8/5 Mashable!

Please add updates@feedmyinbox.com to your address book to make sure you receive these messages in the future. Mashable! - Social software and social networking 2.0. ESPN's Official Twitter Response and Their Social Media Policy Changes August 5, 2009 at 12:39 am Twitter is a strange animal. One man can tweet about an official change in ESPN’s Twitter policy, and the world can respond. In fact, that’s what happened earlier today when we reported on Ric Bucher’s tweet that ESPN was “prohibiting tweeting info unless it serves ESPN.” NPR picked up on the news, and we reported the facts as we knew them at the time. Just a few short hours later, the situation has bubbled up to a point where ESPN has publicly responded to the situation, going so far as to share their addendum to their rules and guidelines for social networking, the memo at the center of the whole ordeal. In fact, ESPN took to Twitter to tweet their official statement to us, well me specifically, and it’s not only refreshingly honest, but the method of response was certainly well received. Nate Smelt (@Nate_ESPN), an ESPN publicist, tweets “@jbruin ESPN’s statement: “We have been active in the social media space for awhile.  As our mission is to serve sports fans, …” and, “..we will continue to be active. We are now merely getting smarter about it by providing guidelines to commentators and reporters.” That’s impressive ESPN, and to be completely fair, the social media guidelines, albeit a little vague and overbearing, are not as bad as we expected. We’ve decided to include them in their entirety so that you, our readers, can judge for yourselves. But the statement that probably elicited the original tweet reads, “The first and only priority is to serve ESPN sanctioned efforts, including sports news, information and content.” Our general impression is that ESPN is sincere about engaging using social media, but perhaps a little overzealous with the words they chose to communicate the policy changes to staff. ESPN’S ADDITIONAL GUIDELINES FOR SOCIAL NETWORKING ESPN regards social networks such as message boards, conversation pages and other forms of social networking such as Facebook and Twitter as important new forms of content. As such, we expect to hold all talent who participate in social networking to the same standards we hold for interaction with our audiences across TV, radio and our digital platforms. This applies to all ESPN Talent, anchors, play by play, hosts, analysts, commentators, reporters and writers who participate in any form of personal social networking that contain sports related content. ESPN Digital Media is currently building and testing modules designed to publish Twitter and Facebook entries simultaneously on ESPN.com, SportsCenter.com, Page 2, ESPN Profile pages and other similar pages across our web site and mobile platforms. The plan is to fully deploy these modules this fall. Specific Guidelines · Personal websites and blogs that contain sports content are not permitted · Prior to engaging in any form of social networking dealing with sports, you must receive permission from the supervisor as appointed by your department head · ESPN.COM may choose to post sports related social media content · If ESPN.com opts not to post sports related social media content created by ESPN talent, you are not permitted to report, speculate, discuss or give any opinions on sports related topics or personalities on your personal platforms · The first and only priority is to serve ESPN sanctioned efforts, including sports news, information and content * Assume at all times you are representing ESPN * If you wouldn’t say it on the air or write it in your column, don’t tweet it * Exercise discretion, thoughtfulness and respect for your colleagues, business associates and our fans · Avoid discussing internal policies or detailing how a story or feature was reported, written, edited or produced and discussing stories or features in progress, those that haven’t been posted or produced, interviews you’ve conducted, or any future coverage plans. · Steer clear of engaging in dialogue that defends your work against those who challenge it and do not engage in media criticism or disparage colleagues or competitors · Be mindful that all posted content is subject to review in accordance with ESPN’s employee policies and editorial guidelines · Confidential or proprietary company information or similar information of third parties who have shared such information with ESPN, should not be shared Any violation of these guidelines could result in a range of consequences, including but not limited to suspension or dismissal. Reviews: Facebook, Twitter Tags: ESPN, social media, twitter Paula Abdul Tweets That She's Leaving American Idol August 4, 2009 at 11:48 pm The rich and famous are increasingly taking ownership of breaking their own news via social media, and that appears to be the case with this huge tidbit for the entertainment world: according to her Twitter page, American Idol judge Paula Abdul is leaving the show. Abdul used several tweets to share the news, writing in full: "With sadness in my heart, I’ve decided not to return to #IDOL. I’ll be miss nurturing all the new talent, but most of all being a part of a show that I helped from day1 become an international phenomenon … What I want to say most is how much I appreciate the undying support and enoormous love that you have showered upon me. It truly has been breathtaking, especially over the past month. I do without any doubt have the BEST fans in the entire world and I love you all." The news doesn't come as a huge shocker to entertainment watchers, as Abdul has been in a somewhat public contract negotiation that apparently never reached a resolution. Idol host Ryan Seacrest even recently tweeted that he "can't imagine doing Idol" without Abdul. Seacrest will now have to find a way, though he has at least 15 million other reasons to stick around. Tags: american idol, paula abdul, twitter Card.ly: Build a Beautiful Social Media Business Card August 4, 2009 at 11:45 pm 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: Card.ly Quick Pitch: Card.ly lets users create easy to share mini virtual business cards that contain all their info. Genius Idea: Business cards need to go the way of the dinosaur. They provide info that can easily be found on Facebook and Twitter, they aren’t interactive, and they waste a lot of paper. A lot of companies seem to agree and have built products that function as virtual business cards – we even highlighted 8 Ways to Create Paperless Business Cards in June. However, Card.ly goes in a different direction. Its goal isn’t just to get you a phone number an an email address, but to create a beautiful, shareable social media card. The virtual business card maker asks you to complete five steps to create your embeddable, shareable card. First is to add your social networks: Card.ly supports dozens of networks from Twitter to Last.fm. Next is to add your personal details – things like your name, your picture, and a quick bio. The next part is the design, something that Card.ly implements beautifully. You have your choice of 27 different skins, though some are only available to premium users. The art and the interface are both clean and impressive in design. The last two steps center around sharing your card. You can (but don’t have to) send your card out via Twitter or embed a button with your contact details. We’d love to be able to embed the entire card, but can understand where that might not make business sense to Card.ly. The end results is a simple, clean, and useful webpage that you can use as your virtual business card. While it’s not as easy to share as Contxts, it is far more elegant of a design – something that isn’t overlooked in the business world. Card.ly’s best features reside behind a premium account – including skins, ad removal, and analytics for your card. It comes at a price of $2.99 a month, which is reasonable compared to some of the other price plans we’ve seen. So if you want to build a beautiful social media card, Card.ly might be the way to go. Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today. Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest – use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines)." Reviews: Contxts, Facebook, Last.fm, PHP, Twitter Tags: bizspark, card.ly NFL Star Antonio Cromartie Fined $2500 Over a Tweet August 4, 2009 at 10:21 pm The NFL, Twitter, and ESPN are in a really bizarre love triangle of sorts that seems to have reached its climax today. Last month we reported that the NFL will not allow in-game tweeting, earlier today we shared ESPN’s new self-serving twitter policy, and now in an ironic twist of news, ESPN is reporting that the Chargers cornerback, Antonio Cromartie [@crimetime31] was fined for $2,500 for a tweet. Cromartie, a local San Diego celebrity and Pro Bowler, has a private Twitter account, but he reportedly took to Twitter and bashed the food at the Chargers training camp. Rumors were circulating throughout the day that the NFL and/or the Chargers had fined Cromartie, but ESPN has confirmed the story with Cromartie’s agent. The $2,500 tweet in question, according to NBC Sports, originated on July 31, and states: “Man we have 2 have the most nasty food of any team. Damn can we upgrade 4 str8 years the same ish maybe that’s y we can’t we the SB we need.” The $2,500 fine is a bit of a shocker from an organization that is very forward-thinking when it comes to social media and Twitter. Last month, Shawne Merriman answered my questions about how he uses social media in front of a packed crowd at a San Diego Tweetup. And earlier in the year, I spent time with Joel Price, the Chargers [@Chargers] staffer heading up their social media efforts. Both experiences we’re incredibly positive and demonstrated that the Chargers and their players get social media. Today’s news, however, doesn’t necessarily discolor the Chargers social media efforts. One could compare Cromartie’s tweet to an employee bashing the company they work for on a social platform. If anything, it shows poor judgment on Cromartie’s part. But, the fine does certainly make us more aware that Twitter creates a gray area between celebrity interaction with fans and the potential for over-sharing sensitive information. We’re curious to see how the Chargers, the rest of the NFL, and athletes in general, respond to the ambiguous nature of Twitter as the season draws closer. Update: Chargers coach Norv Turner was actually asked about social media and the Cromartie incident today during a press conference. Check out the video below: Reviews: Twitter Tags: antonio cromartie, chargers, nfl, twitter ESPN Tells Employees They Can Only Tweet About ESPN August 4, 2009 at 9:15 pm Today is a landmark day for social media, but for all the wrong reasons. Earlier we learned that the United States Marines have banned social media sites on their network, and now we’re discovering that ESPN might have just dropped “the hammer” when it comes to employee tweeting. In a tweet that may or may not defy the new ESPN policy, an NBA analyst for ESPN, Ric Bucher, said that the big-time sports broadcasting network is “prohibiting tweeting info unless it serves ESPN.” We got wind of ESPN’s foul-worthy activity through an NPR post on the subject. Although Butcher’s tweet doesn’t give us the full scoop on ESPN’s policy, it would appear that the network is showing poor judgment and exposing to the world the fact that they have no idea that social media is all about relationship building. We know that many ESPN analysts, show hosts, personalities, and guests are all tweeting. As someone who watches the network quite frequently, I can attest to watching them grapple with Twitter over time, their hosts struggling to understand why athletes tweet, and finally embracing it for themselves with frequent on-air mentions and show tie-ins. It’s a progression of sorts that may stop dead in its tracks, and turn into one giant ego feed, if there’s truth to Bucher’s tweets. Community and social media expert Chris Brogan says it best when he writes, “You can use your robot feeds to blurt out posts and showtimes and stuff, but if you want connectivity to people, engagement to your content, and a sense of participation on the social web, making people only talk about ESPN is a quick one-way ticket to who cares?” ESPN, if you want your viewers to care about you, your shows, and your on-air personalities, then you need to empower your employees to care back, to tweet like humans instead of robots, and use your very powerful platform for conversation. Clearly, you’ve yet to take a deep look at the What the F**k is Social Media deck. There’s a lot of lessons in there that you need to learn and apply right now. Update: NBC Sports has obtained a full copy of ESPN’s policy. You can check it out here. Reviews: Twitter Tags: ESPN, ric bucher, social media policy, twitter The Apple "iProd": What Could It Be? August 4, 2009 at 7:20 pm Rumors always swirl around Apple products, especially when they haven’t been announced yet. We’ve been following the trail on the Apple tablet, a touch-sensitive device for web surfing and possible iPhone apps. We’ve also seen rumors of iPod Nanos with cameras, among other things. Well, we know something is coming. Within the configurations of the iPhone 3.1 OS (coming at the end of the summer), there is a line item called “iProd.” The first sign of this was seen in March, but now it looks like a production version of this mysterious device is close to market – and all we know is that it runs the iPhone OS 3.1 Ars Technica and others caught the information inside the property list of the new iPhone software, which stores user settings. We doubt that there’s a product called the iProd, though. More likely, it is code for an upcoming product. Here are some of the possible suspects: Apple’s New Tablet: The current talk of the town, the rumored Apple Tablet will supposedly be announced next month. In fact, some claim they’ve played with it. It would make sense, as it’s rumored to run on the iPhone and iPod Touch OS software. The New iPod Nanos: Supposedly, the next generation of the iPod Nano will gain a camera. If that’s the case, it’s going to need a more robust OS – like the iPhone OS. It could also be announced in September. iPhone Nano: Nothing but a rumor, but an interesting rumor nonetheless. ????: The honest truth? Everyone’s just speculating over what “iProd” could be. Apple’s always tight-lipped about its products. It could be anything, but it’s fun to speculate about. Tags: apple, Apple Tablet, iphone, ipod, iTablet, Tablet IE6 No More! Popular Web Companies Start Project to Kill IE6 August 4, 2009 at 6:43 pm We’ve made no attempt to hide our belief that Internet Explorer 