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Blog posts tagged with 'Facebook'
Thursday, October 04
One billion — yes, billion — which is how many users Facebook now has around the world. Dino Grandoni of The Huffington Post reports:
Facebook hit the long-sought, 10-digit user mark at precisely 12.45 p.m. PT on September 14. Approximately 1 in 7 people on Earth is on Facebook, given the U.S. Census Bureau’s world population estimate of 7.04 billion
Not bad for a company founded in 2004.
Monday, August 13
Via Sterling C. Beard of The Hill comes an interesting free speech case currently taking place in Virginia:
Facebook and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) are arguing in a Virginia court that “liking” something on the ubiquitous social network is constitutionally protected free speech.
The wrongful termination lawsuit involves six employees fired by the Hampton, Va., Sheriff B.J. Roberts. The claimants say they were laid off for supporting Roberts’s opponent in his 2009 reelection campaign. One of them “liked” the Facebook page of Roberts’s opponent, Jim Adams.
The Facebook/ACLU action is in response to a U.S. District Judge’s ruling a few months ago that simply “liking” something is not enough to be counted as free speech. This should be fascinating to watch play out.
Thursday, July 26
With tech issues increasingly receiving attention in D.C., The Washington Post‘s Cecilia Kang reports on some major tech players joining forces on the lobbying front:
Google, eBay, Amazon and Facebook are launching a lobbying group, The Internet Association, to try to raise their voice in Washington as federal officials focus their sights on their largely unregulated tech industry.
Leading the group will be Michael Beckerman, former deputy staff director of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and longtime adviser to Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich).
Thursday, July 19
It’s election season, which means voter registration efforts are well underway. And as Rachel La Corte of the Associated Press reports, one state is test-driving an innovative new way to register more voters:
Facebook users in Washington state will have something else to brag about to their online friends: that they registered to vote on Facebook.
The secretary of state’s office said Tuesday it will have an application on its Facebook page that allows residents to register to vote and then “like” the application and recommend it to their friends. It’s expected to launch as early as next week.
Monday, July 16
What’s Facebook’s biggest challenge nowadays? According to its Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg, it’s updating the social networking service for our increasingly mobile world, as Jon Erlichman and Christopher Palmeri of Bloomberg report:
Bringing Facebook’s features to handheld gadgets is difficult because the user experience is so different than on desktop computers, he said in an interview from the Allen & Co. media conference in Sun Valley, Idaho. Zuckerberg, meanwhile, played down the tribulations of running a newly public company.
Keep in mind Apple’s iPhone was released just five years ago. Now even innovative services like Facebook are struggling to keep up with the explosion in mobile broadband.
Monday, July 09
Via George Winslow of Broadcasting & Cable, CNN is looking to make its election coverage more social:
CNN has announced a partnership with Facebook for its 2012 election coverage that will include a second screen “I’m Voting” app, user analytics, surveys and other interactive applications that will be available to CNN’s on-air, mobile and online audiences and Facebook 160 million U.S. users.
Thursday, June 21
Facebook now has over 900 million users worldwide, and as Michael Martinez of CNN reports, such a massive user base has inspired a new state law aimed at educating communities about sex offenders:
A new Louisiana law requires sex offenders and child predators to state their criminal status on their Facebook or other social networking page, with the law’s author saying the bill is the first of its kind in the nation.
State Rep. Jeff Thompson, a Republican from Bossier City, Louisiana, says his new law, effective August 1, will stand up to constitutional challenge because it expands sex offender registration requirements, common in many states, to include a disclosure on the convicted criminal’s social networking sites as well.
Martinez goes on to report that Facebook “applauded” the new law.
Monday, June 04
In what is sure to set off a firestorm of privacy concerns, Anton Troianovski and Sjayndi Raice of the Wall Street Journal report Facebook is working on a way to attract younger users:
Facebook Inc. is developing technology that would allow children younger than 13 years old to use the social-networking site under parental supervision, a step that could help the company tap a new pool of users for revenue but also inflame privacy concerns.
