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Man Downloads Child Porn “Accidentally,” Faces Up To 20 Years in Prison

Jennifer Van Grove — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 05:19:29 +0000

Downloading child pornography is not a crime to be taken lightly. While we’ve all seen the To Catch a Predator episodes, it may come as shock to find out that the mere presence of child pornography on your computer’s hard drive is enough to send you to prison for 20 years.

Matthew White of Sacramento is learning this lesson the hard way. The 22 year-old man is facing hard time for downloading child porn, “accidentally.”

White claims that after using Limewire to download “College Girls Gone Wild,” he discovered that inappropriate images of children were also downloaded. Upon the discovery, White claims the photos were immediately deleted.

Now White faces up to 20 years in prison and plans to plead guilty, on the advice of his lawyer, in the hopes of getting a 3.5 year sentence instead (though he will have to register as a sex offender when released).

CBS in Sacramento covered the story, and White’s story is as follows:

“It didn’t appeal to me,” he said. “I was looking for women my age, so I just wanted to download ‘College Girls Gone Wild’ and accidentally downloaded underage pornography.”

About a year later, FBI agents showed up at his family’s home. The family agreed to let agents examine the computer, and at first, they couldn’t find anything.

Investigators later were able to recover the deleted images from deep within the hard drive.

“I asked them, ‘Where did you get that? I don’t remember that.’ I asked them, ‘Could I access that if I wanted to?’” Matt said. “They said no.”

It appears as if the law has no lenience for accidents when it comes to child porn. If you ever find yourself in a similar situation, the only option you have to avoid White’s fate is to report the incident to the authorities immediately.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, helenecanada.

Reviews: iStockphoto

Tags: child pornography, matthew white

EtherPad Responds to User Demand: Service Restored

Jennifer Van Grove — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 04:01:24 +0000

Just yesterday we learned that Google acquired AppJet, the company behind EtherPad, a real-time collaboration word processor.

The announcement came with a bit of bad news for EtherPad users, as the company said it was disabling key functionality (like creating new pads), and planning to shutdown the service completely in March 2010 to focus on Google Wave.

Apparently that news didn’t sit well with avid EtherPad users, as the company has issued a new statement in response to the overwhelmingly negative feedback. Aaron Iba, former CEO, asserts that not only has pad creation been re-enabled, but they’re going to open source the code, and also get EtherPad users Google Wave invites.

Clearly EtherPad users are a passionate bunch, and their vocal disapprobation of the previous transition plan encouraged the company to do a complete one-eighty. AppJet’s complete statement is as follows:

Dear EtherPad Users,

Many of you were not super thrilled with the transition plan we announced in our last blog post, which I guess is really quite flattering. We have worked with Google and the Google Wave team to make the following changes to the plan, which I think you will appreciate:

- We have re-enabled pad creation from the EtherPad home page.
- We have begun planning how to open source the code to EtherPad and the underlying AppJet Web Framework. We will continue maintaining new pad creation from the EtherPad home page at least until we have open sourced the code, and work hard to make sure there will be no or minimal service disruption in the future.
- We are working with the Google Wave team to get all EtherPad users a chance to try out the Google Wave preview within the next couple of weeks. We do realize (as does the Google Wave team) that Wave doesn’t yet have all the functionality you rely on, and isn’t yet as mature as EtherPad. We are confident that in the long term you will be really happy with Google Wave, though. That’s why we decided to join them!

The team we are joining already gets open souce, and we hope that by releasing the code to EtherPad we will not only help you transition your existing workflow, but also contribute to the broader advancement of realtime collaboration technology.

I am sorry for disrupting your productivity, and I hope that this new transition plan helps you out.

Sincerely,

Aaron Iba
Former CEO of AppJet

Reviews: EtherPad, Google, Google Wave

Tags: appjet, etherpad, Google Wave

Car Flipped By Wrecking Ball, Real or Fake? [Viral Videos]

Jennifer Van Grove — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 02:39:13 +0000

A recent video on YouTube, which shows a car hit by a large wrecking ball, is fast approaching viral status on the site.

The video description attempts to paint the incident as real and claims that a, “Dodge minivan that entered a closed construction zone in Manhattan was accidentally hit and flipped over by the wrecking ball as onlookers watch in horror and ran for cover. Driver escaped with minor injuries.”

The problem is that everything about the video makes us think that this is a fake. A few questions that arise: Why would they be using a wrecking ball adjacent to a Manhattan city street? Is there a voice in the background yelling cut? Is there a flipping mechanism underneath the car? Would it be possible to survive from the impact? Why are there no news reports on the incident? And the list goes on.

Given the video description mentioning Dodge, the Chicago Tribune even speculates that the video might be an attempt at a viral ad by Dodge, and we wouldn’t be surprised if that turned out to be the case. Remember the “Amazing ball girl catch” viral video that turned out to be a viral ad engineered by Gatorade?

While you can probably guess where we stand on the video’s status, we want your take. Is the, “OMG! Car Hit and Flipped By Wrecking-Ball in NYC!” video real or fake? What’s your take, and why?

Tags: car flipped by wrecking ball, viral video

Ron Livingston Sues Wikipedia Detractor for Saying He’s Gay

Jennifer Van Grove — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 22:55:53 +0000

Search Google for Ron Livingston, the man of Office Space (and Sex and the City) fame, and you’ll find IMDB links for information on his acting career. You’ll also come across a Wikipedia page on the movie and TV star, with inaccurate details on his personal life. And that’s the problem.

Since May, Livingston has continually fallen victim to an anonymous Wikipedia detractor who continually edits the entry to read that the actor is in a gay relationship.

Livingston, who is married to Rosemarie DeWitt, calls the rumor that he is in a relationship with Lee Dennison “malicious,” and to make the behavior stop he’s filed a lawsuit. The suit, filed yesterday with the Los Angeles County Superior Court, seeks unspecified damages for libel, invasion of privacy, and for using his name and likeness without permission.

According to TMZ, “Ron believes the perp also created fake Facebook profiles for himself and Lee, and both pages claim the two are “In a relationship” with each other.”

Details of the suit are minimal, but given that the online detractor is anonymous, the case would likely require Wikipedia to reveal the poster’s identity to move forward. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Reviews: Facebook, Wikipedia

Tags: ron livingston, wikipedia

Web Community Photoshops a Happy Memory [PICS]

Pete Cashmore — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 19:32:24 +0000

Reddit community member elmstreeter’s mother passed away this week, and yesterday he turned to the social news site to create a photographic memento: his last photo with his mom had her breathing tubes obscuring her face, and he wanted them removed. He wrote in a posting to the site:

My mother died of cancer yesterday. This is the last picture of us together and I wondered if anyone with mad Photoshop skills could touch up the picture and remove the oxygen cannula. I would greatly appreciate anyone who could be of assistance.

PS Hug your mom today

Touchingly, Reddit users did come to his aid, Photoshopping out the tubes and even fixing up a broken chair.

This might be the sweetest story we’ve heard all week. Nice work, Reddit users.

[via Reddit via The Daily What]

Reviews: reddit.com

Tags: trending

Mac Gift Guide: 10 Buying Ideas for Apple Fans

Christina Warren — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 18:41:47 +0000

Now that the holiday shopping season is officially in full swing, you still have a few weeks to get out and get gifts for everyone on your list. If you’re reading this site, chances are you know at least one person who is obsessed with everything Apple (or you are that person yourself). Gifts that fit someone’s personality and existing gadget collection are often a great way to say “happy holidays.”

Here are 10 great holiday gifts perfect for the Apple fan in your life. These gifts run the gamut from stuff that touts an Apple fan’s devotion to those just add a little bit of flair to an existing Mac.

Macify a Workspace

Know someone who just got a new Mac or needs a little help making their workspace more, well, workable? Check out some of these awesome workspace additions for Macs of all kinds and sizes.

BookArc — Twelve South makes some really spectacular stuff to accompany your Mac. The Book Arc is one of those perfect items for the user who always has their MacBook or MacBook Pro connected to an external monitor and keyboard. The stand fits all MacBooks, holds the laptop securely and can save a ton of space or just freshen up how an office looks.

Twelve South sent us one to review and we’re now using it with a MacBook hooked up to an external monitor as a secondary computer on the same desk as a 27″ iMac.

BackPack — The BackPack is also from Twelve South and it is a great addition to any iMac or Apple Cinema Display user’s desktop. It’s a shelf that fits easily onto the back stand of the iMac or Cinema Display and can easily hold an external hard drive, a caddy of pens, a bobble head, you name it. For Mac users that keep an external drive connected for Time Machine, this is a great way to keep the drive out of the way.

