Advocates have been attempting to get this approval since 2003, but the movement for the .xxx TLD has bred controversy, as do most conversations around the porn industry.

The new domain names will be registered through the ICM Registry. Already, nearly 230,000 URLs have been reserved. ICM expects the URLs to sell wholesale for around $60 each. Porn site owners won’t have to relinquish their .com or other URLs, and .xxx domains won’t be mandatory for sites with adult content.

Sales of .xxx domains should begin soon in Q2 2011.

In addition to promising consumers of Internet porn safety from online fraud (including e-mail spoofing, phishing and spam) and child pornography, ICM is also telling webmasters they will see more traffic and higher profits with the new domain, which it says will become a trusted brand for porn connoisseurs.

In addition to the .xxx URLs, ICM is dropping hints about a unique micro-payments platform for porn content on the web. It says the new system will be “safe, secure and anonymous,” potentially opening floodgates of new revenue for the porn industry.

ICANN has been seriously considering approving this TLD since last summer.

Image courtesy of Flickr, adrian_wallett.

More About: ICANN, porn, registry, TLD, url

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That’s precisely what Richard Barton Jr. of Grand Rapids, Michigan, did; he’s now out of jail, perhaps but briefly, on a personal recognizance bond.

Barton, 34, had been estranged from his first wife, Adina Quarto, for a period of several years. The couple, who have a six-year-old son, had discussed getting a divorce in the past, but neither party followed through on those discussions.

As Quarto told The Grand Rapids Press, “He told me he just wanted to ignore the situation and pretend I didn’t exist.”

Barton had also become engaged in 2010 to a woman who thought he was divorced; shortly after that, he unfriended his first wife on Facebook and married the other woman, posting wedding photos to his Facebook profile.

Unfortunately for Barton, he never adjusted the privacy settings on those photos to disallow viewing by his first wife. Although she and Barton were no longer Facebook friends, Quarto was able to see pictures of what appeared to be a beach wedding.

After a few months and still none of the promised divorce papers in the mail, Quarto did the only thing she could do: She called the police. Barton was arrested Wednesday.

We know that Facebook photos have recently been providing some pretty damning evidence in divorce cases, but this latest misstep takes Facebook faux pas to an entirely new level.

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Earlier this week at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas, Mashable interviewed a handful of celebrities and social media influencers on Facebook Live from the Mashable House.

Among the guests were Dane Cook and Facebook exec Randi Zuckerberg, who chatted about how to grow a Facebook page, the effect of social media on news and information distribution, Cook’s upcoming Broadway debut, and a lot more suring the 27-minute interview.

Check it out in the video above, and in the comments section, let us know what you think.

More About: dane cook, mashable, randi zuckerberg, sxsw, sxsw 2011, sxswi, sxswi 2011, video

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Name: Embedly

Quick Pitch: Embedly is a platform for converting URLs into embeddable content.

Genius Idea: Embedding all the media on the web.

When traversing the web, most site visitors will stay on a page 250% longer when there’s embedded media, Sean Creeley tells me. This stat is based on findings from a Google AdWords test he ran last year.

Creeley is the founder of Y Combinator startup Embedly; Embedly’s mission is to make it painstakingly easy for publishers and application developers to add that embedded media and better engage their web users.

“The idea is to engage the user where they are,” says Creeley. “We really want to get the user where they live, instead of making them try to jump through hoops to view multimedia content.”

Embedly can make a call to any web URL or RSS feed, grab the associated media — photos, videos, audio and text — and embed it on a third-party site. So, what the “New Twitter” can now do for TwitPic photos and YouTube videos in the stream, Embedly can do for nearly anything.

In fact, Embedly has created the consumer-facing Parrotfish — available as a Safari, Firefox or Chrome plugin — to bring the web’s media from more than 165 providers into the Twitter.com experience. Twitter becomes infinitely richer via Parrotfish and gives all those URLs your friends share in their tweets instant context — even Mashable articles become readable on Twitter.com.

Parrotfish is just proof of Embedly’s behind-the-scenes technology — something you likely encounter as you flit about the web but never notice it. On a daily basis, Embedly serves 5.5 million URLs to 1,100 sites.

Here’s what that means: if you use Yammer, Tweetdeck, Bit.ly Bundles, Storify, Keepstream, Reddit and several other social web products, then you’re using Embedly. Embedly powers the content embedding for all of these services so that URLs come alive as content you can see or hear on site. On Meetup, for instance, Embedly makes it possible for users to add and listen to SoundCloud tracks on site.

The Embedly customer can choose from a free plan with access to 250 providers or the pro plan that unlocks content associated with any URL or RSS feed. The paid service comes with daily, hourly and minute-by-minute breakdowns of the most popular URLs and domains, as well as Google Safe Browse security features to protect their site visitors against masked URL phishing tactics.

In the future, the Boston-based company hopes to help more publishers get their content off their site and assist with the “Youtube-ization of the Internet,” says Creeley. “Every piece of content is going to be able to be shared and embedded elsewhere.”

Look for the startup to push into the mobile frontier first. Embedly plans to release an iOS library and Android library, which will let customers add embedded content into the mobile experience. The company will start accepting signups for beta access next week.

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

More About: bizspark, embedly, rss, spark-of-genius, startup, URLs

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While Flash 10.2 for Android boasts performance enhancements that improve the experience on mobile, the thrust of this update is to bring Flash to tablet devices like the Motorola Xoom. Adobe says it has been working closely with Google “to ensure tight integration and optimization between Flash Player 10.2 and new OS and browser capabilities.”

The result, Adobe says, is an integrated and fully functional browsing experience. Adobe wanted to make sure a web page with Flash appeared on Android tablets the way it does on the desktop, in the way intended by the page designer.

While Flash 10.2 for Android 2.2 and 2.3 is a production general availability release, Flash 10.2 for Android 3.0 is a beta release. In the next few weeks, Adobe intends to release GA version of Flash 10.2 for Android Honeycomb that enables hardware acceleration and Stave Video support.

Support for Stage Video and hardware acceleration was added to Flash Player 10.2 for the desktop, which was released last month. Combined, these technologies should improve the playback of HD video video and embedded content on tablet devices.

Flash 10.2 for Android 2.2, 2.3 and 3.0.1 is available for download in the Android Marketplace.

More About: adobe, android, android tablet, Flash 10.2, Google, motorola xoom, xoom

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First, Meredith titles Better Homes and Gardens, Fitness and Parents released their respective first issues for the device, followed by Condé Nast’s Self [iTunes link] and a “bonus issue” from Cosmopolitan [iTunes link] magazine, owned by Hearst.

While the latter two were by no means as elegant as Better Homes and Gardens — which re-drafted its layouts and used video and manipulable graphics to enhance much of its staple content — they made up for it somewhat in interactivity.

Cosmo‘s quizzes are much more fun (and easier to keep track of) on the iPad than in hard copy, while Self‘s monthly slew of workout moves, for instance, can be more quickly identified and replicated thanks to sliding animations.

Some interactions, however, are more flash than substance. Cosmo‘s animated makeup how-tos are far too vague to be useful, and the diet tracker Self included in its April issue is likewise useless without a way to enter notes (i.e., keep track of anything at all).

By far the most interesting — and certainly shocking — use of in-app audio to date goes to Cosmo, which recorded men simulating various sex noises. (We don’t suggest you play “the loud moaner” at top volume in your office.)

Although neither Self nor Cosmo are groundbreaking magazine apps, regular readers of both titles will find a better experience on the iPad than in the magazines’ respective print editions. And with time and feedback, we hope, both titles will develop better versions for the device.

Preview Gallery

More About: conde nast, cosmo, magazine, media, meredith, self

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If you’re interested in mitigating that risk, you’ll want to take a look at Moki.tv, an all-in-one guide to the Internet’s entertainment offerings.

From Moki, you can browse a broad and deep catalog of almost all the silver-screen and small-screen content available on the web. You can watch free content from Hulu; subscription stuff from Hulu Plus, Netflix, Amazon Prime and Comcast’s xfinity tv; and on-demand TV and movies from iTunes and Amazon Video On Demand. You can sign up with Facebook Connect, then simply select the content services you already use; Moki makes it easy to connect service with third-party authentication, so you won’t need to remember any logins.

