Facebook may lift its 5,000 friends limit

San Jose Mercury News: Facebook may lift its 5,000 friends limit. Excerpt:

Tech bloggers Mark Cuban, Robert Scoble and Jason Calacanis are among the tiny portion of Facebook users who say they've hit the 5,000-pals wall and aren't happy about it. But lifting the limit would put Facebook at risk of becoming more like rival MySpace, said Adam Ostrow, editor of Mashable, a news blog that tracks the social networking field. Many entertainers and celebrities use MySpace as a promotion vehicle to connect with masses of fans. ...

May 11, 2008 at 12:01 AM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

NY Times on Flickr

 

While I was traveling I missed this New York Times Magazine piece about the photo sharing site Flickr and some of its most popular shooters, such as Rebekka Guoleifsdottir.

May 7, 2008 at 12:43 AM in Photography, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Where Twitter is heading

Dan Farber at CNET News.com on where Twitter is heading. (You do know what Twitter is, right?)

May 4, 2008 at 12:10 AM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Causes on Facebook

Socialactions.com: Brotherly Love on Facebook.

Contribute Magazine has posted an interview with the co-founders of Facebook Causes, Sean Parker & Joe Green. The duo has founded a company called Project Agape, which seeks to spread the practice of micro-philanthropy through social networks. According to their website, the word Agape is ancient greek for "brotherly love, or a selfless regard for other human beings".

Facebook Causes is the first and only project of Project Agape. The application allows any Facebook user to raise money for a nonprofit or U.S. politician by posting a fundraising widget on their Facebook profile and inviting friends to join the cause.

May 2, 2008 at 12:14 AM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Call your Facebook friends for free

Deb from Communicano passes along this info:

Ifbyphone has just announced a Facebook app called Phone-Me-Now that gives Facebook friends free click-to-call capabilities -- without disclosing their caller ID and no matter what type of phone they're using (mobile or landline -- even a rotary dial phone). The widget uses some of the same powerful technologies Ifbyphone also uses to give its small and medium-sized business clients enterprise-level Web presence.

April 29, 2008 at 11:29 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Next generation is reshaping politics through social networking

San Jose Mercury News: Next generation is reshaping politics through social networking -- a Q&A with the authors of the new book Millennial Makeover: My Space, YouTube & the Future of American Politics (Rutgers University Press).

April 27, 2008 at 11:24 PM in Books, Politics, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Filmcrave: A social networking site around movies

I have a lot to catch up on, so I'll be posting some updates on social media and new media matters in no particular order.

Recently came across Filmcrave, a good-looking site originally conceived as a personal movie review site. As its About page explains, "it quickly expanded into the idea of a full use social utility revolving around writing movie reviews, members’ favorite movie lists, and the ability to make and interact with friends."

April 27, 2008 at 09:11 PM in Film, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social networking and mobile entertainment

NY Times: Lights. Camera. Cellphone Action. Excerpt:

Nokia in particular is trying to turn itself into an entertainment-friendly company, much the way Steven P. Jobs has changed Apple’s image with the iPod and iPhone.

Nokia, based in Finland, said it surveyed 9,000 consumers last year and concluded that by 2012 one out of every four consumers will create, edit or share entertainment with friends, instead of getting it from traditional media outlets like television or movie studios.

And that, Nokia executives said, led them to seek out a movie director willing to dabble in mobile video.

“This is not a marketing gimmick,” said Craig Coffey, Nokia’s vice president for North American marketing and a former PepsiCo executive. “The notion of social networking and entertainment is real.” ...

April 24, 2008 at 12:42 PM in Mobile, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Want to develop a MySpace application?

From the stellar Ayelet Noff at Blonde 2.0: Thinking of Developing a MySpace App?

April 5, 2008 at 09:08 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

MySpace, big labels team up

NY Times: Three Record Companies Team Up With MySpace for Music Web Site.

April 5, 2008 at 12:02 AM in Music, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (2) | | (0)

A newbie's guide to Facebook

Computerworld: A newbie's guide to Facebook. A look at the fast-growing social networking site and  its offerings from a business and personal perspective.

April 2, 2008 at 01:33 AM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

Tweetscan picks up the personal tweets you've missed

This is an amazing find.

In Twitter, you can direct message someone, but most people tend to point out something or reply to someone by using its @reply convention.

Trouble is, unless you read all of your updates 24/7 (an impossibility for most mortals if you follow more than 100 or 200 people), a lot of the @replies never come to your attention. This has been a major shortcoming of Twitter since its inception.

