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.
Social networking has become one of the hottest online activities with 73 percent of adults using a social networking site of some kind, according to data compiled by Pew Internet. Around 4 out of 10 online adults get their social groove going with multiple sites, but which are the most popular? Facebook is the...
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Amid a claim and a denial about Facebook’s plummeting popularity among teens, an EU study has emerged that affirms the former assertion, at least among teenagers in the UK. Professor of Material Culture at University College of London Daniel Miller wrote that his research team is conducting 15-month...
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T-Mobile’s prepaid phone service, GoSmart, is doing a little shimmy to get an edge in the prepaid market by offering Facebook access for free, irrespective of whether or not users have a data plan. It’s certainly an interesting idea, and Facebook is in on it. So many people spend so much time on Facebook...
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We won't make fun of you if you decide to don a tinfoil hat, not anymore. A few years ago you might have looked pretty silly wearing one and been the butt of jokes, but these days privacy is no laughing matter, even if companies and our own government treat it like a joke. There's the whole NSA/PRISM thing, but did...
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Facebook is wading into treacherous waters. The social media giant started testing out an autoplay video feature earlier this year that would silently play videos as you scroll past them in your NewsFeed. That’s one thing is it’s videos from your friends or family, but it’s quite another when those...
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With Twitter's stock price surging to new highs, now is a good time to focus on the mobile experience, which is where users are flocking to these days. That's not lost on Twitter, which just updated its app for Android and iOS devices to include the ability to share and view photos via direct message (DM) on your phone or tablet devices. Those...
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Do you hear that noise? It's the sound of stocks changing hands, and today that's good news for Twitter. Why? Twitter's stock is currently trading at around $52 per share, up nearly 6 percent since the opening bell, and that's after gaining 9.3 percent on Monday. Shares of Twitter hit a new high of $52.58 just a...
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Google has become infamous for its persons data-mining; it would love nothing more than to understand every inch of you. But while Google's been in the spotlight for this for a good while, I'd bet that the company would jump at the chance to feed off of Facebook's gathered information. Why? Because the best...
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Major tech firms are lobbying for more user privacy as it pertains to the U.S. government's practice of collecting sensitive data. In an open letter to President Barack Obama and Congress, eight technology companies said there's a need to "reform government surveillance" now that the balance has tipped too far in...
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Habitual complainers rejoice, Facebook may soon implement a "sympathize" button so that other users can send their virtual condolences. If you're like me, you probably loathe the idea of encouraging self-pity posts, and while a sympathize button will certainly lead to more of those, there are other scenarios where it...
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Here's a bit of news that's far from deserving of a "Giddyup!": Thanks to the work of a botnet called "Pony", hackers have gained access to credentials for over 2 million individual accounts. These accounts span the entire gamut: Facebook, Twitter, Google (Gmail), and even a payroll service provider - perhaps the most...
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The concept of Facebook is pretty great. At its best, Facebook is a fantastic tool for staying in touch with friends and family scattered all over the world, as well as reacquainting yourself with high school buddies and college cohorts. This is the beauty of Facebook as its most basic, and as you peel away layers...
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Facebook CFO David Ebersman shook things up when he casually mentioned in a recent earnings call that the social network was seeing a drop in daily use among teens, but it’s possible that the reason he was didn’t make a big deal about it is that there’s nothing to be alarmed about. That’s the...
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When the NSA forced several major tech companies including Facebook, Google, and Yahoo to cough up data on their users, one got the sense that it was a situation of an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object. The first round of that battle went to the NSA because it had (some shadily-acquired) court documents...
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Snapchat's founders evidently have some big things planned for their startup, and it doesn't involve selling to Facebook for $1 billion. It takes some mighty big you-know-what to scoff at that kind of cash, especially when you're in your early twenties as co-founders Evan Spiegal (23 years old) and Bobby Murphy (25...
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Here's what isn't surprising: Facebook is trying to take over where the conventional text message left off. Here's what is surprising: that is has taken this long to get to this point. The tried-and-true phone number is a hangover technology from many generations ago, and it's actually quite unfortunate that it's...
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It took five months for Vine to show up on Android devices after launching for iOS, and another five months later the 6-second video-sharing app is available for Windows Phone, too. The app will look and feel familiar to those who have already used it on other platforms, although there are some Windows Phone-only features such as the ability...
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Alongside Yelp, Facebook, Groupon, and LinkedIn, the world is welcoming yet another social behemoth onto the public trading floor today. Twitter, the microblogging service that evolved from a place to tell people about what you were eating for lunch into a place where news is broken, is now a publicly traded company...
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As I sit here writing this, I'm thinking, "Should I depressed that it's a newsworthy topic when Facebook changes its 'Like' button, or just accept that it's a sign of the times we live in?" I'm not sure of the answer, but as silly as it sounds, in this case, a revamped icon is kind of a big deal, and for a number of reasons. The first, of...
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By the end of the week, there's a good chance Twitter will be a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). Twitter's bigwigs are targeting Thursday, and barring any surprises, it will go down as the biggest tech IPO since Facebook, making several people very wealthy over night. However, it's what...
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The most surefire way to make teenagers disinterested in something is for their parents to adopt it, and it appears that Facebook is having just such a problem. Facebook has finally admitted that there has been a dip in teen usage--although the company hasn’t provided any numbers. This is a sharp turnaround from Facebook’s position...
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It's not unprecedented for mobile apps to receive billion dollar valuations. One need only look at the sum Facebook paid for Instagram, a mobile photo sharing apps that allows users to add filters to their photography. It's a simple app, but because of its widespread appeal, the developers earned a ginormous payday...
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