Mashable: Latest 29 News Updates - including “It’s Time to Get Video on Wikipedia”

It’s Time to Get Video on Wikipedia
Kindle for Mac Has Arrived
Facebook Starts Sending Page Admins Weekly Stat Reports
First Look: Universal Music’s “Six String” Guitar Game for iPhone
It’s True: Twitter Is Down
“My Mom’s on Facebook:” The YouTube Anthem [VIDEO]
Google TV is Coming to a Living Room Near You
Tumblr Gets a BlackBerry App
AWESOME: iPad Digital Magazine Demo [VIDEO]
Foursquare Adds Almost 100,000 Users in 10 Days
FTC on Google Buzz: Consumer Privacy Cannot Be Run in Beta
Now All BlackBerry Apps Can Have Push Notifications
Steve Jobs Cheese Head Feeds Your Next Geek Party [PICS]
Italian Police Use Facebook to Capture Mafia Fugitive
6 Ways Law Enforcement Uses Social Media to Fight Crime
Track Your Favorite Band’s Online Buzz with Next Big Sound
Nexus One Coming Soon to Sprint
Verizon Droid Android 2.1 Update Arrives Tomorrow
5 Fantastic iPhone Apps for Web Developers
Coming Soon: Log in to Digg with Twitter, Google and More [PIC]
YouTube Is Huge: 24 Hours of Video Now Uploaded Every Minute
Posterous Now Lets You Schedule Posts for Later
Our Social Media Obsession by the Numbers [STATS]
Zach Galifianakis Interviews Ben Stiller on “Between Two Ferns” [VIDEO]
MacBook Pro, Air and Mac Pro Refresh Coming Soon [RUMOR]
Mashable’s Weekly Guide to Social Media Job Opportunities
Blockbuster OnDemand Coming to Windows Mobile Classic and Android
Yahoo Acquires Citizen Sports
Book Publisher Tries Reversing the Fate of Industry with Viral Video
New Bing Maps Feature: Stargaze from Street Level

Posted: 18 Mar 2010 02:34 AM PDT

Wikipedia is one of the most amazing knowledge resources on the Internet, featuring millions of articles and images, but it sorely lacks a certain (very important) type of content – video.

For this reason the Open Video Alliance is launching a mass campaign to bring video to Wikipedia. The central site for the project is Let’s Get Video on Wikipedia, featuring a tutorial on how to post videos to Wikipedia as well as a gallery of some of the recently posted videos.

There’s also good news for those who were struggling to convert videos to Theora, which is the open video format used by Wikipedia. The makers of Miro are testing a free utility for converting videos to Theora; it’s not ready for launch yet, but it will be very soon. From their blog post:

“Shhhhh. If you look around that site, you'll notice a reference to a new Miro product that is in a usable beta form but not quite ready for a full launch. Look for a launch announcement very soon.”

The project’s Facebook page is here, and you can also follow the Open Video Alliance on Twitter.

Reviews: Miro, Wikipedia

Tags: community, social media, video, wikipedia

Kindle for Mac Has Arrived

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 11:01 PM PDT

Amazon has just added a major new platform to its Kindle arsenal: Mac. The free application lets you read ebooks on your computer, including those you've purchased previously from Amazon.

Like its applications for iPhone and iPod touch, BlackBerry, and the PC, Kindle for Mac is designed to sync with your Kindle device, so if you're reading an ebook on your Mac, you can pick right up where you left off when you're reading from your Kindle on the train.

Kindle for Mac can be downloaded from Amazon's website now, but note, it requires Mac OS X 10.5 or above. In a statement, Amazon says that full text search and the ability to create and edit notes and highlights will be added in the near future.

The addition of a Mac app was expected, and gives Amazon a presence on yet another key platform. Next up will almost certainly be an iPad app, a move that will be closely watched since Apple will be launching its own “iBooks” app that makes iPad a direct competitor to Kindle. With iPad hitting stores on April 3rd, expect Amazon to get its app out the door in short order.

Reviews: BlackBerry Rocks!

Tags: amazon kindle, apple, ebooks, Kindle, mac

Facebook Starts Sending Page Admins Weekly Stat Reports

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 10:23 PM PDT

Facebook appears to be adding another level of analytics for Fan Page admins: weekly email reports. A number of page owners forwarded us statistics sent to them on Wednesday from the social network, while we received some of our own for the various Pages we manage.

The reports aren't especially detailed, offering only the number of fans added, comments, likes, and visits in the past week. Nonetheless, it's more data for the publishers and brands using Pages – a need that a number of third-parties like Webtrends and Omniture have recently started to try and fulfill.

The feature hasn't been officially announced yet by Facebook, but it follows January's rollout of Post Insights, which tells you the reach and feedback level of each item you post to a Fan Page. Meanwhile, Facebook's overall Insights feature for admins can tell you details about your demographics, longer-term growth, and engagement trends.

In all, this minor feature enhancement represents just another small step in Facebook's mission to make its Pages more appealing to brands, who it hopes in turn spend more money advertising with the site.

Reviews: Facebook

Tags: facebook, facebook pages

First Look: Universal Music’s “Six String” Guitar Game for iPhone

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 09:39 PM PDT

Universal Music Group has debuted a new Guitar Hero-like music simulation game for the iPhone. Priced at $4.99 and available in the App Store right now, it’s called Six String [iTunes link].

