Mashable: Latest 29 News Updates - including “Today’s Top Stories: Verizon CEO Bails from CES, Google Buys IBM Patents, Yahoo to Name New CEO”

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• Today’s Top Stories: Verizon CEO Bails from CES, Google Buys IBM Patents, Yahoo to Name New CEO
• Mimbo the iPhone Robot Mimics Your Emotions
• Skip the Research and Let Sortable.com Find the Product That’s Right for You
• Google Gets 200+ IBM Patents, Including One for a ‘Semantic Social Network’
• Follow The Quadrantids Meteor Shower Online [LIVE VIDEO]
• 10 Easy Customer Engagement Ideas for Small Business
• Klout Confirms ‘Mobile Component’ Is Coming
• Facebook Apologizes for Deleting Abortion Post
• 6 Apps That Block Online Distractions So You Can Get Work Done
• Google+ Sees Massive Membership Growth
• The Iowa Caucus, as Told by Twitter
• Pizza Hut to Pick Stars of Super Bowl Pre-Game Ad Via Facebook
• Codecademy Signs Up 97,000 People for Its New Year’s Resolution Coding Class
• Internet Explorer 6 Usage Drops Below 1% in the U.S., Finally [VIDEO]
• More Than 1 Million People Bought a Kindle Fire Instead of an iPad This Holiday [REPORT]
• Which Politician is Most Popular, Engaging on Social Media Sites?
• 80+ New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed
• ‘Flamel Attacks!’ and More Atari Game Box Parodies [PICS]
• Rick Santorum’s Sweater Vests Spawn Internet Parodies
• Use YouTube As a Music Player With Tubalr
• The Pros and Cons of Android Fragmentation
• Biscotti TV Phone is an Easy, Imperfect Way to Video Chat on Your HDTV
• T’was a Merry Christmas for Rovio; Angry Birds Saw 6.5 Million Downloads [VIDEO]
• Apple iOS Dominates Mobile Browsing Market in December
• Facebook Cited as a Problem in One-Third of UK Divorces [VIDEO]
• Video Conferencing Service iMeet Makes Evernote Its Virtual Notebook
• RIM Considering New Chairmen [REPORT]
• 6 Turnkey Tools for Content Distribution
• KGB Spy Kit Is Not Just for the Movies [VIDEO]
• Twitter Admits Verifying Fake @Wendi_Deng Was a Mistake

Today’s Top Stories: Verizon CEO Bails from CES, Google Buys IBM Patents, Yahoo to Name New CEO Posted: 04 Jan 2012 03:55 AM PST Welcome to this morning's edition of "First To Know," a series in which we keep you in the know on what's happening in the digital world. Today, we're looking at three particularly interesting stories. Verizon CEO Cancels Appearance at CES Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam won’t be giving a keynote speech at this year’s CES due to “scheduling conflicts,” the company has announced. Verizon declined to give any further details on what, exactly, its chief executive discovered in his schedule only days ahead of CES. A Verizon spokesman said the company will probably send another executive to replace McAdam at the event. Google Buys 200+ IBM Patents Google has acquired 217 patents from IBM, including one particularly interesting patent that might help the search giant leverage its social network, Google+, to create a network of experts on specific topics. The rest of the patents cover many different technologies, including data services such as online calendars and email management. Yahoo to Name New CEO Yahoo will name a new CEO as early as Wednesday, All Things Digital reports citing sources familiar with the matter. Yahoo has fired its CEO Carol Bartz back in September 2011, and the company has since been run by interim CEO (and previous CFO of Yahoo) Tim Morse. ATD’s sources claim the leading candidate for the spot is current PayPal President Scott Thompson. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, DNY59 More About: first to know, first to know series, Google, IBM, morning brief, Today's top stories, verizon For more Tech coverage: Follow Mashable Tech on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Tech channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Mimbo the iPhone Robot Mimics Your Emotions Posted: 04 Jan 2012 02:19 AM PST Interested in robotics, but building a robot seems too complex and you can’t afford an Asimo? The folks at Instructables have a solution: Mimbo, a simple, iPhone-based robot in a cardboard body that mimics your facial expressions. At first glance, Mimbo isn’t really all that interesting: it consists of two eyes and a mouth on an iPhone screen, with the rest being concealed by a simple cardboard body. However, with the help of TouchOSC Interface and some facial recognition tracking, it becomes a very cool little thing, mimicking the movements of your eyes, eyebrows and mouth, as you can see in the video below. While the process of creating Mimbo isn’t just a matter of slapping a new app on an iPhone – it requires the understanding of some basic programming concepts and learning the basics of the TouchOSC Interface as well as face recognition app called FaceOSC – those of you who like tinkering should be able to create your own Mimbo relatively easily. Don’t call us when it becomes self-aware and turns against you, though. [via Engadget] More About: iphone, Mimbo, Robot

Skip the Research and Let Sortable.com Find the Product That’s Right for You Posted: 03 Jan 2012 07:59 PM PST The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. Name: Sortable Quick Pitch: Sortable is a search engine that finds the right product or service for you based on your personal criteria. Genius Idea: Lets users skip the research and easily find what they are looking for all on one site without having to search Google. Searching the Internet to find the exact product or service you want is too often frustrating, overwhelming and time-consuming. But a new startup company now makes it possible to find exactly what you’re looking for all on one page – Sortable.com Sortable is a search engine that quickly sorts through the products you’re interested in and discovers the one most suitable for you. Rather than clicking through hundreds of search results on Google or other search engines, Sortable helps users find the exact products they’re looking for based on their personal criteria, all in one place. “Sortable helps you understand the real differences among the products you’re looking for,” Chris Reid, co-founder of Sortable, told Mashable. “Users tell us what’s important to them and based on the information, we point out all the best features about the products and services that they’re most interested in.” Users can use Sortable to search for recommendations on products from five categories – TVs, phones, tablets, cameras, laptops. Once you choose a category, select the features in the personalized bar that are most important to you and Sortable will score the products based on your personal criteria. For example, if you are looking for a pocket-size, waterproof camera with a gps system, all you have to do is check off these features in the top bar and Sortable will instantly sort the products for you based on your preferences. To ensure users understand a product and its features, Sortable lists important information such as the price, size, special features, advantages and tradeoffs. Users can also find additional detailed information by clicking the “i” button next to the product they are interested in. Just in case you notice any missing information about a product, Sortable lets you edit and add details when you create an account on the site. After you review the list of recommended products, select your top two choices and Sortable will compare the products’ core differences to help you figure out the best one to buy and where to buy it. By suggesting where to buy a product, Sortable helps companies sell and advertise their products to visitors on its site. For each product sold on Sortable, the company earns up to 8% of the sale value. By helping users figure out where to buy the products they’re interested in, Sortable is also helping companies sell and advertise their products. For each product sold on the website, Sortable earns up to 8% of the sale value. Although there are similar search engines on the web such as decide.com, findthebest.com and hunch.com, co-founder Reid says Sortable is different because the team reviews and recommends a product based on all its features rather than just one or two popular ones. Reid also says Sortable informs their users about a product’s most unique or interesting feature in comparison to similar items. “Sortable creates a holistic experience where users can learn about and feel educated about the products they’re interested in and all of the features they have to offer,” says Reid. “It’s better than going to a store where the salesperson may not know everything that is important about a specific product.” So far, Sortable has provided 41 million recommendations to up to four million site visitors before it officially launched on Monday. Although users can currently only search for electronic items, Sortable plans to add additional categories such as movies, books, vacation spots, restaurants, etc., in the near future. Image courtesy of Sortable, Sortable Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today. More About: bizspark, electronics, Search, search engine, sortable For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Google Gets 200+ IBM Patents, Including One for a ‘Semantic Social Network’ Posted: 03 Jan 2012 07:41 PM PST Google got a late Christmas gift in the form of 217 patents, acquired by way of IBM. While the patents cover a variety of topics, one in particular could give the search giant a new tool for its social network, Google+. The patents cover many different technologies, but they mainly deal with data services like email management, online calendars and transferring web apps between devices. The patent grab, first reported by SEO by the Sea, potentially serves two purposes: providing avenues to develop new products, and providing ammunition in litigation. The latter reason is undoubtedly the primary one. The search giant had previously received more than 2,000 patents from IBM over the past year, a year that’s seen an unprecedented amount of lawsuits in the field of patent law. Most notoriously, Apple has sued, in one form or another, many companies involved in building devices for the Android platform, including HTC, LG, and Motorola. Apple even won a recent case, which effectively forces HTC to stop selling certain devices in the U.S. or create a software fix. By shoring up its patent portfolio, Google will be that much stronger when in its defense of Android. A big reason behind the company’s $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility this past summer was to get its hands on Motorola’s large cache of patents (24,000, including pending ones). On the product development side, it’s anyone’s guess which of the IBM patents may become future products, but social-media watchers might be interested in U.S. Patent 7,865,592: “Using semantic networks to develop a social network.” The patent details how a social network could be leveraged to lead users to find “experts” or like-minded enthusiasts on specific topics. As the patent’s summary describes, “A method, apparatus and program product are provided for identifying common interests between users of a communication network. … [Interests] may be determined, for example, by calculating a ratio of the number of words in a content source to the time spent viewing the content.” For example, you may want to find someone knowledgeable about real estate in a specific neighborhood to ask for buying advice. But the right person may not list that as an “interest,” so you may not be able to easily find them in your expanded network (which includes friends of friends). A semantic network would find the right person to talk to by analyzing which people in your network post content having to do with the specific topic, and how much time others spend reading it. Might we see a Google+ expand its abilities someday with the semantic social network patent? And is it something you’d be interested in? Let us know in the comments. More About: android, Google, IBM, patents, semantic search, social networking

