Internet Evolution editors find the best, worst, and most interesting social media, Internet, and mobility news of the week and serve it up in one sizzling slideshow.
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We're Number Two!
Google passed Twitter to become number two (and three -- via YouTube) on the social networking charts, for the first time, according to Global Web Index. As Global Web Index writes:
Google+, who despite being branded a failure or ghost town by large portions of the media, grew in terms of active usage by 27% to 343m users to become the number 2 social platform. Interestingly for Google, YouTube (not previously tracked by us as a social platform) comes in at number 3, demonstrating the immense opportunity of linking Google’s services through the G+ social layer. This is also a key indication of why Google+ integrated with the Google product set is so key to the future of search and the internet. We’ve got more coming on Google+ later this week as well.
Internet Evolution's Mitch Wagner, a long-time Google+ user and fan, put it more succinctly: "Neener, neener, haters."
I think it's analogous to TV networks, actually. In the 1950s, there were only 3 TV networks: ABC, CBS & NBC. Who needed more? Now there are hundreds of networks, aimed at all kinds of niche audiences.
There were also "portals" in the 1990s.. Yahoo, AOL, etc.... how many of those still exist as "portals"?
Maybe social networks will go the way of online portals -- and become something totally different.
I, for one, would like to see fewer websites that require a login to be useful.
I expect most people use LinkedIn for work and Facebook for everything else. A relatively few power users use other social networks for a variety of reasons, having to do with content, capabilities, and connecting with people who only use that network
Do you envision a time when people will only use one social network? Or do you think it'll continue to be a pathwork quilt approach, where people use a mix of different social networks for various tasks/reasons?
Google+ isn't just a social network... but then neither is Facebook. Facebook is also building out a bunch of services that its social functions will sit on top of. Facebook has photo sharing features that Google's Picasa/G+ services are not quite as good as. Facebook also has an email service, but it's much worse than Gchat/Gmail. Eventually, I think a lot of these extra services will become almost standardized across social networks.
Twitter seems to be the odd one out since it doesn't really do search very well... maybe not yet?
That's a good point: People like what they like, not because they're first or second usually. I have always wondered why car-makers always say they're the best-selling car; I don't want a car that everyone else has, necessarily! Yawn. But of course, with social media if you don't have critical mass, don't have a lot of users, it'd be like throwing a party and no one showing up (or leaving early, MySpace).
Indeed. Burning bridges is never a good idea. Leave your employer on good terms if you can -- and if you can't, don't settle for burning the bridges. Carpet-bomb them. :)
mhhfive - Good point. I don't drink Coke OR Pepsi; I like Diet Dr Pepper.
Google+ isn't just a social network. It's a social layer that connects all of Google's services. In that respect, it's a fundamentally different animal than Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.
Maybe Google will try to adopt the "Avis" slogan of "we try harder" because they're #2... :P
It doesn't really matter to most people who is #1 or #2... as long as the product delivers what the users want. If Coke or Pepsi switched places in popularity, would any consumer really care that much? McDs vs Burger King? NBC vs CBS vs Fox vs ABC? (I don't even know which network is ranked higher, honestly)
Someday there will be as many social networks as there are cable networks.. and each will serve their communities for certain things (eg. friends, dating, career networking, etc). And no one will really care who is #1 or #2.
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At the IBM Smarter Commerce Global Summit here in Nashville, I'm hearing many stories about how businesses have adapted their IT strategies in response to this rapidly changing, pressurized, data-driven commercial world.
Neal Stephenson is best known as the author of science fiction novels such as SnowCrash and Anathem. But he does other things as well. Among them: He's assembled a team of scientists and engineers to figure out how to build a 20-kilometer-tall tower to use as a platform for launching rockets into space.
While interstellar travel presents huge challenges, it's "almost inevitable," according to a speaker at the Starship Century symposium here in San Diego.
Facebook's Graph Search may face some profound challenges and risks, first, because Facebook users haven't been thinking of their posts as product reviews; and second, because Facebook will now have to contend with the social-network equivalent of SEO "gaming" of results.
A recent release of the popular TweetDeck app for Twitter power-users gives new life to software that had previously taken a wrong turn. Here's a quick walk-through of the new TweetDeck, to show you why it should be at the top of your Twitter toolkit.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
Based on reactions in Nicole's Newsfeed, everyone hates this version of Facebook. This should matter to Facebook now that there's a real competitor on the scene named Google+.
What can users today do to protect their online privacy? The simplest and most obvious option is to not use the Internet – at all. However, once all digital information is consolidated over the Internet, trying to protect digital identity by simply unplugging from the Internet becomes impossible – a fact that has manifest implications for civil liberties, Saunders says.
By 2011 the number of Internet-connected sensors will exceed 1 trillion, making your chances of doing anything or going anywhere unnoticed pretty much zero. Saunders talks about how the 'sensortization' of the Internet is eliminating the traditional divide between online and offline populations.
The 20th Century Internet was characterized by the ability to interact with other people and information on the Internet largely without anyone knowing who you were. The Internet of this century, conversely, will be defined by identity. Saunders explains how Internet users are unwittingly contributing to the demise of the anonymous Internet.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
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