The emphasis is on a more realistic and deeper guitar-playing experience than you get in other music games, though it’s still not quite like the real thing. The game comes with licensed UMG songs by artists like Bon Jovi and Tom Petty. It even includes a song by The Scorpions (“Raised on a Rock”) from an album that won’t hit shelves digital or otherwise until March 23.

There are two game modes: Practice Mode and Studio Mode. Practice mode gives you feedback on how accurate you are in hitting notes. Studio Mode turns off those hints and replaces them with status bars that measure your progress. If you make too many mistakes, you’re kicked out of the song.

We played the game for a while today, and our impressions are that it’s one of the better music games for the iPhone. It won’t be as fun as playing Rock Band on the Nintendo Wii with your entire family, but it’s a worthy distraction, and that’s what mobile games are supposed to be.

How You Play

I played electric guitar in a Blues band professionally for two years. Thanks to that experience, I can tell you that while Six String is not too much like the real thing, it feels like a closer approximation than Guitar Hero. That’s despite the lack of a guitar peripheral — not that I’m complaining that there’s not one (you wouldn’t want to carry around a peripheral with your phone, obviously!).

Six String feels more like a real guitar because the mistakes you make are similar to the ones you’d make on a real guitar — with one hand, anyway. The game simulates the strumming and picking hand and has you using the touchscreen to either strum, tap, or hold each individual string (or a group if strings) in correct time as the notes come up. It works well and it feels a little bit like you’re actually playing music when you’re getting it right.

The game also prompts you with chord changes on harder difficulty levels, but you perform them by tapping with the same fingers you use to play the strings. If you miss notes or chord changes, the music is digitally altered to sound a bit off. It doesn’t sound very realistic, but you can tell what you’re doing wrong. As with Guitar Hero, the skills of real guitar players won’t translate here or vice versa. But that’s not really the point, because it’s a fun game to play.

When you complete a song, you’re given detailed stats and feedback. You can share them with friends through the online service described below.

Online Features

The game comes with six songs: Bon Jovi's "You Give Love A Bad Name," Tom Petty's "Runnin' Down A Dream," Fall Out Boy's "Thnks Fr Th Mmrs," Peter Frampton's "Show Me The Way" and Orianthi's "According To You." If you tire of those, you can buy more in the included music store. Each new track costs $0.99. If you’d like, you can buy the same songs on iTunes from within the app. You can also watch music videos or download ring tones.

Six String connects to a social gaming service called Plus+. You can share your top scores, compete for a spot on the leader boards, and check on any friend’s status. UMG put some Twitter and Facebook integration in the mix, too. It’s similar to the Feint network that’s used by several other iPhone games out there.

Do you have a favorite music game for the iPhone? Head down to the comments below to fill us and the other readers in!

Reviews: Facebook, Twitter

Tags: App, apple, apple app store, guitar, iphone, Mobile 2.0, music, six string, six strings, umg, universal music group, video games

It’s True: Twitter Is Down

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 08:19 PM PDT

Update: It’s back!

Twitter has gone down for the count, and nobody knows why yet. Fail whales now dominate the microblogging site.

Twitter is aware of the situation and posted the following update:

“We're investigating a general site outage since about 8:03pm PDT.”

Not much of an update, but at least the Twitter team is aware and communicating about the situation. While we anxiously wait until we can tweet again, feel free to start your own Twitter conversation in the comments.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: twitter

“My Mom’s on Facebook:” The YouTube Anthem [VIDEO]

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 07:35 PM PDT

Are your parents on Facebook? Do you wish they weren’t? Well, it looks like you’re not alone.

We already knew that Facebook users are getting older. You can’t have 400+ million users without a few (million) adults, after all. So many parents are now joining the world’s largest social network that Facebook added a section where you could declare your family affiliations.

Not everyone’s a fan though, and college kids who used to post countless pictures of their passed out bodies strewn across the dorm floor now have worry about mom posting that one picture of you in tights on your Facebook wall.

Well, the good people over at Back of the Class feel your pain, and thus have created a hair metal anthem dedicated to your woes: “My Mom’s on Facebook.” It’s dedicated to all of those things you just wish your mom wouldn’t say on your Facebook wall.

While the lyrics and instrumentals may not be worthy of Led Zeppelin, their metal rocking ways have quicly gone viral, amassing over 125,000 views in a single day. Watch and listen, and you’ll see why:

Reviews: Facebook

Tags: facebook, viral, viral video, youtube

Google TV is Coming to a Living Room Near You

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 05:49 PM PDT

Not too long ago we got word that Google is working on a TV search project with Dish Network, and now there’s every indication the search giant wants even more direct involvement with the television ecosystem. According to the New York Times, they’re partnering with Sony and Intel in a new Android-based platform literally dubbed Google TV.

The new set-top box will allow users to surf online video from the comforts of the couch, and will compete with the likes of the Boxee Box and the Popbox we got our hands on at CES this year, the Roku set-top device, and to some extent video game consoles that have the ability to stream content from Netflix, Amazon Video on Demand, and others. Beyond straight up video, the idea is to give users an interface to access popular social sites like Twitter and browse photos on sharing sites like Google-owned Picasa on their TVs as well.