Follow The Quadrantids Meteor Shower Online [LIVE VIDEO] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 06:33 PM PST If you’re a fan of stargazing, tonight’s your night. The Quadrantids meteor shower, potentially the best natural lightshow of the year, will be visible Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning. If you live in the Eastern United States, viewing conditions should be ideal, if a bit frigid. The Quadrantids meteors should start to appear late tonight, but will only be visible for about six hours. The peak is predicted to be somewhere around 2:30 to 3 a.m., though io9 reports that the Quadrantids meteors are “notoriously unpredictable” in terms of intensity. NASA says it will be a “brief, beautiful” show. The best place to view the meteors live is the East Coast of North America, since the Quadrantids is best seen from the Northern Hemisphere and it happens to be the middle of the night in that region when they’re due to hit. Sky & Telescope says you should be able to see about one or two meteors per minute at peak intensity. NASA has a tool, called the Fluxtimator, that can estimate the ideal time to watch in your area. But what if you live in Australia? Or a passing cloud ruins your view? Or you just don’t want to go outside at 3 a.m. in sub-freezing temperatures? The Web has you covered. NASA has set up a live video feed, via Ustream, at the organization’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL: Besides the live stream, you can follow the shower via social media. On Twitter, NASA’s Marshall Center (@NASA_Marshall) is posting live updates, and you can also search for the hashtag #MeteorWatch to find like-minded stargazers. There’s also Virtual Astronomer (@virtualastro) for retweets from amateur astronomers. The Marshall Center is also on Facebook, which is probably the best place to comment. And be sure to keep an eye on the recent uploads of Quadrantids on Flickr to see some great photos of the show. Feel like skipping this one? You can see a list of the big star-gazing events of 2012 at Space.com, and Sky & Telescope gives its take on which ones will be worth checking out. Are you watching the Quadrantids meteors tonight? Post links to any photos and videos you take in the comments. Image courtesy of Flickr, Navicore BONUS: The Biggest Space Stories of 2011 1. The Space Shuttle Era Ends When Space Shuttle Atlantis landed at Kennedy Space Center just before dawn on July 21, 2011, it marked the end of NASA's Space Shuttle program. The shuttle was the space agency's No. 1 space vehicle for 30 years, with numerous successes under its belt -- notably the deployment and repair of the Hubble Space Telescope and construction of the International Space Station. The shuttles themselves, however, were notoriously more complex and expensive than they were ever intended to be. They also unfortunately suffered from reliability issues, leading to the tragic destruction of two shuttles, Challenger and Columbia. Despite its issues, the shuttle continued to serve well past its sell-by date, becoming a pop-culture icon along the way. In its last year of operation, the shuttle also finished one of its key tasks: complete assembly of the International Space Station. It's certainly earned its retirement, which the orbiters spend in numerous museums throughout the country. Click here to view this gallery. More About: space, trending

10 Easy Customer Engagement Ideas for Small Business Posted: 03 Jan 2012 06:01 PM PST Scott Gerber is the founder of the Young Entrepreneur Council, a nonprofit organization that promotes youth entrepreneurship as a solution to unemployment and underemployment. The YEC provides young entrepreneurs with access to tools, mentorship, and resources that support each stage of a business’s development and growth. Business and technology writer Efraim Turban defines customer service as “a series of activities designed to enhance the level of customer satisfaction — that is, the feeling that a product or service has met the customer expectation.” While customer experience means different things to different people, it is generally about the sum of all the interaction a customer has with a brand or company. That's a significant difference from customer service, which generally focuses on a single transaction. All of which begs the question, how do you create a customer experience that sets you apart from the competition and keeps customers coming back? Luckily for you, I recently asked a group of successful young entrepreneurs those very questions. 1. Our Customers Are Our Models At Sweat EquiTees, we make sure to feature our customers as best we can. After all, they are our life and soul. Since we sell clothing to entrepreneurs, we have our customers send us photos of themselves in their shirts, and then we feature them as “model entrepreneurs” on our website. It’s a fun and engaging way of promoting our customers and showing off our products. - Benjamin Leis, Sweat EquiTees. 2. Hold a Virtual Party Everyone loves to attend parties, even more so if they don’t need to dress up and drive somewhere. I’ve held virtual parties where I’m on camera interacting with people via chat, giving away fun tips, making jokes and answering customer questions. Why not make learning fun? I should mention it was Halloween and I was a wearing a witch’s hat! - Nathalie Lussier, Nathalie Lussier Media. 3. Put the Spotlight on Customers We like to write about the attendees to our events and their companies on our blog. This makes them happy because we’re spreading the word about their activities. They also feel more engaged and involved with our company in between events, and feel part of a larger community. - Tim Jahn, Entrepreneurs Unpluggd. 4. Put Money In Your Clients’ Pockets Once you know who your clients are and what they do for a living, connect them to people who need their services. You can make virtual introductions, but this also works offline. There is no greater compliment you can give a customer than referring someone to their business. If you put money in your clients’ pockets, they’ll keep putting money in yours. - Robert Sofia, Platinum Advisor Marketing Strategies, LLC. 5. Call Your Customers Call me old-fashioned, but what could be more engaging than a one-on-one phone call? Try calling some of your customers, even if it wasn’t part of your agreement or the package you sold them. If you spend 10 minutes getting to know a customer, you’ll learn some incredible things about why people buy your stuff. You can also win a fan for life. If you just have to keep things online, use Skype! - Corbett Barr, Insanely Useful Media. 6. Geocache Scavenger Hunt I’ve set up a geocaching scavenger hunt for some of my clients to work together as teams and integrate my product while on the hunt. Geocaching uses GPS coordinates to find destinations or hidden objects. This generates a lot of buzz and is a great way to shake-up traditional marketing methods. If you have a product or service, introduce it as a geocache to make some curiosity. - Vanessa Van Petten, Science of People. 7. Use YouTube YouTube videos are some of the easiest, least expensive ways to create a fun, engaging experience. Use a Flip video camera, which has easy editing software, to record testimonials from your employees and clients. Upload videos of your team doing unique or entertaining things. Be sure it’s tasteful and your clients will like it. - Nick Friedman, College Hunks Hauling Junk. 8. Solicit Participation With Contests Engage your customers with trivia, contests or promotions which require a public response to participate. For example, I ask musicians to share their stories on social media. The best stories shared win free digital distribution to get their music on iTunes, Amazon, etc. The goal is to get the conversation going to reach friends of friends. Costs are minimal and ROI is great. - Lucas Sommer, Audimated. 9. Make Yourself Accessible People love feeling like they have access to you whenever they want. If I’m emailing my mailing list, I always try to add a line that says “Anything I can do to personally help you out? Just hit reply.” I always get a lot of responses, and build a much deeper bond with my audience and customers. - Sean Ogle, Location 180, LLC. 10. Show Your Fans Some Facebook Love We really love the relationship that we have with our fans and potential customers, so we like to show the world. Every week on our Facebook page, we highlight one of our fans as “Fan of the Week.” This is fun because their love for our company is displayed to our fans, and that person will then share it with their own network. - Andrew Saladino, Just Bath Vanities. Image courtesy of Flickr, Kaptain Kobold More About: community, contributor, customer engagement, customer service, features, gamification, Small Business, YouTube For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Klout Confirms ‘Mobile Component’ Is Coming Posted: 03 Jan 2012 05:20 PM PST After announcing a new round of funding Tuesday, Klout told Mashable the undisclosed amount raised was a step up from previous rounds and that it now has the resources to work on a mobile initiative. Klout — which measures a social media user’s online influence from 0 to 100 on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn and Foursquare — doesn’t have an official mobile app, so this initiative could fill that hole in the San Francisco-based startup’s growing arsenal. “The money is going to be used to really drive accuracy, transparency and utility,” Klout CEO Joe Fernandez told Mashable. “We want to measure influence every place it exists and make sure Klout users are recognized for their influence every place they go.” On Sunday, Klout CEO hinted in a tweet that users could be seeing Klout for mobile in the future. @BAHjournalist we have some really cool ideas for it. — Joe Fernandez (@JoeFernandez) January 1, 2012 When asked directly Tuesday, Fernandez said, “There is definitely a mobile component to our plans and we are excited about having the resources to push forward with that vision.” The comment comes after Klout announced its Series C funding in a blog post Tuesday. “We aren’t commenting on the amount raised in the round but it was a significant step up from previous rounds,” Fernandez said in an email. That means Klout has raised way more than the $8.5 million it got in January 2011 and the $1.5 million it raised in April 2010. Some unconfirmed reports say Klout raised $30 million this time. Kleiner Perkins lead the new round of funding, and additional backers include Institutional Venture Partners, Venrock, Greycroft and ff Venture Capital. What Else Does Klout Have in Store for 2012? Looking ahead, Klout is still building scoring models for seven more services (YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr, Blogger, WordPress.com, Last.fm and Flickr) that have already been integrated onto Klout users' dashboards. Klout also plans to add Quora, Yelp, Posterous, Livefyre, Disqus, bit.ly and other services. SEE ALSO: The Remarkable Story of How Klout Got Started [VIDEO] Klout likely will continue improving its Topics feature (see screenshots below) and Klout Perks platform. The Topics feature, which rolled out in September and lets you gain insights on top influencers and +K recipients for specific content areas, most recently got a visual update in December with a “sashes” and an “Add a Topic” button. And more and more brands are offering perks to people based on the topics they influence and their Klout scores. The Perks platform is an integral part of Klout’s business model. Clickable Topics on Your Dashboard On your Klout dashboard, you can click on a topic to open its Topic Page. Update: In December 2011, Klout rolled out sashes and an "Add a Topic" button. A blue sash goes to users with the most +Ks for any topic, while a gold sash is given to influencers based on Klout's algorithm. People who fall into both categories receive a blue-and-gold sash. Click here to view this gallery. More About: apps, funding, klout, Mobile

