Mashable: Latest 17 News Updates - including “Mashable Weekend Recap: 32 Stories You May Have Missed”
Mashable: Latest 17 News Updates - including “Mashable Weekend Recap: 32 Stories You May Have Missed” |
- Mashable Weekend Recap: 32 Stories You May Have Missed
- Megaupload Data Could Be Erased This Week
- Samsung Galaxy S Advance Has Two Cores and a 4-Inch Screen
- How Evi Compares to Siri: Evi’s Clever, Too, But Slow [VIDEO]
- SOPA and Hollywood: Standing in the Way of Technological Innovation [INFOGRAPHIC]
- How the Peace Corps is Building a Community of Volunteers Online
- YouTube Cover Song Face-Off: Adele’s ‘Set Fire to the Rain’
- Pinterest Becomes Top Traffic Driver for Retailers [INFOGRAPHIC]
- Meme Machine: Top 5 Viral Hits of the Week
- How To Avoid Hiring The Wrong Person For Your Startup
- 10 Hysterical Political Parodies on Twitter
- Megaupload’s Kim Dotcom Loses ‘Call of Duty’ Top Spot While in Prison [VIDEO]
- Remarkable ‘Joy of Books’ Animation Brings Books to Life [VIRAL VIDEO]
- Can You Name the 20 Viral Topics in This Illustration? [CONTEST]
- Tech Hiring Trends 2012: What You Need to Know [INFOGRAPHIC]
- 21 Must-Follow Pinterest Users
- 39 New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed
- Tweet Your Best Shot to Make NBA’s Curry Your Voicemail Assistant
| Mashable Weekend Recap: 32 Stories You May Have Missed Posted: 30 Jan 2012 04:09 AM PST      We hope the break from football games (really, who watches the Pro Bowl?) gave you some time to catch up on interesting stories, funny memes and other Internet happenings this weekend at Mashable. But if you had other things to do, we’re giving you a way to catch up with the rest of us. Take a look at the links below to see if you missed any thought-provoking pieces or comical videos over the weekend. We offered reviews, updates, in-depth reports, breaking news, commentary and a precious photo of a cotton-candy dog. So join us at Mashable here with our nifty Weekend Recap, and then get ready for Super Bowl weekend! News & Opinion Essentials
Helpful Resources
Weekend Leisure
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| Megaupload Data Could Be Erased This Week Posted: 30 Jan 2012 03:14 AM PST   All the data on Megaupload – legal or illegal – could be erased as soon as Thursday, Feb. 2, the Associated Press reports. The file storage website hires outside companies – Carpathia Hosting Inc. and Cogent Communications Group Inc – to store its users’ data. Since Megaupload’s assets have been frozen, the service cannot pay the hosting companies to keep hosting the data. According to a letter by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia, filed in the case Friday, Jan 27, they could begin deleting data Thursday. Megaupload attorney Ira Rothken says the company is doing what it can to try to keep the data from being deleted. “We’re cautiously optimistic at this point that because the United States, as well as Megaupload, should have a common desire to protect consumers, that this type of agreement will get done,” he said. If the data is indeed erased, it will be very bad news for some 50 million people who’ve used Megaupload’s services, many of them legally. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) indicted seven people and two companies which ran Megaupload earlier in January. The site’s founder Kim Dotcom (a.k.a. Kim Schmitz) and six others are accused of making $175 and causing $500 million in copyright infringement. If they’re found guilty in what the indictment calls a “Mega Conspiracy”, the accused could go to prison for a maximum of 20 years. [via AP] More About: FBI, megaupload, piracy, trending For more Business coverage:
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| Samsung Galaxy S Advance Has Two Cores and a 4-Inch Screen Posted: 30 Jan 2012 01:30 AM PST   A new smartphone from Samsung has been unearthed in the Philippines, the Galaxy S Advance GT-i9070. The device will apparently be Samsung’s mid-range smartphone, with a curved, 4-inch, 800 x 480 pixel screen, a 5-megapixel camera with LED flash and a dual-core processor. Samsung Galaxy S Advance is currently running on Android 2.3.6 or Gingerbread, and we’re likely to see it at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona at the end of February – hopefully upgraded to Android 4.0. After a recent leak at the company’s website, we’re also hoping to see the mysterious Samsung Galaxy S III at that same event, though no concrete details about the device have been revealed yet. Check out some more pictures and videos of the device in action over at hardwarezone.com.ph. Update: the device has been officially confirmed by Samsung. It will have up to 16GB of storage memory, 768MB of RAM, and HSPA support. It will ship with Android 2.3 Gingerbread, unfortunately, and we can expect it in Russia next month, followed by Europe, China, Africa, Middle East, Southeast and Southwest Asia, Latin America, but not the U.S. The price has not been disclosed.  More About: samsung, samsung galaxy s, Samsung Galaxy S Advance For more Mobile coverage:
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| How Evi Compares to Siri: Evi’s Clever, Too, But Slow [VIDEO] Posted: 29 Jan 2012 04:17 PM PST
For such a nominal price, don’t expect Evi to be on par with Siri. There are some major differences with Evi as opposed to the quick and integrated Siri. Evi will not schedule meetings on your calendar or let you dictate text messages. But for functions like finding local shops, restaurants and general information, it’s pretty helpful. I asked Evi: “What time is it, Evi?” and it thought I said, “What time is it TV?”. Messages such as “Just a mo’” appeared on the screen to let me know it was thinking and then it said, “I’m having trouble getting a response from my servers.” Yes, it was noticeably slower than Siri. Other times it would say, “I don’t know right now — try asking again next week.” I asked, “Can you set my alarm for 9 p.m.?” even though Evi is not synced with the other apps like Siri is, it said it hasn’t learned to do that yet. Could it be possible that True Knowledge, the company behind Evi, will integrate the app with its operating system’s other functions in the future? Check out the company’s video below introducing Evi. The voice sounds a lot like Siri, although some reviewers have said the voice sounds annoying. Yes, it thinks too long and sometimes right after you state your query it says it is not getting a response from the servers, but then, your answer appears. But even as I write this, I keep wanting to call this app Siri because it’s quite similar. However, Apple’s assistant still comes out in the lead compared to Evi [Link to app store]. For as many people who use Siri for making appointments and scheduling calls, there are also many who enjoy the depth of knowledge and wit Siri contains. Ask Siri to “tell me about the Civil War” and it directs me to a related link. Ask Evi the same question and you get a brief encyclopedia response including the dates and a small photo. Siri also has built-in cleverness. Just to play around with Evi and find out if any sassy answers were built into this app, I asked, “What’s my name?” and it responded, “Who are you? Surely you know the answer to that one already.” I asked Evi other absurd questions like, What should I eat for dinner?” and it pointed me to a website for an olive tapenade recipe. If you want a bare-bones Siri with some frequent hiccups — but a .99 cent or free price tag — Evi is a good option for now. What do you think about Evi? Have you used it? How does it compare to Siri? Tell us in the comments. More About: apps, Evi, siri, voice recognition
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| SOPA and Hollywood: Standing in the Way of Technological Innovation [INFOGRAPHIC] Posted: 29 Jan 2012 03:46 PM PST In case you’re still unclear about the U.S. Congress’s hapless SOPA legislation that went down in flames earlier this month, the Matador Network sums it up neatly with this angry infographic. Once you’ve read this infographic about SOPA, you might become angry, too. That’s because when you see the series of technological events that has led up to the present day, you’ll start realizing that almost every innovation that came along has been seen by the motion picture industry as a threat to its existence. Even more importantly, Hollywood has forgotten about how all that tech helped its industry, and has also forgotten the un-American activities blacklist that plagued Hollywood in the 1950s. Unfortunately, SOPA or legislation like it such as the ACTA (that’s even more dangerous) could have a similar effect, serving as an Internet blacklist. Despite the studio executives’ awful record of predicting the outcome of tech innovation, new technologies have consistently helped the motion picture industry. The infographic will show you the details of the arm-twisting of movie studios and their political cronies, forever fighting the technology that ends up helping them. At the same time, the studios do their best to influence the political landscape to fulfill their desire for profits and power, regardless of what’s best for their customers. What do you think of the movie studios’ efforts to stand in the way of progress? Let us know in the comments.   Infographic courtesy Matador Network, via Boing Boing More About: infographics, SOPA