Once you’re in, you’ll be able to rate movies and get recommendations — you can even pull your rating from Netflix to Moki and vice versa — and create a queue of shows and movies to watch. The site uses your ratings as well as ratings from IMDb, Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes to make recommendations for you; and the recommendations I got were spot-on, especially after I had imported my Netflix ratings.

Not only can you find and watch what you love without visiting a half-dozen websites; you can also find new shows and films to watch that are similar to ones you’ve already watched. You can sort content by genre, rating, popularity and release date; or you can browse award-winning films and TV shows. The site also has fascinating curated collections of content, like Shakespeare adaptations or Clint Eastwood flicks hand-picked by Eastwood himself.

In addition to getting boatloads of online video, you can explore trending lists of actors and directors, read synopses, write reviews, leave comments, and more. And perhaps best of all, if you signed up with Facebook Connect, you have an instant social connection and can see your friends’ ratings and reviews on content, too.

The site, though new, is remarkably full-featured; many of these cool features are made possible by clever integrations with existing sites and apps.

You can expect to see streaming media sources on Moki.tv soon. Currently, the site’s founders are polling users to find out which streaming sources are the most requested. Moki’s also working on an API.

We like the premise of the site — one-stop shopping for watching TV and movies online — and we like the UI, which is sleekly designed with lots of nice touches. Check it out for yourself, and let us know what you think.

Moki, Inc. is an San Francisco-based Y Combinator startup founded by Matt Huang, a recent MIT math grad, and Sandy Spicer, a fellow dev from MIT. The company is currently hiring looking for local engineering talent.

More About: entertainment, moki.tv, Movies, television, y combinator

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UPDATE: Rose has confirmed this news in a tweet, which reads in part, “I’ll continue advising Digg [and serve] on the board of directors and taping Diggnation (as I have been since [Matt Williams] joined).”

Rose founded Digg in December of 2004, and quickly saw the social news site become one of the hottest in the then burgeoning Web 2.0 space. Over the years, however, Digg’s prominence has declined, and Rose has spent less time with the company and more time on other projects, like the newsletter/podcast “Foundation.”

TechCrunch says that Rose is close to completing funding for a new startup.

Rumors of Rose’s departure from Digg have swirled around the echo chamber for months. In light of the various challenges faced by the company — including layoffs, management changes and plummeting traffic — we aren’t especially surprised to see Rose moving on.

Almost immediately after the launch of “New Digg” in August, users responded by revolting and leaving the service en masse. Competitors like Reddit and StumbleUpon have benefited from the user exodus, and though Digg has tried to realign its vision, it hasn’t had much success in winning back users.

We’ve reached out to Digg for comment and will update if we learn more.

More About: digg, kevin rose, startups

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Can Facebook save lives? Here’s video evidence, telling the story of college student Nitesh Bhakta, who spotted hooded burglars in his living room. He quickly grabbed his laptop and slipped undetected into the attic as the intruders tied up his grandmother and sister and then ransacked the house.

Good thing his Wi-Fi signal reached that far, because he was able to summon help by typing one word into his Facebook status: “HELLLLLLLLP!” His best friend saw the message, called 911, and the cops showed up to save the day.

Nitesh is lucky he has friends who spend lots of time on Facebook, resulting in a police response time that rivaled the speed of calling 911. The resourceful guy and his loyal friends, using the tools at hand, might have saved a couple of lives with the social network’s help.

This might help even things out, given the way that bad guys also use Facebook for their evil deeds.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, emyerson

More About: 911, cry for help, emergency, facebook, life-saving, robbery

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So, what exactly does it take to create a killer app? A good idea, focus, determination and lots of luck certainly help. But there are other factors that up-and-comers can glean from seasoned developers who have been there, done that, and done it well.

I had the opportunity to speak with a handful of leading app developers in the mobile marketplace — established leaders whose products in iTunes consistently top either the highest-grossing or most-downloaded lists. These developers know their stuff, and generously gave a sneak peek into what it takes to create a blockbuster app. Remember, to be the best, you have to learn from the best. Here's what they had to say.

Customize for the Device

The experience that a gamer has on an iPhone compared to a gaming console is dramatically different. Developers need to be aware of the limitations a smaller screen has on the overall experience and create apps that are designed for the particular device. Engaging with a game should be easy and seamless for users, and according to Jason Kapalka, co-founder and chief creative officer at PopCap Games, Inc., it's important to remember that "iPhones aren't PCs or consoles." Seems glaringly obvious, but what developers often overlook is that people use apps on their mobile devices much differently than they do on a more interactive gaming device like the Wii or Xbox.

"When we built Bejeweled and Plants vs. Zombies for the iPhone, we spent a lot of time making sure the controls felt right on the touchscreen. There are lots of iPhone and iPad games that have amazing graphics and great depth, but if the controls are awkward or frustrating on a touchscreen device, none of that matters."

See the Potential for the Platform

Rob Murray, CEO of Firemint Pty Ltd and developer of Flight Control, urges developers to not only take the platform's limitations into consideration, but more importantly, look beyond the limitations to see where the potential lies. "Why do people want to play a particular type of game on this device? What makes it more compelling than a desktop or console?"

Murray is a huge proponent of identifying what the device can do for your app and not the other way around. "Take Flight Control and the iPhone. We embraced the touch screen and used it to great effect. The control scheme is intuitive, elegant and accessible and takes advantage of the ability to interact directly with the game." Taking a feature like the touch screen and maximizing its ability to add to the user experience can make engagement that much more profound. Murray adds, "With each advance in mobile technology comes the potential to do something unique."

Make it Personal

Most great inventions are born from a personal need or desire, and Dave Castelnuovo, from Bolt Creative and co-creator of Pocket God, thinks that app development is no different. In many cases, developers are so focused on filling a niche in the market or creating something that they think will be successful, but don't take into consideration what they personally would seek in an app experience. "The game industry is a hit-driven business and requires you to make a connection with the audience,” Castelnuovo says. “You can make that connection much stronger by creating something that you naturally respond to instead of guessing how someone else will receive it."

Once you have something that hits you on a personal level, you can have more confidence in putting it on the market. If it speaks to you, there's a good chance that it will for others as well. At the same time, Castelnuovo advises developers against agonizing over every single decision. Create a good quality product and set the bar high, but leave room for adaptability and know when to move on. "The original Pocket God app only took us one week to develop and was only meant to be a stepping stone onto bigger and better things. Since we didn't have expectations for it, I think it freed us to do something unique."

Get Feedback Early On

Semyon Voinov, a creative director at ZeptoLab and one of the creators of the wildly successful Cut the Rope apps, stresses the importance of getting the app out to as many people as possible from the early stages of development. Once the app is in their hands, observe how they interact with it and analyze what doesn't seem to be working. "When you notice your friend is not in a hurry to return your device, you are on a good track," adds Voinov.

Prototype, prototype, prototype. Don't keep development under cloak and dagger. Showing the app to friends and family from the get-go will give you a better sense of the collective feedback, and you can tweak the app as it is being developed and come out with a more refined product in the end. The key is to customize the process at every stage, expose it to everyone you know and get the feedback before it is released to the public.

Think Big

Go big or go home is the decree of Bart Decrem, SVP and General Manager of Disney Mobile, and co-founder of Tapulous. Building an app with a big audience in mind positions it well for wider adoption and greater chance for success. What worked for Decrem and his Tap Tap Revenge team was creating an app that they thought was fun, engaging and would appeal to a huge potential fan base. Offering interactive experiences on-the-go, appealing to both iOS and Android users and building an inherently intuitive interface made the team confident in their chances for success.

"Not only is the app [Tap Tap Revenge 4] free, but when we pick the music for the game and launch new music on an ongoing basis, we match it with what's hot on the iTunes charts so we can have the biggest reach possible. At the end of the day, the most important thing to consider when developing a mobile app is your audience."

Start Free

Nothing in life is free, but au contraire, sometimes a really good app is. To get maximum exposure, you need to make your app available to the masses early on to get the early adoption rates and word-of-mouth buzz off the ground. You know you have a killer app on your hands, but no one else does, so you have to spread the word. They say that money talks, but in the app world, free talks.