BassJump — Twelve South just introduced the BassJump, and for MacBook and MacBook Pro users looking for a nice, portable way to boost the sound that comes out of the Mac, it’s pretty ingenious. The BassJump connects to an Apple portable via USB and acts as a subwoofer, adding a richer, more enhanced sound.

Testing the BassJump with my MacBook, I was impressed at how much better the system sounded when it was turned on. Rock and pop music especially was much more lush, less tinny, and had more definition. At $79.99, it’s not a bad option for someone who works in a small office or dorm room and wants a sound solution that is portable (it comes with its own neoprene case).

Slimkey V2 — Macessity makes some really nice Mac-centric accessories, but the Slimkey V2 really takes the cake. It’s a stand for your computer (you can use it with a monitor, a laptop, or with an iMac) that also contains a side-accessible USB hub. This is great because the USB ports on the back of the iMac can often be hard to access and this makes it easy to connect items without having to reach around, which can be really helpful for users who keep their Macs on a desk with a hutch.

Fashionable Cases and Bags

The Apple-addict in your life probably already has a case for their laptop or iPhone, but it probably isn’t as nice as some of these.

Lacoste Messenger Bag — Designed to hold up to a 15.4″ MacBook Pro, this messenger bag was made by Lacoste specifically for Apple computers. It has a pocket for cables, accessories, and even an iPod or iPhone (with holes for earphones). It’s also waterproof so it’s good for the Mac user who has to trek around in all kinds of weather.

Vaja Leather Products — Vaja cases for the iPhone or Mac portables can be pricey — everything is handmade — but the quality is impeccable and the design aesthetic just flat-out rocks. Some of the custom styles can take 25 days to make so they won’t be ready by Christmas, but Vaja does have some models already made and ready to buy.

Vogue Leather Collection — If Vaja is out of your price range, check out the Vogue Leather Collection from More-Thing.com. Good looking and affordable.

Apparel and Toys

Apple has a Company Store at their Cupertino campus that sells lots of official Apple merchandise and apparel. Unfortunately, you can’t buy that stuff anywhere except for the Company Store (although a few places sell some of the items online). That doesn’t mean you can’t still get Mac-centric clothing and toys from other places.

Some favorite spots:

Insanely Great Tees — Insanely Great Tees has a variety of shirts for guys and girls that celebrate the fun, artistic, and geeky side of Mac life. They are printed on American Apparel shirts and hold up extremely well. I have shirts that are two years old that still look brand new.

The Iconfactory — The Iconfactory makes apps and icons for the Mac and the iPhone. They’re the geniuses behind Twitterrific (one of the very first Twitter apps EVER), and their icon “Ollie” is probably as well known as the official Twitter logo. The Iconfactory sells t-shirts featuring their app icons (see above photo) and will soon be offering vinyl toy Ollies – perfect for a Mac lover’s stocking.

If you want to get something really cool and contribute to a great cause, you can bid on a set of four Ollie prototypes. 100% of the proceeds from the auction will go to the American Cancer Society, with Iconfactory matching the winning bid up to $500.00

Throwboy — You can get the Mac lover in your life pillow versions of their favorite Mac OS X dock icons. These pillows from Throwboy are handmade and extremely cool.

Photo courtesy of Nik Fletcher

More holiday shopping resources from Mashable:

- 10 Gift Suggestion Sites for Hapless Holiday Shoppers
- 10 Unique Gifts You Can Make with Help from the Web
- HOW TO: Use Social Media to Find Deals This Holiday Season
- 10 New Sites for Socially Responsible Shopping

Reviews: Twitter, Twitterrific

Tags: apple, Holidays, List, Lists, mac, online shopping, shopping

10 Amazing Augmented Reality iPhone Apps

Amy-Mae Elliott — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 16:26:48 +0000

While Lawnmower Man may have led us to believe the future was a virtual one, it seems that in fact augmented reality (the overlaying of digital data on the real world) is where we’re headed.

A buzz technology right now, augmented reality apps are quickly gaining momentum on the iPhone. So to add to the quick overview of six AR apps we brought you earlier, we sort the digital wheat from the pixellated chaff to bring you ten AR apps for the iPhone that vary from functional, to educational, to just plain fun.

1. Le Bar Guide

Although the wisdom of getting drunk people to wave their iPhones around on today’s mean streets is questionable, if you drink responsibly, as this Stella Artois-backed app urges you to, this could be a handy tool. As with similar location-based AR apps, Le Bar (that’s French for bar, by the way) Guide will assist you in finding the nearest watering hole, give you ratings and then even point you to a taxi within stumbling distance. It’s accurate to 20 feet, which is a coincidence, as that’s about our level of accuracy after three pints of the French stuff.

2. WorkSnug

Another corporate-backed app, this time by Plantronics, is WorkSnug, an iPhone app that finds digital nomads a place to lay their weary laptop. It identifies Wi-Fi hotspots and potential workplaces – from coffee shops to professional rent-a-desk office spaces – with user reviews encompassing power provision, atmosphere, noise levels and even the quality of the coffee. Although currently only available for London, versions for San Francisco, New York, Berlin, Madrid are due soon.

3. Pocket Universe: Virtual Sky Astronomy

This star map app will spell out the stars, planets and constellations for you. Needing no connectivity, this clever app contains data on 10,000 stars, 88 constellations and lunar phases, while the “tonight’s sky” feature shows meteor showers and visible planets based on your location. Just hold your iPhone skywards on a bright night and before you can say “Hubble telescope” you’ll be looking at Uranus.

4. DishPointer

Staying on the celestial theme, what started out as a clever Google Maps mashup has been turned into an iPhone app, and is within days of launching for Android handsets too. The mobile version of DishPointer is designed for satellite installers or mobile broadcasters to hold their phones up to the sky and get a virtual overlay of their nearest satellites to know which way to point the darn dish. If you aren’t employed in such a field, yet you have this on your phone, then your nerd-score just went through the stratosphere. Way to go, cable guy.

5. AugMeasure

Finally an iPhone app your dad can get excited about. Augmented reality measuring arrives with AugMeasure which lets you gauge short distances using on your iPhone’s camera. AugMeasure displays distances (up to 30 centimeters or 12 inches) on the screen overlaid onto the live image which will change as you move the phone. While the results might not be precise enough for that intricate woodworking project you’ve got going on in the basement, for those quick, “No, it’s definitely longer than 6 inches” moments, it’s a must.

6. Virtual Graffiti

If the militant grammar nerd within knows that the sign for “Buddys Bar” needs an apostrophe, then Virtual Graffiti can help. Snap an image, add your witticism, embellishment or “tag”, then, once uploaded, your artistic addition to the world can be browsed on a location basis thanks to the Google Maps integration. All the fun of tagging, none of the embarrassment of getting caught with a spray can in your hot little old-enough-to-know-better hand.

7. Theodolite

If you’re the type that likes to know what axis is bisecting your Northerly inclination and at what altitude, then chances are you already have an actual theodolite. If you don’t and that sentence gave you chills (in a good way) then you’re 99 cents away from topographical heaven. As well as offering all that a theolodite might, but in a decidedly more portable package, this app overlays such data over your camera’s image and even lets you snap the odd screenshot for posterity.

8. Car Finder

We’re sure you have no use for this one yourself, but if you know anyone who might have difficulty finding their way back to the car in those huge parking lots, then the Car Finder app is a good suggestion. Once the car’s location is set, the app creates a visible marker showing the car, its distance away and the direction in which to head. There are other non-AR apps which offer this kind of tool, but we think seeing it on a real-life display will make locating that pesky Pontiac a piece of cake.

9. Firefighter 360

Catering to both pyromaniacs and Backdraft fantasists, Firefighter 360 will set your immediate location on fire, requiring you, as heroic fireperson, to get out the hose, douse some flames and save some passers-by. As far as iPhone gaming goes, it’s arguably not a high point. The sound effects are crude and the graphics cartoonish. But it’s an interesting application of AR that makes us excited about the next wave of AR games. Did we mention you get to play a fireperson?

10. iPew

Want to shoot people in the face with a laser? Yep, there’s an app for that. iPew could easily also be named iPuerile, as it really is that dumb. But, sometimes it’s the simple things in life (kicking leaves, vanilla ice cream, swapping around the keys on a colleague’s keyboard when they’re on vacation) that offer the most pleasure – at least on a short term basis. iPew offers you a choice of weapons and provides gratifying noises as you get someone in your virtual sights and blast them away. Recommended for board meetings, long commutes and those cozy nights in with the in-laws.

