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| 11 Hilarious 'Mad Men' Parody Twitter Accounts | | 12:59:16 AM | Stephanie Buck |
|  Season five of AMC's Mad Men is back Sunday, March 25. But your favorite characters have been around this whole time -- on Twitter. We've hunted down 11 hysterical (and sometimes poignant) Mad Men parody accounts. Keep up with Don Draper, who recently paid a visit to SXSW, and check in with Sally Draper, whose relationship with her mother certainly hasn't improved. SEE ALSO: How Helen Klein Ross Brings @BettyDraper to Life How else do you follow Mad Men online? What are your predictions for the upcoming season? Image courtesy of Frank Ockenfels/AMC |
| Twitter Users Adopt Hoodie Avatars in Trayvon Martin Protest | | Friday, March 23, 2012 11:20 PM | The Daily Dot |
|  After the Internet demanded justice for slain black teenager Trayvon Martin, Twitter reached a fever pitch on Friday, condemning Fox News correspondent Geraldo Rivera for tweeting his view that &ldquohoodie killed” him. There was plenty of raw outrage—but some high-profile Miami Heat stars found a quieter way to make a statement that was unique to the medium. Martin was walking in in a Florida neighborhood, unarmed and a wearing a black hoodie, when he was shot by George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch captain. After Rivera's comments circulated, star point guard Dwyane Wade changed his Twitter profile picture to an image of himself, wearing a black hoodie, his head bowed. He tweeted the image with no text save three hashtags: #hoodies, #stereotype and #trayvonmartin. Soon after, LeBron James tweeted a picture of his own—the whole Heat team, all wearing black hoodies, all with heads bowed, looking almost like monks. James also went without text—just the hashtags #WeAreTrayvonMartin #Hoodies #Stereotyped #WeWantJustice. Photo via @DwyaneWade |
| Klout Doesn't Really Measure Influence [STUDY] | | Friday, March 23, 2012 10:16 PM | Alissa Skelton |
|  A new study about digital influence says Klout and other social media measurement tools don't really define how users influence their networks. All too commonly, sites like Klout and PeerIndex claim to measure influence -- and maybe they do measure influence. But what does digital influence really mean? Brian Solis, author of The Altimeter Group report, says social websites that rank users' social media influence don't measure influence like they claim to do. Rather, Solis says a user's social media score measures the "capacity to influence." "Scores can be measures of social capital, but not true influence," he said. Solis came up with his own definition of digital influence: "the ability to cause effect, change behavior, and drive measurable outcomes online." Solis conducted qualitative research by interviewing vendors, conducting software demos, and reviewing brands with piloted digital influence programs. He also says brands don't really understand influence. "While these tools use sophisticated algorithms to calculate a corresponding number, they do not take into account all of the complexities of influence and the nature of relationships between people in social networks," Solis says. "As a result, brands are potentially misallocating precious resources based on the lack of understanding of what influence is and the role influencers play within customer markets." Klout said it was well aware of Solis's report before it was published -- the company even had an advanced copy. But Lynn Fox, Klout's spokeswoman, would not say whether Klout agreed or disagreed with the report. "The report reinforces that we came in early on and we are furthest along in the process of measuring influence in this market," Fox said. How Klout Found Success by Focusing on Users The 33-page report outlines the three pillars of influence, which is the ways brands become influencers, Solis said. The pillars -- reach, resonance and relevance -- determine how a brand or person can cause change or effect in their social network. A social media score alone does not mean a brand is an influencer, he said. "The Pillars of Influence contribute to social capital, which indicates the likelihood to influence behavior, but a "score" does not predict the resulting actions or outcomes," Solis said. "A score of 74 only represents the capacity to influence, but other variable come into play as defined by the Pillars of Influence." Azeem Azhar, the CEO of UK-based social media influence ranking site of PeerIndex, said the study is a great conversation driver, but the conclusion of the study doesn't mean much. Social media rating sites are all in the realm of influence and the rankings branded as measured influence aren't misleading users, Azhar said. "We are in a semantic battle here rather than a practical battle," Azhar said. "I don't think there's much difference between the capacity to influence and influence itself." He illustrated this with an anecdote about martinis. If a person drank martinis the past 10 Friday nights, it's likely