Google+Facebook+iPhone: 09/03/11

Saturday, 3 September 2011

6 stories of life-changing social media connections

When we think about social media, it’s very easy to keep it sectioned off into nice, little containers. A thought passed along on Twitter might elicit a response, perhaps even a retweet. A Facebook status message is passed along and it gets a like or two.

But what about when it becomes something much more than the sum of its parts? What happens when lives change because of social media interaction? That was the question on my mind this week, so I turned (naturally) to social media in order to find some answers.
The responses that came my way ran the gamut from lighthearted and entertaining to truly heart-wrenching and difficult to read. I’ve condensed a few of them down and I thought I’d share them with you here.

The Social Media Job Boards
We’ve all heard the stories of the world’s job markets. They’re tough to say the least and many people are turning toward more entrepreneurial ventures in order to find what they’re looking for.

Marga Deona is one such person. Deona relates her story of working as a publicity and campaign strategist, dating back to the earliest days of social media via LiveJournal, Friendster and Internet message boards. After spending years building her own network, she took the leap to working on her own.

I’m on Facebook. It’s Over.

YOU may not have heard it, but the death knell of Facebook sounded about a month ago — more precisely, on Thursday, Aug. 4, around 8 p.m. Central time. It wasn’t because the Web site’s growth slowed this past spring and the number of users shrank in the United States. It wasn’t because of the advent of Google+. It was because I, the latest of late adopters, finally joined. My embrace of the site can only mean that it’s officially passé.

It’s not that I was a Facebook snob — in fact, the opposite. I’ve always understood how the site could be a place to while away the hours, and if I could have joined when I was single, I’m sure I would have Facebook-stalked with the best of them. But now I’m a married 36-year-old, I have two children under the age of 3, and I’m bad enough at responding to e-mails, or doing anything else that involves organization or time management, without the temptation of seeing what’s become of my elementary school classmates.

Facebook is only one of many major cultural trends that have bypassed me in recent years: I’m still planning to watch “The Wire,” read the “Twilight” series, and maybe even play that Angry Birds game I keep hearing so much about.

But if I’m being honest, the time suck wasn’t the biggest reason I avoided joining for so long. The biggest reason was that I didn’t know which me would join. Apparently, Mark Zuckerberg believes we should all be the same in every context. According to Time’s 2010 Person of the Year profile of him, he once told a journalist, “Having two identities for yourself is an example of a lack of integrity.” To which my only response is, You’ve got to be kidding. I mean, I’m not even the same person with all the members of my immediate family. And I’ve long thought that my impulse to act differently with, say, my friend from grad school and my husband’s aunt — to adjust my personality to fit the situation and the other person — is an example of good manners, not bad ones.

I’m not under the illusion that all my selves are equally appealing, though, and this was where I got confused to the point of paralysis. Would my profile reflect Professional Writer Curtis (upbeat, friendly, responsible) or Real Curtis (disagreeable, slovenly, judgmental)? Would I use it to hawk my books, or to post pictures of my baby eating her toes? I know the obvious answer is both, but — call me old-fashioned — that just feels completely weird.

I didn’t resolve this identity confusion before joining, but my desire to be a part of things finally overrode my skittishness. On a rare evening when both my children had gone to sleep and my husband was outside reading, I opened a thank-you note for a present I’d sent to my high school friend Tanya. She’d gotten married in early June, and unfortunately, I’d missed the wedding. In her note, she included a photo of herself and her new husband and mentioned that she’d recently seen my brother, P. G., in New York.

And I thought, Tanya and P. G., who lives in Ohio, saw each other and I had no idea? And, Tanya and her husband looked so great and happy that I really wanted to see more pictures from their wedding. I had a strong suspicion that I knew where to find them.

This was not, of course, the first time that not being on Facebook had made me feel as if I lived under a rock. In spring 2010, I received e-mails from two friends announcing the births of their babies, and I hadn’t known either woman was pregnant, even though I was a bridesmaid in one of their weddings. (One e-mail began, “For those of you who we are not in touch with by cellphone, or Facebook. ...”) Last August, my friend Jesse told me that not being on Facebook was just plain rude. And I finally believed him a few months later when some other friend’s baby was born prematurely, and my wish to track the baby’s progress meant I had to directly e-mail the parents, which surely was an imposition on them. This March, when a woman who runs a moms’ Meetup group I’d taken part in sent out an e-mail suggesting that we shift to communicating via Facebook since we were all on it, I had the rather pathetic sensation of chasing on foot after a pack of people riding bikes. Wait up, ladies! I wanted to call out. Hold on! Not all of us!

And so I signed up. I admit that as I did, I entertained fantasies that I would be the billionth person to join and would be given shares of Facebook stock, though if this was the case, I haven’t yet been notified.

Facebook Is Getting a Translate Button for Your International Friends

According to Inside Facebook, Facebook is currently testing a translate button for international users to getting around the language barrier. Facebook will provide a button to translate users' comments on the fly.

Inside Facebook reports that only a few languages, including Spanish, French, Hebrew, and Chinese, are currently supported, but that's just the start.

Analysis Of Early iPhone 5 Cases Point To A Device With A 4″ Screen

There has been a plethora of reports about leaked next generation iPhone parts that are allegedly for either an iPhone 4S or 5 model. Now we are seeing an equal number of rumors about iPhone 4S/5 case designs. Most of these new case designs probably started after an alleged next generation iPhone design document leaked earlier this summer. Indications are that case vendors are taking this leak seriously and producing cases based on the information they have received.

MacRumors previously commissioned a set of renderings trying to decide what the next iPhone will look like. Later they analyzed the existing third-party cases to help decide what that device might look like. The results they were left with are a bit puzzling.

Wael Ghonim's revolution: No leaders, just tweeters

Zurich, Switzerland (CNN) -- The former Google executive who used social media to jump-start social change in Egypt knows the key to leading a grass-roots revolution: Make it leaderless.

"If you want to use the internet to change a problem you are facing or create an opportunity for a lot of people, you have to make sure that everyone is engaged," said Wael Ghonim, speaking at the international One Young World summit -- a Zurich, Switzerland, summit for youth leaders.

"There's no 'I'm the leader; I'm the one who tells people what to do.' "

Ghonim played an integral role in Egypt's social change this year as protests broke out in January over the rule of then-president Hosni Mubarak. He fired off a steady stream of messages to Twitter and Facebook about the uprising and worked behind the scenes to galvanize the uprising.

At one juncture, he was detained for 10 days in Egypt and eventually left Google to start his own venture.

Ghonim said "totally empowering the people" was key in Egypt, using their suggestions for photos and videos to post on Facebook and making sure collaboration was decentralized.

"It's not only important that you have a cause, it's important to make sure that that cause is not centrally managed by a small bunch of people," Ghonim said.

"Our rule is to not keep thinking and analyzing, it's just to get out and do."

Ghonim said the goal now is coming together on initiatives in the post-Mubarak era.

"It's very easy to get rid of a nightmare, it's very hard to dream. The nightmare is very obvious, it's the enemy, and we're all fighting against an enemy. Now when this enemy vanishes, it's very hard to think of a unified sort of thing--this is the biggest Egyptian challenge now."