More iPhone resources from Mashable:

- iPhone TV: Top iPhone Apps for Live Streaming Television
- Top 10 iPhone Apps as Judged by Mashable Readers
- 7 iPhone Apps That Can Save Lives
- 5 Must-Have iPhone Apps for Wine Lovers
- 20 Creative Apps For Your iPhone

Reviews: Android, Google Maps

Tags: Augmented Reality, iphone, iphone app, Lists, mobile app, trending

POLL: Google Destroys Bing in Reader Vote

Barb Dybwad — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 03:31:16 +0000

We’ve had some close calls here in our ongoing Faceoff Series, but this week’s was certainly not one of them.

Each week we put two web services, companies or pieces of software side by side and ask you which of the two would win in a knockdown, drag out fight. This week we pitted Google against Bing for the Best Search Engine crown, and the victory was decisive.

Much like last week’s matchup when Verizon trounced AT&T in a battle of cell carriers, this week saw a clear winner emerge once again. Out of almost 3000 votes, the unsurprising victor was…

…Google with a full 78% of the vote. That’s 2180 votes to Bing’s 519, relegating it to a distant 2nd place at 19%. A slim 3% tie vote at 97 fence-sitters rounded out this week’s head to head brawl.

Check out the full list of winners in the Faceoff series listed below. We’ll keep the series rolling starting again on Monday, so be sure to tune in. Who do you think we should match up in a future edition?

Web Faceoff: Overall Results

Week 1:
- Mozilla Firefox vs. Google Chrome
- WINNER: Firefox, 4600 votes (Chrome: 3310 votes, Tie: 911 votes)

Week 2:
- Tumblr vs. Posterous
- WINNER: Tumblr, 1809 votes (Posterous: 1496 votes, Tie: 256 votes)

Week 3:
- Pandora vs. Last.fm
- WINNER: Last.fm, 1187 votes (Pandora: 1156 votes, Tie: 122 votes)

Week 4:
- Twitter vs. Facebook
- WINNER: Facebook, 2484 votes (Twitter: 2061 votes, Tie: 588 votes)

Week 5:
- WordPress vs. Typepad
- WINNER: WordPress, 2714 votes (Typepad: 267 votes, Tie: 357 votes)

Week 6:
- Windows 7 vs. Snow Leopard
- WINNER: Windows 7, 3632 votes (Snow Leopard: 3278 votes, Tie: 121 votes)

Week 7:
- TweetDeck vs. Seesmic Desktop
- WINNER: TweetDeck, 3294 votes (Seesmic Desktop: 1055 votes, Tie: 260 votes)

Week 8:
- Microsoft Office vs. Google Docs
- WINNER: Microsoft Office, 1365 votes (Google Docs: 994 votes, Tie: 315 votes)

Week 9:
- Apple iPhone vs. Google Android
- WINNER: Google Android, 3323 votes (Apple iPhone: 1494 votes, Tie: 228 votes)

Week 10:
- AT&T vs. Verizon
- WINNER: Verizon, 1161 votes (AT&T: 538 votes, Tie: 118 votes)

Week 11:
- Google vs. Bing
- WINNER: Google, 2180 votes (Bing: 519 votes, Tie: 97 votes)

Reviews: Bing, Chrome, Facebook, Firefox, Google, Google Chrome, Google Docs, Mozilla Firefox, Pandora, Posterous, Seesmic Desktop, Tumblr, TweetDeck, Twitter, TypePad, WordPress

Tags: bing, Google, microsoft, poll, Search, web faceoff

Top 5 Digg Milestones in the Last 5 Years

Ben Parr — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 01:07:35 +0000

As of today, Digg is five years old. Think about that: that’s around 1825 days of story submissions, front page wrangling, and explosive growth. Hell, Digg is older than Twitter and YouTube.

Now that we’ve had half a decade to digg and be dugg, it seems like a perfect time to reflect on Digg’s history, growth, and struggles. While there are many events that shaped the character of the social bookmarking site, five events across five different years stood out to us as pivotal moments in Digg’s history.

Below is a recounting of some of the company’s major turning points, from its birth in 2004 to its struggle to become profitable this year. Here are five of the biggest milestones in Digg’s history:

1. Digg’s Launch

You can’t start a list like this without recognizing how it all began. In November of 2004, founder Kevin Rose (former host on TechTV), along with Owen Byrne (original developer), Ron Gorodetsky, and Jay Adelson (now Digg’s CEO) helped get Digg off the ground. On December 4th, 2004, it launched to the public with less than 1000 users.

Back then, it was simple, ad-free, and focused on tech, but it was the birth of a social media juggernaut.

2. Diggnation

On July 1, 2005, Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht (Kevin’s previous co-host on TechTV’s The Screen Savers), started a video podcast centered around what was popular on Digg. It was one of the first three shows to launch on a new Internet video network called Revision3.

That show was Diggnation, and it quickly grew with the help of loyal diggers into one of the largest and most popular video podcasts around. It helped push Digg and its brand to new audiences while acting as the flagship program for Revision3 at the same time.

Diggnation’s impact on the Digg brand and its community has been tremendous, although it hasn’t helped push Digg into the mainstream consciousness. Still, 231 episodes later, Diggnation has been a big success.

3. Launch of Digg 3.0

The social bookmarking website has gone through several iterations, but perhaps the most important one of them all was when Digg 3.0 launched on June 26th, 2006.

What was so special about Digg Version 3? It was when Digg launched topics and categories, expanding it beyond its technology base. Politics, gaming, business, science, and all of its various verticals have successfully grown and helped Digg exceed its technology roots, although it is still the core that holds the Digg community together.

4. Digg DRM Revolt

While it’s always been known that Digg and its users have a lot of influence across the web, it was made clear to everybody in dramatic fashion on May 1st, 2007.

A group of hackers successfully found a way to crack the Digital Rights Management (DRM) protection of the now-defunct HD-DVD standard. With the encryption cracked, Digg’s users posted the code and instructions on how to copy and crack HD-DVDs

Digg itself was worried that the cracked keys would result in lawsuits and cease and desist orders. Thus, they decided to delete articles referencing it and, in a blog post, stated that “In order for Digg to survive, it must abide by the law.”

That’s when Digg went out of control. Its users flooded the entire website with nothing but the HD-DVD crack or anti-Digg submissions. Digg couldn’t keep up. Eventually Kevin Rose stepped in and conceded to the community’s wishes. From his blog post.

“But now, after seeing hundreds of stories and reading thousands of comments, you’ve made it clear. You’d rather see Digg go down fighting than bow down to a bigger company. We hear you, and effective immediately we won’t delete stories or comments containing the code and will deal with whatever the consequences might be.”

It was on this day that Digg proved its power and really caught the attention of the mainstream media.

5. Digg Ads

At the beginning of this year, Digg was in crisis mode. It laid off 10% of its staff and focused on getting profitable after it was revealed that the company made only made $6.4 million in the first nine months of 2009.

Digg had a plan, however. In June, the company revealed Digg Ads, a new system of advertising where users would control how much advertisers pay for ad space on the homepage of Digg and elsewhere. They officially launched on August 6th.

It’s too early to tell how successful Digg Ads will eventually be, but so far, the future of Digg Ads (and Digg itself) look bright.

Reviews: Digg

Tags: digg, diggnation

Turn Movie Ratings Into a Game with Flickchart

Barb Dybwad — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 00:16:45 +0000

This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.

Name: Flickchart

Quick Pitch: Flickchart is a social network for film lovers to rate, compare and share their favorite films through a unique game-like one versus one mechanism.

Genius Idea: If you’re a movie lover, or even just someone who watches the occasional film, Flickchart is a unique take on rating and socializing your favorite movies. The site shows you two movies at a time and prompts you to pick which one you liked better; if you haven’t seen one or either film just click a button to indicate that and get new choices.

Over time, Flickchart builds a prioritized list of your favorite movies. It uses the aggregate data from all its users to create charts of the most popular films that you can then break down with all sorts of filters including genre, year or decade, actors, directors and by other users. You can also leave comments on any of your comparisons and share films and lists with your friends on Facebook and FriendFeed.

Users can also check out the aggregate stats about individual films, and going in discussions about particular matchups conveniently organized by popularity so you can find the hottest current topics easily. The site also keeps track of the films you’ve marked as “haven’t seen,” which can create a nice “to watch” list for movie buffs.

Flickchart is a fun and compelling site for movie lovers thanks to its simple, game-like premise that’s rather addictive. The rankings and charts it builds for you personally and for the userbase as a whole over time are an interesting and useful data set for people who enjoy film. With an easy to use interface that generates decent utility through enjoyable interactivity, Flickchart is well worth a spin for movie buffs who enjoy a web-based social experience surrounding film.

Spark of Genius Series Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark

BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest – use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines).”