the person will drink a martini the next Friday night, he said. "Or we can say it's likely you have the capacity to drink a martini," Azhar said. "I don't see a difference." Klout openly says on the site has an algorithm to measure influence. The algorithm has come under scrutiny in the past, but Klout says its scientists and engineers work to make sure your influence score is accurate. "Influence in general is a challenge to define, but the point is that the data exists and influence is the ability to drive action," she said. "Our focus right now is continuing to unlock influence for consumers." Does this report uncover the limitations of a social media score, or is this a semantic battle? Are the three social media pillars needed to be a digital influencer? Tell us in the comments. Photo courtesy of iPhoto, AlijaAlija |
| How Google Is Making YouTube More Like iMovie [EXCLUSIVE] | | Friday, March 23, 2012 9:26 PM | Pete Pachal |
|  If you've been seeing a strip of thumbnails along the bottom of YouTube videos lately, you're not seeing things. The site has been quietly rolling out a feature that automatically generates thumbnails of every moment in a video, laying them all out the way a video-editing app like iMovie would. When you're just sitting back and watching, the thumbnails are invisible. But try dragging the playback dot along the red strip at the bottom of the video to find an exact frame. If you hover your mouse pointer anywhere on the red strip, a thumbnail of that specific moment pops up, letting you easily see what you'll see before you jump. YouTube product manager Nundu Janakiram says the site introduced the feature because many users were trying to find exact moments, or see a particular moment in context with the rest of the video. There was a more subtle motivator, too. "You're at your computer and everything on this page is very interactive. You can subscribe, you can like, you can leave a comment, you can click on related videos. We wanted to make the video itself feel interactive, so it doesn't feel like just this black box." For some of YouTube's long-form content, the standard red strip doesn't quite give users precise control to really target a specific moment. With videos longer than 90 minutes, a secondary slider appears when mousing over, so a user can zero in on moments like so: The thumbnails feature isn't on every video yet -- Janakiram says they're limited to just some videos with more than 1,000 views. The feature is available worldwide. The goal is to eventually bring thumbnails to all videos on the site. Considering over an hour of video is uploaded to YouTube every minute, that's a lot of thumbnails. The task of creating, storing and serving up that many images is something only a company on the scale of Google can achieve. And even then it's pretty hard. SEE ALSO: YouTube vs. Hulu: Which is the Future of Online Video? "One of the big challenges was we didn't want to compromise on the speed at which we serve these images, or the quality," says Nils Krahnstoever, the software engineer responsible for scaling the thumbnails to YouTube vast amount of video. "The system actually provides images at multiple resolutions -- initially when youyou see a lower-resolution version of the image, but we increase the resolution of it as we fetch additional data." "That's especially cool," Janakiram said. "We generate tons of these thumbnails, yet when you use this feature it feels almost magical. If there was a lag, it would really detract from the user experience." As magical as the new thumbnails are, there's one thing they can't do: give you more options for the representative thumb when you upload a video. The storyboards aren't tied to uploading, so you still only get three to choose from. Also, you won't be able to see the thumbnails on mobile devices, though Janakiram says they're exploring it. How do you like YouTube's new thumbnail feature? Let us know in the comments. |
| Twitter Reviews 'The Hunger Games' in 140 Characters or Less | | Friday, March 23, 2012 8:07 PM | Jeremy Cabalona |
|  The Hunger Games grossed $19.7 million from its midnight showings across the U.S., making it the seventh highest grossing midnight showing ever -- and the highest-grossing non-sequel. The film has garnered a massive amount of buzz on social media through Lionsgate's online promotion campaign. In addition to its hype, The Hunger Games has also earned a largely positive response from critics. Currently, the film has earned an 87% fresh rating from Rotten Tomatoes and a 68 from Metacritic. Twitter also responded strongly to the film. After the east coast midnight showings let out, Hunger Games-related topics began trending on Twitter. At 3:46 a.m. "Jennifer Lawrence," "Rue," "Peeta" and "Catching Fire" were all trending. SEE ALSO: 20 Hilarious 'Hunger Games' Memes Taking Over the Web Check out some reactions to the film from Twitter users. What kind of reactions to The Hunger Games have you seen on your Twitter feed? Image courtesy of Lionsgate/Murray Close |
