Mashable: Latest 29 News Updates - including “Apple’s Black Friday Sale Starts in Australia, Discounts iPads & More” |
- Apple’s Black Friday Sale Starts in Australia, Discounts iPads & More
- 5 Fresh and Free To-Do List Apps for iPhone
- Apple Buys Land, Looks to Expand Operations in Cupertino
- “Boston Globe” Pilots Site Checkins and Social Commentary With Marginize
- Google Wave Comes Back From the Dead in an Apache Proposal
- Hands-on With Facebook Alternative Diaspora [PICS]
- HOW TO: Help Feed the Hungry with Online Donations
- Richard Branson to Unveil iPad-Only Magazine Next Week
- Android Market Matures with Mandatory Application Ratings
- HOW TO: Boost Holiday Sales With Commonly Overlooked Marketing Strategies
- Job Openings at Mashable and Other Great Companies
- What Is the Web Thankful For? [INFOGRAPHIC]
- Record Labels Withhold Key to Google’s Digital Music Locker [REPORT]
- Why You Need a Nikon D3100 This Holiday Season
- How Investigative Journalism Is Prospering in the Age of Social Media
- Twitter’s Not Building a News Network, But Here’s What It Should Build [OP-ED]
- Aussie Scores Invite to Strangers’ Thanksgiving via YouTube Plea [VIDEO]
- When Will You Do Your Holiday Shopping? [POLL]
- Delicious Founder Secures Funding for Something Even Tastier
- “Angry Birds” Coming to Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360
- 3 Magnificent Mobile Apps That Ruled 2010 [Mashable Awards]
- 5 Facebook Profile Photos to Avoid
- Celebrate the Holidays With Mashable
- Our Favorite YouTube Videos This Week: “What We’re Thankful For” Edition
- UberTwitter Now Available for iPhone
- Social Point of Sale: The Holy Grail for Location-Based Marketers
- What’s Hot in Social Media This Week
- Facebook Could Soon Own the Trademark for the Word “Face”
- 5 Innovative Technologies Changing Health Care [VIDEOS]
- This Morning’s Top 3 Stories in Tech, Mobile and Business
| Apple’s Black Friday Sale Starts in Australia, Discounts iPads & More Posted: 25 Nov 2010 05:30 AM PST      If you’re wondering how low will Apple price selected products on its special Black Friday shopping event, you need look no further than Apple’s Australian online store, where the event has already begun. As you can see in the screenshot below, most discounts are around 10%. You can get a MacBook Pro for 1,328 Australian dollars instead of 1,449; an iPod nano will set you back A$ 184 instead of A$ 199, and you can save A$ 51 on an iPad, which now starts from A$ 578. It’s reasonable to expect similar discounts in other Apple stores around the world, so if you’re interested in slightly cheaper Apple gadgetry, you can do the math now and prepare your credit cards for later.  [Apple Australia via Engadget] More About: apple, black friday, shopping For more Apple coverage:
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| 5 Fresh and Free To-Do List Apps for iPhone Posted: 25 Nov 2010 05:00 AM PST   We all lead busy, hectic lives, which means that it’s all too easy to forget a task here and there. A to-do list can really help keep you on track, but pen and paper lists are easily lost, especially if you are disorganized to begin with. Making a to-do list on the device you take everywhere — your phone — is a great way to get organized. You can whip it out at any point to add an item, or — joy of joys — cross one off. We’ve taken a look at the to-do lists in the App Store and have come up with five fresh options that will help your productivity in specific ways. Best of all, each one is free. 1. Lucid Lists Free This list app offers great functionality and is perfect for anyone who needs reminders for recurring tasks. Whether it’s returning library books, de-fleaing the cat, car maintenance or just a nudge to call your grandmother, Lucid Lists helps you set up reminders for repeating tasks. Tasks are categorized as “raw” denoting a new or far-off task, “ripe,” which means ready for action, or “rotten” if you’ve missed the due date. This system provides an at-a-glance look at what needs doing and should help anyone stay on track of regular chores. Developer: Kembipro 2. Errands To-Do List This functional app offers a calendar-based way to manage your tasks and alerts to make sure you remember to do them. Add a new item to your to-do list and you can set up folders, priority levels, due date and due time. Setting a due time means you can accompany the task with an alert to go off at various timed intervals before it’s due. You can also view monthly calendars that show tasks due on different dates, which is a great way of getting an overview of just what it is your to-do list has in store for you. Developer: Yoctoville 3. Home&Work Lite Ideal for anyone who has a very busy home and work life, this app separates the two areas, offering a micro-managed way of keeping on top of all your tasks, as well as personal projects and study. Within the “work”, “home,” “project,” “school” and “personal” sections, you can add to-do items and other tasks into a plethora of sub-sections such as appointments, documents, events, yard work, etc. There’s even a “to-think” category, if you’re so busy you need to remind yourself to do so. Developer: Manumatix 4. Listable Listable is a very capable option for anyone who shares to-do lists with partners, housemates or colleagues. Once you’ve set up a list, you can share it via an e-mail invite. The new collaborator can then view the list on his or her iPhone, or online if they are iPhone deficient. The lists themselves are simple — you create tasks as text entries and then tick them off or delete them once complete. The app also offers an “activity stream” view, so if you have shared lists with others, there’s an at-a-glance way to view who has done what, and when. Developer: StackBuilders 5. ListPro The developer describes this app as the “ultimate list making toolkit,” and with its free price tag, we’d definitely agree. ListPro is a seriously comprehensive app that lets you create any kind of to-do list, from simple checklists right through to custom lists as complex as you care to create. It’s not just the creation options that are complex — the options within the lists leave no stone unturned. Within to-do lists you can highlight, indent, and add categories, priority ratings, flags and more. Once you’ve created your lists, you can then re-arrange items, filter results and send an e-mail reminder. We’re just touching the surface of what this app is capable of. If you’re a die-hard to-do list fan, or want to try and become one, this app comes highly recommended. Developer: Ilium Software More iPhone Resources from Mashable:
Reviews: App Store, list More About: app store, apple, apps, business productivity, iphone, iphone apps, List, Lists, productivity, Productivity Lists, to-do lists For more Apple coverage:
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| Apple Buys Land, Looks to Expand Operations in Cupertino Posted: 25 Nov 2010 01:05 AM PST   Apple has bought 98 acres of land in Cupertino from Hewlett-Packard, which is moving out of the city, Mercury News reports. As HP moves out of Cupertino to consolidate its operations in its headquarters in Palo Alto, its property is a perfect fit for Apple which had already bought a 50-acre strip of land right across the street in 2006. Mercury News said that the local real estate experts estimate HP’s asking price for the property at $300 million or more. These two sites are together several times bigger than Apple’s current headquarters at 1 Infinite Loop, several blocks away. “We now occupy 57 buildings in Cupertino and our campus is bursting at the seams. These offices will give us more space for our employees as we continue to grow,” said Apple spokesman Steve Dowling. Apple’s move to expand its headquarters comes as no surprise given Apple’s business results in the past couple of years. Apple has been growing tremendously, reporting $20 billion in revenue in the last quarter, and it’s one of the few IT companies which is currently hiring. Apple, which has been at its current ultra-cool address – 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino – for over 30 years, didn’t disclose what it plans to do with the freshly acquired property.  [via Mercury News] More About: apple, cupertino, real estate For more Apple coverage:
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| “Boston Globe” Pilots Site Checkins and Social Commentary With Marginize Posted: 24 Nov 2010 11:27 PM PST   The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.  Name: Marginize Quick Pitch: See what other people are saying about any web page that you browse. Genius Idea: Even if a website doesn’t have a comment section, there’s likely a conversation happening around it throughout Twitter, Facebook, and other sharing sites. Marginize is a browser extension that pulls that scattered conversation to one space of the site’s margin. Users log in through their Twitter, Facebook, or Google Buzz accounts to publicly post to their favorite social site and “the margin” at once. By “checking in” to a site, they can earn badges. Yesterday, Marginize announced that it would make a widget available to publishers who wanted to make the feature native to their sites. The first nine sites to partner up range from investor and blogger Brad Feld to the Boston Globe. Before adding the widget, the conversation on Marginize around these sites was restricted to those who downloaded the browser extension. Now, their readers will have the option to add to the conversation by clicking on a tab that lives on the site itself. The widget could obviously be a key factor in helping Marginize gain users. But what’s in it for the publishers? Theoretically, adding the widget will help them pull together the community of people who are already commenting about their sites within their own networks and to deepen this community’s engagement. Publishers, for instance, have already launched promotions through Marginize. Boston Globe readers who use Marginize, for instance, will be entered to win a tour of the Globe’s printing press. The idea is that by giving users an incentive to interact around content, they will build a stronger community. Founder Ziad Sultan is hoping that these kind of promotions might be the key to Marginize’s future monetization. There are also possibilities for selling analytics or other freemium features to publishers. Marginize’s strategy of pulling in comments from the social web helped crack the problem of needing a critical mass of users before the service would be useful. It also helped win $650,000 in funding. About 10,000 people have used the browser add-on with more than 150,000 sites since the company’s soft launch in June 2010. And while other companies like Meebo have added check-in features similar to Marginize’s, they’ll have a hard time catching up with Marginize’s user base if enough publishers add the widget to their sites. For now, Marginize’s challenge will be convincing more publishers that the widget will do more for their communities than merely adding a comment section on their sites. The site is working on a pilot program with the Boston Globe that allows them to censor comments that are spam or offensive. Unlike comments removed from the Globe’s own commenting system, these comments are made available on a different page in order to retain transparency. As of now, the widget is only available to the nine sites that launched it yesterday, but Sultan says that it will be available, for free, to any publisher that wants it in the near future. If enough sites take him up on the free widget offer, the service could blossom into the go-to way for people to interact across content.   Image courtesy of Flickr, eekim Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark
Reviews: Facebook, Flickr, Google Buzz, Twitter More About: bizspark, boston globe, marginize, spark-of-genius, startup For more Startups coverage:
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| Google Wave Comes Back From the Dead in an Apache Proposal Posted: 24 Nov 2010 10:10 PM PST   Google Wave, which was though to be all but extinct after Google ended development on the project, has been given new life, thanks to Apache. Once considered the e-mail killer, Google Wave was one of the most-hyped launches of 2009. I’ll be the first to admit that I got swept up by the excitement. At the time of launch though, I said that Google Wave would either succeed spectacularly or completely bomb. Unfortunately, my latter prediction came true: Google’s realtime communication tool was a failure. Thus, Google shut the project down, open-sourced the code and released Wave as Wave in a Box. That was supposed to be the end of the story, but now Google Wave has resurfaced in a new proposal to the Apache Software Foundation. Best known for the Apache server, the ASF is host to over 100 open source projects. Several people from Google, Novell, SAP and even the U.S. Navy hope to add “Apache Wave” to that list. The proposal’s three goals are to migrate Wave’s codebase from Google to the ASF’s infrastructure, to get Wave back to a state where development can be continued and to add new committers to the project. While the proposal notes that there is a risk to adopting Wave as an ASF project (it notes that Wave didn’t gain sufficient traction at Google), it also claims that its use by the U.S. Navy and other adopters makes it a worth project. Apache Wave is still a proposal though; the ASF still has to accept the project. With a well-developed codebase and some big committers, we expect that this project will see the light of day. If it does, Wave will have been given a second life. Reviews: Google, Google Wave More About: apache, Apache Software Foundation, Google, Google Wave, open source For more Dev & Design coverage:
