Why Instagram?

Apple named Instagram its best iPhone App of the Year for 2011. Instagram is also the 19th most downloaded free iPhone app of all-time. Instagram launched an Android app just last week.

Instagram currently has over 30 million users and a potentially huge crowd is coming it’s way in next few months, thanks to its recent expansion onto the Android platform. Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom says he thinks Instagram should easily reach 100 million users over next year.

“For years, we’ve focused on building the best experience for sharing photos with your friends and family. Now, we’ll be able to work even Advertisement more closely with the Instagram team to also offer the best experiences for sharing beautiful mobile photos with people based on your interests,” Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote Monday morning on his Timeline profile.

The Instagram founders, two Stanford grads who established their company in San Francisco less than two years ago, wrote Monday in a blog post that the deal was important in their effort to continue to grow and evolve the photo-sharing app.

The sale is expected to close later this quarter, and will bring the nine-person staff of Instagram to the social network. Zuckerberg went on to say that the company will be building on Instagram’s strengths and features and growing the app independently rather than “just trying to integrate everything into Facebook.”

This is the first time Facebook has acquired a company or product with so many users. “We don’t plan on doing many more of these, if any at all.” Zuckerberg said. “But providing the best photo sharing experience is one reason why so many people love Facebook and we knew it would be worth bringing these two companies together.”

The moves come ahead of Facebook’s planned flotation later this year. The firm reportedly plans to issue $5bn worth of stock on the New York-based Nasdaq exchange.

Instagram has “a formula; they figured out how to build this passionate commuity around photos, and they were mobile first. Those are two areas that Facebook could use some help with,” IDC analyst Michael Fauscette.

But if you would ask us, right now this is just an event. What it means for social and photo sharing is yet to be seen further down the road. But $1 billion? Really?

Considering the fact that Instagram is yet to decide a monetary road-map as to how to monetize it’s huge user base, at least for now, Facebook isn’t going to earn a dollar from this acquisition. We hope Facebook isn’t getting distracted by hipster buzz or the photo-sharing bubble, especially at a time when its business decisions need to be as sound as possible to shore up future investor confidence when they announce their IPO.

Search for “Ways to make money online” and you’ll find millions of so called tips. But today, I’m going to talk about a related topic of online surveys, that are often used to gauge the opinions of people on different subjects, and can be excellent means to earn decent dollars online and yet is often neglected as a viable alternative.

The advantages of using the Internet in these matters are evident. First, the low cost because there is no need to use an outside company if you do not want, second immediacy because the results are still in situ , third much higher participation if it knows how to reach users choice service and fourth simplicity because the tools available on the network are not difficult to use.That said, let’s see as the different quality options available to us on the Internet to create a survey and earn money online.

Google Docs

The search giant has its own generator hidden in Google Docs surveys – using which you can build your own survey without spending any money and with very little effort and time. To perform one of these surveys you have to go to Google Docs and create a new document form — and the rest is accomplished by following the easy steps that are marked by adding responses to each new row. At the end of the process it generates a code that we embed in a web page for example so that everyone can respond.

The advantage of this method is that it is very easy to do and like many other Google tools, you can track the results from a spreadsheet that can also lead to a graph to taste, all without leaving Google Docs. In contrast, the results are not always reliable because nothing prevents duplicate voting.

Facebook

Social networking is another ideal place for surveys where there is more contact with other users on the network. And if we talk about the most important community that exists today on the Internet, Facebook should be a priority. Therefore, in the portal there is a tool called Poll for Facebook that is free and consists of three steps:

1. Create the description and the title. At this time we also define the options and edit the text to our liking
2. Include possible questions and answers
3. Network share

Google+

Google+ does not yet have any utility to do surveys, but as in the previous case should have some method of consultation with users on a network that generates great exchange of information among its members. In this case, and while awaiting an API that allows apps to include surveys, best practice is that some users begin to use: write a post on the stream on a point (with the option of commenting disabled), and quickly added possible answers in your own publication comments making it clear that everyone does +1 in the response with which you disagree.

Yes, it is a rudimentary but effective technique, although there may be errors if one user decides to vote in several answers at once. In any case we could do a trace to find the matching user through the various responses, a task that seems cumbersome if there were many participants.

Twitter

Perhaps one of the best places to do a quick poll is the microblogging network, which is aimed at brief and hurried conversations. In fact, there are many options if we decide to use the platform of the blue bird, but we will talk about that we think is the best at this time — Pollowers.