| Happy Puppy Day! Top 10 Dogs to Follow on Social Media | | Friday, March 23, 2012 6:29 PM | Chelsea Stark |
|  Three barks for your favorite dogs. March 23 is National Puppy Day, a day to celebrate man's best tail-wagging, four-legged friend. National Puppy Day was started in 2006 "to help save orphaned puppies across the globe and educate the public about the horrors of puppy mills, as well as further our mission for a nation of puppy-free pet stores." Here at Mashable, we really love our dogs. Not only do they run around our office all day, we also follow them on social media. With that in mind, we rounded up the dogs with the most followers to celebrate the holiday. Topping our list is the unmistakable Boo, the five-year-old pomeranian who rules Facebook with more than 3.7 million followers. All of the other dogs on our list combined don't have Boo's clout. It may be because he looks so cute in sunglasses and hats. Boo isn't the only pomeranian on the list. Tommy, the littlest Tumblr HQ intern, has his own Tumblr, which has earned almost 5,000 followers in two months. Many of the dogs on our list are owned by celebrities, like 50 Cent's dog Oprah Winfree and Bethanny Frankel's dog Cookie. You'll also find dogs with political pull: California's first dog Sutter Brown, an adorable corgi, has his own Facebook, where he conducts official state business. Tell us what you think of our social media pooches, and let us know if we missed any pup that should be on the list. Thumbnail image courtesy of Flickr, ButlerBlue2 |
| 8 Compelling Content Sessions to Expect at Mashable Connect 2012 | | Friday, March 23, 2012 5:26 PM | Jennifer Diamond |
| 
Our largest conference, Mashable Connect, is returning to Orlando, Fla., from May 3-5, and this year we will explore the future of digital with some of the brightest minds in the industry. An array of digital leaders will be speaking on topics ranging from new digital business models, mobile networking, digital campaigning and social TV. There are still a limited amount of tickets available to the public. They include three nights at the Contemporary Resort, compelling content sessions, unique networking activities, connecting with Mashable team members and special events within Disney Parks.
We're pleased to share a sampling of content sessions delivered by our premier Mashable Connect speakers. Stay tuned for the announcement of a complete agenda in the coming weeks. Predicting the Future: Duane Bray, partner at IDEO, will assess our current digital tools, mobile apps and social networks to get a sense of what the future will really be. He'll explore how the role of collective intelligence, multi-threaded narratives and new literacies will shape the next digital landscape. After SOPA/PIPA: What Winning (One) Means: Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School, will share his vision on the future of digital creativity and technology innovation in a post SOPA and PIPA world. The Truth About Online Reputation: Joe Fernandez, Founder and CEO of Klout, will sit down with Mashable to discuss the truth about online reputation. How much influence does your reach online affect you in the offline world? What does your Klout score really mean? There are just a few of the questions that we'll ask Joe Fernandez during our fireside chat. How to Reinvent the Web: Roger McNamee, Managing Director of Elevation Partners, will talk about why the concepts of the "web" and the "Internet" are increasingly obsolete in the face of the new app-centric model. He'll discuss how to reinvent the web to preserve the spirit of openness that has defined the current generation and examine the role of mobile technologies and their influence on how we navigate digital content. Why Sound Will Be Bigger Than Video: What will be the dominate form of media? Alexander Ljung, Founder and CEO of SoundCloud, will explain why sound will be bigger than video. Mobile-first Social Networking: Meghan Peters, Mashable's community manager, will lead a discussion on mobile-first social networking and ask the question: are these the communities of the future? Web 3.0: Curating Big Data is Future of the Web: Burt Herman, co-founder of Storify, will look at how humans and algorithms, along with media and technology, are all coming together to help us make sense of the world in this age of information overload. The Evolution of the Second Screen: Christina Warren, Mashable's entertainment editor, will moderate a panel with Umami, Discovery Digital Media and TVPlus to discuss the evolution of the second screen. This discussion will look at the impact the second screen is having on how content is produced and the huge potential for marketing to this type of engagement. Event Information