Facebook Apologizes for Deleting Abortion Post Posted: 03 Jan 2012 04:53 PM PST Facebook apologized Monday to a reproductive rights activist who posted detailed written instructions for a Do It Yourself abortion. The apology said the instructions were deleted on accident because they were mistakenly thought to be in violation of Facebook’s Statement of Rights and Responsibilities. “”Our policies are enforced by a team of reviewers in several offices across the globe,” Facebook explained in its apology. “This team looks at hundreds of thousands of reports every week, and as you might expect, occasionally, we make a mistake and remove a piece of content we shouldn't have.” Rebecca Gomperts wrote the original post and works at Women on Web, an abortion rights group based in the Netherlands. She said Facebook deleted her original post — along with a screenshot she posted of the warning they sent to her after the original post was deleted. “We are very happy to report that Facebook reversed its censorship of Dr. Gomperts post on how to use misoprostol for safe abortion,” the woman’s group posted on Monday. “Thank you to everyone who contacted Facebook and posted the information on your own sites in solidarity!” Gomperts has re-posted the “how to” abortion piece on her Facebook page. The World Health Organization sanctions the instructions, which prescribe misoprostol (an ulcer drug) and mifepristone to terminate a first-term pregnancy. This is not the first time a technology company has run afoul of pro-choice campaigners. In December, Apple’s Siri was accused of being anti-abortion after it emerged that the voice recognition assistant wouldn’t give users a list of abortion clinics when asked. Do you think Facebook should be able to delete certain types of content? If so, which topics should Facebook not allow? More About: censorship, Facebook

6 Apps That Block Online Distractions So You Can Get Work Done Posted: 03 Jan 2012 04:16 PM PST Perhaps sensing a shift in the zeitgeist, The New York Times has run no less than three stories over the past week about unplugging from the Internet. In the most widely read, Pico Iyer’s “The Joy of Quiet,” the author posits the idea that solitude is the new luxury. Getting away from your PC, your phone and your iPad, Iyer argues, will allow you to get absorbed in a book, a conversation or a piece of music and bring you joy. In another essay, “A Time to Tune Out,” Roger Cohen cites the destructive effects of being addicted to one’s BlackBerry. Finally, Nick Bilton, writing in The Times‘s Bits blog, resolves to spend 30 minutes a day without his iPhone or any other electronics this year. Perhaps, as 2012 dawns, you too are feeling the need to curb your Internet usage. You may find that it’s a bit harder than you first thought. Try an “Internet Sabbath,” for instance, and you may feel that it’s all but impossible to get through a Saturday without checking your email or Twitter or your Words With Friends games. For those of you who fall into this category, there are some software programs that may help you achieve your goal this year. After all, what’s better to fight a software addiction than software itself? Below are a few programs out there that will keep you from breaking your digital resolution. Cold Turkey The grandaddy of the Internet restriction programs, Freedom has garnered celeb fans like Dave Eggers, Nick Hornby, Seth Godin and Nora Ephron with a simple promise: Set the $10 program and you'll be barred from surfing the net for up to eight hours at a time. Fred Stutzman, a postdoctoral fellow at Carnegie Mellon University, developed the software in 2008 after a local coffee bar got Wi-Fi. Before that, Stutzman and others had liked the fact that they could go to the cafe and get work done. Afterwards, "It really changed my experience," he says. "There was a totally different clientele." More than 300,000 people have downloaded Freedom since that time. However, since then, the mobile web has become much bigger, leading to the question of whether there will ever be a Freedom app for your iPhone. Stutzman says that won't happen any time soon. "I wish there was something for that," Stutzman says, noting that neither iOS nor Android lets you override their web-browsing functions. Image courtesy of Flickr, functoruser Click here to view this gallery. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, diane39 More About: apps, distractions, features, Social Media, software, trending

Google+ Sees Massive Membership Growth Posted: 03 Jan 2012 03:43 PM PST Google+ may not have membership numbers as strong as Facebook, but it recently had its strongest-month ever and, at least according to one analyst, is on track to reach 400 million users by the end of the year. Experian Hitwise sent out a tweet on Monday that Google’s social networking site experienced a huge traffic jump in December and more than doubled its traffic in just one month. “Google+ total US visits reach more than 49 million in Dec-11, biggest month to date & up 55% compared to Nov-11 ow.ly/i/oT3R,” Experian Hitwise tweeted. Meanwhile, Experian Hitwise tweeted last Friday that U.S. visits for Google+ have grown eight out of the last nine weeks. Although Google+ has declined to comment on its membership numbers, analyst Paul Allen — who is also the founder of Ancestry.com — told the Daily Mail that the site recently surpassed the 62 million members mark. Of that, 25% of the site's user base signed up in December alone. This growth rate is significant since Facebook didn't pass 60 million members until nearly four years after its debut. At this rate, Allen said he expects Google+ will reach about 400 million users by the end of 2012. Facebook now boasts more than 800 million active members. It's now even easier for users to access Google+ thanks to the strong sales of Android devices, with more than 700,000 purchased each day. Google integrates its Android smartphones with Google+. Do you think Google+ membership will pass Facebook in the future? Which site do you prefer? Image courtesy of Experian Hitwise. Using Google+? Add Mashable to your circles. You’ll get the latest about new Google+ features and tips and tricks for using the platform as well as top social media and technology news. More About: Facebook, Google, trending

The Iowa Caucus, as Told by Twitter Posted: 03 Jan 2012 03:15 PM PST Twitter is on fire with tweets about the Iowa caucus. Politicians are reaching out to Iowans for their support, journalists are offering a behind-the-scenes look at life covering the caucus and Iowans have been declaring their support for a candidate on the microblogging service. Tweeted messages and pictures are giving caucus-watchers unprecedented access and levels of real-time information. SEE ALSO: Can Twitter Predict the Iowa Caucus? | Republican Candidates Take to the Web As the story unfolds, we’re collecting the best examples of Twitter’s use during the caucus. Follow Mashable to learn how politicians, media outlets and citizens are tweeting about Iowa: Image courtesy of iStockphoto, pagadesign More About: 2012 presidential campaign, Iowa caucuses, Storify

Pizza Hut to Pick Stars of Super Bowl Pre-Game Ad Via Facebook Posted: 03 Jan 2012 02:54 PM PST Like many marketers advertising in and around the Super Bowl this year, Pizza Hut’s game plan calls for a little Facebook. The pizza chain introduced the TV spot below on Jan. 1 that threw down the gauntlet to fans: Do your own rendition of the featured song and your video might be featured in a pre-game Super Bowl ad. Those interested can visit Pizza Hut’s Facebook Page to download their video. The deadline is Jan. 15. Ben Hsi, manager of digital advertising for the brand, says Pizza Hut will choose six winners. The brand is looking for “creativity and uniqueness,” he says. The winners will be included in a montage that will in a 30-second ad before the game. With about a month to go before the Super Bowl, crowdsourcing content seems to be making a comeback. Last year, the only brand with a user-generated ad was PepsiCo, which ran a total of six of them for its Pepsi Max and Doritos brands. This year, PepsiCo is only running one crowdsourced ad, but is offering the winner the chance to collaborate with Andy Samberg’s Lonely Island comedy troupe. However, at least one other Super Bowl advertiser, Chevrolet, will run a crowdsourced ad during the big game. In Chevy’s case, there’s a strong Facebook angle as well: The winning video will be determined by which one gets the most shares in Facebook and other social media platforms. What do you think? Is this a smart way for Pizza Hut to secure some buzz before the Super Bowl or have tactics like this lost their novelty? Sound off in the comments. More About: Advertising, Facebook, Marketing, Pizza Hut, Super Bowl

Codecademy Signs Up 97,000 People for Its New Year’s Resolution Coding Class Posted: 03 Jan 2012 02:32 PM PST Codecademy, a startup that uses interactive online lessons to turn anyone into a computer programmer, has signed up 97,000 students in less than 48 hours for its New Year’s resolution class Code Year. That’s more than twice as many students as were enrolled in the 150 U.S. computer science undergraduate programs that the Computer Research Association surveyed last year. Anyone who adds their email address to the class list will receive new programming lessons in an email each week. All Codecademy users already have access to these free lessons, which turn learning JavaScript into a game and will soon expand to other programming languages. The class emails will serve as reminders and guidance, putting individual lessons together in a cohesive curriculum. “One of the biggest complaints we get is that people will learn one lesson and then say, ‘what's next?’ or ‘where do I get to go from here?’,” Codecademy founder Zach Sims tells Mashable about the startup’s self-directed learning format. The New Year’s resolution class answers those questions and makes the program even more appealing in the process. In its first 72 hours after launching this summer, Codecademy signed up 200,000 people for coding lessons. Now it’s signing them up for a year-long commitment at a similar rate. When those who have signed up get their first email on Monday, they’ll be starting their computer science education with at least 97,000 classmates. So far Codecademy hasn’t announced any features that might let those classmates interact with each other, but it seems like a fine opportunity to add social incentives to the learning motivation it has so far maintained with game mechanics. More About: Codeacademy, coding lessons, programming For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Internet Explorer 6 Usage Drops Below 1% in the U.S., Finally [VIDEO] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 02:15 PM PST The end is finally nigh for IE6. Microsoft announced Tuesday that Internet Explorer 6 usage in the U.S. has dropped below 1% and is at 7.7% worldwide. “So as we kick off 2012, we call on the rest of the world – make it your new year's resolution to end IE6 and move to a modern browser like IE8 or IE9,” Microsoft wrote in a blog post. SEE ALSO: Microsoft Begs Users To Stop Using IE 6 Check out the video above to learn more. More About: IE6, internet explorer, mashable video, microsoft

