Mashable: Latest 26 News Updates - including “A Better Way to Find & Install Windows & Linux Apps” |
- A Better Way to Find & Install Windows & Linux Apps
- Google Goes Cold on Hotpot, Shutters the Standalone App
- Book a Better Hotel Room With Room 77
- Google Gets Green Light From Justice Department for Travel Acquisition
- FCC’s Net Neutrality Rules Rejected By House of Representatives
- Our Favorite YouTube Videos This Week: The Death & Taxes Edition
- 5 Recommendations for Assembling a Successful Team of Freelancers
- Facebook, Human Rights Groups Side With YouTube Against Viacom
- Is Facebook Moving Into China? [REPORT]
- AP Union Tells Members to Stop Tweeting
- 3 Ways Companies Can Reach Generation Z
- How a Government Shutdown Could Affect Tech
- Meet Extragram, a Slick Web App for Instagram
- 25 Million Watch Live Video of Bald Eagle Family
- Verizon Customers, Say Goodbye to 1-Year Contracts
- Rebecca Black’s Influence Lives on … At Least on Fridays
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- Technical Difficulties: The Eternal Annoyance [COMIC]
- Timelapse Video of San Francisco-to-Paris Flight Captures Aurora Borealis
- 30 Startups Ask Summer Interns to Apply via Social Media
- Fans Can Create Callaway Golf Ads for ESPN.com
- Why Users Are More Engaged With Social Media on Fridays
- Thanks to Mashable’s Socially Savvy Supporters
- What Would the Music Industry Look Like if Napster Never Existed? [CHART]
- 5 Ways to Improve Your International SEO Strategy
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| A Better Way to Find & Install Windows & Linux Apps Posted: 08 Apr 2011 11:35 PM PDT       This post is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark as a new part of the Spark of Genius series that focuses on a new and innovative startup each day. Every Thursday, the program focuses on startups within the BizSpark program and what they’re doing to grow.In stark contrast to today’s heavily-financed mega-startups such as Facebook, Groupon or Color, consider the unassuming and newly profitable Ninite, maker of a bulk software installation tool for Windows and Linux. Ninite co-founders Patrick Swieskowski and Sascha Kuzins, the startup’s only employees, run a lean operation out of a San Francisco-based office and have no interest in raising flashy amounts of venture capital. Instead, their focus is on being the easiest way for software geeks, regular folks, grandmas and even system administrators to get software. “The most frequent feedback we get from users is, ‘I love you,’” says Swieskowski. The primary reason for the user-love is that Ninite gives them the ability to install dozens of applications with just a few clicks — it strips out all the tedious navigation and unnecessary dialogs usually involved in the software installation process. “This is way software downloads should be,” Swieskowski says. Users seem to agree. One and half years post-release, Ninite’s site now sees 2 million pageviews each month. Second Time’s the Charm Ninite’s origins date back to early 2008, when Swieskowski and Kuzins launched BaseShield, a virtualization project for Windows that would run applications in secure containers. The original idea and product had enough merit to graduate from Y Combinator and help the co-founders raise a small angel round. But the general public wasn’t responding with the same fervor. “It was hard to package that up and sell it to users,” Swieskowski explains. After nearly two years of work on the original product, the co-founders switched to Ninite. The first iteration of the so-simple-it’s-stupid software installer was released at just the right time in October, 2009 — right before Microsoft released Windows 7. “We saw a huge uptake from people. Within a week, we were getting posts on random technology blogs; within two weeks, we had 10,000 users in the beta.” And for good reason. The installer automates installs offscreen, always grabs the latest available version of apps, picks the most appropriate version and language edition for the user’s PC, and auto-updates installed software upon re-run. Accidental App Curators As Ninite worked to simply the application installation process and give users a one-stop shop for picking and downloading great apps, its co-founders slowly became curators of the best Windows applications. The Ninite site features dozens of hand-selected browsers, messaging, media-imaging and file-sharing applications, among other things; and Swieskowski and Kuzins go to great pains to ensure that there are no junk apps or scam installation add-ons. The pair also solicit tips and requests from users, and Ninite has grown to become a powerful distribution mechanism for software titles. Quiet Simplicity“We believe in simplicity,” reads Ninite’s About page. The words epitomize both the product and its creators. Simple has its perks. Ninite became profitable a few months ago, roughly one year after releasing a for-charge Pro product aimed at IT professionals and super users. Now Swieskowski and Kuzins are looking to shed the perception that Ninite is merely something nice to use when setting up a machine and hope to turn the startup into a destination that users return to frequently for single-app downloads. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, gbrundin Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark  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, Ninite, software, spark-of-genius, Windows For more Startups coverage:
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| Google Goes Cold on Hotpot, Shutters the Standalone App Posted: 08 Apr 2011 10:21 PM PDT   Five months after launch, Google is folding Hotpot, its recommendation engine for places, into Google Places. The Hotpot product name is being discontinued, but the technology will remain a part of the Google Places experience on the web and in Google mobile apps. In a way, Hotpot is still simmering inside Places, and Google hasn’t gone completely cold on the idea of local recommendations. But a quick glance at a mobile Place Page will show that Hotpot’s ratings and place discovery features are buried so far down that users will need to scroll to find them. Google is positioning the restructuring as a graduation for day for Hotpot. “The [Hotpot] community has quickly expanded to millions of users who are rating more than one million times per month and enjoying a truly personalized view of the world,” writes Hotpot product manager Lior Ron. The change in direction, however, signifies internal disarray when it comes to Google’s strategy around place discovery. It might even be related to Thursday’s senior level shakeup, as Jeff Huber has just assumed the role of senior vice president of commerce and local. The original idea behind Hotpot was to encourage users to rate and review venues and add friends so they could get personalized recommendations tailored to their tastes. To push users into leaving recommendations, Google released both iPhone and Android apps for Hotpot and expanded the product to support more than 47 languages. “Rolling Hotpot into Google Places helps simplify the connection between the places that are rated and reviewed and the more than 50 million places that already have an online presence through Google Places — places that millions of people search for and find every day on Google,” Ron writes in an effort to explain the decision. More About: Google, google hotpot, google places, hotpot, recommendation engine For more Business & Marketing coverage:
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| Book a Better Hotel Room With Room 77 Posted: 08 Apr 2011 08:06 PM PDT  The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.