Now, Brian Solis points to a solution: Tweetscan.com picks up the personal tweets you've missed. Just plunk in your twitter handle and you'll see all the past tweets directed your way. You can also narrow it down to tweets sent by a particular user. And, you can see tweets sent by one user to another user, not just you.

I was both delighted and horrified to see all the personal messages sent publicly to me — I never saw literally dozens of these. Give it a try.

March 29, 2008 at 02:22 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (2) | | (0)

Top 100 Twitter power users

doshdosh points to the Top 100 Twitter users ranked by number of followers.

Lots of familiar names in the Top 25: Barack Obama, Robert Scoble, Jason Calacanis, Leo Laporte, Michael Arrington, Ev Williams, Kevin Rose, Cali Lewis, Chris Pirillo, Guy Kawasaki, Biz Stone, Amber MacArthur, Dave Winer, Scott Beale.

I only have 600 or so folks following me so far down the Twitter power curve.

March 29, 2008 at 01:36 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Are social networks a real business?

Charlene Li, writing for the Economist, says social networks are here to stay — but they may not be a real business.

March 28, 2008 at 11:52 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social networking through online chess

CNET News.com has this recent 4-minute video on Chess.com and other online chess sites that offer a degree of social networking.

If you just checkmated your new friend in India or took your Russian opponent's rook, new chess Web sites like Chess.com are encouraging niche social networking. CNET News.com's Kara Tsuboi sat down with the site's founder to find out what has attracted more than 100,000 members in less than a year.

March 27, 2008 at 11:29 PM in Games, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Facebook wants to introduce you to ... your friends

Brian Solis at bub.licio.us: Facebook Would Like to Introduce You to…Your Friends. "Facebook has quietly rolled out an interesting feature that’s tucked away on the lower right-hand side of your home page."

March 27, 2008 at 04:49 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

100 social networking sites for video

Here's a Big Crazy List of social networking sites for video. In other words, the top 100 video social networks.

Yep, Ourmedia is on it. We'll be relaunching the site in the not-too-distant future.

March 24, 2008 at 06:29 PM in Social networks, Video | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Toward a universal identity on the Web

San Jose Mercury News: Toward a universal identity on the Web. Facebook is growing up and could finally become a social hub that adults find indispensable.

March 21, 2008 at 02:45 PM in Social networks, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

LinkedIn now offering corporate profiles

San Francisco Chronicle: LinkedIn now offering corporate profiles.

Yahoo employees tend to land at rival Google for their next job. The median age for Facebook employees is 27. And Hewlett-Packard draws as many graduates from Bangalore University in India as it does from San Jose State and Stanford.

In a new feature introduced today, LinkedIn, the Mountain View professional social networking site, has produced 160,000 corporate profiles, from Microsoft Corp. to Apple Inc., detailing information such as common career paths, top schools and popular employees for each company.

The corporate profiles draw on data culled from and supplied by its 20 million users, who list their employer, title, work history and other personal details in their profile. ...

March 21, 2008 at 02:42 PM in Business use, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Book-focused networking sites

Listened to the report on NPR this evening about book social networks.

Bookish people may not be known for their social skills, but a crop of social-networking Web sites aimed at bibliophiles are allowing readers to connect with the page — and with each other — in a brand new "virtual" environment.

Think of it as Facebook or MySpace for people who'd rather browse in a book shop than go to a party. Book-centered sites like LibraryThing, Goodreads, Shelfari, aNobii and BookJetty, among others, allow readers to keep track of books they have read or books they want to read or buy — and see what others are reading and recommending.

Book social networking is believed to have begun in 2005, when Tim Spaulding, founder of LibraryThing, launched the site as a way to organize his own personal book sprawl. The site took off immediately, and Spaulding added ways to socialize and exchange information about books.

LibraryThing allows users to search particular titles to see how many other readers have that book on their shelves, and how many have reviewed it. There are also suggestions of related books to read; it's a virtual feast of information.

"When you've entered your books on LibraryThing, it tells you that this person shares 50 books with you, and that provides a sort of possibility," Spaulding explains. "You can look at their library, you can get suggestions from it, you can even engage them in conversation."

Sean Flannagan, who runs the blog Deeplinking.net, explores art and cultural trends on the Web. He says there are around 40 book-focused networking sites.

"People tend to define themselves by their books, and they love to show off their book collections at home," Flannagan says. "I think book social networks act as an extension of that."

Book lovers seem to agree; hundreds of thousands of them are signing up. ...

March 20, 2008 at 11:34 PM in Books, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Finding useful Web 2.0 and social networking tools

UK's Theknowledge: Finding useful Web 2.0 and social networking tools.