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| How the Peace Corps is Building a Community of Volunteers Online Posted: 29 Jan 2012 03:09 PM PST   When volunteers return home from service with The Peace Corps, they often want to stay in touch with fellow Corps members. Can social media help them do that? Yes, says Erica Burman, director of communications at The National Peace Corps Association (NPCA). The Peace Corps, a U.S. service program, sends Americans across the world to volunteer and develop cross-cultural understanding. Peace Corps members, who serve for 27 months, share a bond with one another. “Once a volunteer, always a volunteer,” goes their informal motto. Erica Burman’s organization is an “alumni association” for Peace Corps volunteers who have returned home. The NPCA’s mission is to keep returned volunteers involved with the greater Peace Corps community. And according to Burman, plenty of her community building is done online. “Social media is really important to us,” says Burman. “The Peace Corps community is very mobile, diverse and fragmented. In pre-Internet days, there were definitely some challenges in keeping connected.” Before the days of social media, trying to maintain a community of returned volunteers was a tedious challenge. Before Peace Corps volunteers were sent home, they would be asked to to share their info with the NPCA. Often, they didn’t agree to do that. A lack of information about returned volunteers’ whereabouts became a major roadblock in the way of forming a cohesive community. But social media has changed that. Volunteers have been forming their own online communities to reconnect and talk about their time in the Peace Corps. For that reason, fragmentation is a daily struggle for Burman’s online efforts at the NPCA. Volunteers often make their own niche groups or communities around their personal profiles or interests. There are online groups for black volunteers, blind volunteers and volunteers interested in fair trade coffee issues or water access issues. The NPCA makes it a point to celebrate these user-created groups while simultaneously tying them to the larger Peace Corps online community. Burman’s team has a presence on Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn and Twitter, and the NPCA is always looking for new ways to get volunteers back in the fold. “We’re trying to use all the means we can to connect people,” says Burman. The NPCA’s online platforms can serve as a way for former volunteers to share their common experience during and after their service. After living in new and very different societies for over two years, returning to the U.S. can cause reverse culture shock. Psychologists have tied this “re-entry shock” to depression and other mental health problems. Volunteers who experience re-entry shock can find one another online to work through their emotions together. These communities aren’t just for returned volunteers, either. With so many Peace Corps members online, the NPCA’s social media spaces have become great resources for prospective volunteers to learn more about the 2-year odyssey on which they’re about to embark. “We’ve usually got about 4,000 people in our ‘Future Peace Corps Volunteer Group’ on Facebook,” says Burman. “We totally encourage prospective volunteers and their family members to connect with these online communities. They’ve hosted meetups in cities such as D.C. and Boston. These groups are excellent sources of info.” Burman says that returned Peace Corps volunteers want to continue volunteering back home and share their cross-cultural experience with the rest of America. According to Berman, Peace Corps volunteers have a unique voice that should be better heard in the U.S. “It's wonderful that we have these tools that people can connect, but our message is make sure you're connected to the larger community,” says Burman. “We have unique skills and perspectives and a voice that can be unique perspective in our country. There’s a call that [Peace Corps volunteers] continue to serve throughout their lives.” What do you think of the Peace Corps’ efforts to reunite and organize returned volunteers online? Let us know in the comments. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, YinYang More About: Social Media
