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Tag: Facebook

Klout or Kred? Find Your True Influential Online Score

Posted by Jeffrey Powers at 9:28 AM on December 22, 2011
Kred Score

Kred Score

If you’re like me, you might have been frustrated with how Klout is scoring your online presence. It seems like score nose-dives for no reason. However, there is a new program on the block in Kred.

What is Kred / Klout?

Just like Klout, Kred is an influence scoring system. It measures how much reach you get on Twitter. If you post, it notes it; if you get re-tweeted, it notes that.

Your Kred can be broken down. On the graphic to this post, you see my global Kred. However, I can choose the drop-down and find out what my Kred is for Social Media, tech, podcasters, and other keywords.

Kred is in beta and only connects to Twitter at this time. It looks like they will be adding LinkedIn and Facebook soon. Klout, on the other hand measures to those three plus Google +, Foursquare, YouTube, and a host of other sites (if you participate on them).

How Kred Measures Score

From the Kred Blog:

Kred gives Influence Points every time there is an exchange that indicates someone inspired another person to take action: replying to them, mentioning them in a post, retweeting their content, or following them or their list.

Kred assigns 10 points for the most common actions like being @replied, retweeted or mentioned in a conversation. More points are given for events that have bigger impact, like having a message retweeted by someone with more than 10,000 followers.

Klout Perks

From time to time, Klout offers perks like gift certificates, gifts, and invitations to closed betas (like when Google Plus was in beta). You can check the Klout perks to find out what you can participate in.

Why Should We Measure Kred / Klout Score?

You might think it’s vein to check your score, but it’s no different than a marketing company checking production on their sales or work. Once you know what your reach is, you can work on improving it. For instance, I have high marks in podcasting, but lower marks in Social Media. I can now focus on building that area.

Kred states it’s the “Nielsons of online”. If people can find your influential in an area, they may just call you up to give you work. For those of us who work for ourselves, getting jobs handed to us sounds like a very delightful thought.

It’s a good idea to see what people recognize you as. If you want to break into a specific field, you want to follow those who are leading. You might even become a leader yourself. Just like a good marketing department follows sales through a third-party company, you can do the same with these two programs.

 

GNC-2011-11-20 #723 Headed Out

Posted by geeknews at 12:16 AM on November 21, 2011

Rare Sunday night show, my wife’s father is really in bad shape, so my wife left for Okinawa with the boys today, and I head out with my daughter in the morning. next show will be from Salt Lake next week. No Thursday show. I cover all the developments on the show today..

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Show Links:
Recommend this Show!
Facebook Sharing!
Firings at Mashable.
Android at 200 Million.
Blackberry 7 Putter Putter?
GoDaddy Leads IPV6 Adoption.
Buy that App in Yuan.
Revision3 Finally goes to HTML5.
Samsung Galaxy Revised for Germany.
Dlink Product Reviews.
Google Music on Android Devices.
Vivitar Camera reviews.
NASA Astrovan.
Clearwire to Default?
Hard Drive Pricing.
40k Apps on Windows Phone.
Hawking Says we need to Colonize Space.
Kindle Fire Selling Briskly.
Change your Password.
Spy Catalog.
Cyber Attack on Water Pump.
Apple pissy about App Store Name.

Credits:
Jack Ellis – Executive Producer
Mike Baine – Associate Producer

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GNC-2011-10-17 #717 Mixing it Up!

Posted by geeknews at 1:18 AM on October 28, 2011

Time to mix it up a bit to keep things interesting. Watch and see :) Lots of great commentary tonight. Times are a changing and it is going to be an amazing time to watch it all go down. I will be on the road for the next two weeks, will likely have guest hosts for the next two shows enjoy.

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Listener Links:
HP keeps PC Division.
Siri cannot understand the Scots.
Human iRobot.
Rogue Website Bill.

Show Links:
A Voice Future.
Google+ on a Roll.
IT hates Mac’s.
Facebook (Artificial Intelligence).
Siri may get you Busted.
HP Keeps it PC Business.
Protect-IP
War??
Protect-IP 2
Libraries new Target.
Visa / Mastercard under Scrutiny.
Video and P2P Dominate Internet.
Time Warner.
Google+ on Rise.
iPhone Accessory Prototype.
NYT Labs!
Cancer Warning Struck Down.
SmugVault Pricing Declines.
Broadband Subsidies.
Groupon Bad Bet?
Samsung Beats Apple.
Sprint Deal with Clearwire.
Nintendo First Loss in 30 Years.
Redbox raises Rates.
Righthaven has to Pay Now!
Hardware Store fights Music Industry.
ARM in Enterprise Servers?
AMD in Green.
Boxee updates iPad App.
New Mars Rover.
Jam with your iPad.
Ford teams up with GoGo.
Facebook trustees.
ALAC Codec Open Sourced.
Rosat Crashes.
Wanna talk to Dave?

