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19 Dec 2010 22:59

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Tech: Do Facebook’s new wider ads invade your space too much?

  • Does Facebook disrespect our space by constantly changing its design? And should we complain about it? One thing you may not have noticed about Facebook’s latest design change is that the ads got a lot bigger and more horizontal, at the cost of social media real estate. While we’d argue that it’s not nearly as big a deal as it seems, digital media strategist David Dalka (writing for TechCrunch) would argue that it’s something you should be angry about. “An offline analogy,” Dalka suggests, “might be when a television channel turns down the volume of their shows, while keeping the volume of commercials higher.” We’re not sure if wider column width is the new Billy Mays, but it’s an interesting argument, to say the least.  source

15 Dec 2010 10:09

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Culture: Time’s Person of the Year not Julian Assange, but some Mark guy

  • OK, so many were gunning for Julian Assange to go into this spot, but at the same time, Mark Zuckerberg is the guy who would probably deserve the honor most if Assange wasn’t in the running. Why? This seems like a pretty good argument: “In less than seven years, Zuckerberg wired together a twelfth of humanity into a single network, thereby creating a social entity almost twice as large as the U.S.” Assange hasn’t done that yet. Plus, wasn’t Assange on the cover of Time like a week or two ago? Seems like he’s already got some high media saturation. source

11 Dec 2010 20:07

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Culture: A sad story of childbirth and death, told through Facebook

  • A heartbreaking tale, told in a postmodern way. Shana Swers of Gaithersburg, Md. wanted to reveal the joy of her childbirth to the world, but the medical complications that followed meant that she would never be able to live to enjoy the motherhood that came along with it. Beyond the story itself, what’s fascinating is the way that The Washington post presents it – as a Facebook stream. This is one of the best story layouts we’ve seen the Post do online. It’s a shame that it had to come with a story so heartbreaking. source

06 Dec 2010 09:50

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Tech: Did Groupon make smart move by not selling to Google?

  • what Groupon, the quickly-growing deals site, reportedly declined a buyout offer from Google for a whopping $6 billion over the weekend. That’s a lot of money to turn down.
  • why The company’s CEO, Andrew Mason was concerned about the strategic direction under Google and what would happen to his loyal staff. So an IPO’s next. source
  • » A mixed record for startups: Some tech companies that have passed on the major buyout offers, like Facebook (which passed on a $1 billion buyout offer from Yahoo! way back in 2006), have only gotten much larger on their own. Other tech giants that missed the buyout opportunity – Yahoo! turned down an epic deal from Microsoft in 2008 and nosedived ever since. Other companies who have taken the buyout have had success stories (YouTube, which is a cornerstone of Google’s offerings) and precipitous declines (MySpace, which is trying to make a comeback; and Bebo, which sold to AOL and then lost nearly all of its value when it was sold again a couple years later). Which is to say, it’s too soon to know whether Groupon screwed up here.

05 Dec 2010 23:16

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Tech: Mark Zuckerberg’s “60 Minutes” appearance gets testy

  • On the plus side, at least he wasn’t sweating. Months after Kara Swisher turned Mark Zuckerberg into a puddle of goo over privacy issues, the Facebook founder was on “60 Minutes” talking privacy with Lesley Stahl, and not turning into a puddle of goo. Odds that he’s been coached since that infamous incident: Even. source

04 Dec 2010 15:10

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Culture: Here’s a photo of Ducktales because we wanted to post one

  • Last night we read about this utterly bizarre idea to have people change their Facebook profile pictures to those of cartoon characters … to help speak out against child abuse. Now, the connection there is tenuous at best, so we ignored it … until we realized we could post a picture of Scrooge McDuck on the site for no apparent reason other to amuse ourselves. So here it is. Ducktales! A whoo-hoo! Tomorrow, Chip ‘N’ Dale’s Rescue Rangers. (OK, ok, because we know that there are hardcore types out there, we’ll note that this image predates Ducktales by a few years, and that the history of the Scrooge McDuck character is utterly fascinating.) source

29 Nov 2010 20:40

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Politics: George W. Bush invades Facebook; world stops dead in tracks

The two things that define the naughts more than anything else, together at last. Bush openly admitted he was there because he was “trying to sell books.” source
 

20 Nov 2010 20:49

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Biz: Debt collectors stalk people on Facebook, actively break law

  • Debt collectors have hit Facebook. Florida resident Melanie Beacham recently sued debt collection agency MarkOne Financial LLC for harassment. Apparently, they decided to not only bug her, but her friends and family on Facebook, all in an attempt to get $362 in car payments. We’re seriously thinking of sending this friend request just to see what this jerk does. Should we? We’ll leave it up to you guys. source

13 Nov 2010 12:04

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Tech: Uh-oh: Is Facebook prepping to attack Gmail head-on?

  • issue Over the last week or so, Google and Facebook have been entwined in an argument over Facebook’s importing of Gmail contacts; Google wants them to open up, but Facebook instead has worked around Google’s roadblocks.
  • reason? So why has Facebook been so resistant to Google’s open-up-your-datastream advances? Well, it seems Facebook is about to launch some sort of messaging thing on Monday. Is it e-mail? Because if it is, that would explain a lot. source

11 Nov 2010 22:53

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Tech: Google/Facebook have lots of money to throw around

  • $3.5 million paid by Google to retain top engineer source
  • » Good engineers are in short supply. At least, that’s what we’re gleaning from the numbers being thrown at them by Google and Facebook. Earlier this year, a Google engineer turned down a 15% raise and $500,000 in cash restricted stock to go work for Facebook. So, Google smartened up: when another staff engineer was seduced by Facebook, Google offered them $3.5 million — yes, million — to stay. They accepted.