Mechanisms being tested include connecting children’s accounts to their parents’ and controls that would allow parents to decide whom their kids can “friend” and what applications they can use, people who have spoken with Facebook executives about the technology said. The under-13 features could enable Facebook and its partners to charge parents for games and other entertainment accessed by their children, the people said.
This is a potential minefield for Facebook, which has always been under the privacy spotlight. If the report is true, it will be interesting to watch it play out.
Friday, June 01
If you had trouble logging into Facebook yesterday, you weren’t alone. Via Reuters:
Facebook’s website suffered sporadic outages on Thursday, anywhere from half an hour to two hours according to various blogs, tweets and affected users, but the company said the problem has been fixed.
Friday, May 18
Yesterday, you may have heard a little something about social behemoth Facebook’s IPO. At The Hill, Brendan Sasso breaks down the numbers:
Facebook will raise $16 billion, trailing only Visa and General Motors as the largest IPO ever.
Under the symbol “FB,” Facebook stock opened at $38 per share. That price will value the company at about $104 billion, more than McDonald’s, Disney and Starbucks.
Taking a different look at Facebook numbers, tech writer Brian Solis notes:
Now the site has more than 800 million users and a new comparison that’s worthy of blog posts, tweets and conference presentations…Facebook now has as many users as the entire Internet did in 2004, which ironically is the year Facebook debuted.
Wow.
Monday, May 14
It’s going to be a big week for Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg. First up is his birthday, which is today. Then later in the week, Facebook’s IPO, which is expected to be massive. But as Alistair Barr of Reuters reports, the 27-year-old tech titan isn’t slowing down — in fact, he’s aiming to better position Facebook for the future of the Internet:
Zuckerberg, 27, who started Facebook in his Harvard dorm room 8 years ago, said Facebook’s key priorities in 2012 were to improve its mobile application, to build stronger ties incorporating its social network with other online apps and to create a “transformative” advertising experience.
The company is “just getting started” with its mobile app, said Zuckerberg, who appeared on stage in a grey T-shirt and dark trousers at Palo Alto’s Crowne Plaza, flanked by Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg and finance chief David Ebersman.
Monday, April 23
The tech patent land rush continues, with two titans agreeing to a massive deal. As paidContent’s Jeff John Roberts reports:
Facebook announced today that it will pay $550 million to Microsoft for the right to 650 patents and patent applications.
Microsoft acquired those patents and hundreds of others in a deal with AOL earlier this month.
Between this and Facebook’s $1 billion purchase of mobile photo sharing app Instagram earlier this month, the social networking giant is currently on a big spending spree.
Thursday, March 29
That’s when Facebook will launch its initial public offering (IPO), according to Matt Lynley of Business Insider. Given there are now close to 900 million users of the service worldwide, Facebook hitting the market just might turn out to be a big deal.
Friday, March 23
In response to recent stories that some employers have been asking potential hires for their social media passwords, Facebook is weighing in. As Mashable’s Sarah Kessler reports:
“This practice undermines the privacy expectations and the security of both the user and the user’s friends,” [Facebook’s chief privacy officer Erin] Egan wrote on the Facebook Privacy blog. “It also potentially exposes the employer who seeks this access to unanticipated legal liability.”
Among the risks to employers, Egan says, are that they will come across information such as age or sexual orientation that could open them up to claims of discrimination if the applicant doesn’t get the job. Employers may also become responsible for information they uncover while pursuing private profiles, such as that which suggests a crime.
Tuesday, March 13
This is a big one. Yahoo! is suing Facebook for a score of patent infringements. Via Kara Swisher of All Things Digital:
In what is either the boldest gamble of its history or the most boneheaded, Yahoo has filed a massive patent infringement lawsuit against Facebook.
The attack by the Silicon Valley Internet icon against perhaps the most powerful consumer social networking site today — also based in tech’s heartland and also an important partner of Yahoo — is sure to be a controversial one, pitting Yahoo against a company that has surpassed it handily in recent years in regards to popularity among consumers.