More Than 1 Million People Bought a Kindle Fire Instead of an iPad This Holiday [REPORT] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 01:59 PM PST According to Amazon, the Kindle Fire led the Kindle line to record-breaking sales of 4 million devices over the holiday season. You have to think that at least some of those shoppers opted for the Fire in lieu of an iPad, and one investment bank says that’s exactly what happened. Analyst Tavis McCourt at Morgan Keegan said in a note to investors today that the Amazon Kindle Fire robbed Apple of 1 million to 2 million iPad sales. He had been estimating about 16 million iPads sold in the quarter, but downgraded that to 13 million. That’s still many more iPads sold than Kindles — even including the E Ink devices, so Apple isn’t exactly threatened. But the iPad’s market position is so dominant among tablet devices — a recent report from comScore said it accounted for 97% of all Web traffic on tablets — that its market share has nowhere to go but down. Also working against the iPad is that it’s not a new device. The iPad 2 was introduced last March while the Kindle Fire came out in November 2011, priced to sell as a hot holiday item at $199 (the iPad starts at $499). Many tech-savvy buyers are likely waiting until Apple unveils the iPad 3, which is expected to happen in the next couple of months, before buying a new tablet. Last quarter the iPad accounted for 24.3% of Apple’s revenue, though McCourt expects that to drop to 21.3% based on his estimates. And even though his general outlook for Apple is bullish, giving it an “outperform” rating, he says that without entering an entirely new product category — like, say, TVs — Apple’s growth will likely slow down over the next two years. Despite the iPad downgrade, Apple’s Christmas wasn’t ruined. McCourt’s note says iPhone sales were higher than expected, and he bumped up his estimate from 27 to 29 million. We’ll get hard answers on these numbers when Apple announces its quarterly financial numbers later this month. BONUS: Amazon Kindle Fire Unboxing and Run-Through Amazon Kindle Fire: Main Bookshelf Interface Click here to view this gallery. More About: amazon, apple, holidays 2012, ipad, kindle fire, trending

Which Politician is Most Popular, Engaging on Social Media Sites? Posted: 03 Jan 2012 01:40 PM PST President Barack Obama may be down in the ratings, but he still has a steady hold on social media popularity. In December, Socialbakers – a social media analytics firm – tracked Facebook-page interactions of the eight key candidates from the Republican and Democratic parties to gauge changes in popularity and monitor fan engagement. Obama led the pack with the most overall interactions on the site, including comments, fan engagement and viral reach. President Barack Obama also has the most Facebook fans – a whopping 24 million, far more than the Republican candidates — but many were collected during the 2008 election period. His fan growth, however, experienced little improvement in December. Instead, former Penn. Senator Rick Santorum experienced the largest percentage growth last month (23%). Santorum still trails in Facebook popularity with only 40,000 fans. That’s well behind former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney (1.2 million fans), Texas Congressman Ron Paul (670,000), Representative Michelle Bachmann (460,000), former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (223,000) and Texas Gov. Rick Perry (179,000). Only former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman has fewer Facebook fans (30,000) than Santorum. Ron Paul's engagement in December jumped 69%. SEE ALSO: Can Twitter Predict the Iowa Caucus? | Kelly Clarkson Album Sales Rise After Ron Paul Twitter Flap GOP hopeful Ron Paul has the highest viral reach (other than Obama). Viral reach corresponds to the amount of people that "like" and comment on his page, multiplied by how many Facebook friends those users are connected to on the site. Michele Bachmann led in person-to-person interactions, which refers to how many people interacted with other Facebook fans' posts and comments. During one week of Socialbaker’s tracking, 228,000 people talked about Obama on his Facebook page, while Ron Paul was the second most-chatted about politician on the site with nearly 60,000 mentions. Not surprisingly, Facebook is encouraging politicians to turn to the site to engage with fans and promote their campaigns. “We’re pleased that politicians at all levels of government, including at the highest level, are using Facebook to reach people in a direct, personal and simple way that was unimaginable a decade ago,” Andrew Noyes, manager of public policy communications at Facebook, told Mashable. “Socialbakers’ analytics paint a compelling picture of how 2012 presidential candidates are actively embracing Facebook on the campaign trail to keep constituents informed about their activities and communicate about critical issues facing our country.” Do you think popularity on social media sites will help predict presidential nominations? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. More About: Facebook, Mitt Romney, Politics, president obama, ron paul, Social Media

