Mashable: Latest 29 News Updates - including “Take a Virtual Walk Through Hong Kong With Google Street View” |  |
- Take a Virtual Walk Through Hong Kong With Google Street View
- Opera Mini 5 Beta Comes to Android
- Revamped Foursquare for iPhone Hits the App Store
- Share Your Latest Purchases With Scordit
- The Truth About the Average Twitter User [STATS]
- 15 Famous Tech Titans Hit Forbes’ Billionaire List
- Twitter’s Website Now Attaches Location to Tweets [PICS]
- Sony Answers Wii Remote With PlayStation Move
- Google Reader Play Transforms Feeds into Entertainment Experience
- Brizzly Launches a Guide to Twitter Trends and iPhone App
- Google Apps Marketplace: 6 Great Apps to Try Now
- Rock Out with PixieTea and Her Amazing iPhone Band [VIDEO]
- Google Fiber Sparks Online Competition Between Cities Nationwide
- SXSW 2010: The Complete Social Media Guide
- Google and Facebook Sued for Mobile Patent Infringement
- Mashable’s Weekly Guide to Social Media Jobs
- YouTube Wants You to Grill the FCC’s Chairman
- MySpace Courts Gamers and Developers with New Platform
- FarmVille Adds Facebook Credits Payment Option
- Video Games On-Demand from OnLive Arrive in June
- Lady Gaga and Rock Band Caught in a Bad Romance
- CNN Sees Facebook As Major Competitor
- The Internet Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize
- Daytrotter Launches New Paid Downloads Option for Bands [EXCLUSIVE]
- 5 Free Android Apps for Web Developers
- Corey Haim Dies: Fans Pay Tribute on Social Media Sites
- YouTube Deploys Ads on Mobile Site
- Get Satisfaction Brings Customer Support to Facebook Pages
- Google Maps Now Includes Intelligent Bike Routes
- YouTube Darlings OK Go Say Bye-Bye to EMI
| Take a Virtual Walk Through Hong Kong With Google Street View Posted: 11 Mar 2010 03:17 AM PST  
The huge city has been covered extremely well; just zoom out of Street View, pull the little yellow Street View figure on the upper left side of the screen and you’ll see that most of the streets are blue, which means Street View is available there. In addition to Hong Kong, Google Street View is now also available in the city of Macau, south of Guangdong province.
Tags: Hong Kong, street view
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| Opera Mini 5 Beta Comes to Android Posted: 11 Mar 2010 12:40 AM PST 
This version is nearly identical to the Opera Mini 5 Beta for other handsets; biggest improvements are speed dial, tabbed browsing, password management and better optimization for touchscreen phones. Compared to the old Opera Mini 4.2, it’s a world of difference, so if you’re an Opera Mini user, you should definitely try out, even though it’s a beta. To get Opera Mini 5 Beta, point your mobile browser to m.opera.com/next, you can also search for “Opera Mini” in the Android Market. Tags: Mobile 2.0, opera mini, web browsers
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| Revamped Foursquare for iPhone Hits the App Store Posted: 10 Mar 2010 09:42 PM PST 
That hiccup resulted in the app briefly disappearing from the App Store before finally returning early yesterday. Now the newly designed version of the app is in the App Store and available for everyone to check out.  This is a nice improvement from the old release and a fitting first-birthday gift of sorts as the app is arriving just before SXSW 2010 — where the app made its first big splash last year — begins. What do you think of the new Foursquare app? Let us know! Reviews: Foursquare Tags: foursquare, foursquare iphone, iphone apps
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| Share Your Latest Purchases With Scordit Posted: 10 Mar 2010 09:09 PM PST 
Quick Pitch: A social site where you share the stuff you’ve bought or want to get, and win prizes by doing it! Genius Idea: It’s nice to share your new purchases or “scores” with friends or to let people know what stuff you really want to score in the future. Likewise, it’s fun to see what your friends are scoring or adding to their wishlists. Scordit handles both tasks, plus integrates with Facebook and Twitter, making sharing and wishlisting easy. Scordit also issues users points for doing certain tasks — like adding scores or wishes to your profile, inviting a friend to the service, or discussing products you already have. Each point gets you a chance to win a $50 Amazon Gift Card each week and towards a bigger prize each month. The prize this month, for example is an iPad.  In the future Scordit will also let you earn coupons and discounts on items in your wishlist, based on the points you a have earned. We like that Scordit supports account creation with both Twitter and Facebook and that you can selectively tweet or share your scores or wishes on those services. Like Hollrr, we do wish that there was a bookmarklet that could make adding items to your scores or wishes even faster. These sorts of sharing sites have a lot of potential but being accessible from outside the main app is something we really want to see. How do you share your scores with friends? Let us know! Disclosure: Scordit is founded by Shane Snow, who has contributed to Mashable. Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark
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, Hollrr, Mashable, PHP, Twitter Tags: getglue, hollrr, product sharing, scordit
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| The Truth About the Average Twitter User [STATS] Posted: 10 Mar 2010 06:16 PM PST 
The study looked at around 19 million Twitter accounts (PDF) in order to figure out how people are using Twitter. It started with one assumption: an active or “True” Twitter user has at least 10 followers, follows at least 10 people, and had tweeted at least 10 times. By that definition though, only 21% of Twitter users are active users. There’s a great deal of interesting data in the breakdown. Only 26% of Twitter users had 10 followers or more by December 2009, while only 40% were following 10 people or more (in fact, a majority of Twitter users, 51%, were following less than five people). In terms of tweets, the report estimates that 34% of Twitter users hadn’t tweeted even once, while a whopping 73% of Twitter’s users tweeted less than 10 times. That means nearly all of the tweets on the social network were coming from about 1/4 of the userbase. Power users dominate.  Barracuda Labs also analyzed Twitter’s growth over time, and the numbers are consistent with previous reports that show while Twitter grew like wildfire in early 2009, it has dramatically slowed down in recent months. Going back further to early 2008, the report estimates that the microblogging tool grew by just 0.31%. However, with the quick rise of media coverage and the influx of celebrities such as Oprah and Shaq, Twitter use grew by 20% in April 2009 before dropping off to 0.34% growth in December 2009. While the news isn’t stellar, it isn’t all bad for Twitter — these metrics are moving in the right direction. A full 79% of users had less than ten tweets in June 2009, but that number dropped to 73% by December. 80% of users had less than 10 followers in June 2009, but that percentage dropped to 74% by December. If that trend continues, you’ll hopefully see a more diverse and active Twitterverse going forward. [via MediaMemo] Reviews: Twitter Tags: Barracuda Labs, followers, stats, trending, twitter
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| 15 Famous Tech Titans Hit Forbes’ Billionaire List Posted: 10 Mar 2010 05:11 PM PST 