Oscar Morales, a Colombian activist who led a Facebook campaign against the FARC radical group in his country a few years ago, appeared with Ghonim and both spoke about texting, Twitter and Facebook.

He said "speed was very important" for him and Ghonim.

"We didn't have enough time to deploy and plan a protest," Morales said.

On iPhone 5 release date, what we really know about specs, 4G, screen

Ahead of its release date, iPhone 5 hoopla is at a fevered pitch thanks to the purported surfacing of a prototype in the Bay Area this week. However, no information regarding the iPhone 5 has surfaced from the incident. No specs, no photographs of the device, and certainly nothing regarding its launch timeframe. In contrast, Apple’s history combined with cold hard logic offer mixed insight into what the device will have to offer regarding its features and specs, whether or not it’ll include the trendy 4G LTE networking, its screen, and even a view into its uber-secret release date.

Specs: iPhone history shows each new generation to have offered some combination of incrementally more processor speed and battery life while getting progressively thinner.. Count on all of the above again with the iPhone 5, with the possible exception of battery life (see 4G below). The new iPhone will include Apple’s A5 processor, which already powers the iPad 2 and delivers significantly more horsepower than the A4 found in the current iPhone 4. And regardless of feature set, Apple nearly always manages to make its devices thinner…

Release date: The most popular iPhone 5 related question has a fairly straightforward answer: look for it no later than October. If it’s coming 2011, it’ll be on the market by then so it’s worked its way into retail stores and the public consciousness long before the start of the holiday shopping season. And if it weren’t coming in 2011 due to delays, Apple would have pushed a revamped “iPhone 4S” to market by now to make up for it. So look for this this month or next.

4G LTE: This gets thorny in a hurry. Verizon and AT&T, the two carriers known to be offering the iPhone 5 on launch for sure, are both pushing next-gen 4G LTE networking hard. However, Verizon’s LTE network is still being built and AT&T’s is still being planned. Any phone with 4G LTE networking turned on will suffer in the battery life department, however it’s a given that the iPhone 5 would come with the ability to turn off 4G LTE in the preferences panel which would revert to the current 3G network and conserve battery life. Good thing too, as most iPhone 5 buyers won’t have access to 4G LTE, at least initially, whether it’s built in or not. Will Apple pull the trigger on LTE? This could be complicated by talk of a Sprint iPhone 5, which would need to support a different kind of 4G to work on Sprint’s network. Same goes for T-Mobile. The question then becomes how many networking technologies Apple can pack into the iPhone 5, or whether it would be willing to continue with separate iPhone 5 hardware model segregated by carrier as it’s done with the iPhone 4. Count this as the big maybe among all the iPhone 5 questions…

Is the future of social commerce on Facebook?

Facebook’s explosive growth has led many to question whether it will become the de facto hub of commerce for retailers. Facebook Commerce is alluring because it enables companies to harness social capital, and retailers are eager to tap into the tremendous word-of-mouth potential of fans liking products, making purchases, and sharing with friends.

Social media strategists often tell their clients to “fish where the fish are,” but while Facebook storefronts can be effective to facilitate impulse purchases, are they the right long-term strategy to grow sales through social media? Perhaps not.

Traditional analytics and e-commerce platforms deliver rich clickstream data, helping retailers track browsing behavior and determine methods to optimize the purchase funnel on their site. These platforms also offer intelligence about which marketing programs (email, search, PPC, social or affiliates) are most effective at driving revenue.

Facebook Insights does provide valuable data on interactions and soft metrics such as impressions, likes and comments. While these are great for measuring engagement, retailers must ultimately make decisions based on factors that directly influence transactional metrics like conversions or acquisition costs, and Facebook’s analytics engine does not yet provide the level of relevant data required for effective merchandising.

Many Facebook storefronts use iFrames or Flash to serve product content, which often results in SEO black holes that receive very little love from search engines. Given that 25-35 percent of traffic to large e-commerce sites is from organic search, the lack of search engine discoverability for product content on Facebook should be a concern.

Facebook testing a translate feature for comments (rumor)

Facebook is testing a new translation feature for comments. A small subset of users are reportedly seeing a new Translate button at the bottom of comments (only on Pages), according to Inside Facebook.

If a comment posted on a Page is in a language that is different than the one your Facebook account is set to, a Translate button may show up just below it and beside the existing Like button. Clicking on the button will translate the comment to your account language. After translation, an Original button appears instead, and if you click that it will revert the comment to the original version (and presumably offer the Translation button again).

It’s not clear how many languages are currently supported, but English, Spanish, French, Hebrew, and Chinese appear to be on the list. The system is far from perfect: it doesn’t always recognize the comments. Sometimes one or more words aren’t translated and other times the following error shows up: “There is no translation available for this story at the moment.”

On the flipside, the technology seems to be work with slang. In the example above, Facebook figured how to translate “Totally cool” from Hebrew to English. Given that Facebook employed its own users to translate the social network’s user interface into multiple languages, I’m wondering if this feature works in a similar way: it may be remembering certain phrases that users have inputted in the past.

It makes sense for Facebook to test this feature out on Pages first: it’s much more likely that Pages will have international users speaking many different languages. You may have friends that speak more than one language, but chances are if they post a comment on your profile, it will be in a language you understand. This feature is clearly meant for users who want to interact with each other but cannot because of a language barrier.

Facebook date forces woman to be getaway driver

These days, if you don't meet your date online, there must be something a little wrong with you.

There is a small cabal of humans, however, who are still uncertain as to whether someone you meet on, say, Facebook, mightn't be married. Or merely a hardened criminal.

I mention this dilemma because of the tale of 23-year-old Leah Gibbs, from Rhondda, South Wales.

The way The Daily Mail presents it, Gibbs met Adam Minton on Facebook and agreed to be his date. Her hope was that they would spend their first encounter watching a DVD at Minton's house. It is not recorded whether he had rented "The Sting", "Bonnie and Clyde," or "Inside Man."

When Gibbs arrived, Minton told her he needed to see a friend and asked whether she might drive him to see said friend.

It appears that there might not have been a friend at all. Instead, she drove him to the vicinity of what the English call a betting shop and New Yorkers call an OTB. There, Minton threatened the staff with a kitchen knife and took off with cash. When he leaped back into Gibbs' car, he reportedly told her: "Go, go, go!" Which suggests he really had seen more than one bank heist DVD.

One can only imagine what might have been pounding through Gibbs' head at this point of her date. She offered the Mail this highly considered quote: "I thought I would be ending the night in Adam's arms."

Having shortly afterward been arrested with Minton--her license plate turned out to be the giveaway after the getaway--she added: "Instead, he had landed in the long arms of the law and I was facing jail."

Gibbs spent a night in the cells before Minton persuaded police that she was merely an innocent bysitter whom he had met on Facebook. Yes, this was their first date.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-20101380-71/facebook-date-forces-woman-to-be-getaway-driver/#ixzz1WyTuCX5a

New iPhone 5 Clue: Will It Have a 4-Inch Screen?

