You know when you watch the BBC, how you always feel smart because of those accents and when you dick around on MySpace, you always feel stupid because the layout was designed by a six year-old?
Well, prepare to feel smart and stupid at the same time, because the BBC has made a sharing arrangement with RupertBook. The BBC will make some of its content available on MySpaceTV, which is the second most popular video site after YouTube.
This is great. Now sex predators can meet teens and learn about international relations all in one easy portal.
MySpace agreed to work with attorney generals of 49 states to improve measures to protect children from sexual predators. The site will create a task force to find effective ways to verify ages of its users. Hopefully these measures will include ways to stop over-zealous moms from encouraging teen suicide.
In the meantime, a couple in Queens was arrested for raping teenage girls they met through the site.
Facebook may invade your privacy, but at least it doesn’t invade your nether regions.
Harsh truth time: Facebook will be more popular than MySpace. It has better page layout, a wealthier base and more potential. MySpace is still good for music though.
But these harsh truths doesn’t stop USA Today from running a puff piece on the pretense that MySpace still stands a chance:
The goal is to make MySpace the starting point for people on the Internet, where they can check in on the activities of friends, peruse e-mail, get the latest on news and weather, and post their favorite photos and videos. "We're offering one place where people are in control," [Chris] DeWolfe coolly explains at an L.A. restaurant near MySpace's offices, cradling a cocktail.
Thanks, but no thanks. Our starting point on the internet doesn’t have flash ads.
Apparently, Classmates.com only value on the internet is as an ubiquitous advertiser. United Online, which owns the site, has withdrawn its IPO plans because of “current market conditions.” In other words, Classmates.com got out-bubbled by Facebook.
Even though people seem not to care about production values when it comes to online porn, Penthouse Media Group wants a slice of the internet sex pie. The company just dropped $500 million on Various Inc., a social networking empire that owns sites like Adutlfriendfinder.com (NSFW, duh) and caters to the older demographic in a way Facebook never will.
Well, if people won’t pay for the sex you produce anymore, you can still make money on the sex they want to produce.
Sometimes I just have to say, “what the fuck?” and the royal we doesn’t work as well. These are my thoughts—raronauer
Last year, the Aronauers got a new dog. Clint, a lab mix, is the one thing my family can talk about non-stop.
Pet owners and new parents share a heightened sense of what’s noteworthy. Deep down, I know Clint’s predilection for cat food and hiking is not fascinating, but to me, it's more interesting than the latest issue of the New Yorker.
But with Cyberfamilias “breaking” the story on Dogster, an animal networking site founded in 2004, I have an excuse to talk about him and what should be the limits of my obsession.
CONTINUED »
So, after a month of civil liberties complaints, Mark Zuckerberg has admitted that the execution of Beacon, its advertising program out of a dystopian novel, was no good.
Beacon originally was an automatic opt-in program that sent data from external websites to the Facebook feed. Civil liberty groups like MoveOn.org, and their spokesman Adam Green, freaked out, and yesterday Mark Zuckerberg apologized for the program’s befuddled launch.
But who did Zuckerberg really apologize to? CONTINUED »
In social networking news, Facebook is removing the automatic opt-in for its Beacon feature. Beacon reported users’ purchases on sites like Overstock.com and Fandango on the Facebook news feed without users' consent.
This made people feel like they were living in a George Orwell dystopian state. More importantly, it ruined Christmas as users were altered of their family members' recent purchases. Facebook announced that it would amend the function.
Even as avid Facebook users, we don't really care about this development. But oddly, this story has been reported everywhere, and everyone talked to Adam Green, a guy from MoveOn.Org. CONTINUED »
The New York Times most emailed list is a funny thing. Global political importance does not make an article most emailed, and neither does good writing.
The most emailed list is determined by demographics. Tech lovers have more of a propensity to email articles than people following the news in Iraq. But every once in a while an article comes along that is so disturbing and astonishing that demographics disappear, and it becomes something everyone should read. CONTINUED »
So apparently Rupert Murdoch is in talks to take over LinkedIn. When Murdoch put his Midas media touch on MySpace, we were irked, but he can have LinkedIn.
Every few weeks, a random person asks us to “connect” on LinkedIn. And what does this connection do for us? Do we get to see their relationship status? Pictures of them binge drinking? Learn about their favorite books? No. At best we discover what this person majored in in college.
So enjoy LinkedIn, Rupert, because a social networking site without incriminating photos is no friend of ours.