After regaining the throne last year, Bill Gates has once again been displaced as the world’s richest man — this time by Carlos Slim (who held that post back in 2007), but he remains the richest man in tech by a wide margin with an estimated net worth of $53 billion. Check out how some other tech heavyweights weighed in: Larry Ellison: $28 BillionThe Oracle founder and CEO is the sixth richest person in the world this year, sitting pretty with $28 billion as his estimated net worth. Sergey Brin & Larry Page: $17.5 Billion EachThe two Google co-founders both place 24th on the list with $17.5 billion in estimated net worth. Steve Ballmer: $14.5 BillionThanks to a rise in Microsoft’s stock price, Ballmer saw his net worth rise and he sits at #33 on the overall list. Paul Allen and Michael Dell: $13.5 BillionMicrosoft co-founder Paul Allen might appear to spend money like its water, but he’s still ranked at #37 on the list, tied with Dell founder and CEO Michael Dell. Jeff Bezos: $12.3 BillionThe Amazon founder and CEO is ranked #43 with $12.3 billion in estimated net worth. That’s a lot of eBooks! Eric Schmidt: $6.3 BillionGoogle CEO Eric Schmidt is ranked #117 this year, tied with News Corp. mogul Rupert Murdoch. Steve Jobs: $5.5 BillionApple co-founder and CEO Steve Jobs has watch his company’s stock price soar over the last twelve months. He’s ranked #136 with an estimated $5.5 Billion. Pierre Omidyar: $5.2 BillionThe eBay founder is ranked #148 on the list. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg: $3 Billion eachWhile most filmmakers don’t necessarily fall into the category of technology players, I think we can make an exception for the guy who gave us Jaws, E.T. and Minority Report and the guy that gave us Star Wars and Howard The Duck. Both directors are tied at #316. Jerry Yang: $1.3 BillionHey, being ousted wasn’t the worst thing to happen to Yang — Yahoo’s stock was up 26% in the last year, buoying the co-founders net worth along with it. Reviews: Facebook, Google Tags: bill gates, billionaires, mark zuckerberg, steve jobs
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| Twitter’s Website Now Attaches Location to Tweets [PICS] Posted: 10 Mar 2010 05:01 PM PST 
While attaching locations to tweets has been possible for several months now through third party apps, Twitter.com itself hasn’t done much geolocation until today. It was first noticed yesterday, but the full rollout seems to be happening today. It’s a simple integration: with any tweet that has a location attached to it (mostly via apps that support it, such as Foursquare and Tweetie), a small location icon will appear at the end of the byline of that tweet. Clicking on it will bring up a Google Map showing the location where that tweet was sent. Here’s a screenshot:  It’s a simple integration, but it’s important to the future of Twitter. Location has become this year’s big trend, and with Facebook set to launch location features next month, the company can’t afford to be left behind. What do you think: is this an important market for Twitter to command? What location features should it launch next? Let us know in the comments. Reviews: Foursquare, Twitter, tweetie Tags: geolocation, twitter
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| Sony Answers Wii Remote With PlayStation Move Posted: 10 Mar 2010 04:24 PM PST 
The controller was originally announced at the E3 interactive entertainment conference last year, but it was not named. Since then people have simply called it “the PlayStation motion controller.” It’s good to have a name to work with even though it’s a straightforward one. Move is expected to launch in Fall of 2010, right next to Microsoft’s competing Project Natal peripheral for the Xbox 360. Both devices will use cameras to track movements, but the similarities end there. Move uses a spherical light which is tracked by the camera in concert with internal sensors. Natal on the other hand uses 3D camera technology to track the entirety of the player’s body without a controller. Sony plans to charge under $100 for a package including Move, the PlayStation Eye camera and one game. The pitch: It’s far more accurate than Nintendo’s Wii remote, so it will appeal to hardcore gamers who play difficult games, not just casual gamers who enjoy party games. The sensor controller will be accompanied by an attachment with an analog stick, just like the nunchuk that Wii owners attach to their Wii remotes. Move will be supported by new games Ape Escape, Echochrome 2, and Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11, plus old games LittleBigPlanet, Flower, and Resident Evil 5. Others are planned too, including several made specifically for the controller: boxing game Dukes, family party game Move Party, high-def sports suite Sports Champions, Kung Fu game Slider, and shooter The Shoot. Here are some images of the controller, some screenshots from the planned games, and an embedded trailer from Sony. Images     PlayStation Move Trailer[img credit: Kotaku] Update: Sony blogged about PlayStation Move, adding tons of details and images. We’ve added the info here. Tags: GDC, gdc-2010, motion controls, nintendo wii, playstation 3, playstation move, sony, video games, wii remote
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| Google Reader Play Transforms Feeds into Entertainment Experience Posted: 10 Mar 2010 03:45 PM PST 
Dubbed Google Reader Play, the new tool is an experimental Google Labs project that presents stories one by one — based on their Recommend Items technology — using enlarged photos and auto-playing videos (in lieu of text) on a black backdrop. Viewers can redefine categories and star, like or share stories, with those behaviors further contributing to what Google displays. Google Reader Play could be both an entertainment utility for browsing the web and a complement to your Google Reader experience. Actions that you take in Reader or Reader Play are shared between the two products, and the recommendations in Reader Play are personalized based on the people you’re following in Reader. Google Reader Play is certainly eye-catching, but it’s more pop than it is substance. In fact, given that Google Reader appeals to fairly narrow audience today, we believe the product was intended to up the entertainment factor and introduce Reader-esque features to a much broader set of users. It’s nice to look at and worth a try; whether or not that’s enough to attract the attention of those outside the web/tech realm remains to be seen. We do, however, think that Google Reader Play on an iPad or actual TV set, say via something like Boxee Box, would be worth watching.
Reviews: Google, Google Labs, Google Reader Tags: Google, google reader, google reader play, tv
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| Brizzly Launches a Guide to Twitter Trends and iPhone App Posted: 10 Mar 2010 03:03 PM PST 
The Brizzly Guide is a user-editable area that fleshes out the backstory and adds contextual information to Twitter trends. Loading up the Guide shows the top 10 current trending topics at the left, and either a description of that topic or a prompt to be the first to explain the trend. Taking cues from wiki-style user-editable sites like Wikipedia, the Brizzly Guide encourages users to curate the landing pages that will act as resources for current and past Twitter trends over time.