As with Android itself, Google TV will likely be an open source platform, with Sony stepping up to manufacture the first hardware that will run it — likely including both set-top boxes and internet-connected TVs. Meanwhile, peripherals manufacturer Logitech is reportedly working on accessories for Google TV devices like a remote control with a small keyboard.

The project is reported to be a few months in already, although without official commentary from Google itself the news technically remains in rumor status. Would you be interested in having a Google-based TV experience?

[via DigitalBeat]

[img credit: marketing.fm]

Reviews: Android, Google, Picasa, Twitter

Tags: android, Google, google tv, intel, iptv, ONLINE VIDEO, set-top box, sony, tv

Tumblr Gets a BlackBerry App

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 05:05 PM PDT

Until recently, blogging clients for the BlackBerry have been pretty limited. But WordPress for BlackBerry was released last month, and today Tumblr released its official BlackBerry app, which lets you post photos, videos, audio, links and text directly from the BlackBerry to your microblog.

Mobelux, the guys behind the stellar Tumblr iPhone app are also the masterminds behind Tumblr BlackBerry. That means that the same attractive interface and robust feature support from the iPhone app is now available to CrackBerry addicts alike.

Tumblr is hosting the app so that you can download it directly to your device. BlackBerry Storm 2 owners might have some issues, but Mobelux developer Jason Emerick has the solution posted on his blog.

The app supports different post types, saving drafts, and publishing options including whether or not you want to also send out the post to Twitter. You can send images from your library directly to Tumblr (just like the Flickr for BlackBerry app) and select pre-existing videos or record new video directly from the app itself.

Kudos to Tumblr — who also tells us the app got 25,000 downloads in the first hour — for putting together a BlackBerry client that doesn’t make any compromises. What apps do you use for blogging from your Blackberry? Let us know!

Reviews: Flickr, Tumblr, Twitter

Tags: blackberry, blogging, tumblr

AWESOME: iPad Digital Magazine Demo [VIDEO]

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 04:22 PM PDT

We’ve witnessed publishers drooling over the Apple iPad’s form factor before the darn thing was even announced, with Time Inc. showing off a concept for Sports Illustrated and Condé Nast prepping a version of Wired for a tablet as early as November of last year.

First came Wired’s official iPad demo, and now there’s a new inspirational vision of the future of digital magazines, courtesy of the following video.

Alexx Henry Photography collaborated with co-directors Cory Strassburger and Ming Hsiung to produce the following cover and feature spread interactive animation for all-digital magazine Viv Mag.

The concept is to envision the interactive publishing potential allowed by the iPad and other tablets coming onto the market in the near, near future. You can check out a behind-the-scenes look at how the video was put together in the second clip below.

Let us know what you think: Are tablets the ultimate savior of print publishing? Would you be interested in checking out a digital magazine like the one depicted in the video?

VIV Mag Interactive Feature Spread – iPad Demo from Alexx Henry on Vimeo.

Behind the Scenes

VIV Mag Featurette: A Digital Magazine Motion Cover and Feature for the iPad from Alexx Henry on Vimeo.

Reviews: Vimeo

Tags: apple, digital magazine, ipad, publishing, tablets, video, Viv Mag

Foursquare Adds Almost 100,000 Users in 10 Days

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 03:57 PM PDT

Foursquare might've been last year's breakout app at SXSW, but it looks like this year’s conference had a much more profound impact on the service's growth. The location based network tweeted on Wednesday afternoon that it's added "almost 100,000 users" in the past 10 days.

That's a huge number when you consider that the year-old company reported having "over 500,000" users less than a week ago. Anecdotally, I can also tell you that the surge in friend requests received over the past several days roughly lines-up with the numbers that Foursquare is reporting – in other words, my network seems to be growing proportionally to Foursquare on the whole.

Foursquare also reported a record check-in day over the weekend, with 347,000 of them taking place on Saturday, a surge also fueled in large part by SXSW festivities. As for the much talked about rivalry between Foursquare and Gowalla, we've reached out to the latter for their own comparable stats, though they indicated that as of Tuesday evening they'd seen 100,000 check-ins in Austin since last Thursday.

Reviews: Foursquare, Gowalla

Tags: foursquare, gowalla, sxsw

FTC on Google Buzz: Consumer Privacy Cannot Be Run in Beta

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 03:33 PM PDT

Earlier today, FTC commissioner Pamela Jones Harbour cited Google Buzz’s “irresponsible conduct” at launch as an example of how companies are being too careless with consumer privacy and online data.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the remarks were made at a public roundtable on privacy-related matters hosted by the FTC, where Harbour made it clear that the FTC can and will take an active interest in protecting consumer privacy.

“The Commission will unfailingly step in to protect consumers where we believe the law has been violated, and that includes violations relating to privacy promises,” she said.

The commissioner’s remarks echo the sentiments of researcher Danah Boyd during her SXSW keynote, and the infuriated Gmail users who felt exposed when they were involuntarily following or being followed by their frequent e-mail contacts per the algorithm of Google Buzz’s original auto-follow feature.