Michael Bevin, co-founder of CandyCane LLC, and designer of top-selling games Fling! and Fuzzle fully supports the freemium model, at least initially. "Having made a great game, you still need to get it exposure somehow — whether by doing some kind of deal, giving it away for free initially, or at least having a free version." You can eventually add more features and put a price on the app, but having a free version makes it more available to consumers to at least test out and see if it's worth putting the money down.

Listen to Your Customers

You may have serious designs for what you want your app to be, but along with that must come flexibility and adaptability to your customers' needs. If you look in iTunes and read ratings for apps, time and time again, customers get irritated when common complaints about the app are not addressed in subsequent version upgrades. That is a sure fire way to lose customers and quickly fall into iTunes oblivion.

Philippe Khan, CEO of Fullpower Technologies, Inc., the maker of MotionX GPS, states that the company "spends considerable energy to differentiate, and focus on quality and customer support." When you are dedicated to constantly innovating your technology and incorporating feedback, consumers respond and appreciate the concerted effort, which in turn creates a more loyal customer.

Delight the User

Among the hundreds and thousands of apps available in iTunes, there has to be something unique about yours that makes it stand out. For Dave Lieb, co-founder and CEO of Bump Technologies, Inc., and creator of the ever popular Bump application, offering something amazing is a primary criterion for creating a killer app. "The app has to delight the user in some way, it has to provide real value or entertainment in a way that isn't transient."

When users are delighted, they will tell their friends about it and word-of-mouth is a crucial part of any app's success. Bump is the eighth most downloaded iOS app of all time in the U.S. and Lieb credits its users as having everything to do with that level of success. "We spent a total of $42 on marketing to create our original YouTube demo video: $22 for black felt for a backdrop and $20 for a pack of video tapes for a borrowed camera." That's a true testament to how powerful a delighted user can be in extending your brand for you.

Have a Vision

You may have a great idea, but you need to think beyond it and anticipate how the app will change behavior in a real-world setting. When SoundHound, Inc. began creating its innovative eponymous sound recognition app, they applied the need to an everyday occurrence and envisioned how users would interact with the technology they wanted to unleash.

"How many times have you hoped a radio DJ would repeat the name of the song you just heard, or have had a song stuck in your head that you didn't know the name of?" asks Kathleen McMahon, vice president at SoundHound. The team envisioned these scenarios and set out to create a mobile solution and set a new bar for music recognition.

Creating an app that has a useful context and provides utility, in addition to entertainment, is SoundHound's driving success. It's all about vision. McMahon states clearly, "Know what you are trying to achieve. Are you going to be a one-hit wonder or tour de force? You can be either. However, if you answer, 'I’m not sure,' then question getting into the game at all. Killer apps are built on vision, not passivity."

Never Give Up

Tenacity, persistence and never giving up are big reasons why these developers have achieved their stratospheric levels of success. Not surprisingly, nearly all of them included this likely, yet important piece of advice in their responses: Developers need to have the patience to continually ask themselves what is going to make their app better. In this crowded marketplace, an app needs to somehow stand out to get recognized. "Emphasize design and functionality. Quality cannot be overstated. Savvy consumers quickly identify the best products and if you truly offer something outstanding, the market will react,” says Jenny Kang, lead designer at AllAboutApps and creator of AppBox Pro.

Ed Williams, VP of mobile applications at Excelltech Inc., the maker of the clever Fake-A-Call app concurs. "Don't give up. Refine your idea until it can be easily implemented, and have a list of advanced features you can add with updates if your first release is well-received." And although he never anticipated Fake-A-Call having such mass appeal, Williams is intent on releasing frequent updates, addressing customer concerns, always keeping the app relevant — and never giving up.

More About: android, App, developing, iphone, itunes, List, Lists, Mobile 2.0, mobile app, tech

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Earlier this week, Mashable interviewed celebrities and influencers on Facebook Live from the Mashable House in Austin, Texas during the South by Southwest Interactive conference.

Among the guests were Rainn Wilson and director James Gunn, who discussed their upcoming movie "Super," which opens April 1, the role social media now plays in movie making and who they like to follow on Twitter.

Check it out in the video above.

More About: james gunn, rainn wilson, sxsw

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It’s hard to believe the Interactive portion of South by Southwest has come and gone. Mashable would like to thank our community who supported us during the festival – from those who spent time with us at the Mashable SXSWi House, watched our Facebook Live interviews, tweeted about our interviews and panel discussion and checked in with our Gowalla partnership.

We’re also thrilled that Mashable was named the most buzzed about brand during SXSWi in a study by Ad Age and the social media analytics firm People Browsr based on brand mentions of specific companies across Facebook and Twitter. A big thanks to everyone!

We had more than 8,000 SXSWi attendees come through the doors at the Mashable SXSWi House for two days of Geek Games, dancing to DJ Chicken George and Eclectic Method, and Sony Bloggie Bootcamp. It was a pleasure meeting and spending time with our community of readers. A special thanks to Romany Malco for hosting the Geek Games!

Video highlights from around SXSWi:

iPad2 SXSW Launch

Mashable's Christina Warren visits the new pop-up Apple store in Austin, TX.

Mike Tyson Interview

Our editor in chief, Adam Ostrow, went toe-to-toe with Mike Tyson for five good minutes. Watch as Adam gets the details about Tyson's new mobile game, his acting career, and his new reality show.

It's Not TV, It's Social TV

Interactive television experts gathered on Saturday at SXSWi in Austin, Texas to discuss the future of social TV.Panelists, which ranged from the likes of Chloe Sladden of Twitter to Gavin Purcell from Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, discussed ways in which they incorporate social media into popular television shows such as "No Reservations with Anthony Bourdain" and "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon."Fred Graver, the senior VP of Travel Channel, spoke to the audience about his initial skepticism regarding the integration of Twitter into "No Reservations." "It wasn't a no brainer for us." said Graver. "The whole thing here is if you have 36-48 hours before the show premiers, do you want to spend your time talking about Tony (Bourdain) live-tweeting? And that was a big discussion but we decided, yes lets do it."Doing it proved to be successful for Graver and the Travel Channel, with "No Reservations" currently at more than 1 million "likes" on Facebook and an increasingly active Twitter following.

Dennis Crowley on the Future of Foursquare

Mashable CEO and founder Pete Cashmore interviews Foursquare co-founder Dennis Crowley at South By Southwest Interactive 2011 on the future of Foursquare.

Ben Huh Talks Sketchy Bunnies

Let's face it: People in animals suits are just uniformly creepy - especially when they're interacting with children. That's why Ben Huh, founder and CEO of the Cheezburger Network, plans to launch a seasonal site dedicated to sketchy Easter bunnies.

Congratulations to Team Divasanddorks who defeated more than 40 teams to win the Geek Games. And congrats to Catherine Ward who won the Sony Internet TV with her Singstar Dance skills on PS3.

Shortly, we’ll be highlighting the photos and vides you submitted through our CNN iReport SXSW partnership.

Don’t forget to tag yourself in our Facebook and Flickr albums!
You can also view photos from the Mashable SXSWi House on our Pixable Photofeed with the Facebook plug-in or iPad app: http://pixb.ly/sxsw

In the meantime, here are some photo highlights of our time at SXSWi in Austin, Texas.

Pete Cashmore & Dennis Crowley

Mashable CEO Pete Cashmore interviews Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley during a featured Q&A at SXSWi.

Ogilvy Notes

Artists take notes of Pete Cashmore's interview with Dennis Crowley.

Ellen Page and Randi Zuckerberg

Ellen Page and Randi Zuckerberg pose for a pic after their Facebook Live interview.

Rainn Wilson, Randi Zuckerber, and James Gunn

The three pose for a few shots after Randi interviewed Rainn and James about their new movie, "Super."

Kevin Rose

Digg's co-founder's talks during a Facebook Live session at the Mashable SXSWi House.

Twister

Mashable's readers square off against one another, hoping to win the Geek Games.

Geek Games

Contestants compete for free swag.

Geek Games Winners!

Congrats to Team Divas And Dorks on winning the Geek Games!

Shuffleboard

People kick back at SXSW.

Romany Malco

Actor Romany Malco, who emceed the Geek Games, gets to know his fans at the Mashable House.

DJ Chicken George

DJ Chicken George laid down the tracks for first night's party at the SXSWi Mashable House.

Partygoers

The party was in full swing all night long at the Mashable house at SXSWi.

