Google revenues were up 32 percent, to a record $9 billion. Android activates 550,000 devices a day. Google+ had 10 million users in less than two weeks of limited availability. But Google can’t ease up on the accelerator. Though Google dominates search, U.S. query volume is flat […] Read more »
Social game developer Lolapps has signed an agreement to merge with game publisher 6waves The newly combined company will have one major competitor in its sights: Zynga. “We’re going to be the clear number two in the space very quickly,” said Lolapps CEO Arjun Sethi. Read more »
More employees toting mobile devices don’t have to cause harm to large enterprises with strict IT compliance rules. In fact, those employees armed with tablets and smartphones can be trained to become brand ambassadors on social media sites and to help the company’s image. Read more »
When it comes to the social networking crowd, sex apparently sells. Victoria’s Secret ended June as the top retailer on Facebook with more than 14.3 million fans, according to the latest data from e-commerce software provider ChannelAdvisor. Walmart, the world’s top corporation by revenue, ranks fourth. Read more »
Google+ has gained 10 million users in the few weeks since its launch, but it has a long way to go to catch up with Facebook. So why is Google CEO Larry Page convinced Google+ will be a major competitor in the social space? Read more »
According to multiple reports, Twitter is close to launching in-stream advertising, including a self-serve platform that will allow companies to inject ads into the network in real time. But how will users react to this intrusion? Forrester Research’s CEO says the move is a big mistake. Read more »
Its fans say Google+ improves on Facebook in terms of privacy protections, because it allows you to filter people into groups or “Circles.” But is this really a big improvement? Not everyone is convinced it is — some argue that it actually makes things worse. Read more »
The latest mobile app to enter the social-video-sharing fray is Vibop, which makes it drop-dead simple to polish your videos and add effects before sharing them with friends. The app is free to download and plans to make money by selling effects in-app. Read more »
LocalResponse — a marketing platform that allows advertisers to send out targeted tweets to consumers based on where consumers have checked in or where they say they are on social networks — has found that its targeting work is paying off with significant engagement from consumers. Read more »
Comments from some prominent ex-Googlers seem to show the company still sees social networking as an engineering problem. While it’s nice the web giant is paying attention to social behavior at all, can it ever understand social networks if it just sees them as data-producing engines? Read more »
If you’re curious about the technology behind Google+, you’re in luck. The project’s technical lead, Google engineer Joseph Smarr, is currently hosting an online question and answer session about the service, sharing details about the social platform’s development, technology, and plans for the future. Read more »
More than 10,000 developers behind some of the hottest mobile apps are using Foursquare’s application programming interface to tap into its location and places database, the company said Friday. The most popular apps running on Foursquare’s API include Instagram, Tweetdeck and Gowalla. Read more »
The web may be more social now than ever before, but according to a recent study, there’s still a lot more room to grow. Fewer than half of the world’s top websites link to Facebook or Twitter on their front pages, according to a new research. Read more »
Google+ is already popular, and it isn’t yet showing any signs of slowing down. If you’re already in or if you’re eagerly awaiting an invite, there are a few ways you can improve the experience when accessing Google’s new social network from Mac and iOS devices. Read more »
Facebook has announced a partnership with Skype that enables one-on-one video chat within the social networking website.The video chat debut is just the first of what Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said would be a series of launches the company has planned for the near future. Read more »
Just as Google smartphone sales may have peaked by comparison, the introduction of Google+ could provide a boost to Android’s market share in the long run. While there’s an iOS and HTML5 version of the new social service, the experience is likely best on Android phones. Read more »
A Wall Street Journal article argues that the proliferation of “like” buttons, retweets and other online voting encourages conformity in online behavior, and that we don’t reveal our “true selves” online because we are afraid of being voted down by the crowd. But is this true? Read more »
Belarussian president Alexander Lukashenko is the latest dictator to try and quash unrest by banning social networking sites. But whether or not his fears are accurate, the truth is simple: many countries now think the success of the Internet is indistinguishable from America’s political ambitions. Read more »
While some mainstream media outlets are trying to take advantage of social tools to engage with their readers, others still seem stuck in the Dark Ages. The latest example of a misguided policy comes from E.W. Scripps, which owns a chain of newspapers and TV affiliates. Read more »