Credits:
Jack Ellis – Executive Producer
Mike Baine – Associate Producer

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Dear Yahoo!: Just Sell it Already.

Posted by Jeffrey Powers at 11:32 AM on October 20, 2011
Yahoo!

Yahoo!

Dear Yahoo!:

It’s time. Time to make a decision. Time to stop holding onto the past. Time to realize you were on the top of game in 2000, but now it’s 2011. Time to see that Yahoo! is Yahover.

Can you turn the company around as Jerry Yang talked about during AsiaD in Hong Kong? Anything can happen. But you are not willing to put the money in to do that. Investors are weary and you have no leadership.

If I was your business analyst (and that isn’t even my profession), I would tell you what I tell other companies that choose not to sell:

  1. Change your name
  2. Set a new 2-year business plan
  3. Get a CEO that knows Social Media
  4. Re-build your look and feel
  5. Re-build your clientele

Did I just say “Change your name?” YES! When I hear Yahoo! I think of a company that was on top of their game back in 2000. Eleven years later and I don’t associate Yahoo! with today. I associate Google, Microsoft or Facebook. I even have a better chance of associating AOL  with 2011 over Yahoo!

Even the best business person will buy land just for the land. They’ll strike down the building and create a new epicenter. If the roof leaks and the foundation is shaky; if the building takes more energy to keep going, then rebuilding might take less money than repairing.

I wouldn’t fret, though. You really helped shape the Internet. You should be proud of that. Now it’s time to save what’s left of the company and maybe put together a new venture. I hear Microsoft is putting together a bid, among others. It’s not going to be $31 a share as in 2008, but I would guess it will be comparable.

If you are going to keep it, then find someone that can turn this company around. Get a CEO that knows what’s going on in the new media space. Someone that is active in Social Media. Someone that will bring new blood into the company.

Sincerly:
Someone that doesn’t want to hear about this anymore.

GNC-2011-10-17 #714 All the News

Posted by geeknews at 1:38 AM on October 18, 2011

You will love the rack overheat alarm going off in the middle of the show. Adds for some comedy and bewilderment by me as I have never heard that alarm coming out of the rack. Lots of great tech news and the show goes way long tonight. Will get that back in check as I do not have to report on “All the News”

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Show Hotline 24/7 1-619-342-7365 or e-mail geeknews@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

Listener Links:
SteamPunk Synth.
iris versus Siri?
Magnet Magic.
Wow How about this one.
Big Brother E-Toll watching us.

Show Links:
Privacy in College.
No Privacy on Mobile.
Baby Play Staged?
RIM new whipping boy.
Sony Style?
Amazon Lockers.
Bill Shock Notices?
Einstein still right.
GE Solar.
Mobile Camera Showdown.
Playbook Plea?
Traffic Stats during RIM Blackout.
Battle for Public Domain.
Warner Brothers Clueless.
ICANN says bring it on.
Happy Birthday Email.
Cyborgs are Us.
QR Code Test.
iPad and iOS 5
Chime.in Launch.
Apple to show us the Money.
SOFIA!
Jobs Memorial.
Ceglia Tells Lawyer to Tell Judge NO!
T-Mobile 4g Unlimited.
Green Macbooks?
Amazon cleaning House.
500px App Rocks.
Did we get lucky?
Find My Friends = 1st Divorce.
Caffeine Express.
Magnet Madness (MUST WATCH).
Radical Moog Synth on iPad.
Instapaper App.
Mark Cuban on OWS.
Asteroids are Coming.
Our Last Transit of Venus!
Virgin Atlantic in Images.
Virgin Atlantic Signs NASA Contract.
Siri Then and Now.
H.265 Spec due in Feb.
iPad replace Playbook.
100 Year Space Mission?
Fake Voice.
Vdio can it Deliver?
Android Fragmentation.
iCloud or Google??
Siri Fix.
iPad Case Comments.
Black Friday PS3 Package.
Your Kidding Correct?

Credits:
Jack Ellis – Executive Producer
Mike Baine – Associate Producer

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YouTube Hackers Invade Sesame Street, Replace with Porn

Posted by Jeffrey Powers at 7:34 AM on October 17, 2011
Sesame Street

Sesame Street Logo

Sunny Day, but the streets look different…

Visitors to the iconic children’s show “Sesame Street” on YouTube got a rude awakening on Sunday. All videos were deleted, and replaced with pornographic material. The header on the front page said “Sesame Street: It’s Where Porn Lives”. YouTube took instant action and brought down the site within the hour. At this moment, the page is still offline.

