Apps
Google Chrome Will Drop Flash Support in 2020

Adobe Flash Player is a tool that has received quite the mixed reception over the years. We can’t forget that the userbase of the product has been on a steep decline ever since the introduction of HTML5.
Well, Google has just mentioned how awful this decline has gotten. The percentage of daily Chrome users who’ve loaded at least one page containing Flash content per day has gone down from around 80% in 2014 to under 8% in early 2018.
The statistics have been provided by Parisa Tabriz, Director of Engineering at Google, during a keynote speech at Network and Distributed System Security Symposium (NDSS) held in San Diego last week.
The subject of discussion in her speech was about security features in Chrome and other aspects of the web platform. Of course, Adobe Flash and its usage was one of the important points to bring.
According to the future plans regarding Content Streaming, Adobe Flash will be dropped from Google Chrome once Version 87 is released to the public. In other words, we’ll see the browser stop supporting this feature in December of 2020.
It’s worth mentioning the fact that Adobe has also mentioned last year that they had plans to stop supporting Adobe Flash Player by 2020 as well. In other words, everyone seems to be ready to move on.
Before Google Chrome’s Version 87 comes around, however. People who like using Flash still can access the feature in a click-to-run policy. There is a catch too, as starting from Chrome 76 —expected in July 2019— Flash will be disabled by default, meaning users will have to enable the plugin in their settings before even entering a click-to-run state.
I will be missing the old Flash games I used to run in sites like Newgrounds and Kongregate. But considering that there are better ways to make games online it’s not hard to see this industry evolving. I guess we’ll just have to get ready for Flash’s demise.
Apps
Mobile apps from Threads make profile switching easy

Twitter rival, Threads, owned by Meta, now allows account switching without logging out.
This Thursday, the social networking app announced that users can swap accounts on its mobile apps by long pressing the bottom right profile icon. Tap “Add profile” after the long press to add a profile.
Users can easily switch between work and personal profiles. Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri did not say if the profile-switching feature allowed you to add a limit of accounts.
On the same day as Facebook allowed multiple personal profiles on Blue, the text-based social networking app announced its profile feature.
Threads keeps adding features three months after its launch. It began testing full-text search in New Zealand and Australia late last month. The company launched global search this month.
Threads added 24-hour post notifications and web quote functionality in September.
Threads’ competitors ship features in a competitive social media landscape. Mastodon released version 4.2 this week with improved profile and post search, automatic quick action suggestions in the search box, a new web interface with thread indicators and article previews, and a Privacy and Reach settings tab.
Apps
Elon Musk said X will collect ‘a tiny monthly payment’ for its service
X owner Elon Musk suggested today that Twitter may no longer be free. Musk said the business was “moving to a small monthly payment” for the X system in a live-streamed meeting with Netanyahu on Monday. He suggested such a tweak to address platform bots.
Musk said, “It’s the only way I can think of to combat vast armies of bots.” According to him, bots have a high effective cost due to their low cost (a tenth of a penny), even though they require a few dollars. Each bot creator needed a new payment method to make another bot.
Musk said the new subscription price would be a “small amount of money.”
Musk also announced that X now has 550 million monthly users and 100 to 200 million daily postings. Musk’s stats may include automated accounts, either good bots like news feeds or malicious bots like spammers.
This figure couldn’t be compared to Twitter’s pre-Musk user base, which was computed using mDAU, Twitter’s own metric. This earlier statistic identified Twitter users who may be monetized by adverts. Twitter reported 229 million mDAUs in Q1 2022.
Musk did not specify when he would charge for X. Since Musk took over the network last year, it has been pushing users to subscribe to X Premium (formerly Twitter Blue). This $8 per month or $84 per year subscription service lets you modify posts, reduce the ad load, prioritize search and conversation rankings, make lengthier posts, and more.
X doesn’t divulge its paying subscribers, but independent research shows X Premium doesn’t attract most customers. X Premium has 827,615 subscribers, according to one estimate.
Musk has considered charging everyone for X. In fact, Platformer claimed last year that Musk was considering a Twitter paywall.
Though hate speech on X came up, Musk and Netanyahu discussed AI technologies and regulation today. Musk called himself “against antisemitism” and “anything that promotes hate and conflict.” Musk threatened to sue the Anti-Defamation League, which has accused Musk and X of antisemitism, in his latest fight.
Apps
X launches government ID account verification

For paid users, X, formerly Twitter, has implemented government ID-based account verification to prevent impersonation and provide “prioritized support.”
Social media partner Au10tix provides identity verification solutions from Israel. The ID verification pop-up says the Au10tix can store this data for 30 days.
X’s verification support page says ID verification is available in “numerous countries,” but not in the EU, EEA, or UK. The region’s strict data protection laws likely explain this.
ID-based verification seems unnecessary and rarely beneficial. The company may age-gate content based on ID age.
“X currently focuses on account authentication to prevent impersonation and may explore additional measures, such as ensuring users have access to age-appropriate content and protecting against spam and malicious accounts, to maintain platform integrity and healthy conversations,” it said.
Users who pass the verification badge will receive a government ID verification note. Only clicking the blue checkmark on the profile page shows it. The company said ID-verified users will get “prioritized support from X Services,” but this is unclear.
The company allowed paid users to hide checkmarks from their profiles last month.
X plans to speed up checkmark reviews if users verify their IDs. Plus, they can frequently change their names, usernames, and profile photos without losing the checkmark.
Only paid users can use ID-based verification. Ironically, X promotes impersonation and spam reduction but doesn’t offer verification tools to all users.
Twitter discontinued legacy verification and removed account checkmarks in April. However, the company reinstated the top account checkmark after much chaos.
The social network added biometric data, education, and job history to its privacy policy last month.
“This will additionally help us tie, for those that choose, an account to a real person by processing their government-issued ID,” X told Bloomberg. “This will also help X fight impersonation attempts and secure the platform.”
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