80+ New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed Posted: 03 Jan 2012 01:20 PM PST Happy New Year! If you’re having trouble getting back to the grind at work today, or missed a few of our digital media resources while you were celebrating, we have our usual roundup for you to catch up on. Still feeling nostalgic about 2011? From tech company overviews to top tweets and YouTube videos, read on for our end-of-year recaps. We also have a number of digital predictions for 2012. Here are this week’s big lists. Editor’s Picks Mashable’s Top 10 Biggest Stories of 2011 Make sure you’re up to speed on Mashable’s most-viewed stories of the year. How Do Co-Founders Meet? 17 Startups Tell All Here’s the skinny on how the co-founders of hot startups met and came up with their business idea. The Very Best of YouTube in 2011 [VIDEOS] We love YouTube videos so much that we bring you one every day in our YouTube Video of the Day series. 5 Tech Trends to Watch in 2012 2012 promises to be a very busy year in all things digital. Here are 5 trends likely to make a big impact in our technologically enhanced lives. Social Media YouTube in 2011: How Its Busy Year Affects You YouTube's eventful year involved a major facelift, eye-popping traffic trends and new features that affect advertisers, musicians and YOU. 6 Tips For Building a High Quality Blog Following How do upstart blogs build such voracious followings? Here are six tips to attracting readers who stick around longer than the click of a StumbleUpon button. Reddit’s Guide to Fitness Dishes Out Diet and Exercise Tips [INFOGRAPHIC] If you've made any New Year's resolutions to get fit in 2012, this detailed infographic from health startup Greatist may come in handy. Top 25 Most-Shared Stories in December Social media ended 2011 on a high note as Facebook rolled out Timeline and Twitter unveiled a new design, brand pages and embeddable tweets. The 10 Most Popular Photos on Twitter This Week [PICS] Here are the most popular photos on Twitter this week, getting the most retweets as of Dec. 29. Top 15 Most Shocking Social Media Disasters of 2011 Social media lends itself to some epic fails. Let’s take a look at 15 of the most memorable social networking mistakes of 2011. 10 Best Spoof Twitter Accounts of 2011 If laughter is the best medicine, Twitter certainly kept us in tip-top shape this year with its crop of super funny spoof accounts. Sports and Social Media: Our Favorite Stories of 2011 Recapping the sports year of 2011, Mashable-style. 8 Hilarious Internet Jokes, Memes and Parody Accounts of 2011 Mashable shares some of its favorite web funnies we’ve come across this year. Here’s to a great 2012 in web humor! 4 Tips for Non-Profit Social Media Success Using social media for your non-profit is a popular way to share your organization’s vision, garner support, fundraise and get volunteers. #LastTweet Collects Final Tweets of Those Who Died in 2011 The New York TImes Magazine has scoured the web for the final tweets of some of 2011′s biggest personalities and avid tweeters who died this past year. Facebook Timeline vs. Old Profiles: How People View Them Differently [STUDY] Eye tracking studies on old and new Facebook, MySpace and Twitter profiles reveal the differences in how they are viewed. Facebook 2012: What the Future Holds for the Social Media Powerhouse In addition to a groundbreaking IPO, the world’s biggest social network has a lot to look forward to in the coming year. What's in Store for Social Video in 2012? In 2012, brands need to create content that attracts, motivates and engages an audience, and thus inspire viral sharing for their campaigns. The Web’s Most Buzzworthy Questions of 2011 Which questions weighed heaviest on the minds of Internet users this year? We asked four Q&A sites to compile lists of their most popular questions. Was the White House’s #40dollars Campaign Successful? We analyzed more than 40,000 tweets to see whether last week’s #40dollars campaign was a hit or a miss with Americans. Twitter 2012: Bigger and More Ads What’s in store for the social networking giant in 2012? It could go one of two ways for Twitter. Edward Burns and the Socialization of Indie Cinema Edward Burns discusses the importance of social media and the disruption taking place in independent cinema. Pinterest: A Beginner’s Guide to the Hot New Social Network Have no fear, soon-to-be-Pintrest fan — we’ll show you the ropes. Twitter’s 15 Major Milestones in 2011 This has been a banner year for top microblogging platform Twitter. Here are 15 of the company’s major milestones in 2011. StumbleUpon’s Most Popular Searches and Links of 2011 The website that lets you “stumble” across the web reveals its most popular topics of 2011. The 10 Most Popular Photos on Twitter This Week [PICS] Here are the most popular photos on Twitter this week, getting the most retweets as of Dec. 22. 7 Cool Digital Projects and Apps We Learned About From the Mashable Awards Check out 7 Cool Digital Projects and Apps We Learned About From The Mashable Awards For more social media news and resources, you can follow Mashable’s social media channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. Business & Marketing 5 Best Practices for Digital Marketers in 2012 In 2012, the expanding digital industry is destined to affect marketing. Try our five resolutions for marketing success. 6 Steps for Protecting Corporate Reputation in the Social Media Age While social media is great for marketing, it can also become a firestorm of angry customers. Here are some ways to protect your brand. 5 Steps for Finding New Customers Finding new customers can be one of entrepreneurship’s toughest challenges. Here are some key tips for targeting the right clientele. 4 Ways Small Business Websites Can Drive More Sales Don't have the resources to invest in a web designer or consultant? Try these tips to optimize your small business website on your own. 2011′s Biggest Winners and Losers in Ecommerce As the year wraps up, it’s the perfect time to recount the ecommerce wins and fails of 2011. Check out which companies made the cut. 8 Ways Digital Will Improve B2B Sales in 2012 B2B sales and services are rapidly changing. Here is what to expect in the year 2012. How to Launch a Social Ambassador Campaign Brands that want to increase social media engagement should consider naming consumers as brand representatives. Here’s how to get started. How the Social Media IPOs of 2011 Fared [STUDY] Social media continued to thrive in 2011 as it fomented revolutions in Egypt, Libya and Bahrain. But investors appeared to be a lot less enthralled. 7 Tips for Marketing to Moms Moms make 85% of purchasing decisions. Here’s how to appeal to the demographic in your marketing campaigns. The Top QR Code Fails of 2011 A QR code expert looks at the top fails by marketers in 2011. 13 Location-Based Marketing Tips for Entrepreneurs Check out these 13 tips for leveraging geo-targeting from successful, young entrepreneurs that have already tackled these questions, and more. 6 Important Startup Trends that Defined 2011 Things change quickly in the startup world, which makes exciting trends and movements. These six trends in particular stood out to us in 2011. 3 Ways Taste Graphs will Fuel Social Commerce in 2012 In 2012, taste graphs will transform the process of product discovery, making it much easier to discover and engage around the products you really want. 6 Game-Changing Digital Journalism Events of 2011 From breaking news curation to new revenue models, many an organization put its best digital foot forward in 2011. The 9 Oddest Job Interview Questions Asked at Tech Companies in 2011 Amazon, Google and HP all made Glassdoor’s list of the top oddball interview questions of 2011. How 9 Retailers Successfully Leveraged Game Mechanics These nine companies successfully leveraged game mechanics to improve consumer marketing campaigns. How Tech and Social Media Companies Cashed Out in 2011 A look back at the two ways social media firms cashed out in 2011: IPOs and acquisitions. The Evolution of Advertising: From Stone Carving to the Old Spice Guy This illustrated timeline, created by Infolinks, takes a walk down advertising’s memory lane. YouTube’s 10 Most-Viewed Ads of 2011 More and more brands are catering ads to the web audience. Check out which ad videos gained the most YouTube views in 2011. The Pros & Cons of Google+ for Small Business Now that brand pages are out, is Google+ a worthwhile landscape for small business? We weigh out the issues here. 3 New Ways to Connect With Content That Interests You This week, we chose three startups that are helping to tailor content in a digital environment over-saturated with information. 5 Ways to Boost Your Digital Media Career in 2012 Tips to help you understand new platforms, conquer data analysis and create engaging content to remain relevant in a changing landscape. Top 10 New Year’s Resolutions for Small Business Owners From enhancing your mobile presence to preparing for tax season, here are 10 inspiring New Year’s resolutions for small business owners in 2012. How will Digital Change Small Business in 2012? We spoke with a number of small businesses about how the industry will continue adapting to new technologies in the new year. Is Gamification Right for Your Business? 7 Things to Consider Sure, it’s a buzzword, but would gamification really fit in your business model? Check out these seven things before you commit to it. For more business news and resources, you can follow Mashable’s business channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. Tech & Mobile Google Nails 2011: Portrait of a Banner Year We’re not exaggerating when we write “Google Nails 2011.” Here’s why. 30 Best Google Doodles of 2011 Google Doodles have come a long way from the first artwork. Here are 30 of last year’s favorites. 4 Big Moves Google Should Make in 2012 Google had a big 2011, with CEO Larry Page leading the company with new focus. Here’s what 2012 may have in store for the Web’s No. 1 brand. 5 Apps Worth Downloading This Week We’ve trekked through the overly frivolous, the ugly and the downright impractical in our search for these five recently launched apps worth downloading. Top 10 iOS Apps of 2011 We scoured our iPad and iPhone devices for the best apps released in 2011. 2011: The Year of Reversal From Verizon to HP to Netflix, the biggest names in tech made big decisions that were ultimately reversed. 8 Amazing Emerging Technologies From 2011 From anti-smudge screens to PlayStation holodecks, here are Mashable’s pics for the best emerging tech of the year. Biscotti: The Best Product Packaging Since the iPod? A cookie-shaped, easy-to-use, $199 video-conferencing solution is impressive, but wrapping it up in packaging that resembles a mash-up between Apple’s design elegance and Henny Youngman’s penchants for one-liners is an altogether different level of accomplishment. 5 Video Game Moments that Defined 2011 Was 2011 the best year in gaming so far? Take a look at our picks for top games and trends that defined the year. HOW TO: Move Your Domain Name Account Fed up with GoDaddy? Here’s how to move your domain to a new registrar with minimum hassle. Spotify Names Top 10 Songs Streamed in 2011 Spotify names top 10 songs streamed this year, and “Pumped Up Kicks” by Foster the People trumped all other tracks. Most Rented Redbox Films of 2011 [INFOGRAPHIC] Rental kiosk juggernaut Redbox revealed its most-rented films of 2011. Pirates Like Vin Diesel: Top 10 Illegally Shared Movies of 2011 Fast and the Furious film series starring Vin Diesel was the most illegally-downloaded movie of the year, with 9.3 million downloads. A Closer Look at the iPhone-Controlled Coffee Brewer Scanomat’s TopBrewer is controlled by an iOS app, has the world’s smallest frother and fits a cabinet. Its Danish designers talk shop. So You Got a Nook Tablet? Tips for New Users If you received a Nook Tablet over the holidays, there are a few tips and tricks you should know. We’ve made setup easy for you. So You Got an iPhone 4S? Here’s How to Accessorize Channel your obsession with all things iPhone by looking through our list of awesome 4S accessories. The 10 Best Android Games of 2011 For those with Android phones and tablets, check out the year’s 10 best mobile games! 5 Tools for a Big League Website on a Budget Running low on cash for your company’s website? Use these tools to make your business look smart and robust without spending a fortune. The 15 Best Mobile Apps of 2011 With so many apps out there, it’s easy to miss out on a must-have mobile tool. We have rounded up our favorite apps of 2011 for iOS, Android and Windows Phone 7. Can Apple Become the Next Big Content Creator? In the last few years, we've seen a fundamental shift in the visual content landscape. The industry gathers steam, especially amidst Apple television rumors. iTunes 12 Days of Christmas App Offers Free iPad Downloads [VIDEO] Apple launched its 12 Days of Christmas App Monday, which lets you fill your new device with music, videos, apps and books for free. Does a Non-Traditional Resume Limit Your Odds? [INFOGRAPHIC] Do you have an infographic or video resume? You could get passed over by resume scanners. Here’s the lowdown on how these scanners work. So You Got a Kindle Fire? Try Our First-Timer Guide If you’ve recently purchased or been gifted a Kindle Fire, congratulations! To begin taking advantage of your device, take a look at our handy guide. 10 Best Sports Games for iPhone For those who want to get in on the action virtually, check out the top 10 iOS games for sports fans. Got an iPhone 4S for Christmas? Have Some Fun With Siri [PICS] Here are excerpts from an e-book that will give you hours of fun with Siri, and furnish you with plenty of fodder to show off your new iPhone 4S to your envious Christmas guests. So You Got an iPad 2? Try These 10 Hip Accessories If you’re looking to accessorize your shiny new iPad, we’re here to help with 10 peripheral products that stand out from the crowd Top 10 Tech This Week [PICS] Imagine yourself propelled 20 years into the future (or in one case, 45 years into the past), and you’ll find yourself in the middle of the latest addition of Top 10 Tech This Week. YouTube’s Best Christmas Videos YouTube’s full of fresh videos this year, spreading some heart-warming, albeit comical, Christmas cheer. Top 10 Space Stories of 2011 From the space shuttle’s final mission to Mars Rovers on Twitter, 2011 will go down as a landmark year for NASA and space exploration. 13 Tech Luminaries the World Lost in 2011 We honor those lost who paved the way for unprecedented technological innovation and world change. Top 10 Apps Downloaded in 2011 The top 10 apps downloaded in 2011. Google Doodles: 12 Years of Holiday Magic [PICS] To celebrate Google style, let’s take a look back at all the holiday Doodles since the very first simple snowman design in 199 For more tech news and resources, you can follow Mashable’s tech channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. More About: Business, COMMUNICATIONS, Features Week In Review, Social Media, Tech For more Media coverage: Follow Mashable Media on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Media channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

