May 30, 2012

Facebook has released details about a new feature that allows businesses to easily promote their posts and get updates in front of more eyes — for a fee.

Although it was reported earlier this month that Facebook was testing a “highlighted posts” feature, the company has now made it official — with a page that explains how the promoted posts will work.

“When you post on your page, it currently may only reach a limited amount of the people that Like your page each week,” a Facebook staffer says via a video posted on the social network.

“Promoted posts help increase the people you reach for any eligible post. It’s an easy and fast way to reach more of the people that Like your page and your friends.”

If a coffee shop wants to let its Facebook fans know that it’s having a 20% discount special, for example, the merchant can promote that post so it gets better placement in its Facebook fans news feeds.

Businesses can also target posts based on specific location or language, and will be able to keep track of how many people saw the post. Any post that is less than three days old can be promoted.

To do so, visit the sharing tool to create a post and located next to the “Post” and “Public” buttons will be a “Promote” tab. Clicking on the “Promote” drop-down menu will allow you to set your budget of how much you want to spend (such as $5 or $10) to highlight the post throughout the duration of the promotion.

“Your promoted posts will be seen by a larger percentage of the people who like your Page than would normally see it,” Facebook noted on its site. “It will also be seen by a larger percentage of the friends of people who interact with your post.”

People will see promoted posts labeled with “Sponsored” in their news feed (not with other ads located in the right column of Facebook), whether they are accessing Facebook on a PC or mobile device. When they Like the post, comment or share, their friends will see it as well.

Similar with ads, you will be billed to the primary funding source designated in the Ads Manager section of your account, Facebook noted on the site.

For more information on how to promote posts, visit Facebook.com/help/promote and check out the step-by-step gallery below.

What’s your take on promoted posts? Do you think they’re a great way for businesses to get more attention, or will it clutter users’ news feeds? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

Want to Promote a Post?

Click “Promote” to open this drop-down menu. Clicking on the denomination pulls up another drop-down menu.

Click here to view this gallery.

More About: Facebook, facebook ads

May 30, 2012

Zynga is building a portfolio of mobile, casual and social games across a variety of social networks and platforms, including, most notably, Facebook and iOS. It has at least 100 million monthly players across its Farmville and Citiville games on Facebook and has expanded its mobile reach significantly with the acquisitions of Draw Something and Words with Friends. But Zynga Founder and CEO Mark Pincus has bigger plans: He wants to be a network.

Speaking at the 10th annual All Things D Conference in Southern California, Pincus said that mobile gaming suffers from a number of problems. “We need more aggregated channels, more ways to discover new apps and find ways back to apps that they’ve been engaged in and we think we can help that. We want to be a gaming network a lot like Xbox Live.”

It’s a bold statement, but also an indication that Zynga will not only be acquiring and building new games and add-ons, but figuring out ways to connect people with games that, perhaps, Zynga doesn’t even own.

Zynga’s goals, however, may hinge on the success of Facebook and its new and rather bumpy IPO experience (Zynga’s own publicly traded stock took a hit when Facebook went public earlier this month). Pincus, who says it was not Zynga’s goal to be on Facebook, couldn’t deny that its games had grown fastest on the platform. “As we saw their platform perform better than anyone else’s, we double-downed on Facebook,” said Pincus.

SEE ALSO: Zynga: We Want to Teach the World to Play

Facebook, explained Pincus, provides two critical components of the “new stack”: Apps Stack and Social Stack and, as such, is really important to Zynga and others.

Zynga’s other avenue for growth is, obviously, acquisitions. Pincus outlined Zynga’s acquisition strategy and told All Things D’s Kara Swisher that their “M+A strategy has always been to look for great teams that would add to our DNA.” He counts the Words with Friends buy as such an addition. In the case of Draw Something, Pincus said they did something Zynga always believed was possible, but couldn’t figure out: innovating on user-generated content.

There have been reports, though, that interest and activity on Draw Something has diminished in recent months. Pincus countered that the app actually has more traffic today than when Zynga first began talking to them. Still Pincus admitted that it’s “still too early to say that that acquisition is successful.”

And, yes, Zynga’s made a play for Angry Birds, though, as Pincus depicted it, it was really just a discussion, “We’re always in the market, engaging with any successful product or team. We’re engaging because we think that we’re learning by meeting these teams. Sometimes there’s a good fit and sometimes there isn’t. We’ve talked to them in the past.”

Pincus also spoke frankly about his performance as a CEO of a relatively young and rapidly growing company, noting that he’s still learning on the management side. When asked to grade his performance, Pincus said, “My grade changes quarterly and you can track it quarterly with how much you like our products.”

More from the D10 Conference: Tim Cook: Steve Jobs Convinced Me to Work for Apple in 5 Minutes

More About: Draw something, Facebook, Mark Pincus, words with friends, Zynga

May 30, 2012

Wish you could get rewards for all your online shopping? Spreadsave, which launched on Wednesday, lets you to shop and get money back for using and sharing deals with friends on Facebook.

Spreadsave is not only a hub for the latest deals on the web — so you don’t have to subscribe to every Groupon and Living Social newsletter — you can earn points by using, posting, sharing and discussing discounts with your Facebook friends.

By logging on to the platform via your Facebook account, you’ll be privy to a vast collection of deals and coupons from various businesses, from Gap and Target to local restaurants. Going to Charlotte, N.C., just for a few days and don’t want to sign up for the city’s Groupon newsletter? You can also search by location to see what’s going in the areas around you.

