Facebook is betting on video filters (the graphics pioneered by Snapchat that can be overlaid on faces in recorded clips) to get more users hooked on its live-streaming tool. Having already demoed its upcoming style transfer graphics (artistic filters that draw from the style of famous painters to transform videos into works of art), it is now offering more details about the artificial intelligence powering its new mobile tools.
Instead of Snapchat, the inspiration for these Live video filters comes from Prisma — an AI-powered photography app that boasts a range of artistic graphics that can be applied to both images and video. Facebook is currently testing style transfers as part of an update that gives added prominence to your smartphone camera within its flagship app in Ireland.
Unlike Snapchat (the app that pioneered filters or, as it calls them, “lenses”), Facebook wants to apply the software to live broadcasts in real time and not after you’ve captured a clip. It’s already started doing this with some of its traditional, Snapchat-style filters, but style transfers are — according to Facebook — its crowning achievement.
On Tuesday, the company published a new blog post explaining in-depth how the style transfer technique works in real-time. Instead of waiting for the image to be processed on huge computer servers in data centers, Facebook claims it has developed a world-first: a deep-learning platform on mobile that puts the cutting-edge technology in the palm of a user’s hand.
Facebook is essentially embedding its neural network (a machine learning system, loosely modelled on the human brain, that learns by consuming vast tons of data) into its Facebook app for iOS and Android. The company terms this deep learning AI “Caffe2Go,” describing it as a lightweight and modular framework built on top of the open-source “Caffe2” project — meaning it won’t drain your mobile device. Facebook is also optimizing style transfer tech, allowing it to be applied to video running at 20 frames per second on an iPhone 6S or above without a drop in picture quality.
“The style-transfer tool in the camera is the result of a marriage between two technologies: the Caffe2go runtime and style-transfer models,” write Facebook research scientists Yangqing Jia and Peter Vajda in their blog post. “It took both technologies to make it possible for you to feel like you have Van Gogh’s paintbrush in your hand when you pick up your phone to shoot a video.”
In a second blog post, Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer details the company’s vision for the mobile AI: “We can create gesture-based controls, where the computer can see where you’re pointing and activate different styles or commands. We can recognize facial expressions and perform related actions, like putting a “yay” filter over your selfie when you smile.”
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg demoed the style transfer feature in October, shortly after which Facebook launched its first Live video filters.
Facebook has not shied away from boasting about its plans for the live-streaming format, and video in general. Last month, the company’s chief product officer Chris CoxCox claimed it now predicts video will generate 70 percent of traffic across Facebook’s properties — such as Instagram, WhatsApp, and its flagship social network — in the next five years. Coincidentally, WhatsApp launched video calling for Android devices in late October — indicating that Facebook is wasting no time in making that future a reality.
Updated on 11-08-2016 by Saqib Shah: Added news of Facebook’s reveal of AI for mobile app
Discord is trying to push more visibility on the internet for some of its biggest communities, and there's a good chance your messages could end up in a Google Search. The platform is preparing to make conversations from certain public servers searchable on the web, so there's a privacy setting you might want to check before the rollout begins.
According to Discord's official announcement, the changes will roll out in two stages. Starting November 16, qualifying servers will have public web pages featuring automated summaries of conversations. By mid-December, individual messages from eligible public channels could also appear word-for-word in Google and other search engines.
You just opened X and started typing your thoughts. Imagine the jump scare when a hand suddenly pops up on your screen, pointing at the promote button. It doesn’t say a word and simply points. For a growing number of X users, this isn’t a made-up scenario but something they have been seeing since yesterday, and very few of them are amused.
Most of us have learned to tune out the usual in-app upsells, whether it’s a glowing upgrade banner or a pop-up about a premium plan. A floating hand hovering over your draft is much harder to ignore, and that’s probably the whole point.
Scroll through any app for five minutes, and you’ll find someone maxxing something. Their skin, their sleep, their protein intake, even their Friday night on the couch. That little suffix has been everywhere this year, and now it has a trophy to show for it. In a recent announcement, Dictionary.com named maxxing its 2026 Word of the Year.
What are people actually doing when they’re maxxing?