March 20, 2008 at 09:49 PM in Social networks, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Are video channels social networks?

Interesting back and forth between a TechCrunch writer and Magnify.net CEO Steve Rosenbaum about how people want to interact with one another in video communities.

More here: Magnify.net Announces Online Social TV Network 3.0.

March 19, 2008 at 11:32 PM in Social networks, Video | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Social network wars are over

From the always perceptive Paul Gillin: Social Network Wars are Over.

If you’re sitting on the sidelines waiting for the market to pick winners in the social network race, you can stand up now. Hitwise data for 2007 shows that MySpace and Facebook together accounted for 88% of all visits to social network sites. The next closest competitor, Bebo , got a little more than 1% of the traffic.   

There simply is no more competition in the general-purpose social network market. Other social media winners include LinkedIn (which wasn’t included in the Hitwise data), YouTube and Flickr. If you're a big brand pursuing a broad strategy, you can safely place your bets on these services. For the next year or two, the also-rans will be busy finding buyers and merger partners.

Now is when it really gets interesting, because now the action shifts to vertical market sites. For many marketers, this is where the more interesting opportunity lies. For example, in the area of health, there’s CarePages.com, Wellsphere, Patientslikeme, RevolutionHealth.com and iMedix. Seniors can choose from Elder Wisdom Circle, Grandparents.com, Eons, TeeBeeDee and Multiply. Mothers can sign up for Cafemom, MothersGroups.com, MomJunction and MothersClick, among others.

And the action isn’t limited to consumer markets. Sermo is a social network for physicians, which now boasts more than 50,000 members. Doctors exchange information about serious medical issues and review cases in real time. Pairup connects business travelers for peer advice, networking and assistance. There’s a list of more than 350 social networks here. 

And also this: Don't Let Tools Distract You.

I was presenting a social media seminar to a public-relations agency recently when the talk turned to uses of blogs. The people in the room were excited  about blogging's potential and were eager to apply the technology to new tasks.

I cautioned them that they were asking the wrong question. The issue isn’t what tool to use, but what problem to solve. Tool selection is secondary. ...

March 18, 2008 at 12:01 AM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (2) | | (0)

Hooked on social networks

San Jose Mercury News: Hooked on social networks. MySpace, Facebook and LinkedIn prove not to be fads, but are they useful? 

March 17, 2008 at 11:00 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Facebook groups face scrutiny for March Madness pools

Chicago Tribune:  Facebook face legal scrutiny for NCAA March Madness pools.

March 15, 2008 at 04:20 PM in Social networks, Sports | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

AOL buys Bebo: There goes the neighborhood

Jeff Jarvis at Seeking Alpha: AOL Buys Bebo: There Goes the Neighborhood. Jeff's got style. Excerpt:

Poor Bebo. I feel for the residents of their hip and convivial apartment block. It has just been bought by a slumlord.

AOL — which is paying $850m for the social networking site, the other Facebook — is where innovations go to die. ...

March 14, 2008 at 09:56 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

New sales program pays Facebook members

Associated Press: Facebook application pays users for helping sell goods to friends.

Facebook Inc.'s popular online hangout so far has proven to be a better place for promoting fun and games than peddling products.

But a new application aims to inject more commerce into the social playground by paying Facebook members who help merchants sell to their friends.

The program, called Market Lodge, revolves around the notion that consumers are more likely to buy merchandise or services recommended by someone they know and trust.

Market Lodge, made by a startup called bSocial Networks Inc., will pay Facebook members a 10 percent commission on all sales made on their recommendations. ...

March 13, 2008 at 03:43 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Journalist becomes object of derision at Mark Zuckerberg SXSW keynote

CNET News.com: Journalist becomes the story at Mark Zuckerberg SXSW Interactive keynote. (By the way, when did a Q&A with a reporter become marketed as a "keynote"?)

I've been seeing a lot of journalists lately who forget that they're not the story, the interview subject is.

March 9, 2008 at 11:28 PM in Media, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Twitter in plain English

Here's a 2 1/2-minute screencast explaining Twitter in plain English. Here's my Twitter page, but I still think tweeting the most banal moments of your day is ... boring. Heading to bed now. (See?)

March 7, 2008 at 02:06 AM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

VideoMap comes to Facebook

Profy: VideoMap comes to Facebook.

Last Fall we talked about YourTrumanShow's new application: VideoMap, which launched at DEMOFall07 and then went into private alpha mode for development and testing. YourTrumanShow is known for giving you a place to video blog your life story. Today marks the release of VideoMap on FaceBook.