As we get closer to the rumored release date of the iPhone 5, yet another clue about its true nature has surfaced today.

Here’s a new set of extrapolations, taken to a speculative conclusion by our friends at MacRumors. When they snagged a couple of publicly available third-party cases that purport to fit the iPhone 5, they noticed that the case is so much wider that it strongly suggests a 4-inch screen on the new iPhone, larger than the iPhone 4′s 3.5″ display.

This is a different case from the iPhone 5 case we showed you yesterday, which was a soft case with closed ends that also suggested that the iPhone 5 will be significantly wider and thinner than its predecessor, also pointing to the possibility of a 4-inch screen.

MacRumors did more precise measurements with this particular case, noting that while the iPhone 4 is 2.31 inches wide, with its 3.5″ screen measuring 1.95 inches wide, an iPhone fitting into this case would have a display measuring a significantly wider 2.24 inches. So if this indeed is the final case design, the iPhone will have a 4-inch screen.

However, given the secretive nature of Apple and the possibility of fake case specifications passed around to various manufacturers accused of leaks in the past, we can’t be sure of the dimensions of the iPhone 5 just yet. This is just one piece of info, but add this to all the other iPhone 5 clues, and most are pointing to the same thing: As the evidence mounts, it points to a wider, thinner iPhone 5 with a larger screen and tapered bottom.

iPhone 5 Cases Suggest a Much Larger Device with a 4" Screen

While we've seen a number of possible "iPhone 4S" parts based on the iPhone 4 design in recent weeks, the design of the iPhone 5 has remained unclear with little concrete evidence of the device's design having yet surfaced. The first claim of a radical redesign surfaced back in April, suggesting that the iPhone 5 would adopt a "teardrop" form factor tapering in thickness from top to bottom.

By late July, a purported design document for the iPhone 5 surfaced and began to make its way to third-party case manufacturers, who apparently placed enough faith in its accuracy to begin making cases based on the design.

Did SFPD reveal that lost device is iPhone 5?

There's still some confusion surrounding the hunt by Apple and the San Francisco Police Department for a lost, unreleased iPhone, thanks in large part to conflicting statements by the police, as well as Apple's reluctance to discuss the matter.

San Francisco police confirmed yesterday that they "assisted" Apple internal security in a recent search of a home that was aimed at finding an unreleased iPhone owned by the company and lost in a San Francisco bar. On Wednesday, CNET was the first to report the search for the errant phone.

Apple has declined to identify the lost device. But when distributing its statement last night through a Word file, a police representative labeled the file "iphone5.doc," according to the Reuters news service.

Immediately after CNET's initial story appeared, SFPD representatives claimed that they couldn't find any records that Apple had reported a lost iPhone or that any of its officers had assisted with any investigation. The SFPD made similar statements as early as yesterday morning.

But by yesterday afternoon, the SFPD had abruptly changed its story. It belatedly confirmed that as many as four policemen from the department's Ingleside station had escorted Apple internal security to a home in San Francisco's Bernal Heights neighborhood.

What changed in 48 hours to help the SFPD locate information about the police's involvement in the search?

"Apple," Lt. Troy Dangerfield told CNET this morning. "We needed information from Apple [to locate records of the investigation], and they didn't reach out to us until yesterday."

Apple declined to comment in advance of CNET's initial report or respond to other media inquiries, and the company even declined to respond to requests made by the SFPD when officers called to help check the veracity of CNET's story, SFPD representatives have said. Apple came forward only after SF Weekly published a story yesterday about Sergio Calderon, a 22-year-old man who told the paper it was his house that police and Apple employees visited late last month.

Read more at http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-20101364-37/did-sfpd-reveal-that-lost-device-is-iphone-5/#ixzz1WyRXmIwp

Accusations Continue to Fly in Missing iPhone Prototype Saga

The missing iPhone 5 saga of 2011 continues.

The newest accusation is that Apple personnel, accompanied by San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) officers, may not have followed proper procedure when searching for the phone in a local man's home.

Background
CNET reported on August 31 that an Apple employee lost an iPhone prototype (possibly the upcoming iPhone 5) in a San Francisco tequila lounge called Cava 22.

Apple then contacted the SFPD and scrambled to recover what it described as a priceless device. CNET learned that the phone may have been sold on Craigslist for $200.

Apple eventually traced the phone via GPS to a home in San Francisco. Police officers and Apple investigators visited the home, were given permission to search the house, but found nothing.

Back in 2010, gadget Web site Gizmodo bought an unreleased iPhone 4 prototype and wrote a widely read article about the device, which was reportedly lost by an Apple employee.

Controversies
SF Weekly initially reported that an SFPD spokesperson said there was no record of the search, raising the possibility that Apple employees impersonated police officers.

Furthermore, the Apple employees reportedly threatened the people in the house regarding their immigration status.

Now, a new SF Weekly article asserts that "three or four" SFPD officials did assist Apple employees in the search of the house for the iPhone prototype.

However, the article asserts that the Apple employees did not identify themselves as Apple personnel. The man whose house they searched said he would not have let them conduct the search had he known that they were not police officers.

Marketing Ploy?
The consecutive lost iPhone prototypes (in 2010 and 2011), and the huge buzz and attention they generated, have led some to speculate that Apple intentionally does this to generate free publicity.

Others speculate that the 2011 prototype misplacement was done to drive attention away from former CEO Steve Jobs' recent retirement.

iPhone 5 release date, Sprint, and Google Motorola connection

Possibly the biggest acquisition of Google, the $12.5 Bn deal with Motorola, is not only about the patents owned by the Android smartphone manufacturer, but also for the search engine company to acquire the popular and innovative products of Motorola Mobility according to Google Chairman Eric Schmidt.

According to a report posted by Bloomberg on Thursday quoting an interview, Google’s Schmidt has confessed that the search engine giant’s decision to acquire Motorola Mobility is more than just the phone manufacturer’s patents, but also about the company’s products like tablets and smartphones.

“We did it for more than just patents,” reveals Google’s Schmidt in an interview with Salesforce.com Inc’s Marc Benioff. The Google boss added, “the Motorola team has some amazing products.” The former CEO of Google inc. also mentioned Motorola’s once-popular Razr feature phone, praising the Moto team.

Motorola Mobility’s current strategy (even before the acquisition announcement) is to introduce and maintain new, and competitive smartphones, including the company’s upcoming product with Verizon Wireless, the Motorola Droid Bionic which is considered as one of the biggest rivals of Apple’s iPhone 5. The Motorola Droid Bionic will include Long Term Evolution while powered by 1 GHz dual-core processor.

Other new Motorola smartphones with the Google Android operating system have larger screen size of 4 inches or more than. Motorola is also selling a tablet, the Motorola Xoom, which is the first Android tablet to feature the Android Honeycomb operating system build.

Surprisingly, Mr. Schmidt’s statement was circulated online while multiple rumors about the iPhone 5 intensify. Some of the new rumors include Sprint Nextel biting the Apple Pie, and new cases suggesting that the next iPhone will also compete in the larger screen department aside from the rumored dual-core processor and better forward facing camera.