Eclectic Method

Eclectic Method laid down the tracks for second night's party at the SXSWi Mashable House.

Sharon Feder

Mashable's managing editor, Sharon Feder, speaks about "the new workplace" on a panel at SXSWi.

Adam Ostrow & Mike Tyson

Editor-in-Chief Adam Ostrow hangs out with former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson.

Brenna Ehrlich & Ben Huh from "I Can Haz"

Mashable's Brenna Ehrlich and Ben Huh, CEO of Cheezburger Network, show off a Mashable Follow badge sticker.

Austin By Night

The Texas State Capitol.

Social Food Truck

Austin loves food trucks. Here is the Chi'lantro fusion food truck encouraging patrons to check in via Gowalla, SXSWi's official location-based app.

Tacos!

Four for a dollar! No wonder the wait was so long ... and worth it!

Mashable team photo

Mashable team members Stacy Green, Pete Cashmore and Morgan Berk outside of the Mashable SXSWi House.

And a final big thanks to our sponsors PepsiMax, Sony Electronics, Skifta and .TV!

Come check out the Pepsi MAX Lot at 3rd Street and San Jacinto Boulevard! Follow @PepsiMAX on Twitter for the daily schedule for huge concerts, happy hours, BBQs, games, and giveaways! And, well, lots of free soda..

Sony Electronics is a leading provider of audio and video electronics and information technology products for the consumer and professional markets. Sony is noted for a wide range of consumer audio-visual products, such as the BRAVIA® LCD and 3D high-definition televisions, Cyber-shot® and α (alpha) digital cameras, Handycam® camcorder and Walkman® personal stereo. Sony is also an innovator in the IT arena with its VAIO® personal computers; and in high-definition professional broadcast and production equipment, highlighted by the XDCAM® HD and CineAlta™ lines of cameras and camcorders, and the SXRD™ 4K digital projector. Join the Sony Conversation at Sony.com/Blog.

Skifta is an app-based media shifting service that turns your Android phone into a global remote control. Easily access your digital media from virtually any source and stream to connected electronics in the home. With the DLNA Certified® Skifta app on your phone, you can easily access music, photos and videos from your phone, the cloud, or remotely from your home and stream that media to connected DLNA and UPnP consumer electronics including TVs, IP-stereos like Sonos systems, PlayStation® 3 consoles, Windows 7 PCs, and thousands more. No wires, downloading or side loading. Check it out at skifta.com.

If your website has a play button, it belongs on .TV. Stand out from the crowd with a .TV domain name; tell people you create and share great video content on your site even before they visit. Come visit us in the Mashable House at Buffalo Billiards on March 13-14 for a chance to register a FREE .TV domain name. And, mark your calendars: the .TV AUCTION starts March 9. Bid on desirable, sought-after domain names including air.tv, stocks.tv, who.tv, and more at moniker.com/tv or register the .TV of your choice for while you're there.

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People are complaining in the iTunes Customer Reviews about the ads, not necessarily because they’re there — advertisements already adorned the Angry Birds HD level-selection screen. However, now if you want to try a level again, when you pause and start over on that level, the “Rovio News” ads show up, slowing down your quest for the coveted three eggs on that particular level.

Adding advertising to free apps seems justified, but slipping the ads into this $5 Angry Birds HD app somehow crosses a certain line. You’ve paid your $5, so you should be allowed to escape all those ads for Angry Birds merchandise.

Lets be fair, though — you get a tremendous amount of gameplay for your $5. It’s just that we were getting that gameplay without the ads before, and now it feels like something has been taken away. Will Rovio remove the ads, or wait for the firestorm to die down?

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When Pandora unsealed her fabled box, she unleashed all the evils of the world. As I read through the recently unsealed Pandora IPO, I instead see a lot that is encouraging. Pandora has opened its “box” and served notice that online radio can and will be a meaningful and profitable business.

The monthly rankings from Ando Media show Pandora with an 11 month AAS (average active sessions — roughly equivalent to “AQH“) of 440,000, from which the company generated approximately $100 million in ad sales in 2010. Then, in December, Pandora’s numbers jumped to 642,614 in AAS. That's an enormous uptick in one month, given Pandora’s previous average. The spike bodes well for its performance in 2011. If you do some quick math, you'll see Pandora monetizing at a rate of about $225 annually per listener.

While this number is considerably lower than terrestrial radio's (estimated to be approximately $400 per listener annually), it has grown dramatically in just this past year. Pandora is monetizing its audience at better than half the rate of terrestrial radio, even though Pandora is still in relative infancy. It’s able to do all this while serving just three ads per listener hour.

How is Pandora getting so much traction with just a fraction of the amount of terrestrial radio's commercial content? Here are the three reasons why.

1. Make It Interactive

Pandora is a multimedia interactive and social experience. As such, monetization does not come purely in the form of audio advertisements. In fact, audio is not even the driving force in many cases. With the Pandora audience continuously interacting with the various features enabled on its player, many visual advertising options are created and monetized. Just think of Pandora's player as a website — because it is one.

The takeaway: Online audio can and should be a multimedia and interactive experience.

2. Target Your Audience

Pandora has sophisticated targeting capabilities which allow it to sell ads at a very high CPM. Joining Pandora as a registered user means the company is able to capture a meaningful amount of data about you. That information is then used to ensure you receive more relevant advertising. The power here is in Pandora's ability to keep a very limited inventory and deliver advertisers high value.

The takeaway: Audience targeting creates higher value advertising.

3. Engage on Mobile

The hottest growth category of all advertising is mobile. EMarketer expects mobile marketing to hit the one billion dollar mark this year, and the Pandora audience is highly mobile. With 80 million registered users, many of whom have downloaded the mobile app, Pandora’s mobile audience is huge and growing. Highly engaged listeners let Pandora compete favorably against mobile RFPs coming from big digital agencies. CPMs in this space are very, very big because of mobile's ability to target listeners down to their physical location.

The takeaway: An engaged mobile audience has great value for advertisers.

Pandora’s Limitations

Pandora's IPO buzz proves the company has done a lot of things right. The audience Pandora has built is larger than any of its competitors in the online radio space, and Pandora offers a highly customized, engaging and socialized experience with less commercial interruption. All good.

For all its growth and strengths, there are limitations to Pandora’s appeal. In its current form, I personally find Pandora more of a replacement for my iPod or satellite radio than my overall radio experience. It’s more of an at-home, workout or long car drive attraction for me. Sometimes, I miss having content professionally curated or being able to sort out local content. For these reasons, Pandora can’t yet compete for my drive time listening. But I trust not everyone is like me, and I’m sure that the team at Pandora is hard at work tackling these issues.

Offline Radio

Even still, offline radio companies have yet to mount a real offense in the online game. Concerns over protecting the existing revenue base from cannibalization, protecting profit margins in highly leveraged capital structures and the burdensome expense of online music royalties have held many from dipping toes in online waters. In fact, the top terrestrial companies are growing their online audience at a slower rate than pure-play competitors. Believe it or not, some are even minimizing audiences by timing out streams and cutting off international access.

Bob Pittman, Clear Channel’s chairman of media and entertainment platforms, recently remarked at an industry conference that Pandora offered “a set of features” that he felt his company and others would soon be providing to their own online audiences. This would bode well for offline radio companies but would likely require partners, time and considerable investment. I think Clear Channel's recent acquisition of Thumbplay’s music service shows terrestrial companies recognize it’s time to get aggressive.

I believe we will see terrestrial broadcasters dive deeper into the pool. Incumbent broadcasters would have a considerable advantage if they mobilize quickly. They maintain the overwhelming advantages of audience scale, quality content and local presence.

Consumers’ lifestyles are also quickly changing. New technologies are more elegant and simple to use, and the winds of the advertising ecosystem are blowing heavily toward digital. Terrestrial radio now shares its orbit around local advertisers with the likes of Pandora, Groupon, Patch, Facebook, Google, local portals and other pure plays. In the years ahead, the broadcast model will be challenged as smaller companies gain at least a basic level of digital sophistication. It'll be fascinating to watch how radio responds and takes part in the market's evolution.

Who’s Winning?

The opening of Pandora’s IPO should serve notice to all companies in the radio space — whether they're offline, online, or both: The business opportunity here is real. To compete in and win this game, you must be truly interactive, social, mobile and highly targetable. Pandora and other companies like it pose a threat and at the same time signal an opportunity. The “box” has been opened. Now what?