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| YouTube Cover Song Face-Off: Adele’s ‘Set Fire to the Rain’ Posted: 29 Jan 2012 02:54 PM PST Each week, Mashable picks a popular song, finds 10 covers of it and asks you to vote for your favorite.   More than year after Adele’s mega popular 21 came out, the album’s third U.S. single — “Set Fire to the Rain” — claims the top spot on Billboard's Hot 100 this week. After 21 weeks on the charts, the song has been covered by musicians across the globe. We’ve narrowed the massive pool to 10 covers in the gallery below. So push Play, enjoy the talent and then vote for your favorite rendition in our poll. NEXT WEEK’S SONG: Coldplay’s “Paradise.” Please tweet your submissions to @BAHjournalist. Josh Harrison
Click here to view this gallery. To listen to more covers used in past YouTube Cover Song Face-Offs, click here. Past Cover Song Face-Off ChampionsGavin DeGraw's "Not Over You" by Brandyn BurnetteFrom the "Not Over You" Face-Off. Click here to view this gallery. More About: Entertainment, Music, music videos, viral videos, YouTube, YouTube Cover Song Face-Off For more Entertainment coverage:
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| Pinterest Becomes Top Traffic Driver for Retailers [INFOGRAPHIC] Posted: 29 Jan 2012 02:22 PM PST Pinterest, a two-year-old social bookmarking site that lets users collect and share things they like on the web, is driving increasingly significant amounts of traffic to retailers’ websites. The service enables users to create online bulletin boards, or “pinboards,” for popular categories such as home decor, food and wedding inspiration. Members can use Pinterest’s “Pin It” bookmarklet tool and iPhone app to save things they see online and offline, and explore and repin the images their friends collect via their personal newsfeeds. The website is especially popular among women, who account for 58% of Pinterest’s traffic, according to Experian Hitwise. The site’s popularity is quickly growing. Pinterest’s traffic increased more than fourfold between September 2011 and December 2011, bringing in 7.51 million unique visitors in December alone, data from Compete indicates. The amount of traffic Pinterest sent elsewhere has risen accordingly, becoming a top five referrer for several apparel retailers, according to internal data from Monetate, which provided the infographic below. Although Pinterest is becoming a significant source of traffic for retailers, search still dominates, and the site has yet to prove itself as a potential sales channel. At present, scant data is available about the social network’s conversion rates.
[via Monetate] More About: pinterest, retail, trending For more Media coverage:
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| Meme Machine: Top 5 Viral Hits of the Week Posted: 29 Jan 2012 02:03 PM PST   The Mashable Meme Machine is a daily look at five hilarious viral topics spreading across the web right now. The weekend is finally here, and if you’ve been too embarrassed to look at photos of cats and Ryan Goslin at the office, we’ve got you covered with this week’s roundup of our best meme coverage. If those two corners of odd Internet culture aren’t intriguing enough, we also have a canine version of Steve Jobs, Drunk Hulk’s interview about the Oscars and a Samsung commercial parody. Stumble upon any hilarious memes lately? Let us know. Feel free to contact Brian Anthony Hernandez (@BAHjournalist), Christine Erickson (@christerickson) or Lauren Hockenson (@lhockenson). 1. Steve Dogs This variation of the popular 2011 meme "Yes, This is Dog" features a Husky looking an awful lot like the late, great Steve Jobs. Its origins are dubious at best, but the image of the canine staring icily into the camera while wearing the innovator's signature turtleneck has blown up all over the Internet. Yes, that is Steve Dogs. Click here to view this gallery. More About: features, humor, Meme Machine, trending, tumblr, YouTube For more Entertainment coverage:
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| How To Avoid Hiring The Wrong Person For Your Startup Posted: 29 Jan 2012 01:38 PM PST   Chris Rickborn is the COO and co-founder for Unrabble, a cloud-computing hiring software company that helps busy startups make great hires. In a startup, hiring a new employee can be a business-changing event. The smaller the organization, the more impact each employee has on its ultimate success. Don't get me wrong — hiring is critical in any size of company, but larger organizations have the ability to orient and train new employees to an extent that startups can't offer. In a large company, if a new employee fails, the work can be redistributed and absorbed by other employees without having a significant impact. In a startup, a bad hire can be devastating. To make matters worse, startup owners rarely have dedicated HR staff, software tools or a hiring process that will take some of the risk out of hiring. Here are five tips to help you avoid hiring the wrong person for your startup. 1. Stop Giving Open Book TestsWriting lengthy job descriptions loaded with job requirements may keep unqualified candidates from wasting your time, but you've also just given every candidate a cheat sheet. Job seekers are taught to break down your job description and weave it into their resume, which will make everyone look equally qualified. There are even websites that will automatically mash your job description together with the candidates resume and spit out a new version with the right keywords embedded. Sell your company, your vision and the position, but make job seekers tell you what they can do for you — not what you told them you want. 2. Don't Confuse Experience With SkillsStartups move fast, and every position is a skilled position. Job candidates can often blur the line between a previous experience and a skill, which is a trap you need to avoid. Don't assume that candidates have certain skills just because it's a keyword on a resume, a previous job title or experience at a similar business. Have an in-depth conversation with your top candidates to discuss what they are best at and learn how they have acquired those skills through experience. 3. Make Sure the Timing Is RightJust like good timing can lead to the successful exit in a startup, good timing can also apply to job candidates. Where is the candidate in his career? Is he capable of taking a big risk at this point in his life? What kind of adversity has he faced in previous jobs? Does he seem too anxious to hit a home run or does his experience tell you he has the patience it takes to succeed? You don't need your employees abandoning ship the first time your startup hits rough seas. Sometimes it's just the right timing that makes a person successful in a new venture. 4. Skip the Initial Telephone InterviewI've never liked doing telephone interviews based on the initial review of a resume — it’s way too time-consuming. But I do like communicating with candidates, because that's when you learn the most about them. After I've looked at a candidate's background I might send off a short message and say, "Tell me about this experience” or, “What do you know about this skill?" How does he respond? Does he respond? Can he write? Is the exchange comfortable? The ability to communicate articulately in writing is a trait of top talent, regardless of the position. If you engage candidates in a more in-depth and ongoing communication string rather than conducting a one-and-done phone interview, you will quickly learn who stands out from the crowd. 5. Separate the "Can Do" From "Can Get it Done" In most startups, resources are tight and the timeline is very short. When you're hiring for a key position, make sure to ask yourself if you need someone who "can do the job" or someone who "can get the job done." The "can do" is the candidate with the hands-on skills who can accomplish the task without any help. The "can get it done" is the candidate who will deliver but may need other resources to make it happen. Both can be valuable attributes to have, but you need to clearly understand which one you need to avoid a hiring mistake that could set you behind. What other tips do you have? Have you hired the wrong person before? Tell us about your experience in the comments. Social Media Job ListingsEvery week we post a list of social media and web job opportunities. While we publish a huge range of job listings, we’ve selected some of the top social media job opportunities from the past two weeks to get you started. Happy hunting!