Quick Pitch: Room 77 is a hotel room database and search engine that helps travelers find great rooms. Genius Idea: Room Request Guarantee, a coming-soon feature that will let users secure their preferred room when booking at a partner hotel. Years ago, Brad Gerstner, now the founder of hotel-search startup Room 77, would maintain a running list of his favorite hotel rooms on his BlackBerry. Friends got wind of the list and started asking for copies, and Gerstner started thinking about the larger problem, a problem of information asymmetry: Hotel front desks have all the information on rooms, while the consumer has nothing. It took years — and countless hours with Gerstner and friends walking through hotel hallways and gathering floor information — for the full Room 77 concept to materialize into a functional hotel room database and search engine. Today, travelers can turn to Room 77 to get the run-down on nearly half a million hotel rooms in 18 different cities. Why might a traveler want access to this data? For starters, any frequent hotel visitor knows that each stay can vary drastically depending on room size, bed quality, balcony or view. Consumers often demand higher floors or rooms with views to circumvent bad experiences; but most often, guests are slotted into rooms as hotel clerks or computer algorithms see fit. Room 77 is designed to give would-be hotel guests access to a combination of hotel-sourced and people-sourced room information so that they can book better rooms. The site and companion iPhone app [iTunes link] return “Room Cards” matched to user preferences — things like high or low floors, view importance and elevator distance. When the user selects a hotel, rooms are ranked and the best matching rooms are returned accordingly. The user can select an individual room to get more details about the room, see where its located in the overall floor plan, take a glipse at the actual view with images sourced from Google and read the Room Card to gain insight into bed type, room square footage and other factoids. At two pilot hotels — the Grand Hyatt Seattle and the Hyatt at Olive 8 in Seattle — Room 77 users can now also click a beta “Look Inside” button to see photos inside each room.  As it stands, Room 77′s greatest shortcoming is it merely solves the information asymmetry piece of the problem; it does little to help the customer book the specific room he wants. Users that find the perfect room can, however, hit the “Request a Room” option for tips on how to book their preferred room number. The startup recognizes this manual process is far from ideal, it’s working on another pilot product it calls “Room Request Guarantee.” “It’s the equivalent of picking your seat on an airline,” vice president of product Kevin Fliess explains. Room 77 is in talks with hotel partners and is making Room Request Guarantee a priority initiative for the year, says Fliess. There’s also a revenue-sharing aspect to the feature, as Fliess believes that users will be open to paying an additional room fee to secure the rooms that they want. Room 77′s greatest asset is its technology platform, Fliess says. The startup uses patent-pending technology to turn raw, unstructured data into digital blueprints for hotels in a matter of hours. The technology piece is crucial to ensuring that the data flooding in from users via the iPhone app, hotel partners and even startup staff members who continue to troll hotel hallways, can be seamlessly transformed into an elegant way for users to consume hotel room data. San Francisco-based Room 77 raised $3 million in Series A funding in April and now has a 20-person team with four PhDs, several travel industry veterans, a few former Googlers and one ex-Facebook employee on staff. Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark 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, crowdsourcing, room 77, spark-of-genius, startup, travel For more Startups coverage:
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| Google Gets Green Light From Justice Department for Travel Acquisition Posted: 08 Apr 2011 06:38 PM PDT   Google’s purchase of ITA Software, a travel and airline software company, has been given a thumbs-up by the U.S. Department of Justice — with a few important stipulations. The DOJ had subjected the deal to some eight months of scrutiny to determine whether the search giant’s foray into travel and flight search might pose antitrust issues. The sale was first made known to the public via media reports about a year ago, and Google confirmed the acquisition in July 2010. ITA‘s flight search technology powers the company’s public airfare search engine, Matrix. Its QPX airfare shopping system is used by airlines and travel distributors around the world, and the company is also offering a new airline passenger reservation system. Since ITA’s software powers many other businesses, the DOJ is requiring Google to continue “to develop and license travel software, to establish internal firewall procedures and to continue software research and development.” QPX and ITA’s other travel search products will continue to be licensed to other companies, even companies that might be competing with whatever travel search app or apps Google might introduce. In this way, the Department hopes to keep competition for travel search fair. Department reps said that the original deal terms “would have substantially lessened competition among providers of comparative flight search websites in the United States, resulting in reduced choice and less innovation for consumers.” Joseph Wayland, Deputy Assistant Attorney General of the Department of Justice's Antitrust Division, said in a statement, “The Department of Justice’s proposed remedy promotes robust competition for airfare websites by ensuring those websites will continue to have access to ITA's pricing and shopping software.” In a statement released Friday, ITA reps stated, “We will begin work immediately to close the acquisition and are committed to making the integration process as seamless as possible for our employees and customers. We are excited about joining forces with Google, and look forward to getting our teams together after close to start working on innovative new ways to make travel search easier.” More About: acquisition, Antitrust, DOJ, Google, ita, justice department, travel For more Business & Marketing coverage:
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| FCC’s Net Neutrality Rules Rejected By House of Representatives Posted: 08 Apr 2011 03:47 PM PDT   The U.S. House of Representatives has voted to restrict the FCC’s ability to regulate how Internet service providers manage their networks, a move that could endanger net neutrality if it were to pass both houses of Congress. House Joint Resolution 37, “Disapproving the rule submitted by the Federal Communications Commission with respect to regulating the Internet and broadband industry practices,” passed the House with a vote of 240 to 179, mostly along party lines. The resolution specifically condemns the Federal Communications Commission’s new net neutrality rules and “prohibits such rule from having any force or effect.” The joint resolution still has to pass the Senate and be signed by President Obama before it becomes a law. The resolution is unlikely to pass in the Democrat-controlled Senate, and President Obama has threatened to veto the measure if it ever reaches his desk. The heart of the matter is whether the government should regulate ISPs, specifically on how they treat content on their networks. Supporters of net neutrality believe ISPs shouldn’t be allowed to block or throttle content for almost any reason. Their argument is that an ISP such as Verizon or Comcast could decide to charge consumers or companies different rates for access to their networks (e.g. paying extra for streaming video). Opponents of net neutrality believe that the government shouldn’t be regulating Internet access or ISPs and that regulation sets a dangerous precedent. There are a lot of potential worst case scenarios out there for both sides. The finer points of the debate have erupted into court challenges and heated arguments. In December, the FCC approved Chairman Julius Genachowski’s initiative to prevent ISPs from discriminating against legal content. Net neutrality supports complained that the new rules didn’t go far enough to protect an “open Internet,” specifically, the growing wireless web accessed by millions of smartphone users. Wireless providers and Republican opponents argued that government intervention was a slippery slope to less innovation and more job losses. Today’s vote only complicates the net neutrality debate, which is already an field with many players and a lot of undecided issues. It’s going to be a long time before the fate of net neutrality is decided — if, in fact, it ever is. More About: fcc, Google, government, House of Representatives, net neutrality, verizon For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:
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| Our Favorite YouTube Videos This Week: The Death & Taxes Edition Posted: 08 Apr 2011 02:36 PM PDT   Raise your hand if you’re planning to spend the weekend feverishly doing your taxes. Raise your hand if you will still be breathin’ and kickin’ come Monday. Yup, in honor of that old saying, “Nothing is certain but death and taxes,” this week’s YouTube roundup theme is, well, the mingling of those two things. Hey, at least you have three more days this year during which to bid the world farewell whilst submitting to death by papercuts. Monty Python: "Tax Thingie"Todd Wasserman: Some brilliant ideas for raising revenues from the Monty Python folks. Best one: A tax on foreigners living abroad. (Note: Clip has about a minute of Victorian era NSFW images preceding the "Tax Thingie" sketch.) Rick RollBrian Hernandez: The meme that never dies gets a political twist. This awesome "Rick Roll" video ends with: "No bills were harmed in the making of this video. No public dollars were spent." Taxman Obama Vs. RxErica Swallow: A clever cut of Obama singing The Beatles' "Taxman." He Wants To Be the Gov. of NJAda Ospina: He just wants to be the Governor of New Jersey. (Which he became, and his twin was the Lt. Governor.) Hot New Dance Craze Hits the SouthJay Bischof: Purple shirt FTW. Meet Joe BlackLauren Drell: Here's where Brad Pitt shockingly faces one of these two certainties in the movie I think of upon hearing "death and taxes." (Too morbid? Sorry.) Horse Jumping RopeBrenna Ehrlich: Sorry, upon being faced with the task of filling out forms, I blacked out. Look, horse!!! "Rent: Too Damn High!"Emily Banks: The Man is always finding ways to take our hard-earned cash -- for rent too. Image courtesy of Flickr, Rob Boudon More About: favorite-youtube-videos, video, viral video, youtube For more Video coverage:
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| 5 Recommendations for Assembling a Successful Team of Freelancers Posted: 08 Apr 2011 02:22 PM PDT   Ray Grainger is founder and CEO of Mavenlink, a comprehensive web-based project management platform that manages the entire scope of business for consultants, freelancers, and other independent service professionals from a single application. Last year, approximately 30% of the U.S. job market was made up of independent workers: consultants, freelancers, temps, and others, according to the Freelancers Union, a non-profit advocacy organization. This figure is expected to reach 40% of the total workforce by 2020. The surge of independent contractors is a relatively recent phenomenon which has been fueled by the web and an incredible array of cloud-based tools. Below are a few recommendations for ways to work with freelancers that will scale no matter the size and scope of your project. 1. Leverage Your Network to Find Great TalentWhen you are looking to complete a project that requires a new skill set, and you don't have a "go-to" freelancer in mind, start by reaching out to contractors you’ve worked with in the past — even if they have a completely different focus. Freelancers often have a strong network of fellow freelancers from prior projects and associations, and are happy to make introductions as they look to build a stronger client relationship. There is also a strong incentive for any freelancer you select through a referral to do good work. It’s a powerful dynamic to have everyone on a project starting from a place of trust. 2. Use an Online Workspace for Collaboration and Project ManagementIt’s easy to lose track of conversations, email chains, document versions and schedules when you’re managing several projects. Start any project by designating a central place for all players — internal and external — to conduct business. By having a one-stop location to find all materials, track conversations, and compare schedules, you’ll help streamline the entire collaboration process and keep things ticking along on time. 3. Create Clearly Defined Goals and DeadlinesAt the beginning of any project, start by setting goals for the entire engagement, and set deadlines against them. All parties will be able to track and know exactly what’s expected of whom and when, and ultimately will deliver a higher quality result. Make sure to continually update the progress of the project as well, so that everyone stays on the same page and bad surprises are minimized. 4. Connect Project Management to Budgets and InvoicingInvoicing often happens outside of project management, with the person receiving the invoice having no idea whether value has been delivered. Linking invoicing to tasks and deliverables from within one system can help anyone in the hiring company (not just the project manager) understand the work that has been purchased and delivered. 