SEE ALSO: Branding: How to Convey Your Startup to the World

After making a purchase, you will earn points and automatically receive a percentage of money back (usually between 5% and 10%) based on the category and amount purchased. Once you’ve accumulated $50 in savings, Spreadsave will mail you your earnings.

There are many other ways to more earn points and rack up dollars. By sending coupons or items to a friend on Facebook — which will show up on their Facebook Timeline — you will be rewarded extra points. If they make a purchase, you will be rewarded even more.

Users with the most points in certain categories will earn prizes each week, from gift cards and music to iPads.

“We wanted to create a way for consumers to be rewarded for all of the shopping they do and wanted to make the e-commerce experience more social,” Andrew Fox, founder and CEO of Spreadsave, told Mashable. “If you’re going to make a purchase online, you should be rewarded for doing so.”

More About: Facebook, groupon, living social, Social Media, Startups

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May 30, 2012

Zynga CEO and founder Mark Pincus just took the stage here at D10, and in a wide-ranging interview with Kara Swisher, he sidestepped conversation about Words With Friends and Farmville long enough to touch on the murky world of console gaming. In a bid to quell any potential surprises at E3 next month, Mark said outrightly that his company is not interested in getting into the console world. “We’re aiming for you,” he said while pointing at Swisher. “We’re going after the mainstream market. There’s too much friction [in the console world].”

He also made clear that he tries to not look too far ahead of where the world really is. When talking about the undeniable shift to mobile, he made clear that there’s still a huge amount of desktop traffic on Zynga’s games — “lots of people play while bored on conference calls at work,” he quipped. It’s an interesting viewpoint in a world where PSN and Xbox Live Arcade has given independent developers all new distribution platforms to reach users, but it also highlights the outfit’s intrinsic attachment to Facebook in particular.

Continue reading Zynga CEO Mark Pincus says ‘no thanks’ to console gaming, isn’t worried about a life detached from Facebook

Zynga CEO Mark Pincus says ‘no thanks’ to console gaming, isn’t worried about a life detached from Facebook originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 May 2012 13:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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May 30, 2012

Swollen with cash following its IPO, Facebook is looking to expand its headquarters in Menlo Park. Its plan to triple its workforce there from 2,200 to 6,600 people was approved by local officials last night, removing the previous cap that allowed a maximum of 3,600 messy, resource-consuming humans. In lieu of the added burden on the city, Facebook will have to contribute $850,000 per year for ten years, plus a one-time payment of $1,000,000. The start of a surge towards greater products and profits, or the beginning of a complacent corporate decline? We’ll let the stock market decide.

Facebook allowed to triple size of its HQ, pays $10 million for the privilege originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 May 2012 05:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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May 30, 2012

Apple CEO Tim Cook was careful not to reveal any deep secrets in his sit-down interview with All Things D‘s Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher. But he did drop a few breadcrumbs for Apple speculators to follow.

Speaking about Facebook, Cook said he thought Apple’s relationship with the social network is “very solid” and that Apple could do more with the company. He encouraged people to “stay tuned.” Many read that as a hint that deeper ties to Facebook might be coming in iOS 6 — similar to how Apple integrated Twitter at the OS level in iOS and OS X 10.8 “Mountain Lion” — but Cook wouldn’t elaborate.

If Apple does strengthen its relationship with Facebook, it would be further reason for the company to finally do away with Ping, Apple’s ill-fated attempt at a social network. Cook said he had thought about killing Ping when a member of the audience asked him about it, but he also noted that some customers really love it.

Cook also suggested that Siri, the voice assistant on the iPhone 4S, would be getting some enhancements in the near future. After saying Siri proved that people want to interact with their phones in new ways, Cook said the it could be broader, and that the potential was “unbelievable.”

“I think you are going to be really pleased with where we take Siri,” he said.

SEE ALSO: Tim Cook: Facebook Is the ‘Closest’ to Being Like Apple

Asked about product secrecy, Cook said Apple would be “doubling down” on it, while at the same time explaining Apple would behave more openly with regard to its Asian suppliers’ practices. At the suggestion of an U.S.-based Apple factory, Cook didn’t entirely shoot down the idea, but he did say there would have to be big changes for that to happen.

“Could assembly process be done in the US someday? I hope so,” Cook said. “[There] has to be a fundamental change in education system to make it possible.”

On the neverending rumor that Apple is in the early stages of making a TV set, Cook didn’t budge. While he said Apple’s relationship with Hollywood was “good,” Cook simply didn’t answer when asked whether Apple was building a television or even the more general “living room content service.”

Ultimately, Cook guarded against saying too much during the interview, apart from dropping the first public acknowledgement from Apple that Ping is a failure. However, he did reveal some more insight into his thinking, and how profound an influence Steve Jobs has been in his life and career.

What did you think of Tim Cook’s first public interview? Check out the full transcript here, and share your thoughts in the comments.

More About: apple, Facebook, iOS, siri, tim cook

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May 30, 2012

Well, it looks like secrecy isn’t the only thing that Apple is doubling-down on these days. Speaking at D10, Tim Cook said that that Apple is “doubling down on Siri,” adding that “you’ll be really pleased with what you see in the coming months on this.” He did also acknowledge that Siri currently has its shortcomings, but said that “customers love it,” and that “what makes Siri cool is that she has a personality.” When it came to a largely non-existent iOS feature at the moment — Facebook integration — Cook said to “stay tuned,” noting that he has “great respect for them,” and that he wants Facebook’s hundreds of millions of customers to have “the best experience” on the iPhone and iPad.

