The rumor mill has been churning Monday afternoon with reports that Twitter is working on its own photo-sharing service that would compete with the likes of Twitpic and Yfrog . TechCrunch first reported the tip, citing multiple unnamed sources, Monday afternoon.
Are you one of those folks who like the idea of a smartphone camera, but think they still have ways to go before they can replace even a simple point-and-click standalone camera? An upcoming, unnamed smartphone from HTC might change your mind. Unearthed via Twitter by Mobile-Review ‘s Eldar Murtazin, the device is a Windows Phone 7-based smartphone with a 12-megapixel camera that also supports shooting in RAW mode, a feature many photo enthusiasts will find useful. A 12-megapixel camera in a smartphone is not unheard of – Nokia N8 has one – but it’s definitely a first in the world of Windows Phone 7 devices
This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum , where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business. From our coverage on Mashable , you’ve probably learned a fair share about Foursquare for business. There are more than 9 million people on Foursquare, and there are 250,000 businesses that have claimed venues and use the location-based service as part of their overall marketing program. Foursquare is a free platform for merchants to use to engage and incentivize customers, but only if done right. Here’s what not to do as you embark on your Foursquare marketing endeavors. 1. Creating a Complicated Special There’s no fun in trying to unlock a special that is nearly impossible to unlock
Guess who’s back, back again? Mashable has wrapped another week jam-packed with tools and resources for your digital life. This week we have stories walking you through the startup investment process, Lady Gaga’s social media spectacle, a history of advertising on Twitter, and even some cool decals for your iPad. Looking for even more social media resources? This guide appears every weekend, and you can check out all the lists-gone-by here any time. Editors’ Picks How Lady Gaga Created a Web Marketing Spectacle for Born This Way [PICS] Lady Gaga has paved a path for stars and brands to get inventive with the ways they use digital and social media to promote themselves and connect with fans. Here’s how she did it with her new album, Born This Way. Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer Conundrum Should Ballmer get the boot? Does Microsoft need a fresh, new face to guide it into a post-PC world? Let’s crunch the numbers. Hacking for Good: Three Ways for Devs to Get Involved Want to use your dev powers for the greater good
The Taliban has extended its propaganda efforts into the social media realm, sending its first tweet in English from the handle @alemarahweb. The account started tweeting in Pashtun in December 19. Its roughly 750 tweets detail what the Guardian calls “highly exaggerated reports” of strikes against the Taliban’s enemies. As of Thursday, some of these tweets have been written in English. Most of them are death tolls. This matches the message that the Taliban has distributed through its spokesmen and other media, including the Internet. Despite declaring the Internet unholy and banning its use for millions of Afghan citizens in 2000, the Taliban has maintained a website since at least 2001
The Modern Media Agency Series is supported by IDG . Marketers should know about two Ps for publishers — personalization and portability are as important to advertisers as they are to publishers. Consumers expectations are rising for information they want accessed on any device. IDG Global Solutions President Matt Yorke says this is new territory filled with a lot of promise. Read more . “Social media engagement.” It’s a phrase that generates a lot of buzz, but what does it actually mean? And, more importantly, why does it matter to companies that are integrating social media into their PR and marketing strategies? We turned to some of the leading communication experts to discover the importance of sparking online engagement and how this new focus has forced PR, marketing and advertising campaigns to evolve. Defining Social Media Engagement Ask five people to define engagement, and you’ll likely receive five different answers. Liz Hawks , SVP and global co-chair of FH Moms Practice , explained it like this: “Engagement is speaking with her (in this case, Mom) where she is, when she is looking for info and in the way she is looking for it.” Rob Clark , Edelman ’s director of insights and measurement, suggests thinking about engagement as the step from attention to action. “This may be a one-click social gesture such as a digg or like , or it may be a blog post written in response with a trackback, or it may be a letter written in response to an online campaign
The Modern Media Agency Series is supported by IDG . With the explosion of mobile devices, advertising dollars will begin to shift to mobile for tech marketers this year. IDG Global Solutions President Matt Yorke explains why these trends should not be ignored. The notion that marketing costs can’t always be understood is an ancient one. John Wanamaker, a department store mogul who died in 1922, once mused, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” The same could be said for social media marketing. Though there are a lot more metrics than Wanamaker could have imagined back in his day, the tricky part is determining the right ones to use. Is it retweets? Facebook Likes? Or maybe just product sales? To get a sense of where social media marketing metrics are right now and where they might be going, Mashable recently contacted some people on the front lines. The group we chose includes: Sarah Hofstetter , senior vice president of emerging media and brand strategy at 360i David Rosenberg , director of emerging media at JWT Dexter Bustarde , senior web analyst at Digitaria . From left: Sarah Hofstetter, David Rosenberg and Dexter Bustarde A lot of campaigns seem aimed at accruing Facebook Likes. But is that success
The Science Channel will debut its first Twitter event Friday, April 1, (April Fool’s Day), during the marathon of the hit series, An Idiot Abroad. Beginning at 2:30 p.m. and running until 11:00 p.m., the Discovery Communications cable network will air all eight episodes of the Ricky Gervais/Stephen Merchant series. In primetime (8:00pm), the channel will also feature tweets from viewers who use the hashtag #AnIdiotAbroad at the bottom of the screen
This post reflects the opinions of the author and not necessarily those of Mashable as a publication. Whenever you bring up the idea that the cycle of innovation must, at some point, come to an end, you inevitably evoke the memory of Charles Duell. For the uninitiated, Duell was the commissioner of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in 1899 supposedly said , “Everything that can be invented has been invented.” We can all have a good laugh at Duell’s expense now (even though he may never have actually said that), but perhaps we shouldn’t. After all, isn’t Duell’s sentiment generally true in a lot of cases? For instance, have cars really changed that much since the ’50s? Sure, they’re more fuel efficient and they now have OnStar systems and USB ports , but they’re still basically the same — four tires that you operate with a steering wheel. They still (mostly) run on gas. They’ve been perfected, but are they fundamentally different? Or take toasters. Is the toaster you could buy in 1971 really all that different from today’s? For all I know, toaster technology may have advanced dramatically since then, but as a consumer, there’s really not much difference. It took a minute or so to make toast 40 years ago, and it still does today
During past Fashion Weeks, advertisers have sponsored news hubs on various media platforms, such as Twitter , to help consumers track the flow of events through curated, real-time stream of coverage.