Engineers at Facebook, Twitter and MySpace have joined the protests against Google's search integration of Google+ results, crafting a browser add-on called "Don't Be Evil" that adds a far broader range of social into search. The tool, distributed at a site called Focus on the User, argues that rather than just pull Google+ profiles and topics into the search engine, Google would better serve actual users by integrating far more social networks: Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Flickr and more. Rather than see exactly what Google wants you to see through its forced Google+ promotion, you can be shown what the company's pure algorithm believes is relevant.
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‘Twitter’ Stories
Twitter acquires Summify for social aggregation
The folks at Twitter have picked up a startup by the name of Summify, a group whose main goal it is to aggregate the social media users around the world deal with on a daily bases. As Twitter scoops up this company, so too does the Summify team move over to San Francisco and their products be transitioned into Twitter-centric orbs. Their main service, the aggregation product which moves Twitter, Facebook, RSS, and other streams into one product, will be shut down inside a month.
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Twitter adds 11 accounts per second!
Social networking and microblogging on twitter are constantly growing it seems. A new stat has surfaced about twitter that is a little mind-boggling if you stop and think about it. TheNextWeb reports that Twopcharts has offered up a handy dandy chart showing Twitter is gaining 11 accounts every second. Twopcharts is a third party twitter app that looks at metrics and such.
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Google+ faces FTC investigation over search antitrust
Google's social network, Google+, will also come under investigation in a US FTC antitrust probe, according to sources, as the Commission examines whether the search giant has improperly used its heft to squeeze out rivals. Although originally expected to cover search, the US Federal Trade Commission's inquiry will now be expanded to look at Google+, two people "familiar with the situation" tell Bloomberg. The social network, and how it now feeds into search results, made headlines last week after Google announced plans to more closely personalize users' search experience.
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Twitter livid over Google search filtering
Twitter has struck out at Google's new Search plus Your World integration of Google+ into regular search results, describing the move as "bad for people, publishers, news organizations and Twitter users." Google announced earlier today that it would be using Google+ information to better personalize search results for users, showing friends' mini-profiles, contextually-filtered topics and suggested new contacts in among the regular findings. That's obviously upset Twitter, which seems to believe it's being forced away from Google users' eyeballs.
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Twitter and The Echo Nest team on music tweet integration
Twitter has partnered with music app data company The Echo Nest to integrate tweets from recording artists into apps, siphoning in messages from verified musician accounts on the short-form social network and pushing them into music apps. The service will mean apps that show lyrics, gig photos, band information or other music-related data can now also pull in Twitter updates from relevant artists.
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Karotz smart rabbit robot uses Facebook
"What the US needs is a social-network aware robotic rabbit." If you've ever found yourself muttering those words, then the Violet Karotz smart rabbit is probably for you (or maybe medication); the third-gen Nabaztag, a web-connected voice recognition robotic desk rabbit, is finally crossing the Atlantic to the US.
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Kanye West wants to hire app guys, tech guys, and more
Rapper Kanye West has returned to twitter after taking some time off. Kanye used to be big on twitter, in fact, he used the service to show the cover of his last album back in July 2010. Kanye is back to tweeting, this time he is talking about a new company that he is setting up, and all the "guys" he needs to hire.
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Google, Facebook and more mull anti-SOPA blackout
Google, eBay, Facebook, Twitter, PayPal and other big-name sites are contemplating a complete, coordinated blackout in an attempt to call users to arms over SOPA, the Stop Online Privacy Act. “There have been some serious discussions about that” Markham Erickson, head of the NetCoalition group of anti-SOPA organizations told CNET, with the so-called ‘nuclear option’ also being considered by Wikipedia and others.
Take your Twitter Kid’s gifts back NOW
If you’ve not yet experienced the unmitigatedly satanic screaming of the hoards of ungrateful kids across the nation at not getting the iPhone they wanted for Christmas, now’s your chance – and if you’re a parent of one of these whining little pukes, you’ve got one option, and one option only: take back everything else you gave them. There’s a song that goes with this sudden collecting of Twitter status updates that sums it all up quite nicely, you can watch it below. When you do, please, for the love of Pete, check your kid’s Twitter account and make sure they’re not a horrible, horrible person.
Briefly envisioning an Apple-made social network
The following is an exploration of what I believe Apple will make sometime in the future if it ever decides to dip into what we currently call the social networking environment here with Facebook, Google+, and Twitter: you’ll find that it’s not wholly unbelievable, but that you’ll perhaps have some issues with agreeing to the full terms if you’re a hardcore Apple fan. An Apple social network would be and will be first and foremost something unique, or at least an amalgamation of uncommon elements combined into a new and groundbreaking service, and it’ll be integrated into its iProducts in a way that’ll once again re-invigorate the masses to buy in to the lifestyle. If Apple has something to the tune of a social network in the works today, this is what it looks like.
Here’s why Google+ shouldn’t work, but does, for now
Just a few months ago, inside the summer of 2011, we saw the birth of Google’s own utterly mystifying social networking site Google+, complete with an interface that resembled not one, but all of the rest of the social media sites combined – what we’ve seen since are hundreds of combatant posts yelling at one another about how Google+ is either growing rapidly or suddenly petering out. There are numbers that can prove both if you don’t pay attention to the other, that much is true. What I want to tell you today is why I think what’s GOING to happen almost certainly WILL.
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