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Facebook and Twitter add new geographic location tool

Catherine — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:13:42 +0000

Within a month, Facebook users will be able to share with their friends precisely where in the world they happen to be whenever they post status updates to their profile. According to The New York Times, Facebook will unveil this addition in April, at a technology conference, while Twitter is prepared to introduce a similar feature on its micro-blogging site within a matter of days. Both social networking websites have realized that a growing number of users are logging on using mobile devices, particularly iPhones. In fact one quarter of Facebook’s 400 million users now use Blackberries and IPhones to update their status or post comments, and this number appears to be rising each month. Once the new service is introduced in April, users may choose whether or not to have their location information automatically added to each status update.

Twitter, however, seems to be ahead of the game at the moment. According to a report in PC World Magazine, Twitter actually tested its geo-feature earlier this week. Several users noticed the new feature on the micro-blogging site, before it quickly vanished. Most observers predict that Twitter will launch its own geo-feature as early as this Friday, during a web developers’ conference.

Twitter’s geo-locator system reportedly adds maps to all tweets and will provide precise place names within cities. Despite the excitement surrounding these developments, some still have questions as to how Twitter and Facebook will handle and share this sensitive personal information, particularly as privacy remains a key concern for many.

IBM program tries to solve blog fatigue

Oscar Fields — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:06:40 +0000

Blog fatigue is really just another way to describe “writer’s block,” a phenomenon which can wreck havoc in the lives of freelance writers, journalists and novelists alike. According to a recent study produced by IBM, blog fatigue is one of the main reasons why the majority of bloggers—both corporate and personal—give up on their blogging and let their website flounder. In fact, 80 percent of those who launch a corporate blog only end up posting five or fewer posts, before giving up on the project. Yet the world’s largest corporations, the most famous politicians and celebrities all realize what a crucial role blogging can play in reaching and expanding their target audience, so giving up on a blog due to writer’s blog can have very significant ramifications. One solution is to turn to content creation firms, where a large team of skilled freelance writers can produce regular blog posts on just about any topic under the sun. But the most effective option, might be to use this service in conjunction with a new widget introduced by IBM, which predicts the topics that a given blogger’s audience would most like to read.

IBM’s program, entitled Blog Muse, offers two widgets, similar to those already used on platforms such as Wordpress. By using one widget, readers can indicate what topics they would most like their favourite bloggers to write about. By using the second widget, however, they can even vote on topics recommended by other readers. Blog Muse then sends the most popular recommendations to the bloggers that are most likely to write on a given topic. Once blog posts have been published based on these user recommendations, the program will send a notification to anyone who voted for, or recommended the given subject. As such, bloggers are assured regular feedback on what readers are most interested in and more traffic is directed to their site.

Casey Dugan, representing IBM Research, noted that while Blog Muse is still in its early stages, the results seem positive. The 1,000 blogs that have tested this new widget saw the number of comments generated nearly double. While Blog Muse is not yet available commercially, IBM plans to introduce this to a wider audience of bloggers in the near future.

Twitter plays key role in White House communication

Kate — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 13:26:01 +0000

Robert Gibbs, the White House’s press secretary and his deputy, Bill Burton, have both signed up for separate Twitter accounts and together they aim to use the world’s first micro-blogging site as a way to give President Barack Obama’s policies and message a more informal feel, as well as offer a glimpse into life inside the Oval Office. But Gibbs admitted that the learning curve has been steep, since writing 140 character tweets in a compelling manner can be a challenge for someone schooled in the art of formal press releases and lengthy journalistic analysis. Gibbs admitted that at first the “whole language of numbers and symbols” evaded him, and he added that he might be well advised to turn to his son, in order to get a better grasp of this increasingly powerful form of communication.
But the initial difficulties aside, Gibbs and Burton have already developed a very effective modus operandi when using Twitter to spread Obama’s policies to the most technologically savvy generations. For example, Burton will regularly start tweeting while Gibbs is still hosting a press conference at the White House and is in the process of elaborating on Obama’s policies. Burton’s role is to offer extra nuggets of information that clarify some of Gibbs’ points and potentially pre-empt questions that journalists might have.
Macon Phillips, the White House director of social networking and new media, added that Twitter offers administration officials the opportunity to hear the questions of “ordinary” citizens in raw form, rather than just the input of the politically savvy media elites of Washington, DC. Gibbs has managed to attract over 35,000 followers since his Twitter debut late last year.

