Facebook has added a tweak to its Place Tips feature by allowing users to view live events on their mobile devices. The company started off by covering Lollapalooza 2015 in Chicago and users can easily view the event via the social network.
In early January, Tech Times reported that Facebook rolled out Place Tips, which provides recommendations about places from users' friends who have already been to the place. This time around, Facebook is taking it a step further by expanding the feature.
"This Place Tips Lollapalooza experience is just one of the many ways Facebook is trying to help people get the feel of an event when they're not there," says a spokeswoman for Facebook in a statement to the Wall Street Journal.
On its initial launch, Place Tips required the user to be in the exact same place as their friends in order to learn what they did while they were there. The new feature, however, does the reverse. Users can now see what their friends are doing or what they are seeing even they are miles apart, all in real-time.
Facebook stresses that the feature is entirely different from Snapchat's Our Story, since the live streaming is filtered in such a way that it includes only the activities of the user's friends as opposed to seeing those of total strangers. Having said that, it will only work if the user has a friend who is attending the event in person.
Twitter will also be covering live events toward the end of the year. Dubbed "Project Lightning," the new feature will work by placing a new button on the user's home screen which, when accessed, will allow users to view live content from events that are happening in real-time.
As Snapchat and Twitter are both moving toward gaining space in real-time event coverage, Facebook needs to update its Place Tips feature to join the competition.
Users who want to stream the Lollapalooza event on their devices can start by searching for it and then tapping on the option that reads "Lollapalooza 2015 in Chicago." They can also use the subheading "See photos and posts from the festival." Through this, users can get a glance at the bands that are currently playing. They can even view the full lineup of the event to learn which artist is expected next onstage.
Facebook says the Lollapalooza live event streaming coverage is a test. The company plans to continue exploring the feature for more live events in the future.