Disclosure: The author’s company works with Pandora to sell audio ads on its platform.

Image courtesy of Flickr, santibon

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This week, our valued sponsors are: IDG, Elsevier, Pepsi MAX, Vocus, VMware, Hubspot, SES New York Conference & Expo, Level 3 Communications, Qualcomm's Snapdragon, LogMeIn Ignition, CUNY School of Professional Studies, Sourcebits, Oneupweb, SoftLayer, Atlantic.Net, SRDS, Buddy Media, Gillette, Clickatell, Microsoft BizSpark, MaxCDN and Eventbrite.

With the explosion of mobile devices, advertising dollars will begin to shift to mobile for tech marketers this year. IDG Global Solutions President Matt Yorke talks about the rise of social and how IDG helps marketers create social campaigns. The line is fading between social media and traditional media. Earned media or sharing of information within social networks is becoming mainstream whether on a PC or mobile device. Learn more.

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Elsevier‘s SciVerse Application Marketplace and Developer Network enables developers to build apps based on trusted scientific content. In 2008, the prominent science publisher Elsevier launched SciVerse to provide developers with access to ample research data. SciVerse also sponsors "Apps for Science," a $35,000 developer challenge to accelerate science. Learn more.

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Pepsi MAX is the zero-calorie cola with maximum Pepsi taste. Pepsi MAX is taking SXSW by storm at the Pepsi MAX Lot, where there will be concerts, live streams, happy hours, BBQs, giveaways, and, well, lots of free soda. The Pepsi MAX Lot is located at 3rd Street and San Jacinto Boulevard in Austin.

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SES New York Conference & Expo is a search and social marketing conference helping brands, agencies, and professionals connect, share and learn what's next for the interactive industry.

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LogMeIn Ignition was deemed the #1 third-party Productivity app for iPad and iPhones in 2010. Get one-touch access to all your applications and files, on all your remote computers with LogMeIn Ignition for iPad/iPhone.

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Offered at the CUNY School of Professional Studies, the MS in Business Management and Leadership is designed to meet the needs of your busy schedule through the flexibility of online study. It is a great educational opportunity at an affordable cost, with in-state tuition for all students. Visit www.sps.cuny.edu/onlinems for more information.

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SRDS connects agencies, brands and media through its online database of media planning data. SRDS is committed to making it easier to buy online ad space and build integrated marketing campaigns. Sign up for a free 14-day trial of the SRDS consumer and business database here.

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Clickatell was the first provider of Online SMS Gateway connectivity, and after 10 years, is still the leading provider. Clickatell can deliver your SMS text messages to over 818 mobile networks in more than 222 countries and territories.

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BizSpark is a program which offers new software businesses and entrepreneurs access to Microsoft design, development and production tools with no upfront costs for up to three years. Learn more or connect with a Microsoft BizSpark advisor here.

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The private beta release offers Gmail users access to the popular Xobni sidebar where they can perform fast contact searches and see an email contact’s photo, job title, company and social network details.

The Gmail version has also been loaded with fresh Xobni goodies. The sidebar shows the user’s relationship history with an email contact and lists out the other parties who also frequently email with that contact. Plus, a multimedia module has been added to show social updates and insights from the user’s network.

“Initially, Xobni focused on providing a search and contact add-in for Outlook. Today we’re much more,” says Xobni CEO Jeff Bonforte. “Our users have been telling us they needed Xobni for all their many inboxes and devices. We wanted to be there too, so we built a cloud infrastructure that unifies your contacts, enhances them with third-party content, and makes them accessible from multiple touch points.”

When Bonforte speaks of multiple touch points, he’s also talking about the pending release of Xobni’s iPhone and Android apps, slated to go live within the next 90 days. All of the new experiences — Gmail, iPhone and Android — will be available in free and pro versions.

We have 150 private beta access invites to Xobni for Gmail, available with the code XOBNI-MASH150 here. Enter the same code to save your place in line for priority access to the mobile apps when those are ready.

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From May to October of last year, the project sent out groups of three musicians and one filmmaker to 13 national parks (one in each province and territory) to capture their experiences in a short film and soundtrack. Those clips are set to be distributed in four ways on March 19: as a making-of television documentary airing on Discovery World HD, a set of short films shown at film festivals, a soundtrack collection of the best music, and an online, interactive portal to each of the 13 parks visited.

The National Parks Project is a collaboration between FilmCAN and Primitive Entertainment in conjunction with Parks Canada and Discover World HD. The site is part of the centennial of Parks Canada, the world’s first ever parks service.

More than 50 artists took part, including members of Broken Social Scene, the Smashing Pumpkins, Sam Roberts and both established and greenhorn directors. The oddball pairings resulted in unique collaborations inspired by the wilderness. Each quartet (three musicians, one director) was selected with the aim of putting together people that have never worked together before, in the spirit of exploring unfamiliar ground.

That sense of exploration is key to the project’s philanthropic goal. “One of the things we really hoped this would be was to connect to the environmental angle but without the didacticism,” said Joel McConvey, one of the producers behind the project. “You don’t have to explain to people why [the parks] are important when you can show people how magnificent they are. When you have a beautiful shot of an old growth forest, we’re showing these people why these are worth protecting in a different way. It’s a way to use art as awareness.”

To help, McConvey said the web portal was launched as a way for people to continue exploring the parks. Each week, project producers will add content from a new park, including extra footage, music recordings, artist diaries and lyric notebooks. Those 13 trips created a huge amount of musical collaborations, which the Parks team has whittled down to an EP and LP. All profits from those sales will go to the Nature Conservancy, a non-profit dedicated to protecting the parks.

Lest you think the trips were all sunshine and roses, the crew skipped posh hotels to experience the wilderness first-hand. “It was camping, it was full on – they were outside for the full time,” McConvey said. “It was pretty extreme, we wanted to give them a genuine wilderness experience.” McConvey said one group of artists took a five-day trek back to humanity after being dropped off by plane at the Nahanni River in the North West Territories. Another trip to Sirmilik in Nunavut had the artists camping out on an actual ice flow.

Strangers to the wilderness, the artists act as a kind of proxy for users at home as they click through the site and follow along each week. The real question is whether seeing these parks with fresh eyes will then make the audience care about them.

What do you think? Are virtual tours enough to make you care about conservation issues? Does social good work even without a direct ask?

More About: Canada, Film, music, national parks, national parks project, parks, parks canada, social good, social media

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The move follows the AP Stylebook's decision to change "Web site" to "website" last year, at which time we wrote, "[We] hold our collective breath for other possible updates, such as changing "e-mail" to "email.'"

Since then the recently much more progressive organization also published a set of 42 guidelines and definitions for social media, though the future of “e-mail” remained very much in flux.

Today's news, fittingly enough, was first announced on the AP Stylebook's Twitter page, where they tweeted: “Language evolves. Today we change AP style from e-mail to email, no hyphen. Our editors will announce it at #ACES2011 today.” Look for the change to be in effect immediately in the online version of the stylebook and in the 2011 print version.

What other antiquated tech terms do you wish would be modified or retired? Let us know in the comments.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, chezzzers.

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More scuttlebutt about the iPhone 5 just surfaced, with rumors of a metal back and near-field communication capabilities heading the list.

No more glass back? If rumors are true, the iPhone 5′s dorsal side will evolve into a metal back similar to the very first iPhone (that’s not a picture of the iPhone 5 above — it’s an iPhone 4 with a metal sticker on the back — update: I’m told it’s a metal backing, thanks, commenters!). That’s according to a reliable source at Foxconn, the Chinese manufacturer that builds iPhones and such, who tattled the tantalizing tidbit to 9 to 5 Mac.

Notice we’re not saying what kind of metal it is. It could be aluminum, but there’s also talk of Liquidmetal, that futuristic substance that’s as easy to work with (and as lightweight) as plastic, but strong as aluminum. A few weeks ago we gave Liquidmetal a 10% chance of appearing in the MacBook Pro, and we’re still thinking it’s a little soon for it to appear on the iPhone. We’re betting on aluminum for the iPhone 5, with Liquidmetal making its appearance in a later version.