Facebook games appeal to unlikely audience

john — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:22:40 +0000

When Facebook first launched its various game applications—such as the popular FarmVille—the assumption was that it would appeal mainly to men. The image of men enthusiastically playing video games in their home’s basement is one that is deeply ingrained in society. But somewhat unexpectedly, Facebook’s games appeal just as much to an unlikely crowd, namely women over 40 years of age. A major survey conducted by PopCap Games shows that middle-aged women are more likely to be playing Facebook games than men, or any other age cohort. In fact, 40-plus women even beat out teenagers when it came to the amount of time they spent on FarmVille.
The survey’s data was collected in the United Kingdom and the United States and it found that a clear majority of social gamers (55%) are women. Even more curiously, the average age of these Facebook enthusiasts is 43. Not only are middle-aged women more likely to start playing games offered through the world’s largest social networking site, but they also tend to spend much more time logging on to this application then men. While 39% of women played this game more than once each day, only 29% of men admitted to sitting down in front of monitor on more than one occasion to try their luck on FarmVille.
Facebook’s FarmVille now boasts 82 million players and 60% of these enthusiasts are actually women. Even Mafia Wars—another popular Facebook game—appears to be most popular among women. Perhaps what these surprising statistics show is that ever more gender stereotypes are being broken down in the world of social networking

Twitter passes milestone with 10 billion tweets

admin — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 13:23:39 +0000

The number of tweets posted on Twitter hit the 10 billion mark this week, highlighting the very rapid growth of the micro-blogging service which was launched less than four years ago. The only disappointment perhaps for Twitter enthusiasts is that the San Francisco-based company was not able to reveal precisely which of its users sent the 10 billionth tweet, due to privacy regulations and the fact that the tweet was posted on a so-called “protected” profile. This simply means that the individual user’s tweets were only visible to a small handful of followers, rather than the broader public. The number of tweets generated is likely to increase even further with Gigatweet—a website dedicated to tracking Twitter-related statistics—estimating that the micro-blogging service may pass the 20 billion mark as early as July.
If the number of headlines that news of the 10 billionth tweet generated serves as any indication—including in major publications like The Telegraph—this prediction might be accurate. But it need not serve as a surprise that major British papers are paying such close attention to Twitter’s fortunes, considering that London residents send more tweets than users in any other city in the world. Twitter use is also spreading among major companies. For example, a total of 57 FTSE 100 firms already use Twitter in order to stay in touch with their clients.
According to Twitter’s own statistics, users now send nearly 50 million tweets each day, with an average of 600 posts per second worldwide. While all of this is encouraging news for Twitter, the micro-blogging site still has some work to do in order to overcome its two larger rivals, namely Facebook and YouTube.

Top secret Israeli information added to Facebook

Christina — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 14:50:44 +0000

A soldier caused havoc within the Israeli military earlier this week, when he decided to post classified army information to his Facebook profile on planned operations in a Palestinian settlement. Apparently not realizing the consequences of his actions, the solider in question posted a status update in which he mentioned that on Wednesday his unit would “clean up” the town of Qatanah, before returning home on Thursday. The soldier’s Facebook friends quickly realized that this seemingly innocuous status update constituted a breach of confidentiality. Rather than adding a comment to his profile, or sending him a Facebook message, they reported him directly to the military.

The unnamed soldier was almost immediately court marshalled and he will now have to spend the next 10 days in prison for having released classified military information on Facebook. The military also had no choice but to cancel the planned raid in Qatanah, after these plans had been published on the world’s most popular social networking site.

Israel is now taking much more drastic steps to warn its soldiers about the dangers of posting confidential military information on Facebook. For example, posters have appeared at most Israeli military bases depicting mock Facebook profile pages for some of Israel’s most avowed enemies, including Iran’s President Mahmud Ahmadinejad and top Hezbollah leaders. At the bottom of the Facebook poster is a rhetorical question: “You think that everyone is your friend?” Israel’s military also issued a statement, in which it warned that foreign spies and intelligence organization regularly scanned social networking sites, in order to gather confidential information.

New York bloggers to be treated like journalists

rob — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 14:05:22 +0000

Major changes are coming to the way New York City officials treat traditional journalists and bloggers, and this move is certain to lend more credibility than ever before to the Blogosphere. Until now, only journalists working for accredited news organizations enjoyed most media privileges in New York, such as the right to cross police barriers when reporting on stories and being issued press passes. But starting later this year, New York officials will begin offering press passes to any journalist based exclusively on his/her personal achievements, rather than affiliations with major print, television or online news organizations. What this means in practice, is that bloggers will be eligible for press passes and will be permitted to cross police barriers after they have reported on at least six events sponsored by New York City and published these online or in print.