Further evidence of Brizzly’s adoption of wiki-style philosophy comes with the announcement of the company’s acquisition of Wikirank, an app that visualizes Wikipedia data and will soon, presumably, help visualize Brizzly data and build out a more robust Brizzly Guide. Wikirank displays popular and trending pages in a clean and easy-to-use interface. CEO Jason Shellen said of the acquisition, “We will be integrating Wikirank technology into the Brizzly Guide over the coming months,” so we should expect to see more from the Twitter client surrounding trending and data visualization in the near future. Are you a Brizzly user? What do you currently use to monitor Twitter trends? Reviews: Brizzly, Twitter, Wikipedia Tags: brizzly, iphone, iphone apps, twitter
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| Google Apps Marketplace: 6 Great Apps to Try Now Posted: 10 Mar 2010 02:43 PM PST 
Although the launch was yesterday, many companies and developers have been preparing for this event for quite some time and a number of very cool and useful apps are already available in the Marketplace. Here are just a few that stand out to us. 1. Zoho for Google AppsZoho and Google Apps actually offer a lot of the same services: hosted email, word processing, spreadsheet and presentation tools, wikis, chat, etc. However, that doesn’t mean that Zoho doesn’t benefit from Google Apps integration. Plus, because Zoho also offers services that go beyond what Google Apps can do, direct integration can be a nice way for Zoho to keep customers using their product (or even make them more interested in checking it out). Zoho has two products in the Google Apps Marketplace: Zoho CRM and Zoho Projects. Zoho CRM is free for up to three users and then $12 per month per user starting with the fourth user. Zoho Projects is free for one project and starts at $12 per month for unlimited projects. Both tools allow users to plugin Google Apps into the Zoho CRM or Zoho Projects system. 2. Intuit Online PayrollIntuit, makers of Quicken and Quickbooks, has an online payroll tool called Intuit Online Payroll. Intuit Online Payroll for Google Apps was one of the applications demoed at the Campfire One event yesterday and it lets users access their payroll or paychecks from anywhere in Google Apps.  For instance, paychecks can be retrieved from Google Calendar, users can print checks or E-File their taxes and run the payroll application from directly within Google Apps. Pricing is $39 per month for one employee filing taxes in one state, each additional employee is $1.50 per month and each additional state for filing taxes is $12 per month. 3. ManymoonManymoon is a team collaboration application that integrates with Google Apps. Think of it as a project and task management tool. The Manymoon app was built to deeply integrate with Google Docs, Google Calendar and Gmail. The company has also created a Google Gadget for managing and monitoring tasks. Manymoon is free and is currently the highest rated app in the Google Apps Marketplace. 4. AviaryAviary offers web-based tools for things like image editing and creation, vector graphics, and audio editing. Now Aviary can integrate into Google Apps, which lets you use Aviary to create graphics that can be used and accessed within things like Google Docs and Google Sites. The free app lets you do all kinds of stuff, like edit images for business cards, presentation slides and labels, create scalable vector art, record and remix audio and even edit the markup from websites or slides. This is the sort of functionality that Google doesn’t have the resources to offer, which is why it’s great that Aviary can just plug into existing Google Apps accounts! 5. ExpensifyExpensify is a service designed to make expense reporting less painful. Expensify’s Google Apps app integrates directly with Google Apps, which eliminates one more step in the expense-report creation process. Once reports are submitted and approved, they can be exported to QuickBooks or other accounting solutions in one-step. Expensify is always free for report creation and submission and for two submitters a month, the approval process is free too. After that, approval for each individual submitter is only $5 a month. 6. Box.netLike Zoho, Box.net shares some features with Google Apps. Box.net has really morphed from a file storage service into a full-fledged cloud-based content management system akin to something like Microsoft SharePoint. Many of the companies that are creating apps for the Google Apps Marketplace also have apps for Box.net’s OpenBox platform. However, while there is some overlap in terms of services offered (especially since Google Docs added file storage support in January), there is even more opportunity for users of both services. Box.net is offering a Cloud Content Management app for Google Docs that will let you basically access and integrate your Google files directly within the Box.net ecosystem. That means you can create a Google Doc or Google Spreadsheet as a file type within Box, which means you can then utilize the collaboration tools of both platforms. You can also access and manipulate your Box content directly from within Gmail and Google Calendar — which really makes this attractive for companies that want to look at replacing both Exchange Server and SharePoint. Existing Box.net users can call their account manager to start the setup process of integrating the two systems and new users can sign up for a free trial of Box.net and automagically add it to Google Apps, plus get 30% off upon sign-up. More to ComeWe’re only scratching the surface in terms of what the Google Apps Marketplace can potentially offer users — as well as developers and other providers — but just looking at some of the apps and integrations that already exist, we have to say, this is exciting. The power of the “cloud” really isn’t realized until you can see how easy it is to not just access files from various places (like on mobile phones), but also when you can easily share and integrate with other services. For small business users especially, the extensibility options offered to Google Apps via the Marketplace makes Google’s platform even more compelling. Have you tried any of the new Google Apps apps? What do you think? Let us know! Reviews: Aviary, Box.net, Gmail, Google, Google Docs, zoho Tags: Aviary, box.net, cloud computing, Expensify, google apps, Google Apps Marketplace, intuit, manymoon, Zoho
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| Rock Out with PixieTea and Her Amazing iPhone Band [VIDEO] Posted: 10 Mar 2010 02:13 PM PST 
According to Gizmodo, the girl made use of apps like DrumMeister, Bassist, iDrum, NlogSynthesizer, NESynth and iShred, as well as a laptop, a camera and photography software. And let’s not forgot those sweet pants, which recall the ones rocked by fellow foreign viral legends, the Norwegian curling team. Check out the video below, which puts all those tape deck recordings of “Like a Virgin” that my sister and I made when I was six to utter shame. Oh, and bonus points to anyone who can translate the lyrics for us so that we can sing along. Tags: apple, iphone, music, viral video
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| Google Fiber Sparks Online Competition Between Cities Nationwide Posted: 10 Mar 2010 01:58 PM PST 
