Social Media Digest: Dorsey’s Dumped, Truthloader Talentspots & Facebook Fine

  • Social Media

Welcome back to your weekly installment of everything that’s hot in the world of social media.

1. You’ll read on our blog here that Twitter has just launched a new directory. Potentially this is big news from a search perspective, but it also helps to dampen the fire about Jack Dorsey’s work ethic and the fact that others at Twitter apparently can’t stand working with him. The New York Times claimed that “employees complained that he was difficult to work with and repeatedly changed his mind about product directions”.

2. Truthloader, the citizen journalism project from ITN is looking for a presenter to “challenge everything” in their new weekly citizen journalism discussion programme. Only the bravest need apply and if you would like to be considered, send a link to your showreel to truthloader@itn.co.uk. Here’s a clip to show you what Truthloader is all about:

3. Facebook is being ‘unliked’ by many across the UK due to having only paid £238,000 in tax last year, according to its accounts. Its sales were £20.4m, despite an estimate that it actually pulled in £175m from advertising sales in 2011. Most of the company’s income is instead believed to be legally going through its European base in Dublin, where corporation tax is lower than the UK. Campaign group The Taxpayers’ Alliance said the tax system needed changing to encourage companies to pay their tax in the UK, rather than another EU country.

4. Further questions were raised over social media content this week as a man who posted an offensive Facebook message following the deaths of six British soldiers has been given a community order. Azhar Ahmed, 20, from West Yorkshire, was found guilty in September of sending a grossly offensive communication. He said he did not think the message, which said “all soldiers should die and go to hell”, was offensive. Ahmed was also fined £300 at Huddersfield Magistrates’ Court. The case has highlighted the need for clear laws governing social media content, given other recent high profile cases where the judgement was considerably different.