Ignore the Vows section in the New York Times. Forget about Time's weird eagerness to play matchmaker. Soon, eHarmony.com and match.com will be like the print paper, a service for the sentimental.
That’s what Business Week predicts anyway. For pedophiles and romantics alike, Facebook and MySpace are becoming the preferred way to meet people online. The reason is simple. On jdate.com, the intentions, pleasing your mother, are too explicit. On Facebook, “you can play it cool.”
Yeah, nothing says “cool” like a poking the entire Ole Miss cheerleading squad.
Here’s some news that will make you respect Luddites: A Dutch teenager is facing charges for stealing 4,000 euros worth of virtual furniture from Habbo Hotel, a 3D social networking site.
Apparently, the teen tricked Habbo residents into giving him their password. Even though the furniture is not real, a spokesman for the networking site claimed, "It is a theft because the furniture is paid for with real money.”
Of course, unlike real theft, the stolen furniture can be regenerated with a mouse click.
When Miss New Jersey was blackmailed with incriminating photos from Facebook, older pageant winners must have wondered why she would allow such embarrassing shots of herself to go online. Reid Hoffman, chairman and president of LinkedIn, explained the prisoner’s dilemma that is social networking down in Florida to the American Magazine conference:
Yesterday, we shared the first installment of results from the Facebook survey.
And while we imagine you were relieved to find out which type of profile picture is the absolute loseriest (For the record, it's "Pretentious hipsters staring off into space with an arts/contemplative stare!") we think you'll be even more interested in the responses to our open call for your craziest Facebook related anecdotes.
There were, in fact, so many amazing responses that we've spent hours compiling them! (Hours that, should, in retrospect, have been spent "reading the newspaper," "interviewing potential sources" and "otherwise doing our jobs.") In the end, it was so hard to pick and choose just a few that we decided to categorize all our favorites into 7 separate—but equally entertaining—groups.
Are you bored? Hopelessly unproductive? Wishing you were on a social networking site instead of simply "working?" Well, now's your chance to tell us all about it!
We want to know how you really feel about Facebook, so take our fun-filled survey and let us know where you stand on annoying group photos, lying about your favorite movies and people who feel the overwhelming need to announce that they're "In a Relationship."
Michael Barrett, Chief Revenue Officer for MySpace, tells USA Today that despite the overwhelming popularity and ubiquity of Facebook, there’s still a need for MySpace.
Facebook is very much about keeping in touch with current friends. MySpace is about keeping in touch with current friends and meeting new friends.
But Facebook is fast becoming a place for the new friends MySpace is infamous for. Last week New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram issued Facebook a subpoena, requesting the site turn over information about whether registered sex offenders have profiles. What, sex offenders aren’t allowed to reconnect with friends from summer camp?
Recently Andrew Cuomo also issued a subpoena against Facebook, claiming that the site’s claims of privacy create a false sense of security for young people.
When MySpace loses all its child predators to Facebook, then it’s really in trouble.
Martha Stewart, the innovative force behind Martha Stewart Living and Martha Stewart Living Magazine has decided to throw her domestic energies into launching a social networking site catering predominantly to your mom. ("My MySpace is very lively," Ms. Stewart said. "Who would have guessed?") Um, everyone. [AdAge]
• We're used to seeing Courtney Love look wasted. We're not used to seeing her wasting away.
• Turns out Chris Crocker's wee is even shorter than his fifteen minutes of fame. Zing! (Very, very NSFW).
• "Spoiler" alert: Carrie is going to be wearing some fugly outfits in the SATC movie.
• Your social networking habit is worth $10B, which is, incidentally, the approximate value of all that time wasted annually on social networking.
• How is Kanye West like a nervous teenage girl before a first date? Answer: Both of them take FOREVER to get ready, desperately need their friends' approval and change their outfit a zillion times.
• Trump's upcoming new magazine to cater to "wealthy readers." Who would have guessed??
MySpace is launching its cellphone version of MySpace. The service will be advertiser supported. Meanwhile, we just updated our facebook status to who cares? [AP]
Netflix, the only thing you use the US Postal system for, has expanded its community features. Along with being able to view your friends’ queues, now you can also view the queues and ratings of friends of friends. Netflix also allows users to follow the reviews of other members in the Netflix community.
With Netflix movie messages and profiles with avatars, it’s only a matter of time before a couple from the Midwest finds each other on Netflix. It will make a great People magazine story and a mediocre Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan vehicle.
Editorial Director
