What’s Hot?

Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp went down last week, so guess what? They don’t get to be the focus of ANY of our Friday five this week. Take that. No, this week we’re looking at red flags, the night tube, Twitter ads and subreddits.

Red Flags

This week, the Red Flags meme took over Twitter, where people state relationship red flags followed by a series of flag emojis. Super simple to understand, unless you’re the friend that texted:

“What’s this meme with all the red flags about…?

Okay I get it now I’ve typed that out”

It was a perfect opportunity for brands to jump onboard, done perfectly here by Ru Paul’s Drag Race and Sparknotes, then terribly by Tesco and Yorkshire Tea. Unfortunately for the two T’s, they were too to the point, on the nose, a hard sell.  Their memes were less hilarious comments on society and more a discussion of what you’re having on your lunch break – in other words, dead chat.

Reinstating the night tube

There was a (small) win for Londoners this week when Sadiq Khan announced that the night tube would re-open on the Victoria and Central lines in late November. The night tube, which has run on Friday and Saturday nights for a few years now, was halted during lockdown last year and failed to re-open alongside the night-time economy.

Women and girls have felt extremely unsafe on the streets this past year more than ever, so Ella Watson launched this petition to re-instate the night tube, which at the time of writing is approaching 150,000 signatures – one of the most signed petitions ever on change.org. The petition has gained lots of media attention since launching and can definitely claim to have helped re-open the Central and Victoria lines. Now we just need the other main lines to start operating again, so we can stop waiting 30 minutes for an Uber, paying £60 for a black cab, or walking home. Sign it today.

Twitter tests ads in replies

Twitter users, soon you’ll start seeing ads in new places – amongst your replies. It’s inevitable that users will be pissed because, well, we all hate change. BUT, it has to be said that this will be good for creators on Twitter. Twitter is proving hard to monetise compared to other platforms, but allowing those with large following to agree to ads in their replies will allow them to make some cash from their Twitter content, stopping them from migrating to other channels.

Watchers on Reddit

Just as in life, on social, lots of people are watchers, rather than participators. It tends to vary platform to platform. TikTok is (duh) the platform with the most users creating content. Then we have Instagram, which allowed users to post more by introducing Stories, and further encouraged engagement via these Stories, through the Q&A and polls sticker options. This allows people to interact and engage with Instagram, but in a more subtle way. Similarly, people on Twitter are more likely to vote in a poll that send a tweet out into the world.

Subtle ways of finding out answers and engaging with communities are key to keeping these ‘watchers’ on your platform, and Reddit has introduced a new way to help these guys establish themselves in their community, without having to actually post: Predictions.

Predictions are small polls/votes where users bet tokens on results. By taking part, you receive 1,000 tokens (no cash is involved) and bet throughout a ‘tournament’ in your subreddit community. At the end, everyone is ranked on how well they did, allowing people to boost their reputation in that community. It’s subtle, fun, and low-stakes since the tokens are essentially worthless – but a nice way to keep communities connected.

Graph Crimes

We’re here with another Twitter account for you to follow: @GraphCrimes.

The thing about graphs is that they’re supposed to visualise data to make it easier to understand. I feel like I shouldn’t have to say that as it’s something we’re taught in primary school. And yet here we are, in a world where there is a Twitter account dedicated to obscure, weird, and hilariously misrepresentative graphs.

Please check out this graph on the average female height per country, which suggests that women from Latvia could sit women from India on their shoulder like a pirate would a parrot.