Home
Social networking
Social networking News
Facebook Unveils 'Watch Party', Making Watching Videos a Social Experience

Facebook Unveils 'Watch Party', Making Watching Videos a Social Experience

By Indo-Asian News Service | Updated: 18 January 2018 13:11 IST

Highlights

Members of a Facebook group can watch videos at the same time
It will create an engagement similar to Facebook Live
The company has said that it will help build a community

Facebook has introduced a feature called "Watch Party" that will let the members of a group watch videos and interact with each other at the same time.

"In a Watch Party, members of a group can watch videos together in the same space at the same time -- videos are chosen by the group admins and moderators and can be any public videos on Facebook (live or recorded)," said Fidji Simoi, Facebook's Vice President of Product in a post late on Wednesday.

She said that with everyone watching, commenting and reacting to the same moments together, it creates a shared viewing experience for video that helps build a community.

The social media giant is starting to roll out the feature with groups because "a billion people use Facebook groups every month to connect around their passions and hobbies and video is a huge part of this interaction."

The executive also said that viewing the videos together on the platform will also create an engagement which is similar to the one which is created by Facebook Live.

Today, live videos generate an average of six times as many interactions as regular videos.

Facebook said it would learn from the experience and hope to expand "Watch Party" in the future.

Last week Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that the platform has always been about personal connections and interactions in meaningful ways.

"As we think about video on Facebook, we're focused on creating experiences that bring people closer together and inspire human connection instead of passive consumption," he had said, adding, "We are excited about what might be possible when we bring the best elements of Live that people love to more video experiences like Watch Parties."

Comments

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.