The blame has been running around as Reddit has a thread, blaming a person titled “MrEdxwx” . MrEdxwx has responded with a video stating his case that he did not hack Sesame Street.

Their Facebook Page has a public apology:

We apologize for any inconvenience our audience may have experienced today on ourSesame Street YouTube channel.  Our channel was compromised and we are presently working with YouTube/Google to restore our original content. We always strive to provide age-appropriate content for our viewers and hope to resolve this problem quickly.

This article was brought to you by the letters and numbers – H4cK0r.

 

GNC-2011-10-10 #712 Facebook App for iPad

Posted by geeknews at 12:58 AM on October 11, 2011

Even though a portion of the country did not work today, there was a great selection of news. In the opening segment we play caller calls, talk about a fabulous green product for the home and a whole stack of tech news.

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Subscribe Today: Audio | Video (HD) | Mobile Video | iTunes | Zune
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Show Hotline 24/7 1-619-342-7365 or e-mail geeknews@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

Listener Links:
Law Enforcement on Twitter.
Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It

Show Links:
Amazon ready to kill next Industry.
Google+ Down 60%?
Twitter locks us in.
iMessage Disrupter?
Netflix #1
Netflix #2
German Spying on Citizens.
Dance Moves Copyrighted?
SnapTags?
Anonymous Attacks re-buffed.
Big Verizon LTE Roll-out.
Sun M-Class Flare.
Customs.
Tablet App Vision Impaired.
TDK Double Downs.
Facebook iPad App.
Facebook caved to Apple.
HTML5 and Facebook App.
Warner Brothers warms to Digital.
Mobile Ad Trends.
Economic Indicators.
Shopping Online to Increase.
Reddit shutdown parts of Site.
Twitter gets Tweet Trademark.
Steve Jobs Biological Father.
Apple iPhone 4s 3 Million?
Chrome Remote Desktop.
Airtime.
iOs Rules the Net.
Get your Project to the ISS.
Go to ESPN versus Affiliates.
X-37C?
Rover Trek Video.
IR Jammer.
Hungary Raid on P2P.
T-Mobile Booster.
Dual Core Windows Phone.
X-47B

Credits: Jack Ellis – Executive Producer
iPhone
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XBox Turning into Over the Top TV Solution? XBox Live TV Coming…

Posted by Jeffrey Powers at 12:42 PM on October 5, 2011
Xbox TV partners

Xbox TV partners

I watch over a lot in the Over the Top Television space. Internet TV, IPTV, whatever you want to call it, it’s a great way to get watchable content without having a full cable lineup.

Last week, Steve Ballmer announced their TV initiative over XBox Live. Over 40 providers have signed up for this venture, including Comcast, HBO, BBC, Rodgers on Demand (Canada), Televisa (Mexico), and other countries including Germany and Italy (20 in all). Best part, if you already have an XBox 360, you have the hardware to do this.

“Today’s announcement is a major step toward realizing our vision to bring you all the entertainment you want, shared with the people you care about, made easy,” said Don Mattrick, president of the Interactive Entertainment Business at Microsoft. “Combining the world’s leading TV and entertainment providers with the power of Kinect for Xbox 360 and the intelligence of Bing voice search will make TV and entertainment more personal, social and effortless.” – Press Release

Add to conventional TV line-up the on-line video providers like Crackle, YouTube, Zune and more. Then there is audio content from Last.fm and iHeartRadio. Finally, Social networks like Twitter and Facebook to round off the service.

The Game System that Became More

Whereas companies like Roku that integrated smaller games like Angry Birds, XBox won’t have that problem. It’s a game system over a TV content distributor. You can play Gears of War, Tweet about it, then watch a video on how to play Gears of War (or another show).

Unified Dashboard in XBox Live

With the unified dashboard (looking similar to the Zune software), you can browse your shows, play the games, work your social networks and more. You will connect to the Comcast Xfinity service to get all that service has to offer.

Getting Rid of the Remote with Kinect

This might be the best part about the XBox TV. By using voice controls and your Kinect, you can gesture to a channel, play, pause and move on. It might get harry if you have more than one person wanting to watch different shows. Still, could you imagine a world without a remote control?

It won’t all be free, though.

Right now, to get HBO Go, you need to have a cable subscription with HBO. I don’t expect that to change anytime soon – especially with channels like HuluPlus. Of course, that is just like many of the OTT systems out there. Pay for a subscription and get the content.

Once again, there could be conflict if you have multiple family members where one wants to play a game and the other wants to watch a movie. So this might not replace a cable box or DVR just yet.