6 must die. IE6 is an ancient browser that does not support many of the major innovations of the last 8 years. Yet it is still used by 15-25% of Internet users – and that fact alone is holding us back from a new area of web applications. Luckily, we’re not the only ones that feel this way. Twitter users and the Digg community both rallied behind our battle cry. But now a high-profile group of startups, most funded by the well-known early stage venture firm Y Combinator, have started their own initiative, IE6 No More. The simple website provides a very concise case for why the Microsoft browser must be abandoned to promote innovation on the web. It then provides a call to action: embed a line of code that will tell your website visitors still using IE6 to switch to a modern browser. Here’s what you would see on a website that has the code implemented: The campaign is led by the website creation company Weebly with the support of about a dozen popular websites and startups. At last count, the startups include: Justin.tv, Disqus, Posterous, Reddit.tv, Divvyshot, Buxfer, Twitluv, Digital Dandelion, Happn.in, Defensio, and 31bits.com While it’s great to see companies taking a stand against the broken browser, we can’t help but wonder whether this type of campaign will make any impact, given that many users of IE6 are only using because of work/IT restrictions or are in underdeveloped countries. David, co-founder of Weebly, gave us his thoughts on the matter: “We think we can have a huge impact: For those users that are just unaware they are using an old browser (mothers, grandmothers), we’d like to encourage them to upgrade and have a better experience using our sites. For those users in corporate environments, we’d like to start putting pressure on the IT department to upgrade — the more users who complain about seeing the prompts (especially if coming from the top), the more pressure the IT department will have to either upgrade IE 6 or install Firefox side-by-side with IE 6 for compatibility reasons.” These startups are fighting an uphill battle, but nobody said killing IE6 would be easy. If you want to support their movement, be sure to check out their website. Reviews: Disqus, Firefox, Posterous Tags: disqus, IE6, internet explorer, justin.tv, microsoft, reddit, Weebly 26 Places to Find Free Multimedia for Your Blog August 4, 2009 at 6:09 pm Nothing makes a blog post more eye-catching than a great header image, but not all publishers have artistic talent. And even accomplished digital creatives often crave some found material to start from or work with in a project. Luckily for all of the above, sources abound for finding a compelling photo to grab your readers’ eyes and draw them in, or to locate fresh multimedia to remix. Creative Commons search You may be familiar with the Creative Commons free licenses that aim to give creators more freedom to allow sharing and remixing of their content. If not, you can find out more about the history of the organization and the different types of licenses from their About page. The most important thing to note is that many CC-licensed images, audio and video files are usable on your blog or site, typically with credit given to the original creator — a quick and easy way to hat-tip the source of the media you’re using. Here are several excellent spots to search large pools of Creative Commons-licensed images: 1. Creative Commons search: this search page aggregates several CC searches into a handy tabbed interface. 2. Yahoo Creative Commons search: search within the Yahoo index for CC-licensed media. 3. Flickr Creative Commons search: search just within Yahoo’s Flickr for CC-licensed images. This can be especially useful if you’re looking for photography in a more artistic vein. 4. Google Advanced Search: though Yahoo has been offering its CC-specific search for a while, Google much later caught up by adding some options to its advanced search interface. Expand the “Date, usage rights, numeric range, and more” link to access the “Usage rights” dropdown. Free stock and public domain images Need a professional-looking image but don’t have the budget for spendy stock photo houses? Check out these great alternatives for free stock photography. Much like with Creative Commons images, many just require attribution be given to the original creator. If an image is in the public domain, it is completely free for you to use for any purpose, altered or not, without credit required. 5. Stock.XCHNG: SXC is a community of photographers who share their work free of charge for use as stock imagery. Grab some shots from here, share your own, and chat with other photographers in the community forum. 6. MorgueFile: Using its own specially-adapted morgueFile Free License, this site offers free commercially usable and remixable high resolution digital stock photography without any attribution requirement so long as you don’t claim ownership or resell unaltered works as is. 7. Everystockphoto: A search engine for free photos, Everystockphoto also allows you to rate, tag, collect and comment on photos. Source and licensing information for each image is available on the search results pages below the photo. 8. PDphoto: Thousands of royalty free and public domain images are searchable here, with high-resolution versions available for many of the photos for a small fee. 9. Openphoto.net: Offers photographic resources under Creative Commons licensing from an open network of photographers, focusing on animals, nature, landscape, architecture, still life, and technology. 10. FreeDigitalPhotos.net: Searchable collection of royalty free photos for corporate or personal use, with high resolution versions available for purchase. 11. PicFindr: Aggregate search engine for free stock images from several of the above sites and others, PicFindr compiles the search results into a single interface with links to the individual photos from their thumbnails. WikiMedia Commons Aggregating all of the associated media from the various Wikimedia Foundation projects, the WikiMedia Commons is a large database that includes primarily freely reusable images, audio and video broken down into their various license categories. To browse within the free subcategories, there’s a handy landing page branching off into various free license repositories, and you can browse by individual media types as well. Just be sure to note which type of license the image you want to use is under and follow the reuse guidelines for that particular license. Some useful collections include: 12. Public domain 13. Creative Commons 14. Sound 15. Video Free audio sources Whether you need some background music for a video project, some fresh tunes to incorporate into a music blog, or are looking for audio from a particular geographic location, these free audio file resources may have a usable sound waiting for you. As with the image sources above, always be sure to double check the license for any particular file you want to use and follow its attribution guidelines if applicable. 16. opsound: A community of musicians and sound artists, opsound contributors upload their works under Creative Commons licenses for sharing and remixing. 17. soundtransit: A searchable archive of field recordings from all over the world, soundtransit’s community shares recordings under the Creative Commons Attribution license. 