New twists to online dating

With hundreds of millions of users on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Google Plus, how do you navigate dating on social networks? Some singles say they’re better than traditional dating sites at giving you a full picture of the object of your affections — for better or worse.

Panama Jackson, who blogs at Very Smart Brothas and recently co-wrote the book Your Degrees Won’t Keep You Warm At Night, says you get a lot of insight into a person’s life when you see the kinds of things they tweet about and if their tweet totals are closer to 40,000 than, say, 5,000.

“The beauty of Twitter is that when something excites you, at that moment you can tell random people and have a conversation about it,” he said. “Once that excitement is gone, it’s hard to relive it. Point here is, if you are both talking about all the important stuff via Twitter, what the hell do you talk about when you do actually ever talk?”

Jackson said he’s found that some of his dating prospects like to vent about life and tweet things that make him second-guess his initial attraction. He’s had about six dates with women he met on Twitter, and although not all of them were disastrous, one was a woman he classified as crazy.

“Twitter is free and Facebook is free, so you never know what you’re getting. There’s a deterrent if I have to pay $50 for a profile, because I might take it more seriously.”

Jackson cautions that flirting online can lead to jealousy, which is likely to intensify the crazy early on.

“I recommend not following or friending people on Facebook or Twitter if you’re interested in them, actually,” he said. “I’ve learned from following some of the women I know that there was interest there, and then I realized, ‘Some of your thoughts actually scare me, and now I have to find a reason to avoid you.’ ”

One way to help gauge someone’s credentials is to see if they have a profile on LinkedIn, a business-oriented social networking site. Allison Peacock, a communications and marketing specialist who blogs at Living Radically Well, likes LinkedIn because “it just helps with the confidence level when you’re meeting people anonymously at first.”

She doesn’t advertise her single status or use sites like Twitter to date, but if she meets someone on a dating site, she uses social media networks to look at the profiles and comments of her prospective suitors “to see more about who they really are outside of the presentation they make on a dating site.”

That’s becoming a more common approach as dating using social media becomes more popular, says University of Texas psychology professor Sam Gosling. And Facebook in particular gives singles better insight into their potential partners than fee-based online dating sites.

One of the things Gosling studies is how people create environments that provide insights into their personalities and how they would like to be perceived.

“There are some crucial differences between social media and online dating sites, and one of them is that people tend to trust social media sites, since there’s a great deal of overlap between their online and offline friends,” Gosling said. “The impression people have of folks based on their Facebook profile tends to be pretty accurate.”

Read more at http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/09/03/2386970/new-twists-to-online-dating.html#ixzz1WyOV5qXG

Spamvertised 'Facebook notification' leads to exploits and malware

Security researchers from M86 Security Labs, have intercepted a spamvertised malware campaign using bogus Facebook notifications as a social engineering element.

Spamvertised through the Cutwail botnet, the malware campaign is impersonating Facebook in an attempt to trick users into clicking on a bogus Facebook notification message. However, the HTML source of the email reveals a link to a malicious iFrame leading to the BlackHole web malware exploitation kit. Upon clicking on the link, the exploit kit will check for remotely exploitable client-side applications and browser plugins, and serve the malware.

Cox Launches "Hurricane Irene: Random Acts of Kindness" Effort on its Facebook Page

CHESAPEAKE, Va., Sept. 3, 2011 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- Cox Communications has launched a "Random Acts of Kindness" effort in Hampton Roads to recognize and highlight residents who are helping their friends and neighbors in the aftermath of Hurricane Irene.

Cox will seek stories and photos through Cox's Facebook, online and other social media channels starting today through Tuesday, September 6th.

As a token of appreciation, Cox will randomly select 10 stories from the "Hurricane Irene: Random Acts of Kindness" effort and will provide them each with special prize packages.

"While we weathered Hurricane Irene well in spite of it being among the most dangerous and powerful storms to hit this region, we know that for many of our friends and families, it's not yet over. To help our fellow friends and neighbors, we know that there are many acts of selflessness and support which are occurring in the region. And we want to highlight those efforts," says Gary McCollum, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Cox Virginia. "We hope that this small effort will help them as they make their way through this challenging time."

Should students, teachers be Facebook friends?

For Ed March, keeping in touch with his former students on Facebook has allowed him to watch them grow up.

“It’s almost as if I live next door to each one,” he writes. “Without Facebook, this would not be possible.”

The retired Plain Local Schools teacher has nearly 600 friends. About half are former students from 1968 to 2003.

“I have never once felt that a Facebook friendship with a former student was awkward or inappropriate. I cared about them when they were my students; I care about them now that they are adults. Nothing has changed,” he wrote in an email.

However, he added, “I’m not sure I would feel the same way if I had current students as Facebook friends. But I joined Facebook after I stopped teaching, so I’ve never had to deal with what might be a less-than-comfortable situation.”

GOOD IDEA OR NOT?
With the school year under way, students are sending and receiving online friend requests from new classmates.

Teachers, too, are getting to know a new batch of students and perhaps wondering how last year’s class is doing.

When, if ever, is it OK for a teacher to “friend” a student or vice versa? Is Facebook just another method of communication, like a note or email?

We posed this question to our readers in light of a recent law passed in Missouri aimed at limiting teachers’ conduct with students via social media and texting. The law, according to The Associated Press, was passed because 87 Missouri teachers lost their licenses between 2001 and 2005 because of sexual misconduct, some of it online, with students.

The Missouri State Teachers Association appealed the law and last week was granted a preliminary injunction, effective for 180 days.

In Ohio, local school districts make rules regarding student/teacher fraternization.

“If they already have a policy and rules that prevent fraternization, that could cover social media,” said Jessica Spears, staff attorney with the Ohio School Board Association.

Some districts in Ohio have strict policies specifically banning communication by social media; others allow it on district Internet, but not personal accounts.

If a district wants to ban it, she said, the OSBA offers language or a model policy on request.

Dayton Public Schools recently added a new policy that prohibits teachers from friending, texting or sending instant messages to students. The rule says also that educators may not respond to students’ attempts at communicating through any personal or professional accounts not approved by the district.

The Dayton Daily News reported that school officials consulted with the Ohio School Boards Association, which has suggested that districts lay out policies against teachers fraternizing with students through electronic media.

NO BAN IN STARK
According to Stark County School Superintendent Larry Morgan, no Stark County districts have created a policy specifically banning teachers and students from “friending” each other.

“My recommendation to a teacher would be not to do it,” he said strongly. “It’s inappropriate and could result in communication that is unprofessional.”

There’s no question that it should not be done, agreed Kevin Oblisk, a retired Canton City Schools teacher.

“Teachers friending students on Facebook is definitely a problem and not even a potential one,” wrote Oblisk of Jackson Township, who believes the school’s email system is a better choice.

“Things can start out to be fun and enjoyable, but let rumors or anger get in the air ... then the situation changes and someone gets hurt or in a really big mess.”