5. Keep it SimpleAll the process, planning and technology won't make a bit of difference without buy-in from all parties. Keeping everyone on the same page requires keeping everyone engaged. Start with a straightforward approach and easy-to-use technology that encourages participation. If the approach or the technology are too complicated, the project will suffer as team members struggle with adoption. Let's face it, there is more talented expertise outside your company than within it. In a world of increasing specialization, learning to work effectively with external resources opens up access to specialized expertise. As you engage more of this external talent, you benefit from all the know-how they bring to the table gained from multiple clients across multiple industries. As this new way of working continues to accelerate, it will be critical that the technology your company uses maximizes the effectiveness of both the internal and external workforces. Of course, technology alone isn’t a stand-in for strong management. Combining optimal technology tools along with well-defined processes and workforce strategies will help maximize communication and goal attainment.  Interested in more Business resources? Check out Mashable Explore, a new way to discover information on your favorite Mashable topics.Image courtesy of iStockphoto, shironosov More About: business, freelance, freelancers, social media For more Business & Marketing coverage:
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| Facebook, Human Rights Groups Side With YouTube Against Viacom Posted: 08 Apr 2011 02:12 PM PDT   Facebook, Freedom House, Yahoo, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the National Alliance for Media Art and Culture and 44 law professors are siding with YouTube and Google against Viacom’s newest legal appeal. The courts granted Google a summary judgment in Viacom’s $1 billion lawsuit against YouTube last year. The issue was whether YouTube was protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), a law that protects against claims of copyright infringement if the content was uploaded by users to an organization’s network. Although the lawsuit cost Google $100 million, it eventually prevailed. It didn’t take long for Viacom to file an appeal. The media giant, which owns MTV, Paramount Pictures, and Comedy Central, called the court’s ruling “fundamentally flawed” in its appeal last year. Earlier this week, Google struck back with a 107-page response arguing for its humanitarian and social value, while criticizing what it calls Viacom’s use of selective quotes. Now the tide is against Viacom once again. Today, no less than 13 different groups filed amicus briefs in support of Google in the YouTube/Viacom case. Here are the most interesting organizations throwing their weight behind Google.
“We regret that Viacom continues to drag out this case,” A YouTube spokesperson told Mashable. “The court here, like every other court to have considered the issue, correctly ruled that the law protects online services like YouTube, which remove content when notified by the copyright holder that it is unauthorized. We will continue to strongly defend the court's decision throughout this appeal process.” Viacom first filed this lawsuit in 2007. Four years later, it’s still being battled out in court. And since the suit began, Viacom has embraced YouTube’s competitors, including Hulu. We have reached out to Viacom for their comment. What’s yours? More About: ebay, facebook, Google, iac, viacom, Yahoo, youtube For more Video coverage:
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| Is Facebook Moving Into China? [REPORT] Posted: 08 Apr 2011 01:53 PM PDT   According to the latest crop of rumors, Facebook is about to make a deal that will bring it into the vast Chinese market. Though such rumors have been circulating since 2007, the information is presently coming from numerous credible industry sources. But don’t expect to friend anyone in China. Keeping with the country’s closed nature, any new Facebook social network in China wouldn’t be linked with the rest of the site. According to TechRice, Facebook will be partnering with Baidu, the largest search engine in China, valued at $50 billion. That’s if Hu Yanping, founder of the Beijing-based Data Center of the China Internet (DCCI), tweets the truth. He says Facebook has already signed an official contract with Baidu to create a new social network in China. Marbridge Consulting has also heard from multiple industry sources, which say Facebook will be working with Baidu on the new China site, bolstered by rumors that Baidu visited Facebook in February. So we have tweets on top of rumors on top of blog posts. The preponderance of evidence is that Facebook has something going on in China. But given that China wants to prevent the kind of revolutionary fervor reaching a fever pitch in the Middle East and Northern Africa lately, any version of Facebook in China will likely be tightly regulated and censored. Could this end up being like that pale imitation of Twitter we saw sprouting up in China late last year? And will China’s penchant for censorship mean a Chinese version of Facebook is doomed to die? Let us know what you think in the comments. More About: china, facebook, rumors For more Social Media coverage:
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| AP Union Tells Members to Stop Tweeting Posted: 08 Apr 2011 01:22 PM PDT   As contract negotiations resume between executives for the AP wire services and the News Media Guild, the labor union is calling for a “tweet-out.” While the parties prepare to meet for negotiations on Monday and Tuesday, the News Media Guild is telling union employees of the Associated Press: “Don't post Tweets or Facebook any links to any AP stories. This is only for those NOT required to tweet as part of their job,” according to an e-mail obtained by Poynter. Reporters are not generally required to share their stories via social media, according to CNN; it’s more a matter of graciously supporting one’s company, or self-promotion. While the tweet-out is only one part of the planned protests — in the past, AP journalists nixed their names from their stories and photos. Granted, this latest strategy is more of an attention-grabbing stunt than an actual detriment to the AP (it’s a newswire, so AP stories are featured on, and tweeted by, many other sites), but it does demonstrate the growing importance of social when it comes to news media. We reached out to the AP for comment and it directed us toward a memo, which was sent out on Thursday night, saying: “Since January, we have said at the negotiating table and in our notes to the field that this change must be enacted soon if we are to fund the projects AP needs to maintain our market position and to prevent further erosion of our revenue. External competition to our news business remains fierce, and we must have the cash to be able to maintain our competitive advantage.” (You can read the rest over at Poynter.) The “tweet-out” was not mentioned in the memo. More About: ap, News Media Guild, twitter For more Media coverage:
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| 3 Ways Companies Can Reach Generation Z Posted: 08 Apr 2011 01:16 PM PDT   Kathy Savitt is the Founder and CEO of Lockerz, a social commerce site headquartered in Seattle where she leads the company's vision of continuing to engage with Generation Z. You can follow her on Twitter @ksavitt. Most of Generation Z can't yet legally operate a car. Born between 1992 and 2010, some can't even use shoulder strap seatbelts yet. But that doesn't mean they aren't actively shaping perceptions about products and brands. Nearly half of teens who use the Internet buy things online, more than four in five will use social networks this year, and 96% of U.S. teens ages 12 to 17 will use the Internet at least monthly. Generation Z is the most disruptive generation in modern history. Instead of waiting for ideas to filter through the generations that came before, Generation Z-ers are tastemakers — often before they're out of elementary school. Social media has demolished all barriers to communicating about brands and products. If you can write, you can share, and Generation Z is all about sharing. Take Silly Bandz, the inexpensive, animal-shaped rubber bands worn as bracelets. The trend first took hold among nine and ten-year-olds, but before long, fashion models were wearing them on runways, and Moms wore them to soccer practices. How can you connect with this generation and, more importantly, capture their limited attention to create loyal brand advocacy? Here are three things companies can do to succeed with Generation Z. 1. Generation Z is Not Brand LoyalCompanies that expect Generation Z to be loyal based on a carefully crafted brand image and marketing message will find that their effort is wasted. Generation Z simply doesn't buy it. Instead, the product itself is what's important, regardless of marketing campaigns. For instance, as recently as four or five years ago, you could walk down a Generation Y high school hallway and find the "popular" girls dressed head-to-toe in Abercrombie & Fitch, the “preppy” girls in American Eagle Outfitters, and the Goth girls in Hot Topic. Not the case in a Generation Z high school hallway — they categorically reject "badge brands." Here, you will see a girl in the boots she saw Jessica Alba wearing on TMZ, a basic tank from Target, and a hand-made sweater a good friend scored from Etsy. 2. The Age of the CuratorWith their mass adoption of iPods, Generation Y reduced the currency of music from the album down to the song. Generation Z is doing the same with every other purchasing decision. The result — what you see them wearing, watching, and reading — is their own curated version of the world. There is no hiding from Generation Z. They are extreme curators, sharing and panning everything from movies to books to clothes (and eventually, cars, home furnishings and health care plans). Take the case of two movies that opened in the summer of 2009. Year One starred Jack Black and Michael Cera, and the marketing was basically: "Hey, it's Jack Black and the guy from Juno. You're gonna love it." Then there was Paranormal Activity, which built its reputation at one film festival after another, until it was finally released in 13 college towns. Fans in other cities were then allowed to vote on where the movie should go next. Eventually the film was released nationwide, and after grossing $193 million on an original shooting budget of just $15,000, it’s become one of the most profitable movies of all-time. Year One got terrible reviews upon its debut and made just $62 million, barely recouping production costs. To Generation Z, platform and production value are irrelevant. They judge each product and piece of content on its own merits. 3. Enhance and Enable CurationWhat does Generation Z care about? Finding and sharing the best stuff in the world. They aren't just consumers, they are curators. They not only discover brands and products but they evaluate them with brilliant objectivity, sift through them, and share the results. Please a Generation Z-er with your particular product or service and you'll earn your biggest supporter. As a result, marketers need to make it easy to share what their Gen Z customers love. From Facebook "Likes" to branded tweets to Polyvore's brand expression collages, it's never been easier to share your opinion online. Don't stifle conversation, nor attempt to control conversation about your products — encourage it. There will be bad along with the good, but it will be authentic. This transparency will ultimately contribute to the long term success of your brand. Regardless, promoting an "open brand" ethos will lead to better informed and more passionate curators. Ready or not, Generation Z is here, and they are the future. I, for one, am thrilled to have a front-row seat as we watch them change the world before our very eyes. Interested in more Business & Marketing resources? Check out Mashable Explore, a new way to discover information on your favorite Mashable topics.Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Bennewitz More About: business, generation y, generation z, MARKETING, social media For more Business & Marketing coverage:
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| How a Government Shutdown Could Affect Tech Posted: 08 Apr 2011 12:51 PM PDT   About 800,000 U.S. government employees are facing an unpaid vacation if Congress does not agree on a budget bill by midnight on Friday. The government shutdown could halt military pay, national park and museum operations, financial regulation and many other operations deemed “non-essential.” Here’s how the shutdown could affect the tech world: Hold That IPO!The Securities and Exchange Commission announced on Thursday that it would not process any company filings in the case of a government shutdown, Reuters reports. That means that IPO filings would be put on hold. A prolonged shutdown (unlikely, but possible) could affect companies late in the IPO process, like Zipcar, as well as companies that have filed but haven’t set terms yet, like LinkedIn. Government Websites Go Dark?A memo that Office of Management and Budget Director Jack Lew wrote to the heads of executive departments and agencies asked them to make determinations of whether their websites were essential or not, The Hill reports. According to this memo, public access to government information doesn’t fall under this category. Websites necessary for operation like the IRS website for filing taxes, however, will remain open. A Victory For Telemarketers And SpammersAccording to a statement