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, DNY59, AlexRaths More About: interviews, job interviews, job recruiting, job search series, jobs, trending For more Business coverage:
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| 10 Hysterical Political Parodies on Twitter Posted: 29 Jan 2012 12:00 PM PST There are countless parody accounts on Twitter — musicians, celebrities, cartoon characters and religious figures can all grace your feed with their presence. The most entertaining parodies, however, may be those of politicians around the world. For some people, real politicians who utilize Twitter can be overwhelming with constant campaigning and diehard opinions, especially during an election year. But their parodies — which sometimes boast more followers than the verified accounts — offer a momentary break from all that. Check out the gallery for 10 hilarious political parody accounts that are still relevant, providing you with amusing 140-character insights that may, in a weird way, even highlight some truth in politics (or at the very least make you laugh). Which political parodies on Twitter did we miss? Let us know in the comments. 1. @GingrichIdeas   This clever parody reads like Newt Gingrich's secret to-do list. He has quite the vision for the United States if he gets elected president (hint: there's a lot of space talk). Click here to view this gallery. Thumbnail courtesy of Andreas Eldh. More About: features, political parodies, trending, Twitter
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| Megaupload’s Kim Dotcom Loses ‘Call of Duty’ Top Spot While in Prison [VIDEO] Posted: 29 Jan 2012 11:59 AM PST   Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom can’t defend his top-spot score in the game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 from behind bars — he was recently bumped to the no. 2 spot by a player named Azaros. On Wednesday, a judge denied Dotcom bail, meaning he likely won’t be able to usurp Azaros’ Modern Warfare 3 title anytime soon. But Kim Dotcom, 38, has more troubling concerns than his gaming title. Last week, Dotcom appeared in court to face charges of copyright infringement to the tune of $175 million, and he allegedly cost copyright holders $500 million in lost revenue due to his Megaupload website. Dotcom became the best Modern Warfare 3 player on New Year’s Eve and celebrated with friends who threw confetti on him [scroll down to see the video]. It appears as though the Megaupload millionaire adores everything “mega” — including his player name on the game: MEGARACER. The New Zealand Herald reported that a room in Dotcom’s New Zealand mansions has seven 60-inch televisions, each with its own Xbox and Lazyboy reclining chair, which from the looks of the background in the video, it may be the place where he took the no. 1 spot. Kim Dotcom, whose real name is Kim Schmitz and is a German citizen, was arrested and detained on Jan. 20 along with three alleged accomplices in New Zealand. Because some of Megaupload‘s servers were based in Virginia, United States authorities were able to get involved in the case. He is waiting extradition to the United States to face the charges. A fifth suspect was arrested this past Wednesday in the Netherlands. Authorities are still looking for two more suspects linked to Megaupload. Nabbing a high-ranking score in a video game that sold more than 15 million copies takes obsessive dedication. Ironically, Megaupload might have made it even harder to reach that top spot by facilitating free downloads of games such as Modern Warfare 3. What do you think about Dotcom and Megaupload? And for those of you who play Modern Warfare: Call of Duty 3, what do you think about Azaros earning the top spot? Tell us in the comments. More About: Call of Duty, Kim Dotcom, megaupload, modern warfare, trending For more Entertainment coverage:
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| Remarkable ‘Joy of Books’ Animation Brings Books to Life [VIRAL VIDEO] Posted: 29 Jan 2012 11:00 AM PST
Relax and enjoy the magic that ensues when you combine a bookstore full of books, skillful stop-motion animation, haunting music, a boatload of creativity and 28 volunteers: The Joy of Books is a brilliant video by Sean Ohlenkamp. Just when we were thinking books were dead, along comes this video that’s so impressed the denizens of YouTube, 2.5 million people have viewed it since its debut earlier this month. Those books didn’t just jump and dance around the bookshelves by themselves, either. Ohlenkamp wasn’t specific about how long it took for him and his 27 volunteers to create this masterpiece, but he did thank “all the volunteer hands who shelved and re-shelved books all night, every night.” He also thanked Composer Grayson Matthews for the beautiful custom music you hear. “We spent many sleepless nights moving, stacking, and animating books at Type bookstore in Toronto,” Ohlenkamp says, adding that he got the idea for this carefully choreographed bookstore extravaganza when he and his wife