“Facebook’s entire social network model, which allows users to create profiles for and connect with, among other things, persons and businesses, is based on Yahoo’s patented social networking technology,” Yahoo’s lawsuit reads, in part.
Over at Paid Content, Jeff Roberts examines the 10 patents cited in the suit. Meanwhile, TechDirt’s Mike Masnick thinks the suit will backfire on Yahoo!:
If this plan is actually based on some clueless exec’s idea of how to boost Yahoo’s share price, not only is that sadly mistaken, but it also kills off the only chance Yahoo might have had to boost its sale price going forward. Stupid, anti-innovation patent lawsuits against better, faster, more innovative competitors might seem like a short-term strategy that makes sense, but in Silicon Valley, it’s the death knell of any company.
Thursday, September 22
Earlier this week, the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland released a study, “The Facebook App Economy,” which estimated the app ecosystem of the popular social networking is now directly responsible for over 182,000 jobs. And that’s just a drop in the job creation bucket. The study also estimates the entire Facebook app economy has produced over 235,000 jobs and contributed some $15 billion to the U.S. economy.
While the current app craze may not last — at least not at its current fever pitch — there’s no denying that right now the ecosystem is thriving. And producing. And it’s not just Facebook that is growing in the app environment. Amazon, Microsoft, and the Android mobile platforms each boast healthy app stores of their own, thereby creating additional jobs, encouraging investment, and adding value to the entire economy.
Then there’s Apple’s App Store, which this past July hit two impressive milestones: over 500,000 apps available, and over 15 billion — that’s right, billion — app downloads. Think that’s impressive? Think about the number of people working on mobile apps for Apple’s service right now. Then think about the fact the company’s App Store didn’t even exist four years ago.
Just five years ago, the online economy mainly brought to mind services or advertising. But the unprecedented adoption of mobile broadband has launched a new platform where everything from a 99¢ game to an entire online book store can create careers and inspire businesses.
The mobile broadband platform has the power to drive innovation and investment for decades to come. Three short years ago, the second iPhone helped ignite the mobile broadband explosion when it made “3G” a household term. Now mobile broadband is moving into the next generation.
The LTE era is right around the corner. We should all be excited for what it will bring.
Monday, September 19
That’s how many jobs the fast-growing Facebook app ecosystem has created, accord to a new study from the University of Maryland Business School. As The Hill‘s Brendan Sasso reports:
Based on those figures and average salary estimates, the researchers concluded Facebook apps have added between $12.19 billion and $15.71 billion to the economy.
“Our findings confirm that social media platforms have created a thriving new industry,” Hann said. “As Facebook and other platforms grow, we will continue to see job growth and the ripple effects of these advances in the U.S. economy.”
The full study is available here (PDF).
Friday, August 05
Good news today in the ongoing war against spammers. As Gautham Nagesh of The Hill reports, the so-called “Spam King” of Facebook has surrendered to the FBI:
According to the Department of Justice, Sanford Wallace, 43, of Las Vegas, compromised roughly a half-million Facebook accounts and sent roughly 27 million messages through the social network between November 2008 and March 2009. He appeared in court Thursday and was released on a $100,000 bond.
Thursday, June 30
There was a time when MySpace — the social networking site that was a precursor to Facebook — seemed like it would completely dominate the Internet. Those days are over. As Brenna Ehrlich of Mashable reports:
The day that the web has been buzzing about has finally come: MySpace has been sold, to an advertising network called Specific Media for a mere $35 million.
That “mere” above is due to the fact that Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. purchased MySpace just six years ago for a whopping $580 million.
Wednesday, June 22
According to a new study from Pew, users of Facebook are more engaged in politics. Reports Eliza Krigman of Politico:
Someone who visits Facebook multiple times per day is 2 times more likely to attend a political rally or meeting, 57 percent more likely to influence someone else’s vote and 43 percent more likely to have said he or she would vote, the survey found.
Interestingly, the career-focused social site LinkedIn is tops when it comes to users taking their political activity to the voting booth.
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