Once you enter the account of Twitter in Pollowers website, you have to create the survey with the question and possible answers and send it to Twitter. The best thing about this development is that it has a function for which other users can return to share the survey with their followers with what the data are amplified.

Others

We end our review by focusing on two quick survey services more generally:

- Twtpoll was designed at first for Twitter but can be extended to our Facebook and Gmail contacts. Some functions are extra service though.

- Quipol is designed for a very specific type of survey that requires only two possible answers. Since the website is tailored to the survey you can participate in other’s surveys as well. It also allows sharing on Twitter and Facebook Analysis.

As you can see the online survey creation options are varied and the employment system as well. If you are faced with the need to make an opinion poll ever, remember that the Internet offers the most powerful of all space to do so, especially if the surveys are integrated with social networks.

Guest Author: Asher ross is an expert technical writer from UK with expertise in writing articles over UK Web Hosting Mac OS, Apple, Mobile and UK cloud hosting technology.

Review of New Chat Feature (Interface) of Facebook:

But review from users of Facebook and various polls reveal that the users have not liked the Facebook side chat bar. The reasons for the negative feedback are:

1. Interface not appealing: Users find that the chat bar, which occupies the screen on the right side of the browser, is not visually appealing.

2. Makes the screen cluttered: Apart from the facility of video chat which is not used by several of the users, the new feature seems to be useless as it occupies a lot of space unnecessarily on the Facebook screen. This leads to the screen of Facebook appear cluttered, and also reduces the width of the Facebook page. This disadvantage is more annoying if you are working on a small width screen.

3. The option of groups have been removed: Due to this, users cannot hide their online status from the people with whom they do not want to chat.

4. The friend’s list: It is detected automatically, and the users have no choice in its selection. This automatic selected list does not have the names of the friends you chat the most, and so is not a good feature.

How to Get the Good Old Classic Chat Interface Back in Facebook [Using Browser Extensions (Add-ons)]

However, there is good news for the people who do not like the new chat feature and want to switch to the old classic chat interface of Facebook.

In order to disable to new chat interface and get the old one back, there is a browser add-on/extension which can be installed on your computer and you can get the old chat interface of Facebook back. It is an excellent extension for Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome and Opera web browser users, which can bring back the good old classic chat in Facebook.

For this, you can install the add-on as per the browser you are using. The add-ons are available on the respective browser’s official web sites.

“Facebook Chat Sidebar Disabler” is a free extension, which helps you in disabling the new Facebook chat sidebar and return the good old normal chat window back. Simply install it and open Facebook and click on chat link. You’ll get the old chat back.

You can also toggle between old-style chat and new chat using “Use Old-Style Chat” option in chat menu.  To use video chat, just open a normal chat tab and click the video icon in title bar of the conversation.

Download Link (Mozilla Firefox)

Download Link (Google Chrome)

Download Link (Opera)

If you do not want to install this add-on, you can open your chat in a separate page and chat on this. As it will be in a totally different page, your browser page will not get cluttered. To open this new chat page, press Ctrl+D, and this chat page will be added to your browser bookmark list.

How to Get the Old Classic Facebook Chat Interface Back [Using Userscript]

You can also use “Facebook Sidebar Chat Reversion” userscript to disable new chat sidebar and bring back old chat in Facebook.

Guest Author: This is a guest article by Amanda Kidd who is a blogger and writer who has a special inclination towards technology. Her blogs on tech help involves Mobile Applications related problems and new gadgets, vehicles upcoming in the market like the flying car. Being a gadget freak she is planning to buy a Sony camera in few days.

At the same time, however, this function is every day abused. You know exactly what I’m talking about. These updates clog up your newsfeed, waste your time, and sometimes they even may make you rethink why you joined this Facebook circus to begin with. Here are some of the top 5 worst offenders that have every trait to be included in the ‘Most Irritating Facebook Status Updates’ list.

Top 5 Facebook Faux Pas That You Should Avoid

1. Cry for attention.

This is one of the most irritating of all Facebook status updates, because they are usually vague and, more often than not, they’re overblown. For example, one day you will see on your news feed Ms. Drama Queen’s update: “Could life get any worse…“. A few hours later, concerned friends post comments, asking if everything is alright, but she would never reveal precisely what happened (if anything happened at all) because she craves the comments and attention.