First there was Topeka, KS, which renamed itself by proclamation to Google, KS. Then Duluth, MN upped the ante by promising (comedically, we hope) to name all the town’s first-born children after Google. Then Greenville, SC entered the fray with their all-out “We Are Feeling Lucky” social media campaign that included a landing page, YouTube channel, Facebook events, and Twitter hashtag. But will any of these efforts be enough? The Competition Topeka, Duluth, and Greenville are not alone in wanting Google to trick out their municipalities with super fast Internet speeds. A growing number of American cities are making their pitch to Google in advance of the March 26th deadline, and some of them are pretty creative. Peoria, IL, for example, is playing off its reputation as the prototypical middle American town and the famous “Will it play in Peoria?” catchphrase. They’ve launched Google Plays in Peoria in an attempt to convince the company that their town is the perfect test-bed for Google’s new technology. Perhaps taking a cue from Topeka, on the other hand, Sarasota, FL has also renamed itself… to Google Island. Their site includes the standard YouTube videos, Facebook Fan Page, Twitter account, and cleverly, a “Declaration of Independence from Narrowband Networks.” Other cities have also pulled out all the stops in their campaign to get Big G to invest in their infrastructure. Baltimore, MD thinks a petition is the way to go, and presents their case using a Google Maps mashup, YouTube videos, and a list of local startups that could use a few more bits on their BmoreFiber.com pitch page. Austin, TX, Charlottesville, VA, Greensboro, NC, Portland, OR, Grand Rapids, MI, and Indianapolis, IN are also in on the action with either official or citizen-led campaigns to catch Google’s attention. Who Wins? Google, For One Google has yet to reveal how it will pick where its magical fiber will be implemented — glitz and numbers may ultimately have nothing to do with it. However, no matter which city wins the ultimate prize of having Google come to town and pimp out their Internet connections the way Xhibit pimps out cars, Google itself is a big winner in the process. So are social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. Google wins because they get to further their agenda. The stampede among cities to compete for Google’s trial has already demonstrated the desire that people and municipalities have for faster Internet infrastructure and “open access” networks. “It's obvious the ISPs and incumbent utility providers don't feel the incentive they need, the pressure they need, to keep themselves up to date,” wrote a commenter on a blog post from Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn’s office declaring their intention to compete for Google Fiber. Making the public more aware of the issues that Google cares about (better/faster infrastructure, universal access, net neutrality) is a win for Google, whose plans for the cloud-based computing hinge on faster and more ubiquitous broadband connections. Facebook, meanwhile, has proven to be one of the most popular meeting grounds for Google Fiber advocates. Most of the campaigns already mentioned in this post have a presence on Facebook, and some communities and citizen-led groups have put the entirety of their energy on promoting the case to fellow citizens through the social network. There are growing Facebook groups for Google Fiber in Ventura, CA, Columbia, MO, Davis, CA, Huntsville, AL, Buffalo, NY, Baton Rouge, LA, Rochester, NY, Fresno, CA, Cincinnati, OH, San Luis Obispo, CA — to name just a few. In fact, a Groups search for “Google Fiber” on Facebook this morning yielded almost 250 results.  Other cities and towns are turning to Twitter to make their case. Madison, WI, for example, has a Twitter account and is using the hashtag #madfiber to spread the word about Google Fiber to other Madison residents. And Memphis, TN mayor A.C. Wharton, Jr. is using his Twitter account to tweet about his city’s pitch and encourage citizens to get involved using the #memphisgoogle hashtag. Social gathering places like Facebook and Twitter are used all the time for campaigns bigger than the Google Fiber competition, so it may seem naive to call those sites winners here. But like Google, social networks would benefit immensely from faster, more universal broadband access, so getting their brands entangled in the movement early might be a major boon down the road. Is your city gunning for Google Fiber? Which of these campaigns do you think will best catch Google’s attention? Let us know in the comments. Reviews: Facebook, Google, Google Maps, Twitter, YouTube Tags: facebook, Fiber Optic, Google, google fiber, Google Kansas, ISP, isps, social media, tech, trending, twitter, youtube
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| SXSW 2010: The Complete Social Media Guide Posted: 10 Mar 2010 01:16 PM PST 
Whether you plan to physically attend or not, social media will be critical to how people connect and share ideas at this world-class event. If you want to keep in touch with all the goings-on, look no further than these tools that you can use on the web, your mobile device, and your favorite social networks. For Those Headed to AustinWhile in-person networking is the goal of many, social media will be key in bringing interested parties together across this vast festival that this year is spread across four separate campuses. If you’ll be in attendance, check out these resources for staying connected. The Official SXSW First-Timers GuideIf you’re brand new to SXSW and feeling a bit overwhelmed at the scope, the first-timers guide has a wealth of resources to assist the uninitiated. These include links to online registration (if you still need to sign up), hotel booking, scheduling tools, maps, and this informative video. my.SXSW and QR Coded Badges The official social network of the festival is my.SXSW, and you are automatically invited to join upon registering. This closed network, just for attendees, allows users to build personalized conference schedules, join exclusive groups, and connect with others at the festival. The addition of QR codes on registered badges gives attendees with smartphones an added way to solidify in-person connections. Simply scan a new friend’s personalized QR code and you’ll automatically be following him or her within the my.SXSW network. For additional ways to utilize the my.SXSW network, check out the info on their tools page. SXSW2010 Event Calendar on sched.org Sched.org is an interactive calendar with social media integration that makes it ideal for festivals like SXSW. An “unofficial” but highly useful calendar has been created for SXSW that will give you an overview of each day’s events, talks and panels. Sign in with Facebook Connect or Twitter and start compiling a list of the events you’ll be attending. By clicking on a particular event, you can also see who else is attending, and view real-time updates about the event from other attendees on social networks. With a bit of effort, this tool could become your go-to social dashboard and connection builder for the entire festival. SitBy.UsSocial media aficionados will be converging on Austin from all over the U.S. and the world. It’s likely that some of your Twitter friends will be in attendance while you’re there. Don’t let an opportunity for an in-person meeting slip by. SitBy.Us is a useful tool that lets you see which panels your Twitter friends will be attending, and even where in each room they will sit. By logging in with your Twitter account (via OAuth), SitBy.Us provides a mobile-optimized web interface that allows you to plan and coordinate panel attendance with people you’re looking to connect with in person (and perhaps even avoid those you don’t!). SXSW Badges for Foursquare Foursquare has created 16 new SXSW-specific badges for those location-based networkers who are Austin bound. What’s more, if you do unlock a badge, you can track down a Foursquare team member at the festival and claim a temporary tattoo with the mark of honor. Cliqset’s SXSW Map Cliqset.com has created a real-time map that aggregates all of the geo-tagged activity in the festival area of Austin. Pulling in data from the major location-based social networks (Brightkite, Flickr, Foursquare, Gowalla, Qik, and Twitter), the map will give you a bird’s eye view of who is at SXSW, where they are, and what they’re doing. Click a pinpoint on the map to expand the user’s status update. It should be interesting to see the map fill up with notes come festival time this Friday. Disclosure: Cliqset is a Mashable sponsor Mashable’s Austin Real-Time Looking to connect with like-minded festival goers or other attendees from your hometown? Check out Mashable’s own Austin Real-Time Network. Sign in with your Twitter, Facebook, or Cliqset ID and browse or search for other festival patrons by common interest or location. By adding yourself to the network, you can also share what you’re doing and where you are via your favorite social networks. For Those Who Will Watch from AfarIf you’re not able to make it to Austin this year, don’t fret. The magic of social media and the web can bring the festival within reach. While you may not be able to hob-knob with your favorite tech and music geeks in the warm Austin sun, you can still get your SXSW fix with these resources. The Official SXSW Twitter and Facebook Accounts Being the socially-savvy team that they are, the crew behind the festival does a good job keeping their fans and followers in the know. If you want to keep an eye on developments in Austin, be sure to add these official channels to your