The Mobile Marketing team would like to start 2017 by wishing you all a happy New Year, and hoping that you have all fully recovered from any celebrating/mourning the end of 2016. Either way, there were a few stories you might have missed over the Christmas break, so with no further ado:

Twitter launches live 360 video
Twitter introduced live interactive 360° videos to give users the opportunity to see the entire scene when watching livestreamed content from their favourite broadcasters. Videos with the feature are marked with a Live 360 badge.

For the time being, only select Twitter partners can go live using the feature, via Periscope, but everyone on Twitter and Periscope can watch the live videos.

Its a direct competitor to Facebook, which launched its own live 360 videos in mid-December.

Snapchat upgrades ad targeting
Snapchat introduced ‘goal-based bidding’ – giving advertisers more options when buying through the Snapchat ad platform – according to Advertising Age.

The new tools enable advertisers to bid on ad engagement, rather than simply paying for ad views. Snapchat is said to use machine learning to target people who are most likely to engage with a specific ad.

Amazon filed patent for flying warehouse
Amazon filed for a patent in the US for the use of airborne fulfilment centres utilising drones for delivery. The patent, filed in April, was uncovered by CB Insights’ Zoe Leavitt.

Amazon suggests, in the patent, that the warehouses could be airships that remain at 45,000ft – from which the drones may be deployed to deliver items to certain delivery locations.

Facebook’s advertising struggles continue
Business Insider reported on the revelation from Drew Huening, director of Omnicom’s digital ad buying trading desk Accuen, that “Facebook ads are far less viewable than [advertisers] were expecting.” This comes not long after Facebook’s well-documented ad metric calculation struggles were revealed to be continuing in its second metrics report.

In addition, Facebook has come under fire for buying data regarding its users offline lives and not disclosing this information, ProPublica reported.

Oculus acquires The Eye Tribe
Facebook’s Oculus confirmed that it has acquired eye tracking device developer The Eye Tribe, but refused to share any further details, according to TechCrunch.

The startup has developed eye tracking developer kits for computers that mean VR systems will only generate graphics depending on where you are looking – making the eyes the focal point.