Our annual destination conference, Mashable Connect, brings our community together for three days to connect offline in an intimate setting at the Contemporary Resort at Walt Disney World®. Registration is now open. Held in a unique location away from everyday distractions, Mashable Connect is a rare and valuable opportunity to be surrounded by digital leaders across industries. You'll spend time with Mashable's passionate and influential community, hear from top speakers who will provide insight into the the technologies and trends that are shaping the next era of digital innovation, and get to spend time with the Mashable team. To keep Mashable Connect as intimate as possible, only a limited amount of tickets are available. A Look Back at Last Year's Mashable Connect Supporting Sponsor Sponsorship Opportunities A limited number of sponsor opportunities are available for Mashable Connect. This is an excellent opportunity to get in front of Mashable's passionate and influential audience. Contact sponsorships@mashable.com for opportunities. |
| Twitter Does Not Actually Predict Box Office Sales [STUDY] | | Friday, March 23, 2012 4:34 PM | Samantha Murphy |
|  Twitter has developed the reputation of being able to predict the future -- from box office sales to presidential primary results and even the stock market. But according to researchers at Princeton University, Twitter might not be able to foretell how well films will perform after all. A new report called "Why Watching Movie Tweets Won't Tell the Whole Story" found that monitoring tweets related to movies is not a reliable source for what could actually happen at the box office. The news comes as analysts predict a record-breaking opening weekend for the movie The Hunger Games, based on active chatter about the book-to-film trilogy. "We found that data from Twitter -- while valuable for the unprecedented access it provides into the public psyche -- is not necessarily representative of the larger online population, as seen from the results of our studies on ratings computed from movie tweets compared to International Movie Database (IMDB) and Rotten Tomatoes ratings," study co-author and professor of electrical engineering at Princeton University Mung Chiang told Mashable. SEE ALSO: Social Media Supports 'Hunger Games' More Than 'Potter,' Less Than 'Twilight'/a> Chiang, along with two postdoctoral research associates Soumya Sen and Felix Wong, analyzed about 10 million user tweets with movie keywords from Twitter between February and March 2012 (around Oscar season) and data using machine learning techniques to label tweets based on their temporal context (before, during and after watching a movie) and opinion (positive or negative reviews). "Twitter users tend to be much more positive in their reviews and comments for films overall," Chiang said. "But they are less positive than IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes reviews for Oscar 'Best film' nominated movies." In addition to sentiment analysis, it looked at how well certain films performed at the box office via data on IMDB. "We found that if a movie received high ratings in IMDB -- by over 70% approval -- and a lot of buzz on Twitter, then it usually does well at the box-office in the long run," Sen added. "But otherwise, predicting box-office success is difficult. Movies with a lot of hype on Twitter and low IMDB ratings can be successful or unsuccessful at the box-office. It's harder to predict." Overall, the study found no clear evidence that shows a direct link between Twitter hype, ratings and box office sales. "The most surprising finding was that Twitter data may not be representative enough of the total population, so it is somewhat risky to use the site for forecasting," Sen said. "More sophisticated techniques may be needed to understand the applicability of such data sets, such as the metrics we developed to understand the extent of the difference between Twitter users and other online rating side users." Do you think Twitter can predict big trends? Let us know in the comments. |
| Social Network Badoo Officially Launches in U.S. With Nick Cannon [PICS] | | Friday, March 23, 2012 4:07 PM | Brian Anthony Hernandez |
|  Multilingual social network Badoo is making a push into the U.S., signaling its official launch this week with entertainer Nick Cannon and a massive public photo shoot in New York City dubbed the Badoo Project. The London-based company, which first released its network in London in 2006 and has 140 million registered users in more than 180 countries, already has 6 million registered users in the U.S. Badoo claims 35 million monthly active users worldwide. The three-day Badoo Project that started Thursday involves four fashion photographers, who will give 1,000 New Yorkers new online profile pictures. Twenty-four of the best portraits will appear on billboards and taxi-tops across NYC from April to May. Facebook "Likes" on the project's website will determine the winners. Badoo's chief marketing officer, Jessica Powell, stressed the importance of having a standout profile photo, which is especially important for Badoo users because the social network is about meeting new people and not mingling with existing friends. "Most people use Badoo for friendship, chatting, dating and making new contacts. I