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| Hands-on With Facebook Alternative Diaspora [PICS] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 08:35 PM PST   Following a release of initial source code back in September, the first group of private alpha invites for Facebook alternative Diaspora were released to users on Tuesday. Mashable managed to snag some invites and has put together a gallery to show you the service and how it looks right now. The story behind Diaspora, which was started by four New York University students, goes back about six months to the first Facebook privacy crisis of the summer. Disillusioned with social networking giant’s privacy settings (or lack thereof), the Diaspora team decided to try to do something different. Using Kickstarter, the team hoped to raise $10,000 so that they could start working on the project over the summer. In the end, the guys ended up raising just more than $200,000. Of course, six months is a long time in Internet time. The public backlash over Facebook’s privacy gaffes have largely died down — it seems to be an accepted necessary evil of being social in this day and age. The source code was summarily panned by much of the tech elite, but the developers claim to have taken the criticism to heart. Now that alpha invites are going out, how does the service stack up? Potential For Change or Disappointment?We want to be fair to Diaspora by noting that the service is in the very beginning stages of a private alpha. Thus, we’re not going to be too critical of the service’s lack of features — or the fact that attempting to log in using Safari will crash the browser, full-stop, every single time. The interface itself is clean, if a little sparse. There are no ads, there are no distractions. Unfortunately, as we’ll discuss later, there is also very little activity of any kind. Diaspora looks a lot like any other social network, but we should note that even though this is an alpha, there is an air of incompleteness with Diaspora that’s a little disappointing. I’m a huge fan of minimalist interfaces, but Diaspora just looks desolate. The big focus with Diaspora is that your data is portable, encrypted and selective. You can download all of your data directly from your profile — or download all of your photos. You can also close your account without having to go through any delete shenanigans a la Facebook. The big feature for Diaspora is known as “aspects.” Think of aspects as Facebook Groups, sans the interaction. In other words, you can create a grouping of people — an aspect — named work, and only people in that aspect will be able to view or comment on your messages or photos. Contacts can be assigned one or more aspect, so you can get pretty granular about what you want to share. Additionally, when you select an aspect tab, you can view the activity from those contacts with that designation. Aspects are private so no one knows if they are or are not designated “friend” or “people I don’t know” or anything else. The concept isn’t unlike the Friends Group feature that LiveJournal used a decade ago. I still think LiveJournal understood group and information delegation better than any other social network, so it’s a good feature to emulate. You can also publish messages or photos that are visible to everyone, and you can cross publish to your Twitter or Facebook accounts. And that’s about it. At this stage, you don’t have the ability to attach other kinds of files. You can comment on status updates, but you can’t send users direct messages, nor can you post to anyone’s dashboard or wall. In short, right now it’s kind of like a social network, except there is very little social activity taking place. What If You Built a Social Network and No One Was There?Here’s the big problem with Diaspora — no one is there. Now, part of that is a byproduct of the service just entering private beta. But even so, I have six people on my contact list. No one, to my knowledge, has posted anything, other than me. Of course, it’s possible people are having conversations that just aren’t visible to me, but right now, it’s like adult swim at the YMCA. You know, there aren’t any adults at the pool so there are just a bunch of kids standing around the empty water, waiting impatiently for the lifeguard to stop flirting with your sister and get back to work? Yeah, it feels like that. What makes Diaspora worse, however, is that there is no easy way to find people. OK, you can search by Diaspora username and if a person has opted, you can search first and last name in the directory, but you can’t compare your contacts from Twitter or Facebook against the Diaspora database. That makes finding anyone — or being found — really, really hard. If I have to look by hand for all my friends, really, what’s the point? Enough Talking, What Does it Look Like?Right now, we have a hard time getting excited about Diaspora — it just seems like yet another social network, admittedly with some more sane policies on data portability and privacy. Unless the team can vastly improve the user discovery system — and introduce some elements to make interacting more approachable, we really don’t see this service being more than a blip on the roadmap of Facebook’s continued assault on the world. Check out our walk-through of the service: Welcome Screen After you choose your username and password, this is the first step for setting up your account. Creating Aspects "Aspects" are the Diaspora term for contact groups. With aspects, you can selectively post things to people under a particular aspect, while also viewing their activity in one place. By default, Diaspora creates aspects for "Work" and "Family." You can create as many aspects as you want. Connecting to Other Services Diaspora lets you connect to Twitter and Facebook. This is a one-way connection -- Diaspora can push data out to those sources, but you can't pull data in. Connecting Services Complete Finished After choosing your connection options, the set-up process is over. Initial Home Screen The home screen is your big dashboard for Diaspora. At the top, you can switch between tabs for the various aspects you have created. You can also see contact requests and add or invite other users to your Diaspora network. Manage Aspects Vadim sent me a contact request. I can choose to add him to one of my pre-existing aspects or create a new aspect. Drag and Drop To add contacts to an aspect, you just drag their user pictures into the aspect that you want. You can only assign one aspect from this page, but you can assign a contact to additional aspects later on. Aspect Dashboard The aspect dashboard is similar to the home screen, except that the message or photos you post are only visible to the people in that aspect. Aspects are not visible to others, so no one will know how many different groups of contacts you have. Public Post On the home screen, you can post a message or update to all of your various aspects. If you've connected to other services, you can also cross post to Twitter and Facebook. Status Message The status message screen is pretty sparse, but just like on an aspect page, you can choose to add a photo to your message. Edit Aspect Within each aspect, you can edit to toggle what contacts you want to include or remove from that aspect grouping. Edit Aspect Sidebar The contact list lets you search by contacts or search by a Diaspora handle. You can click on a button to toggle the aspect on or off for each user. Home Screen Updated This is the home screen with a little more data on it. You can see where each of your updates has been published -- "Work" or "the world" in this case. You can also view how many contacts you have and how many are in each aspect. Settings In account settings, you can change your language, download your photos and also download an XML file of all of your data. There is also a handy "Close Account" option. Profile Edit You can edit your profile to include a bio and whether to allow others to search for you on Diaspora. You can also change your user photo and even use other photos you have uploaded or shared to the service. Public Profile View This is my profile. You can see my name, biography, any photos I have shared and what status messages I've published. If you aren't in one of my aspects -- like Work -- you can't see that update. You can add a comment underneath an update, where you can also view other comments. You can also choose to re-share an update to your other groups, or to the public. Reviews: Facebook, Internet, Safari, Twitter More About: diaspora, facebook, Guide, trending, walkthroughs For more Social Media coverage:
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| HOW TO: Help Feed the Hungry with Online Donations Posted: 24 Nov 2010 07:30 PM PST   Around this time of the year, as many of us begin to celebrate our blessings, our thoughts turn toward those in need. Especially as those Americans among us prepare for our Thanksgiving feasts, it’s difficult to think of others — perhaps even people in our own towns — who might be going hungry without making some effort to help. These days, however, it’s easier than ever to help others. You don’t have to pick up any canned goods or make a trip to a soup kitchen. With a just a couple minutes and a few mouse clicks, you can donate to any number of food banks, charitable organizations and homeless shelters. Many organizations, from big-name charities such as the Salvation Armies to your local food bank, have websites that can accept donations; a lot of these sites even accept Paypal, too. And many will allow you to set up automatic monthly donations so you can keep helping others even when the holidays are over. Check out some of the organizations here, and please let us know in the comments if you’ve found a great way to help others by making online donations. 4 National Organizations That Help Feed the HungryName: The Global Foodbanking Network This group’s ambitious mission is to alleviate world hunger. This organization is the only one of its kind operating not only on a national level but on a global level, as well. It operates in 18 countries, supplying food to existing food banks. It also works with nongovernmental organizations to create more food banks where they’re needed. The Global Foodbanking Network was founded in 2006 by four of the largest hunger-helping organizations from around the world. Name: The Salvation Army The Salvation Army is one of America’s best-known charitable organizations. Its programs range from substance abuse rehabilitation to disaster relief, and its holiday fundraising drives are a staple of holiday shopping in the United States. When you donate to the Salvation Army, you can name a specific use for your funds. If hunger is a particular concern of yours, you can ask that your funds be used to purchase food for Salvation Army shelters’ sit-down dinners or for food distribution to needy persons. Name: Feeding America Feeding America is a leading organization in the struggle to fight hunger in the United States. It helps a network of food banks around the country by securing and distributing food and raising funds; these efforts have allowed member food banks to supply food to more than 37 million Americans each year. Name: United Way According to the United Way, education, income and health are the building blocks for a good life. In attempting to build the public health, many local United Way organizations also offer assistance to hungry people, from operating food banks to helping needy folks find and use community- and government-provided resources. Finding a Food Pantry or Food Bank Near YouIf you’d like to make an impact on your own community, you can always find a food bank or food pantry near you. Many have websites, and many of those websites take credit card or Paypal donations. If they don’t take online donations, many food pantries may list items needed and times when physical donations of food can be dropped off. You can always use Google Maps to locate a food bank near you; however, the information Google has can sometimes be inaccurate. Other ways to find food banks locally are through FoodPantries.org, which allows you to search by state or ZIP code to find a food pantry near you, and the Feeding America food bank locator, which does roughly the same. One great resource for finding food banks and pantries is Ample Harvest’s food pantry finder, which lists critical information about local food pantries including website URLs, directions, donation days and times, food and other items needed, and other programs offered by that pantry. Ample Harvest also helps local gardeners donate excess produce to food pantries around the country. We encourage you all to give as you are able, and for those of you who are celebrating tomorrow’s holiday, we wish you a very happy Thanksgiving. Image courtesy of Flickr, SamPac. Reviews: Flickr, Google, Google Maps More About: charity, food bank, online donations, social good, thanksgiving, trending For more Social Good coverage:
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| Richard Branson to Unveil iPad-Only Magazine Next Week Posted: 24 Nov 2010 04:50 PM PST   Virgin Group Chairman Richard Branson is set to unveil a new magazine built specifically as an app for the iPad at a press event on Tuesday in New York City. We first caught wind of the magazine in July. AdAge reported that the magazine would focus on the entrepreneurial space, highlighting "new creative, business, travel and technology ideas" to an "upscale international audience," a la Fast Company and Wired. The invitation for Tuesday’s event, however, cites international culture, entertainment, design, business and travel among its list of themes, suggesting a different focus. In fact, it sounds like this could simply be a digital in-flight magazine. Virgin already distributes a handful of printed magazines on its flights, including Seatback and entertainment title Electric!, which are handed out to customers rather than marketed to the general public. The venture is nevertheless interesting in light of the number of publications that have created digital versions for the iPad, and the revenue publishers are commanding from advertisers (between $75,000 to $300,000 for a seasonal campaign, The New York Times reports). That’s not to mention the $30 million Rupert Murdoch/News Corp is investing in the forthcoming iPad-only newspaper, The Daily, rumored to launch in December. The iPad and other tablet devices present an opportunity for publishing companies to create paid-for content without the costs of printing and distribution. Still, the bulk of advertising revenue for newspapers and magazines continues to come from print, and producing apps for the iPad can be extremely costly. We’ll have to wait and see whether Branson and Murdoch can drum up enough iPad advertising revenue to be profitable. Image courtesy of Flickr, hotmayo Reviews: AdAge, Flickr More About: ipad, magazine, media, News Corp, publishing, richard branson, rupert murdoch, The Daily, trending, virgin group For more Entertainment coverage:
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| Android Market Matures with Mandatory Application Ratings Posted: 24 Nov 2010 03:31 PM PST   In a few weeks’ time, Google’s Android Market will begin displaying one of four possible content ratings — All, Pre-teen, Teen and Mature — for each application available on the market. The addition of ratings is said to be in response to user demand. The new ratings system will require developers submitting new and updated applications to include a rating according to Android Market guidelines. Developers will be able to specify their own rating, but the Android team may choose to re-rate applications if users flag them as incorrectly rated. A word to the Android developers out there: Should you ignore the request for content rating, your application will be treated as “Mature” by default once the ratings are made visible to users, according to Eric Chu of the Android Developer Ecosystem. The mandatory rating system represents the maturation of the market, which has long been regarded as far less restrictive than Apple’s App Store. Apple implemented its own rating system for iOS apps in mid-2009; it too has four age-based tiers: 4+, 9+, 12+ and 17+. Both the App Store and Android Market prohibit pornographic applications. Reviews: Android, Android Market, App Store More About: android, Android Market, content ratings, Google, Google Android For more Mobile coverage:
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| HOW TO: Boost Holiday Sales With Commonly Overlooked Marketing Strategies Posted: 24 Nov 2010 02:25 PM PST   Charles Wiedenhoft is the director of business planning and optimization for Red Door Interactive, a San Diego-based Internet presence management firm that manages clients’ online presence by analyzing their unique challenges, advising them on Internet-based solutions and implementing strategies to help them profit from their web initiatives. E-mail him at cwiedenhoft@reddoor.biz. You might want to add customer experience to the annual list you're making and checking twice. Gift buyers are finding new ways to shop with feature-rich smartphones and immediate delivery of digital products and services. Here are a few suggestions to help retailers make one final push for a merry customer experience that will drive sales this season. Digital Gift CardsShoppers are now looking for digital equivalents to gift cards to bypass the barrage of plastic many receive this time of year. Retailers can benefit from digital gift cards by avoiding postage fees and paper processing. Additionally, some studies show that more than 20% of customers spend more than the initial face value of their gift card — a clear sales booster right there. Applebee’s restaurant chain is selling gift cards on Facebook. Fans who purchase there can personalize the cards with Facebook album photos and audio messages. QR Codes2D bar codes, often called QR codes, that link to mobile websites, product videos or click-to-call numbers are gaining popularity. Target is using QR codes in an effort to increase sales and awareness for new toys. Users can scan bar codes in the catalog and instantly get product and pricing information from the company’s website. Some bar code readers provide analytics such as number of scans, unique users, handset information and demographics. It's a great way to push a product that you're having trouble selling or learn a little more about your customer base. Wish ListsEncourage customers to make the right gift-buying decisions with mobile-accessible wish lists available wherever they shop. The key benefit for retailers is to convert first time shoppers into loyal customers. You might want to include comment functionality so friends and family could chime in on what gifts they think would be good for the person. After the holidays, companies can encourage wish list owners to purchase items at discounted prices that they didn’t receive as gifts. The products may not otherwise be on sale unless you took part in creating a list. Geo-FencingThis hyper-local marketing allows retailers to track the location of customers through signals sent from their mobile phones. Shoppers who opt in receive a mobile text message as they get near a store location or other relevant point of interest. Messages can be tailored to a different time of day and area. This "moment in time" communication shows promise of strengthening relationships with customers through relevance. Companies, such as The North Face, plan to send customers branded text messages about weather conditions as they reach hiking trails. L'Oreal and Starbucks are also getting into the game by offering text coupons at nearby locations for their opt-in users. More Traditional IdeasIf these tips are overwhelming, grab some hot chocolate and relax with a few simpler ideas.
Some shoppers will do all their holiday buying on their mobile phones or online, mowing through offers like an advent calendar. Inside the mind of the increasingly value-conscious and progressive consumer, "tech-savvy" becomes synonymous with convenience. It's not just about standing out anymore. It's about making peoples' lives easier through experiences that surprise and delight. More Business Resources from Mashable:
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, kutaytanir Reviews: Facebook, Google, iStockphoto More About: business, gift cards, List, Lists, MARKETING, online marketing, online shopping, QR Codes, retail, SEO, small business, wish lists For more Business coverage:
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| Job Openings at Mashable and Other Great Companies Posted: 24 Nov 2010 02:17 PM PST
If you’re seeking a job in social media, we’d like to help out. For starters, Mashable’s Job Lists section gathers together all of our resource lists, how-tos and expert guides to help you get hired. In particular, you might want to see our articles on How to Leverage Social Media for Career Success and How to Find a Job on Twitter. But we’d like to help in a more direct way, too. Mashable's job boards are a place for socially savvy companies to find people like you. This week and every week, Mashable features its coveted job board listings for a variety of positions in the web, social media space and beyond. Have a look at what's good and new on our job boards: Mashable Job PostingsAd Ops Manager at Mashable in New York, NY. VP Product at Mashable in San Francisco, CA. Front End Web Developer at Mashable in San Francisco, CA. UI Designer at Mashable in San Francisco, CA. VP of Sales at Mashable in New York, NY. Events Content Coordinator at Mashable in New York, NY. Events Manager at Mashable in New York, NY. Ruby on Rails Developer at Mashable in San Francisco, CA. Mashable Job Board ListingsDirector, SEO at Pronto in New York, NY. eCommerce Product Manager at Electronic Arts in Redwood City, CA. Social Media Associate (Entry Level) at Morpheus Media in New York, NY. Sr. UX Lead at Threespot in Washington DC. Marketing Associate & Graphic Designer at Manhattan GMAT in New York, NY. Senior PHP Developer at Synacor in Buffalo, NY. Kno On-Campus Marketing Internship at Kno, Inc. in Santa Clara, CA. Vice President of Portal Products at Synacor in Buffalo, NY. Senior Database Administrator at Synacor in Buffalo, NY. Product Manager, Identity Management at Synacor in Buffalo, NY. Systems Architect at Synacor in Los Angeles, CA. Production Designer at Buddy Media in New York, NY. Sales Executive at Buddy Media in New York, NY. Inside Sales Representative at Buddy Media in New York, NY. Sr. Marketing Manager at Buddy Media in New York, NY. Technical Writer at Buddy Media in New York, NY. Internet Communications Manager at a marketing firm in Southwest Florida. Product Manager at Buddy Media in New York, NY. Integrated Marketing Manager at American Express Publishing in New York, NY. Director of Social Media at Frontier Communications in Stamford, CT. Web Developer at Diane Von Furstenberg in New York, NY. Director, PWI Mobile Channel at Fidelity Investments in Boston, MA. Operations Manager at GOOD Worldwide LLC in Los Angeles, CA. ASP.Net Coder at Quality Medical Imaging in Las Vegas, NV. Web Manager at Friendship Circle in Michigan. Vice President, Digital Marketing at MTV in New York, NY. Associate Producer at MTV Networks in New York, NY. Manager, Marketing at Digitas in Boston, MA. Senior Level SEO at SEER Interactive in Philadelphia, PA. Perl Software Engineer at Shutterstock in New York, NY. Social Media Marketing Manager at M80 in Los Angeles, CA. Director of Social Media at Gerson Lehrman Group in New York, NY. Social Media Strategist at Harrison College in Indianapolis, IN. Associate Creative Director at Qais Consulting Pte Ltd in Singapore, Singapore. Digital/Interactive Producer for Social at roundhouse in Seattle, WA. Interactive Production Manager at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York, NY. General Manager, The Daily GOOD at GOOD Worldwide LLC in Los Angeles, CA. General Manager, GOOD.is at GOOD in Los Angeles, CA. Back End Web Developer at All Things Media in Ramsey, NJ. Web Marketing Manager at PMI Mortgage Insurance, Co. in Walnut Creek, CA. Digital Program Manager at Atom Digital in Santa Monica, CA. Software Engineer at Google in New York, NY. Media Relations Specialist at Practice Fusion in San Francisco, CA. Interactive Project Manager at Swanson Russell in Lincoln, NE. Software Engineer at Google in New York, NY. Consumer Insights Analyst at BabyCenter in San Francisco, CA. Assistant Editor at The Phoenix Media/Communications Group in Boston, MA. Social Media Strategist/Consultant at KSR in Miami, FL. Product Manager, Social Media Community, CNN.com at Turner Broadcasting System in Atlanta, GA. Product Manager Site Optimization, CNN.com at Turner Broadcasting System in Atlanta, GA. PHP Developer at Punchkick Interactive in Chicago, IL. Client Services Director at The EMRC in Raleigh, NC. Strategy & Planning Manager at Spring Creek Group in Seattle, WA. Account Executive, Digital at Porter Novelli in Washington, DC. Contract Community Manager at BabyCenter, LLC in San Francisco, CA. Account Manager/Product Manager at Kinetic Fin in Bedford Hills, NY. Web Product Manager at MTV Networks in New York, NY. Sr. Account Planner at Draftfcb in Irvine, CA. Digital Account Coordinator at Draftfcb in Irvine, CA. Sales Executive at Wildfire Interactive in Palo Alto, CA. Technical (Internet) Product Specialist at Northstar Travel Media, LLC in Secaucus, NJ. Social Media Community Manager at Ipsos in Chicago, IL. Social Media Community Manager at Ipsos in Culver City, CA. Director of Online Services at Netcentric Campaigns in Washington DC. VP of Distribution and Affiliate Relations at a confidential new media company in New York, NY. User Experience engineer at (mt) Media Temple in Culver City, CA. Director of R&D at PlumWillow in New York, NY. Coordinator, Social Media at Bobcats Sports & Entertainment in Charlotte, NC. Web Optimization Analyst at Demand Media in Santa Monica, CA. Developer, Social Currency at Adknowledge, Inc. in Burlingame, CA. Digital Strategy Manager – Mobile at Arc Worldwide in Chicago, IL. Executive Level Position at BusinessDictionary.com in Fairfax, VA. Mashable’s Job Board has a variety of web 2.0, application development, business development and social networking job opportunities available. Check them out at here.
