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Tracking Shoppers On &amp; Offline
Tracking Shoppers On & Offline

Tracking Shoppers On & Offline

Concern over new surveillance software

(Newser) - A marketing data company is blending information about consumer habits online - and offline - to create more accurate and detailed information for advertisers. AP reports Acxiom Corp is bringing to the Internet the consumer profiles and 'life-stage' categories for which it is already well known among direct-mail companies and...

Facebook CEO Apologizes for Ad System

Users can disable service after wave of privacy complaints

(Newser) - Facebook CEO's apologized today for the company's new advertising system and told users they can disable it, the Wall Street Journal reports. The system, which tracks users' web activities, raised a firestorm of complaints over privacy concerns. "We've made a lot of mistakes building this feature, but we've made...

iPhone Tops Google Search List
iPhone Tops Google Search List

iPhone Tops Google Search List

Fastest-growing US search term in 2007

(Newser) - The iPhone topped Google’s list of fastest-growing search terms this year, reports Reuters. "iPhone, of course, is a word very few people typed in a search box in 2006,” said a Google rep. “It didn’t exist.” The list was dominated by social networking and...

Tech IPOs Back, But With a Difference

Lessons of dot-com bust learned, startups wait until near-profitable

(Newser) - Tech IPOs are back--but this time around, things are more subdued than in the heady days of the dot-com boom. These days, tech startups wait until they are profitable, or at least cash-flow positive, before making a public debut, MarketWatch reports. The strong performance of VMWare's August IPO has boosted...

Beacon Does Track Users Who Log Off: Facebook

Admission contradicts earlier denials

(Newser) - Facebook has admitted that its Beacon ad system is tracking users even when they've logged off the site, PC World reports. Even those who opt out of the system that broadcasts activities to friends are being monitored. The company's email announcement reverses earlier denials and will likely stoke criticisms of...

Pioneer Blog Site Popular in Russia Sold

LiveJournal's new owners plan to add cash, expand globally

(Newser) - A free blog site that pioneered personal web publishing among Russia’s intellectuals has been sold to a pair of entrepreneurs who promise to add cash and expand it globally, Reuters reports. Six Apart said it sold LiveJournal, which claims 14.3 million blog accounts and 20 million visitors a...

Facebook Court Defeat May Presage a Fall
Facebook Court Defeat May Presage a Fall
OPINION

Facebook Court Defeat May Presage a Fall

Zuckerberg's attempted censorship 'a major fumble', says columnist

(Newser) - Facebook has been handed a defeat in its attempts to censor the independent Harvard alumni magazine 02138, which published confidential court documents relating to founder Mark Zuckerberg's earlier work for a rival site. That's a good thing, says Kara Swisher of the Wall Street Journal, for whom the attempted injunction...

$$$ Thrown at Buzz Drive Facebook's Beacon Plans

But it's proving difficult to get right on social networking sites

(Newser) - Facebook's efforts to fix its Beacon system show that talk isn't cheap, as marketers increasingly are finding it’s a great way to spread the word about their product. Word-of-mouth advertising has taken off, with nearly $981 million being spent on campaigns last year, a 36% increase from 2005, reports...

Facebook Backs Off Beacon
Facebook Backs Off Beacon

Facebook Backs Off Beacon

Switches ad platform to 'opt-in' format after users decry involuntary 'sharing'

(Newser) - Facebook has watered down its unpopular Beacon ad platform, which "shared" information about users' online shopping habits with everyone in their Facebook network—without their permission. Now, instead of making users opt out every time they make a purchase if they don't want it to be broadcast, Facebook will...

Your Log-in Please, Sir?
Your Log-in Please, Sir?

Your Log-in Please, Sir?

Social networking sites for the super-rich

(Newser) - The super-rich are joining the social networking craze, but they're certainly not going to mix with the masses on MySpace. Exclusive sites for millionaires using the same membership criteria as snooty country clubs are appearing on the Web, reports the Wall Street Journal. Invitation-only site aSmallWorld.net has proven popular—...