Google has since made major tweaks to Buzz, but Harbour believes the misfire is a symptom of a greater problem. She says: “This is turning into a dangerous game of 'copycat' behavior … Unlike a lot of tech products, consumer privacy cannot be run in beta.”

Obviously Harbour’s strong words were directed beyond Google and could apply to all Internet companies that store personally identifiable information on consumers and their online behaviors. As users we tend to forget about the implications of our online actions and naively place our trust in the cloud by storing information, files and communication online. Hopefully the FTC’s agenda around privacy will help to ensure that our trust is not abused in the future.

[img credit: iSerg, iStockphoto]

Reviews: Gmail, Google, Google Buzz, iStockphoto

Tags: FTC, google buzz, privacy

Now All BlackBerry Apps Can Have Push Notifications

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 03:21 PM PDT

Today, RIM is opening up the BlackBerry Push Service to all BlackBerry developers.

Push notifications let applications notify users of an alert or new message in real-time. This feature has been available to some developers since October of 2008, but today, everyone can get in on the action.

This can be especially useful for breaking news, sports scores or for social networking apps like Twitter and Facebook. Push notifications also improve battery life, because the app doesn’t have to constantly poll a server looking for new data.

RIM has a new page dedicated to the BlackBerry Push Service for developers that gives an overview of how the system works, the different service options and links to resources in the SDK.

Developers have a choice of what type of Push Service they want to implement. BlackBerry Push Essentials support is free for all tiers of users. Developers that want to have more control over their push notifications and content delivery can opt for the BlackBerry Push Plus service, with an annual fee based on how many push notifications are sent per day.

Apps that already use the BlackBerry Push Service include WeatherBug Elite, CNNMoney, 7digital and Facebook for BlackBerry.

It’s nice to see RIM doing more developer outreach to cultivate more feature-rich applications. The BlackBerry is still the most popular smartphone in the United States, but competitors like the iPhone and Android are moving much faster in terms of application development and innovation.

Do you develop for the BlackBerry? Does open access to push notifications affect your development plans? Let us know!

Reviews: Android, Facebook, Twitter

Tags: blackberry, push notifications, RIM

Steve Jobs Cheese Head Feeds Your Next Geek Party [PICS]

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 03:11 PM PDT

When you really need those hors d’oeuvres to impress your geek friends, look no further than the Steve Jobs Cheese Head. Upon witnessing the photographic evidence you may be hungry — or you may be just plain disturbed. But if you’re brave enough to give it a try for your next cocktail party, check out the full instructions on The Cooks’ Den.

Tags: apple, cooking, Food, steve jobs

Italian Police Use Facebook to Capture Mafia Fugitive

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 03:00 PM PDT

Suspected Italian mafioso Pasquale Manfredi was apprehended in the southern region of Calabria thanks to his Facebook contacts.

Many are concerned with the privacy implications of sharing information online, and criminals increasingly have cause to be more concerned than anyone — as Manfredi could probably tell you.

BBC News reports that Italian police have used the suspect’s network of connections on the popular social networking site to ascertain his whereabouts. One of the country’s top 100 most-wanted suspects, Manfredi was reportedly arrested trying to escape from the rooftop of an apartment complex in the city of Crotone.

It’s not the first time Facebook has been used to locate a suspect: a careless robber in Pennsylvania was nabbed after updating his Facebook status inside the victim’s home, a Facebook death threat led to an arrest in Colombia, and a British man who taunted police on Facebook was apprehended by Scotland Yard.

In other words: Social networks have enough privacy implications for the law-abiding among us; criminals should really think twice about trying to maintain an identity online.

[img credit: davidsonscott15]

Reviews: Facebook

Tags: arrest, crime, facebook, italy, police, privacy

6 Ways Law Enforcement Uses Social Media to Fight Crime

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 02:46 PM PDT

Lon S. Cohen is a freelance writer and is @obilon on Twitter. He's also the Director of Communications at @ALSofGNY.

From felons on Facebook to tips through Twitter, social media is being used more and more by law enforcement agencies, and not just to fight Internet-related crimes. We're talking about solving crimes that are happening on the street and in your community.

According to Lauri Stevens, founder of LAwS Communications and organizer of the SMILE (Social Media In Law Enforcement) Conference being held in Washington D.C. this April, adoption of social media is still in the "very, very, early stages," but she sees it making an upward turn. "I expect 2010 will be a monumental year," she said.

But many police departments that have embraced social media are still trying to figure it out.

“Most agencies … are not significantly proactive with keeping up with content and updates," said Terry Halsch from CitizenObserver.com, developers of the tip411 system for police agencies. "There are some limitations because of uncertainty of how secure information is, how can it be efficiently maintained, [and] the risks and liabilities of entering the world of social media.”

Below are six different ways law enforcement is utilizing social media and real-time search to enhance tactics, disseminate public information, and ultimately prevent criminal activity.

1. Police Blotter Blogs

A police blotter is the record of events at a police station. Traditionally, a desk sergeant kept a register of these events. Nowadays, Twitter feeds, blogs, YouTube, and Facebook Fan Pages are being used by captains and chiefs to put out the digital equivalent of the police blotter in real-time.

Publishing a register of crimes and arrests in an area has been an online activity for a while now, especially through local newspaper websites. But social media is allowing many police officers on the scene to report the publicly available details of a crime for themselves. Reporters are getting their facts directly from a stream of real time-data and blog posts coming from the department.

