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Pinterest's browsable catalogs put prices front and center
Pinterest is still on a quest to become your go-to social network for shopping, and it's launching a couple of new features in an effort to achieve its goal. Today, the company is adding a new button that says "More from [brand]" under Product Pins. Tapping on the button takes you to the brand's browsable catalog, which clearly shows you each product's price and gives you a way to shop and choose what you want to buy from within the platform itself. When you click through an item, you'll be taken to the retailer's website, so you make a purchase.
Pinterest hires the exec behind Walmart's tech transformation
If you're wondering how serious Pinterest is about turning itself into more of a shopping portal, here's your answer: the company has just hired former Walmart CTO Jeremy King as Head of Engineering. King headed Walmart's e-commerce team and oversaw most of the massive retailer's digital strategy, including in-store pickup of online orders and online grocery pickup. He also led the company's innovation arm called Walmart Labs. While Amazon continues to dominate the e-commerce space, Bloomberg says Walmart's online sales grew by 40 percent last year under his leadership.
Pinterest's new tools turn it into more of a storefront
If you come across more and more product pins on Pinterest in the future, that's because the platform has rolled out tools that make it easier to sell goods. In fact, companies can now upload their full catalogs to the website, which can turn Pinterest into some sort of a storefront for various brands. The social network's new dashboard can easily create product pins from the items in companies' catalogs. It also gives them a way to organize their feed and make their posts easier to discover.
Instagram code hints at Pinterest-style public collections
Instagram hasn't been shy about borrowing a page from Pinterest's book through its Collections feature, and it might be ready to take things a step further. Software sleuth Jane Manchun Wong has discovered that Instagram for Android includes hidden code for public Collections. You could not only share favorite travel destinations or fashion items with the world, but add contributors to help fill out your list.
Pinterest blocks some searches to curb anti-vaccination myths
Social networks have made a number of efforts to halt the spread of anti-vaccination myths, but Pinterest recently took things a step further: it's curbing all talk about vaccination. The site has revealed to the Wall Street Journal that it blocked vaccination-related search terms late in 2018 to limit misinformation until it had a more effective way of filtering content. The company tried to pull the misleading material, but found that it couldn't remove all of it.
Pinterest's diverse workforce helped it design a better skin tone filter
Last April, Pinterest began testing a search feature that allows users to filter results by skin tone. The idea being that those looking for beauty tips will be able to find relevant makeup and hair advice, regardless of their race. Today, the company is announcing that this feature will roll out more broadly across its user base, and that it's also coming to its mobile app. Not only is it a particularly useful feature, it's also emblematic of Pinterest's ever-growing efforts at increasing the diversity and inclusion within the company.
Senate report details Russia's online meddling in 2016 election
The US Senate is about to receive a report detailing Russia's online manipulation attempts during and after the 2016 Presidential election, and it promises to shed new light on the subject... including a lack of evidence from the internet giants themselves. The research, conducted by both Oxford University and network analysis company Graphika, outlines some familiar strategies. The Russians "clearly sought to benefit" the Republicans, rallying support for Trump on social networks while trying to "confuse, distract and ultimately discourage" Trump's opponents. It also notes that Russia's digital influence plans started with Twitter, but quickly expanded to Instagram and YouTube -- Facebook actually came last. They also tried smaller social networks like Google+, Pinterest and Tumblr (owned by Engadget parent company Verizon) as well as email.
Pinterest rolls out product recommendations for easier shopping
Over the last few years, Pinterest has become not just a place to pin your favorite clothing or home decor ideas, but also where you would go to shop. Buyable pins would let you purchase items directly from Pinterest, while recommendation tools like Shop the Look and Lens relied on machine learning and visual search to figure out what else you'd be interested in. Today, Pinterest is ready to up the ante with a brand new Product Pin system that'll make the site even more of a shopping destination than before.
Pinterest is still being used by 250 million people every month
While more prominent social networks are facing slightly slower growth or even seeing user numbers dip a little, Pinterest has quietly become bigger than ever. The company has revealed that more than 250 million people are using the service every month. Pinterest also has more than 175 billion pins, an increase of 75 percent since early 2017, which underlines the platform's growth.
Instapaper buys itself back from Pinterest
Back in 2013, developer Marco Arment sold his popular read-it-later app Instapaper to Betaworks, the company that had previously acquired Digg. Two years ago, Pinterest bought the little company to "accelerate discovering and saving articles on Pinterest." Now, the very same team that's been working on it for the past five years is taking Instapaper back.