“Youth’s emotions can be unpredictable — that’s a fact.”

Now that he is retired, Oblisk communicates via Facebook with former students as they are now adults.

Another retired educator, Mary Spear of Canton, agrees.

“I can see no time when I would want to be on Facebook with my students. Even though a student and teacher may have an honorable friendship through Facebook, it’s just a bad idea,” she said.

If the relationships turn sour, an immature student could use social media to retaliate, she said.

“Teachers must retain a professionalism and distance that I don’t think can be achieved through social networking with their students,” said Spear.

Tim Cook: iPhone 5 prototype distracts from real iPad, Android issues

Tim Cook’s first full week on the job at Apple has been a doozy: even as the chorus of inquiries regarding the latecoming iPhone 5 grows, a bizarre story involving a supposed iPhone 5 prototype has become front page news. The story involves such sordid claims as yet another Apple employee losing a prerelease iPhone model in yet another bar, and Apple employees impersonating police officers in an attempt to retrieve it. Elements of the story travel beyond suspicious and border on hallucinatory. But regardless of whether the story is true or merely someone’s fanciful fabrication, it only serves to distract from the real issues which Cook faces as he enters the ownership phase of the “rent to own” CEO position he’s inherited.

iPhone 5: supposed lost prototypes aside, the iPhone 5 faces various issues. First and foremost is that it was expected this summer but has instead slipped several months with no official end in sight. Apple typically doesn’t comment on non-unveiled hardware products in order to protect sales of current models and prevent would-be copycat competitors from getting the early scoop. But in this case that silence is creating issues of its own, as consumers increasingly scratch their heads and wonder what is going on. This comes at a time when Cook must not only get the iPhone 5 out the door, but manage to leverage the fact that AT&T and Verizon are newly pitted against each other in the iPhone market while also bringing smaller carriers like Sprint and T-Mobile into the iPhone 5 arena. But the iPhone isn’t the only issue on Cook’s plate, and in fact may not be the biggest…

Samsung Galaxy S II May Be Challenged by ICS, iPhone 5

August sure was a quiet month for smartphones, particularly for those based on Google's (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android operating system.

Beyond carrier preannouncements of forthcoming phones, a moratorium was practically put on the month, with Hurricane Irene perhaps the biggest event to mark (or mar, if you prefer) the mobile sector, with carrier outages up and down the East Coast.

Samsung broke the quiet Aug. 31 with the introduction of its Galaxy S II handsets in New York City. AT&T (NYSE:T), Sprint (NYSE:S) and T-Mobile are all offering their own takes on the ultra-thin, ultra-light handsets, which are equipped with 4.3-inch, Super AMOLED Plus screens, 16GB of onboard memory and a 1.2GHz dual-core processor.

Sprint is launching its Galaxy S II Epic 4G Touch Sept. 16, so the company is making its Galaxy S II a summer launch. AT&T and T-Mobile have yet to commit to launch dates for their versions, which could arrive after Sept. 21, making them fall releases.

To that end, GigaOm raised a fair question: Did Samsung wait too long to launch the S II? As writer Kevin Tofel noted: "I have little doubt that it will continue to sell well in the U.S., but perhaps not as well as it might have sold if it were launched earlier."

The next one to three months are going to offer many solid smartphone choices. Indeed, one of the reasons Verizon reportedly eschewed the Galaxy S II was to focus on the Samsung Droid Prime (or Nexus Prime).

This smartphone will reportedly be the flagship Android 4.0 "Ice Cream Sandwich" handset that blends holographic user interface capabilities and other "Honeycomb" perks.

Verizon is slated to launch its long-delayed Motorola Droid Bionic 4G phone later this month.

Finally, Apple is expected to launch the iPhone 5 in October, which will severely test Galaxy S II sales on AT&T, Verizon and possibly even Sprint this fall.

Droid Bionic, Droid Prime and the iPhone are only three that we know are coming. There could be a lot more on the horizon. Maybe Samsung really did miss out on a full month of Galaxy S II sales.

Analysts shrugged their shoulders at the news. Current Analysis analyst Avi Greengart said there is no launch strategy when it comes to mobile devices these days. "You ship as soon as you can ship," Greengart said.

Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney largely agreed.

Social media connect farmers with local customers

Locally, the only glimpse you might get of farmer Kimberlie Cole comes at markets as she sells her organically raised meats from the back of a truck, hair tucked back in a kerchief.

But when she's back at West Wind Farms in Morgan County, she likes to give her customers a glimpse into life there from her smartphone. And it might be as close as any of us get.

"We're rural. We're kind of remote," she said. "But they can see pictures and basically get a live report of what's going on."

But more than chronicle her adventures, Cole updates customers about her whereabouts when making deliveries or heading to the market. She posts recipes that can be used with her products (often from her table), as well as articles on topics she supports.

"I guess the most important thing is getting (customers) connected with our product," she said.

While it's a misnomer that farmers aren't technologically savvy (they've been using GPS on their tractors for decades), it can be hard to picture them stopping to type with their thumbs while standing between rows of cornstalks. But that's what many agriculturists have been doing lately to connect with consumers. Last week, the AgChat Foundation held a conference in downtown Nashville for farmers across the country — and spanning many farm types and sizes — to learn about improving social media skills. It's the second conference held by the organization, and attendance doubled in size this year.
"When I first started the Facebook page, mom and dad didn't even know what Facebook was," said Amy Delvin Tavalin, daughter of Cindy and Hank Delvin of Delvin Farms in College Grove. "Now, Mom has a Facebook page."

4-inch iPhone 5 May be Shortlived as iOS 5 Beta 7 Reveals 3.7-inch Display

Most people speculating about iPhone 5 specifications believed that the next Apple iPhone will feature a 4-inch display screen to compete with major smartphones in the market.

However, the latest iOS 5 beta 7 released for developers has revealed a picture of iPhone 5 based on Photo Stream icon featuring a 3.7-inch screen. In what appears to be the most "believable" iPhone 5 rumor to date, the next generation iPhone features a rectangular home key, which differentiates itself from iPhone 4’s circular home key. Apart from featuring a bigger screen, iPhone 5 looks slimmer in comparison with iPhone 4. In fact this is the second time that 3.7-inch display rumor has gained credibility and most probably this should be the next generation iPhone.

Recently, Italian blog MacityNet posted what seems to be an extensive set of photos of a purported iPhone 5 case. Case manufacturers have dropped hints iPhone 5 specs, but their track record is far from perfect. The new iPhone 5 case design showed that the next iPhone is expected to have more resemblance to the iPod touch than the iPhone 4. Also the edges and curves align with iPad 2. And one of the most interesting features the case reveals is that the iPhone 5 is expected to be taller and wider than iPhone 4, which clearly shows that Apple has definitely increased the screen size for the next unit.

