons I can’t go on Love Island” meme, where, as you would expect, people list the reasons they can’t go on Love Island. A particular favourite can be found here.
I decided to have a go myself:
- I am half Filipino, and they already had a half Filipino girl on this season so that’s the Filipino-girl diversity quota filled until 2026
- I vomit when I’m stressed, which some would view as grim, but I think it could spice up this year’s recouplings a little bit (e.g. “The girl I would like to couple up with is… Lucinda” *queue vomit*)
& that’s it. Those are the only two reasons.
Welcome to the Club
Lockdown’s most exclusive club, Clubhouse, has got a whole lot more inclusive. This month, the platform announced that the invite-only and waitlist system is over. The launch was a huge gimmick anyway (IMO), being exclusive made Clubhouse sound interesting, but someone in pretty much every one of my WhatsApp groups offered up their invite back in February/March.
Clubhouse probably decided this move after a really slow March-May. After 9 million downloads in February, popularity sank to 2.7 mil in March, under 1 million in April, before rebounding to 2.8 mil in May. Downloads started increasing again in June, probably due to it’s launch on Android, which has lead to the Clubhouse team expanding their staff from 8 to 58! With growth like this in only five months, we can’t wait to see what’s next…
Dulux turned 90 this week. And at the same time (somewhat confusingly) everyone’s favourite interiors obsessed Old English Sheepdog and Dulux icon turned 60 – not literally, or that would be a Guinness World Record. But Dulux’s relationship with the breed is celebrating an anniversary, and you can celebrate too by buying a coffee-table book showcasing how design trends have changed over the years. All proceeds go to charity including the Old English Sheepdog Rescue & Welfare. So, so, soooo cute. And also the aesthetics of the 70s? Most excellent.
Stories go global
Instagram captions have offered local-language translations as long as I can remember (apparently, I can only remember back as far as 2016 – oh dear) and FINALLY Stories are getting the same treatment!
That helpful little “See translation” button will now appear on screens to allow you to read over 90 different languages. Of course, this is only for text, not audio, but allegedly that tech IS coming. Our only question is who will get there first: Insta or TikTok?