Individual cops aren't about to turn into citizen journalists anytime soon, but the police are able, through social media and real-time updates, to provide essential information that the public and news gathering agencies need to know. Journalists today often use the web for their first line of research, and rely on web-based police reports for many of the details they need for a story.

"We don't just release the police report; we write our own story and post it to our website," said Mark Economou, the Public Information Manager for the Boca Raton Police Department in Boca Raton, Florida in a post on ConnectedCops.com. "Even more interesting, we are finding the media is just cutting and pasting our stories to their sites, both in television and print."

The Boca Raton Police Department has developed their own branded web platform that they call Viper. Social media is a very important part of their strategy, and like anyone adopting social media into a plan, they use it to support and enhance the work they already do.

2. The Digital “Wanted Poster”

In the vein of an Old West “Wanted” poster, displayed in the most trafficked area of town, modern-day law enforcement agencies are posting descriptions of criminals on today’s most trafficked spots — namely the social web.

With millions of users, extraordinary reach, and the lightning-fast exchange of text, photos, and video, platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube are ideal for getting the word out about wanted persons with up-to-the-minute updates.

The Boynton Beach Police Department is a good example. On their Facebook Fan Page, the department put up a post with the headline, “Police need help identifying motorcyclist who robbed man at ATM.” In the post there was a photo from the ATM machine of the crime in progress. The department also cross-posted the information to their Twitter page.

In the UK, the Leicestershire Constabulary is one of a number of police departments focusing on being hyper-local and involved with the community through social media. Their website has a section titled “Can you help?” which is formatted like a blog, and contains posts about ongoing criminal investigations, and a “Wanted Poster” and “Missing Persons” area with photos and requests for residents to respond with any leads they might have.

The stories are also fed to a Facebook Page that is very interactive and updated constantly. They also maintain a Twitter profile, a YouTube account, and the department offers the ability to subscribe to their news feed via RSS. It's an impressive mixture of social media tools that seems to work fluidly and update automatically.

3. Anonymous E-Tipsters

Tips from the community have been a time-honored way that citizens have worked with the public to fight crime.

Consulting companies are developing very sophisticated ways for the public and the police to interact online. The tip411 program developed by the CitizenObserver Corporation is marketed to law enforcement as a web-based notification toolset. Citizen participation has always been a big part of fighting crime, and the people at tip411 stress that social media "acts as a 'force multiplier' by empowering your community to get involved."

“Anonymous text tip systems are gaining significant traction because they enable young people to provide information without fear of retribution, i.e. ‘Snitches get Snitches,’” said CitizenObserver's Terry Halsch.

The program allows tipsters to send information anonymously through a variety of means including "anonymous web chat, text tips and secure social media publishing." Filtered alerts can then be pushed out through a police department’s central location to other web mediums. Bundled with other offerings, tip411 can then be published with Google Maps to create a clickable, interactive crime "heat map" of sorts where others can click on links directly to add more information and tips based on location. This program is meant to encourage increased interaction between the police and the community through real-time web tools.

"It doesn’t matter to us where the information comes from," said Detroit's Chief of Police, Warren Evans, a tip411 user. "We just want the information so we can act on it. I want people to know that they can feel safe using this system to communicate with us directly."

4. Social Media Stakeout

Social media advocates stress listening as a part of any brand's online marketing strategy. Listening to the bad guys doing bad things has always been a part of police work. It's important for police to search the real-time web to target particular keywords and phrases being passed around on social media. Use of social media monitoring has a strategic, tactical and operational application for law enforcement.

Boston Police Department Superintendent John Daly spoke about using Twitter search to monitor chatter around the Boston area in real-time. He's very sensitive to the implications of engaging in this type of search, as many police departments are.

"We have to be very careful because there’s a Big Brother aspect to this," Daly said.

He stressed that they were not looking at "everyday messages," as he put it, but specific tweets that signaled something they should be looking into.

"But when people start saying, ‘What’s that smoke coming from the Hancock Tower?’ or ‘Why is everybody running around Copley Place –- is something going on?’ — if two or three things come in we look at patterns, trends, something maybe we should be paying attention [to]. So it’s sort of an early warning system."

5. Thwarting Thugs in the Social Space

Myspace, Facebook and Twitter are popular with gang members, and police use this to their advantage. Law enforcement has been able to infiltrate street gangs by posing as fellow gang members online, making connections, and intercepting criminal communications as they happen. Information like photos, videos, and friend links help law enforcement understand the dynamics of gangs when investigating their activities.

"Investigators build phony profiles to 'friend' gang members either within YouTube, Facebook or Bebo, and then may migrate that friendship to another platform and gain trust and get their 'friends' to share useful information," said SMILE conference organizer Lauri Stevens.

According to an article in 219magazine, police in Cincinnati used Facebook and MySpace to follow more than 20 members of a local gang, the “Northside Taliband.” The evidence they gathered helped law enforcement connect members to a multitude of crimes, including a possible homicide.

Other agencies have employed these tactics as well. The NYPD is using the Internet to monitor gang activity, as well, and in a story reported in the Daily News, cops said that gangs have been communicating on Twitter. They think that one Twitter exchange between gang members may even have resulted in the shooting of a youth. The police seek out code words and slang used by individual members to follow gang members online who are organizing illegal activities.