Apple's purported move to introduce a 3.7-inch screen is a surprise given that major smartphone manufacturers have been releasing smartphones with larger screens ranging from 4 inches to 4.7 inches in the past two years. Motorola, Samsung and HTC have all introduced smarpthones with 4.3-inch size, establishing a trend. The best-selling phones like Samsung Galaxy S2, HTC Sensation 4G, Samsung Droid Charge, HTC Thunderbolt, Motorola Photon 4G and even the highly anticipated Motorola Droid Bionic feature a 4.3-inch screen. Maybe Apple believes that customers consider smartphones with 4.3-inch screen too big. Or there must have been an internal survey within Apple users which convinced it to stick to smaller screens. It can't be said with certainty what made Apple go for a smaller screen, but smaller display will be a treat for loyal Apple users who believe that Apple brings the best.

Read more at http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/208017/20110903/iphone-5-3-7-inch-display-screen.htm

4 New Phones that Can Hinder Apple iPhone 5's Road to Smartphone Battle Win

The launch of the next generation iPhone, dubbed iPhone 5, is being highly awaited, with a lot of speculations surfacing every other day regarding that.

Meanwhile, with so many high-ended Android and Windows smartphones out (and ready to be out) in the market, smartphone users are spoiled for choices. Although iPhone continues to be the gold standard for the smartphone industry, its upcoming version tends to face a tough challenge from a string of 'smart' smartphones.

While Apple is still not making any announcement regarding the iPhone 5 release, IFA Germany has taken the wraps off some latest smartphones that can pose a major threat to the impending next generation iPhone. But as far as the winner of the so called 'smartphone war' is concerned, we can't do more than just betting on a particular one, until the rivals face each other on the battle field.

Apple hunted lost item - clue points to new iPhone

Officers did not say exactly what Apple had lost, but they left a clue -- the San Francisco Police Department's Friday press release about the hunt was called "iphone5.doc," an apparent reference to a new version of the mobile phone that tech industry watchers expect to be released soon.

Apple declined to comment on the matter.

Tech news service CNET this week said an iPhone 5, which has not been released, went missing in a San Francisco bar in July. SF Weekly, a local newspaper, on Friday quoted a San Francisco man as saying police had come to his house in July searching for a lost iPhone.

Although a prototype of the iPhone 4 went missing in 2010, police said this time Apple had tracked "the lost item" to a San Francisco house and four police accompanied two Apple employees to the house.

"The two Apple (security) employees met with the resident and then went into the house to look for the lost item. The Apple employees did not find the lost item and left the house," the police statement said.

It did not say why police accompanied Apple security or the circumstances under which Apple employees "went into the house to look for the lost item". Police did not respond to a request for further comment.

SF Weekly quoted a 22-year-old man who described himself as the resident of the searched house as saying the group identified themselves as police and that none had said they were working for Apple. They had traced the phone to the house using satellite positioning software on the device but did not find anything in the house, he said he was told.

The man, identified by SF Weekly as Sergio Calderon, could not be reached for comment by Reuters.

Police, meanwhile, gave different versions of events during the day on Friday, while Apple has declined to comment at all.

Facebook Gets More Into Music

LOS ANGELES (AP): Facebook is preparing to bolster the programming tools it offers to licensed music services like Rhapsody, Spotify, MOG and Rdio to make it easier for users of the social network to find out what songs their friends are digging.

The tools won't amount to a unique music service on its own, since Facebook has not negotiated licensing deals with major music companies, according to a person familiar with the matter.

But it will give Facebook users yet another reason to stick around. Being more aware of what your friends are listening to could make the subscription music plans more attractive. They all offer unlimited listening to millions of new and old tracks on mobile devices for US$10 a month, but they have yet to gain enough traction to replace revenue the music industry has lost from declining CD sales.

The person was not authorised to speak publicly on the matter and declined to be identified.

Facebook is expected to reveal the specific set of tools at its developer conference in San Francisco, called f8, on September 22.

talking to our partners

Spokesman Larry Wu said Facebook had nothing new to announce. "Many of the most popular music services around the world are integrated with Facebook and we're constantly talking to our partners about ways to improve these integrations," he said in a statement.

This week, subscription leader Rhapsody launched a beta version of its integration using Facebook's sign-in tool, Facebook Connect. A Rhapsody customer can now 'like' an artiste or song, and doing so lets others know in the person's Facebook news feed. Liked artistes are synced across both services and Rhapsody subscribers can listen to artistes that their friends have liked on Facebook.

But there is no way currently to find out exactly what a friend is listening to at a particular moment, nor can a Facebook friend join in and simultaneously listen to what a Rhapsody user is playing in real time.

Rhapsody spokeswoman Jaimee Steele said the company is "definitely interested" in improving its Facebook tools.

"We think that music is a very social experience and we are always looking at ways to enhance that experience," she said.

Swedish new entrant Spotify allows Facebook friends to access the playlists their friends have chosen to share. Rdio allows people to connect through Facebook, follow other Rdio users and find out what albums they have been listening to the most.

Rdio CEO Drew Larner and MOG spokeswoman Marni Greenberg declined to comment.

Facebook's new tools are an incremental step in getting people to pay for music even if Facebook itself does not stand to gain directly.

So far, subscription plans that offer unlimited song listening have not been popular enough to reverse a decade-long slide in CD sales. Piracy is partly to blame for the decline, as is the popularity of buying singles, such as through Apple's iTunes music store, instead of albums.

Google+ Pro Tips Weekly Round Up: Google Adds Google+ Extensions

This week, Google held back on introducing a slew of new Google+ features, and introduced new Chrome extensions instead. The new additions won't replace of your favorite Chrome extensions, but they are very useful, and elegant.

Google+ Chrome Extensions From Google

+Timothy Jordan introduced the official Google +1 Button extension, which allows you to +1 any website you visit. Please note, that unlike other +1 extensions, since this one is created and made explicitly for Google, any pages and URLs you visit will be sent to Google to help retrieve +1 information. That information will not be kept for longer than 2 weeks. When you +1 a page, that information will show up in your Google+ profile.

Google+ is a truly international social networking site, as evidenced by many users who are writing posts in non-English languages. Many people let Google know that they wanted a way to more easily communicate with those people, and earlier this week, +Josh Estelle announced that you could now add a Google Chrome extension that lets you translate your Google+ stream. When you install it, just mouse over the text you want translated.

Good Google+ Tips to Know

+Tim St. Clair let us know that you can now add photos from your phone to your album. If you're on your phone, just select the photos you want to add, and click on Add to album. This will take you to a new page, where you can create a new album, or add the pictures to an existing album.

+Arun Shroff discovered a bug in Google+ where you cannot view more than the last 250 posts for any Google+ profile. This means that if you didn't bookmark a particular post you liked, or wanted to save it for later to digest, it would be really difficult to find once it dropped out of your stream. Shroff provides two workarounds: you can create an RSS feed of your public posts using PlusFeed, and bookmark any posts in your RSS feed reader, or search your own posts with the queries: site:plus.google.com keywords or site:plus.google.com inurl*/yourGoogleIDhere keywords. There are issues with both solutions. The RSS feed solution only pulls in the last 10 public posts, and cannot pull in private posts at all. The site queries do not include all of your posts, only the ones that Google deems important, which might get weighted more heavily by +1s, shares, or comments. It does not include your limited, private posts.