Reviews: Facebook, Flickchart, FriendFeed, PHP

Tags: bizspark, Film, flickchart, Movies, social networking

DONE DEAL: Yahoo and Microsoft Finalize Search Partnership

Adam Ostrow — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 22:42:18 +0000

The Microsoft-Yahoo search and advertising deal, first announced back in July, has just been finalized by the two companies.

Back in October, it was revealed that details were still being mulled over because of the deal’s complexity, but this afternoon, the companies put out a statement to let the world know that the deal is now complete.

Here’s the statement:

Yahoo! Inc. and Microsoft Corporation today announced that the companies have finalized and executed the definitive Search and Advertising Services and Sales Agreement and License Agreement in accordance with the letter agreement announced in July.

The companies released the following joint statement:

“Microsoft and Yahoo! believe that this deal will create a sustainable and more compelling alternative in search that can provide consumers, advertisers and publishers real choice, better value, and more innovation.

“Yahoo! and Microsoft welcome the broad support the deal has received from key players in the advertising industry and remain hopeful that the closing of the transaction can occur in early 2010.”

Now, we wait for Bing to become Yahoo’s search engine, a process that likely won’t be finished until late next year, but will have major implications on the search landscape once complete.

Reviews: Bing, Yahoo!

Tags: bing, microsoft, Yahoo

Google Android Is Watching You [VIDEO]

Brenna Ehrlich — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 22:31:26 +0000

It’s no secret that Android and iPhone are something of mortal enemies — just take a look at any of the Droid ads currently hitting TV screens across the country.

Well, imagine a world in which the makers of Android — Google — kicked up their battle plan a notch, drawing upon the arsenal of dirt that the search engine has cached on its users to blackmail us all into ditching our iPhones in favor of Motorola’s myTouch. College Humor has imagined such a world, which they have hilariously rendered in the video after the jump.

That’ll make you think twice for sexting, huh?

Reviews: Android, Google

Tags: andoid, college humor, droid, Google, iphone

RUMOR: Friendster to Be Sold for $100+ Million

Ben Parr — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:41:22 +0000

Do you remember Friendster? Several years ago, it was one of the hottest startups and social networks around, long before MySpace or Facebook hit the scene. Google even tried to acquire it back in 2003. But while it’s on the decline in the western world, it’s a powerful force in Asia, where it is one of the most popular Web sites in nations such as the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and Indonesia.

According to Reuters, the social network is not only moving to lock in its Asian audience, but it’s about to get a new Asian owner as well. Fresh off a redesign aimed at its Asian userbase, Friendster will be sold by the end of the year to an Asian buyer for an amount north of $100 million.

The company, which has been private since its inception in 2002, was founded by programmer Jonathan Abrams and received investments from several venture capital firms totaling around $50 million. Now it’s led by CEO Richard Kimber, a former director of Google’s South Asian affairs.

It’s no surprise to us that Friendster’s focus on the Asian market would eventually result in an Asian owner. Friendster, while mostly ridiculed and forgotten in the U.S., is still one of the world’s largest Web sites and has room to grow within Asia. Considering its rapid decline in the U.S., Friendster could have done a lot worse.

Did you use Friendster back in the day or are you a current user? We want to hear your Friendster stories (or ridicule) in the comments.

Reviews: Friendster

Tags: asia, friendster

LUNCHTIME POLL: What’s Your Favorite Blogging Platform?

Barb Dybwad — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:31:50 +0000

Happy Friday, folks! That means it’s time once again for the weekly Lunchtime Poll!

Last time we asked about your favorite video sharing sites — be sure to check out the results of Mashable readers’ video sharing favorites to get caught up. This time we want to know about your favorite blogging platforms: What do you use when 140 characters or a short status update aren’t quite enough? Head on past the break to find out the Mashable staff favorites, then let us know your choice in the comments (and why).

What’s your favorite blogging platform?

Mashable Faves

Adam Ostrow: For personal use: Posterous, for professional: WordPress.

Jennifer Van Grove: Posterous: The super simple platform makes it possible for me to maintain fresh content with little to no effort… Ironically, I’ve found that my Posterous posts are seeing impressive page views. Consistency and frequency is the play, and Posterous makes that possible.

Brenna Ehrlich: Tumblr: I like being able to interact with my readers, who frequently reblog my posts and pass them ’round the Web. I get a ton of traffic from Tumblr alone.

Christina Warren: Long-form: WordPress, even though I think it is mediocre at anything other than blogging (CMS it isn’t). Short-form: Tumblr.

Tamar Weinberg: WordPress!

Matt Silverman: Blogger for me, despite its faults. I like to keep things within one Google username as much as possible.

Josh Catone: WordPress for long posts, Tumblr for fleeting thoughts.

Ben Parr: WordPress, then Posterous. Drupal is better for more complicated CMS tasks, though.

Barb Dybwad: I love the simplicity and community baked into Tumblr, but also the customization and full-featured power of WordPress.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, ericsphotography

Reviews: Drupal, Google, Mashable, Posterous, Tumblr, WordPress, blogger, iStockphoto

Tags: blogger, blogging, blogging platforms, lunchtime poll, poll, posterous, tumblr, Wordpress

8 Tips for Managing a LinkedIn Group

Jessica Faye Carter — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 21:22:26 +0000

Jessica Faye Carter is an award-winning author and columnist. Her company, Nette Media develops social media technologies for women and multicultural communities, and she blogs at Technicultr.

With over 50 million users, LinkedIn continues to be among the most popular social networking sites for business professionals, offering a variety of features for its users. One such feature, Groups, allows members the opportunity to create and manage groups focused on a wide range of business-related subjects, and some of the largest groups have hundreds of thousands of members and rival many niche social networks outside of LinkedIn in terms of size and activity.

Groups offer valuable networking opportunities for their participants, who gain access to resources and information that can be beneficial for their careers. If you are considering starting a LinkedIn group or want to increase the effectiveness or reach of your current group, the 8 tips below can help.

1. Use a Personal Touch

LinkedIn provides a wide range of tools that allow you to stay connected with your members in ways that feel personal. The Templates feature allows you to provide automatic responses to new members, and even to those requesting to join your group. It’s an easy way to envelope new members into your community. But you don’t have to limit yourself to early interactions.

Most members would be pleased to receive a note congratulating them on an accomplishment, or to read your comment on a discussion topic they started. As Dharmesh Shah, co-founder and CTO of HubSpot observes, “LinkedIn groups are all about community and bringing people with common interests together.”

He should know: his group, OnStartups, is the fourth-largest on LinkedIn with a membership that exceeds 113,000.

2. Lay Some Ground Rules

Establishing posting guidelines and displaying them prominently (in a featured discussion) is an easy way to help new members get acquainted with your group. Such guidelines generally provide users with community contacts, encourage them to post information in appropriate sections, and specify conduct that can get them banned (spam or attacking other group members, for example).

Making everyone aware of the rules also gives you a reference point when you have to handle a difficult situation with a member.

3. Praise the Good, Deal with the Bad

Encourage member participation by praising and highlighting valuable contributions to the group. This incentivizes others to share their content and engage. If you encounter negative or counterproductive behavior from a member, it’s important to be professional and civil. Should it become necessary to issue a warning, handle the matter privately. Apart from unusually egregious behavior or spam, it’s also a good idea to give a member a warning or two before banning them from the group. Ultimately, it’s up to you to use your best judgment.

4. Help Your Members Promote Themselves

One of the biggest complaints about LinkedIn Groups is the number of people who join simply to promote themselves or their business — and then hijack the group discussion boards to do so. They usually aren’t interested in engaging with others and can have a negative impact on your community. One way to manage these bombarders is by designating a place, like a Subgroup, for group members to promote their service offerings.

Subgroups are automatically available to all of your group members and are easy to set up. Highlighting this promotional opportunity satisfies those who want to self-promote and keeps your discussion boards open for business. You can also feature members in other ways, such as in your occasional emails to the group membership or in a featured discussion that you update regularly.

5. Add Some News Feeds

To keep a steady stream of content available for members to discuss, use the “Manage news feeds” feature to add the RSS feeds for your blog or other blogs to the News section. The posts will then become automatically available to the members of your group for reading and discussion. Of course, you don’t want to flood the boards with self-promotion, so if you aren’t getting enough news inputs from your users, you may want to remove the feed and update the news section with a variety of content manually.

6. Facilitate Connections Outside of LinkedIn

It’s natural for members to seek to make non-LinkedIn connections after being active in your group for awhile. You can offer a range of options to help your members engage elsewhere on the Internet or offline.