Got a job posting to share with our readers? Post a job to Mashable today ($99 for a 30 day listing) and get it highlighted every week on Mashable.com (in addition to exposure all day every day in the Mashable marketplace). Image courtesy of iStockphoto, YinYang Reviews: Google, Mashable, iStockphoto
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| What Is the Web Thankful For? [INFOGRAPHIC] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 01:54 PM PST   It’s that time of year again where we let everyone know what we’re thankful for. We all know the usual suspects (friends, family, God, Twitter, etc.), but what else is the web thankful for? What dominates our “grateful for” lists? To figure that out, Thankfulfor.com has put together a (surprisingly long) report that details what things people say they are grateful for having in their lives. It has also created an overarching infographic with the help of JESS3 for those of you not eager to read a 55-page report. To gather this data, Thankfulfor collected more than 25,000 random entries from its archives and, with the help of CrowdFlower’s crowdsourcing, was able to categorize the posts in 42 categories. Some highlights from the report:
Just below self was the “Life, Inspiration, God” category, which 19.2% of all posts referenced. Below is the infographic, along with an embed of the 55-page report. In the spirit of the report, please feel free to let us know what you’re thankful for this year in the comments. InfographicClick the image to view a larger version of the infographic.  2010 Gratitude Index ReportMore About: Holiday, infographic, Thankfulfor, thanksgiving For more Social Media coverage:
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| Record Labels Withhold Key to Google’s Digital Music Locker [REPORT] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 01:27 PM PST   Google’s long-anticipated music service will not be released in time for the holiday shopping season, if a new report citing an executive at Google is accurate. Delays can be attributed to the reservations of record label executives, who are said to be balking at the idea of a digital locker for storing and streaming music in part because they fear users would use the locker to store and stream pirated tracks. “What’s been holding things up is that the labels will do downloads, but they need to know more about the locker service, and Google really wants to keep the two together,” the executive said to the New York Post. According to previous reports, the “Google Music” service was expected to launch by Christmas and have two key components: a digital download store and a cloud-based subscription locker service costing $25 per year. The digital locker feature would allow users to store their music — purchased from Google or added from their own collection — for streaming across multiple devices. Defining Google’s streaming rights around this locker system seems to be the major sticking point. This is a relatively common hardship for all cloud-based music services. Even Spotify, the super trendy U.K. freemium music streaming service, may not be faring so well — it was recently reported that the startup lost $26.7 million in 2009. Still, all may not be lost. The source holds out a sliver of hope for a pre-Christmas launch and suggests a late first quarter 2011 release is more likely. Unfortunately for Google, the delay would mean a missed opportunity to capitalize on holiday music sales. Image courtesy of Flickr, lipjin Reviews: Flickr, Google, Spotify More About: Google, google locker, google music, music, streaming music For more Business coverage:
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| Why You Need a Nikon D3100 This Holiday Season Posted: 24 Nov 2010 12:49 PM PST   This post is part of the Mashable 10, Mashable’s gift guide of the 10 hottest gadgets that will be on everyone’s wish list this holiday season. We’ll be publishing one new post each weekday until November 26. [EDITOR'S NOTE: Due to an unfortunate oversight, a previous version of this article inadvertently recommended the discontinued D5000.] Virtually everyone now has a camera in their mobile device. The image capture capabilities of these devices tend to range from three to five megapixels. And they’re increasingly including LED flashes — a feature that is sorely absent from many mobile devices from just 12 months ago. In their pursuit to be all-in-one, on-the-go gadgets, mobile devices have marched deep into territory once firmly held by point-and-shoot cameras. The result is that many pocket cameras have effectively become redundant. If, however, you find the image quality of your phone is not always up to snuff, a digital single-lens reflex camera (DSLR) will take your photography to new levels. It just won’t fit in your pocket. Nikon D3100 That said, this holiday season has few better DSLR options than the Nikon D3100. It is that rare device that manages to pack a ton of performance at an extremely competitive price. With 14.2-megapixels, the D3100 is capable of resolutions greater than any non-professional photographer would likely need. Additionally, the bundled 18-55mm lens has built-in image stabilization and is a great starter lens for anyone just getting into DSLR photography. The D3100 features a particularly competent automatic mode that will allow you to get your DSLR bearings. As you gain experience with the device, there are a slew of manual settings that will allow you to tweak your images to professional levels. Settings like ISO and white balance, for instance, are extensively adjustable. It also includes a handful of smaller features that make it stand out in the category. The D3100 is capable of 1080p HDSLR video. Sure, even with its autofocus, it requires a tripod to roll video, but when you get it right, it’ll look amazing. At its core, though, the only D3100 feature that really matters is the quality of pictures. And in that category, it performs on an exceptionally high level. The Bottom Line It’s important to consider that all DSLR cameras are essentially lens systems. As you grow as a photographer, you can expand your camera with new lenses and when you outgrow the capabilities of the D3100, those lenses will carry over with you to your next Nikon. In the end, if you feel like your mobile device isn’t quite right for shooting every occasion, and you want to take pictures that look amazing, DSLR is the way to go. For about $650 with an included image stabilizing lens, we feel that the Nikon D3100 is among the best entry-level DSLR options currently on the market. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, malerapaso Reviews: iStockphoto More About: d3100, digital camera, DSLR, mashable 10, Nikon, photography For more Tech coverage:
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| How Investigative Journalism Is Prospering in the Age of Social Media Posted: 24 Nov 2010 11:52 AM PST   In a society that is more connected than ever, investigative journalists that were once shrouded in mystery are now taking advantage of their online community relationships to help scour documents and uncover potential wrongs. The tools and information now available to journalists are making the jobs of investigative outlets more efficient. The socialization of the web is revolutionizing the traditional story format. Investigative reporters are now capturing content shared in the social space to enrich their stories, enabling tomorrow’s reporters to create contextualized social story streams that reference not only interviewed sources, but embedded tweets, Facebook postings and more. Journalists are also leveraging the vast reach of social networks in unprecedented ways. In many respects, social media is enabling watchdog journalism to prosper. Here’s how. Distributed ReportingOn the social web, investigative journalists are tapping citizens to take part in the process by scouring documents and doing shoe-leather reporting in the community. This is advantageous because readers often know more than journalists do about a given subject, said Jay Rosen, a journalism professor at New York University. "That was always the case, but with the tools that we have today, that knowledge can start flowing in at relatively low cost and with relatively few headaches,” Rosen said. Rosen admits that we are just starting to learn how to do this effectively, but there are certainly some great experiments being done. Talking Points Memo Muckraker had success with this approach by having its readers help sort through thousands of documents pertaining to the investigation of the U.S. Department of Justice’s controversial firing of seven United States attorneys in 2006. TPM provided clear instructions to its readers to cite specific documents that included something interesting or “damning." Even though they had hundreds of readers contribute in the comments, it’s important to remember the often invisible factors that contribute to that success. The site’s readers had a shared background knowledge because they had been following the story as Josh Marshall and his team developed it over months of reporting. They were also motivated to show that the attorney general had done something wrong, Rosen pointed out. A similar example on a grander scale is that of The Guardian deploying its community to help dig through 458,832 members of parliament (MP’s) expense documents. They’ve already examined roughly half of those, thanks to the 27,270 people who participated. The Guardian rewarded community participants by creating a leader board based on the quantity and quality of their contributions and also highlighting some of the great finds by its members.  Recruiting Shoe-Leather VolunteersBut can a call to action motivate the community to do some actual shoe-leather reporting? Wendy Norris, an investigative reporter and Knight Fellow working on web and mobile civic engagement applications at Stanford University, motivated a community to do just that with a simple tweet (shown below). Norris was investigating whether locking up condoms and keeping them stored in pharmacy shelves in Colorado was depressing purchases, especially those by younger people, who might be too embarrassed to ask a clerk for help.  Norris used Facebook and Twitter to recruit 17 volunteers to go to 64 stores in one week and find out whether the condoms were displayed freely on shelves across the state. When all was said and done, the distributed reporting actually disproved the rumors in the community. Social updates and e-mails from the field showed that condoms were stocked on open shelves in 63 of the stores canvassed. One of the stores did not sell condoms at all. "The investigation was fun to report and a great public service,” Norris said. “I’ve researched quite a few other stories using social media… But this was the most fun example of how it can work well for investigative reporting.” Norris outlines seven quick points that were key to her success:
Community-Sourced MappingThere’s a big difference between an audience and a community. Norris probably wouldn’t have been able to convince a detached “audience” to go out and do some reporting, but because she had built a community, she was able to get them on board. It’s not just about the tools journalists use, but the community they have already established and whether that community is a genuine one or just a crowd, said Rosen. Is the relationship you have with the community strong enough that community members are willing to participate with information, advice, feedback? "It’s similar to how we make a mistake if we look at the gross number of followers, because what really makes a difference is how densely inter-connected those people are," Rosen said. In Columbia, South Carolina, journalists of The State Media Company newsroom noticed something didn’t smell right in their town. It wasn’t corruption, but an actual stink that was permeating the air outside. Betsey Guzior, the features editor, decided to call on the community to help investigate the smell using an open Google Map.  "People were sharing tweets and Facebook posts, but this map let us own a different level of conversation," Guzior said. The community helped narrow down the possibilities and the next day health officials pinpointed the source of the smell to land owned by a former city councilman. TBD.com has been able to leverage its community during breaking news stories on several occasions, including using Twitter and Foursquare to get eyewitness info during the Discovery hostage situation. But the site has also taken advantage of social tools and mapping to investigate ongoing issues with the Metro. The site integrated Crowdmap, enabling the community to submit issues through a form, sending an e-mail or tweeting with the #tbdwmata hashtag. Mandy Jenkins, social media editor at TBD, said it has been an ongoing topic of the site’s reporting.  Keeping the Powerful Accountable With Social QuestionsBecause the social web gives both citizenry and journalists access to officials and companies at the click of a mouse, social question and answer tools can be used to collaboratively investigate issues and keep powers accountable. In the UK, Paul Bradshaw founded HelpMeInvestigate, a site in beta that enables users to start an investigation and invite others to collaborate on it. It often includes answers to questions that journalists wouldn’t be interested in, but ones that people care about.  "It’s primarily helped people investigate issues that otherwise wouldn’t get investigated," Bradshaw said. "It also connects people together around a cause that might otherwise not have connected and makes it easier for whistle blowers and inside sources to find people to pass information on to." And then there is the more recent example of Kommons, founded and built by Cody Brown, a recent NYU graduate, along with former classmate Kate Ray. Kommons is simple: You ask a question and get it answered. It’s also built on the idea of keeping the powerful accountable by taking these questions out of private channels bringing them into a public forum, where those who answer must deal with the repercussions publicly.  The site is heavily integrated with Twitter, connecting questions to Twitter usernames. Other users on the site interested in the question can follow it for updates and contribute their own follow-ups, all of which are on the public record. "Kommons is designed to help more people ask questions, but we’re also designed to help others easily find them later," Brown said in answer to my question: "How do you see Kommons being used for investigative journalism?" Kommons also leverages the community. Whether it’s working for an established brand or having a credible personal brand, those things often come into play for journalists looking to get answers or their calls returned, Brown said. But most people don’t work at The New York Times and they have to work a lot harder to get answers. A Networked NewsroomWhat if newsrooms were open to the public, where sources could drop in to give tips to reporters who are digging for a story? Social media opens it up virtually, and by building a networked community of sources on the social web, investigative journalists can get story leads they otherwise wouldn’t have, and are able to report stories more quickly.
Robert Hernandez, an assistant professor at the USC Annenberg School of Journalism, said if journalists connect with their communities through the social web and encourage and engage in a dialogue, they’ll be more likely to get tips for stories that are worth investigating. But it’s all about the relationship. “Social media has amplified our reach and network to increase the size of the of the crowd,” Hernandez said. “Investigative reporters need to be committed to social media to build that brand, so that one day, the investment pays off." But perhaps the biggest challenge for many investigative journalists is opening up to the community in the first place. “Most investigative reporters are freaked out about sharing publicly what they are working on. They are convinced that the guy from the street will steal their story.” Rosen said. “But if you can’t tell people what you are working on, you cannot do any distributed reporting." Once you open up to that community, it takes time to build that relationship. “Social media tools are useful when you need a diverse range of knowledge, but you need an existing community to really use them well, too, and that takes time and understanding," Bradshaw added. The Investigative Network EffectHaving an open dialogue on social sites can encourage sources to come forward and build interest in the investigation and story. If you publicize the activity of an investigation while it is ongoing, Bradshaw said, it will help bring other potential sources with new information into the conversation. But sensitivity is the key. "Don’t use social media for the sake of it," Bradshaw said. "It should be appropriate to the people involved and the objectives you’re pursuing." If you’re dealing with sensitive material or sources you want to protect, then you might want to deal with it offline, he said. But if you’re doing a public investigation, the social web’s network effect can give you a boost. Paul Lewis, an investigative journalist for The Guardian, has demonstrated the value of the network effect in several investigations. He recently had to investigate the death of a deportee on a plane from the UK to Angola. It was suspicious because the guards that escort the deportees had been criticized for brutality in the past, Lewis said. To find witnesses of what took place on the flight, Lewis tweeted from his account, asking for anyone who was on the flight that saw what happened. He started a hashtag named after the victim, #jimmymubenga, and Lewis received several responses, including one from a man who was quite distraught in his reply. "Could we have done that story five years ago? Probably not," Lewis said. "Journalistically, it has opened up a whole new realm."  Monitoring the Conversation and SourcesThough many people often joke about stalking their friends on Facebook to learn about new developments in their lives, journalists can take advantage of social search and monitoring tools to find relevant information and, in some cases, even keep up with officials’ activity. Meghann Farnsworth, the distribution and online community manager for the Center for Investigative Reporting and California Watch said its reporters use Twitter to monitor government agencies, noting themes they may be emphasizing or subtle changes in policies that in reality may have a larger impact on the public.  "Our reporters can cite endless examples of key stories they caught swirling in the world of social media that may otherwise have been overlooked or were more difficult to effectively track in the past," Farnsworth said. "For smaller investigative organizations like ours, these tools are indispensable." At The Washington Post, reporters are constantly on the look out for sources on social media or examples to use in their stories, said Mark Luckie, the national innovations editor. He said social tools make it much easier to connect to the community or get readers’ input for a story. "The collective wisdom on social media is far beyond the knowledge of the individual reporter or even the collective newsroom," Luckie said. There are many enterprise tools for monitoring conversations taking place on social media, such as Radian6 or Spredfast. But the web also offers many free and simple tools for easy social searching. Jenkins said many of TBD’s staff members monitor the social web every day to follow up on questions or happenings around town. "If I see a tweet come in, either directly to us or on a random keyword search, I can dig in and try lots of combinations to find more witnesses and more info," Jenkins said. She also uses Facebook status searches at Openbook or Open Facebook to monitor news or dig for information. "If reporters aren’t currently tapping into these two search types, they’re missing out," she said.
Creating a Transparent ProcessWhen an in-depth investigative story is released, it often requires some transparent finessing from the journalist or editor to establish a sense of trust and credibility in the reporting process that took place, especially with controversial or sensitive topics. Social tools can help you have an open dialogue about the story after it is published, or, if created prior to its publishing, it can build some momentum as well. The Wall Street Journal, for example, in its recent series on digital privacy, created a Twitter account that curates information from other sources on the topic and answers questions from readers. Because the series created a lot of conversation around the topic and took on criticism from media, this was a great way to help address readers’ questions. The account was successful because it offered readers a destination for conversation around this topic, and even linked to pieces that criticized the series itself, creating great transparency.  Keeping an Eye on New ToolsEstablished social networks are great for finding sources and connecting dots more easily, "but journalists shouldn’t wed themselves to a particular tool simply because it’s popular at a given time,” Farnsworth said. Perhaps the greater understanding comes from recognizing and reacting to the fact that the entire web is becoming social.
