How to Be a Social Media Power Influencer (And Why!) Calls for major reform of college sports unlikely to produce meaningful change. Virtually no matter where you turn for your news and commentary -- from sophisticated publications like The Atlantic to rants on sports radio for the lowbrow among us -- you're likely to have been left in recent months with the overwhelming impression that big-time college sports is in a state of crisis, and that momentum is building for some kind of radical action that would result in a wholesale transformation of the enterprise. Don't hold your breath.
That’s not to say that all is well in college sports -- it’s impossible to argue otherwise given recent scandals at some of the highest-profile universities in the country -- or to write off as meaningless various efforts by the National Collegiate Athletic Association and others to toughen academic rules, increase financial support for athletes, or otherwise alter the landscape. Mark Emmert, NCAA president “There is an enormous amount of uninformed, emotion-driven debate and conversation going on right now.” --Mark Emmert, NCAA Donna A. Designers Behind Facebook Timeline: 5 Lessons For Creating A UI With Soul | Co.Design. For most of computing history, interfaces have been about function.
Word processing programs help you compose documents. Banking websites help you make transactions. Sites like Flickr help you display and share photographs. But Facebook’s Timeline (the new version of the user profile which is slated to be released to the general public “in the next few weeks”) wanted to do something more: It wanted to convey a feeling. Two feelings actually: The feeling of telling someone your life story, and the feeling of memory--of remembering your own life. If Facebook had simply had utilitarian goals in mind for its new profile, like “Help me identify what happened in 2008,” designing Timeline would have been simple. But Facebook didn’t want to do that. Time Is The Most Universal Framework Across Cultures One of the primary decisions that had to be made was what the basic organizing framework would be.
But they soon realized that wouldn’t scale. Life Feels Like A Stream; Life’s UI Should Too. Whatever Happened to Ringtones? When was the last time you downloaded a ringtone? 2008? For many of us, downloading our favorite pop song du jour feels as dated as choosing a buddy icon our AIM profile. However, somewhere, people still download ringtones.
The mobile call alerts still make up one-third of the online music industry. This Music Production School infographic takes a look at the still-kicking ringtone ecosystem. Not surprisingly, the ringtone industry has been in decline since 2006, when it totaled about $4.5 billion in global sales. Some predict it will be extinct by 2016. As of November 2011, Lil Wayne dominates the ringtone charts, having the number one tune, "6 foot 7," and being featured in the number two and five tracks (Chris Brown's "Look at Me Now" and Kelly Rowland's "Motivation"). Overall, rap is the most dominant ringtone music genre, although when it comes to free downloads, iPhone users have more diverse tastes than their Android counterparts.
SEE ALSO: HOW TO: Make Free iPhone Ringtones. The 10 Most Popular Photos on Twitter This Week [PICS] This week's most popular photos re-tweeted in the English language were a mixed bunch, peppered with both tragedy and comedy. Unfortunately, the most re-tweeted picture was of a tragic young victim of brutality, and another one was a picture of a missing person whose story had a much happier ending. On the other hand, most of the pics were more lighthearted, showing you people and their activities from a completely different perspective. Even though there weren't as many celebrity pics this week as usual, of course, there's a hint of Justin Bieber in there, who seems to dominate all things Twitter.
As you peruse the 10 most popular Twitter photos of the week, compiled for Mashable by real-time photo search engine Skylines between Dec. 2 and Dec. 8, keep in mind that if you click through to the pics' originating pages, the number counts might be different because Skyline made its determination a couple of days ago. The 10 Most Popular Photos on Twitter This Week [PICS] This week's most popular photos re-tweeted in the English language were a mixed bunch, peppered with both tragedy and comedy. Unfortunately, the most re-tweeted picture was of a tragic young victim of brutality, and another one was a picture of a missing person whose story had a much happier ending. On the other hand, most of the pics were more lighthearted, showing you people and their activities from a completely different perspective.
Even though there weren't as many celebrity pics this week as usual, of course, there's a hint of Justin Bieber in there, who seems to dominate all things Twitter. As you peruse the 10 most popular Twitter photos of the week, compiled for Mashable by real-time photo search engine Skylines between Dec. 2 and Dec. 8, keep in mind that if you click through to the pics' originating pages, the number counts might be different because Skyline made its determination a couple of days ago. SoundCloud Passes 4 Million Users, Partners With Headliner.fm To Give Bands A Killer Promotional Tool. By now, you may have run across a SoundCloud audio track somewhere out there in the wild, wooly Interwebs — perhaps during one of your mad, late-night music searches. In which case, you’re familiar with the tell-tale signs: The scrolling orange cursor, the messages tagged mid-song, and that distinctive social waveform layout. For those who have no idea what I’m talking about, SoundCloud is the fast-scaling, Berlin-based audio sharing platform that enables music-makers and audio-lovers to upload and share audio tracks.
Because of SoundCloud’s somewhat unique visualization (tracks are laid out horizontally in waveform, as they might appear were they fresh out of the studio, or playing in GarageBand or some other music creation app), users can add comments to the waveform at specific times during the track. (Like, “you clearly stole this guitar riff from Steve Vai, loser”, for example.) It’s a great idea, but can it last? For more on Headliner, check out the video below: The FP Top 100 Global Thinkers. All revolutionaries want their stories told to the world, and no one has conveyed the hopes and dreams of Egyptians more vividly than Alaa Al Aswany.
The dentist turned author rose to fame with his 2002 novel, The Yacoubian Building, which charted Egypt's cultural upheaval and gradual dilapidation since throwing off its colonial shackles. Aswany used his prominence to help found the Kefaya political movement, which first articulated the demands that would energize the youth in Tahrir Square: an end to corruption, a rejection of hereditary rule, and the establishment of a true democratic culture. For his political activism, Aswany was blacklisted by Egypt's state-owned publishing houses, and security officials harassed the owner of the cafe where he met with young writers. How times change. Aswany was a fixture in Tahrir Square during Egypt's uprising -- he was almost killed three times, he said, during the running battles between demonstrators and pro-Mubarak thugs. John Ritter.
Shared Circles. Rodney Pike - Google+ - Google+ Entrepreneurs Rodney Pike shared a circle with you. David Wees - Google+ - Here's 500 educators in my circles. Hope you find this… Paul Melrose - Google+ - This is my e-learning/education technology circle … Life, Love and it's Labour. Monster.com Launches BeKnown: Professional Social Networking for Facebook. Today Monster.com dropped the gauntlet and launched BeKnown, a new Facebook application that hopes to become the professional social network for Facebook users, and a vital new tool for recruiters, human resources, and talent acquisition teams. In this blog post we will explain this market and preview some of the exciting features in this important new offering. Facebook vs.
LinkedIn for Professional Social Networking As most people in the talent acquisition industry know, LinkedIn has become a major force in the corporate recruiting market. The company’s stellar IPO and and rapid growth as “the professional social network” has created a transformational platform for corporate recruiters and job seekers. Corporate recruiting is LinkedIn’s fastest growing revenue stream, and the company is now aggressively building new tools and services.
Today the LinkedIn network has around 100 million users and is growing at a rate of nearly 3 million per month. Fig 1: Facebook vs. Monster.com. Social Media Success Is About Purpose (Not Technology) - Anthony J. Bradley and Mark P. McDonald. By Anthony J. Bradley and Mark P. McDonald | 2:57 PM November 1, 2011 In the real estate world, there is a saying: “The three considerations that most impact value are location, location, and location.”
In the world of social media, they are purpose, purpose, and purpose. Nothing impacts the success of a social media effort more than the choice of its purpose. What is a good purpose for social media? If you’re like most executives (and you’re being honest), probably not. No wonder most organizations struggle with gaining tangible and significant business value from social media. That deficiency often leads to a worst practice we call “provide and pray.” The lesson? Facebook’s core purpose is for people to easily track what their friends are doing. Yes, some social Web environments have strayed from their original purpose. Choosing the right purpose is difficult (much harder than providing the technology).
Purpose is a business decision.