Technology

Get ready for some significant changes in the way enterprises manage their growing fleets of mobile devices — and in the technologies they use to provide that management.

2017: EMM suites go beyond MDM, add sophisticated capabilities

2016: Mobile management takes on apps, content

2015: Mobile device management broadens

Just over a year after Skype introduced a colorful, Snapchat-inspired makeover which included its own version of &stories,& the company says itnow going to refocus on simplicity & and itditching stories along the way. The redesign had been met with a lot of backlash. Skype had clearly wanted to appeal to a more youthful demographic with its update, but in doing so, it cluttered the user experience with features no one had asked for or needed.

One of these was &Highlights,& a feature that was very much Skypeown take on Snapchator InstagramStories. With Highlights, Skype users were able to swipe up to pull up their smartphonecamera, then snap a photo or record a video that could be decorated with typed or handwritten text, as well as with Skypeown set of stickers. This could then be shared with individual Skype users, groups, or posted to the Highlights section of the app.

Above: Skype on mobile

The company had argued at the time that the rise of stories across social media meant it was something that all social apps would adopt. And because it was the way people were used to interacting now, Skype needed to include the feature in its own app, too.

But stories, as it turns out, may not be as ubiquitous or as in-demand as a &news feed& interface & there are places it makes sense, and those where it does not.Skype is the latter.

In its announcement, Microsoft admitted that the changes it had introduced weren&t working.

&Calling became harder to execute and Highlights didn&t resonate with a majority of users,& wrotePeter Skillman, Director of Design for Skype and Outlook.

Instead, the app is introducing a simpler navigation model where there are now just three buttons at the bottom of the mobile app & Chats, Calls, and Contacts. Highlights and Capture are both gone. (If you actually used Highlights, you have until September 30 to download them to save them before the feature is removed).

There were already some hints Microsoft was planning to dial back its design changes. It recently announced it was keeping Skype Classic (Skype 7) around for an extended period of time, after its plans to shut the app down was met with overwhelming user outcry. It said then that it would gather more feedback to find out what it is that people wanted before forcing the upgrade to Skype 8.0.

With the new desktop version of Skype, the company now says itmoving the Chats, Calls, Contacts, and Notifications to the top left of the window to make it easier for long-time Skype users to understand.

Skype also toned down its over-the-top use of color in the app and introduced a Skype &Classic& blue theme adjusted for contrast and readability. It yanked out some of its goofier decorative elements, as well, like the notifications with a squiggle shape cut out, which it admits &weren&t core to getting things done.& (Ya think)

Below: Squiggles

While itgood that Skype is now listening to users & it says ittesting new prototypes across global markets and it launched a UserVoicesite & itconcerning that it had not done enough listening beforehand. If it had, it wouldn&t have released a version of its app that bombed.

Skype should embrace its &classic& status, and not feel the need to play catch-up with teen chat apps like Snapchat, or social media trends like stories. People use Skype to get things done & calling faraway friends, placing work calls, and even recording podcasts. Being a simple and stable voice and video calling app is one that can retain loyal users over time, and attract those who need to communicate across platforms without all the fluff found elsewhere.

The latest design is available in Skype version (8.29) for Android, iOS, OS X, Linux, and Windows 7, 8 - 8.1 operating systems.

The UKleading broadcasters and ISPs have called for the government to introduce independent regulatory oversight of social media content.

The group of media and broadband operators in the tightly regulated industries spans both the state-funded and commercial sector — with the letter to theSunday Telegraphbeing inked with signatures from the leaders of the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Sky, BT and TalkTalk.

They argue therean &urgent& need for independent oversight of social media, and counter suggestions that such a move would amount to censorship by pointing out that tech companies are already making choices about what to allow (or not) on their platforms.

They areargue independent oversight is necessary to ensure &accountability and transparency& over those decisions, writing: &There is an urgent need for independent scrutiny of the decisions taken, and greater transparency. This is not about censoring the internet, it is about making the most popular internet platforms safer, by ensuring there is accountability and transparency over the decisions these private companies are already taking.&

&We do not think it is realistic or appropriate to expect internet and social media companies to make all the judgment calls about what content is and is not acceptable, without any independent oversight,& they add.

Calls for regulation of social media platforms have been growing from multiple quarters and countries, and politicians clearly feel there is political capital to spend here. (Indeed, Trumplatest online punchbag is Google.)

Yet policymakers the world over face the challenge of how to regulate platforms that have become so popular and therefore so powerful. (Germanylegislated to regulate social media firms over hate speech takedowns last year but itin the vanguard of government action.)

The UK government has made a series of proposals around Internetsafety in recent years, and the media - telco group argues this is a &golden opportunity& to act against what they describe as &all potential online harms& — further suggesting that &many of which are exacerbated by social media&.

The government isworking on a white paper on Internet safety, and theTelegraph says potential interventions currently under private debate include the creation of a body along the lines of the UKAdvertising Standards Authority (which reports to Ofcom), which it says couldoversee Facebook, Google and Twitter to decide whether to remove material in response to complaints from users.

The newspaper adds that it is envisaged by proponents of this idea that such a regime would be voluntary but backed with the threat of a legislative crackdown if the online environment does not improve. (The EU has been taking this approach with hate speech takedowns.)

Commenting on the groupletter, a government spokesperson told the Telegraph: &We have been clear that more needs to be done to tackle online harms. We are committed to further legislation.&

For their part, tech platforms claim they are platforms not publishers.

Yet their algorithms indisputably create hierarchies of information — which they also distribute at vast scale. At the same time they operate their own systems of community standards and content rules, which they enforce (typically imperfectly and inconsistently), via after-the-fact moderation.

The cracks in this facade are very evident — whether ita high profile failure such as the Kremlin-backed mass manipulation of Facebook platform or this smaller scale but no less telling individual moderation failure. There are very clearly severe limitations to the self-regulation the companies typically enjoy.

Meanwhile, the impacts of bad content decisions and moderation failures are increasingly visible — as a consequence of the the vast scale of (especially) Facebook and GoogleYouTube.

In the UK, a parliamentary committee which has been probing the impact of social media amplified disinformation on democracy recently recommended a third category be created to regulate tech giants that&s not necessarily either a platform or a publisher but whichtightens their liabilities.

The committeefirst report, following a long and drama-packed enquiry this year (thanks to the Cambridge Analytica Facebook data misuse scandal), also called for social media firms to be taxed to pay for major investment in the UKdata protection watchdog so it is better resourced to be able to police data-relatedmalfeasance.

The committee also suggested there should be an education levy also raised off social media firms to pay for the digital literacy skills necessary for citizens to navigate all the stuff being amplified by their platforms.

In their letter to the Sunday Telegraph the group emphasizes their own investment in the UK, whether in the form of tax payments, original content creation or high-speed broadband infrastructure.

Whereas U.S. tech giants stand accused of making lower contributions to national coffers as a result of how they structure their businesses.

The typical tech firm response to tax-related critiques is to say they always pay the tax that is due. But technical compliance with the intricacies of tax law will do nothing to alleviate the reputational damage they could suffer if their businesses become widely perceived as leaching off (rather than contributing to) the nation state.

And thatthe political lever the media firms and ISPs look to be seeking to pull here.

We&ve reached out to Facebook, Twitter and Google for comment.