Incidentally, 9 to 5 Mac is again hearing those rumors about a larger screen on the iPhone 5, but its sources are not as specific about the size of the screen as those who reported to DigiTimes that the iPhone 5 would have a 4-inch screen. Given all the chatter about a larger screen — and the increasing screen size of the iPhone’s competitors — we’re thinking it’s likely that the iPhone 5 will have a significantly larger screen that probably stretches out from one edge of the iPhone 5 to the other.

What about NFC? An on-again/off-again rumor of the iPhone 5 containing near-field communication (otherwise known as “wave and pay” chips) has now returned. Earlier in the week, the scuttlebutt was that Apple decided against including NFC in the iPhone 5 because of worries about the lack of a clear standard for NFC.

Now we’re hearing something different from Elizabeth Woyke of Forbes magazine, who says an Apple employee leaked information about how the iPhone 5 will have NFC. If it does, it will probably link its payments through iTunes, and given Apple’s reluctance to jump into the NFC fold because of a lack of standards, embrace some sort of proprietary technology that the company hopes all others will follow.

How about it, commenters? Let us know about rumors you’ve heard, and whether you think any of these we’ve mentioned will someday turn into fact.

Image courtesy 9 to 5 Mac

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ABC Family aired Thursday night some brand new footage from the final film in the Harry Potter saga, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. Thanks to the magic of YouTube, that footage is now online for everyone to see.

The final — and seventh — Potter book was adapted into two films. The first part was released in theaters in November 2010. Part 2 hits cineplexes on July 15, 2011.

Over the years, the Harry Potter films have grossed more than $6.4 billion at the global box office, making Harry one of the most popular film series of all time. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 will be showing up in 3D at select theaters, which should really add something special to the mix.

Over at the MTV Movies Blog, they dissect the new footage in full. In the coming weeks, we expect that Warner Bros. will continue to pepper the web, Facebook and Twitter with more news from the Potter-verse.

Are you excited about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2? What film is your favorite in the series?

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The storm tore your ship asunder, you wash up on a deserted island, make a coconut fire, set up your wireless network, poach a few hermit crabs for lunch, cruise for some new Rebecca Black vids, blah blah blah, the usual.

And then you notice your connection is unacceptably sluggish.

Mashable Comics are illustrated every week by Kiersten Essenpreis, a New York-based artist who draws and blogs at YouFail.com.

More Mashable Comics:

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- Watson vs. Jeopardy: The Early Years
- Great Moments in Text Messaging

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The channel is just the latest social media effort dedicated to helping quake victims reconnect or locate loved ones.

Just hours after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, Google created a special crisis response page that offers users a way to get the latest information about the quake and an updated page of resources. Google Japan also has a localized version of the page.

The YouTube channel is particularly nice because it offers visual exposure for people to get out their message. For friends and family members in other parts of the world, it’s also a way to find out if loved ones are OK.

What do you think of the way social media is being used to help keep individuals informed and connected in Japan and abroad? Let us know.

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Now that SXSWi has come and gone, the digital world will be looking for the next great event to learn from, be inspired by and meet people doing interesting things in the space. We’ve got good news – there are still a few spots left for Mashable Connect 2011, our intimate conference that will bring together leaders from the digital world for three days away to share and connect offline in a unique setting.

This invite-only event is being held at Disney World May 12 to 14. Tickets are limited and we expect to sell out by March 31. Apply now: http://mashable.com/connect/application

Join more than 100 key influencers and leaders to discuss the new online identity, Attentionomics and the new ROI, trends in social TV, mobile marketing and social good, among other topics, from provocative and esteemed speakers. The latest speaker list is below and we’ll be adding some exciting names in the coming days.

Attendees include digital leaders from key companies, organizations and brands such as the 92Y, American Association of Advertising Agencies, Behance, Buddy Media, Constant Contact, Converseon, CNN, Deep Focus, Edelman, Fenton, Fidelity Investments, Ford, Gowalla, Hallmark Cards, Hasbro, HBO, Hilton Worldwide, Intridea, iStrategyLabs, Microsoft, NBC, Ogilvy, PepsiCo, Rackspace Hosting, Radian6, Rockfish, Saatchi & Saatchi, Scripps Networks, SocialVibe, Spotify, Syncapse, Thrillist, Triton Digital, Tumblr, TV Guide, UN Foundation, Universal Music Group, Wells Fargo, Xero and Yahoo.

And if you enjoyed getting to know the Mashable staff during SXSWi, you’ll have even more opportunities because most of our team will be at Mashable Connect.

Registration for Mashable Connect 2011 is all-inclusive and includes content, meals, special events and surprises, hotel rooms and transportation.

There will be plenty of opportunities to connect with speakers, including:

• Scott Belsky, Founder & CEO, Behance
• Rohit Bhargava, SVP, Global Strategy & Marketing, Ogilvy
• Sabrina Caluori, Director of Social Media & Marketing, HBO
• Cameron Death, Senior Vice President and General Manager, NBCUniversal Digital Studio
• Craig Engler, SVP & General Manager, Syfy Digital
• KC Estenson, SVP & General Manager, CNN Digital
• Elizabeth Gore, Executive Director Global Partnerships, UN Foundation
• Scott Heiferman, Co-Founder & CEO, Meetup
• Lisa Hsia, Executive Vice President, Bravo Digital Media
• David Karp, Founder, Tumblr
• Rob Key, CEO, Converseon
• Dave Knox, Chief Marketing Officer, Rockfish
• Josh Koppel, Founder, ScrollMotion
• Michael Lazerow, CEO, Buddy Media
• Marcel LeBrun, CEO, Radian6
• Adam Rich, Co-founder and Editor-in-Chief, Thrillist
• Steve Rubel, SVP/Director of Insights, Edelman Digital
• Ian Schafer, CEO, Deep Focus
• Michael Scissons, President and CEO, Syncapse
• Raymie Stata, SVP, Chief Technology Officer, Yahoo!
• Christy Tanner, Executive Vice President & General Manager, TVGuide.com & TV Guide Mobile
• Josh Williams, CEO, Gowalla

Publicly available details can be found at: http://mashable.com/connect

More About: mashable, mashable connect 2011, social media, social networking

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Some of the world’s smartest people are currently at work creating online platforms like Groupon and Gilt Groupe that make consumption more social, game-like and addictive. By combining clever behavioral economics with the immediacy and universality of the social web, we've never been better at tricking people into buying stuff.

What if we used those same dark arts and new technologies to actively shift our consumption away from mere products and more toward the consumer behavior and brands that are part of the solution? The 21st century needs a revitalized consumer movement that does just that.

A Little Background

The glory days of consumer activism were the 1960s and 70s. Consumer watchdog groups and activists like Ralph Nader had emerged around the world to win significant victories, like making our cars safer and highlighting some of the worst abuses of corporate power. But as Matthew Hilton has documented in his social history of consumer activism, by the 1980s the consumer movement had been sidelined by the wave of deregulation that swept America and much of the industrialized world.

As the movement has waned, corporate social responsibility and cause marketing have thrived in its place — but these are creations of companies, not consumers. Some of this activity has been transformative, but some of it has been peripheral or used to distract us from harmful economic activity.

Today, we have the tools to change that. Social technology has been busy revolutionizing electoral politics and social movements — helping to elect a U.S. president as well as raise hundreds of millions in micro-donations for non-profits.

We now need to use that online organizing toolkit — and some of the same behavioral insights that are fueling the current success of the consumer internet — to push consumer activism into the 21st century. This new consumer movement can be more powerful, less top-down and significantly broader in scope than its 20th century incarnation. It could transform corporate behavior, shift consumer demand and drive cultural and political change.

What Is To Be Done?

Here are some of the key pieces of infrastructure that technologists, activists and progressive companies can get working on together:

Game It

Consumer activism needs to be as fun and as gratifying as Groupon. To do this, we need to help platforms like Carrot Mob scale. Carrot Mob facilitates competitions between local businesses to make social and environmental improvements. It then coordinates consumers to reward the winners with a flood of new customers. The challenge for Carrot Mob and the recent spate of platforms experimenting with “Groupon for good” mechanisms will be figuring out how to organize consumers at scale. They’ll need to target the big brands and not just local businesses, and find the most efficient ways to do so.