Tools with potential are cropping up all the time. For instance, Farnsworth said she’s keeping a watch on the Appleseed Project, Diaspora and Storify to see what storytelling opportunities might arise there. Storify is a curation tool in beta and invite-only that has generated buzz among journalists in the industry for enabling content producers to easily curate social content with context into an embeddable stream. So, what better way to tell Storify’s story than by using the tool itself? More Social Media Resources from Mashable:
Images courtesy of Flickr, disrupsean and iStockphoto, JordiDelgado Reviews: Facebook, Flickr, Foursquare, Radian6, Twitter, iStockphoto More About: citizen journalism, facebook, foursquare, Google Maps, investigative, journalism, journalists, media, reporters, social media, social networking, social web, Storify, twitter For more Social Media coverage:
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| Twitter’s Not Building a News Network, But Here’s What It Should Build [OP-ED] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 11:31 AM PST   Twitter co-founder Biz Stone says that he wants to create a Twitter news service — “something that would be very open and shared with many different news organizations around the world.” During an interview on Reuters Television, Stone said he is eager to utilize the millions of tweets that pass through Twitter’s servers for what would essentially be a news wire. Twitter wouldn’t manage a Twitter news service alone, though; Stone envisions that it would be a partnership with other news organizations with a focus on being open. Stone also said that a Twitter news network would help news organizations keep in touch with people on the ground. We’ve seen this in action with the Iran Election crisis, the Haiti Earthquake and many other world events. Because tweets come in at lightning speeds, they provide a wealth of on-the-ground information to news networks not available just a few years ago. Since that interview though, Twitter’s head of communications Sean Garrett has stated that Twitter is not working on a news network. That’s not a surprise; Biz Stone is known to talk about off-the-wall concepts using his rather impressive imagination. Still, that doesn’t mean a Twitter news service isn’t a good idea. Twitter should (eventually) build a news wire for media organizations. Here’s what it should look like: Twitter Doesn’t Want or Need to Be CNN Before we get worked up by the hype of a Twitter news service, let’s be very clear: If Twitter ever built something for media outlets, it wouldn’t be a “news network.” In other words, don’t expect Biz Stone to be anchoring a Twitter TV network where he reads tweets off as if they are indisputable news facts (though we’d pay to see that). Instead, what Stone is talking about is creating a firehose of relevant tweets that news organizations can use when stories are breaking. In that regard, a Twitter news service would be more like its firehose partnership with Gnip than last year’s rumored Twitter TV show, a rumor the company quickly debunked. In my view, a Twitter news wire would be focused on selecting and repackaging relevant tweets based on queries from traditional news outlets. I can even see Mashable using the Twitter firehose to supplement our coverage of events, announcements and breaking world news stories. It just depends on how the content is delivered and curated. Would Twitter’s partners write stories based on the tweets, deliver raw tweet data, or offer something in the middle? In the end though, news organizations tapped into Twitter’s firehouse would have a big advantage over their competition. As we now know, Twitter often breaks news faster than the media. Real-time access to Twitter’s data could give news organizations a major advantage by helping them quickly dissect the situation on the ground. Photos, videos and multimedia from the scene would be at their fingertips, ready to be included in a blog post or a breaking news report on Fox News, CNN or MSNBC. As I’ve argued before, Twitter is an “information network,” not a social network. It’s designed to deliver information as quickly and as widely as possible. There really isn’t anything that can match Twitter’s combined reach and speed when it comes to disseminating information. That’s why a Twitter news service would definitely succeed, so long as Twitter avoids the trap of becoming the one actually reporting the news. Reviews: Mashable, Twitpic, Twitter More About: Opinion, twitter, Twitter News Network, Twitter News Service For more Social Media coverage:
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| Aussie Scores Invite to Strangers’ Thanksgiving via YouTube Plea [VIDEO] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 11:21 AM PST   For years, Australian journalist James West has been receiving e-mails from the mysterious Tran family in West Palm Beach, Florida, detailing their Thanksgiving Day plans. The catch? The notes were not meant for him, but for an entirely different — much more local — James West. After three years of these misplaced missives, West did what anyone would do in this situation: He launched a webseries in which he implored the Trans to invite him to dinner. And it worked, according to news.com.au. West started his YouTube campaign three days ago with an initial plea to the Florida family. He has since posted five episodes of Tracking Down the Trans, in which he Google stalks the family, learns more about each member, then, finally breaks down and e-mails them. The result? The family is welcoming him with open arms, and homeboy is getting on a plane today. He’s bringing the canned corn. Oh, and West — you’re totally invited for leftovers at the Ehrlich family abode in Massachusetts if you’re planning on sticking around the states for a few. Check out the first vid below, and the rest on YouTube, and let us know: Would you invite this guy to your Thanksgiving dinner? Tracking Down The TransImage courtesy of James West [via The Daily What] Reviews: Google, YouTube More About: thanksgiving, viral video, web video, youtube For more Web Video coverage:
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| When Will You Do Your Holiday Shopping? [POLL] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 11:04 AM PST   Cyber Monday has become an enormous online event in the U.S., with upwards of 100 million Americans taking to the Web on the day after Thanksgiving weekend to do some holiday shopping. But retailers are increasingly angling to use the web to drive Black Friday sales too; this year, for example, we're seeing numerous brick and mortar stores connect promotions to location-based services in addition to deep discounts on their websites. All of that has us wondering when you plan to do your holiday shopping this year: Cyber Monday, Black Friday, or at some point much closer to the actual gift giving festivities? Let us know by voting in our Thanksgiving Eve poll: image credit: Chris22090 on Flickr Reviews: Flickr More About: black friday, cyber monday, ecommerce, holiday shopping, shopping For more Business coverage:
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| Delicious Founder Secures Funding for Something Even Tastier Posted: 24 Nov 2010 10:34 AM PST   Union Square Ventures — the New York-based investment firm with a stake in Twitter, Foursquare and Zynga — has announced that it has invested in Delicious founder Joshua Schachter’s latest project: stealth startup Tasty Labs. Schachter founded the social bookmarking web service Delicious in 2003 and went on to sell it to Yahoo in 2005, a decision he later publicly lamented. At Tasty Labs, Schachter is joined by co-founders Nick Nguyen and Paul Rademacher. Rademacher is a former Google and Dreamworks engineer; he’ll be heading up engineering for the stealth startup. Nguyen previously worked with Schachter at Delicious and just recently left Mozilla to serve as VP of product for Tasty Labs. Little is known about Tasty Labs apart from the all-star pedigree of its founders, but the startup says it plans to put “the useful back into social software,” according to the sparse website. “We’re building a social layer based on utility and the apps to run on it,” Schachter said when reached for comment. Andreessen Horotwitz and additional undisclosed angel investors all participated in the round. Funds will used to build out a team of engineers and designers in Silicon Valley. Image courtesy of Flickr, Joi Reviews: Delicious, Flickr, Google More About: delicious, joshua schachter, social software, startup, Union Square Ventures For more Business coverage:
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| “Angry Birds” Coming to Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 Posted: 24 Nov 2010 10:21 AM PST   Angry Birds, one of the most successful mobile games in history, is taking its bird-slinging game mechanics to a new platform: the traditional game console. Rovio, the company behind the popular iPhone and Android game franchise, says that it is working on a version of the game for the Xbox 360, Wii and PlayStation 3. CEO Peter Vesterbacka also told the BBC that the games would launch next year, although he wouldn’t reveal much more beyond that. Vesterbacka also revealed a second piece of news: the company is actively working on Angry Birds 2. The new game isn’t a sequel to the original though, but is instead a completely new game featuring the angry birds and the evil pigs. As for the premise of the game, Vesterbacka told the BBC that, “the pigs will be a lot more active than just being slingshotted at by birds.” He also added that there will be a lot more of the pigs in Angry Birds 2. Reviews: Android, Angry Birds More About: angry birds, gaming, iOS, iphone, nintendo wii, trending, Wii, xbox, Xbox 360 For more Entertainment coverage:
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| 3 Magnificent Mobile Apps That Ruled 2010 [Mashable Awards] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 09:50 AM PST
Here at Mashable, we’re fortunate enough to get to use, review, and write about hundreds of apps each month. 2010 has been a particularly great year for apps, thanks to the debut of the iPad, the growth of Android and new platforms like Windows Phone 7. Looking back through my collection, these are three of my picks for “Best Mobile App” for The Mashable Awards. As always, remember to nominate and vote for your favorites! 1. Hipstamatic (iPhone) There are a ton of great photography apps for the various mobile platforms. On my iPhone 4, I have two full folders full of photo apps and utilities. Still, no app gets used as much as Hipstamatic [iTunes link]. The $1.99 app turns your iPhone into a toy camera with a degree of accuracy and retro-recreation that is unparalleled by any other photo app. From the viewfinder to the choice of film, lenses and body styles, the app is authentic in every way. Not only can you share photos on Flickr, Facebook and Twitter, you can also order prints of your photos, and — get this — the prints are done on real photo paper and using a real analog process. Too cool. 2. GoodReader for iPad When GoodReader for iPhone [iTunes link] first appeared on the scene, it seemed like the PDF and document reader that Apple just forgot to include in iOS. Since its release, Apple has beefed up its native document support, but GoodReader still excels at opening up large files, and even more importantly, acting as a fantastic file manager and viewer. Here’s what makes GoodReader better than just a regular file viewer: You can easily connect to network or cloud-based servers or folders to download or upload, you can download file archives off the net, and you can annotate, make notes, and add drawings to your files. In short, it’s a Swiss army knife of awesome. GoodReader for iPad [iTunes link] is $1.99 and is still one of the best business apps you can get for Apple’s tablet. It includes all the great features of the iPhone app, but thanks to the bigger screen real estate, you can really go read and view your files with more precision. Good.iWare frequently updates its apps, adding new features and functionality. It is the $2 app that keeps on giving. 3. Pulse (iPhone, iPad, Android) Alphonso Labs’ Pulse News made a big splash when it was first released for the iPad. That success led to the release of apps for the iPhone and Android. Part RSS reader, part social aggregator, and completely beautiful to look at, Pulse is part of a larger trend of apps that are reinventing the news reading experience. Earlier this month, Pulse transitioned from a pay app to a free download. It’s a great way to get the news across your devices and we love its integration with Posterous and other social services. Your PicksThose are our picks for “Best Mobile App” — but what about you? Let us know in the comments your top mobile app for 2010. Don’t forget to nominate your favorites before November 29, 2010 and vote for your picks! Mashable Awards Category Sponsor:
Mobile Future is a broad-based coalition of businesses, non-profit organizations and individuals interested in and dedicated to advocating for an environment in which innovations in wireless technology and services are enabled and encouraged. Our mission is to educate the public and key decision makers on innovations in the wireless industry that have transformed the way Americans work and play and to advocate continued investment in wireless technologies. Our "Mobile Year in Review 2010" animation provides a glimpse into the most notable breakthroughs in the wireless industry this year. The Mashable Awards Gala at Cirque du Soleil Zumanity (Vegas) In partnership with Cirque du Soleil, The Mashable Awards Gala event will bring together the winners and nominees, the Mashable community, partners, media, the marketing community, consumer electronics and technology brands and attendees from the 2011 International CES Convention to Las Vegas on Thursday, January 6, 2011. Together, we will celebrate the winners and the community of the Mashable Awards at the Cirque du Soleil Zumanity stage in the beautiful New York New York Hotel. The event will include acts and performances from our partner Cirque du Soleil Zumanity. In addition, there will be special guest presenters and appearances. Date: Thursday, January 6th, 2011 (during International CES Convention week) Images courtesy of Cristiano Betta on Flickr Reviews: Android, App Store, Facebook, Flickr, Foursquare, Mashable, Posterous, Twitter, iPhone More About: android, goodreader, hipstamatic, ipad, iphone, mashable awards, mashable awards 2010, mobile apps, pulse For more Mobile coverage:
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| 5 Facebook Profile Photos to Avoid Posted: 24 Nov 2010 09:21 AM PST   If a Facebook picture is worth a thousand words, we’re pretty sure there’s one word in the lexicon you’d be loath to have associated with you: tool. (Unless you’re a handyman, in which case, carry on.) Yes, Facebook started off as a gated community for college kids awkwardly trolling for chicks in their rooms because the outside world was just too bright … too bright. But now, as Mark Zuckerberg sallies forth with his plan to consume all of society, it has become kind of legit. Last week, Zuckerberg unveiled a messaging system for the book of faces that will consolidate e-mail, texts, chat and Facebook messages. While we won’t be calling Z’s new baby a “Gmail killer” any time soon (dude, eradicate all those FB phishing scams and then we’ll talk), the fact that Facebook would take such a step got us thinking. Every day, 4 billion messages are shot off via Facebook, and next to those 4 billion messages is something that could make or break the legitimacy of your missive — or, at the very least, amuse or horrify your friends: your profile picture. This is your calling card, your public face. So why do so many of you contort it into that of a duck? Read on for five common types of Facebook photos that make your friends want to block you, potential employers take pause and future suitors weep with frustration at the state of the human race. And so begins my Netiquette column — which I write with my Stuff Hipsters Hate co-blogger, Andrea Bartz — this week over at CNN. Check out the column at CNN.com >>Image courtesy of iStockphoto, edfuentesg Reviews: Facebook, gmail, iStockphoto More About: cnn, facebook, netiquette, Stuff Hipsters Hate For more Social Media coverage:
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| Celebrate the Holidays With Mashable Posted: 24 Nov 2010 09:10 AM PST
The holiday season is in full force on the web, and this year, Mashable is spreading cheer both on and offline. You’ve seen our spirit in the Mashable 10 gift guide and other holiday coverage. Now we’re inviting you to celebrate with us by attending or organizing a Mashable Holiday Meetup on December 16. A Mashable Meetup can take just about any shape you'd like depending on what best suits your social community. For planning tips, check out our how-to guide or join the Mashable Meetup Organizers Facebook Group. Tech and Holiday Themes Here are a few topic suggestions that marry two of our favorite things: technology and the holidays!
Ways You Can Participate
Image courtesy iStockphoto, PhotoEuphoria. Reviews: Mashable, Twitter, iStockphoto More About: Holidays, mashable meetup For more Social Media coverage:
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| Our Favorite YouTube Videos This Week: “What We’re Thankful For” Edition Posted: 24 Nov 2010 08:05 AM PST   So cometh that day of thanks, when we all ruminate on the events of the year past, and then lapse into the inevitable food coma. Being reflective folk over here at Mashable, we have decided to take a brief break from gazing at our glowing screens to gaze into our souls, shifting through the debris to uncover what we are most thankful for. And that, dear readers, is the theme of the YouTube Roundup this week: Our smartphones. No, just kidding — it’s giving thanks. So before you sit on down to a huge meal replete with tryptophan, take a tick to dig into this cornucopia of heartwarming fare. I promise it’s a lot more earnest than my intro — well, most of it, anyway. Be sure to share what you’re thankful for in the comments! A Beautiful Year of MarriageVadim Lavrusik: I’m thankful for my wife Krista, my better half (I know, I know). This is a video I made for her for our one year anniversary. Watch at your own risk of “aww”-ing to death. You’ve been warned. “You Are My Sunshine”Ben Parr: I’m thankful for the friends and family that bring warmth into my life. Pebble Ridge, Westward Ho!, North DevonAmy-Mae Elliott: I love living by the seaside and go to the beach every day, rain or shine. I’m thankful for the North Atlantic Ocean as seen in one of its many moods in this clip of my local beach. Boy Meets Ice PondErica Swallow: I’m thankful that even as we grow up, my friends and I are still amused by the little things in life. This is my friend, Nick, entertaining himself (and me) by an ice pond. “I found a big rock we can throw at it.” Priceless. The Best of Bruce Campbell, Part 1 (Warning: A Bit Bloody)Brett Petersel: I’m thankful for the existence of the one and only Bruce Campbell, one of the greatest actors of ALL TIME (Take that, Kanye!). When I was younger I wanted to become a horror film actor because I had been (and still am) a fan of his films, which include The Evil Dead and Army of Darkness, among others. Some years later I became a K-12 schoolteacher, but my dreams of fighting the living dead and spilling blood (on film) have never gone away. This video captures some of the best scenes from Bruce Campbell’s films. Groovy! Buffy the Vampire Slayer, “Rest in Peace”Brenna Ehrlich: I’m thankful for the weird, weird Ehrlich family (now including Douglas Riggs) who has made watching Buffy: The Musical a Thanksgiving tradition. See y’all at my sister’s haunted farm house! Live Video as Patriots Win Super Bowl XXXVIIIAdam Ostrow: I am thankful for the Patriots playing on Thanksgiving this year. Here’s video of them winning their first Super Bowl, for which I thank the tuck rule. Planes, Trains & AutomobilesBrian Dresher: There are many classic Christmas movies, but it’s the rare comedic gem of a Thanksgiving classic that I enjoy at this time of year! Here’s the trailer for John Hughes’ ’80s flick, Planes, Trains, and Automobiles! Frank Sinatra, “New York, New York”Josh Catone: Because I have to provide a counterpoint to all this nauseating New England sports love… I’m thankful for the New York Yankees and all 27 of their World Championships. There’s no video from the first one (1923) and going through all of them would take too long, so here’s Ol’ Blue Eyes singing “New York, New York,” instead. Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, “Empire State of Mind”Brenna Ehrlich: And while we’re on the subject of New York, I have to say I’m thankful for how much Mashable has grown this past year. Matt Silverman and I started around this time last year, and our staff has blown up since then. We also have a real-life office now (follow us on our Tumblr, Mashable HQ), so I’m thankful for the chance to change out of my pajamas every day to go to work. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, kcline Reviews: Mashable, Tumblr, iStockphoto More About: Film, music, sports, television, thanksgiving, video, youtube For more Web Video coverage:
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| UberTwitter Now Available for iPhone Posted: 24 Nov 2010 07:22 AM PST   Popular Twitter client for the BlackBerry, UberTwitter, is now also available for the iPhone. The current version has been released as a beta, with the full 1.0 version being announced for December. Aside from the standard features offered by most Twitter clients: tweeting, retweeting, direct messaging and link shortening, UberTwitter boasts a unique feature called UberView. Enabled by simply turning the iPhone to landscape mode, or by tapping a tweet, UberView shows you the content from any embedded link within the tweet, such as a photo, video or an entire webpage. With several very advanced Twitter clients — such as TweetDeck and HootSuite — already being available for the iOS platform, UberTwitter will have a tough time convincing iPhone users it’s the right Twitter client for them. However, BlackBerry-iPhone converts (UberTwitter claims that more than 9 million users have downloaded the BlackBerry client) will probably be glad they can continue tweeting with a familiar app. UberTwitter is available for free from iTunes [iTunes link]. Reviews: BlackBerry Rocks!, HootSuite, TweetDeck, Twitter, iPhone, iTunes More About: iphone, twitter, ubertwitter For more Mobile coverage:
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| Social Point of Sale: The Holy Grail for Location-Based Marketers Posted: 24 Nov 2010 07:16 AM PST   Zachary Adam Cohen runs ZAC, Digital Agency, a boutique digital strategy firm in New York City, working with brands and businesses to re-equip themselves for success in the 21st century. He blogs regularly on topics such as social media, technology startups and the creative process behind digital strategy. He can be found on Twitter @ZacharyCohen. Many have touted the latest advances in location-based technology, but the news is mostly disappointing for marketers, advertisers and digital gurus. Writing in the Times, Joshua Brustein pined: "Everything is in place for location-based social networking to be the next big thing. Tech companies are building the platforms, venture capitalists are providing the cash and marketers are eager to develop advertising. All that is missing are the people." Brustein's piece cites a Pew Research Center finding that only 4% of Internet-using American adults have also used location-based services. Depending on who you are talking to, this is either stupendous news or a serious reality check. For the multitudes who are mostly unaware of location-based services such as Foursquare, Gowalla and SCVNGR, the fact that millions of people are broadcasting their whereabouts to their social networks — a mix of online friends, acquaintances and strangers — must be astounding. I hear it all the time. “Why would people tell other people where they are? Isn't it dangerous? I've seen people checking in at church and OB-GYN offices. Is there nothing sacred?” And yet for those on the front lines of technology, marketing, branding and advertising, that 4% seems painfully low. What's Missing From the Location-Based Revolution?In a word: Sales. The conversion aspect just isn't there. There is a small subculture of early adopters, but if these services expect the mass adoption that is necessary to attract the attention of brands and advertisers, then the process needs to be simplified. One untapped solution marketers should explore is integrating social networking — especially location-based checkins — with the point-of-sale systems many businesses already have in place. As it stands now, if I walk into Gap and check in on Foursquare or Facebook Places, and I end up buying a pair of jeans and a sweater, Gap may know that I checked in. But their POS system is only aware of the sale, not the social profile of the buyer. It’s a missed opportunity: two disparate stars in their marketing universe, seemingly unconnected. Someone needs to build a shuttle connecting the two. Gap should know not only that I am in one of their stores, but who I am with, and how long it has been since I was last there. The logical extension of this is that Gap should know what I bought last time I was in. Then the store would be able to offer me specials, discounts or exactly what it is I came in to buy in the first place. This is the holy grail of location-based marketing. The Potential of Data-Driven ServiceOnce a retailer, restaurant or hotel makes this connection, it can offer the most relevant products as close to the point of sale as possible. After all, if you’re already in a store, you’re likely to make a purchase. Let's imagine a restaurant scenario. There is a French bistro in downtown Manhattan that I frequent about once a month. Most of the staff know me, but I don't have personal relationships with anyone in particular. I have a relationship with the restaurant itself. I check in on Foursquare, I leave reviews on Yelp, I tweet about people I see there or what I am eating. And if something interesting or terrible happens — seeing an Olsen twin for instance (both interesting and terrible) — I might write a blog post about it. This is on top of the normal offline conversations I might have with family and friends about the restaurant. If the restaurant was aware of my physical presence there, in real time, the host would be able to see when I last visited, what I ordered, and how much I spent. Did I tweet about it? Did I enjoy a particular wine? Was the roast chicken undercooked? Armed with this information, the restaurant could develop strategies to make my current experience even greater and turn an occasional customer into a loyal one — perhaps even a brand evangelist. A host could thank me for coming back and apologize for the chicken, or offer a wine similar to the one I tweeted about enjoying so much. Perhaps after dinner on Saturday nights, I routinely go to a jazz club. The restaurant will know I’m a regular based on my Foursquare history and maybe it will co-market with that jazz venue to offer tickets to patrons like me. This would be small business community-building at its finest and realest. They can discount me, up-sell me or offer me a value-add, but it will be so targeted, so relevant and so personal that I'll hardly be able to refuse. Of course, it will take some time to establish what is appropriate and what isn't, but this opens up a whole new world for strategists to discuss, test and develop into winning tactics. Tasti D-Lite Is Leading the Way As previously noted, Tasti D-Lite is the only national retailer that has integrated its loyalty program with location-based checkins. The problem for national retailers is that various locations often use different POS systems. The cost of synchronizing social POS across various platforms is onerous, particularly as the value prospect remains uncertain. TastiRewards incentivizes customers to link their Twitter and Foursquare accounts to their Tasti D-Lite loyalty cards with the reward of additional loyalty points. Each time a customer checks in, a tweet is automatically sent out to his followers, earning the company a seemingly valuable brand mention. More recently, Tasti D-Lite has started integrating branded iPad applications in several stores. Clearly this is a company committed to experimenting with new technology and social media. Its social technology officer, B.J. Emerson, has done a wonderful job promoting these initiatives. Given what we’ve seen so far, I think that the integration of social location-aware apps into point of sale systems is inevitable, and it will be one of the greatest strides in bridging the gap between the online and offline marketing worlds. [EDITOR'S NOTE: This article was filed prior to the announcement of Foursquare's integration with Safeway's VonsClub.] More Location Resources from Mashable:
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, nfsphoto Reviews: Foursquare, Gowalla, Internet, Twitter, Yelp, foursquare, iStockphoto More About: business, customer service, Facebook Places, foursquare, gowalla, location, MARKETING, small business, social crm, social media, social media marketing, twitter For more Business coverage:
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| What’s Hot in Social Media This Week Posted: 24 Nov 2010 06:50 AM PST   Welcome to this week's edition of "What's Hot in Social Media," a series in which we revisit the week’s most popular stories concerning social networks. We're keeping our eye on four interesting developments this Wednesday. Facebook Might Soon Own Trademark for Word "Face" Facebook is getting close to possessing the trademark for the word "face" when used in the context of online chat rooms or bulletin boards, having received a notice of allowance from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office this week. Twitter, Foursquare Announce Expansions Twitter and Foursquare have announced that they are expanding their teams, both in terms of numbers and geographic locations. Twitter plans to “have a small number of people on the ground in Europe in 2011,” according to a spokesperson. Foursquare has opened a West Coast office and is on the lookout for engineering talent. Phrases Unseats Farmville As Number One Facebook App FarmVille has lost its number-one position on Facebook to an application called Phrases, ending its long domination of Facebook's top application charts — at least in terms of monthly active users. Bishop Suspended Over Facebook Comments About Royal Wedding A Church of England bishop has been suspended indefinitely after posting a series of negative comments on Facebook about Prince William and Kate Middleton's engagement. Reviews: Facebook, Twitter, foursquare More About: british monarchy, facebook, farmville, foursquare, phrases, social media, twitter, yelp For more Social Media coverage:
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| Facebook Could Soon Own the Trademark for the Word “Face” Posted: 24 Nov 2010 06:05 AM PST   Facebook has received a notice of allowance from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for the trademark on the word “face” when used in the context of online chat rooms or bulletin boards. Facebook filed for this trademark in December 2005. The notice of allowance does not mean that Facebook has been granted the trademark just yet, but it’s getting really close. In the next three months, Facebook must pay a fee and file a statement of use, at which time it must prove that it is actively using the mark to provide goods or services, and then get the approval of an attorney. The trademark covers the word face only in the context of “telecommunication services, namely, providing online chat rooms and electronic bulletin boards for transmission of messages among computer users in the field of general interest and concerning social and entertainment subject matter, none primarily featuring or relating to motoring or to cars,” the pending document reads. While the context in which the trademark can be enforced is quite narrow, it’s still scary to see Facebook owning a trademark for a term as general as “face.” Facebook is also vigorously defending its rights over the other half of its name. In August, Facebook filed a suit against social network Teachbook.com in an attempt to protect the use of the word “book” pertaining to an online networking service. [via Inside Facebook] Reviews: Facebook More About: Face, facebook, social media, social networking, trademark, trending For more Social Media coverage:
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| 5 Innovative Technologies Changing Health Care [VIDEOS] Posted: 24 Nov 2010 05:48 AM PST The Smarter Products Series is supported by IBM. Find out more about how IBM is working to create a Smarter Planet.   The health care industry is a rapidly changing one, making it hard for the average consumer to keep up with the many innovations that are revealed every week. From the operating theater to the patient’s bedside, there are new products being revealed all the time that make a real difference for medical staff and patients alike. We’ve found five amazing innovations that are especially clever. Have a read and let us know your thoughts in the comments below. Are there any other medical innovations that are improving health care that you’d add to the list? 1. Intuitive Surgical da Vinci Surgical SystemIntuitive Surgical’s da Vinci Surgical Systems help doctors with robotic-assisted minimally invasive surgery. While the surgeon sits at a console, the remotely controlled robotic arms carry out the procedure. The system boasts better visualization, enhanced dexterity and greater precision. Complex procedures, such as open-heart surgery, can be carried out with one to two centimeter incisions, meaning less risk for the patient. 2. Life Recovery Systems ThermoSuitCooling patients down before treating them for a heart attack (or other emergencies that require resuscitation) has been shown to limit damage to the brain and save lives. The ThermoSuit cools patients with direct water-on-skin contact and offers cooling times of up to six times as fast as conventional methods. The ThermoSuit takes about 30 minutes to drop a body core temperature by three degrees, is portable, and can be used on a normal gurney. 3. Zoll LifeVestLiving under the threat of sudden cardiac arrest is a frightening situation, because it can happen at any time. The LifeVest is an alternative to invasive implant options that may be unsuitable for at-risk patients. It’s the world’s first wearable defibrillator that constantly monitors the heart’s activity. The LifeVest can quickly detect an arrest and then defibrillate the heart back to a normal rhythm — with no need for external help. 4. Vocera Communications SystemThe Vocera wireless communication system looks to have revolutionized in-house communications in the hospitals where it is used. The wireless badge worn by staff allows them to call and page other staff members and departments using intuitive voice commands (e.g. “Call Dr. Jones”), rather than leave a patient, find a phone and look up numbers. In addition, iPhone and BlackBerry apps mean the system can be accessed outside the building for off-site staff. 5. LightLab C7-XR OCT Intravascular Imaging SystemThis imaging technology enables much more advanced images, rendered much quicker, from within the heart using near-infrared light. A vast improvement from older technologies, the C7-XR aids in the diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease. The system essentially lets cardiologists look in great detail inside a coronary artery before and after a procedure — something that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. BONUS: The Hydrant Showing that innovations don’t have to be high-tech, The Hydrant is one of those simple, why-didn’t-I-think-of-that ideas. Giving patients more independence, and just as crucially freeing up medical staff’s time, it helps prevent dehydration by giving the patient constant access to fluids, without them having to ask for assistance. Series Supported by IBM The Smarter Products Series is supported by IBM. Find out more about how IBM is working to create a Smarter Planet. More Related Resources from Mashable
Reviews: BlackBerry Rocks!, iPhone More About: health, health care, healthcare, IBM, List, Lists, medical, medicine, Smarter Products Series, tech, video, videos For more Tech coverage:
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| This Morning’s Top 3 Stories in Tech, Mobile and Business Posted: 24 Nov 2010 05:46 AM PST   Welcome to this morning's edition of "First To Know," a series in which we keep you in the know on what's happening in the digital world. We're keeping our eyes on three particular stories of interest today. Acer Unveils 3 Android-Powered Devices Acer has unveiled three forthcoming Android-powered devices: a 7-inch tablet, a 10.1-inch tablet and a 4.8-inch smartphone. The devices are scheduled to go on sale in April 2011. Facebook Might Soon Own Trademark for Word “Face” Facebook has received a notice of allowance from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for the trademark on the word "face" when used in the context of online chat rooms or bulletin boards. iOS 4.3 Slated for December Release [REPORT] With the release of iOS 4.2.1 now complete, Apple intends to launch iOS 4.3 by mid-December, according to Macstories. No one knows for sure what the update will include, but many speculate that iOS 4.3 will deliver app subscriptions to millions of iOS devices. Further News
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, DNY59 Reviews: Android, Aviary, Facebook, Skype, iStockphoto More About: Acer, facebook, first to know series, ios 4.3 For more Tech coverage:
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Farnsworth said sites might come and go, and that reporters should keep a close eye on new opportunities. Perhaps in the future, investigative journalists may take advantage of location-based tools similar to 
In 2010, the mobile app really has become the new currency. With hundreds of thousands of apps available just in the 
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