Tim Cook: Apple doubling-down on Siri, ‘stay tuned’ on Facebook developments originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 29 May 2012 23:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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May 30, 2012

Even if you don’t use Instagram, we’re guessing you’ve encountered an Instagram image somewhere on the web — even if you didn’t realize it.

Instagram’s calling card is the photo filter, a digital layer that, when added to a standard photo, gives it the appearance of professional editing. Some filters enhance the colors in a photo, while other dull the light to a soft glow for an aged, vintage appearance.

But while Instagram’s filters revolutionized mobile photo editing, they’re only a portion of the appeal. The mobile app boasts over 50 million users, despite only living in iOS and Android devices. Instagram launched on Android just this year — it quickly earned 5 million downloads in six days.

Its success caught the eye of the most valuable social network in the world. Facebook acquired Instagram in April for $1 billion. Although we’ve only just begun to witness Facebook’s plans for the photo sharing app, the social giant recently launched its own filter-friendly photo app, dubbed Facebook Camera.

Instagram has surely come a long way, business-wise, since co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger introduced the app in 2010. But on the whole, the app has remained simple, straightforward and social since its inception.

We’re here to share the Instagram basics, whether you’re new to the network or need some additional tips. Better hurry, though — Instagram has undergone such changes in the past few months, who knows what else is in store.

We’d love to learn about your Instagram experiences. How do you use the app? Can you share any helpful advice or anecdotes for new users? Any predictions for the future of Instagram? Please share in the comments below.

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1. Register / Setup

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Instagram has always been an almost exclusively mobile platform. Therefore, you must download the iPhone or Android app to your device in order to register an Instagram account.

Instagram accounts are public by default, but you may elect to create a private account. In that case, only users who you approve may follow you and view your photos. Head to your profile tab and scroll down to “Privacy.” There, you may select to make photos private.

Once registered, change your profile picture and edit your profile information, which includes a brief 150-character bio and a website. You may also edit profile information here.

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2. Notifications

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Since Instagram doesn’t have a web-hosted feed of photos, you’ll be doing most of your browsing on mobile. For that reason, you may choose to enrich your mobile experience by setting up push notifications.

Depending on your level of comfort, enable the following push notifications:

• When a user likes or comments on one of your photos.
• When a user @mentions you in a comment.
• When your photo is posted to the Popular page.

To control the notifications on your iOS device, exit the Instagram app and access the Settings location. From there, find Instagram in the Notification Center and configure your app preferences.

Android Instagram users must change notification settings from the app itself. Head to Settings > Edit Profile > Push Notifications.

If you choose not to enable external notifications, Instagram will still keep you apprised of your account activity in-app. New user and comment notifications appear in the News section of the app (see above-left), which you can access via the navigation panel — the icon looks like a speech bubble with a heart in it.

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3. Connect to Social

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Again, because Instagram is a relatively isolated social app that lives inherently on mobile, it’s important to connect social accounts to get the most out of the experience. You may choose to link Instagram to your Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, Tumblr, Flickr, Mixi and Weibo accounts (the last two apply only to iPhone users in Japan and China, respectively).

To connect social accounts, head to the Profile Tab > Edit Sharing Settings, then choose the network you wish to connect.

Each time you upload a photo to Instagram, you’ll have the option to share to each of the social networks you’ve enabled, or to none. If you choose to share to no social networks, the photo will post only to Instagram, viewable only by those users who follow you on the app. (More on social sharing later.)

Here are some examples of how Instagram has affected, and in some cases, revolutionized social media:

• Facebook Releases Instagram Clone
• Meet @TextInstagram — Instagram Without Photos

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4. Add a Photo

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The bread and butter of Instagram is, obviously, sharing photos. Before you explore much else, I suggest you test it out.

Click the blue camera button in the center of your Instagram navigation panel. By default, Instagram activates your device’s camera, so you may either choose to snap a picture then and there, or choose a picture already saved to your phone. If you choose the latter, click the double-square button on the lower-left of the screen.

If you choose a photo from your camera roll, keep in mind that Instagram sizes photos to perfect squares. Therefore, if you select a photo that was originally taken horizontally (landscape), you’ll have to crop some portions of the image — either that, or live with the default black border.

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5. Filters / Borders

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Once you’ve either taken or selected a photo, a set of tree icons appears beneath the image. These are the 17 famous Instagram filters which add different pre-determined layers to your photos, and give the effect that you’ve altered or professionally edited them. Many filters add “vintage” effects, which have certainly pleased many a hipster.

Scroll through the filters and experiment with the best one for that particular image. You’ll soon find that certain filters work well with specific types of photos, whether outdoor panoramas, personal portraits, odd perspectives, intense colors, etc.

Each filter also has its own associated border. For instance, the Earlybird filter adds rounded edges to your photo, and Kelvin adds a rough, sandpapery frame. You may, however, choose to forego borders altogether by tapping the square “frame” on the upper-left of the edit screen.

Check out these photos, which all take full advantage of Instagram filters:

1. Circle, Indonesia

Courtesy of @bogieeryawan

Click here to view this gallery.

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6. Tilt-Shift

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Another celebrated editing option on Instagram, tilt-shift allows you to selectively focus certain planes of the photo, almost as if you were using a special DSLR lens. Tilt-shift gives the appearance of an altered depth of field, which can make smartphone snaps look stunning when used wisely.

