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Share your Periscope streams with a screenshot
Periscope has rolled out a new feature which allows users to take a screenshot of a stream and share it with the larger Twitter community. It's essentially the app's version of a retweet. As TechCrunch points out, this feature is likely to be embraced primarily by the service's bigger broadcasters like Amanda Oleander or Chris Hadfield as a means of promoting their active live feeds. Additionally, Periscope updated the Private Broadcast function. Users can now select either individual "mutuals" (people that you follow and who also follow you) from the invite list or select everybody on it with a single click. Unfortunately, sharing screenshots and the revamped Private Broadcast is currently only available on the iOS version.
Periscope streamers and viewers can finally watch video the right way
Video should be shot in landscape mode. Look at that giant TV in your living room. Head down the movie theater and check out the silver screen. Both are in landscape and now, finally, Twitter's live video-streaming app Periscope will support the correct orientation on iPhone and Android. But, if you're a fan of portrait videos (you monster) you can continue your upright video shooting ways. For viewers, they can watch videos in either landscape or portrait mode regardless of how they are shot. The app will auto rotate the video to compensate how the phone is held.
The After Math: Periscope views and new Samsung phones
While Google was busy reinventing itself as Alphabet, Twitter quietly annihilated its 140 character limit for direct messages, and Samsung released two new, big phones with appropriately big names. Here's a completely numerically biased version of the week's events.
Periscope for iOS can mute notifications
Periscope's latest version for iOS comes with a handful of useful features, including one for folks suffering from notification overload. Now, you can "mute" broadcasters you follow so you don't get a pop-up every time they go live. Don't worry about missing their shows, though -- their updates still appear on your feed. The global feed has also been revamped to feature broadcasts relevant to your interests and language preference. Plus, you can now take advantage of iOS 8's Handoff feature, which means that you can start watching a show on an iPhone or an iPad and transition to a MacBook without issues, and vice versa. Android users might notice that the the revamped global feed is now also available on their devices, and Periscope promises that the mute option will soon follow it to Google's platform.
Livestream your GoPro adventures with Meerkat
In its ongoing war with Periscope for the hearts and screens of mobile users, Meerkat announced a new feature on Thursday. Users can now livestream their adventures from select GoPro cameras. Right now, only GoPro Hero3's offer the feature. Users will also need an iPhone with a wireless connection to the camera in order for everything to work. Meerkat is reportedly working to add support for both the Hero4 camera series and the Android platform in the near future. This announcement follows the recent Meerkat additions of the "cameo" feature that allows your friends to hop onto broadcasts with you and an embeddable web player.
Bangalore's police wants people to capture crimes on Periscope
Periscope is already great for showing strangers your lunch and pirating pay-per-view boxing matches, but Bangalore's police force wants the city's citizenry to use it for much more than that. If police commissioner MN Reddi gets his druthers, the people of India's third largest city will soon use Twitter's live-streaming app to capture footage of crimes in action so cops can find them and shut 'em down. (Sorry, Meerkat, you're not needed here.)
Periscope for iOS lets you scour the globe for livestreams
Part of the appeal of Periscope is watching streams from complete strangers. Sure, your friend's tour of their office is compelling, but it's nothing compared to video streamed from inside North Korea. To make it easier to find livestreams the other part of the world or just down the street, Twitter has updated the iOS version of the app with a map view. Livestreams show up as red pins above a geographic region. Once you find an individual or clusters of pins you're interested in in viewing, pinch to zoom in and tap for information about those feeds. If you're not a fan of circumnavigating the globe with your finger, the global feed list is still available. Periscope also updated the replay feature so broadcasters no longer have to upload a video when they finish livestreaming. Those videos are now instantly available for viewing. Finally, you can share streams you're watching directly to Twitter instead of just to fellow Periscope users. It shouldn't too long before these new features pop up in the recently launched Android version of the app.
Skeegle is like Meerkat or Periscope, but for private groups
Broadcasting live video from your smartphone has quickly become all the rage. The most popular enablers of this craze are Meerkat and Periscope, both of which aim to create a global community of streamers and voyeurs that find each other's feeds through open social networks. New player Skeegle, however, wants to do things a little differently, by making mobile live-streaming a more private affair. The premise is simple: you choose exactly who you want to broadcast to. Once you've downloaded the app, logged in with a Facebook account and associated your phone number with it (WhatsApp-style), you can start building groups from your phone's contact list (think "friends," "family," etcetera). When you stumble upon something worth streaming, you simply select the groups you'd like to be notified of your activity, start broadcasting, and that's it.
British Museum to give live tours over Periscope
Live-streaming apps may have become a new way for social types to show their vanity, but they're also great tools for delivering slices of world culture to people's mobile phones. That's exactly what the British Museum hopes to do with its popular exhibit Defining beauty: the body in ancient Greek art, which will be the focus of a live tour over Twitter's Periscope app. The museum has British historian and broadcaster Dan Snow on hand to lead a 30 minute journey through the exhibition's white marble statues, terracotta works, bronzes and ornate vases. There'll also be the chance to post questions using the iOS and Android app.
Twitter finally launches Periscope for Android
Periscope for Android is here. Twitter's new streaming app contains many of the same features found in the iOS version, but with a few Android exclusives. In addition to more granular notification controls than found in the iPhone version, there's a new "return to broadcast" feature that helps get viewers back to a stream after being interrupted by a phone call, text or other pesky distraction.
Meerkat for Android is out of beta on Google Play
Meerkat has not only beaten its Twitter-owned rival Periscope to Android devices, it's also shed its Beta phase according to a Tweet published Wednesday. The Meerkat for Android live streaming video apps operates just as its iOS counterpart does, allowing users to share real-time feeds with their Twitter followers. Conversely, Periscope's Android debut is still coming "soon! We're working on it," per a post on the app's blog published April 1st.