Build Them Up

Consumers need to get behind not just the individual businesses that are doing the right thing but also the new product categories and industries that have the potential to change the world. Electric cars, for example, will only succeed as a product category and help to end our dependence on oil if millions of consumers buy them. We have to allow for platforms that can sort customer demand and organize those same customers to put pressure on government and build the infrastructure needed for that change. Most important, we need to help make these fledgling green products culturally iconic and make buying them a social act, not just a consumer transaction.

Point-of-Purchase Activism

Behavioral experts and marketers know that the salience and mental "availability" of a particular product among a sea of choices is often critical to consumer decision making. Location-based consumer activism can make better choices more salient at the point-of-purchase. Initiatives like Good Guide, which rates thousands of products according to their environmental and social impacts, are headed in this direction. The more these services are able to interrupt and notify consumers with relevant information or alternatives as they shop, the more likely they are to actually impact purchasing.

Lift the Veil

An important function of a revitalized consumer movement will be to help consumers distinguish between authentic and inauthentic corporate realignments. There's so much generic green messaging out there these days. If you accept the environmental mission statement on the website of a company like Koch Industries, you’d never know that its owners are investing millions in defeating action on climate change. We need to find compelling new ways to help consumers cut through the marketing fog.

The recent campaign by cultural activists The Yes Men, which crowdsourced hilarious parodies of Chevron's "We Agree" ad campaign, is a good example of a way to put social media to work on this front.

Rapid Response

Using online organizing techniques, consumers can now instantly coordinate campaigns that put pressure on companies and encourage them to do the right thing. Unlike politicians — who are more used to this kind of coordinated pressure — many companies are more easily rattled when their brands are on the line.

The recent campaign by gay rights groups in response to Target's donation to an anti-gay politician was a good example of this kind of work. Celebrities and their fans can also help. Lady Gaga has now dissolved a deal with Target because of its alignments. Importantly, we must do this by coordinating consumers at the global level. Just as many companies are organized transnationally these days, consumers will need to follow suit. A strong consumer blogosphere will also help surface the best opportunities for these kinds of campaigns.

There's a lot of exciting work to be done to build a 21st century consumer movement. Organizers, programmers, social media mavens, progressive companies and everyday consumers can be part of the next great wave of technology-driven social change. To be effective, that movement will need to be fearless, fact-based, hopeful, culturally mainstream and — most importantly — fun.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Pgiam

More About: consumer advocacy, social good, social media

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The account has amassed almost 190,000 followers in less than a day. And so far, TEPCO has sent seven tweets, all in Japanese.

The damage to nuclear plants has been a major point of concern, as radiation leaks and the threat of a major nuclear meltdown looms. The Twitter feed will be another way to keep Japanese residents, and the rest of the world, informed about the plants.

TEPCO says it will use the Twitter account to notify people of power blackouts and radiation leaks. The first tweet warned of blackouts in Tokyo, if electricity use wasn’t reduced, according to AFP. The power company has imposed rolling, three-hour-long blackouts as it attempts to balance electric supply and demand.

Social media has played a vital role in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami. People have used social media sites to find loved ones, and Japan’s prime minister created an English-language Twitter account earlier this week, too.

Here’s a roundup of our coverage of social media and technology as it relates to the events in Japan, and ways you can help:

• Twitter Users React To Massive Quake, Tsunami In Japan
• Google Responds to the Japan Earthquake With an Online Crisis Center
• Watch: YouTube Footage of Japan Quake [VIDEOS]
• HOW TO: Follow the Japan Earthquake Online
• The 'Godzilla' Incident: Did Twitter Users Gang Up on CNN Earthquake Anchor?
• Run a Website or Blog? You Can Help Japan With One Code Snippet
• Help Japan: Facebook Click Helps Dogs Rescue Trapped Quake Victims
• Apple & Microsoft Take Different Approaches to Japan Relief
• Japan Earthquake & Tsunami: 7 Simple Ways to Help
• AT&T, Sprint & Verizon Offer Free Calls & Texts to Japan From U.S. [UPDATED]
• How Facebook Users Reacted to the Japan Earthquake & Tsunami [ANIMATED GRAPHIC]
• Social Media Plays Vital Role in Reconnecting Japan Quake Victims With Loved Ones
• Japan Tech Shortage: Who's Affected?
• Gilbert Gottfried Fired Over Japan Jokes on Twitter
• Apple Delays iPad 2 Launch in Japan
• U.S. Military Blocks 13 Popular Websites on Its Network in Japan
• Japan's Prime Minister Launches English-Language Twitter Account for Quake Updates
• LivingSocial's Newest Deal: Matching Donations for Japan Earthquake & Tsunami Relief
• Toshiba, Hitachi Halt LCD Production in Japan

Image courtesy of MapLarge.com

[via MediaBistro]

More About: japan, japan earthquake, Nuclear Plant, trending, twitter

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Another LCD maker, Hitachi, has also been forced to halt production at one of its factories, and Sony and Panasonic have also suspended operations at several of their plants.

The negative impact of these disruptions on Japan’s economy is obvious, but it’s hard to tell how they will affect global LCD supply, as Panasonic plans to offset the damage by increasing production in other factories, while Hitachi might get help from Taiwan-based Chimei Innolux Corp.

Some analysts think that smartphone shortages are still a possibility, though. “Given that the market for smartphones outside Japan is pretty active, supply disruptions there could cause problems for some handset makers of some models,” said Damian Thong, an analyst at Macquarie Capital Securities in Japan.

It’s too early to point to specific smartphone models, but the earthquake in Japan might soon start affecting us all in the way of “out of stock” signs.

[via Reuters]

More About: Earthquake, Hitachi, japan, LCD, Toshiba

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Mark Zuckerberg may have come to China, but Facebook is unlikely to enter anytime soon. Neither Facebook nor the Chinese government are interested in a messy compromise on freedom of expression (all Chinese networks are censored), especially after the Facebook-fueled revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt.

Instead, China’s social media scene is different from anywhere else: Four homegrown networks are vying for the mass market. Renren, a faithful copy of Facebook, is China’s leader and is planning for an IPO soon. In addition to its nickname-based network (Qzone), internet giant Tencent is at long last awakening to real-name social with its new network, Pengyou. Finally, Kaixin001 is dying, stuck between the decline of its social games and rise of Sina Weibo (China’s Twitter).

In addition to the top four, China also has a "long tail" of social networks that are more specialized — just for children, gamers or lovers. Here, we take a deeper look at those top four networks and what makes them tick.

Renren: The Leader

Renren is like a miniature Facebook with a mean streak and a quest for monetization. One year ago, Renren was concerned that Kaixin001 might overtake it. Kaixin001 attracted a white collar audience before Renren had fully expanded out from its on-campus origins (like Facebook, Renren started at its nation’s elite universities). But Renren has since left the slower Kaixin001 in the dust and is now China’s leader in real-name social networking (even though Tencent’s Qzone has far more users overall).

As one social network operator (who asked to remain anonymous) described it, “Renren is all about business. Kaixin001 has a tech founder [Cheng Binghao] who wants to do more than just copy.” Kaixin001 was reportedly offered the domain name Kaixin.com for 500,000 yuan (about $75,000), but the Binghao passed. The consummate businessman Chen Yizhou, chairman of Oak Pacific Interactive (OPI is Renren’s umbrella group), jumped at the opportunity. OPI set up an exact clone of Kaixin001 at Kaixin.com. That cutthroat tactic was a masterstroke.

Anything Facebook releases, Renren immediately copies: Connect, Like, Places, Groups, etc. To be fair, a few features are localized: brand advertising, a game layer and emoticons.

Renren is strong when it comes to monetization. Brand campaigns are sold to companies at high prices. Fan pages, while free on Facebook, start at 600,000 yuan (about $90,000). That said, Renren’s fan pages are like mini-sites, such as the example from Nike above. Targeting is used only sparingly and the “long tail” of small, local advertisers has yet to arrive in China.

The umbrella group, Oak Pacific Interactive, is building an empire on top of Renren. Renren users are channeled toward Oak Pacific Games (gaming is the traditional cash cow for China’s Internet) and now Nuomi, one of China’s top Groupon clones. OPI is far more aggressive than Facebook in terms of monetization.

Renren has the most open third-party ecosystem of any social network, but unlike Facebook, it has been unable to effectively monetize social games. One of its competitors is now opening up to third-party developers. That could be a point of weakness for Renren.