Analysts at Wall Street’s major financial firms initiated wholesale coverage of LinkedIn on Tuesday, putting forth their opinions of the company’s future growth prospects and estimates for how the stock should perform. Wall Street’s predictions for LinkedIn, in a word? Bullish. Read more »
Formspring.me has hit a major milestone in its relatively short lifespan. The 18-month-old San Francisco-based startup, which allows users to create profile pages on which anonymous people can ask them questions, now has 25 million registered users. Read more »
Facebook announced Thursday it has added Reed Hastings, the chairman and CEO of Netflix, to its board of directors. The addition of Hastings to Facebook’s boardroom is the latest signal of the Palo Alto, California-based social networking giant’s growing focus on the entertainment industry. Read more »
Online anonymity has been taking a beating recently, with the Gay Girl in Damascus affair and a recent piece by the former ombudsman at NPR criticizing anonymous comments. But allowing people to be anonymous has real value for society that shouldn’t be dismissed so quickly. Read more »
Skype added deeper Facebook integration to its latest software for Windows, bringing instant messaging, the ability to “like” a Facebook status from Skype and improved contact integration. This is just the start for a stronger partnership between the two and it doesn’t end on the desktop. Read more »
As Turntable.fm has shown, a new era of social music may be upon us, one that is less about scaling wide, but more about going deep. The third era of social music is about immersion as sites add more immediacy and intimacy to the experience. Read more »
Twitter and Facebook are great tools for reporting on world events — but what happens when we turn those tools on one another? We got a glimpse of that in Vancouver, and it was a glimpse of a future that some would rather not see. Read more »
Many recent headlines have been devoted to Facebook’s focus on HTML5, and specifically on an internal HTML5-based project at the company dubbed “Project Spartan.” But Facebook’s investment in HTML5 is nothing new — and it’s certainly nothing that the company has been secretive about. Read more »
A new report from the Pew Center shows that not only are users of social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter more socially and politically engaged both online and offline, but there are few signs of any “echo chamber” effects from online social activity. Read more »
Descuento Libre is a daily deal site catering to Latinos in the United States. While Groupon emphasis new adventures, this year-old site is staking a claim with family-friendly activities and household goods and services and a different model for attracting businesses. Read more »
Raptr, a social network for gamers, is showing some interesting ways in which it’s using what it knows about its members to create tailored experiences that cut through a lot of noise. And it’s showing how social networking can evolve to be even more personal. Read more »
As rumors of a big Facebook/Spotify deal swirled, Mark Zuckerberg took the stage at the e-G8 Forum in Paris and reasserted that he has no ambitions to go Hollywood. “We don’t have the DNA to be a music company or a movie company,” Zuckerberg said. Read more »
People have created a web of connections online through social networks. But a new wave of apps are looking to help people create spontaneous connections when people arrive at specific locations, giving rise to temporary social networks that are built around a place and a time. Read more »
Updated. LinkedIn’s huge debut today may have left some money on the table for initial investors, but it was still very lucrative especially for founder Reid Hoffman, who is now worth $2 billion more based a market cap of $10 billion. Read more »
In recent months, 500px has become the new favorite site of a lot of Flickr “power users.” What’s especially remarkable is that the company, which is bootstrapped and currently has just four full-time employees, has attracted all this growth purely through word-of-mouth. Read more »
The entertainment industry has its eyes set on Facebook, hoping that the site will help to sell VOD rentals for Hollywood blockbusters like The Dark Knight and indie flicks alike. However, history teaches us that social networks can’t help you sell stuff that no one wants. Read more »
LocalResponse is taking location data from check-ins and combining it with implicit location information gathered from social status updates to create a targeted marketing platform that lets businesses reach consumers in real-time wherever they are. Today, they’re rolling out the engine for national brands. Read more »
Online social networks have been around for years, but most of them still make the same basic — and utterly incorrect — assumptions about the way we interact with each other. Whose fault is that, and how exactly do we fix it? Read more »
Keeping up with Twitter, Facebook and all the posts and comments written about your company can be overwhelming. Postling is a centralized dashboard for organizing, managing and tracking all your social media efforts, so that you can engage with your entire online community from one location. Read more »
Integrated voice calls to Facebook chat friends arrives today, but not from Skype, Google Voice or another usual suspect. Say hello to T-Mobile’s new Bobsled brand of solutions, the first of which is a free application that integrates with Facebook for voice calls. Read more »
