Facebook Hosts Real-Time Broadcasts For Afropunk Festival

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Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg asserted earlier this week that the social media giant was not a media company but rather a tech company because it is building tools for distributing and creating content without actually creating content. The same spirit was seen during the annual Afropunk Festival last weekend when the social networking site provided its platform for real-time broadcasts from the Brooklyn-based music festival online, according to Business Insider.

Going live benefits all

On Afropunk’s Facebook Page, live broadcasts from the festival were published to digitize the festival experience for fans who were not able to attend the event in real life. The videos include exclusive backstage interviews with the artists conducted by NTS Radio and UK hip hop artist Akala and on-the-ground conversations with event attendees.

So far, the most popular video is a fashion-centric recap of Day 1 of the event, with more than 4,000 likes and reactions, 350 shares, 200,000 views, and 180 comments. A conversation between the poet Nikki Giovanni and-hip hop artist Akala also received a lot of attention. Also an interview of Tyler the Creator by NTS Radio grabbed eyeballs, notes BI.

Through Facebook, Afropunk was able to transmit directly to around 1 million fans and does not have to worry about difficulties in setting up a new media channel, drawing users to a standalone site and paying excessive production costs. Artists also benefit as they get a lot more exposure by being on Facebook where they can interface with hundreds of thousands of Afropunk followers and Facebook’s broader base of 1.7 billion users.

Facebook to stabilize shaky 360-degree videos

In other Facebook news, the social network is testing an algorithm to stabilize its 360-degree videos. With conventional cameras, shaky video is a big problem, and with virtual reality and 360-degree cameras, it is much worse. The new approach mixes 2D motion models with 3D reconstruction to reduce unwanted effects in immersive footage, like lens deformations, bobbing camera movements, and stitching between cameras, reports Engadget.

Due to the 3D elements, it is more accurate, and the partial use of 2D techniques makes its faster and stronger. More importantly, it is efficient, and the user can stabilize a video faster than it takes to play it. Also the user can reduce the bitrate for a video by around 20%, resulting in smaller file sizes and better video streaming. The social networking site is planning to make the tech available to everyone on both Oculus and Facebook devices, the report notes.

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