"It is another tool … just like old phone records,” a police source said in the article.

6. Tracking and Informing with Twitter

As we all know, Twitter has plenty of uses for individuals and companies. Law enforcement also uses the service to communicate with the public.

Stevens told us that she follows at least 700 law enforcement agencies worldwide on Twitter alone. Not all of them are active, but some have found unique ways to incorporate Twitter into their police tactics. "The LAPD used Twitter to monitor crowds during the Michael Jackson funeral," for example, said Stevens, and the Boston Police have been using Twitter to alert followers of evolving situations in real time.

Sergeant Tim Burrows does media relations for the traffic services unit in the Toronto Police Service. Tim saw his traffic safety messaging hampered by the mainstream media's editing time lines, so he started using Twitter to talk to the local media about ongoing situations and inform the public. He considers his tweets about traffic safety information a valuable public service.

The Broward County Sheriff's Office took things a step further. When the police wanted to utilize social media they, like many agencies, felt that existing public sites were too unsecured and vulnerable for a system-wide roll out within the department. So inspired by Twitter, the department took things into their own hands.

"CyberVisor was my vision of Broward County Sheriff's Office’s own controlled Twitter," said Lynne Martzall, External Affairs Manager, who worked with webmaster Tony Petruzzi to create it.

Since it was rolled out, CyberVisor has been used to broadcast information about unfolding situations, such as crimes in progress, to put out information after a bank robbery and when the Sheriff’s Office was looking for an escaped convict. For now, the public can't respond to CyberVisor — it's broadcast only — but it has still be effective.

In one instance, they alerted followers to someone in South Broward County impersonating an officer. In another, they sent out a missing child alert from a local elementary school with a detailed description of the child's physical appearance and where the child was last seen.

More social media resources from Mashable:

- The Science of Building Trust With Social Media
- How Companies Are Using Your Social Media Data
- How Twitter in the Classroom is Boosting Student Engagement
- 4 Ways the Entertainment Industry is Getting More Social
- How Musicians Are Using Social Media to Connect with Fans

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, jodiecoston

Reviews: Bebo, Facebook, Google Maps, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube, iStockphoto, michael jackson

Tags: BLOGS, facebook, law enforcement, police, social media, social networks, twitter, youtube

Track Your Favorite Band’s Online Buzz with Next Big Sound

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 02:34 PM PDT

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: Next Big Sound

Quick Pitch: Next Big Sound is a tool that gauges the popularity of bands and artists via fan activity on a variety of social networking sites.

Genius Idea: As the music industry and the online world become more and more enmeshed, tracking band popularity via album sales — and even digital downloads (Hello, piracy!) — seems rather arcane. Just because a band isn’t moving a ton of CDs at any given time doesn’t make it less buzzworthy — especially as services like Pandora and Spotify continue to take off.

That’s where Next Big Sound comes in. The website is basically a tool for fans, artists, music industry professionals and journalists to track the popularity of an artist across 16 sites: Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, Twitter, iLike, Wikipedia, Soundcloud, Reverb Nation, Pure Volume, OurStage, Vimeo, Bebo, Amie Street, Jam Legend and Virb. Fan interaction counts as plays, fans, views, likes, downloads and comments — depending on the site.

As of right now, the site functions like a wiki; you can add bands that have not yet been included (I added Everyone Was in the French Resistance… Now!). Currently, there are 699,328 artist profiles.

We tested out the service with YouTube darlings OK Go, banking on the fact that the social media space has been buzzing about them as of late.

As you can see, there’s a pretty visible spike in online activity around March 1, when OK Go’s new video premiered.

You can also compare bands to see who’s getting the most buzz. This could be a great tool for determining the breakout band during a festival like SXSW — or for bitter, insecure musicians to employ when their rivals hit the big-time. We tried it here with OK Go and smaller (yet perhaps more rad) band Surfer Blood.

Surfer Blood’s social media cache isn’t quite as big as OK Go’s, but there’s a visible spike in recent activity, which makes sense considering the band is playing SXSW today.

Next Big Sound makes it pretty easy for you to get in on the action — as least as a fan, I’m not in a band, so I haven’t tried out the “verify your band’s account” feature — you can star your favorite bands and have updates on their stats sent your inbox at whatever time you choose (either daily or weekly).

Right now, the site is collecting data on media mentions of SXSW bands to determine which are getting the most attention — it even has as online playlist of hot bands. This data is sure to be a godsend to music journalists, concert venues and labels following the fest, which is considered one of the top arenas for breakout bands to make their mark.

We’re down with Next Big Sound — as both a tool and toy for musicians and music enthusiasts. It’s cool to see a company change how it thinks about the music industry, which seems to be more in flux every day.

1. Code Cheat Sheets

iphone apps web developers concentric sky code cheat sheets

Concentric Sky offers a range of code “cheat sheets” ideal for when your mind just goes blank and you’re away from your usual reference material. Priced at $0.99 each, there are apps available for CSS, mySQL, JavaScript, php, RegEx, jQuery and HTML — the last three of which let you write and test code inside the app. Searchable, and clearly laid out, the info in the apps is available offline, unlike other options that link out to external references. Whether you want to brush up on the bus, or need to code on-the-go, these will be a useful weapon in your web design arsenal. Another great alternative is jQuery 1.4.