We wondered if the application's official release would live up to the promise of its debut, and the answer is mostly yes. During DEMO the creators of YourTrumanShow promised the VideoMap would offer a widget that would work with YouTube, FaceBook, MySpace and more. They said the widget would offer a graphic representation of your video connections and collections across social networks.

I installed the FaceBook application as soon as it came out this morning to give it a whirl. ...

Once the application was installed it took me to a screen to import any videos I had on YouTube. I don't have many, not being a video blogger, so the process was fairly quick for me. ...

Actually, I have a few hundred videos online, and like half the population they're not on YouTube, so I hope VideoMap and similar applications take that into account in their development roadmap.

March 3, 2008 at 11:49 PM in Social networks, Video | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Facebook vs. LinkedIn: Which is better for business?

Computerworld: Facebook vs. LinkedIn: Which is better for business? 'We test two top social networking sites with six business problems.'

March 3, 2008 at 11:38 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Facebook and the price of user privacy

ZDNet.co.uk: Author Aaron Greenspan, the maybe-creator of the Facebook idea, asks, What's so difficult about keeping information private?

March 2, 2008 at 12:38 AM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

MySpace hosts dev Jam

SF Chronicle: MySpace hosts dev Jam. Just as Facebook opened up its platform to outside developers last year, MySpace unveiled its platform to developers in early February. It plans to release the results to users this month and held a devJam all day today.

March 1, 2008 at 10:25 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Facebook adds features to lure in filmmakers

VentureBeat: Facebook adds features to lure in filmmakers.

Facebook is making moves on Hollywood. The company has introduced a new fan “Page,” called Facebook Film. It’s a template of a Facebook Page that comes loaded with applications intended to help filmmakers reach and interact with Facebook users.

Founder Mark Zuckerberg has been talking about Facebook becoming more a media company for some time. First, Facebook became a new sort of publishing company, with its news feed offering. Now Facebook is reaching out to other parts of the media. ...

February 28, 2008 at 03:14 PM in Film, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (1) | | (0)

'I want my privacy -- and my Facebook'

San Jose Mercury News: Yes! I want my privacy. Yes! I want my Facebook. Internet users say they want to protect their personal data, then share it with total strangers. (Mercury News illustration)

Americans are conflicted about Internet privacy. They say they want better protection for their personal data, but often trade away safeguards to connect with friends or find what they are looking for online. ...

February 28, 2008 at 02:33 PM in Privacy, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Superpoke Song

I just came across this Facebook "Superpoke Song" by TapDanceJedi. Other Facebook tunes at the Go2Web2.0 blog.

February 27, 2008 at 02:20 PM in Amusing, Music, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Kara interviews social media pioneer Seth Goldstein

Wall Street Journal columnist (and friend) Kara Swisher does an 8-minute video interview with Seth Goldstein, CEO and founder of SocialMedia.com in Palo Alto (no relation to SocialMedia.biz, which has been around quite a bit longer).

Kara calls the company "the friend to the widget makers" and Seth calls it "the largest analytics network for social media applications."

February 25, 2008 at 11:57 PM in Social networks, Social-media | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

When Facebook censors your political speech

When Facebook censors your political speech:

San Jose Mercury News: Obama vs. Facebook.

What is the difference between a Barack Obama supporter and a spammer?

According to Facebook, it can be as little as two "get out the vote" wall posts on a Web page maintained by the popular social-networking site.

On Wired's How-to wiki.

On myDD.

February 23, 2008 at 10:25 PM in Free speech, Politics, Social networks | Permalink | Comments (0) | | (0)

Is Facebook losing its glow?

The knock on Facebook:

Times Online (UK): Is Facebook finally losing its glow? After months of explosive growth, the number of people visiting Facebook fell for the first time last month.

PC Magazine: Facebook's death spiral. "Facebook's long, slow, and, for some, sad decline into oblivion has begun."

Renaissance Chambara: Facebook fatigue.

I'm hearing the same thing from some of my friends, though I don't see any decline in activity in my Facebook feeds.

February 21, 2008 at 11:25 PM in Social networks | Permalink | Comments (3) | | (0)

Facebook makes it easier to quit

The NY Times on how Facebook has finally made it easier to close your account.

Facebook.com, stung last week by the wrath of members who want to sever their relationships, tripped again when it tried to let them do so.

But the company said over the weekend that it had fixed the problems, making it possible — and not too difficult — to delete an account from the site entirely. ...

February 18, 2008 at 10:38 AM in Social networks |