Is Facebook about to go QR code crazy?

Imagine that you’re walking around a bar. Everywhere you turn you see people wearing shirts emblazoned with checkered barcodes. No one is talking to each other. Instead of dancing and conversing, the majority of the establishment’s patrons are taking camera phone pictures of those around them. Pictures aren’t being taken of people’s faces, but rather [...]

CNN’s Klein says he fears social networks

At a press event in NY today, CNN chief Jonathan Klein says he fears social networks more than his TV competition. “The competition I’m really afraid of are social networking sites,” he said. “That threatens to pull people away from us. The people you’re friends with on Facebook or the people you follow on [...]

Notes: Microsoft Tab, ShatnerSpace, YT Captions

Noted, after watching “Alice in Wonderland” and giving it a C…
Whole bunch of pictures of the Microsoft Tablet at engadget. Coolness abounds.
Shatner creates his own social network at MyOuterSpace.com. A Sci-Fi social network. Could he have owned this space (as it were) if he thought of this years ago, or what? (Geekosystem via Mediaite)
Oscar advertisers [...]

Who’s tops on Twitter in local TV?

We all know that local TV loves its Twitter. Since there’s no easy way to search for the answer, we’ll just throw it out in the form of a question: Which local TV sites and anchor/reporters have the most followers on Twitter? For example, Jenni Hogan, a traffic anchor at KIRO-TV, has [...]

Thousands more cities added to Facebook Ads

Facebook’s local advertising tool has rolled out thousands more cities that advertisers can target, in the U.S. and across the globe. Facebook didn’t provide a list, but I found Issaquah, Bothell and dozens of other surprisingly smaller cities near Seattle.
When I created a fake ad for Issaquah, a town of 24,057 people, [...]

The ‘Glue’ that holds together more social networking

There’s another social networking site out there now. That may be a ho-hum way to begin an essay, but stay with me for a moment because the new site does many things well. “Glue” works because it takes a new approach to sharing – that is, the sharing of things you like, in large lists. [...]

Virtual goods meet physical environments

The virtual goods economy is here to stay. When virtual food and clothing first appeared on social networks a few years ago, I thought that the fad would come and go. Whereas the collection of virtual goods had grown into a full-fledged market in Asia, I remained skeptical of the long-term lifespan of consumerism around digital items in the U.S.
With the [...]

Liveblogging trials: where do you stand?

Southern Methodist University prof Jake Batsell raises a thought-provoking discussion over at Journalism 2.0, as he presents the pros and cons of liveblogging (or Tweeting, or whatever) a courtroom trial. Batsell presented a case study to his class:
“…examining the Bakersfield Californian’s Web coverage of a quintuple-murder trial in 2007. The young reporter was under pressure [...]

Notes: ABC News, Carlos Slim and OK Go

Noted, while wondering if coffee could be considered “breakfast soup”:

Diane Mermigas: “How to Halt ABC News’ Slide Toward Irrelevance.” (BNet)
Facebook Drives 3X Traffic to Broadcast (sites) Than Google News (ReadWriteWeb)
CNN’s Leon Harris: “An anchorman SHOULD be a journalist!” (Poynter)
Will Carlos Slim buy the NYT? We don’t know. We just like the name “Carlos Slim.”
Finally, [...]

Red Sox hold meetup: you should, too

I’m going to #SoxUp tonight at Fenway Park, a gathering of Boston social media types. The Sox are helping to put on the meetup, and I think it’s ingenious. For years, Terry Heaton and I preached the idea that stations and newspapers should hold blogger meetups. I think gathering the social media people from your [...]

Spot.us makes some changes based on feedback

Crowdsourced journalism site Spot.us has listened to its audience and has tweaked its process. According to Nieman Journalism Lab, “Users can now easily follow updates on a reporter’s pitch and donate their time or expertise to a story, instead of just their money.” This is a good change, because it allows different levels of interaction. [...]

Huffington Post introduces college edition

There’s a new edition of Huffington Post out, and it’s aimed at college kids. HuffPost College launches with more than 60 partner school newspapers. Smart. HuffPost College is run by two people – one of whom is already the site’s tech editor. Ariana Huffington writes:
“HuffPost College features voices from colleges and universities all around the [...]

Facebook now bigger than Yahoo

Facebook is now the second most-popular site on the web. In January, Facebook pulled in 133.6 million users to Yahoo’s 132 million, according to Compete. That puts Facebook in second, behind only Google. If you want to see something really interesting, check out the chart below that shows engagement. In this category, Facebook blows them [...]

Facebook partners with PayPal for local ads

Just a couple days ago, we wrote that businesses are flocking to Facebook, and now the social media giant announced a strategic relationship with PayPal. “We want to give the people who use Facebook, as well as advertisers and developers, a fast and trusted way to pay across our service,” said Dan Levy, director [...]

Notes: iPad, Email and Vatican Rock

The iPad business model for news: Strategies publishers must embrace. (Nieman)
Top 500 companies lag in SEO. Holy crud. (MediaPost)
Social Networkers still love email. (eMarketer)
42% would consider paying for newspapers online. (Nielsen)
NYT reporter resigns amid allegations of plagiarism (editorsweblog)
Just because: Vatican’s newspaper lists its top ten albums. Really. (Spinner)

Locamoda enhances Foursquare with digital out-of-home media integration

The convergence of mobile social networks and physical locations just got a major shot in the arm. Locamoda, a pioneering social media company specializing in digital out-of-home, has brought Foursquare visualizations to place-based media networks. Though such an integration has been possible since Foursquare opened its API, Locamoda is the first company to make the natural extension [...]

Local businesses flocking to Facebook

Social media giant Facebook continues to grow larger than anyone thought possible, and buried in the last round of stats is this important tidbit, thanks to InsideFacebook:
Pages that Facebook defines as local businesses went from 700,000 actives to 1.5 million (since December). In other words, local businesses comprised half of the overall increase in active [...]

‘Nashville is Talking’ no more

Nashville is Talking, one of the earliest (if not the earliest) examples of a station partnering with its local blogosphere, has closed down. The site was started in 2005, when WKRN’s then-General Manager Mike Sechrist hired local blogger Brittney Gilbert to staff the original site. The move was, as near as we know, unprecedented. At [...]

Average Facebook sharing up 500% in six months

Growth continues like crazy on the Social Web, with Facebook showing an increase of sharing in the past six months to the tune of 500%. The now-400-million Facebook users each post an average of 12 items per week. This is an audience you simply have to empower to share your content. There’s no avoiding the [...]

And so it begins: I get “Buzz”ed

Because you can never participate in too many social networks… Google just hit me with Buzz, its social network that really sits on top of GMail in a fairly easy way. Setup was automatic and it immediately started me off by having me follow 30 people. Apart from the @gmail.com addresses, the choices seem to [...]