Bloggers who attend the city’s press conferences, local parades or who report on emergencies that do not require the crossing of police lines will be eligible to apply for a two-year press pass. Additionally, bloggers and journalists with less experience reporting on events may be eligible for special, single-use press passes.

New York’s change of heart concerning bloggers has a lot do with the work of civil rights lawyer Norman Siegel. The prominent attorney led a lawsuit against NYC for not determining whether a journalist deserved a press pass based on his/her accomplishments, but rather on the company that he/she works for. Siegel argued that it was now high time for bloggers to receive the same treatment that newspaper or television journalists have long enjoyed.

Facebook and Twitter make people turn to internet for news content

Ryan — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 13:20:12 +0000

As a sign of the dramatically changing times, more people are now turning directly to the internet for news, rather than to printed newspapers or magazines, and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are playing a major role in driving traffic to websites with news content. According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project survey, fully 61 percent of Americans indicated that they get some of their news online. The majority of Americans who do turn to the internet for news now also use social networking sites to help sift through the wealth of content available online. The survey found that 75 percent of Americans access news content through Facebook posts, Twitter links, or by e-mail. Additionally, more than a third of all internet users (37 percent) share newsworthy content using these same social networking sites, or by e-mailing links.

The Pew survey also found that the internet and social networking sites have dramatically altered the way in which we read the news. Rather than being loyal to a single source and dedicating a “discrete” moment of the day to reading about current events—such as over a morning coffee—we now access news throughout the day, particularly with the growing popularity of mobile devices, such as Blackberries and iPhones. We are also more proactive when it comes to passing news stories on to others. The vast majority of respondents (65%) indicated that rather than having a single favourite online news source, they pick and choose their content from several sites.

Soldiers to tweet from the front

Catherine — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:32:21 +0000

American soldiers are now able to literally tweet messages to loved ones and supporters from the battlefields, thanks to new rules introduced by the Pentagon. US officials have lifted a longstanding ban, which prohibited active soldiers from sending messages home about their life on the frontlines and opened the door for Web 2.0 technology to make its way into the world’s most dangerous war zones. The Pentagon had been very concerned up until now that allowing soldiers to use Twitter, Facebook or Youtube and to permit them to blog about their experiences in battle would result in dangerous leaks and may expose military secrets. There were also worries that thousands of soldiers using Web 2.0 technology on the military’s overseas computers would eat away at the army’s bandwidth. But after a seven-month long review of the Pentagon’s policy, soldiers will be able to share more personal information on their experiences in war zones than ever before, adding thousands of new voices to the world’s most popular social networking sites.

But there will be limitations on access to social networking sites and other online content. For example, commanders will have the authority to temporarily block access to Web 2.0 technology, if they feel that this may use up too much bandwidth, or if military secrets may be at risk. Some of the biggest changes are likely to affect the Marines, where strict directives issued last August completely banned all access to Twitter. The Pentagon’s new directives, however, will require the Marines to dismantle these restrictions in short order.

One of the most important reasons for allowing soldiers access to social networking sites such as Facebook, is the comfort this form of contact can give military families back home. Their loved ones will be able to show that they are doing well—even in the most dangerous situations—by posting a simple status update, adding a photo or commenting on the profiles of friends and family members.

Facebook status updates to appear in Google search results

Ryan — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 15:02:19 +0000

Major changes are coming to the way Facebook users find information about their favourite organizations, companies and celebrities on the world’s most popular social networking site. Google has decided to add status updates posted by millions of celebrities and organizations active on Facebook to its main search engine. While the updates posted by individual Facebook users will continue to remain private, Google has indicated that its crawlers would make all other material on the social networking site fully searchable. This means that companies that have developed Facebook profile pages will be even easier to locate and will gain much greater visibility, as any links, blogs, status updates or other information posted on these pages will appear in Google’s new real-time search feature.

Now that statistics show Facebook to be the world’s second most popular website in terms of daily visits, a growing number of companies realize that one of the best ways to reach out to their clients and keep them informed of new products and services is by setting up a Facebook page and gathering “fans.” The fact that Google will make all of these pages searchable through its main engine will likely serve as an incentive for even more small and medium-sized businesses to enter the world of Web 2.0 technology and joins industry giants.

But Google is hardly the only search engine to realize the importance of working with social networking sites, in order to add relevant and updated content to search results. Yahoo, for example, signed a deal with Twitter and will begin crawling the nearly 600 tweets that are posted each second by the micro-blogging site’s users.