Backlash Forces Facebook to Retool Beacon

Users feel 'creeped out' by advertiser info-sharing platform

(Newser) - Facebook execs are pondering changes to the unpopular Beacon advertising platform after massively negative feedback, reports Business Week, and an announcement on "evolving" it could come as soon as today. Users are threatening mutiny over the tool, less than a month old, that tells their friends all about their...

Newspapers Look to Make Connections
Newspapers Look to Make Connections

Newspapers Look to Make Connections

Trying to reach younger readers, more will link to Facebook and MySpace

(Newser) - Newspapers readers at an increasing pace are turning to Pluck, a media syndication company, to link their sites to social networks, like MySpace and Facebook, giving them access to 165 million users, Reuters reports. Pluck will use the Facebook programming interface and Google's OpenSocial system to share information between its...

Privacy, Shmivacy: Facebook Is Doomed
Privacy, Shmivacy: Facebook Is Doomed
OPINION

Privacy, Shmivacy: Facebook Is Doomed

Unwanted interactions killing social networking

(Newser) - Aggressive new advertising tactics make Facebook look more evil by the day, but don’t worry, InformationWeek columnist Cory Doctorow writes, because it’s doomed anyway. Sure social networks are “pure crack” for some, but sooner or later everyone gets friended by someone they’d rather avoid, and eventually...

Facebook Feud Heats Up
Facebook Feud Heats Up

Facebook Feud Heats Up

Independent Harvard alumni magazine dishes the dirt on it

(Newser) - Three former Harvard students who are suing Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for stealing their idea are finally about to get their day in court, reports the indy Harvard alumni magazine 02138. Forensic data experts are searching  Zuckerberg’s computer hard drives, searching for source code, which the company claims is...

Networking Teens Risk Identity Theft

UK study says millions share data too casually with strangers

(Newser) - Millions of young users of social networking sites are risking identity theft because of information shared online, warns a UK study reported in the Independent today. Britain's privacy watchdog concludes that 4.5 million web users from 14 to 21 years old could be vulnerable to identity fraud, and young...

Facebook Fights Anti-Privacy Charges
Facebook Fights Anti-Privacy Charges

Facebook Fights Anti-Privacy Charges

Battle with MoveOn hinges on the meaning of 'private'

(Newser) - Facebook jumped to the defense of its new social advertising program yesterday, under attack by a MoveOn campaign. MoveOn calls the program a “massive privacy breach,” but Facebook says that misrepresents Beacon, which does not make information "public." "Information is shared with a small selection...

Facebook is Grinch Stealing X-mas: MoveOn

Group vows battle, saying ads violate user privacy

(Newser) - MoveOn.org plans to campaign against Facebook's "Beacon" ads, and do it on the social networking site's own turf, News.com reports. MoveOn promises an ad drive, a protest group, and an online petition over the advertisements—which post information about users' purchases on friends' news feeds. MoveOn calls...

Wiki Founder May Take on Facebook
Wiki Founder May Take on Facebook

Wiki Founder May Take on Facebook

Jimmy Wales' new project combines networking, search

(Newser) - Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales is apparently going after Facebook and Google in the social-networking arena, Wired reports. Wales showed slides of his upcoming project during a speech in South Africa, and a tech blogger on hand described it as a "search/social networking hybrid" that incorporates elements of both internet...

Techno Savvy Teens Turn Backs on Email

Online chatting, text messages dominate youth communication

(Newser) - If snail mail is going the way of the dodo, then it looks like, among teenagers, email is going the way of, well, the snail: half of all teens prefer instant messaging to old-fashioned emails; and while overall use increased six percent last year, e-missives among the "Facebook generation"...

Inside the 'PayPal Mafia'
 Inside the 'PayPal Mafia'

Inside the 'PayPal Mafia'

Company's first generation behind $30 billion of cutting edge companies

(Newser) - They may be the most brilliantly successful—or luckiest—or both—small group of entrepreneurs in history: PayPal alumni who, like founders Peter Thiel and Max Levchin, left the company to create $30 billion worth of innovation: YouTube, Facebook, Slide, Yelp, Digg, investment firms, philanthropies, solar-power companies, an electric car...

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