2. My kid just accomplished X.

It’s wonderful to be a proud parent. But it’s just plain annoying when a parent uses Facebook as some sort of promotional tool for their kid. While, yes, I’m very happy when your little bundle of joy learns how to control its bowel movements, or when he gets an A in gym class, I honestly don’t want to find out on Facebook, if I wanted to know at all.

3. Complaining about Facebook on Facebook.

This may be my all-time least favorite status update, simply because whenever anyone complains about a new Facebook policy that upsets them, they do so without understanding the extreme irony embedded in this. If you don’t like Facebook, don’t use it.

4. Posting a news story everyone has read.

Now there are some Facebook users out there who somehow think that no one else in the world reads the news. Of course, it’s different when you link to an interesting, obscure story that you found in an alternative newspaper or magazine. Or, if you have some insightful commentary to add to what has become stale debate on any given current event. But don’t link a New York Times headlining story about the death of Michael Jackson. We know already.

5. My life revolves around my significant other.

When love is in the air, that’s all well and good. But writing you and your sweetie’s love story using Facebook status updates does not make for good entertainment or even informative news. If you want to send her private messages, go ahead, be my guest. Very few people want to know the details of your love life.

Check Out These 12 Facebook Facts You Probably Didn’t Know

There you have it, some of the most annoying status update offenders out there. If you’ve done one of these things before, it’s not that big a deal. But think twice before posting something that may make you cross those implied lines etched in the social fabric of Facebook.

Are there any other status updates that have become pet peeves in your book?

Guest Author: This is a guest article by Patricia Garza, who writes about gadget, technology, design, social media, e-learning related articles at online university rankings.

But for non-techno-savvy users, enabling Facebook’s new social video calling feature might not be a straightforward affair. If you are looking for an easy way to enable video calling feature on any user’s Facebook account, it is essential to install Facebook video chat plugin for your web browser. In addition, Windows users also have to ensure that they have the latest version of Microsoft DirectX installed.

Step-by-step Guide to Enable Facebook Video Calling (Powered by Skype)

1) Login to your Facebook account and open Facebook’s Video Calling Setup page — http://facebook.com/videocalling
2) Click on the “Get Started” icon.
3) At this junction, you will be asked to select any of your Facebook contacts who are online.
4) Select any of your online contacts to open the chat box with “Video” symbol.
5) Now click on the video symbol to raise a pop up asking if you want to “Set up Video calling”.
6) Click on the Setup, which will ask you to save a plug-in. [assuming that you have NOT already installed this plugin]
7) Install this plug-in to enable Facebook video chat in your browser.

That’s it fellas. Now, you are ready and equipped to start using Skype powdered video chat in Facebook. All you need to do from here on is to just open the chat box and click on the Video symbol to start video chatting (calling) with your online Facebook friends. The video call will be started as soon as your friend answer.

You can see if a friend is available by entering their name at the bottom of the chat list on the right side of the page. Friends that appear online in chat are also available for video calls. A green dot next to a friend’s name means they’re online and a moon icon means they’re online but inactive. Just like with chat, only your confirmed friends can call you on Facebook. You also have the option to ignore any call you receive.

How to Easily Setup and Use Facebook Video Calling Feature?

However, according to Facebook some users may face issues with video calling because of hardware and/or software incompatibility. Facebook video calling is supported for the latest versions of Firefox, Safari, Chrome and Internet Explorer web browsers.

If you face problems using this feature, you should probably check if any other program is currently (simultaneously) using your webcam.

Some other issues with Facebook video calling include the inferior quality of the video, as compared to Skype. Also there is no way to resize the video window. Also, Facebook video does not work with mobile phone yet… you need a computer and wi-fi connection for best results.

Is Facebook’s new video chat something you’ll use? Do you find it as “awesome” as Zuckerberg promised? Do you think Facebook can compete with Google+ Hangout (which lets you video chat in groups)? Let us know in the comments below.

This new feature is basically Facebook’s way of creating a huge, photo-searchable database of its users. But it also raises questions about what Facebook does with this user data once it collects it and who else is accessing that data after it’s collected.

Why Facebook’s Facial Recognition is Creepy?

Facebook’s new facial-recognition feature is getting some unwelcome recognition from a prominent privacy group and lawmakers in the U.S. and European Union. Of course, you can “opt-out” of the facial recognition service, but it’s a pretty weaksolution. Because, opting out won’t keep Facebook from gathering your private data and recognizing your face — it’ll just keep people from tagging you automatically.