‘Flamel Attacks!’ and More Atari Game Box Parodies [PICS] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 01:05 PM PST Every Sport Ever in Pong Form Pong. Superpong. Doublepong. Hockeypong. ... Click here to view this gallery. Atari game box art was always sort of dramatically disproportionate to the games themselves. Action-packed illustrations of astronauts in space or a dead-locked tennis game on the cover never really matched up with the 8-bit games and their bleeping soundtracks and pixelated graphics. So what if the box covers were actually accurate for a change? That thought struck the crew at MightyGodKing.com who decided to scan a bunch of covers and re-title them in Photoshop. The inspiration came from a random garage sale purchase: “So I hit up a garage sale over the weekend and bought a genuine, working-condition Atari 2600, with a huge stack of games nearly mint in their boxes, for a song. I thought I'd scan the box covers and give you all a look back into the fun of yesteryear.” That “fun” isn’t exactly as you remember it thanks to titles such as “Every Sport Ever in Pong Form,” “Wild and Groovy Space Combat,” “It’s F–king Checkers” and many more. If you know what Atari is, then enjoy the bizarro trip down fake-memory-lane. If you don’t know what Atari is, well, here’s an explanation. You’ll find way more of these over at MightyGodKing.com. Got a favorite you wish they parodied? Let us know in the comments. More About: atari, games, Gaming, humor, video games For more Entertainment coverage: Follow Mashable Entertainment on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Entertainment channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Rick Santorum’s Sweater Vests Spawn Internet Parodies Posted: 03 Jan 2012 12:35 PM PST Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum’s sudden boost in the polls is more obvious on Twitter than in traditional national news polls. Could the spike in positive sentiment be because of the V-neck sweater vests that Santorum routinely wears while on the campaign trail? Stranger things have happened. While other GOP candidates make public appearances in suits, the former Pennsylvania senator has been donning sleeveless sweaters. This has inspired some parody social accounts including a @FearRicksVest Twitter account, Facebook Page, Tumblr blog and YouTube music video. On Monday, Santorum detailed the moment when his sweater vests caught fire online during an interview on Laura Ingraham’s radio show. He said the meme began after a speech he gave at a Mike Huckabee event in Iowa in mid-December: “If there was one event that really began the moment, it was that speech,” Santorum said. “So all the sudden the sweater vest was like, ‘Fear the vest.’” SEE ALSO: Republican Candidates Take to the Web in the Battle for Iowa Although there’s no statistical correlation between Santorum’s poll success and the sweater vests, more Americans are gravitating toward and favoring Santorum. What do you think about social networking’s ability to turn virtually anything into a meme? Sound off in the comments. Here’s a sampling of places where Santorum’s sweater vests have popped up. Twitter A Twitter account — @FearRicksVest — brought Santorum’s vest to life on Dec. 17. Fear me…and….hear me! I’m @RickSantorum‘s sweater vest! I’m on the Iowa campaign trail w/Rick #FearRicksVest #Santorum #iacaucus — Rick’s Sweater Vest (@FearRicksVest) December 17, 2011 Rick & I have now had over 350 events in Iowa together.I’ve been there by his side from the beginning. #iacaucus #santorum @RickSantorum — Rick’s Sweater Vest (@FearRicksVest) December 21, 2011 According to @nytimes, I’m turning heads! Prepare! @RickSantorum could really shake up race 2Nite ht.ly/8gBHa #iacaucus #santorum — Rick’s Sweater Vest (@FearRicksVest) January 3, 2012 The account has 350 followers at the time of writing. YouTube The We Pick Rick YouTube channel posted this “Sleeves Slow Me Down” music video, also on Dec. 17. The video has 741 views so far. Tumblr The Fear Rick’s Vest Tumblr blog posts photos, videos, polls and tweets about, what else, Santorum’s vests. Facebook The Fear Rick’s Vest Facebook Page mainly shares posts from Santorum’s own, official Page. Sixty-two people “Like” the Page. More About: 2012 presidential campaign, election 2012, memes, republicans, Rick Santorum, trending, Twitter

Use YouTube As a Music Player With Tubalr Posted: 03 Jan 2012 12:10 PM PST Chances are you’ve already used YouTube as a music player. But how much fun was that? You had to return to the page every time a song ended, search for the next one and then load often-crude comments and clutter along with your song. A 23-year-old software developer in Atlanta has fixed the YouTube listening experience with a simple app called Tubalr. It searches YouTube for the top songs from a particular artist and arranges them in a continuous playlist. If you’d like to mix it up, a “similar” option searches related artists on Last.fm and delivers their top videos on YouTube to your playlist. When you search the same band twice, it rearranges the playlist so you don’t get bored. That’s it. “I was surfing YouTube and found some amazing HD music videos,” says creator Cody Stewart, “and I thought it would be a cool idea to play those back to back without having all the other stuff I didnt find interesting — mainly the 10,000s of comments about cats and dogs.” Stewart, neither a surfer nor a Tuba player, created the app in order to show off his skills during a job search. He says he based the no-fuss interface on Google. Part of what makes the app so simple and slick is that it doesn’t make money. Unlike free playlist sites such as Pandora, the only ads you’ll see are in the videos themselves. So far about 124,000 searches have been completed by 2,000 user on the app. Not bad for a project that started as resume fodder. More About: Music, Tubalr, YouTube

The Pros and Cons of Android Fragmentation Posted: 03 Jan 2012 11:33 AM PST Carmen Delessio is CTO of Layercake, an NYC startup focused on helping parents to quickly and easily manage their photos and digital memories. Request a beta invite at GetLayercake.com. Carmen’s Kindle Fire and other apps can be found at BffMedia.com. My $99 Logitech Revue was just upgraded to the latest version of Google TV. My "go to" tablet these days is Amazon’s $199 Kindle Fire. These are both Android devices and are examples of the platform’s recent fragmentation. Android fragmentation highlights include: 5 OS versions on devices (Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, and Ice Cream Sandwich) Devices in various sizes, from small phones to TVs Device manufacturers branching their own versions of Android Amazon's Kindle Fire is an example of a device with a manufacturer's custom version of Android. This splintering has caused real concern among developers. Android fragmentation is most often compared to Apple's closed ecosystem for iOS. Apple iPhone and iPad developers can deliver pixel-perfect apps and be assured the apps will just work. Android's multiple sizes, OS versions and branching make that pixel-perfect delivery difficult for developers. But there are some positives of Android fragmentation from a developer standpoint. Here’s a look at some of the pros and cons. Pros for Developers Kindle Fire is showing strong sales Amazon has a dedicated market for the Kindle Fire Developers can design for a specific device Apps on TV are cool Low penetration in the TV app market means it’s easier to get noticed The Android compatibility package and “fragments” address the issue of OS fragmentation (more on this below) New revenue models are available Cons for Developers Too many devices running different operating systems Need multiple designs for your apps Too many apps in the Android Market In general, Android users pay for fewer apps Android tablet sales are poor Google TV has not enjoyed mainstream success yet TV apps are new and unproven App Markets App markets are a key to platform and developer success. The Amazon Android market on the Kindle Fire is the first significant alternate Android market for consumers. There are other options out there, but Amazon puts together the device and the market and curates the apps. This is quite like Apple's process. Though built on Android, the Kindle Fire is a device that lives in a closed ecosystem. With more than 4 million units sold, the Kindle Fire deserves developer attention. Similarly, an app market has just recently appeared on Google TV. Sony devices received the app market in November 2011 and the Logitech Revue received the update in December. It is only now that a developer can see his Android apps in a TV market. Kindle Fire I believe in the numbers. Kindle Fire will be the most successful Android tablet in the foreseeable future. There are plenty of consumers out there who just use and trust Amazon. TV ads and the Amazon site will be their introduction to the tablet world. The $199 price tag and focus on the device as a reader and video player make the Kindle Fire a consumer device worthy of attention regardless of lackluster reviews. Amazon knows how to sell, and that is an opportunity for developers. We can hope that making a good app for this device will drive sales. Google TV Apps look great on TV. As a developer, it's fun to see your app on a big screen, especially if you’re working with photos or videos. The availability of a marketplace drives growth and consumer acceptance. The recent upgrade provides the first real opportunity to develop and market apps for a Google TV. There is a window of opportunity for developers to stand out from the crowd before media companies and others really get into the game. Google TV provides the potential for new revenue models. Advertising on TV apps is an unknown, but showing an in-app ad on the big screen may be more compelling than a 40-pixel mobile banner. Promoting your own phone and tablet apps within a TV app is an idea that seems worth pursuing. It is common to have a free advertising supported app and a paid app, but maybe a free TV app and paid apps on all other platforms is the way to go. We can speculate quite a bit about apps for TV, but one thing is certainly true — you can't take it with you. Technical Solutions Google has done a lot to address fragmentation. One of the few times I thought Google showed a sense of humor as a company was when they added a new feature called “Fragments” to the Android Honeycomb release. Fragments provide the ability to create and reuse sections of the screen as UI components. In one app, a fragment may take up the full screen on a phone and just part of the screen on a tablet. Google has provided a compatibility library that further addresses Android OS fragmentation. The library supports fragments and commonly used features for Android 1.6 to 3.x. A single code base can support Eclair through Ice Cream Sandwich. Design and Targeting Devices As screen sizes are factored in, the development task becomes design dependent. While Android provides great support for designs that work on multiple screen sizes, it can still be more challenging than the pixel-perfect closed iPhone system. One option is to target a specific device. I’ll admit a guilty pleasure in developing an app just for the Kindle Fire. Based on the market size and technical spec, it seems worthwhile. Knowing that I could create and test an app on a single device and that it would look great on every Kindle Fire is very gratifying. It’s a small taste of how iPhone designers and developers must feel. Google TV and Android tablet apps have a lot in common. Depending on your design, they may be exactly the same. Creating a TV app may lead you to releasing a tablet app because … you might as well. Conclusions A developer has the capability to create a single app for all devices using available technology. I suspect a common approach will be to use fragments and the compatibility library, which offer a significant amount of common code across a phone, Kindle Fire, and tablet/TV releases. Having three or four products in the market may make more sense financially as well. An app called “Great App (Kindle Fire Edition)” may share 95 to 100% of the code with an app called “Great App (Google TV Version).” Rather than comparing that to iOS development, compare it to the work that web developers do to create websites that work well in five or six different browsers. The opportunity to use newer Android versions and tools will help new developers get up to speed. The compatibly package and fragments will help those developers support multiple devices. The availability of Kindle Fire and Google TV offer two new markets for apps. Right now, the rewards for developing on new platforms for Android outweigh the risks. More About: android, contributor, design, development, features, Mobile, mobile development, programming