18. pdsounds.org: The mission of pdsounds is to capture the acoustic phenomena in the environment of our daily lives and contribute them to the public domain for free and unfettered reuse. Search for something specific or browse the catalog of public domain sounds. 19. Internet archive open source audio: One subsection of the mighty Internet Archive collection, the open source audio section is primarily full of reusable Creative Commons-licensed sound files. You can also find usable audio files pocketed throughout the broader Audio collection as well. Free video sources Although almost everything including Tiger Woods getting air and browser-induced projectile vomiting is embeddable these days, if you need video footage that’s remixable or republishable these are some great destinations to check out. 20. Internet Archive Moving Images Collection: the Internet Archive is a big winner in this category, with thousands of free movies, films, and videos on hand featuring everything from classic feature-length films to zany educational shorts shown to impressionable school children in the 50s, 60s and 70s to cartoons now old enough to be in the public domain. 21. Open Source Cinema: A community site for creating and remixing video online, users upload footage under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 License. 22. Vimeo: You can browse the videos tagged with Creative Commons or use a complex search query to search for videos tagged both “creativecommons” and the keyword you’re looking for. 23. Flickr: You can use Flickr’s Advanced Search interface to look only within video content that’s Creative Commons-licensed. Further resources Beyond the primarily larger collections above, there are many smaller sources for Creative Commons and remix-friendly media from individual creators, collectors and collectives. If you’ve got the time to traverse some of these, you could find even more usable media off the beaten path. 24. Wikipedia list of public domain sources 25. TeacherLibrarianWiki’s list of copyright-friendly image sources 26. NASA: The vast majority of images, audio and video published by NASA are not copyrighted and may be reused, although for commercial usage be aware of NASA’s non-endorsement guidelines. More blogger resources from Mashable: - Top 10 WordPress Plugins to Promote Your Social Media Profiles - 25 Great Blogger Widgets - A Guide to Protecting Your Online Identity - 8 of the Best Social Media Extensions for Joomla Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Johnnyscriv Reviews: Flickr, Google, Vimeo, iStockphoto Tags: blogging, creative commons, public domain, remix culture John Quincy Adams Starts Tweeting … 161 Years After Death August 4, 2009 at 5:45 pm John Quincy Adams, the sixth President of the United States, was born in 1767 and lived until 1848. You would think that alone would exclude him from using Twitter to communicate his thoughts, not to mention him using a computer or even electricity. But that’s exactly what the Massachusetts Historical Society is going to make happen starting Wednesday. The kicker’s that every tweet will be formulated by President Adams (@JQAdams_mhs himself. How is that possible, you ask? A high school student browsing the archive of President Adams made a unique observation about his diary entries: they were the length of the standard tweet. Here are two gems, courtesy of the Associated Press: August 6th, 1809: “Thick fog. Scanty Wind. On George’s Bank. Lat: 42-34. Read Massillon’s Careme Sermons 2 & 3. Ladies are Sick.” August 15th, 1809: “Weather fine_ wind scanty. Lat: 44-13. Long: 53-40. This afternoon I found the Caboose on fire.” The concise nature of his entries, combined with the historical importance of his life, convinced the Massachusetts Historical Society to try a novel approach in teaching history to Generation Y. His trials, tribulations, and top books will all be tweeted out. On top of that, the MHS will tweet out maps showing the location of President Adams during his trip to Russia while he was a diplomatic representative of the U.S. Our hat goes off to the Massachusetts Historical Society for trying this exciting approach to historical education. Also a thumbs-up to the student who discovered the possibility. This should be a great way to learn more about one of America’s most important historical figures and the time in which he lived. Reviews: Twitter Tags: history, john quincy adams, twitter YouTube Adds AdSense-like Revenue Sharing August 4, 2009 at 5:25 pm Launched late last year, YouTube’s Promoted Videos program allows publishers to place bids for keywords in order to achieve placement on relevant YouTube search results pages, similar to Google’s auction mechanism for publishers via AdWords. Until now, the Promoted Videos only showed up alongside those search results as well as periodically on the YouTube homepage. But YouTube just closed the loop by adding Promoted Videos to related partner watch pages in the Related Videos section, adding an AdSense analogy to the revenue-sharing equation. With the new change, now Promoted Videos are contextually matched to YouTube partner watch pages (simply YouTube’s term for an individual video’s page) based on the content of the video and text on the page, giving publishers an extra promotional boost on video pages that are naturally related to the audience’s interest.  The new system also shares with AdSense its revenue-sharing power: both the publisher of the Promoted Video and the partner whose page it appears on will share a cut of the advertising money with YouTube. The net effect is to make the Promoted Videos program more effective overall by making its videos visible not just on active search results pages but on passively related partner pages as well. The Promoted Videos show up in the Related Videos column in the right sidebar, clearly delineated with a yellow background and a text tag. It’s a relatively small change with big implications for publishers making use of the Promoted Videos program, who will now benefit from the increased exposure to their videos. Other YouTube partners benefit as well, by getting a cut of the revenue from the Promoted Videos featured on their watch pages. Reviews: Google, YouTube Tags: advertising, promoted videos, Revenue, video, youtube Heath Ledger Directed Music Video Debuts on MySpace August 4, 2009 at 4:43 pm Before his untimely death, Heath Ledger had become a full blown movie star and Hollywood fixture known for his acting credentials. Most of us, however, were completely in the dark about his directorial aspirations and work behind the camera. Back in January of 2007 Ledger proposed to direct a music video for Modest Mouse’s then unreleased song, King Rat. A year later, the concept had been finalized, but Ledger died before the music video could come to fruition. Today, however, the music video has just been released on MySpace by Modest Mouse, and it shows Ledger’s directorial vision as brought to life by THE MASSES, who finished the video in his honor. Modest Mouse has been around since 1993, and the indie rock band has seen managed to attract both a cult and mainstream following. The story goes that lead singer Isaac Brock was approached by Ledger, who aspired to direct the video for King Rat, and “marry his love of bold and original music with his impassioned stance against the illegal commercial whale hunts taking place of the coast of Australia each year.” THE MASSES, a collective of directors