Experiment with the tilt-shift feature by tapping the button above the photo that looks like a water droplet. From there, choose either the horizontal bar or the circle. The bar adds a thin field of focus across your image, which you may tap and move up and down, or two-finger tap and swivel to rotate. Or move the circle tilt-shift across your photo for a more focused effect.

You’ll find that tilt-shift elevates many photos to a professional (and sometimes artistic) standard. But other times, tilt-shift can seem out of place. Use your best judgment and artistic know-how to determine the effect you’re looking for.

Here’s why Android users got excited:

• Instagram Adds Popular Tilt-Shift Feature to Android App

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7. Other Options

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Before saving your photo, test a few other edit options. Tap the sun icon on the lower-left of the edit screen to apply the Lux effect — essentially, an auto-enhance button that enriches the colors in your image.

Additionally, the curved arrow to the right of the frame option rotates your image, and the next camera icon flips your camera front-facing so you can take a picture of yourself.

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8. Share

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Once your photo is ready to go, click the green checkmark. This brings you to the social sharing screen.

If you wish, add a caption explaining what you’ve photographed, an anecdote, or really anything your social networks would enjoy. Feel free to add category hashtags and @mention people, especially if you plan to share via Twitter. The caption will be the text of the tweet, and the app will file hashtags and @mentions accordingly.

If you’ve enabled location services, you even have the option to tag where you took the photo.

Then, depending on what networks you’ve linked to Instagram, toggle the accounts to share across those platforms.

The way your photo appears when posted depends on the style of the social network to which you post. For instance, if you share to Twitter (see left), Instagram tweets a link to your photo, along with the text you choose as the caption. Instagram photos appear natively on Twitter.com, which means you don’t even have to click the link to view someone’s photo — you may simply expand the tweet to view directly. When sharing to Facebook, your Instagram photo will appear in the news feed with the attached caption.

You may also choose to retroactively share the Instagram photos you’ve already posted. Head to your profile, then select a photo. To share, click the icon on the lower-right of the screen — it has three dots. Choose the “Share post” option and select one of your networks. Or choose “copy URL” to share manually.

At this time, you may only share another user’s photo if A) you use iOS 5.0, and B) you tweet the photo. Android users do not have this feature. Follow the steps to enable this capability here.

Browse some great Instagram photos here:

• Facebook HQ on IPO Day, As Seen on Instagram [PICS]
• 21 Ridiculously Cute Dog and Cat Instagram Pics

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9. Follow Users

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Now you’re ready to find users to follow. Chances are many of your social media friends are already using Instagram, and on top of that, a bunch of celebrities are, too.

Head to your profile tab and select “Find Friends.” You may search for friends who have connected their Facebook and Twitter accounts to Instagram, or you may input your phone’s contact list to generate further connections. Or search by name, username or tag (e.g. “#skydiving”).

Finally, Instagram does a great job curating suggested users and trending photos. Head to the Popular page (see right), denoted by the star on your navigation panel, and peruse photos that strike your fancy.

Once you’ve followed some users, you’ll begin to see their photos appear in your news feed, accessed by tapping the icon that looks like a house on the left side of the navigation panel. Alongside user photos, you’ll see people who have liked or commented on the photo. Add your own two cents!

Learn more about interesting Instagramers to follow here:

• 25 Most-Followed Users on Instagram [PICS]
• 12 Extravagant Instagram Pics by the Rich and Famous

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10. Getting Around the Web Barrier

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As you’ve probably surmised by now, Instagram’s web presence is quite prohibitive. It relies on social integration for navigation, sharing and discovery, however clunky the process may be.

In its Help Center, Instagram admits, “While we’re still developing our web presence at instagram.com, we encourage you to check out third-party sites that have been created using the official Instagram API.”

It highlights sites like Webstagram, Flipboard and Prinstagram for viewing photos on the web and printing photos off the web, among others.

Many users wish they could access their Instagram news feeds on the web, similar to Facebook. It stands that we’ll likely see a bit more web integration now that Facebook owns Instagram, but for now, Facebook’s focus is primarily mobile. Instagram may have to wait. Until then, enjoy the app and get filtering!

In addition to Instgram’s suggested third-party apps, give these a go:

• Pinstagram! How Two Friends Merged Pinterest and Instagram in Two Days
• Pixlr Aims to Fill the Hole Between Photoshop and Instagram
• Snapstagram Wants to Print Your Instagram Photos [VIDEO]
• Browse Your Instagram Feed On Your iPad’s Retina Display With InstaPad Pro

More About: android, apps, Facebook, features, instagram, iOS, photography, Social Media

May 29, 2012

Enterprise software giant Salesforce has agreed to acquire Buddy Media — which helps brands with their Facebook Pages — for more than $800 million, according to one report.

The Buddy Media clientele currently includes such well-known brands as HP, Mattel, L’Oreal, Carnival, and Virgin Mobile and promises on its site to “turn fans and followers into real connections.”

Buddy Media’s services include setting up an interactive profile for clients, publishing and moderating content across social networks, creating and deploying socially-enabled content across the web, and creating and tracking social activity from a customer’s first click on a website to when they make a purchase.

According to All Things D, Salesforce has agreed to buy Buddy — but the deal has not yet been finalized. The article cites “people familiar with the deal” who claim Buddy Media chose the deal with Salesforce over another competitive deal from Google.

Facebook and WPP (a holding company) were also rumored to be considering buying the service.

Salesforce currently works with a number of enterprise clients to help connect customers and employees to increase sales and improve customer service. The cloud-based platform will likely use Buddy Media’s existing services to help supercharge its efforts on social media sites such as Facebook and Google+.

