SAN FRANCISCO – Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) kicked off the F8 developer conference at Fort Mason Center with a keynote speech from the CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
The F8 developer conference, which started way back in 2007, is the social networking giant’s way of connecting with developers.
These are the few noteworthy points from the myriad of things announced at the conference.
Chatbots
Mark Zuckerberg has officially unveiled the Chatbot API for Messenger and launched a beta version of the particular variant. The company also shows off the technology behind the intelligent virtual assistant M, the Bot Engine which will be able to handle text-based conversations on its own due to the Artificial Intelligence learning. This will allow developers to create even more sophisticated bots.
Surround 360 Camera
With the advent of VR headsets, 360 recording is the new trend. To join the fuss developed around Virtual Reality, Facebook bought Oculus VR, the company behind the Oculus Rift, the first successful VR product to step into this market.
So an announcement regarding a 360-degree camera rig is not that astonishing. More specifically, 17 cameras have been included in the device, 14 of which are bolted to a ring and are capable of shooting 8K video at 60fps.
The rig is not up for sale, as its main aim is to generate VR content for Oculus Rift owners.
VR goes Social
The Menlo Park-based company plans to take the VR experience to a whole new level with the introduction of various new social features, such as VR selfie. This can be done with the help of a special controller to manipulate objects of the virtual world, while the controller can function as a digital selfie stick.
Live Videos
Facebook is quite excited with the Live Video feature and is gunning for a wider rollout. So it has released the APIs in order for developers to make advantage of them, thus getting more people to interact through Live Videos.
Profile Expression Kit
Moreover, FB has also rolled out the option to upload profile videos to both Android and iOS devices. Finally, the company enables users to use third party apps like Boomerang by Instagram, Vine, BeautyPlus and a few other services to create funny and personalized videos for their Facebook profile. This is still in a closed Beta stage but there will be a public rollout later on.
Account Kit
The Account Kit enables users to log into new apps using just their phone number or email address, thereby helping app developers to promote their apps and grow further.
What was your favorite part of Facebook’s F8 2016 conference? Let us know in the comments below.