Pinterest makes it easier to collaborate on group boards
Pinterest is adding some new features to group boards that will make it easier to message the group members as well as keep track of what's being changed and who's joining. The new activity feed will show you when a member has saved a new Pin or when a new section has been added to the board. It will also show you when a new member joins. Additionally, when someone saves a new Pin, you'll now be able to respond with a like or a reply, which will start a new thread, and you use an @-mention in order to say something to a specific member.
Google tests Pinterest-like layout for image search
Google hasn't been shy about borrowing cues from Pinterest. Its latest effort, however, may be more transparent than others. The company has confirmed to TechCrunch that it's testing a new Image Search on desktop with vertical results that will seem familiar if you're regularly browsing Pinterest for ideas. Each image now has captions along with badges describing what those images entail, such as a product or a video. And it won't surprise you to hear that clicking on a picture provides much, much more than before.
Amazon makes it easy to share the Alexa skills you create
In April, Amazon introduced Alexa Skill Blueprints, a way for anyone to customize certain Alexa skills without having to code. Now, the company has made it easier to share those skills with others. The growing list of templates include blueprints for trivia, dad jokes, flashcards and info for your babysitter or pet sitter. Just fill in the templates with the information you want to include and the new skill will be available on every Alexa-enabled device on your account.
Pinterest is testing a way to search pins by skin tone
It can be hard to find the right makeup or outfit color combination ideas in a vast sea of Pinterest pins -- especially if you're not white. Since 70 percent of its users go on the website to discover and save looks and styles to try (that's according to a study the company conducted), Pinterest has launched an experimental feature that gives you a way to filter pins according to skin tone. When you search for terms wherein skin tone may be relevant -- "makeup," "peach blush" or "fuchsia lipstick," for instance -- you'll see four icons representing different skin tones on the upper left-hand corner of the results.
Pinterest made its app more accessible to the visually impaired
Pinterest announced some design changes this week aimed at making its app and website more accessible for the blind and visually impaired. The company partnered with Lighthouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired and collected feedback from individuals with various levels of vision impairment to better understand Pinterest's limitations and what could be improved. Pinterest employees also tried to experience the issues firsthand by wearing visual-impairment goggles or attempting to navigate the app with only a keyboard, Co.Design reports. "We tried to help [ourselves] understand all the different disabilities people might have when they use Pinterest," Long Cheng, the company's lead designer, told Co.Design.
Pinterest's new tab will only show pins from people you follow
Pinterest's home page is mostly about discovering pins relevant to your interests, with all its recommendations from various users on the platform. Well, Pinterest must have realized that some might prefer to see pins from specific users, so the virtual corkboard has launched a new tab that only shows pins from people you follow. Also, it shows pins in the order those users save them.
Study: Most YouTube influencers still don't disclose sponsored deals
It's been almost a year since the FTC warned social media influencers that they should "clearly and conspicuously [disclose]" if they're being paid for a post or video. But according to a new Princeton University research, most YouTube and Pinterest influencers still don't add proper disclaimers to the content they produce. The researchers analyzed over 500,000 YouTube videos and over 2.1 million unique Pinterest pins from August to September 2017 for the study. They found that 3,472 videos and 18,237 pins in the bunch had affiliate links, but only 10 and seven percent, respectively, contained written disclosures.
Pinterest's new tools help keep your boards organized
Pinterest has rolled out new tools that will help keep you sane if the pins you've been collecting for years have been driving you mad. To start with, you can now archive a board once you're done with it. Say, you've been using Pinterest to plan a party or a wedding -- you can toss that board to archive after you're done with it to keep things clean. By doing that, you're also stopping Pinterest from sending you relevant recommendations, so you don't have to keep seeing bouquets and wedding dresses if you're sick and tired of looking at them.
Refine Pinterest Lens visual searches with text suggestions
2017 was a good year for Pinterest Lens users. Whether the feature helps you find recipes based on your brunch pics, offer style tips from the clothes you already own or gave you a hand with your Target shopping, the company's visual search is handy for a lot of things. In fact, Pinterest says Lens powers over 600 million of those searches monthly, and twice as many folks are using it every day compared to six months ago.
Amazon's QR-like 'SmileCodes' are the key to discounts and Lockers
Amazon will start rolling out its own version of QR codes, TechCrunch reports. Called SmileCodes, they function just like a typical QR code -- scan it with your phone and see where it leads -- but they'll only be scannable through the Amazon app and, naturally, they feature the very recognizable Amazon smile right in the center. According to TechCrunch, Amazon has been piloting them for the past few weeks in pop-up shops and Amazon Lockers in Europe and next month, SmileCodes will hit the US. They'll debut in magazines such as Cosmopolitan and Seventeen.