Cost: $0.99 each

2. Color Stream

iphone apps web developers color stream color palette app

A little bit like Adobe’s Kuler on your handset, Color Stream is an app that will help you narrow down the correct color, or palette of colors, for a project. The Lite version of the app is available for free, and lets you create a palette of five colors side-by-side using a slider bar in either RGB or CMYK modes. You can then identify your chosen shades by their hexadecimal values for use on the web. This is handy enough, but the paid-for option (priced at $2.99) offers even more functionality, such as the ability to save palettes, use the built-in color schemes, or even match colors perfectly by creating a palette based on elements from an image or photo.

Cost: Lite version is free, full version is $2.99

3. FTP on the Go

iphone apps web developers ftp on the go ftp client

If you need to be able to securely log-in to a server away from your desk, then this app — which emulates desktop FTP clients on your mobile — might well be the answer. As well as offering the ability to edit text on the fly and make those changes live quickly, there’s the option to view common file types, download them to your iPhone, e-mail them, and upload videos and correctly-sized pics from your mobile device too. Meanwhile, cleverly getting around the iPhone’s multi-tasking issues, there’s a built-in web browser so you can see changes without leaving the app, allowing for speedy work — which as far as we know, no client has ever complained about.

If you don’t need access to your FTP server, don’t forget about Dropbox for the iPhone, which will let you view your Dropbox folder while on the go.

Cost: $6.99

4. Ego

iphone apps web developers ego stat tracking

For an on-the-go, at-a-glance look at you site’s stats, either for your own consumption, or to keep a customer satisfied, Ego is a one-stop-shop for such data. This app does not go into extreme detail, but it will summarize data from Ember, Feedburner, Google Analytics, Mint (with an additional download), Squarespace, Twitter and Vimeo. Data such as how many Twitter followers an account has racked up, feed subscription totals, and visitor numbers are all at your fingertips in an easy-to-use app that saves you logging into to a plethora of individual services. The developer, Garrett Murray, says Ego offers a flexible framework for adding support for other services, and welcomes suggestions on adding other stat-tracking options.

Cost: $1.99

5. Read & Note

iphone apps web developers read and note

In addition to offering a full-screen browser (as opposed to the iPhone’s Safari window), this app allows you to make notes on, or copy and paste text from, web pages. Whether you’re browsing around for inspiration or assessing a site for changes/improvements, being able to easily annotate the web with a mobile app is simply brilliant. Other functionality includes the ability to upload .txt .doc .pdf .ppt .xls .rtf .jpg files, bookmark sites, and share uploaded documents over Wi-Fi to any web-enabled computer.

Cost: $1.99

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More web development resources from Mashable:

- 5 Free Android Apps for Web Developers
- 10 Popular Firefox Add-ons for Web Developers
- 10 Essential Chrome Extensions for Web Developers
- 11 Outstanding Online Resources for Web Developers
- 7 Superb Social Plugins for WordPress

Reviews: Dropbox, Google Analytics, Mint, Safari, SquareSpace, Twitter, Vimeo

Tags: apps, code, html, iphone apps, Mobile 2.0, web design, web developer, Web Development, web development series

Coming Soon: Log in to Digg with Twitter, Google and More [PIC]

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 12:49 PM PDT

This past weekend, Digg CEO Jay Adelson revealed that the social news site is working on a complete overhaul that will be rolled out over the coming weeks and months. Today, the company provided a sneak peek at one of the major additions: the ability to log in to the site using a variety of third-party services.

In addition to supporting your Digg and Facebook accounts (which the site already does), Digg plans to let you use your Twitter, Google, Yahoo or OpenID accounts. Here's what that screen will look like:

Digg says it decided to start with those services based on finding out which services that its members already use. The data offers some interesting insight into the Digg audience and its overlap with other online communities and services:

This is just one of many things Digg hopes will spur a new wave of growth at the site, but it could be a key piece. The company says in a blog post that its Facebook Connect integration increased registrations by 20-30%.

Reviews: Digg, Facebook, Google, Twitter

Tags: digg, facebook connect, openID

YouTube Is Huge: 24 Hours of Video Now Uploaded Every Minute

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 12:31 PM PDT

YouTube has just announced that it has surpassed yet another milestone, and this one’s a doozy: 24 hours of video is now uploaded to the social video site every sixty seconds. Every second you are browsing YouTube, a full 24 minutes of video is uploaded to the site.

On May 20, 2009, YouTube announced that its users were uploading 20 hours of video per minute. That means in a 10-month time frame, YouTube uploading has increased by more than 17%. The feat’s incredibly impressive by almost any standard. More than two million minutes of video (or 34,560 hours) is now uploaded onto YouTube per day.

The Google-owned video site even provided a graph depicting its growth:

Around April or May 2008, users were “only” uploading 12 hours of video per minute. In less than two years, YouTube has doubled that influx of content. There’s no sign of it stopping

Reviews: YouTube

Tags: ONLINE VIDEO, video, youtube

Posterous Now Lets You Schedule Posts for Later

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 12:27 PM PDT

Posterous — the e-mail-to-blog-to-everywhere platform — has just introduced a new feature that will let users schedule posts to be published in the future via e-mail, web or bookmarklet.