social feeds. SXSW Videos Though not officially connected to the festival, SXSW Videos is a user-generated destination for footage from the event. Powered by Viddler, the site lets you browse videos that come out of SXSW (in various categories, including Interviews, Shows, Bands, etc.) as well as upload your own if you’re in attendance. The content can be a bit of a grab-bag, but if you’re looking for some first-hand video accounts of what’s happening on the ground, check in there every once in a while. SXSW Blogs Searching for other ways to live vicariously through the SXSW attendees? Dedicated blogs are a good way to stay in the loop. The Unofficial SXSW Insider’s Guide is a blog/community built with Ning where festival attendees (and interested parties who couldn’t make it) can blog, upload photos, and discuss events. You can browse the site blog-style to see what people are up to, or connect with individual members to get a more social scoop. SXSW Baby is another unofficial blog that will be covering the events throughout the festival. Currently, they have quite a few tips for those who are enroute to Austin. But if you’ll be checking in from home, stay tuned for further updates as the festival kicks off this Friday. Mashable’s SXSWi Channel Of course you can always stay up to date on the latest news coming from Austin with Mashable’s own channel, dedicated to the Interactive Media portion of the festival. Members of our team will be on the ground in Austin to get you the social media and tech scoops that are sure to break in the days ahead. More SXSW resources from Mashable:Reviews: Brightkite, Facebook, Flickr, Foursquare, Gowalla, Mashable, Twitter Tags: BLOGS, cliqset, facebook, festival, foursquare, gowalla, location-based, networking, ning, social media, social networks, sxsw, sxsw2010, twitter
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| Google and Facebook Sued for Mobile Patent Infringement Posted: 10 Mar 2010 01:00 PM PST 
The complaint, first reported by Bloomberg, was said to be filed by Winksite yesterday in a Manhattan federal court, and points to patent infringement claims around Facebook Mobile and Google Buzz. The company is looking for reparation in financial form (though specific amounts have yet to be disclosed). More importantly, it is also seeking “a court order to prevent further use of its invention.” Winksite was awarded the patent in question — United States Patent No. 7,599,983 “Method, apparatus and system for management of information content for enhanced accessibility over wireless communication networks” – in October of last year, though its mobile application technology dates back to 2004. Given this, Winksite’s lawyer Jeremy Pitcock believes that both the social networking and search giant were aware of the patent and are thus liable for damages. The patent summary reads:
Both Google and Facebook are said to be reviewing the complaint but have yet to put out public statements addressing the matter. We’re curious to see how the court and companies respond, but until then we will dig into the case and original patent to see if we can get more clarity on the specific technologies that Winksite feels are being unlawfully used in Buzz and Facebook Mobile. [img credit: KLH49, iStockphoto] Reviews: Facebook, Google Buzz, iStockphoto Tags: facebook mobile, google buzz, lawsuit, patent, patent infringement
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| Mashable’s Weekly Guide to Social Media Jobs Posted: 10 Mar 2010 12:50 PM PST 
If you’re seeking a job in social media, we’d like to help out. For starters, Mashable’s Job Lists section gathers together all our resource lists, how-tos and expert guides to help you get hired. In particular, you might want to see our articles on How to Leverage Social Media for Career Success and How to Find a Job on Twitter. But we’d like to help in a more direct way, too. Mashable's job boards are a place for socially-savvy companies to find people like you. This week and every week, Mashable features its coveted job board listings for a variety of positions in the web, social media space, and beyond. Have a look at what's good and new on our job boards: Mashable Job Board ListingsSenior ASP.NET Developer at a confidential company in Santa Monica, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Digital/Social Media Director at Chlopak, Leonard, Schechter & Associates in Washington DC.
Read more about this opportunity here. Social Media Coordinator at Surfaces USA in Los Angeles, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Web Developer at Scheels in Fargo, ND.
Read more about this opportunity here. Online Marketing Specialist at United Domains in Cambridge, MA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Operations Engineer at Blackboard Inc. in San Francisco, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Mobile Web Developer at Blackboard Inc. in San Francisco, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Blackberry Developer at Blackboard Inc. in San Francisco, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Android Developer at Blackboard Inc. in San Francisco, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Online PR Associate at Xomba.com in Jacksonville, FL.
Read more about this opportunity here. Social Media Sales Consultant at Meltwater Buzz in Mountain View, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Account Executive at Impact Radius in Santa Barbara, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Social Media Sales Consultant at Meltwater Buzz in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Community Account Manager at (mt) Media Temple in Culver City, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. New York Editor at Citysearch in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Senior Account Executive at MWW Group in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Part Time Marketing/Social Media Intern at SheSpeaks Inc. in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Senior Account Executive at Electric Artists in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Web/Multimedia Designer at Colby College in Waterville, ME.
Read more about this opportunity here. Technical Champion at CreativeFeed in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Media Sales Professional at TMG in Washington DC.
Read more about this opportunity here. Facebook Application Developer at a confidential company in Houston, TX.
Read more about this opportunity here. Social Media Strategist at M Booth & Associates in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Account Executive at Wildfire Interactive in Palo Alto, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Account Manager at Wildfire Interactive in Palo Alto, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Product Manager at Wildfire Interactive in Palo Alto, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. MySQL DBA/Developer at Interactive One in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Corporate Social Media Rockstar at Harrah’s Entertainment in Las Vegas, NV.
Read more about this opportunity here. Social Media Manager at Hachette Filipacchi Media US in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Senior Marketing Manager at SheSpeaks Inc. in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Creative Strategy Consultant at Common Cents Inc. in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. Senior Product Manager/Evangelist at Microsoft in Redmond, WA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Senior Brand Manager at Smarter Travel Media in Charlestown, MA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Web Developer at Vantage Strategy Consulting in Annapolis, MD.
Read more about this opportunity here. Social Media Admin Assistant at www.tree.com in San Diego, CA.
Read more about this opportunity here. Project Manager/Digital Media at TMG in Washington DC.
Read more about this opportunity here. Digital Strategist at 360i.com in New York, NY.
Read more about this opportunity here. LAMP Software Engineer at Adknowledge in Kansas City, MO.
Read more about this opportunity here. Director of Digital Communications at TCI in St. Louis, MO.
Read more about this opportunity here. Digital Director at TMG in Washington DC.
Read more about this opportunity here. Mashable has a variety of web 2.0, application development, business development, and social networking job opportunities available. Check them out at Mashable's Job Board.