Just last week, Salesforce’s rival Oracle snapped up Vitrue for $300 million. Like Buddy Media, Vitrue focuses on helping brands manage their social media presence using CRM-like tools and dashboards.

Is $800 million too much for a service that basically helps you manage your Facebook presence? Let us know your take in the comments.

More About: Buddy Media, Facebook, oracle, Salesforce, vitrue

May 29, 2012

Could this be the craziest novel you’ll ever read in print?

The unconventional layout of Kapow!, from author Adam Thirlwell, features upside-down and spinning text. That’s intentional. It’s supposed to reflect the noisy confusion of stories from the Arab Spring, as they emerged online.

The novel Kapow! tells the story of Arab Spring in 2011. London-based writer Adam Thirlwell and the design team at publisher Visual Editions dreamed up the concept.

Thirlwell manages “to bring to paper how most of us digest on screen,” according to Visual Editions co-founder Anna Gerber.

The unusually formatted novel features large typography, pull-out pages and wordplay. The aim of these visual digressions: to represent what it’s like to follow the protests and demonstrations in the Middle East and northern Africa via links, tweets and YouTube.

“I thought it was the perfect form to describe the way you were able to find out about these things through various social media,” Thirlwell tells Mashable.

Though the book is based on real events, it’s a work of fiction. The setting is clearly Cairo, Egypt, but the city’s epicenter Tahrir Square is never mentioned.

Thirlwell’s unnamed protagonist is semi-autobiographical. The narrator is also a London-based writer learning about the revolution in 2011. The story takes off when the narrator meets a taxi driver named Faryaq whose family lives in Egypt during the revolution. He comes to learn about a “marriage that’s hijacked by public events.”

The project took six months of planning, three months of writing and three months of editing to complete. “I found it fascinating to mimic the way one’s attention is constantly being distracted or changed by what you’re looking at,” Thirlwell says.

SEE ALSO: Can Augmented Reality Save the Printed Page?

Thirlwell spent months looking at blogs featuring day-to-day updates from revolutions. He focused primarily on blogs and YouTube.

“Within the revolution they were using Facebook, Twitter and everything,” he says. “YouTube, I think, is in a way the most interesting because if you suddenly upload a video, it has an instant impact in a way that any article about that doesn’t.”

He wrote the story as the Arab Spring movement was unfolding last winter. Videos, images and blogs posts were available almost immediately after events happened.

“[The web] is working to mobilize a huge amount of people very fast,” he says. “To the bystander, like the American or British person observing the revolution, it becomes a way of actually seeing what you otherwise wouldn’t be able to see.”

Of course, Mideast revolution is still being documented online. Last week, news of Syria’s #HoulaMassacre spread widely across Twitter before news organizations were reporting about the incident. The U.N. reports 49 to 100+ residents of Houla were killed.

This Thursday, news from Egypt about the country’s presidential elections is expected to light up Twitter and other social networks.

Check out some images from Kapow! on Amazon. And let us know in the comments: would you read this? Does it do a good job of representing the cacophony of the Internet?

Click here to view this gallery.

Images courtesy of Visual Editions

More About: Arab Spring, books, Facebook, Social Media, Twitter, YouTube

May 29, 2012

Link shortening and tracking service bit.ly got a major makeover on Tuesday. It offers a slew of new features to help make link sharing more dynamic — from bookmarks and profiles, to its first-ever iPhone app.

Although the new tools will surely add more depth to the service, the layout has left many of its most dedicated users confused about how to shorten a link — which most of us would consider to be bit.ly’s raison d’etre.

Bit.ly — which has more than 25 billion links saved since 2008 and gets about 300 million link-clicks each day — launched a redesign to not only expand its presence but give users more curation power. Among the most notable of the new tools is a profile page and what the company is calling “bitmarks,” which are similar to bookmarks.

“Bitmarks are the interesting links you collect across the web — a hard to find recipe, an article, an awesomely hysterical video,” the company wrote on its blog. “It’s anything that you find and want to save and maybe even want to easily share. You can organize them into bundles based on a theme or share them with your friends via Facebook, Twitter and email. You decide whether each bitmark gets published to your public profile or saved privately, so that only you can see it.”

SEE ALSO: The Best and Worst Times to Share on Facebook, Twitter

When searching for bitmarks, you can see instant results based on the URL, title and notes as you type in keywords. Bitmarks can be added to a personal profile and can be made private or public. You can also save and share from its new Chrome extension, bitmarklet or via its iPhone app.

The free iPhone app allows you to (finally) share and shorten links easily while on the go. The app also provides access to your bitmarks and saved pages to view in offline mode.

The move is also part of an effort to see what others are sharing across various social networks such as Twitter and Facebook in one place. Bit.ly has already integrated those sites into the service; you have long been able to log in to bit.ly by using your Facebook or Twitter account.

Bit.ly bundles is also not a new feature — it was first introduced in 2010 as a way to curate topical or related collections of links — but now you can collaborate and edit along with friends.

Although the service’s new features will make the site more dynamic, it’s no longer intuitive to shorten a URL. Some people took to Twitter to discuss their frustration with the new layout.

I literally do not know how to shorten a link on the new bit.ly, nice job guys!

— Anthony De Rosa (@AntDeRosa) May 29, 2012

To convert a link, click on the “add a bitmark” link on the top right corner of the homepage and then click “save” (or “save and share,” if you wish to share). Then click on the “i” icon under your bitmarks section to copy and paste the shortened URL.

What do you think of the new site features? Are you confused by the layout? Let us know your opinion in the comments.

More About: apps, bit.ly, Facebook, Twitter

May 29, 2012

Style makeover show What Not to Wear returns to TLC on Tuesday night with an episode that incorporates the opinions and suggestions from its Facebook fans to determine the outcome of the show.

What Not to Wear — a series hosted by Stacy London and Clinton Kelly, who give women fashion makeovers and style tips — enlisted the help of the Facebook community to kick off its ninth season, airing on May 29 at 9:00/8:00 p.m. CT.

Filmed before a live studio audience in March for the first time, the show enlisted the real-time opinions of WNTW fans by asking which items the episode’s contestant Anna should throw out and which new items Stacy and Clinton should select for her.

SEE ALSO: Watch What Happens Live: Behind the Scenes of Bravo’s Most Social Show

“What Not to Wear fans are incredibly passionate about the show and the overall theme of personal transformation, as can be seen by the year-round engagement on the show’s Facebook page,” Stephanie Eno, senior director of production at TLC, told Mashable. “Knowing this, we wanted to give our viewers a special role in our season premiere and our contributor’s makeover.”

Before the taping, WNTW posted a message on its Facebook page encouraging fans to return to the site to play along later that day. It then posted pictures of Anna’s clothing collection, asking fans if she shouldkeep or toss items, and uploaded photos of potential outfits for Anna’s makeover. Fans voted on which items would best suit Anna’s body type and style.

User engagement on its Facebook page skyrocketed, with thousands of fans leaving comments and reactions. WNTW’s page also crossed one million fans during the taping.

“The level of post engagement as we filmed was unprecedented for the show, and we can’t wait to share the outcome of Stacy & Clinton’s makeover with the fans who helped make it happen,” Eno added.

The move of incorporating fan interaction into TV episodes is becoming a part of a larger trend. In fact, shows such as The Voice, Watch What Happens Live and Oprah’s Lifeclass are leading the pack as innovators in the social TV space, incorporating tweets and Facebook interaction into episodes.

More About: discovery, Entertainment, Facebook, Social Media, social networking, social tv, TLC, what not to wear

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May 29, 2012

Earlier this month, General Motors made headlines when it announced plans to pull its ads from Facebook because they were “ineffective.” But the story may be more complicated than that, a story published in AdAge on Tuesday suggests.

Sources told AdAge the reason GM decided to pull its advertising is because Facebook wouldn’t let the company run “bigger, higher-impact ad units” than what it currently offers — i.e., small display ads and Sponsored Stories. GM wanted to run a full-page takeover. Facebook said no.

Facebook declined to comment about client meetings. GM could not be reached by press time.

The original report, which was published by The Wall Street Journal three days before Facebook’s May 18 IPO, has been blamed in part for Facebook’s less-than-spectacular market performance. GM reportedly spends $40 million on Facebook annually, about a quarter of which goes to paid ads. The other $30 million goes towards content creation.

Facebook’s ad revenue has been increasing at a rate of $1 billion per year since 2009, bringing in more than $3 billion last year alone. The social network will face mounting pressure over the coming months to grow those figures without compromising users’ browsing experience.

---

SEE ALSO: The IPO Won’t Change Facebook. Online Ads Will

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It’s a problem, of course, that just about every other online publisher faces. Some, like Twitter and Tumblr, have opted for “promoted” messages over large display units. Even those companies have had to revise products when users reacted negatively, as Twitter did with a hovering mobile display unit called the Quick Bar (or “Dick Bar,” as users dubbed it.)

Facebook has thus far dabbled with both display and promotional advertising. Its only large-format display ads, which take up most of the page above the fold, appear when users log out of Facebook.

Ian Schafer, CEO of ad agency Deep Focus, expects that the logout ads are “probably the only bone that Facebook will be throwing into the large-format ad realm for the foreseeable future.” That’s because “Facebook protects its platform at all costs. That’s the Zuckerberg way,” he says.

“We need to stop thinking about Facebook as a publisher, and look at it instead as platform,” Shafer adds. “To say [Facebook's] ads aren’t big enough is begging for a MySpace-like fate for them, and a big dramatic withdrawl from Facebook because they won’t give you bigger ads feels so uninspired. It’s not about baiting people into clicks, it’s about what you do once [users] do interact with the ads,” he insists.

As a user, what kinds of ads would you be most willing to tolerate on Facebook’s website and mobile apps? Would you rather see hovering display ads or an ad takeover on the right side of your Newsfeed, as examples, or would you prefer to see promoted posts from brands you follow within your Newsfeed?

More About: Advertising, Facebook, General Motors

May 29, 2012

Earlier this month, General Motors made headlines when it announced plans to pull its ads from Facebook because they were “ineffective.” But the story may be more complicated than that, a story published in AdAge on Tuesday suggests.

Sources told AdAge the reason GM decided to pull its advertising is because Facebook wouldn’t let the company run “bigger, higher-impact ad units” than what it currently offers — i.e., small display ads and Sponsored Stories. GM wanted to run a full-page takeover. Facebook said no.

Facebook declined to comment about client meetings. GM could not be reached by press time.

The original report, which was published by The Wall Street Journal three days before Facebook’s May 18 IPO, has been blamed in part for Facebook’s less-than-spectacular market performance. GM reportedly spends $40 million on Facebook annually, about a quarter of which goes to paid ads. The other $30 million goes towards content creation.

Facebook’s ad revenue has been increasing at a rate of $1 billion per year since 2009, bringing in more than $3 billion last year alone. The social network will face mounting pressure over the coming months to grow those figures without compromising users’ browsing experience.

---

SEE ALSO: The IPO Won’t Change Facebook. Online Ads Will

---

It’s a problem, of course, that just about every other online publisher faces. Some, like Twitter and Tumblr, have opted for “promoted” messages over large display units. Even those companies have had to revise products when users reacted negatively, as Twitter did with a hovering mobile display unit called the Quick Bar (or “Dick Bar,” as users dubbed it.)

Facebook has thus far dabbled with both display and promotional advertising. Its only large-format display ads, which take up most of the page above the fold, appear when users log out of Facebook.

Ian Schafer, CEO of ad agency Deep Focus, expects that the logout ads are “probably the only bone that Facebook will be throwing into the large-format ad realm for the foreseeable future.” That’s because “Facebook protects its platform at all costs. That’s the Zuckerberg way,” he says.

“We need to stop thinking about Facebook as a publisher, and look at it instead as platform,” Shafer adds. “To say [Facebook's] ads aren’t big enough is begging for a MySpace-like fate for them, and a big dramatic withdrawl from Facebook because they won’t give you bigger ads feels so uninspired. It’s not about baiting people into clicks, it’s about what you do once [users] do interact with the ads,” he insists.

As a user, what kinds of ads would you be most willing to tolerate on Facebook’s website and mobile apps? Would you rather see hovering display ads or an ad takeover on the right side of your Newsfeed, as examples, or would you prefer to see promoted posts from brands you follow within your Newsfeed?

More About: Advertising, Facebook, General Motors

May 29, 2012

Facebook may be about to acquire facial recognition tool Face.com, according to multiple reports.

Israeli business publication Calcalist, which has accurately leaked acquisitions of a number of Israeli companies in the past (including Apple’s acquisition of flash storage company Anobit), says that Facebook is in talks to purchase the startup for “tens of millions of dollars.”

Face.com already powers two photo apps on Facebook’s platform, Photo Finder and Photo Tagger. The company also has a public API, which it updated in March to enable third-party apps to estimates the ages and moods of people in photos.

Rumors that Facebook was interested in acquiring Face.com have appeared before, but the two companies disagreed over price, TheNextWeb reports.

Should the latest rumor be true, this will be Facebook’s first major acquisition since going public earlier this month — unless last week’s rumor about Facebook’s interest in acquiring Opera happens to be true.

A Facebook spokesperson said the company does not comment on rumors.

More About: face.com, Facebook

May 28, 2012

The taciturn and, so far brilliantly successful Apple CEO, Tim Cook, will sit down for a rare, public interview with All Things D’s Walt Mossberg on Tuesday at the 10th Annual D conference. With the intense scrutiny every single move the Cupertino-based company is under, Cook’s words will be closely monitored. Will he signal a shocking new direction for the company? Maybe he’ll show off that new stylus the company just tried to patent. The possibilities are endless.

As I prepare to sit in on the event, I came up with my best and most interesting guesses for what golden nuggets will cascade from the lanky Alabama native’s lips:

1) “I give you the iPhone 5″

This is the dream of not only every single Apple fanatic, but virtually the entire smartphone-using world. In his brief tenure, Cook has yet to introduce a completely new product. In fact, it has been over a year since the iPad 2 rolled out. The iPad Retina (or iPad 3) is really just an update (similar to what the iPhone 4S was to the iPhone 4). If I close my eyes, I can see Cook holding up the new 4.5-inch or 3.95-inch liquid metal or all aluminum iPhone 5 and ATD’s Walt Mossberg grinning broadly at the beauty of the little device. On the other hand, Apple is not in the habit of introducing major products at non-Apple events (and just a week ahead of Apple’s own World Wide Developers Conference). Why might it happen? Because this is Cook’s Apple, and not the late Steve Jobs’. Cook has been doing some things his own way and this could be the moment to put his own stamp on product introductions.

2) “Under that fabric is the new Apple iTV”

An Apple TV set is too big for Cook to hold in his hand or even two arms, but the potential of him introducing an entirely new product line is a tantalizing one. All rumors point to the possibility that Apple is working on a smart HDTV, especially since the device would be a lot like a large screen iMac, but with the tiny Apple TV box built in. On the other hand, rumors sometimes lead to dead ends, and, again, Cook may not want to intro brand new hardware on someone else’s stage.

3) This is Apple 2.0

Now this would be a bold and, potentially, dangerous statement for Cook to make. It would be an indication that this is the Apple you know, but with some important and welcome changes. The reality is that things are changing at Apple. A recent report details how closely he’s working with stockholders and investors and that his attention to process is even changing the way products are developed. What if he uses such a phrase simply to describe the important changes he’s making at the organization to steer it to even greater success?

4) We’re pleased to introduce iTunes with Facebook integration.

I think we can all agree that no one is using Ping, the iTunes-only integrated social network that was supposed to turn all that music we’re consuming on iTunes into a Facebook-like social experience. That has not happened. Recently, Tim Cook expressed his admiration for Facebook. Perhaps this is a signal that Apple’s about to back pedal on a rare misstep, drop Ping and replace it with a fairly rich Facebook integration. It’s not hard to imagine “I’m listening to Norah Jones on iTunes” on your Facebook timeline, is it?

5) This is the iPad Mini, and it’s amazing

Ever since the first iPad introduction in 2010, rumors of a 7-inch sibling have persisted. Jobs did his best to quash the rumors, telling investors during an earnings call that a 7-inch screen is “too small to express the software.” “When we make decisions on 7-inch tablets it’s not about cost, it’s about the value of the product when you factor in the software,” he added. Jobs really did not want to make that smaller tablet. He made those comments, however, in 2010, before the arrival of the relatively successful Amazon Kindle Fire. That device reportedly owns 50% of the Android tablet market, and it’s only been available since November of last year.

So Cook could surprise many and vindicate those who have long believed Apple was on this path. The smart money, however, says this will not happen.

6) Our fight is not with Samsung and HTC, it’s with Google
Some believe Apple is getting ready to boot Google maps from iOS 6 in favor of its own mapping technology. This would be yet another blow in the once-chummy Apple/Google relationship. However, nothing has hurt that more than Android. Steve Jobs hated Android and told his biographer Walter Isaacson so: “I’m going to destroy Android, because it’s a stolen product. I’m willing to go to thermonuclear war on this.” Instead, Apple went to war with all the companies building products on top of Android: Samsung, HTC, etc. What if Cook, who reportedly recently sat at a mediation table with Samsung’s CEO over patent disputes, finally turns the full ire of Apple on Google. The D10 stage seems like an unlikely place to do it, but then we know Mossberg will ask and Cook has to say something.

7) Thanks for having me, Walt.

Cook could end up talking about Apple in ultra-broad strokes and leave nothing on the table for reporters except scraps. This is also unlikely.

The reality is this may be the first opportunity many get to see and hear the real Tim Cook. My take on him is that he’s been far more instrumental in Apple’s success over the last decade than most of the Apple gadget-buying-public realizes. He’ll use the interview to make that clear, put his stamp more visibly on Apple and, I hope, surprise us. What do you think Cook will say when he takes the stage in southern California? Would you prefer products or the “The Story of Cook?” Tell us in the comments.

More About: apple, Facebook, ipad, itunes, tim cook

May 28, 2012

If you didn’t realize this already, take note: Bragging about your big pile of cash on Facebook isn’t a great idea.

A 17-year-old Australian girl learned this lesson the hard way last Thursday when she posted a picture of some money on Facebook. The girl was helping her grandmother count the loot and couldn’t help sharing that information with her online friends.

The status update apparently prompted two armed masked would-be robbers to try to visit the girl’s house, but, because of some faulty information, hit her mother’s house instead and made off with a smaller pile of cash. No one was injured.

Image courtesy of Flickr, Artist in Doing Nothing

More About: crime, Facebook, videos

May 28, 2012

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his bride, Priscilla Chan, have made a bizarre, odds-beating cameo in a Chinese documentary that’s become a viral sensation in that country.

The doc, from China Central Television, shows the two cavorting in Shanghai in March, weeks before their recent wedding. The pair visited the country that month for a personal trip. According to CNet, the images of Zuck and Chan have since gone viral in China on Sina Weibo, a popular social media site.

The 40-second clip above shows the two apparently caught at random during the shooting of the doc — an unlikely event considering Shanghai’s population of 13 million.

More About: Facebook, mark zuckerberg, priscilla chan, viral videos

May 28, 2012

Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

Despite amassing something close to a billion users, Facebook has mainly stayed true to the startup mantra of staying focused on a few core things. In this case, that has been promoting openness and sharing among friends and, increasingly, the world at large. Such was the case for its rival Google at the launch of the search company’s IPO. Since then, however, the company has launched a pair of operating systems powering handsets and tablets around the world, a digital media store selling everything from apps to books, and its own social sharing service (at least twice).

With the vast capital infusion that comes with an IPO, Facebook has an opportunity to expand far beyond its own site and Like buttons that now line up in a row next to sharing buttons using Twitter and Google+. The company certainly has no love for Google and has kept Apple at arm’s length, but it has had a strong partnership with Microsoft, which made a financially shrewd $240 million investment in Facebook back in 2007. Windows Phone would be a poorer experience were it not for its tight Facebook integration. The giant social network would gain from entering the device market or spinning its own version of Android as Amazon has done, but there would also be significant challenges to striking out into its own ecosystem.

Continue reading Switched On: Facebook’s ecosystem dilemma

Switched On: Facebook’s ecosystem dilemma originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 27 May 2012 21:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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May 27, 2012

Facebook may be gearing up to launch its first-ever smartphone by next year, a new report suggests.

According to The New York Times, engineers have been sought by recruiters to work on building hardware for a Facebook smartphone. This would be the social network’s third attempt to develop a smartphone, the report said, citing sources close to the matter.

The news comes as search engine giant Google completed the acquisition of Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion earlier this week. This move could help Facebook counter that with its own foray into the smartphone hardware business.

SEE ALSO: How a ‘Facebook Phone’ Could Help Facebook Break Into Mobile Apps [VIDEO]

Rumors about a possible Facebook phone have been circulating for the past few years. Although Facebook was reportedly first working on a smartphone in 2010, sources said the initiative stopped due to development complications. Meanwhile, AllThingsD has reported Facebook and manufacturer HTC were working together to develop a mobile device under the code name “Buffy.”

It’s believed that “Buffy” may still be in development. Hiring engineers to work specifically on building Facebook phones would position the company to explore other smartphone projects, as well.

Do you think a move into the smartphone business would be smart for Facebook or would it overextend itself? Would you buy a Facebook phone?

More About: Buffy, Facebook, mark zuckerberg, smartphone, smartphones, trending

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