were organizing their own bookshelf a year ago. By the way, don’t miss the clever part where the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers books dance with each other. Watching this video made me think about the importance of old-fashioned books, still playing a role even in my techno-environment that’s been almost taken over by digital content. Even though I enjoy reading books using Amazon Kindle software on an iPad 2, I still enjoy the tactile feeling of reading a real book, the smell of fresh newsprint or musty book dust, and the ability to see how much of the book I’ve read at a glance as it’s sitting on my nightstand. How about you? Are you a gadget geek who’s abandoned all paper reading material altogether, or have you hesitated to make the jump to the world of digital books? Or are you in between (as I am), reading lots of books and tons of Internet text on screens, but diving into old-fashioned paper books from time to time as well? More About: books, viral-video-of-the-day, YouTube, youtube video of the day For more Entertainment coverage:
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| Can You Name the 20 Viral Topics in This Illustration? [CONTEST] Posted: 29 Jan 2012 10:06 AM PST   Instead of sending holiday cards to clients and friends in December, London-based digital agency Syzygy recently whipped up a creative illustration that depicts 20 notable events from the past 12 months. Syzygy then asked people to name the 20 viral topics, which has spurred a flurry of online activity to the tune of 2 million Twitter impressions and 500,000 Facebook impressions. As a reward to participants, Syzygy gave away 150 posters of the illustration to people who correctly guessed some of the events. “We decided to try something different, something that celebrated the stuff we love — the weird, the epic, the stupid, the surprising — and did it in a way that was beautiful to look at, a piece of digital art,” Syzygy engagement manager Mille Clausen told Mashable. The illustration highlights memes, deaths, important news, popular ads and other viral topics. How You Can ParticipateSyzygy, which plans to reveal the answers on Monday, sent Mashable one of the poster-sized illustrations, which we want to give away to one of our readers. So put your thinking cap on and try to guess the events drawn in the illustration. The reader who names the most events will win the illustration in addition to a few Mashable goodies. Submit your list of answers by Jan. 30 at 1 p.m. ET to BrianH@Mashable.com with this subject line: “20 Things Answers.” For clues, go here and click “Show Clues.” Be sure to name the events and not just the objects or people. We’ll update this post with the answers on Jan. 31. “As a single image with no text, it is also incredibly easy to share, regardless of where you live and what language you speak,” Clausen says. “Perfect for the social web.” Illustration by Syzygy’s Peter Jaworowski and Ars Thanea’s Michal Lisowski More About: Advertising, contest, death, memes, News, trending
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| Tech Hiring Trends 2012: What You Need to Know [INFOGRAPHIC] Posted: 29 Jan 2012 09:45 AM PST Job trend reports are pointing to big things for the tech industry, including lots of openings and opportunities for growth. Here’s the lowdown on tech hiring trends. In 2012, there will be increased demand for mobile app developers, data warehouse analysts and user experience designers. Consider the number of people companies will need to hire to build mobile applications across platforms for Apple products, Android and other smartphones. We have previously reported that the smartphone app downloads are projected to grow from 10.9 billion in 2010 to 76.9 billion in 2014. Executive vice president of Acquity Group Jim Newman, whose team created the infographic below, believes the current tech hiring trends shows that top tech companies including Apple, Google, Facebook and Microsoft are hiring like crazy despite the global economic downturn. “Whether the students choose business or technology disciplines, getting experience with Internet-enabled solutions will give them a huge head start when it comes to career opportunities once they graduate,” Newman said. The infographic shows that the biggest tech job markets of 2012 lie in New York, Baltimore, Seattle, San Francisco, Silicon Valley, St. Louis, San Antonio and Greensboro. Newman told Mashable that there are huge shortages of qualified professionals in the digital and technology space. As an alternative, American companies have hired international employees that are qualified for these U.S. tech jobs because of the lack of help. “Unfortunately, the bubble-burst of the early 2000s swayed many high school and college students away from these areas,” he said. “As an employer, I am experiencing significant challenges in finding enough qualified professionals.” Newman hopes this encourages students and young professionals to consider high-tech jobs as U.S. demand grows for better research and development of products. Infographic by Acuity Group.   Thumbnail image courtesy of Flickr, Fotinakis. More About: careers, infographics, jobs, Social Media, Tech, trending