and artists, decided to complete the video on Ledger’s behalf. They’re even working with Modest Mouse to donate proceeds from iTunes video downloads for the first month to the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. The non-profit is dedicated to defending ocean wildlife and habitats, and very much works to fight against the injustices that Ledger wanted to convey in the video. The 6 minute King Rat music video can viewed on MySpace or THEMASSES website, and it’s certainly a beautiful work of art that tells a poignant story by flipping the roles of man and whale. We’re slightly disappointed, however, that Modest Mouse and/or THE MASSES have decided not to support embedding of the video, and have even prohibited MySpace users from adding the video to their profile. We hope they’ll reconsider, so the video, and Ledger’s mission to raise awareness on whaling practices, can reach a larger audience. *Image courtesy of teadrinker on Flickr Reviews: Flickr, MySpace Tags: heath ledger, king rat, modest mouse, music video, myspace Current TV Journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee Released From North Korean Prison August 4, 2009 at 4:12 pm Current, the TV network and social news web site that counts Al Gore at its Chairman, has reason to celebrate this afternoon. The two journalists working for the company that were detained in North Korea back in March have been freed following a visit to the country by former President Bill Clinton. According to CNN, the release of Current's Laura Ling and Euna Lee "came after former U.S. President Clinton met with top North Korean officials in Pyongyang." Those officials included North Korean President Kim Jong Il, who was pictured with Clinton earlier today. Ling and Lee were arrested while working on a story near the border between China and North Korea, and were swiftly sentenced to 12 years in labor camp. No official comment yet from Current regarding Ling and Lee’s release, but the story is receiving a huge amount of discussion on Twitter. Reviews: Current, Twitter Tags: current tv, euna lee, laura ling TweetBlocker Helps You Identify and Unfollow Twitter Spammers August 4, 2009 at 3:29 pm There may be one more sure thing in life beyond death and taxes: spammers. Twitter is of course no stranger to the scourge, and TweetBlocker is a new tool designed to help you get rid of any spam accounts you’ve inadvertently managed to follow, whether in haste or through the use of auto-follow. Using a combination of blacklist-style identification and Bayesian algorithms for identifying spammers from the contents of their tweets, this app from the folks at HashRocket adds another tool to our collective belts for fighting back against Twitter spam. After authenticating your Twitter account, TweetBlocker generates a list of your followers with a numerical score as well as at-a-glance letter grades according to how spammy the service thinks they are, with A+ being the best and F the worst. From here you have the option to block or simply unfollow each account. Rolling over a user’s icon pops up a list of their most recent tweets so you can quickly double check any accounts you might be on the fence about. In our tests we did find some false positives in our list as well as some questionably low grades for relatively popular accounts (see above — blip.tv passes with flying colors while Blip.fm seems dangerously close to repeating the fourth grade), but the recent tweets rollover function should help you make sure you’re not inadvertently blocking or unfollowing someone having a momentary lapse of reason or temporary absence from Twitter. And as far as tools for helping cut the spam go, another addition to the arsenal — particularly one so easy to use — is entirely welcome to the Twitterverse. Reviews: BLIP, Twitter Tags: auto-follow, spam, TweetBlocker, twitter Ben Stiller Discovers Social Media [VIDEO] August 4, 2009 at 3:06 pm We already know that savvy celebrities are on Twitter, have Facebook fan pages, and engage with fans directly online. A few, however, have been more than a little late to the social web party. One such celebrity, Ben Stiller, isn’t afraid to poke fun at himself for discovering the joys of Facebook and Twitter a little behind the curve. Stiller, a brand new Twitterer (@RedHourBen) with just two tweets and 4,992 followers, is ready to let us all know that he is online, and even using Tweetdeck to post to both Twitter and Facebook. Ben is also fresh on Facebook, and in true Ben Stiller fashion he created a video dripping with dry humor, complete with a fake family, just to let us — his new fans and followers — know that he is, in fact, online. We love it. Congrats, Ben. It does seem as if you get it now. Now you should join us on Mashchat sometime, so we can quiz you on Facebook status updates, tweets, Twitter clients, and all the other great web stuff you’re bound to be exposed to now that you’re online. Reviews: Facebook, TweetDeck, Twitter Tags: ben stiller, facebook, twitter Flickr Search Finally Gets Smart August 4, 2009 at 2:27 pm Flickr is awesome, but the search stinks. It’s impossible to peruse a large quantity of images without investing way too much time and energy. In fact, most of us power Flickr searchers either use a few of these third-party search tools, or use the site:flickr.com operator with Google or Bing image search to get around the painfully poor search experience. Thankfully, Flickr search just got a much needed makeover and it’s now as smart as it should be. The redesign has focused the search experience around processing large quantities of images with a much improved layout and quicker to find filters. The new search experience was rolled out this morning, so you should already be greeted with the much improved results. You’ll notice that results now follow a typical search engine layout with thumbnails as the default, and sorting options so you can toggle between relevant, recent, and interesting, and adjust size for small, medium, detail, and slideshow search results views. You’ll also love that you can click the info icon for small and medium image results to get a glimpse of a slightly larger image, and see total image views, comments, and faves, as well clickable tags and user info. Plus, should you use the advanced search options to filter for things like Creative Commons licensed images, Flickr now clearly highlights your search criteria at the top of the page. On the right hand side of the page, you’ll now see related image options to supplement your search results. According to Flickr, the new groups, photographers, tag clusters, and places boxes are “Based upon how our members are tagging their photos and participating in the Flickrverse.” We’re really impressed with the Flickr search improvements, and think that it’s finally a smart image search experience that we would enjoy using. What’s your take on the new Flickr search? Share your thoughts in the comments. See Also: 7 Totally Unique Flickr Search Tools Reviews: Bing, Flickr, Google Tags: flickr, image search, Search 5 Ways to Get the Most Out of Your Music Collection August 4, 2009 at 1:41 pm If you’re like most people these days, you’ve probably got a lot of music on your computer — whether from your own CD library, or downloaded from Amazon, iTunes, or (ahem) elsewhere. But if the only thing you’re doing with your music collection is listening to it, you’re missing out. There are a large number of web applications devoted to helping you get more from the music you already have. With the five web sites and applications below, you can learn more about your music playing habits, clean up your collection, see your favorite artists live, and have more fun with your music. What other web sites or applications do you use to get the most out of the music you own? Let us know in the comments. 