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Over the course of the past few months, Facebook has been working hard to bring Snapchat’s main features to its suite of products — including WhatsApp — and now it looks like its efforts are finally paying off. During its Q1 earnings call on Wednesday, the social networking giant revealed that WhatsApp’s recently-implemented 24-hour Status feature has amassed 175 million daily users, overtaking  Snapchat  Stories which currently has around 161 million. What’s particularly interesting, however, is that more than half of Snapchat’s user base refrain from visiting Facebook on a daily basis, according to App Annie research shared with  Bloomberg . Talk about bad timing! Facebook couldn’t have announced the news at a worse time. Shortly after it made the revelation, WhatsApp suffered a  major service outage  across the globe, lasting for a little more than two hours. Users weren’t happy, to say the least.

Google today  announced  a change to its AdSense policy that will remove a limitation previously in place that restricted certain kinds of ads “above the fold” – meaning, visible on a website without scrolling down the page. The company says that it will now allow its 300×250 medium rectangle ads to be implemented above the fold on the mobile web, without resulting in AdSense violations. Oh great. These ads take up a good amount of space on a small screen as it is, but at least until today you wouldn’t have to encounter them unless you were scrolling down the page while reading an article. Now Google is saying they can appear on the visible part of the page you see when you first click through to a mobile website. That doesn’t leave much room for content – like the headline, leading image or article text – especially on smaller-screened devices. The change may have been partly influenced by consumers’ preferences for larger smartphones, like the iPhone 7 Plus, Samsung Galax

Anthony Joshua with his IBF belt Anthony Joshua is a Nigerian born British boxer and the newly crowned World Heavyweight Champion. He clinched the title on the 29th of May 2017, after beating 41-year old Ukrainian boxer Wladimir Klitschko at the Wembley Stadium. The boxer is set to be honoured back home in Nigeria as the Sagamu Stadium and a street in Ogun state is to be named after him. Yinka Mafe, the majority leader of the State House of Assembly in Ogun State Nigeria, was among those who watched Joshua’s win in an open air viewing event. Joshua’s parents hail from the Ogun State region of Nigeria. According to ESPN , Mafe has vowed to rename the stadium after Joshua, while the popular Cinema Street will also bear his name. Joshua’s great grandfather, Omo-Oba Daniel Adebambo Joshua, built the cinema that sits on the road during the 1950s. “We are proud of what he has achieved as a son of Sagamu, and we will be happy to do our own little bit to sho

As Osinbajo’s panel likely to submit reports tomorrow.  ABUJA-Baring any last minute eventuality, the Presidential committee investigating suspended Secretary to the Government of the General of the Federation, SGF, Babachir Lawal and the Director-General of the National Intelligence Agency, NIA, Ayo Oke would submit its report tomorrow. The Minister of Justice and Attorny-General of the Federation, AGF, Abubkar Malami who is a member of the panel headed by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo dropped the hints on Tuesday while speaking to State House correspondents after a private meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari at the presidential villa, Abuja. He however refused to speak on whether the committee would yield to the calls of not making the report public, saying “it will be preemptive”, as the committee’s 14 days life span is yet to elapse. Similarly, the president also met with the Group Managing Director, GMD of the Nigerian National Petroleum Cooperation, NNPC, Maikanti Baru. D

Boy, that was quick. Last week, Twitter revealed its plans to amplify video by  launching 24/7 streaming channels  on its platform and subsequently announced that it was  teaming up with Bloomberg  to deliver round-the-clock financial news. Now, it’s got a dozen more partners on board to broadcast video on its platform. The new deals will see daily and weekly programming from the likes of BuzzFeed News, The Verge and Cheddar, as well as games from the WNBA and MLB. You’ll also be able to tune into concerts from Live Nation, fashion shows and behind-the-scenes content from IMG, MTV award ceremonies and more. There are even a couple of exclusive new sports shows being developed exclusively for Twitter. With that, Twitter hopes to rake in major ad dollars in a way that it hasn’t really managed with its other promotional campaign offerings for businesses. It’ll be interesting to see if the company’s bet on the idea that people will stay glued to its platform for more than just twee

