Plandids Jump the Shark: It’s another buzzword!! This week it’s “plandid,” a portmanteau of “planned” and “candid” — which is basically a post that looks like you didn’t know the pic was taken, but you’re still posing. It isn’t new, but is making the rounds in social this week. How do you take the best plandid? Shoot using burst mode; pick your favorite authentic pose, and post (deleting the other 30 burst pics is optional). We dare you to tag it #plandid. (LINK)
Facebook Watch: Facebook just announced a new short-form, professionally produced video feature called Watch. Facebook has already wrangled over 30 content partners from comedy to reality to live sports, and expects to grow into the hundreds and even thousands of shows down the road. The social aspect of seeing what your friends are watching and being able to view and interact with the comments from other fans is sure to make for an engaging experience. Launch is slated for August 28th and we’re excited to… um.. watch. (LINK)
#HEYTWITTER: An influential German Twitter reported hundreds of racist, sexist, abusive or otherwise hateful Tweets. Twitter didn’t delete them, so he sprayed them on the pavement outside the company’s offices in Germany. It made for a provocative video and furthered discussion about censorship and hate-speech online this week. (LINK)
Insta Stories Embraced by Brands: To celebrate the one year anniversary of Stories, Instagram released a host of stats about the feature. Of note, half of the 15 million businesses now active on the platform have also produced a Story in the last month, and one in five organic stories from those businesses gets a direct message. Oh, and Apple finally joined Instagram this week. So there’s that. The most popular face filters? Puppy ears, sleep mask, bunny ears, love with heart-shaped darts AND koala ears. (LINK)
Eclipse-Jacking: The solar eclipse on the 21st will be the first since social media became a thing. Which has us asking: if the moon blots out the sun and companies don’t try to brand-jack it, did the eclipse really happen? Krispy Kreme is making a chocolate glaze donut. Hertz ran an eclipse-themed rental campaign. Casper built a pop-up $500 tent rental city in Wyoming. Airbnb is hosting a geodesic dome and jet-viewing contest. But our favorite is Chiquita’s Banana Sun: “For two glorious moments before and after the total(-ly overrated) solar eclipse, Chiquita will temporarily turn the sun into a giant banana. This phenomenon shall be known as the banana sun.” Stay cool, brands. (LINK)
GREG SWAN 