Read more at http://googleplus.wonderhowto.com/blog/google-pro-tips-weekly-round-up-google-adds-google-extensions-0129664/#ixzz1WyJtzcUq

Google Bought Motorola for the Hardware, After All

Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility last month wasn't just about the patents. The Mountain View, Calif. company is interested in the hardware business, too.

I reported two weeks ago that partners such as Samsung have been scrambling behind the scenes to prepare for such an eventuality, which now seems to have been a smart move. Chairman Eric Schmidt confirmed Google's intentions in a question and answer session at a Salesforce.com conference on Thursday.

"We did it for more than just patents," Schmidt said, adding, "the Motorola team has some amazing products."

Yes, Motorola has quite the treasure trove of patents -- some 24,500+, to be exact. But it makes no sense for Google to dump $12.5 billion into just technology alone: Motorola's extensive product portfolio is also quite valuable.

Why would Google not want to take advantage of this, or, worse yet, spin it off? After all, much of Apple’s success revolves around the fact that uses a "top-down" approach, which allows for a seamless experience that is tightly controlled by the company itself.

Look at Android: its fragmentation (hardware that varies from device to device) is nightmarish for developers. An app that works great on one device may malfunction on another, leading to an unpredictable experience for you the user.

With Motorola in tow, Google can now produce, in-house, a slew of Android devices--mobile phones, tablets, and the like--and better guarantee a consistent experience. It just makes sense, and now Schmidt has all but confirmed that.

Google shuts down Aardvark and 9 other products

Google Chief Executive Larry Page's push to narrow the tech giant's focus and streamline operations continued on Friday with the announcement that the company was shutting down 9 projects and Aardvark, a side company that built a social search site.

"Technology improves, people's needs change, some bets pay off and others don't," said Alan Eustace, a senior vice president at Google, in a blog post titled "a fall spring-clean."

Eustace said some of the products would be killed off, while others will be merged into existing products as features. The employees working on the affected companies and projects will be reassigned to new positions at Google.

"This will make things much simpler for our users, improving the overall Google experience," he said. "It will also mean we can devote more resources to high-impact products -- the ones that improve the lives of billions of people. All the Googlers working on these projects will be moved over to higher-impact products. As for our users, we'll communicate directly with them as we make these changes, giving sufficient time to make the transition and enabling them to take their data with them."

Page announced the company-wide refocusing in July when Google pulled the plug on Google Labs, a website that let users test out new products with which engineers were experimenting. Google Labs was where Gmail and Google Docs got started and was at one time an important piece of the company.

The Google CEO and co-founder described the moves in a statement made during a Google earnings call as as putting "more wood behind fewer arrows."

Last month, Google also shut down Slide, a side company that made social apps mostly for Facebook, MySpace and Apple's iOS. Most of Slide's employees were rolled into other parts of Google, but Slide's founder, Max Levchin, who is well known as a top engineer with a solid understanding of social networking, left the company.

Eustace said that while Google is axing some companies it has purchased over the years and ending other products, it won't keep Google from being creative.

"We've never been afraid to try big, bold things, and that won't change," he said. "We'll continue to take risks on interesting new technologies with a lot of potential."

New Android Amazon Kindle to abandon eInk and take on iPad with customized Android build

Amazon's next Kindle will abandon the efficient, easy to read eInk display of existing models and morph into a $250, 7 inch color touchscreen model based on Android, but incapable of accessing Google's app market or benefiting from future Android releases.

The details of the new Kindle were leaked by TechCrunch writer MG Siegler after a hands on review of the new model. Siegler said the device looks very similar to the BlackBerry PlayBook "in terms of form-factor."

The report states that Amazon was trying to ship the 7 inch model alongside a 10 inch companion, but focused on delivering the smaller tablet first. It is expected to ship in October, with the iPad-sized version held back for another year.

Priced at $250, Amazon's new Kindle will be far cheaper than the RIM PlayBook (pictured below), which still costs at least $450 even after a $150 price cut by Best Buy to move inventory after sluggish sales. However, the new Kindle will cost the same as Barns & Noble's Nook Color, which is similarly sized and is also based on Android.

Amazon's next Kindle will abandon the efficient, easy to read eInk display of existing models and morph into a $250, 7 inch color touchscreen model based on Android, but incapable of accessing Google's app market or benefiting from future Android releases.

The details of the new Kindle were leaked by TechCrunch writer MG Siegler after a hands on review of the new model. Siegler said the device looks very similar to the BlackBerry PlayBook "in terms of form-factor."

The report states that Amazon was trying to ship the 7 inch model alongside a 10 inch companion, but focused on delivering the smaller tablet first. It is expected to ship in October, with the iPad-sized version held back for another year.

Priced at $250, Amazon's new Kindle will be far cheaper than the RIM PlayBook (pictured below), which still costs at least $450 even after a $150 price cut by Best Buy to move inventory after sluggish sales. However, the new Kindle will cost the same as Barns & Noble's Nook Color, which is similarly sized and is also based on Android.

Google Highlights Advances in Copyright Protection

Google, which has faced intense criticism for years over copyright issues, said on Friday it has made progress on four copyright-protection initiatives it outlined in December.

The company has finished building tools that now allow it to act on average in 24 hours or less on valid complaints from copyright owners -- the so-called "takedown notices" -- that their content is appearing without permission on Google sites, starting with Blogger and Web search.

The tools simplify the process of submitting these complaint notices, which cite the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) when requesting that their works be removed from websites.

"We built the tools earlier this year, and they are now being successfully used by more than a dozen content industry partners who together account for more than 75 percent of all URLs submitted in DMCA takedowns for Web Search. Our response time for these partners is now well below the 24 hour target," Kent Walker, a Google senior vice president and general counsel, wrote in a blog post.

In coming months, Google will make the tools more broadly available to copyright owners that have a track record of "valid" takedown requests, the company said.

In addition, since January, Google has been proactively weeding out from its query auto-complete feature terms associated with searches for pirated content.

Google has also tightened its processes for detecting rogue Web publishers that attempt to use the company's AdSense advertising program to display ads on pages that contain copyright-infringing content.

"In April, we were among the first companies to certify compliance in the Interactive Advertising Bureau's (IAB's) Quality Assurance Certification program, through which participating advertising companies will take steps to enhance buyer control over the placement and context of advertising and build brand safety. In addition, we have invited rights-holder associations to identify their top priority sites for immediate review, and have acted on those tips when we have received them," Walker wrote.

Google is also taking steps to give more prominent placement on its search results to authorized preview content, starting with a feature called Music Rich Snippets, designed for music sites to highlight their content in the snippets that appear in Google results.

China’s regulators may force Baidu to be more like Google

China Central Television’s recent attacks on Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) may lead to new regulations that force China’s largest search engine to separate paid advertising from organic search results more clearly.

On August 15, 2011, CCTV aired a half-hour program exposing Baidu’s practice of ranking search results based on the amount paid to Baidu for a priority listing, instead of based on the relevance to the search terms used.