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| 21 Must-Follow Pinterest Users Posted: 29 Jan 2012 09:05 AM PST 1. Luce de Luce Focus: Photography/Art Boards: 49 Our Favorite Board: photography Click here to view this gallery. Looking to save some search time and launch into a rich Pinterest experience? We’ve scouted out some of the best Pinners the service has to offer. Although the site has a reputation for girly, wedding-themed content, we’re here to present a variety of inspiring perspectives, from photography themes to gadget wish lists. So, scoot through our gallery to discover some of the most popular curators on the web’s hottest social circuit. Which categories and themes do you think Pinterest does best? Where could it use some work? Tell us what you think and let us know your favorites in the comments below. More About: features, pinterest, Social Media, trending For more Social Media coverage:
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| 39 New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed Posted: 29 Jan 2012 08:30 AM PST   Been away from Mashable for a few days? Here’s something that’ll get you caught up in a flash: it’s our weekly roundup of Mashable features. Look at all the coolness you missed: We have tips for the transition into Facebook Timeline, tricks for improving your productivity via Google Calendar and Safari and links to the most popular memes. We’ve covered social networking in the workplace, using networks for social good and even using plugins to help you get the old Facebook back. So if you wanted to catch up on the best of our digital media resources, you’ve come to the right place: Editor’s Picks
Social Media
For more social media news and resources, you can follow Mashable’s social media channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. Business & Marketing
For more business news and resources, you can follow Mashable’s business channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. Tech & Mobile
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| Tweet Your Best Shot to Make NBA’s Curry Your Voicemail Assistant Posted: 29 Jan 2012 07:15 AM PST   How would you like to put an NBA star to work as your own personal phone operator? That’s more or less the idea behind a Twitter-driven contest by Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry. Curry has called for fans to tweet him video clips their best moves from the game H-O-R-S-E, where players try to best one another with trick shots. Fans have until midnight on Sunday to send their videos to his @StephenCurry30 account with the hashtag #SC30. His top 5 picks will then be entered into a poll on his Facebook page, where fans will vote the ultimate winner. And what do you get if you win? Curry will record a personalized outgoing voicemail message for you to use. So whenever a friend calls, there will be one of pro basketball’s brightest young stars saying that you’re unavailable but to please leave a message. “They can give me a script if they want, or leave it up to me to be creative and use my personality a little bit, but we’ll probably end up doing a blend of both,” Curry told Mashable. Curry, who wears jersey number 30, is one of the NBA’s most active and personable players on Twitter and other social platforms. The H-O-R-S-E contest is the latest in a series of #SC30 promotions he has done in recent months with the help of marketing firm Spiracle Media. In November, fans submitted videos of themselves singing Christmas carols to win a personal Skype conversation with Curry. In December, he was touched by a fan’s winning entry in a call for New Year’s resolutions and met with her before a home game. Curry said it’s not always easy to stay active on social media channels during the busy NBA season, but that the extra effort is worthwhile. “I just think it’s a lot of fun to go back and forth with people that pay attention to what I’m doing, and it’s a big part of just enjoying this whole NBA process,” he said. Curry said that he may try to replicate some of the best submitted shots to post back for fans if he gets time between games, workouts and sleep. One young fan has already set a high bar for the contest with this trick-shot video: Looks like that kid’s family could be getting a new outgoing voicemail soon courtesy of Stephen Curry. But who would Curry himself pick to tell people he’s not available? When asked, he chose Cam Newton, the quarterback for his hometown Carolina Panthers NFL team. “I would get him to guarantee a Panther playoff appearance next year for everyone who called me,” Curry said. Who would you choose to record your outgoing voicemail message and what would you have them say? Let us know in the comments. Image courtesy of nba.com/warriors For more Social Media coverage:
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