Coronavirus Epidemic Prompts Facebook To Cancel Annual 'F8' Developers Conference

WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 28th February, 2020) Facebook called off its annual developers' F8 2020 conference and announced plans to replace the event with a series of locally hosted sessions, videos and live streamed content, the company said in a press release.

"Given the growing concerns around COVID-19 [novel coronavirus], we've made the difficult decision to cancel the in-person component of F8 2020," the release said on Thursday. "We're planning other ways for our community to get together through a combo of locally hosted events, videos and live streamed content."

F8, or Facebook 8, is a term derived from a company tradition of eight-hour "hackathons."

The release promised additional details in the coming weeks and included a link for participants to sign up.