Biscotti TV Phone is an Easy, Imperfect Way to Video Chat on Your HDTV Posted: 03 Jan 2012 11:15 AM PST Biscotti on the HDTV Click here to view this gallery. If you spent part of the holiday season trying, unsuccessfully, to get your grandparents on Skype, then Biscotti TV Phone may be the answer to your video chat prayers. It's a relatively effective $199 HDTV-based solution that requires no monthly fees, minimal setup, no software installation and virtually no tech know-how. Developed by Biscotti, a company founded in 2008, Biscotti TV Phone is shaped like its cookie namesake, but that's where the similarities end. From the excellent packaging, to the instructions to the onscreen control and super-simple remote, Biscotti TV Phone aims to be a video conferencing solution anyone can set up and use — and it more or less succeeds. There isn't much to the Biscotti system, just the HD video phone, an AC power adapter, the remote and some mounting supplies. The instructions in the box are more images than words and prove useful, though not always as helpful as they should be. Set Up The instructions depict the Biscotti TV Phone being affixed to the top of your TV with a couple of square adhesives. Those squares align with two square spaces on the bottom of the Biscotti. Oddly, the image shows the squares on top of the TV first. That apparently is an oversight. Biscotti execs explained that you can put the squares on the Biscotti TV phone first, then press it onto the TV (future instructions will clarify the setup). This, however, leads to the second issue. I don't know about the top of your TV, but my Sony HDTV set (which is only about a year old) is not flat. Instead it slopes down from front to back at about a 25-degree angle. If I place the Biscotti device flat atop my set, it'll point at the ceiling. Fortunately, the device is quite small and light and you can actually support it with just cables coming out of it, and the included cable support mounts that let you wrap up the cables and affix them to the back of your TV. My guess is that Biscotti will work on clarifying some of the language and visuals on set up when they deliver the first Biscotti update. Biscotti is a somewhat unusual video conferencing solution in that, instead of using a separate HDMI input, it employs an HDMI pass-though. I simply unplugged the HDMI out cable from my TV, plugged it into the Biscotti, and then added another HDMI cable that ran from the Biscotti device to my TV (that extra HDMI cable is not included). The pass-through allows Biscotti to deliver a control overlay on top of your regular cable TV output. The idea here is that you no longer have to switch inputs or even devices to send and answer video calls. Biscotti powers up as soon as you plug it in and when you turn on your TV the setup screen is the first thing you'll see. A Wi-Fi only device (no Ethernet option), Biscotti starts by identifying available Wi-Fi networks. You select yours and then enter the network password. The only way to enter the proper password is via the remote and a painful on-screen, on-at-a-time-key-selection on-screen keypad. Sadly, this is not the only time you'll have to use this text entry method. Once the device successfully finds and connects to your network, Biscotti TV phone will guide you through user name creation. You have to enter that via remote, but, thankfully, Biscotti has a bunch of custom passwords to choose from. That's pretty much the setup, and when it's done you see Biscotti's large, clear main menu. It sits on top (left of center—just outside a standard 4:3 viewing screen) of your regular TV show and includes Account, Contacts, Call History and Setup. Making Calls There are two choices at this point call someone within the Biscotti network or call someone who uses Google's voice and video chat. Since Biscotti is relatively new and few other people actually own the device, it's likely you'll start by calling someone on GChat (alternatively, you could shell out another $199 and send a Biscotti TV Phone to whomever you plan on calling the most). Making calls with Biscotti TV Phone is easy, but adding contacts is not. As with your Wi-Fi password and user name, you have to enter every single one of your contacts via the remote and on-screen keypad. Biscotti execs promised me that importing contacts from other services like Gmail is on the product roadmap. I made a series of calls both within the Biscotti proprietary network and to Gmail contacts. Quality Biscotti-to-Biscotti was pretty good, Biscotti-to-Gmail (which means they're likely on a computer) was just OK. Every once in a while the image would pixelate or smear—especially if the other caller moved. This issue was far more evident on the Gmail call side. Audio on all calls sounded clear, with only occasional echoes. It is kind of neat to conduct video calls on your HDTV, but the quality doesn't exactly compare to what I'm used to on Skype-to-Skype PC calls. Biscotti works hard to make the video conferencing experience as simple as, well, making a regular phone call. With a graphic that looks like an old-school telephone, Call History shows you every call you made, received and missed, which means you can call back later. Plus, if someone calls you while you're watching TV, a little window will pop up over the show you're watching and you can choose to answer to ignore. I like this, but Biscotti will also pop-up an alert if there's a system update available. This happened during one of my family’s favorite shows and they immediately blamed me. In the future, Biscotti please let me check or find a less intrusive way of notifying me. Normally, you'd answer calls with the remote, but if you have a (Consumer Electronics Enabled) CEC-enabled TV, you can turn on auto-answer and let the TV turn on when a call comes in and turn off if there's no activity on Biscotti. So, is Biscotti the video conferencing call of your grandparent's dreams? Maybe. If Biscotti can work out the small kinks in installation, contact entry and call quality outside the Biscotti network, $199 for a lifetime of free video calls is a pretty good deal. Bonus: Biscotti Unboxing Biscotti TV Phone Box Click here to view this gallery. More About: CES, Google, Skype, trending, video chat

T’was a Merry Christmas for Rovio; Angry Birds Saw 6.5 Million Downloads [VIDEO] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 10:52 AM PST Careening birds were a popular gift this holiday season. Angry Birds, Angry Birds Rio and Angry Birds Seasons combined for 6.5 million downloads on Christmas Day, said game-maker Rovio. That’s more than three times the amount of downloads it had in 2010. Check out the video above to learn more. Did you give or receive the popular mobile game this holiday season? [via AllThingsD] More About: angry birds, Christmas, rovio, trending For more Entertainment coverage: Follow Mashable Entertainment on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Entertainment channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Apple iOS Dominates Mobile Browsing Market in December Posted: 03 Jan 2012 10:29 AM PST Apple dominated the mobile browsing market in December, far-surpassing competitors such as Android and BlackBerry. According to statistics from NetApplications, Apple's iOS platform made up over a majority (52%) of mobile web access last month, besting Android 16.2% mobile market share. In fact, Android placed third in December behind Java ME (21.27%). Rounding out the top five was Nokia's Symbian platform (5.8%) and BlackBerry (3.5%). However, Apple's share of the mobile-browsing market has slipped in the past few months. In November, it dominated 54% of mobile browsing and a whopping 61.5% in October. Apple did gain momentum throughout 2011, as it only occupied 46.6% of the mobile market in February 2011. That growth was likely bolstered by the launch of both the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S in 2011 . Its mobile market share in December was led by iPhone users, with 25.2% of the mobile Web used by Apple smartphone owners. The iPad was the second most-used device, with 24.5% of the mobile web occupied by owners of the device. Meanwhile, Apple is rumored to be holding a media-related event that will happen in New York City this month. But it's not expected to be the launch of a new device, such as the iPad 3, and is likely to focus around small-scale advertising. More About: android, apple, blackberry, ipad, iPad 2, iPhone 4S, JAVA ME, Mobile, smartphone, Symbian

Facebook Cited as a Problem in One-Third of UK Divorces [VIDEO] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 10:20 AM PST Facebook may be a good way to bring people closer together, but according to a recent study it might also drive married couples apart. The study, conducted by Divorce-Online, reveals couples are increasingly citing Facebook in divorce petitions. One-third of petitions now contain references to Facebook. Check out the video above to learn more. What do you think of the study? Has Facebook complicated your own real-life relationships? More About: Facebook, marriage, mashable video

Video Conferencing Service iMeet Makes Evernote Its Virtual Notebook Posted: 03 Jan 2012 10:12 AM PST In the physical world, people take notes and share documents during meetings. Video conference service iMeet is aiming to give virtual meetings the same option through an integration with versatile note-taking service Evernote. iMeet users can now access any documents saved in their Evernote accounts during meetings. They can easily share those documents with other members of the meeting, record meeting minutes or collaborate on new group notes that can be shared with anybody, including those who weren’t in attendance. The idea is to take documents to and from meetings, like physical notebooks or briefcases, without downloading and saving files. More than 9,000 developers have integrated Evernote with everything from NFC tags to productivity tools, but Evernote VP of Marketing Andrew Sinkov says that this is the first time that a company has used the service for virtual meeting notes. And it’s not exactly a dinky startup that took the first leap. iMeet is a product of 20-year-old PGi and has about 62,000 users. We think the overlap between this userbase and Evernote’s 20-million-strong conterpart will find the new feature useful. Take a look at the gallery below and let us know if you agree. iMeet Evernote Integration iMeet user profiles include a standard option to link to an Evernote account for easy access and sharing of Evernote files. Click here to view this gallery. More About: cloud computing, evernote, iMeet, PGi