User experience cannot suffer too badly during Renren’s aggressive monetization and IPO focus in 2011. Renren's social graph is strong and it executes faster and better than any of its competitors, but it's still nowhere near as dominant as Facebook is in the West.

Tencent: The Sleeping Giant Awakens with Pengyou

Tencent should own real-name social networking in China, but has instead been sleeping on the opportunity until now. Tencent has similarities to AOL, circa 1998. Its walled garden is the Internet for many Chinese, particularly in second- and third-tier cities. QQ, its dominant instant messenger, claims 637 million active accounts, a flood of users that it can direct at any service or content it cares to. Moreover, Tencent monetizes much better than AOL was ever able to via games and virtual goods.

But Tencent struggles among sophisticated netizens (though most still use QQ Messenger) and is playing catch-up in real-name social. Tencent’s most popular social network, Qzone, claims 492 million active users. It’s unclear just how active those users are though; many profiles are simply skeletons. And just like on QQ, many users go by a nickname rather a real name. Users are younger and from comparatively more rural areas of China, making it less attractive to advertisers.

Benjamin Joffe, Tencent expert and CEO of Internet market research firm +8*, states, ”Tencent is definitely not the best in terms of products or innovation — similar to Zynga in that sense — but their ability to deliver a 'good enough' mass market service and integrating it within their ecosystem is impressive.”

On January 6, 2011, Xiaoyou’s users were just merged into a new social network, Pengyou (friends), which is finally Tencent’s attempt to reach the entire population of Chinese social networkers.

With Pengyou, Tencent is pushing into real-name social and taking a step toward becoming a more open and mature firm. The network has an open platform with about 90 applications and games – a step forward for the notoriously closed Tencent.

But ”open” still has limits in China. "The problem with the Chinese market is that the social networks are game developers themselves. There is a conflict of interest.  If your games are popular, they’re not only not helping you but even put pressure to squeeze you out," says Liu Yong, the CEO of social games firm Rekoo. Rekoo is based in Beijing, but focuses on the Japanese market.

But Tencent can use QQ Messenger to direct near limitless traffic to its own offerings. On the downside, it’s difficult to persuade China’s sophisticated netizens to “trade down” for a service with a less urbane user base. That’s the reason why Pengyou is Tencent’s first major product that is not branded with the cute and youth-friendly QQ penguin.

The sleeping giant is awakening from its slumber, though it still has a long way to go in real-name social. 2011 should be a decisive year in the Pengyou (friends) vs. Renren (everyone) showdown.

Kaixin001: In Troubled Waters

In 2008 and 2009, Kaixin001 gained a widespread following among white collar office workers in top tier cities and threatened to become China’s leading real-name social network. But it’s now in trouble.

Kaixin001′s meteoric ascent was fueled by two factors: 1) social games, and 2) a content forwarding feature, where users share the hottest news, jokes or celebrity gossip, with comments attached.

These two attractions have since lost appeal. Social games have dropped in popularity, and post forwarding — quick updates on the hottest news — is now provided in a purer form by Sina Weibo, China’s popular micro-blogging service. The other opportunity they missed is group buying. Kaixin001 had a huge amount of white collar users, which is the perfect match for a group buying service.

Because Kaixin001 is still popular in tier one cities like Shanghai and Beijing, foreigners in China often have a warped perception of the network’s nationwide popularity. In reality, Kaixin001 does not have much traction elsewhere, nor does it have the funds or network — like Tencent (Pengyou) and Oak Pacific Interactive (Renren) — to push into China’s “lesser-tier” cities.

All the tech insiders I’ve spoken with tell of a site in decline. One post on Zhihu (China’s Quora clone) estimates that Kaixin001′s acquisition value has fallen from 500 million to 50 million ($75 million to $7.5 million). Kaixin001′s Binghao has expressed his ambition to join the rush of China tech IPOs, but that seems highly unlikely.

These setbacks will test the true strength of Kaixin001′s social graph. But not all news is bad. The network does still command a large, high-value audience, and it has strong ties to the Sina Corporation, so being acquired is a possibility (Sina holds a stake in Kaixin001 and Binghao is a former Sina CTO).

Sina Weibo: China’s Red-Hot Microblogging Service

Sina Weibo is a microblog that far surpasses Twitter in functionality (threaded comments, groups, audio messages and direct video uploads). And it is hot in China right now. Sina Weibo has more than 100 million registered users, expects to keep growing rapidly, and perhaps even exceeds Twitter in active users. This explosive growth has brought the value of the network up to an estimated $2 billion.

Yu Jin, analyst at China International Capital Corporation, writes: "Microblog services became popular at the end of 2009 as [they] match the needs of Chinese Internet users. They have acquired users at an astonishing speed, to some extent at the expense of SNS websites."

Sina, also the owner of China’s largest portal site, has lofty ambitions for Weibo that could compete with traditional social networks. It’s constantly experimenting with new features and already seems to have stolen away much of Kainxin001′s audience. You don’t understand China social if you don’t understand Sina Weibo.

The Next Tier of Networks

In China, the difference among the “top four” social networks and the next tier is not as vast as the gulf in the U.S. between Facebook and “the rest.” Notably, 51.com and Douban are two mid-sized networks that are neither mass-market nor niche.

51.com started strong with backing from Sequoia and Giant Interactive and an audience of users in rural areas but now has no chance of conquering the mass market. Social networks often operate on an elite spread basis: You can move down the “social ladder” but not up. It’s no accident that Facebook started at Harvard and Renren started at China’s elite Tsinghua University. Although 51.com has dropped off from the top ranks since last year, it still claims to have 40 million monthly active users. But Chinese tech news site DoNews reports that its peak user base is down from 11 million to 700,000, a big flameout for a site that once had intentions for an IPO.

Douban, an urban network built around fan groups for books, music and movies, has 20 million active users. Douban has a highly engaged and participatory user base, making it worth watching.
In addition, there are countless additional Chinese social networks for dating, business, and any other community you can imagine.

Despite government regulations that make the Internet an “invisible birdcage,” Chinese social networks have just enough space to fly. The social media space is diverse and thriving, with Renren, Qzone, Pengyou and Kaixin001 leading the pack. Just don’t attempt to directly port your “global” Facebook strategy here.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, pagadesign

More About: business, china, kaixin001, pengyou, renren, sina weibo, social media, social network, tencent

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Between Instagram, Picplz, Hipstamatic and Path, mobile users have a smattering of options when it comes to sharing stylized photos. Each competitor brings something slightly different to the table, but all are paparazzi-intent on attracting mass attention via the crowds at South by Southwest.

Picplz, the only application of the bunch that caters to the Android crowd, wisely added collections, or playlists for photos, to its service before the festival got underway. The smart maneuver was especially appropriate for SXSW as Picplz users can now team up to curate their favorite photos from the show.

On March 11, the kick-off of the Interactive portion of the show, Instagram gave its newsfeed a sexy makeover. Photo effects aficionados will get an even bigger rise out of the new Tilt-Shift Effect. The effect lets app users add focus to their photos and is unbelievably impressive in action.

Path’s version 1.5 release — a significant upgrade — finally hit the app store Wednesday, just in time for the Music portion of the festival. The new Facebook sharing options and photo and video lenses make Path infinitely more compelling. Could this be the startup’s breakout moment?

Apple’s favorite app for the iPhone, Hipstamatic, is giving users something to celebrate at SXSW: a free SXSW HipstaPak complete with a limited edition lens and a commemorative case. The giveaway is perfectly suited for super users and newbies alike.

So with four formidable contenders, which one will deliver the knockout punch? Instagram looks to have the momentum at the moment — you could say it’s won the battle, and not the war — but the fledgling mobile photo sharing genre still needs time to mature and so too do the apps competing for consumer attention.

Mashable readers, what say you? Which photo sharing app will win the mobile photo sharing war?

The SXSW Faceoff Series is supported by Pepsi MAX. Come check out the Pepsi MAX Lot at 3rd Street and San Jacinto Boulevard! Follow @PepsiMAX on Twitter for the daily schedule of huge concerts, happy hours, BBQs, games and giveaways! And, well, lots of free soda.

More About: hipstamatic, instagram, mobile photo sharing, Path, picplz, SXSW Faceoff Series

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