Women 2.0, an organization for women entrepreneurs in technology, has a LinkedIn group founded by Angie Chang with over 18,000 members. This group provides numerous opportunities for members to connect apart from the group. Members can share their Twitter handles in a featured discussion, or participate in a Women 2.0 Startup Essentials Workshop for face-to-face interaction. Depending on the size of your group, you might consider starting a Meetup group for local interaction, hosting a webinar, or arranging a dinner or meeting at an industry conference or event.

7. Take a Poll

Use LinkedIn’s Polls application to get feedback from your members on group features and functionality. Create a free poll and then highlight it in your group, either by linking to it on the discussion boards or by submitting the poll’s URL to your News section. Be careful; if you make the poll available in the general directory, your responses won’t be limited to group members — anyone on LinkedIn can respond.

8. Promote Your Group

The sheer size of LinkedIn means that your group is likely to get some members without much effort on your part. But this shouldn’t be an incentive to neglect promotional tools. Some of the strategies you can use to promote your group include low-hanging fruit like inviting others in your network to join, encouraging members to invite their colleagues, and by highlighting your group to other, non-competing groups (LinkedIn members can belong to up to 40 groups simultaneously).

Shah took his group to the next level by promoting it on his standalone OnStartups blog as a static link, as well as in specific articles. He issued this call to action to potential members: “Are you passionate about startups? Then, connect with other like minded people in the LinkedIn OnStartups group”. He even created a custom URL (http://linkedin.onstartups.com) that was co-branded, catchy, easy to remember, and short enough to fit on Twitter.

Do you have any best practices for managing LinkedIn groups? Share your ideas in the comments.

More small business resources from Mashable:

- Top Mobile Productivity Tools for the Small Business
- HOW TO: Choose a News Reader for Keeping Tabs on Your Industry
- 5 Advanced Social Media Marketing Strategies for Small Businesses
- 4 Ways Social Media is Changing Business
- HOW TO: Use Twitter Hashtags for Business

Reviews: LinkedIn, Twitter, news

Tags: business, groups, linkedin, List, Lists

Apple Acquires Streaming Music Service Lala

Barb Dybwad — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:49:24 +0000

Update: Both The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal’s AllThingsD report that this is a done deal.

This is still officially in rumor status at this point, but reportedly two independent sources told CNet that Apple is close to acquiring Lala, a streaming digital music service and storefront. The insiders say the deal is very close to being done, with terms already agreed upon and only pending a final sign-off.

One of Lala’s unique features is the ability to upload songs from your music collection to their company cloud, providing not only a convenient backup source but also access to your library from mobile devices. You can also buy streaming-only Web albums rather cheaply, another relatively unique offering in the crowded online music space. Assuming this deal becomes reality, signs point to Apple looking at providing some sort of streaming service to users, perhaps with a cloud storage component for music collections.

Plus, with the music subscription space heating up once again thanks to the recent MOG All-Access launch and (hopefully) impending Spotify U.S. launch, perhaps Apple is eying an additional music model to expand the reach of its iTunes business.

Although iTunes is currently the largest music store and a huge money-maker from digital download sales, the landscape of music online is certainly shifting — MySpace’s recent acquisitions of iLike and imeem, along with Google’s deal to provide streaming music in search results, point to a shift in how users expect to access music on the Web.

It would make sense that Apple wants to get in on that trend. Some incorporation of streaming functionality courtesy of Lala’s technology would make sense given the current climate.

What do you think Apple will do with Lala if the acquisition goes through?

Reviews: Ilike, MySpace, Spotify, imeem

Tags: apple, Google, ilike, imeem, Lala, music, myspace, online music, streaming, trending

MySpace and Facebook Sitting in a Tree?

Adam Ostrow — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:46:10 +0000

It’s been rumored that archenemies MySpace and Facebook have turned friendly in recent months, discussing the possibility that MySpace users might actually be able to sign into the social network using Facebook Connect.

Now, a more detailed report from the blog Inside Facebook says that this will become reality “in the first part of 2010.” According to their sources, MySpace is thinking along the same lines as Yahoo, who earlier this week announced major Facebook integration across many of its services. That thinking could essentially be summarized with the old proverb: If you can’t beat them, join them.

For MySpace’s purposes, that hypothetically would mean users accessing the site with their Facebook credentials, and then sharing back the increasing amount of exclusive entertainment type content that the site has been acquiring to their Facebook friends. In turn, MySpace gets more traffic that it can sell to advertisers, but ultimately cedes the race to be the Web’s social identity provider.

That space is seemingly a war that will be waged between Facebook and Google. The latter just launched integration with Twitter earlier this week, that allows users to sign into Google Friend Connect — its Facebook Connect rival — with Twitter. Maybe social identity ultimately won’t be that complicated after all.

Reviews: Facebook, Google, MySpace, Twitter, Yahoo!, google friend connect

Tags: facebook, facebook connect, Google, myspace, social networking

Google Makes an Acquisition to Help Build Google Wave

Ben Parr — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:28:17 +0000

Google’s been on an acquisition spree recently. In the last few months alone, it’s acquired ReCaptcha (for scanning books), AdMob (for mobile advertising), On2 Technologies (for video compression) and Teracent (for targeted display ads).

Now you can add a fifth acquisition to that list. Google has just acquired AppJet, the creators of the real-time collaboration word processor EtherPad. In AppJet’s announcement, the company revealed that its product and its staff will become part of the Google Wave team.

The actual EtherPad service will stay up for another four months, until the end of March 2010. After that, it will shut down, as the team will focus on Google Wave.

We’ll have more details and thoughts on this acquisition soon.

Reviews: EtherPad, Google, Google Wave

Tags: etherpad, Google, Google Wave

Thanks to Mashable’s Socially Savvy Supporters

Tamar Weinberg — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:23:48 +0000

Thanks to this week’s advertisers and partners for enabling us to bring you the latest social media news and resources. Mashable’s sponsors are as social media savvy as our readers!

Advertise with us and get noticed.

Help us to help you. Mashable is seeking out site sponsors for our large, diverse audience — social media users, venture capitalists, early adopters, developers, bloggers, and many more. You’ll receive hundreds of thousands of views a day in addition to weekly recognition to thank you as our premium sponsors. Are you interested? Contact us for more information and to receive our media kit and rate card.

This week, our valued sponsors are PowerPay, The NY Times Reader 2.0, MOTOBLUR, Conduit, Clickatell, Influxis, EdgeCast, Microsoft BizSpark, MailChimp, Sun Startup Essentials, and Eventbrite.

PowerPay is a registered Visa/Mastercard payment processor offering the most powerful all-in-one merchant account solution in the industry. Each of our merchants and partners are given VIP service by a dedicated relationship manager at the corporate level. This means you do NOT bounce around in a phone queue when you could be spending your time building your business. This philosophy has contributed to our reputation as the leader in online payment processing. Click here to find out how you can get started today!”

Times Reader 2.0, powered by Adobe AIR, is a downloadable software application offering a digital experience of The Times that’s very much like reading the printed newspaper. Whether you’re using Windows, Mac OS or Linux, Times Reader gives you everything you’d expect from The New York Times in print, delivered to your computer in less than a minute. After you’ve synched, no Internet connection is needed, so you can take the most insightful journalism with you wherever you go.

MOTOBLUR from Motorola was built expressly for the way people communicate today. It’s the only service that automatically delivers and organizes your conversations, contacts and content from all your favorite sites and sources in easy-to-manage streams. Whether it’s Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, text messages, Gmail or work e-mail, MOTOBLUR keeps track of it all and serves it up on a customizable home screen and integrates it through the phone. Plus, with MOTOBLUR you have peace of mind, because all of your info is backed up and secure. Discover MOTOBLUR on Motorola CLIQ available at T-Mobile. It’s time to spend less time managing life and more time living it.

Clickatell offers mobile social networks the opportunity to measure their return on investment: Not only does Clickatell offer an Interactive Campaign Manager tool that allows you to monitor and intervene in your customer campaigns in real time, it also generates and manages database integration and comes with additional marketing tools. Track the delivery status of your text messages and the responses; take the guesswork out of campaigning. Your valuable messages will always be delivered as our products allow for message escalation to alternative delivery gateways. Social networks are also, through the account management package, given control over network channels and connectivity options. All necessary tasks have been automated and our central interface allows you to manage multiple connections and projects at the same time.

Which leading social networking companies have chosen Clickatell as a mobile messaging partner? Read our success stories here.

The Conduit On-Demand Marketing Platform offers web publishers of all sizes various solutions, including creating and publishing a branded community toolbar, sending your community desktop alerts, sharing and distributing content from the Conduit Marketplace, and much more. The platform is free, easy-to-use and very powerful, and is available for Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari browsers. Anything you can put on a website can also be deployed on a community toolbar and offered to your users wherever they are on the web, including: your logo, content, gadgets, feeds, social media tools, chat windows, games, services, links, and more. Every community toolbar also comes complete with a search-box powered by Google, to ensure your users have easy access to the most popular search on the web. Click here for more information on how to set up your own community toolbar, send desktop alerts, and find cool content and gadgets – for FREE!