The appeal of Posterous is that every blogging behavior can be completed via e-mail with little to no thinking involved; this feature is no different. To schedule posts, users simply need to add “delay” or “publish” commands to e-mail subject lines and specify time constraints.

To publish a post on a specific date add “((publish: on mo/day/year))” or to delay publishing add “((delay: in x minutes or hours))” after your post title in the subject line of the e-mail. The “schedule later” option is also available in the Advance Settings portion of the bookmarklet or the Manage Page section on the web (see below).

The new feature addition is a minor upgrade with bigger implications as Posterous continues to make its simple blogging platform more business-friendly. It also comes just a few days after the introduction of a page break element, and further exemplifies how such a simple platform can support complex functionality.

[img credit: dolphinsdock]

Reviews: Posterous

Tags: posterous, social media

Our Social Media Obsession by the Numbers [STATS]

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 11:55 AM PDT

From the time we wake up in the morning to the moment we call it a day, and every moment in between (think bedroom, bathroom and dinner table), we’re checking in on our favorite social media sites.

This conclusion comes from data gathered by an independent study (commissioned by Retrevo), which surveyed 1,000 online individuals.

Per the report, our Facebook and Twitter activities continue even after we’ve hit the hay, with 48% of respondents checking in on activity when they wake up in the middle of the night or as soon as they wake up in the morning. Unsurprisingly, these night owl social media behaviors skew heavily toward those under the age of 25.

iPhone users are the most social of the respondent pool and were significantly more likely to check or update Twitter or Facebook from bed — many before turning on the TV in the morning. Several also use these sites to consume their morning news. The iPhone’s app and web experience is clearly making it even easier for the young socialites to maintain their Internet presence regardless of their physical station in life.

The study also found that 56% of social media users check Facebook once a day, 32% don’t mind being interrupted by an electronic message while eating and 24% of respondents under the age of the 25 have no problem with digital communication while on the pot.

A few other interesting data points from the study include:

- 12% of respondents check/use Facebook every couple of hours
- 62% of individuals over the age of 25 see electronic communications during a meeting, meal, sex or bathroom act as unwanted interruptions
- 23% of iPhone owners primarily get their morning news from Twitter and Facebook

While we can’t verify that the data is representative of the entire population, most of these stats — which might be surprising on first look — should be expected. Now that smartphones with apps are ubiquitous, it’s quite logical that these devices would accompany their owners even in the most private or intimate of scenarios.

[img credit: Markus Bollingmo]

Reviews: Facebook, Twitter

Tags: facebook, social media, stats, trending, twitter

Zach Galifianakis Interviews Ben Stiller on “Between Two Ferns” [VIDEO]

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 11:34 AM PDT

Comedian Zach Galifianakis’s edgy celebrity interview web show Between Two Ferns attracted a big movie star in its latest episode. Ben Stiller came on the show, and the Funny or Die-hosted video has been spreading quickly in blog posts and tweets today.

Between Two Ferns is nominated for multiple Streamy Awards this year. Each episode features recent SNL host Zach Galifianakis (known for his work in Comedians of Comedy and The Hangover) awkwardly interviewing a deadpan celebrity guest while sitting between two ferns. Usually he passive-aggressively does something extremely unprofessional, causing the guest to become increasingly flustered.

This viral vid with Ben Stiller follows a similar pattern. Galifianakis opens the interview by botching Ben Stiller’s last name, then suggesting he change it to “There, Done That” — it goes even further downhill from there.

Here’s the video, but be warned that it has some NSFW language, so you might want to plug in those headphones.

Tags: ben stiller, Between Two Ferns, celebrities, comedy, funny or die, viral video, web series, zach galifianakis

MacBook Pro, Air and Mac Pro Refresh Coming Soon [RUMOR]

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 11:18 AM PDT

If these Australian Apple ads are any indication, a hardware refresh may be coming soon for at least the MacBook Pro, MacBook Air and Mac Pro lines.

The official-looking ads show higher pricing than what the Australian online store actually lists when you click through them, suggesting that the ads represent an early look at what the pricing will be for the refreshed hardware lines.

Similar pricing inconsistencies were found within Apple’s own New Zealand site, lending credence to the theory that a hardware refresh — and accompanying price change — might be on the way in the near near future.

We’ve also seen hints flying around recently that Apple is working on a processor upgrade for its Mac lines to Intel Core i5 and Core i7 chips.

The MacRumors Buying Guide, which tracks upgrade rumors and average hardware refresh times, also currently lists the Macbook Pro, Air and Mac Pro units as status “Don’t Buy — Updates soon.”

In other words, it’s still a collection of tiny details, but all signs seem to point to an impending Mac hardware refresh. If you’re contemplating picking up a Mac in one of those lines, it might be worth holding off a short while.

Tags: apple, Hardware, intel, intel core i5, intel core i7, mac, mac pro, macbook, macbook air, Macbook Pro

Mashable’s Weekly Guide to Social Media Job Opportunities

Posted: 17 Mar 2010 11:17 AM PDT

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: