Thoughtpick: A unique perspective of the Web and social media...
A unique perspective of the Web and social media...

March 18, 2010

What Is It Like to Work With Facebook & Zuck?

We have all heard about how it feels like to work at Google and how Google is the trend setter of creating the perfect environment for creativity and employee retention. But Facebook is different. Rarely have we ever heard about how it feels like to work with Mike Zuckerberg, a company that employs more than a 1,000 able people must have a story or two to share.

The fact that rarely anything about working at Facebook, or with Zuckerberg, is featured in the media made me curious to learn more about.

The Beginning

450px-markzuckerberg

Zuck Man

Mark Zuckerberg was somewhat of a local celebrity at Harvard in the fall of 2003. His first site Facemash was a hit at campus; a hot-or-not site for Harvard. Due to that popularity, he was recommended to code another project.

During that time Cameron Winklevoss, Tyler Winklevoss, and Divya Narendra were on the lookout for a programmer to code their idea for them. They wanted to create a social media network for students at Harvard and then potentially expand it to other universities. Based on the recommendation they received, they contacted Mark, and both parties agreed to start working on the project. While at first Mark was enthusiastic about the project, shortly his tone and enthusiasm waded. He went from saying “I read over all the stuff you sent and it seems like it shouldn’t take too long to implement, so we can talk about that after I get all the basic functionality up tomorrow night” to “The week has been pretty busy thus far, so I haven’t gotten a chance to do much work on the site or even think about it really“.

[read full article >>]

March 15, 2010

And The Nobel Peace Prize Goes to…

The Internet!” says the tuxedo-clad Nobel Peace Prize presenter.

Upon hearing her name, the Internet, dressed up in her best attire of a colorful table-based website, and with a flock of blue Twitter birds flying over head, seemed to be really surprised. She quickly got over the shock (thanks to multitude of fans updating the shock Wikipedia entries in her head), and strutted her way to the stage to accept her prize.

She really did look her best, didn't she?

She really did look her best, didn't she?

Oh, wow,” the Internet says, “I‘ve been around for a while but no one ever thought of nominating me for the prestigious Nobel Pea—”

The crowd interrupts her acceptance speech with loud and booming cheering: “W00t! W00t! W00t!

[read full article >>]

March 6, 2010

Feb-2010 Must-watch Videos: Skinput, OK Go, Youtube 101 & Chatroulette

The nature of the internet is filled with a lot of information and seeing it animated and simplified visual is certainly a blessing, since it opens our mind to new ways to see our world. Whether it’s through maps, info-graphs or psychedelic illustrations videos on the web surely added a much needed freshness to information and data on the web.

Hopefully with more bandwidth we will see more innovation in this field but for now we can enjoy some recent videos that have been noticed on the web by the Thoughtpick bloggers:

Skinput

Think of the possibilities for this one! This is actually a working prototype for the ultimate in mobile computing. Add a Wi-Fi capability to it, and make it as sexy and small as an iPod and you got yourself a decade long hit. Now I might find it difficult not to mention that I would find it uncomfortable to hold my arms in a fixed position for too long. Although it is slightly different it and definitely reminds me of Sixthsense technology.

Source – Mashable

[read full article >>]

March 3, 2010

Facebook: A Penny for Your Thought?

Except that, in this case, Facebook could possibly be asking you to pay a penny for your thought, rather than the other way round.

Okay. That’s a very misleading title from my side, but I can’t help it. People who claim that Google is the next evil empire, move over. I’m willing to bet some money on the fact that it’s actually the blue-faced Facebook that will wreck more havoc.

Let me introduce you to “Facebook Credits“, now open for applications that not only spam our sorry butts off, but are also about to do some ripping off. Basically, Facebook Credits is a currency that is aimed at making the purchase of virtual goods across Facebook’s apps easier.

How many Facebook Credits do you need today?

How many Facebook Credits do you need today?

Here’s what Deborah Liu, from Facebook’s blog, has to say about it: “By providing a single, cross-application currency, our goal is to making transactions simpler for users, leading to a higher conversion rate for developers. Specifically, our early testing has shown that users paying with Facebook Credits are significantly more likely to complete a purchase than the average Facebook user.”

To make it super easy, Facebook Credits supports different credit cards, fifteen currencies, mobile payments, and recently, PayPal.

[read full article >>]

March 2, 2010

European Union Kicks IE’s Butt

I never saw this day coming, but now that it did, I am very impressed.

The European Union, believing that “not knowing you have a choice is no choice at all“, has made Microsoft integrate a Browser Choice window in their operating system for both new users and existing Windows PC users. This screen will provide users with a chance “to make an active choice in the source of the software that acts on your behalf to broker your online experiences, and meet your own unique needs and interests.”

This decision ends a long-running dispute over the US software giant’s dominant market position. This “browser choice screen” will present users with a list of leading browsers — including Mozilla’s Firefox, Apple’s Safari and Google’s Chrome — presented in a random order. The screen will be offered as an automatic download for XP, Vista, and Windows 7.

The browser choice menu

The browser choice menu

[read full article >>]

February 22, 2010

Quarky News of the Web — Feb 2010

While news like the new Google Buzz, the new Facebook interface and soon to come mailing system dominate the headlines, there are always smaller headlines that tend to go unnoticed. They are the headlines that let us know how individualistic and unique some of the interactions on the web can be, and how much social media is shaping our world in ways that we could not have fathomed 20 years ago.

So the Quarky News of the Web section will be dedicated to those pieces of news that might go unnoticed but still pack quite the punch.

Google only looks out for Google’s privacy

After a wild party hosted by Orkut Büyükkökten, a senior Google engineer, Google exec barred the pictures of the night from being posted on the web. The home-warming party was wild, with  female and male strippers, booze and God knows what else; so there was a good reason for the ban. Thankfully, we can always depend on Facebook for leaks when Google fails, photos of the party surfaced on it.

Orkut at a party in Jan. 2009

Orkut at a party in Jan. 2009

[read full article >>]

February 19, 2010

Microsoft Takes on Google with Social Outlook

Oh, no.

These days, everything feels like it’s being drip-fed social media. Don’t get me wrong, I love social media, but companies are over-doing it, with the latest addition to the list of extensive-stitching-together being Outlook Social Connector.

I love the name! “Social Connector”: just as unimaginative as everything else that the horn-rimmed guys at Microsoft do.

My own anti-Microsoft sentiments aside…

What the hell is it exactly?

Look, they even use MS Word created clouds!

Look, they even use MS Word created clouds!

The Outlook Social Connector is an add-on for Outlook. When a user clicks to read an e-mail message, a new pane on the main e-mail reading screen fills with the sender’s most recent Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn activities.

[read full article >>]

February 3, 2010

Learn Social Media by Example: The Ford Fiesta Campaign Analyzed

Social media is what we love to talk about at Thoughtpick. In a effort to allow you to better understand and grasp the right use of social media for your upcoming campaigns, we are dedicating this regular section for you tailored to analyze old, new and current campaigns in terms of audience, success, lesson learned and more so you could learn about social media by example!

Campaign Stat Box

Brand: Ford Fiesta (Automaker Industry)
Campaign Website: http://www.fiestamovement.com/
Channels Used: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Blogs
Appeal: Win a car.
Target Audience: 18-30 age group in the US
Date of Campaign: 2009/2010

In Tough Economic Times: Can You Sell a Car Through Social Media?

After a gut-wrenching year for American automakers, Ford wanted to change its fortune with the all-new 2011 Fiesta.

After all, this Fiesta is not a very American car. Small, compact and fuel-efficient, the Fiesta is more tastefully European than insensibly American.

But it is not the functional design that has raised the numbers for Fiesta, it’s actually their fantastic social media campaign. The Ford marketing team spent a lot of effort in making sure it got buzz on the Web.

The Idea: Drive Your Car Through…

What they did was simple: they invited a 100 “social agents” to try the Fiesta for six month, and share their experience with the world. They had them promote the car through different social media sites, including Twitter, YouTube and blogs.

[read full article >>]

January 15, 2010

Google StreetView: Virtually Stealing Adspace

Google patent for the ads

Google patent for the ads

Google was just granted the patent above, which is leading internet observers to believe that Google will soon introduce ad-retailing on outdated billboards in Google Street View.

Basically, if a banner owner feels like the ad showing is totally out of date, he would be able to update the spot with a different ad, just like on a real billboard.  According to the patent, it will also work with posters in shop windows and theatres, and Google seems to be planning to also sell space for “unclaimed” spots–potentially leaving the spots free for rival services to advertise on a competitor’s business.

500x_googlebillboard

Okay, it probably won't look exactly like this...

What Does This Mean For Online Advertising?

With banner blindness going stronger than ever, advertisers and ad-sellers must come up with new ways to make use of the online community to generate advertising money.

Advertising in virtual worlds like Second Life became very popular several years back, but soon proved to be a fad. Meanwhile, contextual advertising like Adsense is still growing strong.

[read full article >>]

December 20, 2009

Facebook Apologizes for their Privacy screw-up… kind of!

I just got an email from my system with a screen shot of a message she just got on Facebook. The message stated:

Worried about search engines? Your information is safe.

There have been misleading rumors recently about Facebook indexing all your information on Google. That is not true. Facebook created public search listings in 2007 to enable people to search for your name and see a link to your Facebook profile. They will still only see a basic set of information.

Facebook Search Engine Privacy Message

Facebook Search Engine Privacy Message

NOT a rumor…

What Facebook is calling a rumor is documented by hundreds of posts around the web. About 2 weeks ago, Facebook’s “new and improved” privacy settings were announced. When you click next you get a screen to update your privacy settings (see image below). Many of the defaults on this page are to open your profile information to “everyone“, which includes search engines – and Google.

[read full article >>]

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