In development for over a year, Instagram announced today that it is adding a new ‘close friends’ feature to Stories. The new feature, which is rolling out in stages today, lets users limit who can see individual Instagram Stories posts.
Limiting a photo or video to close friends is straightforward. Friends can be added or removed from the ‘Close Friends’ list from the side menu in your Instagram profile. When you’re ready to share a photo or video as part of your Instagram Story, the new feature adds a circular green button with a white star to the bottom of the screen that restricts sharing to people on your close friends list.
When you receive content from people who have added you as a close friend, their avatar at the top of Instagram’s main view will be outlined in green to signal that a close friend has shared something. The image or video is also badged as having been shared by a close friend.
It will be interesting to see how the Close Friends feature impacts Instagram. I like the idea of limiting some of what I share on Instagram with a smaller circle of friends. For many people, I expect the feature will make them more comfortable with sharing more as opposed to moving their entire Stories usage to a private group. However, it also has the potential to drain Stories of much of their content in favor of private silos.
If you use Gmail, you have a lot of options to get it out of a browser tab and into an app. Many of our readers are familiar with Apple Mail and excellent third-party apps like Airmail and Spark, but there are lots of other interesting email clients available on the Mac that...
My piece on photography above got me thinking about trying new things and experimenting. Like a lot of people, I’m sometimes better at starting new projects than finishing them. Left to my own devices, I’d flit from one shiny object to the next, dabbling in more than I can master. Starting is fun, but...
Home Home, the third-party HomeKit utility by Matthias Hochgatterer, has been updated with a new camera widget and even more powerful options for advanced automation. For cameras, Home now comes with a HomeCam-like widget to visualize a grid of real-time video feeds of your favorite cameras without opening the app. I like how the...
Over Thanksgiving a relative asked me if there was a way to mute the iPhone’s ringer without muting any of the other apps. I had never tried it and was surprised to find that the Phone app is unique in that it has no ‘None’ option among its ringtones like Messages has and no...
Question: I just got a new 12.9-inch iPad Pro, but I still have many USB-A chargers throughout my home. I like that I can charge my iPhone from just about anywhere, but I want to be able to do the same with my iPad. Can you recommend any cheap and reliable USB-A to USB-C cables?...
Smartphones have put increasingly-capable cameras in the hands of millions of people worldwide, transforming photography. What makes photography on the iPhone and iOS especially compelling is the convenience of always having a camera with you and the smooth continuum of apps for beginners through experts. No matter where you fall on the spectrum, there’s...
In an interview with CNET, Apple Vice President Greg Joswiak revealed that the iPhone XR has been the best selling of the latest iPhone models every day since it was launched, a statement that is no doubt aimed at recent reports that XR parts orders have been reduced due to weak demand. Joswiak declined to provide specific sales figures to CNET.
Joswiak also said that Apple would again be marking World AIDS Day by making a donation to support Red, a nonprofit founded by U2 band member Bono. Apple is a long-term supporter of Red and has participated in World AIDS Day in a variety of ways over the years, raising $160 million since the group was founded in 2006.
In the past, the company has made donations based on Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, donated based on Apple Pay purchases, turned store logos red, and worked with music artists and app developers to release special Red-themed content. According to CNET, this year:
The company will donate $1 for every Apple Pay purchase at an Apple Store, Apple.com or through the Apple Store app from Dec. 1 to Dec. 7, and it plans to turn 125 Apple Store logos red in honor of the day.
That’s similar to last year, except that this year the donation does not include in-app transactions, and Joswiak told CNET the App Store is not participating with any special promotions this year. That’s a shame because past Red-themed promotions raised awareness of Red’s efforts to combat AIDS as well as funds to support the group’s work.
On this week’s episode of AppStories, we take iOS for a car ride covering CarPlay, Do Not Disturb, in-car dongles, and automation.
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Federico