Influxis is an official Adobe hosting partner and resource for the Adobe Flash Media Interactive Server. Influxis provides Flash hosting plans for all levels of use – beginner to enterprise. With a reputation for exceptional customer service, Influxis provides an extremely reliable international network of FMS servers in the U.S., U.K., and Germany.

EdgeCast Networks offers a superior, cost-effective, global content delivery service that gives our customers competitive advantage in the delivery of digital media. Our world-class content delivery platform provides customers the cost benefits and flexibility of controlling their own content delivery network while liberating them from ISP contracts, capital investments and operational hassles.

BizSpark is a program which offers new software businesses and entrepreneurs access to Microsoft design, development, and production tools with no upfront costs for up to three years. Members can also connect with a nationwide community of Network Partners – investors, incubators, service providers, and entrepreneurial organizations – who are keen to help.

For more information, or to connect with a Microsoft BizSpark advisor, please visit MicrosoftStartupZone.com/BizSpark.

MailChimp is a powerful, easy-to-use email marketing service. You design, me deliver.

If you’re working for a startup, Sun can help you get it off the ground fast. We created the fee-free Sun Startup Essentials program offering deep discounts on industry leading, power efficient systems and storage products, optimized open-source software, massively scalable Web hosting services, plus free visibility via Sun’s co-marketing engine. It’s time to build your business on the kind of infrastructure that can scale right along with the skyrocketing demands of success. Find out about Sun Startup Essentials today!

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Additionally, thanks to the following partners for making Mashable happen:

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Mashable would also like to thank AttentionPR for their PR support. AttentionPR proves that PR today is measurable, transparent, and yes, social. Learn more about AttentionPR.

Rackspace is the better way to do hosting. No more worrying about web hosting uptime. No more spending your time, energy and resources trying to stay on top of things like patching, updating, monitoring, backing up data and the like. Learn why.

ConcentricSky offers web development and strategic consulting services with a focus on emerging technologies such as Social Media and iPhone Apps. From simple websites to integrated web applications, we deliver innovative solutions that exceed your expectations – not your budget.

We can get your name out there.

Contact us for more information about supporting Mashable’s growth and development. Alternatively, visit our advertise section for more details about:

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Reviews: Facebook, Firefox, Gmail, Google, Internet Explorer, Mashable, MySpace, Safari, The Conduit, Twitter, adobe AIR, linux

YouTube Launches Video Targeting: Your Ad on JK Wedding Dance

Adam Ostrow — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 19:52:09 +0000

If you’ve ever wanted to place an ad on a Susan Boyle performance, the JK Wedding Dance or, more recently, the dancing doctors in pink gloves, now you can.

YouTube has just launched a new tool that gives advertisers serious control over where their ads appear — all the way down to selecting individual videos.

In addition, the video-sharing site says that the new targeting options can suggest videos based on “keywords (like politics or fashion), viewer demographics (like age and gender), interest-based categories or some combination of the three.”

YouTube says that the features are currently beta and “intended for advertisers who work closely with sales representatives at YouTube,” but I was able to check it out by simply going to google.com/videotargeting and logging in with my Google account.

This marks yet another step in Google’s efforts to monetize YouTube, of which there have been many in the past year. The new options seem like a great addition that will create more efficiency — and perhaps revenue — in the YouTube ecosystem.

Reviews: Google, YouTube

Tags: advertising, video, youtube

Mashable’s Social Media Guide for Small Businesses

Matt Silverman — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 19:03:53 +0000

Over the past year, Mashable has written extensively on the value of social media to small businesses. We have also contributed regularly on this topic to the American Express Open Forum.

From the fundamentals of Twitter branding, to the importance of blogging, to getting work done with some great online tools, small businesses face many challenges when trying to understand how to use social media. However, taking the time to learn how to leverage social media and technology to benefit your business will pay big dividends in the long run.

Whether you’re just signing up, or primed for some advanced social marketing, the posts below have all the tips, tricks, and wisdom you’ll need to take your brand to the next level.

Social Media 101

Start here for the basics on how and why your business should be implementing a social media campaign.

These posts have real-world advice and examples of how businesses have succeeded on social networks. From Facebook to Twitter to LinkedIn and beyond, here are the resources you’ll need to get started.

- Social Media 101: How to Avoid Alienating Your Customers

- Why Should Traditional Businesses Care about Social Media?

- 10 of the Best Social Media Tools for Entrepreneurs

- Putting Social Media in Real Life Context for SMBs

- Why Your Business Needs to Be on Facebook

- Making Social Media a Tool, Not a Distraction

- How to Use Twitter Hashtags for Business

- 5 Mistakes to Never Make on Twitter

- How SMBs Can Capitalize on the Twitter Woes of the Fortune 100

- 5 Small Businesses Successfully Using Social Media

- How to Build Your Company’s Profile on LinkedIn

- 3 Great Social Media Policies to Steal From

- 5 Secrets From Social Media Insiders

- Social Media: What’s Next

Blogging

Blogging is an essential way for businesses to keep their customers informed and interested in new products. When connected to social networks, business blogs can have a powerful reach.

There are a host of great online tools and tricks you can use to get your business blog up and running for maximum buzz. These posts cover all the best practices and how to avoid the most common mistakes.

- How to Set Up Your Small Business Blog

- 5 Winning Post Ideas for Your Small Business

- 6 Tips for Customizing Your Small Business Blog

- 5 Rules for Better Web Writing

- 5 Blogging Executives and What They Can Teach Us

- How to Get Free Press by Becoming a Source

- Sage Social Media and Blogging Advice for SMBs From the Experts

- The Small Business Guide to Wikis

- Top 5 Business Blogging Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Video

Online video is booming, and it offers great opportunities for customers to discuss and share your brand. A video that “goes viral” can put your product into the feeds and inboxes of thousands of potential customers and make your brand known to a much wider base.

Paid advertising on social video sites like YouTube can also be extremely lucrative. Check out these posts for tips on how to get the most from a video marketing campaign.

- How to Use Online Video to Establish Credibility

- 5 Important Web Video Lessons for Small Business Owners

- Live Video and Business: Some Best Practices

- YouTube: An Unlikely Small Biz Marketing Platform

- 4 Tips for Marketing Your Business on YouTube

- Video Advertising: Not Just for Big Business

Mobile

Mobile devices keep you and your employees connected to your business. The proliferation of smartphones also means that your customers will be interacting with your brand in new ways.

It’s important to keep in touch with mobile business trends. Which devices and platforms will your customers be using to search for and connect with you? These posts have the lowdown on mobile web, productivity on the go, and tips for choosing the right devices for your business.

- Optimizing Your Business Website for Mobile Visitors

- Mobile Productivity Tools for the Small Business

- iPhone App Economics 101

- Beyond Yelp: Location-Based Opportunities for Vendors

- How to Choose a Smartphone For Your Small Business

- Which is Better for Business: BlackBerry or iPhone

Productivity

No matter the type of business, improving productivity is always at the top of the to-do list. Social media and Web collaboration tools can really speed up your workflow.

However, there are many choices and many pitfalls. Choosing the right applications and keeping your employees connected is key.

These posts will show you how to get things done quicker and smarter on the Web.

- 3 Fresh Ideas for Working Smarter

- Collaborate Online: 3 Toolsets That Get Stuff Done

- 3 Steps for Staying Focused and On Task

- Content Management Systems for Small Businesses: An Overview

- How to Stay Organized With Google Calendar

- What Microsoft Office’s Move to the Web Means for You

- Intranet and Collaboration Solutions for Small Businesses

- Six Web Tools for Better Time Management

- Supercharge Your Customer Communications and Save Money With Web-Based VoIP

- Never Miss an Important Phone Call Again with Google Voice

- 6 Adobe AIR Apps for Small Business

- Google Wave: What Small Businesses Should Know

- Tools for Collaboratively Building Presentations

PR and Marketing

Perhaps the biggest draw of social media for small businesses is the ability to create far-reaching and relatively inexpensive marketing campaigns. But there’s a lot more to it than simply tweeting updates from the water cooler, or linking to your newest blog post.

Ensure maximum return on social media investment by engaging your customers across multiple platforms. These posts will show you how.

