Facebook is currently prototyping ‘Voice Clips’ which might become a brand new way of sharing post on the Social Media platform. The feature termed “Add Voice Clip” will appear on the status update composer menu. With this feature, users will be able to record short audio clips and share to their friend list.
The trial period started in India, with an Indian user being the first to use it. By including this mode of status sharing, Facebook hopes its users will be enthusiastic about sharing thoughts orally rather than by using words. They are also launching this feature to facilitate users that struggle with non-native language keyboards by enabling them to talk instead of type.
“We are always working to help people share and connect with their friends and family on Facebook in ways that are authentic to them. Voice Clips gives people a new medium through which to express themselves,” a spokesperson from Facebook said.
It is however yet unsure whether this feature will be available globally, as it is still in its testing phase. Facebook is actively looking for innovative ways to enable users to share original posts on its website or app directly; instead of re-sharing posts from other platforms such as Instagram, or Twitter. Over the years, there has been an original content broadcasting decline of 21% since mid-2015. Figure which further crashed down by an additional 15% as of mid-2016.
Facebook now fears to have become a social media where people only share their life events like “Going to Delhi University.”
Voice Clips could allow people to share absorbing, genuine life stories and opinions. Especially those who are not very comfortable in front of a camera or are not good at editing, or do not possess a good phone camera.
It is therefore logical that Facebook turned to India to test their ‘Voice Clips’ prototype as Bharat has over 22 local languages and typing can be hard for them. Additionally, after hitting saturation in the West, India’s 1.3 billion population is a very tempting market for the social media network.
Facebook is very involved in developing voice-enabled features and is currently working on developing smart home speakers named Fiona and Aloha. They are rumored to reach the markets in July. The Aloha model is said to be more advanced than Fiona.