1. Last.fm Last.fm is one of the most popular music social networks on the web. The site has on-demand listening, social networking features, and a great iPhone app. But where Last.fm really shines is their tried and true Scrobbler software that pays attention to what you’ve been playing in iTunes, Windows Media Player, Winamp, or on your iPod and adds the music you’ve played to your profile. From there you can see which artists, albums, and tracks you play the most, and get recommendations for similar music you might like based on the songs you’re listening to. Other good options in the music recommendation category include MyStrands and the iLike music player addons. 2. TidySongs An amazingly useful new Adobe AIR app that just launched in July, TidySongs automatically scans your iTunes library for duplicates, missing cover art, and poorly formatted, misspelled, or otherwise wrong track and artist information. The application can automatically fix song info, or can just point out errors so you can fix them manually. TidySongs works really well and was able to identify and fix with surprising accuracy a large number of the songs in my music library that weren’t properly labeled. In addition to fixing song details, TidySongs can organize genres, fix duplicates, and find missing or incorrect album art. Another option to help clean up your library metadata is TuneUp. 3. Livekick Once you’ve uploaded your iTunes library to Livekick, the site automatically populates a calendar of upcoming concerts in your area from the artists you listen to. The site can also import music from Last.fm, Rhapsody, Pandora, iLike, Zune.net, imeem, MySpace, and Blip.fm. Once you’ve imported your music, Livekick can deliver concert updates by email or RSS. The site also offers a downloadable desktop widget that keeps track of the music you listen to in Windows Media Player, Winamp, or iTunes and suggests concerts you might be interested in based on your listening habits. 4. TuneWiki Lyrics site TuneWiki offers a unique, free iPhone app (iTunes) that allows you to automatically augment the music you play on your iPhone or iPod Touch with song lyrics while listening. The app displays lyrics synced to the song you’re listening to, karaoke style, translated into over 40 different languages. It also has a nice “music maps” feature that shows you what music other people in your geographic area are listening to. 5. JamLegend JamLegend is a Guitar Hero-like game built for the web. Instead of using a guitar-shaped controller to keep in time with the beat, however, you instead press keys on the keyboard that correspond to falling notes as the song plays. But what really sets JamLegend apart is that you can upload your own songs. You get 5 free MP3 uploads, after which you’ll have to pay for the privilege of rocking out to your favorite music from your own collection. Still, the fact that you can go beyond the site’s 500 or so built-in songs by using your own music collection is a great feature. The game is somehow a lot more fun when you can use music from your own MP3 library that you’re guaranteed to like. More music resources from Mashable - 10 Ways to Share Music on Twitter - 16 Great Music Add-Ons for Firefox - 18 of the Best Music Tumblelogs - Social Music: Top 5 Sites to Build a Playlist - Social Music: 5 Ways to Find Concerts Near You Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Dizzy Reviews: BLIP, Ilike, Last.fm, MySpace, Pandora, adobe AIR, iStockphoto, iTunes Tags: air, jamlegend, Last.FM, livekick, music, tidysongs, tunewiki Should Your Brand Have Its Own URL Shortener? Coca-Cola Now Does August 4, 2009 at 1:08 pm URL shorteners are a dime a dozen, and some industry onlookers actually believe they are bad for the Web. But in reality, if you're sharing links on a service like Twitter, you need one, at least for the moment. So how do you choose? Some services offer detailed analytics (like bit.ly), while others offer schemes that can get you more traffic (DiggBar and StumbleUpon's Su.pr for example). But what if you want don't want to give up the branding that comes with having your own URL? The solution seems to be to launch your own URL shortener, and one of the world's most respected brands has done just that. Coca-Cola is now using CokeURL for its short links, a move that may lead many other brands to consider doing the same. How To Do It For starters, creating your own URL shortener isn't much harder than using one of the existing services. In addition to building one in-house, you can use a service like awe.sm, yourls, or budurl (which Coke is using) to get up and running fairly quickly and inexpensively. The Advantage With retweeting becoming the currency of Twitter (and perhaps soon Facebook), having your own branded URLs means a lot of potential exposure for your company as users see your URLs instead of those of a conventional URL shortener. It also could create a perception of trust in the links – i.e., people are more apt to click something that looks like a known brand name than a random 4 or 5 letter combination of letters. The Disadvantage Other than the cost, which isn't likely to be prohibitive to most, the only major disadvantage of going with your own shortener is missing out on some of the features and benefits offered by third-party services. Those benefits might become bigger over time – for example, Bit.ly is rumored to be launching its own news service based on the use of its links – but if your main goal is simply moving traffic from point a to point b with basic tracking, building your own URL shortner shouldn't be much of a detriment. Conclusion Coke moving to its own shortener is a big deal in this little corner of the Internet. While for most people, tinyurl, bit.ly, or any other third-party service will continue to be more than sufficient, big brands and celebs certainly have an opportunity to benefit by launching their own shortener. With the relative ease with which it can be done, expect Coke to be far from the last major name to go this route. Reviews: Twitter Tags: coca cola, social media, twitter, url shorteners Delicious Joins the Twitter Era August 4, 2009 at 11:58 am One of the more interesting parts of Delicious has always been its "popular bookmarks" section, a list of the links that have been bookmarked the most by users over a given time frame. But similar to Digg, which is also currently trying to reinvent itself, it can take a relatively long time for these links to bubble up, especially compared to services like Twitter and the link tracking tools built on top of it. Today, Delicious is trying to combat this issue by integrating a number of Twitter-related features. With its new "Fresh Bookmarks" section on its homepage, Delicious doesn't wait for a story to get a lot of bookmarks (typically more than 100 in the old version), but looks at other metrics including related links as well as tweet count. They've also included "Related Tweets" under each link, so you