Twitter’s Growth Slowing But Not For Long

Evan Williams, one of the co-founders of Twitter, was one of highlighted opening sessions at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Fransisco, Tuesday.  And Williams, revealed that he believes Twitter’s future will be bright with some of the new changes coming to the site.  

John Battelle, from Federated Media Publishing, hosted the chat and tried to get Williams to spill Twitter’s marketing revenue model to see if the site would eventually turn into a revenue-churning business.  Although Williams wouldn’t really answer the question, he did go onto say, “It’s not like we are spending our days looking under couch cushions for the elusive revenue model. Obviously, we are thinking about it.” (more…)

Report States Online Marketing Video’s On The Rise

Turn Here, an Online Video Production, Advertising and Distribution company, released the results of a recent survey about companies using Online Video’s for marketing.  The company surveyed 116 companies, which ranged from Fortune 500 companies, to PR and digital agencies, and traditional regional based companies.

Overall the report states that video through the web is increasingly becoming an important online marketing tool to reach out to clients.  83.5% of those surveyed have said they are already using some sort of online video marketing.  Companies however were split when it came to what type videos they produce.  Roughly 57.3% said they have created branded videos, content produced for companies to showcase their products or services, while 38.7% have created editorial content for their website.  (more…)

U2’s YouTube Tour

One of the biggest band’s in the world announced via their YouTube Channel on Monday that they would be offering fans a live online concert .  U2, which will be ending their 360 World Tour next week in Vancouver, will broadcast their concert live from Los Angeles on YouTube Sunday night for fans around in the globe in 16 countries.  The concert has been sold out for quite some time but tickets on Craigslist are going for up to $1000 for those hoping to get a chance to see the band first hand. 

The band has apparently been wanting to reach out to their fans through social media according to U2’s manager Paul McGuinness. “The band has wanted to do something like this for a long time,” said McGuinness. “As we’re filming the LA show, it’s the perfect opportunity to extend the party beyond the stadium. Fans often travel long distances to come to see U2 – this time U2 can go to them, globally.” (more…)

Facebook Changes Coming Once Again

Just last year, Facebook users were up in arms about the new layout on their favorite social networking site.  Close to a million people signed a petition to bring back the old layout and now after a year of finally settling down and adjusted to the layout, Facebook has leaked out information that there are some new changes coming to their website.

One change that has already taken place within the past 24 hours, is the layout of Group pages.  For the longest time Group pages were a mirror image of one of the original Facebook profiles, just with different information.  Group pages now look like the current profile layout and fan pages.  According to Facebook’s blog this ultimately means ‘that groups will now have a Wall that summarizes all the recent activities of people within the group and a Publisher that enables members to share their content.’  It also means that group activities and what’s being posted on the group wall will now be posted to your news feed.  However, instead of getting posts from everyone from your groups, you will only be shown posts from your friends in the same group.  (more…)

Need New Friends? There’s An App For That

One of iTune’s top applications Loopt, has done it again.  The first live geographical based application, which allows you to check in and see where all your friends are at that moment has created a new social networking app.  LooptMix is a brand new application, and after a quick registration, allows you to meet others in your area. 

The new application has been a feature of the original Loopt application for quite some time now and has now decided it’s time to branch off on it’s own.  The app will allow users to connect with other people in their area with similar interests.  Let’s say for example, you and a group of friends are at the park and are about to play a game of basketball.  However, you are short a person or two.  Well now with LooptMix, you are able to log to see who is nearby and enjoys playing basketball.  You are then able to have a live stream chat from the app inviting them to come play or have any conversation. (more…)

Google Wave Makes an Early Splash

Just a few years ago, the word “tweet” probably meant very little to you. It was nothing more than the onomatopoeic sound a bird makes. Of course these days millions of people are logging onto the social-networking juggernaut Twitter and voicing their thoughts instantly via tweet.

Could the word “wave” take on similar cultural currency? It will if Google has anything to say about it. In fact, the company aims to replace e-mail and instant-messaging in one fell swoop. On its Google Wave preview page, Google defines a wave as “equal parts conversation and document.” For the time being, the search giant’s stab at combining e-mail with chat and live documents is still in its testing phase. It’s being offered on an invitation-only basis, and so far the reviews from testers have been mixed. (more…)

Not Your Garden-Variety Small Business

With two decades of experience in the antiques trade, Susan Ingram was somewhat surprised when her sales figures finally began to decline. It quickly became apparent that she would need to adapt a new strategy; otherwise the business would become a relic in its own right.

Signing on as a jack of all trades in 2007, Susan’s son Garrett Ingram helped to facilitate the shift away from antiques and toward the lucrative garden décor market. Garrett saw an opportunity to turn the family business, A Rustic Garden, into a burgeoning online enterprise. (more…)

Social Media Sets World Record

Over the weekend the social media world had the keyword #beatcancer tagged all over the web.  EVERYWHERE, an Atlana based Social Media Marketing firm had asked bloggers at BlogWorld, & the New Media Expo, which both took place in Las Vegas this past weekend, to put #beatcancer in their posts to spread awareness and raise money for cancer, which then started a trending topic on Twitter.  Radian6, who was the online monitoring company, announced this afternoon, that #BeatCancer broke the Guinness World Record for Most Widespread Social Network Message in 24 Hours. (more…)

Hollywood Banning Social Media

We have all had it happen at one time or another, where we post something that we shouldn’t have and later regret.  Although it hasn’t happened yet many film studios are working on banning the use of social media sites all together to the cast of their films, so that no details of projects will be released.

Dreamworks, which is known most specifically for their computer-animated films, is the first studio to announce that they are currently working on new contracts for Mike Myers & Cameron Diaz, who are scheduled to reprise their roles in the next Shriek saga, which will ban the use of social media sites.   The new contract will state that that the actors will be forbidden from posting any information on any Internet sites. (more…)

FBI Warns Social Media Users

A new report out by the FBI, is warning users of the popular social networking sites, Facebook and Twitter that thieves are only one click away.  The report says there are becoming more and more cyber-thieves on social networking sites, which can provide them with a whole slough a personal information.  Nearly 3,200 hijacked accounts have been reported to the Internet Crime Complaint Center, and thousands more are expected to be unreported since 2006. 

The center which is an alliance between the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center was established as a place “to serve as a means to receive Internet related criminal complaints and to further research, develop, and refer the criminal complaints to federal, state, local, or international law enforcement and/or regulatory agencies for any investigation they deem to be appropriate.” (more…)