travel a lot for work and use sites like Badoo to find out about new clubs or bars."Cannon, host of America's Got Talent and chairman of TeenNick, was among the first to go through the Badoo Project experience and get his portrait taken (see pictures in the above gallery). "Your image online is the most important thing -- it's like a business card in a sense," Cannon told Mashable at the event, where he wore Louis Vuitton and Gucci and encouraged participants to show their personality. "Most people use Badoo for friendship, chatting, dating and making new contacts," Cannon added. "I travel a lot for work and use sites like Badoo to find out about new clubs or bars from people that might share my interest in music, or simply connect with my fans." At the event Thursday, participants lined up to get their makeup and styling done before getting their portraits snapped by one of four fashion photographers -- Kenneth Cappello, Dan Martensen, Brooke Nipar and Danielle Levitt -- who have collectively worked with celebrities and brands such as Katy Perry, Justin Bieber and GQ and Vogue. Nipar, who shot Mashable CEO Pete Cashmore's portrait for Fast Company this year, says that having four photographers shooting portraits all day at once is rare and that a project like Badoo's is important: "People like to look good." After the photo shoots, each participant got to pick his or her five favorite portraits. Badoo immediately uploaded them to each person's Badoo profile. "We're not a normal tech company," Badoo's Powell said, "because our users are not early adopters, but they're still young, diverse and social. That's why we chose New York to officially launch Badoo." SEE ALSO: Badoo Unveils Features to Help Shy Users Flirt Badoo, which snatched up $30 million in funding in 2008 when it had just 12 million users, is available as a browser service, iOS app, Android app or Blackberry app. At the Le Web conference on Dec. 7, Badoo founder Andrey Andreev discussed the company's growth, including the U.S. expansion and its 400 employees. The company is profitable and monetization is built into the site. A feature that lets users pay money to have their profiles featured higher in the app is one way Badoo brings in money. What is the Badoo Proejct? |
| Legislators: Employers Shouldn't Ask for Your Social Media Passwords | | Friday, March 23, 2012 3:54 PM | Alex Fitzpatrick |
|  Two lawmakers are taking a stand against companies that have been demanding access to employee's social media accounts. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D.-Conn.) will introduce a bill preventing companies from snooping on your Facebook page, Twitter profile or other sites. He told Politico that the practice is an "unreasonable invasion of privacy" for people seeking work. "Senator Blumenthal is deeply troubled by reports of employers asking job applicants and current employees to surrender the login information for their social media accounts," says Nu Wexler, Blumenthal's communications director. "He believes the practice is an unreasonable invasion of privacy and he is working on legislation that would ban it." Blumenthal's bill is expected to be introduced to the U.S. Senate in "the very near future." A California state senator, however, doesn't think that's quick enough. Democrat LeLand Yee announced Friday that he'll soon introduce a similar bill in California's senate. "It's completely unacceptable for an employer to invade someone's personal social media accounts," said Yee in a statement. "Not only is it entirely unnecessary, it is an invasion of privacy and unrelated to one's work performance or abilities." According to a spokesperson for Yee, his office discovered the problem while working on a separate initiative to digitize public records to make them more seachable by the general public. In the process of interacting with the technology community, Yee found out about the phenomena of employers demanding private information from prospective hires. "We put that issue on the backburner and decided to address it next year," says Yee's spokesperson. "Then the Associated Press started to report on these cases nationwide, and the senator said 'We can't afford to wait, this is happening too quickly.'" Yee's spokesperson says that Yee is glad the issue is being addressed at the national level, but he thinks his office can move faster than Washington and pass a bill in California by Jan. 1. He's taken to Twitter to ask people to share stories of employers demanding access to their person accounts. Been a victim of employer request/demand 4 #socialmedia info in #CA? Let me know so we can pass #privacy law bit.ly/GS0viB #Tech #SM— Leland Y. Yee (@LelandYee) March 23, 2012 Facebook itself took a stance against the practice Friday morning. SEE ALSO: ACLU Responds to Facebook Password Debate/a> Do you applaud the lawmakers' efforts to ban employers from asking employees for their social media login information? Sound off in the comments below. |
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