Social Networking, Internet Lifestyle And Security News
Passionate about net neutrality? Facebook privacy issues freaking you out? Want to know more about the latest security breach? Here we'll cover the headlines that matter in our ever evolving digitally-connected lives and lifestyles around the world.
Last fall, a couple of reports trickled out that didn't bode too well for Facebook's future. They claimed that teens were effectively leaving the social network en masse - it was simply no longer cool, a reality heightened by the fact that so many parents also use the service. Well, as it now appears, some conclusions...
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Facebook has a billion users, but its sights are set squarely on the next billion--or several billion--in developing nations. Sure, some of that drive represents a desire for profits, but Mark Zuckerberg also appears to genuinely believe that Internet access is a human right. In any case, he wants everyone to have Internet access, and he wants...
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Facebook doesn’t go down all that often, but when it does it’s big news. The social network reportedly experienced an outage at approximately 1 a.m. PST that affected users all over the world. Users in countries including Australia, New Zealand, England, South Korea, India, were unable to access Facebook...
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Mark Zuckerberg and the rest of the gang at Facebook finally launched a photo and video sharing app to compete with Snapchat. Called "Slingshot," Facebook's version is more than just a clone, though it may appear as such at first glance. After all, it allows you to take a photo or video, scribble some artistic flair...
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Have you ever stopped to really think about you're throwing out there in the social stratosphere? On the surface, they may appear to be a bunch of silly posts and status updates about your weekend or where you went for lunch, but on a deeper level, perhaps posting to Facebook reveals more about yourself than you...
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With only so much top level talent available in the technology industry, it's not uncommon for high ranking employees to change firms. Such is the case for David Marcus, president of eBay's PayPal division, who is joining Facebook to spearhead the company's efforts in mobile messaging. His primary responsibility will...
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Let's not tread lightly here, we all know how the stereotypical video gamer is portrayed on TV, and perhaps in our own minds sometimes as well -- overweight, anti-social, hyperactive (especially on chat), lazy, living in their parents' basement, and the unflattering list goes on. Just reference the "Make Love, Not...
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Facebook rolled out a new mobile feature that uses your device’s microphone to “hear” a song you’re listening to or a TV show you’re watching so you can append that item to a status post. Predictably, a lot of people believe that this is a feature designed for snooping and are not happy...
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The U.S. government is somewhat like that older family member you have that understands the importance of social media but is rather baffled at how to actually use it effectively. Particularly, the Secret Service is trying to find a tool that analyzes social media such as Twitter and Facebook, and it includes a rather...
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Unless you're willing to live out the rest of your life as a hermit, you'll notice there's a pecking order wherever you go. This is especially true among teenagers, but what might surprise you is exactly how their social statuses are determined these days. Instead of name brand clothes, which has been the case for...
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Your life can be an open book on Facebook if you want it to, but the problem for some less savvy users is that it's an open book even they don't want it to be. After all, it's not just experienced PC users posting to Facebook anymore -- anyone and just about everyone users the social network these days, and to make...
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Apparently fed up with being rejected by Snapchat, Facebook for the past several months has reportedly been working on a video sharing and chatting application of its own. It's called Slingshot, and like Snapchat, it allows users to send short video messages to recipients with just a few taps. However, it's not yet...
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Armed with Facebook’s deep pockets and strong backstop, Oculus VR is much better able to poach talent from big companies than when it was just an exciting startup (John Carmack notwithstanding). The big get for this week is Adrian Wong, who left his post as a lead electrical engineer at Google[x], where he...
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One of the biggest downsides of social media is that there's way too much information to take in. It's made worse when some people like to post a lot more than the usual person. There are some people I follow on Facebook or Twitter that can post upwards of 10 - 20 times a day. That's hard to deal with sometimes, when there's only so much time...
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The "Poke Wars" have ended folks, as Facebook has decided that nobody really cares about the Poke app, which was only available on iOS anyway -- it was never released on Android. It's the end of a 10 year run from when Poking was first made available. It would launch to mobile in 2012 and offer users a self-destruct timer similar to Snapchat's...
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John Carmack’s former employer, Zenimax, went after the industry veteran last week claiming that important code that he used in helping to build the Oculus Rift VR headset is actually IP owned by Zenimax. The company also stated that it provided VR technology to Oculus VR’s Palmer Luckey and others over...
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Sometimes when a company rolls out a new feature, it’s such an obviously good idea that everyone wants that you barely even have to talk about it further. Such is the case with a new Twitter feature spotted in the wild that lets you “mute” annoying Tweeters. Simply put, you can mute someone on...
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Watch out all you instant messaging applications, Snapchat just learned how to send texts in traditional form. What started off as a disappearing photo and video sharing service is now becoming a full-fledged communication platform that combines fun and functionality. Suddenly it starts to make sense why Snapchat...
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The Heartbleed Bug illustrated just how vulnerable our global communications structure really is, and now a glut of important tech companies in collaboration with the Linux Foundation are launching a new initiative called the Core Infrastructure Initiative to better support the open source projects and technologies...
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Facebook wants to be the No. 1 source for breaking news stories, and with over 1 billion members playing on the world's largest social playground, it's certainly feasible. What's lacking are resources journalists (or would-be journalists), but that's changing with the roll out of FB Newswire, which Mark Zuckerberg and the gang say will make...
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A new website sponsored by Ubisoft as part of its advertising campaign for the upcoming hacking-themed game Watch Dogs isn't just a plug for the title -- it's a chilling example of exactly how easy it is for companies to mine your data. While I'm normally averse to giving any application or service access to my...
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As Twitter looks to become a viable platform for mobile advertisers much like Facebook, there have been a series of changes to the service leading up to that goal, both behind the scenes and on the surface. Today's update falls into the latter category -- the recently introduced web profile experience is rolling out to all users worldwide...
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