can see what people are saying about the bookmark. Delicious explains this in a bit more detail on their blog: "On the previous delicious.com page (click the Popular tab), you typically found links that had ~100 bookmarks – so more authoritative resources as opposed to fresh news. Additionally, given that the most popular tag on delicious is 'design', you probably encountered headlines like '100+ Wordpress Themes' on most days (in fact, I used to make bets on this). For this new Fresh homepage, our system displays recently bookmarked links and tweeted messages focused mostly on technology, web, politics, and media. Underneath the hood, Fresh factors several features into the ranking like related bookmark and tweet counts, "eats our own dogfood" by leveraging BOSS to filter for high quality results, as well as stitches tweets to related articles even if the tweets do not provide matching URLs (as ~81% of tweets do not contain URLs)." Using only this morning to go on, the service’s new approach seems to be doing a fairly good job of finding the most important links; a story about form President Bill Clinton’s visit to North Korea, which is clearly the most discussed news story of the day so far, takes the top slot. Two Mashable stories are also under “Fresh Bookmarks,” so they must be doing something right Here’s what the new homepage looks like: Naturally, Delicious also wants its users to tweet more, which would conceivably add velocity to bookmarks on its new homepage and help it keep pace with other real-time link trackers. As part of that effort, the service now lets you tweet during the process of saving a bookmark. This is certainly the direction that Delicious needs to move in if it wants to remain relevant – at least from the perspective of delivering timely stories and links to its users. It will always hold some utility as a bookmarking tool, but just how valuable that is in a world where you can search or tweet and typically find what you're looking for in seconds will increasingly come into question. Tags: delicious, twitter What Grade Do YOU Give Obama? August 4, 2009 at 11:36 am CNN wants America to grade the President’s second 100 days, and they’re using the web to do it. Using a Facebook app and a poll on CNN.com (and on Thursday, text messaging and phone-ins) the network is attempting to conduct a national poll reaching as many citizens as possible. The CNN National Report Card: Second 100 Days is a TV show happening from 8pm till 10pm this Thursday, but it’s also another attempt by CNN to leverage user interaction online. In addition to the Facebook poll, they’re soliciting videos on iReport, CNN’s user generated reporting site, in which viewers explain the reasons behind the grades they gave. The best videos will be aired on CNN. It’s hardly the first time CNN has leveraged social media in its initiatives. Back in 2007 the network partnered with YouTube to host both Democratic and Republican debates, while iReport launched in 2008. More recently, CNN has worked with Facebook to live stream events (like Obama’s Inauguration) with realtime Facebook chat. Reviews: Facebook, YouTube Tags: facebook, obama 5 Reasons Why Twitter's Growth Cannot Be Stopped August 4, 2009 at 11:15 am Vadim Lavrusik is a new media student at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He is @lavrusik on Twitter and blogs at Lavrusik.com. With all the skepticism of whether it’s just a social media fad and questions about how the company expects to generate revenue, Twitter has left many critics silent by continuing to grow. Though the company has made some improvements, including its recent redesigned homepage, many wouldn’t credit these changes with the successful growth of Twitter. It’s all about the people and how the service has been put to use by the millions. Whether using it during their everyday lives, marketing a business or reporting on tragic events, users have shown the value of Twitter and will continue to contribute to its growth. Below are just five reasons why Twitter will continue to grow. Please add your thoughts below in the comments, as well as other reasons you believe Twitter will continue to grow. 1. Consistent growth The microblogging site reached 23 million unique users in June, according to Compete, which was a 16 percent growth compared to May. This doesn’t even include the millions that do not visit Twitter.com and instead use third-party services to update. The site has had a consistent growth, and we expect it will continue to do so for July numbers. 2. Gaining approval from big companies According to PR firm Burson-Marsteller, as reported by Mashable’s own Adam Ostrow, Twitter is the social media platform of choice at Fortune 100 companies. The firm reported that 54 percent of the companies have a Twitter presence and for the companies that use only one social media platform, 76 percent of them use Twitter as their preferred choice. And if the big guys are using it, well, the smaller companies will do so as well. Oh wait, small businesses are already using Twitter. So basically they have the ground covered big and small. Either way, the complete results of the study are below: B M Social Media Fortune 100 View more documents from guest338fbe. 3. Twitter is the number one most social brand Twitter is the most active Web presence and generates most conversational volume on the Web, making it the number one social brand for July 2009, according to Social Radar. It was at number one in June too. Social Radar analyzes the Web to see what brands are mentioned most by unique sources. This includes blogs, other social networks, forums, etc. The analysis includes brands, not just social networks. Facebook is at number 4, with the iPhone and Google at number 3 and 4, respectively. Check out the full list for July here. The point is there is a lot of buzz out there about Twitter and people are continuing to talk about it, and it’s even becoming part of everyday language. 4. Twitter receives millions in free media coverage The media loves to cover Twitter and anything that relates to using the service. In fact, Twitter received $48 million worth in media coverage in 30 days, according to Ad Age, which also notes that the figure is about half of what Microsoft plans to spend on marketing Bing. So what amounts to $48 million worth in advertising? How about 3 billion impressions and 57 percent of that is from TV. These figures don’t even include the smaller newspapers that likely mentioned Twitter. The irony is that this very post is contributing. 