Undercover CCTV reporters also demonstrated how easily a fictitious company selling unlicensed weight-loss products could buy its way to the top of Baidu’s search results, all with the assistance of Baidu’s authorized sales and marketing agents.

This was not the first time that CCTV attacked Baidu for ethical lapses. In November 2008, the state-owned television network aired several news reports that highlighted Baidu’s practice of auctioning off top search results to the highest bidder, and of punishing companies that didn’t purchase priority placements buy removing links to their website from search results. The programs also showed that Baidu sold priority placement for certain key medical terms to fake hospitals and unlicensed medicine suppliers.

Even though nearly three years had elapsed between the programs, and Baidu had launched Phoenix Nest, a new online marketing system designed to improve relevance in paid search, the recent CCTV show explained that Baidu is still following the same old paid search business practices. It still allows unlicensed companies to buy their way to the top of the search results for key terms, CCTV claimed.

The program closed with an overt call for regulation, stating that it was clear Baidu was incapable of regulating itself.

Baidu’s practice of auctioning-off top search placements stands in sharp contrast to the Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) approach. As the selection quoted below from the founders’ letter in Google’s initial public offering prospectus states, Google decided long ago that their search results would be as good as they could make them.

Google users trust our systems to help them with important decisions: medical, financial and many others. Our search results are the best we know how to produce. They are unbiased and objective, and we do not accept payment for them or for inclusion or more frequent updating. We also display advertising, which we work hard to make relevant, and we label it clearly. This is similar to a well-run newspaper, where the advertisements are clear and the articles are not influenced by the advertisers’ payments. We believe it is important for everyone to have access to the best information and research, not only to the information people pay for you to see.

Commentators have pointed out the many possible motives that might lie behind CCTV’s reports on Baidu, ranging from the political, to the commercial, to journalists actually doing their job.

Whatever the motives, rumors do suggest that China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology may issue new online search regulations, including restrictions that would affect Baidu’s paid search rankings.

Deng Hongmin, Deputy Director of the Internet Safety Bureau at the Ministry of Public Security, confirmed during another Baidu-focused CCTV program aired on August 18, 2011, that several departments are currently revising relevant internet regulations. If those new rules are written, what might they look like?

One obvious regulatory solution to the Baidu paid search problem, as pointed out in several of CCTV’s programs, is to categorize the service as a form of advertising subject to China’s existing advertising regulatory regime. As risk factor number eleven in Baidu’s most recent annual report points out, paying for priority search placement is not currently classified as advertising under Chinese law, and thus Baidu (as the provider of the service) is not currently required to ensure that the content is fair and accurate or otherwise in compliance with applicable law.

For the advertising regulatory solution to work, however, paid search results and organic search results need to be differentiated. Otherwise Baidu might be placed in the impossible position of being held responsible for the content of every webpage that appears in its search results.

And that brings us to an interesting potential resolution: China’s regulators might force Baidu to segregate paid search advertising from organic search results, just like Google has been doing for years.

But how would the regulators determine if Baidu is complying with the new rules? Google faced a similar dilemma when it first entered the Chinese market and needed to learn how to censor its search results in order to comply with Chinese law. Since regulators wouldn’t tell them what information needed to be blocked, as described in Google’s February 2006 testimony before the U.S. House of Representative’s Committee on International Relations, Google analyzed searches that originated inside China’s “Great Firewall.” It then censored, from its own search results, any materials that China’s regulators themselves blocked.

Zynga Aims to Level Up Social Gaming

Zynga, which makes hugely popular Facebook "social games" such as Farmville and Mafia Wars, is trying to make has released details of Adventure World, an ambitious and potentially more absorbing new type of social game.

Adventure World is an Indiana Jones-style strategy game in which players search for historical artifacts and piece them together to earn virtual gold and experience points.

The game is much larger and more complex than anything Zynga has built previously, and calls for players to strategize about not only what to do in the game itself but also which Facebook friends to invite along for the ride. It introduces concepts more commonly found in PC video games, providing a large, complex virtual world. Zynga hopes this will attract new players and keep everyone engaged longer, which is key to its profits.

Zynga's existing games can be played in as little as a few spare minutes; the company makes money mainly by selling things for players to use inside its games. The company sells a lot of these virtual items; its filing for an initial public offering reveals that Zynga had $91 million in net income last year on $597 million in revenue. That marked a five-fold increase in revenue from the year before.

If Zynga is to keep growing, it needs to develop new kinds of social games, and Adventure World is a bold new step. It is 40 times bigger than the largest version of Farmville, featuring five major environments, including a jungle and the inside of a volcano. It has 35 different maps to explore, puzzles to solve, and enemies to battle on the way to collecting precious artifacts. Unlike other games that run within Facebook, Adventure World is designed to be played full-screen, immersing the player in the world of the game.

Adventure World was built by a team of developers with experience building "massively multiplayer online games" for companies such as Turbine, which makes The Lord of the Rings Online. The game's creators adapted concepts from this kind of PC game in an effort to provide a richer experience. "We wanted to bring more story to Facebook," says principal game designer Jesse Kurlancheek.

iPhone 5 Q&A: release date to specs to Sprint+Verizon, top 5 answers

The iPhone 5 is still more about questions than answers: its release date is up in the air. Its specs are mostly unknown. Carriers like Sprint and T-Mobile are circling the iPhone 5 wagon without letting on the real story, even as Verizon settles in. And that supposed iPhone 5 unit found the other day in San Francisco appears to have never existed. So much for getting hints the unofficial way. But cold hard logic dictates that far more is knowable about the iPhone 5 through simple deduction than any leaked unit or specs would let on anyway. From carriers to specs and more, here’s a Q&A of the top five issues surrounding the upcoming iPhone 5.

What is the iPhone 5 release date: This is the question which must be answered before any of the others matter. It’s also the least answerable, at least when it comes to circling a specific date on the calendar. But try this on for size: if Apple were going to simply roll out an “iPhone 4S” rehash of the existing iPhone 4 with a few spec bumps, it would have done so by now. The fact that it hasn’t done so means the iPhone 5 is coming this year, or else Apple would have gone to its 4S fallback already. In the last five years, Apple has never introduced a major new hardware product any later in the calendar year than September, and has never put it on sale any later than October. If nothing else, that narrows things down…

Will the iPhone 5 be on Verizon: This one’s easy: without a doubt, yes, Verizon will offer the iPhone 5 on its release date. That was a given the minute Verizon signed on for the iPhone 4 earlier this year.

Will Sprint have the iPhone 5: Now you’re learning to ask tougher questions. Apple needs the iPhone 5 to be on Sprint so those who are loyal to the carrier won’t continue uniformly buying Android and BlackBerry phones and will give the iPhone a chance instead. Sprint needs the iPhone 5 because its to larger rivals, Verizon and AT&T, both offer it. But it made total sense for the iPhone to be on Verizon, and that took four years to pull off. Two issues which could affect a Sprint iPhone 5 are the technology involved (Sprint uses a different kind of “4G” networking than Verizon or AT&T or even T-Mobile), and any deal between Apple and Sprint will have to be negotiated to both sides’ liking…