*By Conor White*
After losing $136 billion in market cap in less than a week, Facebook is looking for ways to reinvigorate its outlook at a time of slowing ad revenue growth, [continued fallout](https://cheddar.com/videos/facebook-stock-crushed-after-disappointing-earnings) from the Cambridge Analytical data privacy scandal, and the [latest revelation](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/31/us/politics/facebook-political-campaign-midterms.html) Tuesday that it's detected attempts to influence this November's midterm elections.
"It's been a long 2018 for Facebook," said Madison Malone Kircher, an associate editor at New York Magazine. "Which brings us to the one thing Facebook is doing right, and that's the Stories platform. It works really well on Instagram, which Facebook owns, and they've really been trying to push to make it work on Facebook."
Instagram Stories has 400 million daily users, double the number of users of rival Snapchat, and Facebook has been trying to lure advertisers to the Stories platform.
Kircher said in an interview Tuesday with Cheddar that neither of the social media companies has figured out how to make user-generated stories on their platforms profitable.
"Snapchat, which is the creator of this style of posting, has also struggled with it," Kircher said. "They rolled out a new platform called 'Commercials' this week, which is similarly trying to figure out how to sell ads against this style of content."
In the end, Kircher said Facebook can push Stories to advertisers all it wants, but it won't be successful until it's popular with users.
"It's a two-fold problem Facebook has," Kircher said. "One, trying to convince advertisers to buy ads in this space, but first they have to figure out how to get us to use it."
For more on this story, [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/facebook-pushing-stories-feature-to-advertisers).
These are the headlines you Need2Know.:
Microsoft uncovered a new spear-phishing scheme waged by Russian hackers who targeted a handful of websites apparently linked to the government in an attempt to influence this November's elections.
Netflix is planning to test a feature that would provide recommendations for other content that would play in between episodes of shows. Austin Powell, managing editor at The Daily Dot, calls it a "really bad look" for the streaming giant.
These are the headlines you Need2Know.
Dan Primack, business editor at Axios, talks all things Elon Musk.
NEO U, a new gym in New York, is not just a place to get in shape, it's a studio where fitness professionals can share their workouts with online followers around the world. The co-founder Nate Forster wants trainers and partners like Soul Cycle, Equinox, and Peloton to see the NEO U platform as an opportunity, not competition.
Facebook is planning on launching a dating feature, fueling more competition in the online dating world. Sarah Jones Simmer, Chief Operating Officer at female-focused dating app Bumble, tells Cheddar that competition validates the industry and rids the stigma of online dating.
Public-radio platforms PRX and PRI are merging to capitalize on the growing appetite for podcasts. Kerri Hoffman, the CEO of Public Radio Exchange, tells Cheddar she wants the work of her producers to be heard."There are lots of podcasts," she said. "It's really important that we create lily pads along the way that help people get more successful."
Amazon's reported interest in Landmark Theaters may not only be about about showing the streaming giant's films, says Larry Dignan, editor-in-chief of ZDNet. It's likely a retail play by Amazon, the e-commerce giant, he says. "Remember, whatever Amazon does has everything to do with Prime subscriptions."
The outspoken CEO of Tesla told The New York Times, "this past year has been the most difficult and painful year of my career." In a revealing, hour-long interview Thursday, Musk choked up several times describing his struggles leading the electric-car company.
