Give, get and collect photos with Facebook's new app — Moments. Facebook's new separate app "is a private way to give photos to friends and get the photos you didn’t take," which makes it easier to view those captured moments among friends and family.
How many times does the same group shot get taken with many different phones? How often do you actually get those photos that are taken of you or your friends from the same event? With Moments, it's now possible to get hold of those photos taken of you and other photos taken by your friends. It's also easy to give and collect those photos with Moments. You don't need to have the same group shot taken by multiple cameras. Instead, only one camera is needed.
Here's how Moments makes it easier to share those photos even further. Once your pictures are taken and synced with Moments, you then have the option to share selected photos on Instagram, Facebook or Facebook Messenger.
The newly created app can be downloaded for users of both Apple products and Android devices in the United States, and will be introduced to other countries soon.
Download: iOS / Android
It's Party Time
When you're at a party or gathering, many people will often want to take a group shot with a camera phone. They often insist on spending a little too much time taking the picture with different cameras in the hopes that everyone can have a visual of the event. Afterwards, they may even ask to have those pictures tagged on Facebook or sent through email. In the end, too much time is spent, photos are often lost and the whole situation ends up being too complicated.
Moments promises to ease this situation. One person can take one group shot and then sync that photo to friends who were at the event. This makes it easier to share those photos to everyone without the hassle of tracking down contact information, taking multiple pictures of the same group shot and spending too much time trying to get everyone to pose for different cameras.
With Moments, "you can then privately sync those photos quickly and easily with specific friends, and they can choose to sync their photos with you as well."
The Tech Further Explained
The facial recognition technology behind Moments (which is also the same tech behind tag suggestions on Facebook) is what powers the app and groups which friends were in which photos. The artificial intelligence recognizes the images, in this case facial images, by reading the output produced by the images. The images are then run through a processing machine which then group the images further or closer away based on similarities or differences.
"Moments uses facial recognition technology to group your photos based on the friends who are in them." — Will Ruben, Facebook Product Manager
As Yann LeCun, Director of Facebook AI Research, explains in the video, if two objects are similar, they put those two objects closer together. If they aren't similar, they group the images further apart according to the machine. Most of the code and research is then published in open source and can be worked on by research communities to improve upon the tech.
What People Are Saying
Because Moments uses facial recognition and expects this feature to be active at all times, a lot of people have expressed privacy concerns over what the social network may know. Furthermore, a final decision by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration on creating a code of conduct around the use of facial recognition software has not yet been completed, meaning privacy issues about the tagging of people in pictures is still in question. You may want to learn how to protect yourself with Facebook's privacy check-up tool.
Other people, who may be frustrated with Facebook, have also complained about downloading yet another standalone Facebook app that takes up space and data on their phones.
However, excitement over sharing pictures securely (friend to friend) is promising, as people have expressed their willingness to experiment with the app. The video below gives a brief visual of how to use the application and what it offers.
What Do You Think?
Does the app sound promising to you? Have you used it? Are you excited or worried about the tech behind Moments? Tell us your thoughts in the comments.
Image Credits: friends taking photo Via Shutterstock