Got a job posting to share with our readers? Post a job to Mashable today ($99 for a 30 day listing) and get it highlighted every week on Mashable.com (in addition to exposure all day every day in the Mashable marketplace). Reviews: Android, Mashable, eXperience
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| YouTube Wants You to Grill the FCC’s Chairman Posted: 10 Mar 2010 12:47 PM PST 
The interview, which takes place right after the release of the National Broadband Plan on Tuesday, March 16, will explore topics such as access and affordability, security, Internet in schools and net neutrality. Most, if not all, of the questions will come from YouTube user submissions. Last month, the FCC released a report on broadband adoption that indicated that cost is the biggest barrier to widespread broadband adoption in the U.S. We’re sure this, along with concerns about net neutrality and the FCC’s new plan around it, will be hot topics of discussion. Last month was the first edition of the CitizenTube series, where President Obama answered questions live on YouTube after the State of the Union. It proved to be a major success, with more than 12,000 questions submitted and 660,000 votes registered. While we don’t expect the same type of response for the FCC chairman, there still should be thousands of questions from concerned citizens on the state of broadband and Internet in America. Reviews: YouTube Tags: CitizenTube, fcc, youtube
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| MySpace Courts Gamers and Developers with New Platform Posted: 10 Mar 2010 12:35 PM PST 
As we learned in our interview yesterday, about one-third of MySpace users currently play games daily, and the goal is to drive that number up to 50%. The new MySpace Games Gallery experience gives users a better interface for discovering, sharing and rating new titles by providing personalized recommendations, popular game charts and notifications from friends’ Streams.  A new iPhone application, dubbed Neon, lets users access their games on the go. The app provides real-time notifications that are shareable with friends, access to all games currently available on MySpace and a way to remotely install games right from the phone. A number of new social games are launching on the platform as well, including Fish Isle, Hoop Fever Live, Kingdoms of Camelot, Paradise Paintball, SPP Ranch, Warlords, Wild Ones and Zombie Revenge. For game developers, MySpace is adding a number of new features to the platform, including a new API for analytics, a way to track how users are finding new games, access to improved performance tools for multiplayer games and integration with Unity, a powerful 3D gaming engine. The latter is part of an effort to encourage third-party developers to craft more sophisticated and visually rich game titles than the current crop of casual social titles currently in vogue on social networks (Farmville et al). Do you play casual games on MySpace, Facebook or other social networks? Are you interested in being able to access the titles you play from your phone? Would you be interested in seeing more sophisticated games become available on social networks? Reviews: Facebook, MySpace, iPhone Tags: casual games, games, GDC, GDC2010, iphone, iphone apps, myspace, social games, unity, video games
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| FarmVille Adds Facebook Credits Payment Option Posted: 10 Mar 2010 12:06 PM PST 
The popular online game uses two units of in-game currency: Farm Cash and Farm Coins. Previously, you could buy them with a credit card or PayPal. Now the game offers Facebook Credits as an option. Facebook Credits are the number-one option, actually. They’re the default payment choice, featured at the top of the list pictured here.  We recently learned that Facebook takes 30% of developers’ Facebook Credits revenue — the same percentage that Apple takes from its iPhone and iPod touch App Store sales. Analysts have speculated that Facebook might surpass $1 billion in revenue this year, and the social network’s virtual currency could be a vital part of growth beyond that. This new option in FarmVille is arguably bigger for Facebook Credits than it is for the game. FarmVille has more than 80 million users, making it bigger than Twitter. Exposure to an audience that large is an important milestone for the Facebook Credits project, which has been a slowly expanding experiment up until now. Reviews: Facebook, iPhone Tags: facebook, facebook credits, facebook platform, farmville, microtransactions, online games, virtual currency, Zynga
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| Video Games On-Demand from OnLive Arrive in June Posted: 10 Mar 2010 11:54 AM PST 
We wrote about OnLive previously when it went into beta testing. You can think about the service as essentially “Netflix Instant Queue for games,” where your monthly subscription costs gives you instant access through your PC or Mac to a library of video game titles, including high-profile new releases from launch partners Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, 2K Games, THQ and Warner Bros. At launch, we should expect between a dozen and 25 games to be live on the service, with more to come as game publishers negotiations proceed. One of the perks of this type of system is that players don’t need to have screaming fast hardware to play the latest, graphics-intensive game titles — all that processing is done on the server side, and images are sent back to the player’s computer (or OnLive’s Micro Console TV Adapter unit) over the network. Mac users also stand to benefit in particular from a service like OnLive, in that many PC titles never get released on the Mac or are only ported long after release. Still, the service will face competition from Valve’s Steam, which recently announced native Mac support for its digital distribution platform and several of its popular titles.  OnLive does offer something fundamentally different, however — instead of downloading video game software to your local computer, OnLive keeps its games running in the cloud and users play them instantly across the network. Not only is the service disruptive in terms of consumer behavior, but could upset the existing supply chain by disintermediating retail stores and even in some sense consoles themselves. If you’re interested in checking out OnLive in action, the company just expanded its beta program to accept another 25,000 users. Successful registrants will also be rewarded with three months’ worth of free service. Are you interested in an on-demand video game service? Do you prefer to download and own your own digital game copies a la Steam or does a cloud-based streaming service appeal to you? Is $14.95 a reasonable price for a monthly subscription? Reviews: Steam Tags: 2k games, cloud computing, EA, GDC, GDC2010, mac, onlive, pc, streaming, THQ, ubisoft, video games, warner bros
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| Lady Gaga and Rock Band Caught in a Bad Romance Posted: 10 Mar 2010 11:34 AM PST 
Yes, “Paparazzi” and “LoveGame” are missing from the list, but this might be just the beginning of Rock Band’s Gaga content. Gaga is a hit in geek culture. She’s a spokeswoman for Polaroid. One hundred thousand Facebook users rallied to create and celebrate National Lady Gaga day. Twenty-five percent of Vevo’s 35 million visitors only watch Gaga videos. And her “Bad Romance” music video (which has almost 143 million views on YouTube) is loaded with gadgets like iPods, laptops, and Wii remotes. Rock Band and Lady Gaga are already in the zeitgeist together. Last year, South Park ran a scene with Cartman performing Gaga’s “Poker Face” on Rock Band with his friends and it became a viral YouTube video. We’ve embedded it below. Have fun, and get this: This South Park version will be available for Rock Band, too! You’ll be able to start bluffin’ with your muffin’ (or at least your suite of fake musical instruments) on the Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii on Tuesday, March 16, and on the Sony PlayStation 3 the following Thursday, March 18. South Park Does Lady Gaga in Rock BandReviews: Facebook, YouTube Tags: celebrities, electronic arts, harmonix, Lady Gaga, music, playstation 3, PS3, rock band, South Park, video, video games, Wii, Xbox 360
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| CNN Sees Facebook As Major Competitor Posted: 10 Mar 2010 10:55 AM PST 
In a recent question-and-answer session with BusinessWeek, Klein specifically states, “We want to be the most trusted source,” and, “I’m more worried about the 500 million or so people on Facebook versus the 2 million on Fox.” The intriguing statements come just weeks after Hitwise released data showing that Facebook’s new role is becoming that of a news site. As a news portal and discovery engine, Facebook has the power to make or break a story, a power that clearly threatens the rank and file of the old media elite. Where we discover news is no doubt changing, but that’s not all bad news for CNN. We tend to think that the power wielded by newsies on Facebook could prove to be an advantage for CNN should the network really cater to the social networking crowd. For example, in recent months we’ve seen the ratings of award shows skyrocket; part of the ratings bump correlates with web denizens experiencing the televised broadcast with their friends, family and followers online. It would seem logical then that TV and online can coexist in a mutually beneficial relationship. As for CNN’s immediate future, Klein’s comments also indicate distinct strategies for web and broadcast. Moving forward the company plans to continue with video content on CNN.com and ramp up affiliate deals with the likes of HBO and Time Inc. So where do you get your news: CNN or Facebook? Disclosure: Mashable has a content syndication partnership with CNN. [img credt: Pragmagrapher] Reviews: Facebook, Mashable Tags: cnn, facebook, media, News, trending, tv
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| The Internet Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize Posted: 10 Mar 2010 10:44 AM PST 
