October 2009

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…)

Social Media Companies Support New FCC Proposal

Last month, FCC Chairman, Julius Genachowski, proposed an outline of explicit rules that will soon protect consumer access to an open Internet.  What is considered as “network neutrality,” the rules will prevent broadband-based Internet providers such as AT&T and Comcast for example, from discriminating against certain types of services, applications, or online views.  They will  also require providers to have have public access to the companies manage-mental practices.  (more…)

The Week In Social Media

iePlexus’ Weekly Video Blog from iePlexus on Vimeo.

Here at iePlexus, we now officially on Facebook and we are inviting all of you to become of fan of the company. All you need to do is log onto Facebook, search for iePlexus INC and hit become a fan. The site is intended to give you a place interact with company, by posting comments on the wall, reading our blog, and finding client testimonials along with so much more and if you aren’t already make sure you follow us on twitter @ieplexus.

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Google Getting Off The Streets & Onto The Sidewalk

With Google Maps, you are able to drive through streets in 14 different countries, explore the moon, mars, and even views from the Hubble telescope.  They are currently working on getting street views up in 24 more countries and hope to have them up and running within the next year.  In the mean time, Google is thinking ahead and taking it’s map feature to the next level.  By using the Google Trike, you’ll now be able to explore sidewalks, park trails, university campuses, theme parks, zoos, golf courses, and boardwalks across the globe,  just to name a few.

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Zuckerberg’s Gamble: Facebook Thrives Despite Redesign

Now that the dust has settled and users have had almost a year to digest Facebook’s polarizing site redesign, it’s time to take stock of the social-networking behemoth’s strengths and weaknesses. Back in July, PC World tech writer Hillary Rhodes posed a thought-provoking question: Is Facebook past its prime? It may still be too early to provide a conclusive answer, but we can at least take some time to evaluate the site’s recent successes and missteps.

From the outset it was clear that Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg regarded Twitter as a serious contender in the social-networking world. Those beliefs manifested themselves in the redesign, which aped Twitter’s simplicity and real-time news feed. Twitter began to catch on with celebrities, journalists and average Joes, in part because of the quickness and ease associated with tweeting. (more…)