While facial recognition technology has exciting possibilities – and is already being utilized to some extent by Google and Apple – there are some obvious privacy concerns as well. Many Facebook users have complained on the site that the feature was turned on without their consent.

Unfortunately, Facebook has a (very bad) history of introducing new features without letting users know in advance. Moreover, Facebook has found itself in hot water a number of times in recent years for making changes that have raised privacy concerns.

Hence we would probably not be too surprised if they don’t listen to all these fresh complaints and end up taking no actions to modify the feature. But if you are wondering how to turn OFF the new facial recognition feature in Facebook, here is how.

How to Disable Facebook’s Facial Recognition Feature?

1. Go to the “Account” tab in the top right hand corner

2. Click on “Privacy settings“

3. Click “Customize settings“

4. Scroll down to “Things others share“

5. Click “Edit settings” next to “Suggest photos of me to friends”.

6. Select “Disable” or “Enable” from the drop-down

As you can see above, the Tag Suggestions can be turned off by customizing your privacy settings under the “Things others share” heading. But there could be another, more novel way to get around the feature — by taking bad photos! Hope, Mark Zuckerberg is listening.

Here are some more variation of wall post phrases that this worm seems to be using while spreading on Facebook:

1. OMG <your facebook profile name> you should untag yourself in this vid
2. OMG <your facebook profile name> why are you in this vid
3. hey <your facebook profile name> you look so stupid in this vid
4. hey <your facebook profile name> why are you in this vid
5. hey <your facebook profile name> i can’t believe youre tagged this vid
6. ROTFL <your facebook profile name> what are you doing in this vid

When the user clicks on the video, it seems to be loading in an enlarged video player window.

But the real problem starts when the user clicks on the apparently innocent ‘Play’ button on the enlarged video screen. Once you click the Play button, it does not play any video, but instead displays a message that reads, “Select Address bar.  Press Ctrl+V. Press Enter.“

But here is what it does in the background. As soon as the user had clicked on the first video link, it starts scanning the user’s friends list and generates a malicious code, which the worm copies into the clipboard memory.

When the user selects the address bar and presses <CTRL>+<V> (which is the keyboard shortcut for paste) then <ENTER> , he/she ends up posting a similar OMG why are you tagged in this vid type message on one of his/her friend’s Wall.

At this moment, it is not yet known what kind of data, apart from your friends list, is accessed by the worm. But knowing some of the past Facebook worms and their malicious abilities, the possibilities of this OMG/WTF worm can be scary!

So how to prevent this spam? Simple, don’t click on any suspicious links in Facebook however attractive it may appear! Hackers are just exploiting the curious nature of human mind to good use in doing their job. To avoid getting such malicious wall messages, you may restrict other people (who are NOT your friends and not in your contact list) from posting on your wall. For doing this, choose:

“Account -> Privacy Settings -> Customize Settings -> Things others share -> Friends can post on my Wall ( Enable / Disable ).”

In an effort to put an end to the never-ending personal security issues, the social networking giant, Facebook is working on some changes to its privacy policy pages that will simplify its policies. By doing so Facebook is hoping to repair its bad reputation by crafting a new privacy policy that regular web user can understand easily.

In a blog post, the company said, “At Facebook, we are constantly developing new experiences and features to help you control your information. Some of our recent work includes simplified privacy settings and publisher privacy controls that let you select your audience every time you post something on Facebook. We plan a lot more innovations in the months ahead so check back from time to time.“

While the updated policy does not change Facebook’s existing methods of harvesting user information, it makes the whole process more transparent and easy to understand. This move comes after Facebook itself admitted that its existing privacy policy is “longer than the U.S. constitution – without the amendments“. The new draft is shorter and, more importantly, easier to understand, with headings like “your information and how it is used,” and “how advertising works,” which make the process clear to a layman.

The new privacy policy is just the latest step by Facebook to address user and regulators’ concern about privacy. Amidst a torrent of criticism about its privacy controls last spring, Facebook consolidated many of its settings into control panel designed to make it easier for users to adjust when and how their information was shared with other users and third parties.