Italian Wired suggests that the Internet should receive the highly regarded prize for helping to advance “dialogue, debate and consensus.” The nomination from Wired has been dismissed by some as a publicity stunt — and the support of long-time Wired columnist and investor Nicholas Negroponte is hardly surprising. Although currently seeing some success with the One Laptop Per Child program, Negroponte’s past projects have included such dubious endeavors as as Swatch Internet Time. The award is to be given to the person (or organization) who has “done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.” The creators of the World Wide Web — Tim Berners-Lee, Larry Roberts and Vint Cerf — have been nominated, too. The final nominations will be now be considered by the Committee with the winner due to be announced on October 8, while the awards ceremony will take place in December. Do you think the Internet should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize? Or should it go to a person or organization? Is Wired’s campaign just a PR stunt? Have your say in the comments below. Tags: internet, nobel peace prize, Tim Berners-Lee, Wired
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| Daytrotter Launches New Paid Downloads Option for Bands [EXCLUSIVE] Posted: 10 Mar 2010 10:02 AM PST 
“We started thinking about how we could help these bands more and make more things happen for them,” Daytrotter Founder Sean Moeller told us. The site will adopt a freemium model in order to preserve access to the Daytrotter service fans know and love; users will still be able to download 128 Kbps MP3s or stream audio from Daytrotter sessions for free, but high-quality Apple lossless versions of the sessions will be available for purchase. Prices will vary, but are expected to be in the ballpark of about $4 for a typical four- to eight-track session, with a Download Manager application handling fast and easy access to the music you’ve ordered.   Nearly 90 bands have already signed on for distribution deals with Daytrotter, and Moeller says talks will be ongoing with the majority of the 1,200-some artists that Daytrotter has worked with in the past. For new bands coming in for a Daytrotter session, the option is open to sell tracks through the site, but isn’t at all mandatory: “It’s a way to give these bands an option. We don’t force bands to sign anything when they come in to do a session; it’s all in good faith,” said Moeller. The new initiative reflects a rapidly changing music industry as business models shift onto the digital landscape. Moeller noted, “The record label model is really old at this point,” and that as more and more people are turning to blogs as sources of music discovery, why not “cut out the middleman”? This model offers a chance for new revenue streams for bands as well as an opportunity to go beyond an advertising-supported model for Daytrotter. While revenue-sharing specifics were not disclosed, Moeller said labels and bands should expect “a fair split.” In addition to selling their Daytrotter sessions, artists are encouraged to use the new platform to sell other studio albums, live recordings, and to generally think of Daytrotter as a new partnership opportunity for direct sales. One way to think about the new business model shift is to imagine replacing “the now-gone neighborhood record store with the cool kid behind the counter whose judgment you could always count on,” Moeller said. For music fans, buying direct through Daytrotter means supporting their favorite bands with a more favorable cut than with services like iTunes, as well as contributing to Daytrotter’s mission of promoting music discovery and giving exposure to up and coming bands. If you’re already a fan of Daytrotter, what do you think of the new business model? If you’re new to the site, would you feel good about kicking in a few bucks to support emerging artists or are you happy with free streams and lower-quality downloads? Tags: business models, daytrotter, digital downloads, music, music industry
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| 5 Free Android Apps for Web Developers Posted: 10 Mar 2010 09:50 AM PST 
If you’re already using these essential extensions for Google Chrome, and these tried and true add-ons for Firefox to make your developer tasks easier, then these five Android apps should complete your developer set. 1. HTMLeditor It doesn’t get any more fundamental than this. HTMLeditor is a simple, lightweight little app that will let you code and test HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. It’s a simple text editor that saves your work to your SD card and previews it in a stripped-down mobile browser. It doesn’t highlight errors, or even render images in the preview, but it still makes for a handy mobile solution. 2. AndFTP If you need mobile access to the content on your web servers, check out AndFTP, an extremely robust free utility. Add login information for multiple domains, choose the one you want to access, and the app quickly (over 3G) pulls up your file tree in an easy-to-navigate interface. Using your handset as though it’s a web-connected USB drive, you can upload and download files from your server, manipulate existing files (move, rename, delete), and browse your own device. The app supports FTP, SFTP, and FTPS connections. 3. View Web Source If you’re surfing the mobile web with Android and come across something that needs a closer “developer’s eye view,” check out the View Web Source app, which will download the full source code of any web page into a text editor, where you can make changes or notes, and copy/paste it out to an e-mail for later review. 4. Magic Color Picker Mulling over some web design ideas while you’re out and about? The Magic Color Picker app lets you browse the wonderful wheel of web-safe colors in your quest for the perfect menu shade or logo hue. The app gives you color values in multiple formats, including hexadecimal, RGB, HSV, YUV, and HSL, and offers a few choices for ways to visualize your web palette. The one drawback is that there is no way to bookmark or export the color codes once you find one, so grab the old pen and paper if you need them for later use. 5. HTML Test Studying for the next web dev pop quiz at school? Looking to flex your coding knowledge muscles? The HTML Test app will hit you with 20 timed multiple choice questions about our favorite Internet syntax. Answer them all to the best of your ability, then go back through to see how well you did. If you take the quiz a few times, you may start to see some questions repeat. But it’s great for a quick study break or the impromptu “Code-Off.” No cheating! Series supported by Rackspace  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. More web development resources from Mashable:
Reviews: Android Tags: android, Android apps, apps, code, html, Mobile 2.0, web design, web developer, Web Development, web development series
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| Corey Haim Dies: Fans Pay Tribute on Social Media Sites Posted: 10 Mar 2010 09:37 AM PST 
The actor was a teen icon and heartthrob in the late 1980s, known for his roles in films like Lucas, The Lost Boys, License to Drive and Dream a Little Dream. While his more recent work has been more limited, that hasn’t stopped fans from flooding Twitter and Facebook with responses to this news.  Because Corey Haim and Corey Feldman were frequently associated with one another, it’s not surprising that for a brief period of time, “The Goonies” became a trending topic on Twitter as well. However, it was Feldman, not Haim, that starred in that classic. Facebook groups like “R.I.P. Corey Haim (The Lost Boys)” are also sprouting up. Haim, who suffered from drug addiction throughout the 1990s and 2000s, gained Internet attention in 2001 when he attempted to sell his hair and teeth on eBay (these auctions were eventually pulled down because they violated eBay’s TOS, which states you can’t sell body parts). He also starred in a reality show called The Two Coreys alongside Corey Feldman for two seasons on A&E. What was your favorite Corey Haim movie? Let us know in the comments! Reviews: Facebook, Twitter Tags: #ripcoreyhaim, corey haim, death
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| YouTube Deploys Ads on Mobile Site Posted: 10 Mar 2010 09:15 AM PST 
Google’s all about the mobile ads nowadays; it acquired mobile ad network AdMob for $750 million last November, and AdWords (those contextual sponsored links in search results and the like) went live on iPhone and Android a year ago. YouTube has experimented with mobile ads in the past, running exclusive campaigns with select advertisers and deploying ads to some users in the United States and Japan. Sony advertised the DVD release of recent Oscar-nominee District 9 on YouTube mobile, for example. The company’s leaders and engineers are wise to try and stay on top of this. The search giant is a prominent force in desktop ads, but as more people adopt smartphones it’s not hard to imagine that mobile will eventually be an even more powerful influence in the advertising sphere. Reviews: Google, YouTube Tags: ads, advertising, business, MARKETING, Mobile 2.0, youtube
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| Get Satisfaction Brings Customer Support to Facebook Pages Posted: 10 Mar 2010 09:02 AM PST 
That means the Ask A Question, Share an Idea, Report a Problem and Give Praise functionalities are all present and commingling with the service’s intelligent question database so both customers and brand representatives have the ability to collectively tackle queries. The Social Engagement Hub lives in its own tab inside the Facebook Page and can be fully customized, branded, and tweaked for a specific purpose or campaign. The most impressive part, though, is that all activity inside the hub is centralized on the Get Satisfaction platform, so no conversation is lost inside the Facebook experience and each one can be distributed across multiple environments (which allows for repurposing). The application is currently being tested by a handful of brands (check out POM’s support tab), but the company is rolling it out to all interested businesses. The Social Engagement Hub is targeted to bigger brands, but coming this spring Get Satisfaction will roll a slightly scaled down version — minus customization — for small and medium business that will cost $99 per month in addition to the current paid plan.