Periscope no longer requires Twitter for sign ups
Periscope used to require Twitter integration, because the livestreaming app's kinda, sorta owned by the social network. Yes, we did mean to say "used to," because its latest version gives you the power to choose between a Twitter account and a phone number to sign up. You'll still get user recommendations based on your Follow list if you register via Twitter, but that's pretty much the only difference between the two. The new Periscope also allows you to swap profile pictures with snapshots in your Camera Roll and makes replying to comments during broadcast a one-tap affair. Finally, if you install the refreshed app from iTunes, know that every strike of your banhammer will be announced on the comments section. Periscope says that adds an "important layer of transparency and accountability" and could even make those with God complex think twice before hitting block.
Periscope will find live video streams near you
Sure, Twitter's Periscope app will tell you which of your friends are streaming, but what if you want to find out who's broadcasting the local baseball game? You won't have that problem for much longer. Periscope chief Kayvon Beykpour has revealed that the app will soon get a way to find streams in a given area. It won't be so precise that you can creep on others, but it could be helpful for following protests and other unfolding events without having to get a link from someone else. Beykpour suggests that the map-based browsing is coming soon, so you shouldn't have to wait long before Periscope is as good at helping you discover streams as it is for watching them.
Los Angeles partners with Waze to head off traffic gridlocks
Los Angeles' traffic problems are legendary, which is probably why the City of Angels is following Boston's lead and partnering with Waze for real-time traffic alerts. The LA mayor's office Periscoped the announcement (as you do, I suppose), and tweeted that the partnership could lead to better understanding of how traffic moves in TInseltown and hopefully improve commutes. How's that? Well, the data inherently goes both ways. Specifically, Google's traffic app should tip off drivers to natural road hazards, car crashes and amber alerts while simultaneously informing the county about where backups and other issues are occurring. No word if it'll extend to pointing out where paparazzi are hiding, though.
Meerkat looks to Android for a chance at beating Periscope
Can an Android launch save Meerkat? SXSW must seem like a long time ago for the folks behind the livestreaming app that took Austin by storm back in March. It was just a few weeks later that Twitter launched Periscope, which, thanks to the social network's clout and a better user experience, has quickly become the streaming app of choice. Right now both services are iOS only, though, and Meerkat is hoping to hook the hundreds of millions of Android users on its app with a public beta launch.
Vertical videos are here to stay thanks to apps like Snapchat
If you despise vertical or portrait video as much as some of us do, bad news: according to recent comments from ad agencies and media executives, you'll be seeing a lot more of them. The awkward format has been in our crosshairs since the iPhone 4 came out in 2010 and we felt the need to explain how to fix it. It's used by cellphone-wielders who are either too lazy to turn their phone 90 degrees or are just unaware that they should. The result is video that's okay on smartphones but horrible on computer screens or TVs due to unsightly vertical bars. In addition, Snapchat and new livestreaming apps like Periscope and Meerkat will soon make the format seem normal for many users.
Periscope makes it easier to view live streams from people you know
Thanks to Periscope's early fame, one of the major downsides to the live streaming app is that the first thing you saw when you launched it was a slew of streams from strangers all over the world -- strangers that you probably don't care that much about. It was difficult to sort through the mess to find broadcasts from the people you do want to follow. With today's Periscope update, however, that changes. Now when you launch the app, you'll see live and recorded broadcasts from people who are in your social graph (ie. the folks you follow) in a Friends list, while the rest of Periscope's global stream is now in a separate Global tab.
Periscope update keeps viewers from showing up at your house
Twitter's video-streaming app Periscope may have buried Meerkat's hopes of being the go-to way to show the world your office refrigerator. But until today, it had a rather scary privacy issue. When a broadcaster shared their location, instead of that location being a neighborhood or city, viewers could zoom all the way into the broadcaster's whereabouts. An update to the app has fixed that awesome feature for stalkers.
Watch Periscope livestreams on Windows Phone with unofficial app
Live streaming apps like Twitter's Periscope and Meerkat are all the rage right now, but so far they've only been accessible to iPhone users. Enter Telescope, a third-party Periscope app for Windows Phone, which opens up the service's live streams to an entirely new audience. You can't actually broadcast your own streams from the app yet (the developer says it's coming), but you can sign up for Periscope and view other live feeds from within the app. It's not a complete solution, but it's something until Twitter rolls out an official Windows Phone client. Expect to wait a while though -- even Twitter's own microblogging app for Windows Phone is still miles behind its iPhone and Android entries. Both Twitter and Meerkat say they're also working on Android apps, but Telescope makes Windows Phone the first platform outside of iOS to get one of those live streaming apps.
Twitter's Periscope is the best livestreaming video app yet
The age of ubiquitous livestreaming is upon us. I say this not only because of the sudden popularity of Meerkat, the mobile livestreaming app that now boasts over 100,000 users and celebrity aficionados like Jimmy Fallon and Madonna. No, it's because Meerkat now has a rival. A very big rival, in the form of Twitter. Today, the social media company has taken the wrapper off Periscope, its very own livestreaming app that it acquired only a couple of weeks ago. Indeed, it was this very purchase that caused Twitter to cut Meerkat from its social graph, a move that makes it a lot harder for those on Meerkat to find folks to follow. Periscope, on the other hand, won't have the same problem -- it automatically suggests people you follow on Twitter when you sign up. That's certainly a significant advantage, but the app needs to be good, too, if it wants to unseat Meerkat. So, is it?