5. Continued growth internationally As news breaks, more users internationally are learning the value of using Twitter. Whether it is the protests following the Iran Election or the Jakarta bombings or the fact that the Chinese government felt they had to block Twitter during the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, the site gets more users in those countries as the value of the service unravels during a time of need. Right now, about 55 percent of the audience is international, according to comScore. This number too will continue to grow. More Twitter resources from Mashable: - 5 More Twitter Related Trends to Watch Right Now - Twitter Better: 20 Ways to Filter Your Tweets - Twitter for Beginners: 5 Steps for Better Tweeting - 5 Habits of Successful Executives on Twitter - 5 Ways Twitter Can Save You Money Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Dalaj Reviews: Bing, Facebook, Google, Twitter, iStockphoto Tags: Lists, social media, twitter US Marines Banned From Social Media Sites August 4, 2009 at 8:36 am The US Marines issued an order Monday that bans social media sites including Twitter, Facebook and MySpace on its network. The sites increase the risk of sensitive information leaking out to adversaries, the order explains. The ban, which will last a year, essentially rules out use of all public social networks by Marines, unless a mission-critical need exists. The fully-capitalized document reads, in part: THESE INTERNET SITES IN GENERAL ARE A PROVEN HAVEN FOR MALICIOUS ACTORS AND CONTENT AND ARE PARTICULARLY HIGH RISK DUE TO INFORMATION EXPOSURE, USER GENERATED CONTENT AND TARGETING BY ADVERSARIES. THE VERY NATURE OF SNS CREATES A LARGER ATTACK AND EXPLOITATION WINDOW, EXPOSES UNNECESSARY INFORMATION TO ADVERSARIES AND PROVIDES AN EASY CONDUIT FOR INFORMATION LEAKAGE THAT PUTS OPSEC, COMSEC, PERSONNEL AND THE MCEN AT AN ELEVATED RISK OF COMPROMISE. EXAMPLES OF INTERNET SNS SITES INCLUDE FACEBOOK, MYSPACE, AND TWITTER. That’s not to say that the Department of Defence is turning its back on social media, however: a new DOD site with social media integration is expected to launch this month, writes Wired. Meanwhile, the Marine Corps Facebook page has more than 75,000 fans. For most Marines, however, such sites will be off-limits from now on. Reviews: Facebook, MySpace, Twitter Tags: marines, social media Augmented Reality Twitter is the Coolest Thing Ever August 4, 2009 at 6:45 am …but unfortunately not available in the iPhone App Store just yet. It all started last month with TwittARound, an application for the iPhone 3GS that uses the GPS, compass and camera to show where Tweets are coming from. As the stunning video below shows, Tweets are overlaid on the landscape, augmenting your view of the world. Twittaround hasn’t made it into the iPhone App Store yet: the iPhone SDK doesn’t provide public APIs for manipulating live video. In other words: the app is using parts of the software that Apple hasn’t opened up yet. Neither is there an unofficial version of the code available at this point, although there is an open letter that begs Apple to open these parts of the SDK. A New Player Enters the Market And yet augmented reality Twitter apps may be coming to your phone soon enough. Local Twitter search provider Tweetmondo is teaming up with augmented reality service Layar, the company has announced on its blog, bringing augmented reality Tweets to phones running Google Android. Later, they plan to bring the service to iPhones. They’ve also posted the video below demoing Layar’s existing technology. So while it’ll be awhile coming, augmented reality Tweets might be headed to a phone near you soon. [via Venturebeat] Reviews: Twitter Tags: Augmented Reality, iphone, twitter Demi Moore Twitter Picture Exceeds 800K Views [Video] August 4, 2009 at 5:33 am Top Twitter user Ashton Kutcher isn’t just giving Twitter props in the mainstream media: he’s also inadvertently marketing Twitpic, the popular Twitter photo posting service. On The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien last night, Kutcher spent time discussing his Twitter addiction, a Twitter-related dream about Barack Obama, and the Twitpic he posted of wife Demi Moore’s bikini-clad butt in March. Suffice to say, that tidbit has led to a reposting of the pic (not obscene, but perhaps not ideal for workplace viewing) to dozens of blogs today: in total since March, it has racked up 820,000+ pageviews for the fledgling image host. Below, Ashton’s take on Twitter and the cheeky Twitpic: Reviews: Twitpic, Twitter Tags: ashton kutcher, twitter What the F**k Is Social Media? Here's an Answer August 4, 2009 at 1:35 am If you’re a regular reader of Mashable, you’re likely a firm believer in the power of social media. We’ve highlighted how the social web can improve your career, aid charitable causes, transform businesses and even change the world. In short, we’re convinced. But what do you say to someone who doesn’t get it? Maybe you have a boss who thinks social branding a waste of time or chatted with a friend who doesn’t believe that Twitter can help land her a great job. Maybe they have no clue what social media even is. Last year, marketing director Marta Kagan helped solve this problem with her presentation What the F**k is Social Media?. It was quickly a social media hit for its wit and its very convincing case for the raw power of social media. With the tremendous growth of Twitter, Facebook, and blogging in the last year though, Ms. Kagan thought it was time for a sequel. We couldn’t agree more. The stats she cites and the savvy she employs in What the F**k is Social Media: One Year Later makes it a worthy successor. The next time you need to explain the benefits of social media to someone, just send them this post and make sure they flip through the entire presentation. Here it is: Reviews: Facebook, Mashable, Twitter Tags: social media Google CEO Quitting Apple's Board Not Enough to Stop FTC August 3, 2009 at 10:56 pm While the FCC’s investigation of Apple’s rejection of the Google Voice iPhone App has been making big headlines the last few days, another government investigation into the two companies seems to be slowing down (but not stopping): The Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) interlocking directorates probe. For the last few months, the FTC has been investigating whether Apple and Google have been participating in anti-competitive practices by having Google’s CEO on Apple’s board of directors. Considering Google has several competing products (Android, Google Chrome, Chrome OS), it made some sense. Now that Google’s CEO has resigned from Apple’s board, you’d think the investigation would be over. Not so, according to the FTC. They put out a statement earlier today giving a thumbs-up to Schmidt’s resignation but clearly stating the investigation will continue: On August 3, 2009, Apple announced that Eric E. Schmidt, Chief Executive Officer of Google, was stepping down from its board. "We have been investigating the Google/Apple interlocking directorates issue for some time and commend them for recognizing that sharing directors raises competitive issues, as Google and Apple increasingly compete with each other," said Bureau of Competition Director Richard Feinstein. "We will continue to investigate remaining interlocking directorates between the companies." So why isn’t this case going away? The answer’s simpler than you might think: Google and Apple still share a director: Arthur Levinson, the former CEO of biotech giant Genentech. Until he resigns from one of the two boards, the investigation will continue. Once he leaves though, it would be difficult to justify charging either company with any wrongdoing retroactively. Expect Levinson to leave one of the two boards in the near future. Besides, neither company was really focusing on the FTC probe anyway. Now it’s about the FCC Google Voice investigation, where they’re on opposite sides. The events of the last few days are probably the beginning of a new era of standing on opposite ends for the two storied giants. Reviews: Android, Google, Google Chrome Tags: apple, FTC, Google   This email was sent to topblogsofthenet@gmail.com.  Manage Your Account Don't want to receive this feed any longer? Unsubscribe here.