Facebook Adds More Verbs To Open Graph Actions, You Can Now ‘Do’ More Stuff Through Partner Apps

new-fitness-action-compressedFacebook announced a number of new common actions today for Facebook activity, joining the “watch video” and other existing ones available to developers. These include actions in the Fitness, Books and Movies & TV categories that help users better express their interaction with media and their world. Of course, they also help developers mining the Open Graph for data get a more accurate picture of user intent and habits.

Lees meer

HTC Facebook Phone Specs Leak, Outlining A Solid Mid-Range Device With FB And Instagram Pre-Loaded

Facebook PhoneQuestion: How do you attract a key youth, mobile-first demographic to your social network and get them to increase engagement? Answer: Partner with an OEM handset manufacturer to create a powerful yet reasonably priced branded device with all your software already on board. Facebook looks to be readying a follow-up to the HTC Status, a mid-market smartphone it released with a dedicated Facebook button in 2011, and a new leak shows off its specs.

Lees meer

Cheers Raises $2.5M Series A To Expand Its Positivity Network And Make The Case To Brands

iphoneCheers, the app and social network built around giving users the chance to celebrate the good things in their lives, has raised a $2.5 million Series A funding round led by MindFund and including Charles River Ventures, Trinity Ventures, AngelList founder Naval Ravikant and others. The startup launched just over a year ago in February, and is still very much experimenting with its positivity-based social network, according to founder Farhad Mohit.

Lees meer

Twitter Adds DMARC Email Authentication To Curb Login-Jacking Attempts Via Impostor Messages

twitter-bird-calloutTwitter announced via its blog today that it has begun using DMARC, a security protocol designed to cut down the number of fake emails that users receive from companies pretending to be Twitter itself. The move should help cut down on phishing scams, where third parties try to get users to give up their login details via false requests for password verification or other personal info.

Lees meer

With 3,500 Paying Customers, HipChat Launches A Native Mac Client To Vanquish The Lousy Adobe AIR App

hipchat-formacHipChat has been doing some good things since it was acquired by Atlassian back in March 2012, including updating its iOS apps with much-needed improvements, but the sorry excuse for a Mac app it offered built on Adobe AIR remained a huge sore spot. Today, the company is officially launching its native Mac client in beta form, and it’s already a complete 180 from the previous version.

Lees meer

Twitter Study Shows Its Mobile-First Users Are Younger, More Engaged And Easier To Market To

Mobile Blog Post #2Twitter released the details of a new study about its “primary mobile users,” or those who engage with Twitter more on mobile devices and on the mobile web than on the desktop. The study, commissioned by Twitter from Kantar Media’s Compete, revealed that Twitter’s mobile-first users are more engaged than mobile users in more ways than one, skew younger, and tend to be more receptive to branded content than their desktop counterparts.

Lees meer

Path Settles With FTC Over Privacy Row, Will Pay $800K And Establish New Privacy Program Including Outside Audits

path-logoPath’s 2012 included a major hiccup when it was discovered in February last year that the app uploaded user address books in their entirety to its servers. The company quickly responded by deleting the data and apologizing for the transgression, but the damage was done: The FTC levied charges against the startup, and today the government body has announced the results of those proceedings in the form of a settlement.

Lees meer

Twitter Currently Experiencing Widespread, Rolling Service Outage

fail-whaleTwitter is currently experiencing a widespread service outage that appears to be intermittent, according to our checks with the web client, third-party apps and website service status checking tools. Other TC staff are able to access the service on and off every few minutes, but it seems like the stream is interrupted, and third-party clients like Tweetbot still appear to be having trouble connecting at all, although they’re still able to send and receive direct messages.

Lees meer

Twitter Brings Large, Lightboxed Photos To The Web, Adds Video From Vine, YouTube And More To Media Galleries

twitterTwitter has announced a couple of updates for its web service today, designed around media sharing. There’s a new interface for viewing photos, which provides a larger look at pictures without forcing users to leave the page thanks to a lightbox overlay, accessible when you click a photo from a profile page or in search results. And video from Vine, YouTube, Vimeo, and any other partner whose movie clips show up in expanded tweets now also shows up in a user’s media gallery alongside photos.

Lees meer