The Xbox Live TV service is expected to come out before the holiday season. The announcement comes before then so you can plan purchasing an XBox 360 or Kinect system for your loved ones to connect up quick. While the OTT solution is more pricey than a Roku or Apple TV, it does do more than just watch video, view pictures or listen to music. It also has some great game titles. It also has a new way to browse through your content.

Best Buy Selling Napster? To Rhapsody?

Posted by Jeffrey Powers at 1:06 PM on October 3, 2011
Rhapsody

Rhapsody

The details are not disclosed, but it looks like Rhapsody has come to an agreement with Best Buy to take over Napster service. Of course, this is Rhapsody’s attempt to counter the surge of users on Spotify.

Napster was founded in 1999 by John and Shawn Fanning. Of course, issues arose with the downloading of illegal music, which was brought to the forefront by the band Metallica. The peer-to-peer sharing site went bankrupt in 2002, then sold their assets to Roxio, who then sold the company to Best Buy.

Rhapsody has also been in the music space since 2001. Their music streaming service has gone through a few changes, but survived for over ten years. So when Spotify brought a surge to the online streaming service category, it would make sense that Rhapsody would want to counter.

“This deal will further extend Rhapsody’s lead over our competitors in the growing on-demand music market,” said Jon Irwin, president, Rhapsody. “There’s substantial value in bringing Napster’s subscribers and robust IP portfolio to Rhapsody as we execute on our strategy to expand our business via direct acquisition of members and distribution deals.”

The only thing we know from the details is that Best Buy will still keep a stake in the company. That could become a great marriage for Rhapsody, because Best Buy has been known for putting bundles into their product sales. Getting someone on a service for a couple free months and hope they don’t cancel the membership when the time comes.

Currently, Rhapsody and Napster are the two largest on-demand music services. With the acquisition, they will be able to run against Spotify and the Facebook integration.

The deal will be finalized on November 30th.

Huffington Post Going Strong – 1 bn Page Views, New Hires, Head Spins….

Posted by Jeffrey Powers at 10:28 AM on October 3, 2011
Huffington Post

Huffington Post

For anyone that wonders why AOL got into bed with Huffington Post, here is your answer. People use the site. At least, that is what HuffPo says and we believe.

Last month, Huffington Post claimed they hit 1 billion page views in the month of August. With as much diversity that the post has, I wouldn’t be surprised. With the growth of the site in the last 30 days, I wouldn’t be surprised if it hit 2 billion a month by early next year.

So how are they doing this right?

Sites with Communities

This seems to become a new trend – divvy up a site into several niche markets. Make the site feel like it caters to what you like. If you cannot group people in one big circle, make little circles and put all the numbers together in the end.

The announcement also talked about the purchase of “Localocracy” – an “online town common where registered voters using real names can weigh in on local issues.” This could bring the HuffPo to your local community. Get news and comment on it.

The HuffPost 50 is another good example. They call it the “Internet Newspaper”. You can get a little bit of everything on this page. You can scan the front page, find the one thing you like, read it, and move on.

Top Name Site Hires

This is how part of the press release reads:

The Huffington Post Media Group announces today the launch of four destination sites: Huff/Post50 (www.huffingtonpost.com/50), HuffPost Gay Voices (www.huffingtonpost.com/gay-voices) and HuffPost Weddings (www.huffingtonpost/weddings). Each offers HuffPost’s unique combination of real-time news and opinion, and passionate communities powered by a leading social news platform.

HuffPost/50 — whose Editor-at-Large is actress, producer and writer Rita Wilson — covers the challenges, complexities and joys facing the boomer generation, now 77 million people strong. It spotlights boomers who fearlessly tackle new challenges in the spirit of reinventing themselves, regardless of age, and encourages boomers to question conventional wisdom about aging. Topics being covered include: longevity, relationships and sex, politics, the intense “sandwich” pressure of simultaneously taking care of aging parents and children, retirement, spirituality and religion, friendship, politics and dying.

Not only did it announce new communities in LGBT and Wedding categories, it also put a staff together that includes comedian Margaret Cho, Heidi Klum, and other celebrities in their respected fields.

Engagement

It’s amazing to see how many people “Like” an article. Whereas a site has a good day with 34 likes on an article, HuffPo good post would see 1000x the traffic. For example – their “Arrested Development is back” post produced 79,000 likes.

Integrating the Facebook Factor really helps. Then again, their social comment section also adds community response, which – in turn – can be posted back to the social networks. I guess the day of the forum is really dead.

So in a nutshell, Huffington Post is a community site. You can go to get your tech fix, political fix, LGBT fix, and more. It  has news, commentary, pictures, video and so much more. Of course, it’s staff of bloggers and reporters is pretty impressive. So 1 billion page views is not surprising. With addtional website acquisitions, the 2 billion view mark a month is very possible.