Stories isn't Available to Everyone yet

Some of our subscribers who aren’t subscribed to Telegram Premium have noticed that they are still not able to post stories after updating the app to the latest version, 10.0.

It is expected that the future will gradually be available to all users on the latest versions of the apps.

#stories

Viewing Stories

• By default, all stories from your contacts that you are allowed to view are displayed above the chat list.

• You can scroll down to expand the stories section.

• To view a someone’s story, simply tap their profile photo.

• You can also view stories from other Telegram users that allow you to do so: their profile picture will have a colored ring if they have an active story. This can be anywhere from your chat list or the list of participants in a group.

• Tap on the right and left sides of the screen while viewing a story to move to the next or previous story, or swipe right and left to see stories from the next user.

More on this update can be found here.

Hiding Stories from the Header

• If you want to hide stories of a specific user from the header without blocking them or removing them from your contacts, tap and hold their profile picture, and choose “Hide Stories.” This will move their stories to the archive.

• To unhide, open the archive, tap and hold their profile picture, and choose “Don‘t Hide Stories.“

• It‘s not possible to completely disable stories.

• Note that your chat with the user won’t be moved to the archive, and they won’t know that you have archived their stories.

More on this update can be found here.

Managing Notifications for New Stories

• By default, you will get notified when one of five contacts that you communicate with most frequently posts a story.

• You can manually enable or disable notifications for stories from any user by opening one of their stories, opening the menu, and toggling the “Notify about Stories” setting.

• You can also enable or disable notifications from the header: tap and hold the user’s profile picture and toggle the “Notify about Stories” setting.

• Story notifications can be fully customized by adding exceptions for individual users or entire groups.

More on this update can be found here.

Reacting and Replying to Stories

• While viewing someone’s story, you can react to it by clicking the heart icon, or by simply opening reply dialog and choosing a reaction.

• You can also tap and hold the heart icon to choose a different reaction without having to open the reply dialog.

• Notice that in however way you react, you will be added to a list of those who have viewed the story, even if you are in Stealth Mode.

More on this update can be found here.

Creating Stories

• Create stories using photos or videos either from your gallery or through the in-app camera.

• You can use combine multiple images from your gallery in one story: open the sticker panel in the editor and tap the photo icon in the bottom corner. There, you can also find and choose images from the internet.

Dual Camera Mode

• Photos and videos can be taken simultaneously from both front and back cameras, and switch between them even while recording.

• The recording from one camera fills the entire screen, while the other camera appears as a small circle that can be moved around even while recording.

• This feature is not available on all devices.

Media Editor

• Using the built-in media editor, you can attach stickers, GIFs, text, and location tags, and make adjustments to brightness, contrast, and saturation.

• When adding geotags, you can specify any point on the map or choose a suitable one from the list. The location you choose doesn't necessarily have to be the place you live or the place where the photo or video was taken.

Story Captions

• Stories have a separate text field where you can add a more detailed description.

• Text captions support @mentions and links, allowing you to tag your friends and share websites.

• The maximum length of the caption is 200 character for regular users, and 2048 characters for premium users.

More on this update can be found here.

Story Privacy Settings

• When posting a story, you can choose from four privacy settings: Everyone, My Contacts, Close Friends, and Selected Contacts.

• Each setting can be customized, allowing you to include or exclude individual users, or all members of specific groups.

• Additionally, you can create a list of users who will never see your story, regardless of the selected privacy settings.

• You can also disable screenshots so that the viewers won’t be able to screenshot your story on their devices or share it with others.

More on this update can be found here.

Editing Stories

• You can edit the privacy settings and pretty much any details of your story at any time: captions, text overlays, stickers, and other elements—all without the need of deleting your story and creating a new one.

• To edit a story, open the menu button, and choose “Edit Story.”

• While a story is up, you can change who can view it: open the privacy settings in the top right corner, and choose between the options: Everyone, My Contacts, Close Friends, or Selected Contacts.

• You can view your stories from Settings > My Stories. There you can tap on any story to see who viewed it, change its visibility, or remove it from your profile.

More on this update can be found here.

Detailed View Statistics

• You can see a list of those who have viewed your stories.

• You can open the list of viewers directly in the story or from the archive at Settings > My Stories.

• Filters allow you to see which contacts of yours viewed the story, and let you prioritize recent views or reactions.

• To see if a specific user has viewed your story, simply enter their name in the search bar.

• This list becomes inaccessible 24 hours after the story expires. Premium users have permanent access to it.
Updated 24.08.2023. Some Premium users have permanent access only to list of users who have sent reaction. Viewers lists are not accessible for such users Premium users forever.

• Note that the reaction and view counts always remain accessible.