RIM Considering New Chairmen [REPORT] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 10:01 AM PST A new report suggests that Research in Motion, the company behind the BlackBerry, is looking to make some changes to its board of directors, changes that could cast aside current co-chairmen Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie. According to the Financial Post, a committee of independent directors are assessing whether Lazaridis and Balsillie — who also serve as co-CEOs of the beleaguered company — should be replaced as chair. The Post cites sources familiar with the matter as pegging Barbara Stymiest, who joined the RIM board in 2007, as the leading candidate for replacement. Back in July, RIM agreed to a review of its governance structure. This agreement followed calls from unhappy shareholders for the company to separate the roles of chair and chief executive. As the Post notes, separating the roles of chairman and CEO is more common in Canada and the UK than it is in the United States. Still, the current co-CEOs and chairmen have been resistant to change. The governance review is expected to be delivered by Jan. 31. SEE ALSO: It Doesn’t Matter if RIM is Lying, It’s Still in Deep Trouble RIM struggled significantly in 2011. Not only did its stock drop dramatically, it cut 2,000 jobs and it wrote-down nearly $500 million on its PlayBook tablet. RIM continues to slash prices on the PlayBook, but that hasn’t been enough to stop the decline in market share. Even worse, during its last quarterly earnings call, the company announced that its next-generation BlackBerry 10 devices would be delayed until late 2012. All signs point to a company that is in serious trouble. Until now, the RIM board of directors has remained supportive of the co-CEOs/chairmen, but patience might be running out. In an emailed statement, RIM told us: “As previously disclosed, RIM’s Board has established a Committee of independent directors with the mandate to study the Company’s governance structure and report their findings by January 31, 2012. The Committee is on track to meet this schedule and the Board will then publicly respond to the recommendations of the Committee within 30 days.” More About: blackberry, research in motion For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

6 Turnkey Tools for Content Distribution Posted: 03 Jan 2012 09:29 AM PST Shane Snow is a New York-based tech journalist and co-founder of Contently.com, a marketplace for brand publishers and journalists. It's never been easier to become a publisher, but being a publisher ain't easy. Today, the scarce resource in the publishing world is not infrastructure; it's audience. To compete for reader attention, bloggers are finding they not only have to produce better content, they also have to figure out a way to get it in front of people. Content discovery engine Outbrain composed a haiku on the subject, and though I hate cliches, this one rings true. "If you wrote a blog And no one came to read it Did you write a blog?" Fortunately, tools are emerging to help publishers reach new audiences. Though getting more readers won't be much help if your content sucks, the following five solutions can help publishers build an audience with the push of a button. 1. Outbrain: Headline Distribution Outbrain is a lot like Google Adwords for content. Publishers provide an RSS feed of their content or submit individual links, and Outbrain produces headlines at the bottom of stories on major media sites under the label "Sponsored" or "Related" posts. Publishers pay a few cents per click, and Outbrain's marketing team claims the relevancy of the traffic generates 44% higher pageviews per session than search or social media referrals. Outbrain's network spans some of the largest publishers on the web, including CNN, Fox News, Hearst, Mashable, MSNBC and Slate, says Lisa LaCour, Outbrain's VP of marketing. "Unlike many of the other lower-cost paid distribution outlets, Outbrain’s network contains many impressive premium sites like the NYTimes.com, CNN.com, etc., plus a number of well sought after blogs," says Scott Slatin, president of Rivington Media, which works with a number of ad-supported publishers. "To get placement on these types of sites for less than $0.10 a click is something that no other paid distribution partner can match." Outbrain recently launched a self-serve platform to allow small businesses and blogs to distribute their headlines with ease. Charlie Baker, founder of Palimedia, which handles reader acquisition and paid syndication for several global brands, says, "The Outbrain script allows a publisher to reach out beyond its own network of properties to reach users on the Outbrain network in a highly automated fashion. In many cases, I can do more with Outbrain because I don't have to play by some of the rules Google and Facebook forces on its advertisers." 2. SimpleReach: Suggested Story Distribution SimpleReach helps publishers find and expose the content that will drive the most traffic through social channels, according to its president, Bryan Birsic. Its primary product, The Slide, is a tool that surfaces the most shared – and most likely to be shared – content a publisher has in its archives, and encourages users to share it. It also allows publishers to distribute their most social content across other publishers' sites. "In working on The Slide, SimpleReach realized that social signals were increasingly and overwhelmingly important in determining the content that drove the most traffic to publishers," says Birsic. "Setting yourself up for success as a publisher must begin with a fierce focus on taking advantage of social channels." 3. ARC: Newswire Distribution An acronym for "Access, Reach, Connect," ARC Engagement Platform is an "all-in-one" tool for automatically distributing text and multimedia content across social networks, top 100 video sites and about 6,000 media outlets, according to PR Newswire. "[It] works as a complement to their news release capabilities," explains Joe Pulizzi, CEO of Content Marketing Institute. For those publishers wanting a press release-style distribution strategy, ARC appears to provide flexibility, allowing users to dynamically update content once distributed. 4. Zemanta: Link Distribution Zemanta is a link distribution engine cleverly disguised as a text editor plugin. The consumer-facing side of Zemanta's software analyzes the content of blog posts-in-progress and suggests relevant photos and links for authors to add on the fly. Publishers, Pulizzi explains, "can plug into [Zemanta's] network of bloggers to promote relevant content for them to link to." For example, if a blogger is composing a story about snow cones, a publisher who wants to distribute that blogger’s snow cone content can pay to promote the posts through Zemanta's suggested, "sponsored" links. "About 75,000 bloggers actively use Zemanta," says Tin Dizdarevic, Zemanta's director of marketing. 5. TubeMogul OneLoad: Video Distribution TubeMogul calls itself, "the most powerful video distribution and tracking solution available." Whether that's hyperbole or not, the service is free, flexible and powerful enough that social video baron Gary Vaynerchuk plugs it relentlessly in his book Crush It. In short, OneLoad allows users to upload a video once, then automatically distribute it across a wide network of popular social and video networks. Users can then track their videos’ success (or lack thereof) across those networks using TubeMogul analytics. 6. StumbleUpon: Paid Social Distribution For inexpensive and hopefully viral pay-per-click content distribution, the standby for many marketers and publishers is StumbleUpon, a social network that serves users page after page of "random" content from around the web. Cost per click starts in the pennies and goes up from there, depending on volume and category. The traffic comes from StumbleUpon's website or browser toolbar; therefore, readership is less predictable and more bounce-inclined than other sources, but it's about as turnkey as turnkey can get. With distribution tools like these, publishers like can worry less about reach and more about producing quality content. "The real key to content distribution is to create great content that people want to engage with," LaCour says. "Once you do this, the distribution methods you choose will support its growth." Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Goldmund More About: blogging, Business, content, contributor, features, Social Media For more Business coverage: Follow Mashable Business on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Business channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

KGB Spy Kit Is Not Just for the Movies [VIDEO] Posted: 03 Jan 2012 09:04 AM PST There may be more truth than you’d think to the James Bond-like spy gadgets in movies. Entertainment blog English Russia released photos of a KGB spy kit that includes a lip stick gun, pipe gun, cyanide gun and other various small firearms. Check out the video above to see some of the items in an authentic KGB spy kit. [via Gizmodo] More About: espionage, KGB, mashable video

Twitter Admits Verifying Fake @Wendi_Deng Was a Mistake Posted: 03 Jan 2012 08:47 AM PST On Tuesday morning, the world learned that the account bearing media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s wife’s name, Wendi Deng Murdoch, is not run by her or anyone connected to her. And less than two hours after the revelation, Twitter admitted in a tweet that it had mistakenly verified the @Wendi_Deng account (see tweet below), causing users to poke fun at the legitimacy of Twitter’s verification process. We can confirm that the @wendi_deng account was mistakenly verified for a short period of time and apologize for the confusion this caused. — Twitter Comms (@twittercomms) January 3, 2012 The impostor sent these tweets between 9 and 10 a.m. ET calling out Twitter on its blunder. Hello Twitter. As News International has finally come to their senses, it’s time to confirm that yes, this is a fake account. I’m not Wendi. — Wendi Deng Murdoch (@Wendi_Deng) January 3, 2012 And you have to wonder even more why Twitter verified this account for a full day. I never received any communication from them about this. — Wendi Deng Murdoch (@Wendi_Deng) January 3, 2012 But I’m definitely not married to Rupert Murdoch. — Wendi Deng Murdoch (@Wendi_Deng) January 3, 2012 News Corporation originally told a few media outlets the Deng account was legit, but the company backpedaled and that’s when the fake Deng came clean in the above series of tweets. Mashable had previously reported that “an unverified account” using Deng’s full name had persuaded the News Corporation CEO to delete an insulting tweet. Shortly after the exchange, the tweet went missing from his accurately verified Twitter account. Murdoch joined Twitter on New Year’s Eve and has since accumulated more than 90,000 followers. Do you think this incident shows a major hole in Twitter’s verification process? Sound off in the comments. More About: News, news corporation, parody, Social Media, Twitter For more Social Media coverage: Follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter Become a Fan on Facebook Subscribe to the Social Media channel Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

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