Reviews: Facebook, Get Satisfaction Tags: facebook, facebook page, get satisfaction, MARKETING, software
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| Google Maps Now Includes Intelligent Bike Routes Posted: 10 Mar 2010 08:42 AM PST 
The company writes that the new biking features will “include as much bike trail data as possible, provide efficient routes, allow riders to customize their trip, make use of bike lanes, calculate rider-friendly routes that avoid big hills and customize the look of the map for cycling to encourage folks to hop on their bikes.” The new option now sits next to the current Google Maps standbys — car, public transit and walking — for online routing options, so users can select the new option from the dropdown menu to uncover a Google-recommended bike routes (likely sans big hills!). You can also turn on a “Bicycling” layer via the “More” tab when zoomed into a particular city in Google Maps. The trails’ green hues should indicate terrain and road type. Dark green equates to bike-only, light green means there’s a bike lane, and dashed green means it’s a decent biking path but one without a bike lane. Before you get too excited, we should note that as of right now biking is not an option in mobile apps, so make sure to plan ahead before you hit the pavement. Reviews: Google, Google Maps Tags: biking, Google, Google Maps
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| YouTube Darlings OK Go Say Bye-Bye to EMI Posted: 10 Mar 2010 07:33 AM PST 
Here is the full statement from EMI:
How Did We Get Here?As we have reported in the past, OK Go took arms against the sea of troubles that arose back in January when EMI and YouTube disabled embedding on a video for one of their new singles, “This Too Shall Pass.” The band has built its reputation to some degree on the popularity of its viral videos, and Kulash and the rest believed that the lock-down version of “This Too Shall Pass” was hindering fans’ enjoyment of the video as well as any publicity the band might garner from sharing. Kulash released a public statement on the band’s site and even wrote an op-ed in The New York Times on the issue. An interesting tidbit from the op-ed:
Blogs, fans and news outlets were buzzing, and it was clear that people were interested in the issue of ownership and the battle between achieving virality and making money. In fact, according to a release from Big Hassle Media, who represent OK Go, Kulash’s blog post about the issue went viral itself, garnering more than 500,000 hits in just two days. The State Farm FactorTherefore, the band had the world’s attention when they released another video for the same song last week, this time featuring a Rube Goldberg machine and fully embeddable, thanks to sponsorship from State Farm Insurance. Just for point of reference: At press time, this video, which was released on March 1, has nearly seven million views. The first video, featuring the Notre Dame marching band, was released on January 8. As of now, it only has 1,181,070 views. When asked whether he thought the controversy surrounding the first video contributed at all to the success of the second, bassist Tim Nordwind said, “It’s hard to know if Damian’s op-piece has made a huge difference, but for people who pay attention to it, yes, I think that it’s one reason that people are paying attention. Or maybe even possibly rooting for us… I think what people are responding to is that it’s just kind of an awesome video. I think people are reacting to the Herculean effort that it took to make this thing.” According to State Farm Advertising Manager Todd Fischer, the band and the insurance company had been in talks since the fall of 2009 about the possibility of making a sponsored video. “Both of us kind of looked at each other as iconic brands in our own sense — the OK Go guys liked what State Farm has been doing in the music and entertainment space… On the flip side, we obviously — like so many other people — had great respect for what OK Go had done in the social media space and how they had used their videos to connect with young adults and with music fans along the way.” Although the insurance company has done branded integration with movies and TV before, this the first time they’ve been involved in a viral music video, an avenue by which they saw an opportunity to connect with a whole new market. We’ve reported in the past on several viral video campaigns that made use of this growing medium as a way to grab the attention of the Internet-savvy set — the Ray-Bans tattoo commercial and the Chuck Liddell Reebok spot spring to mind. Fischer says that the partnership speaks to the evolving manner by which we consume media. “You see a lot more brands starting to play in the space [of viral videos]… I think it’s changed the way people look at a 30-second television ad spot because they also think of how it will translate to the online space, because of the power and the influence that online has in reaching so many more people these days.” On OK Go’s side, the band was able to create the video that they wanted, while also attracting tons of media attention. “We had this idea to do a Rube Goldberg project and it was a slightly more expensive idea than what we had had in the past and they were willing to sponsor it, but also let us do whatever it was we wanted to do,” Nordwind says. According to Fischer, the company would also be game to partner with the band again, as well as other bands that might have similarly innovative ideas. What Does This Split Mean?This chain events, as well as the most recent chapter in the drama, raises the question that everyone’s been asking as of late: Does OK Go — or any band for that matter — require a relationship with record company in order to survive? According to an representative from EMI, the label was instrumental in setting up the partnership with State Farm. EMI has a unit called Brand Partnerships, Licensing and Synchronization that basically brings bands and brands together — they’re the ones who get songs into commercials (which is becoming a more and more common way for a band to make money). According to a rep from EMI, the label approached State Farm and pitched the idea to the company. “Basically our label sort of worked as a middleman,” Nordwind says, “but it was basically us sort of dealing with State Farm. But to be really honest, the label and State Farm were very hands-off with us. They really just let us do what we wanted to do.” Therefore, the question becomes: Is the band/label situation a kind of Rube Goldberg machine in its own right — an overly elaborate system built up to achieve a simple outcome? Can OK Go achieve the success on their own? It will be interesting to see what results from their breaking away from EMI, and how they continue to use the medium of the Internet to spread their music. We’ve reached out to the band for further comment and will update this post if we hear anything more. Reviews: YouTube Tags: EMI, music, OK Go, State-Farm, trending, youtube
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Last week, an App Store error got the latest version of 
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 
Name: 
A new study from security firm 
Forbes has released its annual list of the 
Twitter has just flipped the switch on geolocation within Twitter.com. Now at least some users can pull up location-based information from individual tweets on the microblogging website.
Sony has 
Google has just 
Web-based Twitter client 
The free 
Last night at its Campfire One event, Google 
It seems like every city in America wants Google Fiber. And who can blame them? Ever since Google announced its plan last month to bring 
This year’s 
Facebook may have secured a patent for its 
YouTube is pushing itself further into citizen journalism with an interview with FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, and just as it has in the past, the world’s largest video portal is allowing its users to submit questions via 
One of the many initiatives on 
The Facebook platform game 
Today at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, OnLive CEO Steve Perlman 
The first 
When it comes to competition, CNN President Jon Klein fears Facebook. The man at the top of the news network believes that the social network is more of a threat to his business than other broadcast media organizations.
The Internet is 
If you’re a web developer on the go, you may sometimes find the need to test some code, fix an error, or manage remote files when you’re away from your desktop. If you have an 
Corey Haim, best known as one half of “the two Coreys,” was found 
Today 
Bikers rejoice, Google has just 
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