• Premium users can enable Stealth Mode to anonymously see stories of other users. This will remove them from the viewer list of stories posted 5 minutes before and 25 minutes after enabling Stealth Mode.

More on this update can be found here.

Bot API was updated to version 6.8

What's new:
• Added the field story to the class Message for messages with forwarded stories. Currently, it holds no information.
• Added the field voter_chat to the class PollAnswer, to contain channel chat voters in Polls. For backward compatibility, the field user in such objects will contain the user 136817688 (@Channel_Bot).
• Added the field emoji_status_expiration_date to the class Chat.
• Added the method unpinAllGeneralForumTopicMessages.
• Increased to 512 characters the maximum length of the startapp parameter in direct Web App links.

See the full changelog for details on the official website.

#update #BotAPI

Telegram Data Center Is Unstable

DC2 users are currently experiencing issues in using Telegram. The status hangs on "Updating...".

Symptoms: displaying the inscription "Connecting ..." in the title and others.

#outages

Back To Stable

Telegram was unstable for around 40 minutes, and at some point it was impossible to send and receive messages. However, the issue seems to be fixed now.

#outages

Telegram has been blocked in Somalia.

The Somali government has made the decision to block the TikTok and Telegram applications, as well as the online betting website 1XBET, within the country, stating that they are being used by "terrorists" for propagandistic purposes.

According to the Ministry's information, these listed platforms are being utilized by "terrorists" and "groups promoting immorality" to disseminate violent images and videos, as well as to mislead the public.

This decision was made ahead of the second phase of a military offensive against the radical Islamists known as "Al-Shabaab," who have been conducting a bloody uprising against the central government in Mogadishu for over 15 years.

The Ministry of Communication and Technology, in its statement, indicated that it has instructed internet providers to cut off access to these three platforms by August 24th. Legal actions will be taken against those who fail to comply with this requirement, the nature of which is not specified.

#bans #Somalia

Telegram Desktop updated to version 4.9.2

What's new:
— Remove single recently used emoji or reset the list from context menu.
— Change all emoji skin colors from Emoji & People section.
— Connected Websites section in Settings > Privacy and Security.
— Bug fixes and other minor improvements.

Download: from official website or GitHub.

#update #desktop

Stories from Telegram

An increasing number of users are starting to see stories posted on behalf of Telegram. These stories visually showcase some of the story features from the messenger’s latest update.

Previously, we reported that the Telegram team intends to share information about app updates in a new format (in addition to the long-standing text updates in the messenger’s official account).

It isn’t possible to hide these stories from the main screen using the same method as hiding stories from contacts: the standard hiding method is not available in this case.

#Stories

Does The Ability to Post Stories Without Having Premium Subscription Depend on Your Region?

In the version 10.0.0 of Telegram's mobile applications, posting Stories became available even to accounts without a Telegram Premium subscription. However, many users have discovered that this feature hasn't appeared for them.

The editorial team at @tginfoen believes that the ability to post Stories for users without a premium subscription depends on the country's phone code linked to the Telegram account.

For instance, in Russia, Ukraine, Indonesia, Uzbekistan, India and Iran, publishing Stories without Telegram Premium isn't possible, whereas users from Belarus and Kazakhstan are permitted to do so.

A detailed article about the editorial team's observations and story publication in other countries is available at the following link: tginfo.me/stories-by-countries-en

Update on August 28, 2023: Telegram Stories feature is now available to users with Uzbekistan phone number.

#Stories

Stories is Now Available in Uzbekistan

In a recent article, we addressed the absence of Stories in several countries, Uzbekistan included. Users have reported that it's now possible to post stories without a Premium subscription by using an Uzbek phone number. We're also looking into expansion of this feature to other countries, but availability details are still pending.

#Uzbekistan #Stories

New Features on the Telegram Ads Platform

Over the past few weeks Telegram Ads (the official advertising platform) has undergone several significant changes. Let’s explore the new possibilities now available to advertisers:

• External links with no length restrictions:
This new feature allows advertisers to add special UTM tags to the URLs entered, providing detailed information about each traffic source.

• Fast food advertising now permitted:
The previous ban on promoting fast food products on the platform has been completely lifted.

• Information about reasons for ad rejection:
Telegram now informs advertisers which specific group of requirements their ad doesn’t meet, such as “Destination quality”, “Destination functionality”, “Irrelevant destinations”, or “Manipulation of content.”

• Metrics viewing for CTR, CPM, CPC, CPS of published ads:
Thanks to this new feature, advertisers can assess the effectiveness of their advertising campaigns.

• Ability to use custom emojis in ad text:
Capture the attention of potential clients and subscribers using unconventional emojis.

#AboutAds