It’s been nearly  13 years since the Chinese government first blocked Wikipedia  across the country, following which its ban has been lifted and restored several times, mostly owing to concerns around censorship. Now, in a bid to offer a similar service while maintaining control over what’s published, the government is building its own online encyclopedia – and it’s hiring 20,000 people to do it. CHECK IT OUT Yang Muzhi, the editor-in-chief of the project and the chairman of the Book and Periodicals Distribution Association of China, described the Chinese Encyclopedia as ‘a Great Wall of culture’. The web-based resource will serve to showcase “China’s latest science and technology developments, promote historical heritage, increase cultural soft power, and strengthen the core values of socialism.” It’ll take the efforts of scores of scholars and researchers to put together by 2018, as they’re tasked with writing up more than 300,000 entries of about 1,000 words

Osogbo—The founding National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Chief Bisi Akande had urged Nigerians to pray fervently for President Muhammadu Buhari’s health. A statement by Chief Akande in Osogbo yesterday, read in part: “The health of the leader is intricately intertwined with the health of the nation. It is more so in a delicately fragile union of nations called Nigeria. I did not see President Buhari at the wedding of his adopted son in Kaduna, last Saturday. I was sad and I wept. “When last we met at the wedding of his daughter in Abuja, last December, I complained to him that I was not happy about his stressful looks. His reply connoted some allusions to circumstances where an honest man fighting corruption is surrounded mostly by unpatriotic greedy ruling class. He felt painfully frustrated. “He assured me he would soon be going on vacation. I then knew that corruption has effectively been fighting back. And I prayed for Nigeria. That was why Asiwaju Bola T

Bill Gates in the tricycle. To the right is another tricycle driver doing his own business. Photo: Bill Gates on Facebook The world’s richest man, Mr. Bill Gates, with a net worth of $87.2bn as stated by Forbes, has been sighted taking a ride in a tricycle popularly called Keke Napep or Keke Marwa in Nigeria. The multibillionaire was on one of his yearly visits to India when he took the joy ride. See the photograph, which earned a whopping 19,180,694 likes, as posted on his Facebook wall:

IMAGE: LILI SAMS/MASHABLE WhatsApp  users know that, with things like group chats and people messaging you all day, your most important chats can get lost in the shuffle.  But now the messaging service is testing a new feature that'll make it a whole lot easier to manage your chats Android Police  reports that WhatsApp is testing a feature that would allow you to pin chats, keeping them at the top of the chat list even if you get messages from other users. To pin a chat, users can tap and hold on the chat, and a pin logo will appear on the top bar along with the delete, mute and archive logos. Users can pin up to three chats, and can easily unpin any of the three chats to add another. The feature is currently being tested on the beta version of the Android app which users can get by opting into the beta group  here . Since the feature is only in beta, there's no guarantee that it will be rolled out to all users, but for the sake of our lost messages, we sure h

The Senate has stepped down the bill to establish the Nigerian Peace Corps, after lawmakers opposed its passage. The setback, Tuesday, followed the presentation of the committee on the bill chaired by Bayero Nafada. But rather than take votes for the bill’s passage for a third reading, senators, including deputy senate president, Ike Ekweremadu, and minority leader, Godswill Akpabio, argued against its passage. They cited the lawsuit involving the head of the peace corps and the police. More to come. Source: Premium times 

HIGHLIGHTS The feature is still being tested in the Android beta The latest WhatsApp beta lets you pin chats on top A maximum of three chats can be pinned WhatsApp has  reportedly  been testing many new features recently to make chats more fun and convenient, and another such feature has come to light. The new  WhatsApp  feature allows users to pin conversations with their favourite contacts to the top to the Chats tab. The new feature is being tested on Android for now, but is expected to roll out to stable versions of the app soon. Android Police was the first one to  spot  the new WhatsApp pinning feature, and if you're running WhatsApp beta for Android versions 2.17.162 or 2.17.163, you'll most likely be able to use it. Press on the individual/ group chat you want to pin to the top, and choose the Pin symbol from the top bar. The other options alongside  Pin  are  Delete ,  Mute , and  Archive . Once you pin a chat, it will remain on the top of your