According to initial reports, though the content of the new draft policy appears to be more or less similar to that of the old Facebook policy, the font is larger, with navigation elements built in. In addition, the new policy also is accompanied by illustrations and diagrams showing the user what it means when a user selects data to be shown to everyone. At any rate, from a visual standpoint, obviously, the new version is more appealing. What do you think about the social networking giant‘s new Privacy Policy?

If you have a Facebook Page for a brand or business, this Facebook announcement about the all new Facebook Page layout and features at the top of your business or personal page is certainly going to make you interested. As a clarification though, Facebook is making changes to Pages with a new layout which is more consistent with a regular Facebook’s user profile.

Unlike individual-oriented Facebook profiles, pages are designed for businesses, brands, public figures, and organizations and administrators to typically oversee their day-to-day operations. The innovative layout eliminates the tabs on the top of the page by providing it a spanking new look than just an up to date user profile pages. With the original design, links emerges as an alternative of tabs on the left side of the page underneath the brand’s profile picture.

The redesign is by now in public view and will take consequence from March 10 for all. The pages are predominantly designed for businesses, brands, public figures and organizations to oversee their on a daily basis operations. Sending a message to administrators on February 10, the company provided pages to owners for the opportunity to preview and upgrade untimely to the innovative format.

In a nutshell, in the new Facebook page layout, the existing tabs at the top of the page are removed and links are located on the left-side below your Facebook Page’s profile photo. Just like the new Facebook user profile, the most recent images uploaded on your Facebook page will appear in a horizontal strip at the top.

In the new layout, ‘Likes’ and comments on your page are displayed on the notifications bar appearance. A photo-strip option have been formed above the wall that displays the most recent photos the Page has ‘tagged’ itself in and the photos will be displayed in a diverse order every time the page loads.

However, Based on a review of 1,000 comments posted in response to Facebook’s blog by Friday, this step was unpopular with many administrators. Other administrators disliked the social networking giant‘s step away from chronological order. Go here to preview the new Facebook Page features. Do you like the new features or hate it more than anything?

]]> http://techchunks.com/social-media/facebook-pages-get-a-facelift-new-look-improved-features-unveiled/feed/ 6 http://techchunks.com/social-media/mark-zuckerbergs-facebook-fan-page-hacked-and-reinstated/ http://techchunks.com/social-media/mark-zuckerbergs-facebook-fan-page-hacked-and-reinstated/#comments Thu, 27 Jan 2011 07:41:45 +0000 Asha http://techchunks.com/?p=4218 First they targeted Nicolas Sarkozy’s Facebook page, and now they have targeted none other than Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg’s page on his own social networking website. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s fan page was hacked Tuesday — a high-profile breach on a site that constantly faces scrutiny about its handling of its members’ private data.

The message that appeared on Zuckerberg’s page under his name read: “Let the hacking begin: If Facebook needs money, instead of going to the banks, why doesn’t Facebook let its users invest in Facebook in a social way? Why not transform Facebook into a ‘social business’ the way Nobel Price winner Muhammad Yunus described it? http://bit.ly/fs6rT3 What do you think? #hackercup2011“

As many of you might know, Muhammad Yunus is a Nobel Peace Prize winner and the founder of the Grameen Bank, which offers small loans to people who have no collateral to get started in business. The message also linked to a recently edited Wikipedia article about social business and asked readers: “what do you think?”

Zuckerberg’s fan page has more than three million followers and is probably managed by media assistants to the social networking magnate, according to cyber-security experts. So we can not rule out the possibility that the site may not have been hacked at all and the post may have been made by a disgruntled employee.

But if it was a genuine case of hacking then the hacker may have got access to the account, via a poorly chosen password or spyware installed on an employee’s computer that stole the password.

At any rate, the message received more than 1,800 “likes” before it was removed from the page. Facebook’s representatives have not returned calls seeking comment. Only thing we heard back is – “A bug enabled status postings by unauthorized people on a handful of public pages,” a Facebook spokesperson said in an email reply to an AFP inquiry. “The bug has been fixed.“

Video Confirms Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg’s Fan Page Was Hacked

While Facebook is staying silent on the hack, the company posted a blog entry Wednesday morning titled: “A Continued Commitment to Security.” It draws attention to Data Privacy Day Friday. The day is an international effort by governments and businesses to draw attention to personal-data protection issues.

But one thing is for sure. After this ugly incident, Mark Zuckerberg might be wanting to take a close look at his privacy and security settings after this embarrassing breach.