- 10 Small Business Social Media Marketing Tips

- 5 Advanced Social Media Marketing Strategies for Small Businesses

- 5 Tips for Managing Social Media Marketing Expectations

- How to Be Your Own PR Person

- Email Marketing Lives: 3 Services for Sending a Great Newsletter

- 9 Surefire Ways to Get Blogs to Cover Your Business

- Real-Time and Hyperlocal: Advertising Trends Every Business Should Know About

- Tweetable Eats: What Street Vendors Can Teach Businesses About Twitter

- Why You Should Talk About Everything But Your Business Online

- Going Global: How to Sell a Worldwide Audience Online

- Before You Go Online: Talk to Your Customers Offline

- 6 Tips on Rebranding Using Social Media

- What is a Community Manager and Should I Hire One?

- 3 Qualities to Look for When Hiring a Community Manager

Numbers and Stats

Enough theory and hypotheticals – get to the data already!

If you’re looking for some cold, hard stats to explain what’s going on with the business of social media, read on.

From venture capital to tracking your social investments, here are some important posts on how businesses are cashing in on social media, and how social networks are changing the online marketplace.

- By the Numbers: Social Media and Small Business

- Social Media’s Impact on SEO

- Venture Capital Today: Key Numbers to Remember

- Using Social Media to Research Venture Capital

- Is Peer-to-Peer Lending Better Than the Bank?

- How to Track Your Twitter ROI

Strategy and Management

So you’ve got your social media plan in place and you’re starting to see some benefits for your business. Great! Now, how do you keep up and keep track? There are many tools that can help you streamline your social media efforts to ensure you’re always moving in the right direction.

Here are some advanced strategies on how to manage your social media presence, hire Web-savvy employees, and stay on top of this fast-moving field.

- 5 Things Small Businesses Can Learn From Big Business Social Media Campaigns

- How to Choose a News Reader for Keeping Tabs on Your Industry

- The “Iterate Fast and Release Often” Philosophy of Entrepreneurship

- Cutting Through the Resume Pile: Recruiting Tools for Small Businesses

- How to Use Social Media to Find Star Employees

- Online Hiring: LinkedIn and Beyond

- How to Research Potential Hires Online

- How to Train New Employees in Social Media

- How to Manage Customer Feedback

- Clickstreams: What They Are and Why You Should Track Them

- 5 Payment Platforms to Consider for Your Business

- How to Manage Telecommuting Employees

- 5 Ways to Use Social Media for Customer Service

Your Small Business Ideas

We hope you’ve found some strategies you can incorporate into your small business plan. What other tools and tricks do you use to maximize the reach of your social media presence? Share some ideas in the comments below.

Images courtesy of iStockphoto, iqoncept, Yuri_Arcurs, Franck-Boston, Lefthome, Pertusinas, jgroup, Talaj, studiovision

Reviews: LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube, iStockphoto

Tags: business, Guide, List, Lists, small business, social media, trending

Awesome Visualization of Social Media Usage Around the Globe [Infographic]

Adam Ostrow — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 18:33:02 +0000

Want to know how many people are microblogging in Australia? Or uploading photos online in Brazil? Or writing blogs in the Netherlands? There’s a map for that — literally.

TrendStream, who publishes the Global Web Index, has created a fantastic visualization that shows the penetration of different social technologies in major markets around the globe. The research is based on interviews with 32,000 Internet users in 16 countries.

A few of the findings they report:

“The massive impact of China: The vast Internet population coupled with hugely socially active set of web users, makes for a massive volume of content creators. However due to the inward looking nature of Chinas internet economy combined with the language mean that this volume of content does not impact the broader Internet

Low engagement in Japan: We also associate Japan with technology innovation, and actual while you might not think it, the low engagement is indicative of progress. Why? Our map shows PC activity and we know from this research that a huge number of Japanese users are bypassing PC altogether and using mobile devices to access social platforms and create and share content. Just over 34% of social network users only accessed through mobile in the month of the research, this is compared to 3% in the UK, a staggering indication of where the future is heading.

The low level of microblog engagement: Despite the Twitter hype, microblogging is still not a mass social activity and nowhere near the size and scale of blogging.”

Here’s the full map for your viewing pleasure (you’ll want to blow it up to full screen):

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: social media

WARNING: New Facebook Chat Phishing Scam in Progress

Barb Dybwad — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 18:06:18 +0000

Be on the lookout for a current spate of phishing tactics spreading on Facebook via the chat feature.

The attack employs similar methods to those used by past scams, using hijacked user accounts to send chat messages with a generic message and a link to a familiar-looking Facebook phishing page. Of course, if you actually click the link and enter your details on the fake Facebook login page, the hackers steal your e-mail and password and direct you on to the real Facebook.

Once your account has been compromised, hackers use it to perpetuate the scam by spamming your friends in chat. Automated bots handle the heavy lifting of pestering your contacts. At least one of the messages comes in the format “ROFL this you?!” with a phishing link, but this particular vulnerability may take other forms, so be sure to use caution when receiving any remotely suspicious chat messages from your Facebook contacts.

Facebook typically aggressively pursues phishing scams like this one, so hopefully it won’t be plaguing users for too much longer. Until then, please use caution when using chat. Have you spotted any variants of this scam?

Reviews: Facebook

Tags: facebook, facebook chat, facebook phishing, hackers, phishing, scams

Google Finance Now Streams News in Real-Time

Christina Warren — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 17:54:09 +0000

In June of 2008, Google Finance introduced real-time streaming quotes, making the site much more useful for Wall Street watchers. However, stock quotes aren’t the only kind of information that is beneficial when offered in real-time; financial news and updates are more useful when users can reach them without delay.

Today, Google announced that it’s bringing streaming financial and market news to Google Finance. News will be streamed from 8 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. ET, offering a 90-minute buffer around U.S. trading hours. Streaming quotes and streaming news will make it easier for those who want to keep an eye on what’s going on — and you don’t have to constantly refresh.

News will be streamed both from the main Google Finance page and in the dedicated news area. Google has also been beta testing a Google Finance site that is more accessible in real-time overall. Recent quotes are streamed live as you navigate through the Google Finance site; company stock information now appears in real-time if the market is open and related companies’ tables are computed on-the-fly in real-time.

By offering real-time quotes and now news, Google has the potential to take a chunk out of existing companies like Bloomberg and CNBC who specialize in offering market information.

Reviews: Google, news

Tags: finance, Google, google finance, realtime

5 Best YouTube Sports Moments of 2009

Jalen Rose — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 17:09:26 +0000

This post is part of Mashable’s Fab Five series with Jalen Rose, which highlights trends in the social media space. Jalen Rose is a former 13-year NBA star and current ESPN basketball analyst but may be best known for being a member of the famous University of Michigan Fab Five.

With 2009 coming to an end, I thought I would take a look at some of the year’s best sports moments in social media. This week, I’m talking about YouTube videos. Each of the following sports moments was captured on video and uploaded to YouTube for all of the world to see. As a result, millions of people have watched these videos this year. So, without further ado, here are my fab five YouTube sports videos of 2009.

1. Trick Shot Mastery

The only thing missing is the whistling from the Harlem Globetrotters’ theme song! This took a tremendous amount of practice, no doubt. Amazing shot after amazing shot with style, flair, and oustanding range! Shaq actually challenged this young fellow to a game of H-O-R-S-E after seeing this video.

2. Vijay Singh Hole in One

I’m no golfer but I wouldn’t suggest trying to emulate this shot. I don’t think golf balls are made to skip off water. Either way, Singh managed to pull off one of the craziest sports moments of the year, and perhaps one of the craziest golf shots of all time.

3. Hardest Hitting 6 Year Old

This youngster puts the “pop” in Pop Warner football! He blows up plays like he was shot out of a cannon. Watch out for this future all-pro in the making — he’s NFL bound!

4. Women’s Soccer: New Mexico’s Elizabeth Lambert

I certainly don’t support the kind of behavior exhibited by the young lady in this video. However, the footage of New Mexico’s Elizabeth Lambert punching, tripping, and pulling the hair of her opponents is a video that has swept across YouTube (and mainstream media) in the last month. Whether I support her actions or not, I have to admit that this video was one of the most memorable sports moments of 2009.

5. Usain Bolt Sets World Record

Usain Bolt is a machine. This was one of the most spectacular moments in all of sports this year, and maybe ever. Racing against a group of world-class sprinters, Bolt dominated his “competition” and set a new world record in the process.

Honorable mentions: Lebron’s Playoff Buzzer Beater, World’s Longest Basketball Shot, Manu vs. Bat, Crazy Georgia U. Fan

It was hard to narrow down my list to just five, and I know I missed some great sports moments from this past year. Which video that I did not include most deserves to be there? Add your picks in the comments.

More sports resources from Mashable:

- 5 Athletes Who Would Have Been Social Media Mavens
- 5 Social Media Athletes to be Thankful For
- How the NBA is Using Social Media
- Sports and Social Media: Where Opportunity and Fear Collide
- Football Tweets: 20 Must-Follow NFL Players on Twitter

Reviews: YouTube

Tags: fab five, jalen rose, List, Lists, social media, sports, videos, youtube

Comply With the FTC’s New Blogger Disclosure Rules With Amusing Icons

Adam Ostrow — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:54:58 +0000

Earlier this week, the FTC’s new blogger disclosure rules went into effect, meaning that whenever one of us receives anything that could potentially be looked upon as a conflict of interest, it needs to be disclosed in our writing.

While I personally have a slightly different take on this than many of my peers, best practices for disclosing these relationships are still to-be-determined (at Mashable, we typically do it with text in the article). To try and solve that problem, illustrator Jeannine Schafer has designed an amusing icon set that can be used when looking to appease the FTC guidelines.

The full set can be found over on Louis Gray’s blog, but we’ve included a few of our favorites here:

Reviews: Mashable

Tags: blogging, FTC

The Power Outlet of the Future Includes USB Ports

Jennifer Van Grove — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:43:25 +0000

We technology lovers are often faced with power outlet conundrums that kill our productivity, if not break our geeky hearts.

Rejoice, oh gadget junkies, for the power outlet of the future has come, hailing from True Power. It costs just under 10 bucks, and starts shipping in early 2010 (which is just a few short weeks away) — but you can pre-order now. So what makes this outlet so much greater than all the rest? Simple: two USB ports.

Now you can plug in USB-powered devices — think iPhones, iPods, PDAs and digital cameras — alongside your standard UCS powered devices. As Gizmodo puts it, the USB power outlet is a “no-brainer.”

Tags: power outlet, usb

Analyst: App Store Could Hit 300,000 Apps Next Year

Christina Warren — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:04:20 +0000

As we approach the end of 2009, industry analysts and pundits are all racing to share their thoughts and predictions for what’s going to be big news in 2010 (don’t worry, Mashable will be making our predictions in the coming weeks). Yesterday, IDC announced their Top 10 Predictions for 2010.

We’ll spare you the boring industry stuff and cut to the area that most caught our eye: mobile. IDC makes some bold hypotheses about mobile, but it’s their prediction that Apple’s app store will surpass 300,000 apps in 2010 that we find really interesting.

Big Predictions for the App Store, but Big Enough?

IDC predicts that by the end of 2010, at least 300,000 iPhone apps will be in the app store. They also expect that many of these apps will be from Global 2000 businesses and brands. That absolutely follows the trends we are already seeing. iPhone apps — and really mobile apps in general — can be used not just as an extension of an existing brand, but also as a way to promote new products and sub-brands.

I don’t think anyone is expecting the more than 900 percent year-over-year growth that the store saw in 2009, but is a 200 percent increase enough?

Developer irritation aside (and I’m not trying to downplay the potential significance of that — just putting things in perspective), the iPhone continues to be the go-to platform for mobile games, branded applications and tie-ins with Web sites, desktop apps and other services.

We think 300,000 apps by year’s end is a little soft. The gaming market alone has huge potential, especially as the iPod touch (and the iPhone) can rival mobile game platforms like the Nintendo DS and the PSPGo.

Android Will Continue to Accelerate

Interestingly, IDC predicts that Android’s rate of app development will be several times that of Apple’s — with 50,000-75,000 apps available by the end of 2010.

That seems like a pretty fair assessment from our perspective, although we think it’s important to illustrate the biggest caveat with Android: Yes, you can run it on many devices and many types of devices, but there are different considerations that need to be taken into account for certain types of hardware, Android OS versions and screen resolution. And that’s before the issue of whether or not wireless carriers fully embrace the Android market is even raised.

Android has a ton of a momentum and a ton of potential, but the effects a fragmented device base can have on the market shouldn’t be overlooked.

What Do You Think

Do you think IDC has the right idea with their predictions? Do you see mobile growing even faster in 2010? Let us know.

Reviews: Android

Tags: android, app store, idc, iphone

Gboard: A Keyboard Just for Gmail Users

Christina Warren — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:09:24 +0000

Looking for the perfect, unique gift for the Gmail addict this holiday season? Look no further than the Gboard, a keyboard just for Gmail users. Rather than commit all of those keyboard shortcuts to muscle memory, you can execute the same tasks with action-specific keys. At $19.99, it’s an interesting stocking-stuffer.

We’re not going to lie. When we were first heard about the Gboard, we were a little skeptical. Visions of the OOMouse insanity flashed in our heads and we wanted to hide. However, the nice guys at Gboard sent us a unit to review, and, we have to say, we’re impressed.

Setting it Up

Using the Gboard is extremely easy. Just plug it into the USB port on your computer (it works with both Windows and Mac, although we can’t imagine that Linux would have any problem either — we didn’t test it out) and then enable keyboard shortcuts in Gmail or Google Apps if you haven’t done so already.

To enable keyboard shortcuts, just click on the Settings button, and, in the general tab, select the radio button to turn keyboard shortcuts on.

That’s it, now all the buttons work exactly as they appear on the pad.

Tip for Mac Users: Mac OS X won’t recognize the Gboard when you plug it in, but it will see that a keyboard device has been conncected. Select the ANSI keyboard type and you’ll be good to go. Your regular keyboard will continue to work without interruption.

Using the Gboard

The Gboard has 19 buttons and each corresponds with a task in Gmail. From the board, you can search, go to results, go to starred mail, compose a message, reply, reply to all, forward a message, star and archive messages, delete and mark messages as spam, flip through your messages (and within message threads themselves), select messages and go right to the inbox.

In my tests, I found that the Gboard acted exactly as if I was using the regular shortcuts. Although there are some things you can do with Gmail shortcuts that you can’t do on the Gboard (like label messages or move messages to a different label), the most frequently used functions are all there and the layout is actually pretty ergonomic.

Moreover, the placement of the keys doesn’t seem to be totally random, and moving forward and backwards through messages was actually much nicer on the Gboard than pressing “k” and “j” repeatedly on my keyboard.

Why Not Just Use Keyboard Shortcuts?

Lots of people are going to question the Gboard’s mere existence. After all, can’t you just use the keys on your laptop or keyboard and get the exact same results?

Yes, you can absolutely get the same results from a regular keyboard (and, as I stated, there are a few things you can do with the keyboard that you can’t do with the Gboard). That doesn’t mean that the Gboard is without merit or that it doesn’t have its own benefits.

Lots of Gmail users — even heavy Gmail users — don’t use keyboard shortcuts, either because they don’t know they exist or because they can’t ever remember what keys do what. I’m one of those users who lives and dies by my keyboard shortcuts. However, because I typically use Mail.app for my mail needs, my muscle-memory shortcuts are all off whenever I try to use Gmail. In the past, I’ve gone through the motions of customizing my Gmail shortcuts so that they match what I use in Mail.app, but because I have about four or five different Google Apps accounts that handle my mail (and each account is different), having to set those for each and every mailbox has been something I’ve never really had the patience to do.

The nice thing about having a separate pad just for Gmail is you don’t have to memorize each keyboard shortcut (just look at the button, or if you are a touch typist like me, a few hours of use is probably all it will take to get the location of the buttons mapped to your fingertips).

For users who aren’t familiar with the concept of shortcuts and just how much time can be saved by not using your mouse to click on everything, the Gboard is a nice introduction.

Overall

Overall we’re impressed with the Gboard. It does what it says it will do, the keys are laid out in a way that makes sense, and, for heavy Gmail users, shortcuts can save a tremendous amount time throughout the day.

Reviews: Gmail, linux

Tags: gboard, gmail, keyboard shortcuts, keyboards, trending

Google Enters the Word Game With Its Own Dictionary

Stan Schroeder — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 14:38:48 +0000

Google already permeates nearly all spheres of our online lives, so the fact that it’s launched its own dictionary doesn’t surprise us much. After all, Google has offered word definition via the define:word search query for quite some time now, so the dictionary, quietly rolled out at google.com/dictionary, is simply an extension of this service.

The dictionary, like most Google services, is very simple, and ties into the search engine’s translation service, as it includes word definitions for 28 languages, including English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Chinese, Portuguese, Arabic, Croatian and others. Type in a word, and you’ll get the definition(s), related phrases, as well as aggregated definitions from other Web services such as Wikipedia.

Other similar services such as Dictionary.com or Answers.com surpass Google’s dictionary when it comes to features, offering a thesaurus, synonyms, and definitions from specialized sources such as medical and scientific dictionaries. But Google’s foray into this arena is still bad news for the other services: Google’s aggregation feature makes its service a good starting point, even if it’s not the best dictionary out there.

Reviews: Google, Wikipedia

Tags: Dictionary, Google