that the Federal Trade Commission posted on Friday, the Do Not Call Registry and Spam Database will not be available to law enforcement organizations in the case of a furlough. Google And Microsoft Wait For PaychecksIt’s not just government employees who might find themselves without a paycheck should the government shut down. Hundreds of thousands of business who have contracts with the government might also be affected. Those companies include mid-size IT firms and giants like Google, which beat Microsoft out to be the provider of choice for the first federal agency to use either company’s cloud-based services. (Microsoft still holds a vast number of government contracts for its Office suite.) Government BlackBerrys Get Switched OffSome furloughed employees would either turn in their BlackBerrys or be banned from using them. CNNMoney reports that employees deemed “essential” will be permitted to continue checking essential emails on their BlackBerrys. Which begs the question of how these employees will know which emails are essential without reading them first. More About: furlough, goverment shutdown, trending For more Social Media coverage:
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| Meet Extragram, a Slick Web App for Instagram Posted: 08 Apr 2011 12:37 PM PDT   When Instagram released its public API earlier this year, CEO Kevin Systrom said, “We've done our job if people's photos can get anywhere in the world instantly.” Extragram, a shiny new third-party web app, brings Systrom’s vision to fruition. Developed by a five-man team, Extragram is a slick web client that lets Instagram users log in to access photos on the web, instead of just via the iPhone app. “We just loved how beautiful Instragram made the images look,” says co-creator Karthikeyan Mani. “We wanted to come up with a really good user interface that would complement the beautiful photos Instagram churns out and we wanted to make it easy for our users to discover more of these lovely images and users through our web interface.” Extragram gives Instagram members three different views for feed and popular photos: Grid, Filmstrip or Map. Each view offers an artistic or place-based interpretation of the original feed format in the Instagram app. In any of the views, users can interact with photos. By rolling the mouse curser over a photo, users can see heart and comments icons they can click on to view and add “likes” or comments. The web app also allows users to search for photos, places, people and hashtags.  Extragram is not the first Instagram web client; Gramfeed was released a few weeks ago with similar features including photo feeds, comments and “likes.” Hundreds of developers have shown interest in using the Instagram API, and we’re just now starting to see the tangible output of their efforts. Whether there’s a potential for real businesses or startups — not just cool apps — to emerge around the Instagram platform is unclear. For now, we can watch an ecosystem take shape — and share massive amounts of filtered photos. More About: extragram, instagram, instagram API, mobile photo sharing For more Social Media coverage:
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| 25 Million Watch Live Video of Bald Eagle Family Posted: 08 Apr 2011 12:20 PM PDT Here’s a close-up live video stream of the pair of bald eagles and their babies that have captured the attention of 25,617,946 viewers all over the world for more than a week. The pair of eagles and their trio of tiny hatchlings live in a 6-foot-wide, 1.5-ton nest, situated 80 feet above the ground in a cottonwood tree in the Decorah Fish Hatchery in northeast Iowa. Part of the Raptor Resource Project, a non-profit group that specializes in the preservation of falcons, eagles, ospreys, hawks and owls, this live shot is streaming 24 hours a day, seven days a week. There are even infrared lights trained on the eagles, giving you a look at them in darkness as well. If the eagles aren’t doing much at the moment, go to the Raptor Resource area of the Ustream website and you can see videos from last weekend of each of the chicks hatching. More About: animals, Baby Eagles, Bald Eagles, Chicks, Hatchlings, Raptor Resource Project, streaming video, trending, ustream For more Video coverage:
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| Verizon Customers, Say Goodbye to 1-Year Contracts Posted: 08 Apr 2011 11:58 AM PDT   Verizon customers interested in signing a one-year contract (as opposed to the standard two) should lock in their selections now; the company has confirmed that it is eliminating the one-year contract option as of April 17. Verizon claims the policy change is taking place because the “greater majority of customers sign up for a two-year contract.” The nation’s largest wireless provider (at least until that AT&T/T-Mobile deal is approved) previously offered users the ability to sign one-year contracts or contract extensions in lieu of the standard two-year agreement. Customers who opted for the one-year contract were still able to purchase new equipment at a discount, albeit a lesser discount than the subsidized two-year agreements. In an email to BGR, Verizon reiterated that its contract-free month-to-month plans would still be available to consumers. Meanwhile, according to draft circulars obtained by DroidLife, Verizon may be introducing a new month-to-month prepaid plan that offers users unlimited voice and text for $50 a month. Data will cost extra (reportedly $30 a month for unlimited data). AT&T recently increased the early-upgrade price on some of its smartphones and feature phones. What do you think about Verizon eliminating one-year contracts? Let us know. More About: verizon For more Mobile coverage:
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| Rebecca Black’s Influence Lives on … At Least on Fridays Posted: 08 Apr 2011 11:43 AM PDT   It’s Friday. Time to surf over to YouTube and take in another viewing of Rebecca Black‘s smash hit jam, “Friday,” huh? No. I’m not kidding. According to YouTube, that’s exactly what folks are doing. YouTube explicates the Friday phenomena in a blog post today, demonstrating how searches for “Rebecca Black” have remained strong on the video-sharing site following the video’s viral kick-in-the-you-know-what. For comparison’s sake, other searches for viral videos (such as “Golden-Voiced” homeless man) have waned during the same time period after release. The most interesting observation, however, is the obvious: Searches for “Rebecca Black” spike every Friday. YouTube also says that searches for “Friday” have also spiked; the site is seeing more searches than ever for this term. Granted, the video hasn’t been out for too long, and it did get considerable buzz last Friday when Rebecca Black took over Funny Or Die, but the observation is interesting all the same. It also lends some serious cred to that old saying, “Keep it simple, stupid.” Name your song after a day of the week, and people will listen to it on said day. The Beatles got some serious spin for “Eight Day a Week,” but just imagine the possibilites if they had titled the jam “I Love You on Tuesday.” Endless. More About: music, Rebecca Black, video, viral video, youtube For more Video coverage:
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| Acer Honeycomb Tablet Landing April 24 for $449.99 Posted: 08 Apr 2011 11:12 AM PDT   Acer will be bringing its first Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) tablet to the U.S. on April 24 at an iPad-busting price of $449.99. The Acer Iconia Tab A500 is the company’s first Honeycomb-based tablet and it features a 10.1-inch screen, dual-core Nvidia Tegra 2 processor and front- and rear-facing cameras. Check out these specs:
 Specification-wise, the Iconia Tab A500 is a dead-ringer for the Motorola Xoom. The big difference — and this is an important difference — is price. The Xoom entered the market at a wallet-breaking $799.99. Although this included a 3G (upgradable to 4G) radio, the fact that the tablet ends up costing $70 more than a similarly equipped iPad 2 3G was a turnoff to a number of users. Motorola introduced a lower-priced Wi-Fi only Xoom at the end of March, but the damage may already have been done. Acer is not only matching Apple’s iPad 2 price point, it’s besting it by $50. The Iconia Tab A500 will be available exclusively at Best Buy stores. Users can pre-order the A500 in Best Buy stores beginning April 14. Although we’ll reserve final judgments for hands-on testing, the Iconia Tab A500 could be the first Android-powered tablet to have what it takes — in terms of specs and price — to take on the iPad 2. More About: Acer, acer iconia tab a500, android, honeycomb, honeycomb tablets, tablets For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:
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| Technical Difficulties: The Eternal Annoyance [COMIC] Posted: 08 Apr 2011 10:46 AM PDT   Mashable Comics are illustrated every week by Kiersten Essenpreis, a New York-based artist who draws and blogs at YouFail.com. More Mashable Comics:
More About: cloud computing, humor, mashable comics, tech For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:
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| Timelapse Video of San Francisco-to-Paris Flight Captures Aurora Borealis Posted: 08 Apr 2011 10:25 AM PDT If given a whole row to themselves in a flight from San Francisco to Paris, most people would just sleep. Not this passenger, who set up his Canon 5D Mark II digital SLR camera on a tripod and attached a timelapse controller. When he pointed his 16mm-to-35mm lens out his airplane window, the result was this remarkable timelapse video of his 11-hour flight. Taking that Great Circle route above the polar regions, the video flies us through the aurora borealis, giving us a look at those spectacular northern lights. Also remarkable is the fact that the Air France flight crew allowed the use of that bundle of electronic devices throughout the entire flight. At the end of this video, you’ll see the rig with which he snapped the 2,459 shots — one approximately every two miles. After the flight, they were edited together along with a few judiciously placed iPhone pics shot along the way. By the way, you don’t even need to be flying that far north to see the northern lights — once on a night flight from Montréal to Detroit, I could see the aurora borealis out of the right side of the plane during the entire trip. More About: aurora borealis, Canon 5D Mark II, flight, Timelapse, video For more Video coverage:
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| 30 Startups Ask Summer Interns to Apply via Social Media Posted: 08 Apr 2011 08:58 AM PDT   About 30 of the startups in Dave McClure’s 500 Startups portfolio will require their summer internship applicants to submit a social media component this year. “Startups have a greater emphasis on cultural fit within their companies because they're so small and also they're moving very quickly — they need people who think creatively and are willing to break the mold,” says Nathan Parcells, the co-founder of InternMatch. “That's not really identified in a traditional cover letter.” Parcells knows the importance of quality interns. His company guarantees clients that they will find a good intern using its website, and it employs seven interns to help find those internship applicants on prestigious college campuses. InternMatch is organizing the competition, dubbed 500 Interns. While it might be especially annoying to have an incompetent intern hanging around all summer in a small, startup setting, startups aren’t alone in using social media to help weed out the creatives from the mass of cover letters. This March, ad agency Campbell Mithun chose its six summer interns after asking applicants to make their cases exclusively on Twitter. The Sierra Club, STA Travel and Charlie Sheen are just a few of many to use YouTube as an application tool. What Parcells has in mind is less specific. He suggested that Quora, YouTube and Twitter could all be leveraged creatively, but the format is completely open. All that is required is a link to the media within the InternMatch application. Twilio, Slideshare and Appbistro are a few of the startups participating in the social media intern search. McClure is also accepting applications for a two-week job shadow. Check out the full list here. More About: 500 startups, internmatch, internships For more Startups coverage:
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| Fans Can Create Callaway Golf Ads for ESPN.com Posted: 08 Apr 2011 08:25 AM PDT   In what looks like a win-win for the advertiser and publisher, Callaway Golf has launched a promotion that lets users create their own banner ads to post on ESPN’s homepage. What makes the initiative attractive to ESPN is that after fans create their ads, they post on their Facebook walls. Fans’ friends could then click on the ads, which direct them to ESPN.com. Fans who opt to make their own banner get a choice of four possible quotes to supplement with their own message. The ad promotes Callaway’s new line of RAZR Driver and Iron golf clubs. This is the first time user-generated content has been featured on ESPN’s homepage. Ad agency Eleven created the effort. Customizing a banner ad with user-generated content seems to be a new trend; Callaway's not the first brand to try it. Last month, Saab launched a similar promotion via Facebook in which fans could write their own banners. By providing a level of audience engagement, both brands are trying to improve the historically low response rates for banner ads, which perform even worse on Facebook. More About: advertising, banner ads, Callaway Golf, ESPN, MARKETING, user-generated content For more Business & Marketing coverage:
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| Why Users Are More Engaged With Social Media on Fridays Posted: 08 Apr 2011 07:58 AM PDT   Rebecca Black‘s not the only one who thinks there’s something special about Friday. Two separate pieces of research out this week show that the end of the work week is the best time to get traction on status updates and tweets. Analyzing more than 200 of its clients’ Facebook pages over a 14-day period, Buddy Media found that engagement on Thursdays and Fridays was 18% higher than the rest of the week, and that engagement was actually even better on Thursday than on Friday. Meanwhile, Twitter Chief Revenue Officer Adam Bain — speaking at the Ad Age Digital conference earlier this week — said that Twitter users are more engaged with tweets on Fridays. The reason is fairly obvious, says Jeremiah Owyang, a partner at the Altimeter Group: “People are heading into the weekend so they’re thinking about things besides work. They’re mentally checking out and transitioning to the weekend.” Rick Liebling, director of digital strategy at Coyne PR, concurs: “It’s a matter of people finally pushing past the work week and coasting toward the weekend, picking their head up a bit to see what’s going on and what their friends are up to.” However, Liebling adds that there might be another factor at work: There may be fewer posts overall on Fridays, which means a greater number of average click-throughs. Dan Zarrella, a social media scientist at HubSpot, agrees with that assessment. “I call it ‘contra-competitive timing,’” Zarrella says. “As the overall activity seems to slow down from the hustle and bustle of the week, readers can give each tweet more attention because there are fewer other tweets fighting for it.” Whatever the case, the fact that Thursdays and Fridays are the best days of the week for engagement isn’t yet common knowledge among marketers. As Buddy Media CEO Michael Lazerow also noted at the Ad Age Digital conference, most brands are similarly unaware that their status updates will get more pickup if they’re posted after work hours. But Owyang says that what’s generally true may not be applicable to many marketers, anyway. For instance, “Friday may not be the best time for the B2B audience because they’re checking out mentally.” Similarly, Lazerow said that for movie companies, the weekend is the sweet spot, but for other media companies, Monday is the worst day of the week. “It’s the noisiest time to post,” Lazerow said. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Just_Human More About: Buddy Media, facebook, Social media research, trending, twitter For more Social Media coverage:
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| Thanks to Mashable’s Socially Savvy Supporters Posted: 08 Apr 2011 07:41 AM PDT
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| What Would the Music Industry Look Like if Napster Never Existed? [CHART] Posted: 08 Apr 2011 07:19 AM PDT   According to the labels, record sales would have burgeoned if not for the existence of file-sharing site Napster. The labels’ optimistic forecast comes in the form of a chart included in a trial brief for their case against LimeWire. The above chart was born out of a case brought by major labels like Sony Corp.’s Arista Records and Warner Music Group Corp.'s Atlantic Records against LimeWire. The trial is scheduled to begin May 2. In the brief, the labels say:
What do you think of the labels’ position? Are Napster, LimeWire and Co. to blame for the declining music industry? Should the labels have embraced file-sharing earlier and adapted it to their own purposes? Let us know in the comments. [via The Hollywood Reporter] Image courtesy of iStockphoto, shulz More About: filesharing, legal, limewire, music, napster, trending For more Media coverage:
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| 5 Ways to Improve Your International SEO Strategy Posted: 08 Apr 2011 07:02 AM PDT   Liz Elting is co-founder and co-CEO of TransPerfect, the world's largest privately held provider of language and business services. Web users in the Middle East, Asia, the Americas and Europe have embraced Facebook, Twitter and other social platforms as vehicles for communication, commerce, and revolution. If North American-based businesses are to reach this rapidly expanding, increasingly sophisticated Internet audience, they must get smarter about international search engine optimization (ISEO). Just like domestic SEO, international SEO aims to boost the likelihood that a particular website will rise to the top of search results, thereby enabling increased conversion rates. The challenge internationally is selecting the right SEO strategies for an enormous number of locales, cultural norms and languages. Here are some key points to consider when tackling ISEO. 1. Humans Beat Machine TranslationEven with adequate time for review and planning, machines can make small errors in localization that have significant consequences. The pressure to get it right via social media is exponentially greater, since time is short and engagement expectations are high. Brands need human experts who can quickly identify faults in automated translations and repair them before damage occurs in important markets. This is also true for accompanying imagery, which can convey unintended messages if not properly vetted. 2. Learn Vernacular and Optimize Keywords AccordinglyWhether a user seeks out information via a regional search engine or through Facebook pages or Twitter hashtags, the company looking for that prospect must anticipate the phrases he or she will employ. For example, a young person in one part of the world may search for shoes using a slang term, such as, "tennis shoes," "sneakers" or "kicks.” No two search engines use the exact same algorithm to produce organic results. The techniques required to optimize for Chinese search engine Baidu, for example, may be vastly different from those needed to optimize for Google. Businesses that want to reach targeted users need expertise not only in language, but also in culture and technology. This is one reason why enterprises must adopt an integrated approach to ISEO that determines the right wording and creates consistent, relevant messages in ads, landing pages, social media posts and search engine marketing. 3. Make Every Character CountImproving the visibility of a website abroad — which demands knowledge of regional cultures, dominant local search engines and top keywords — starts with translation. Effective localization requires more than plugging words into a bot that spits out literal interpretations. This is certainly true for global websites, but the importance of connotation intensifies as communication gets more compact. Twitter's strict length parameters, for example, make every character choice a critical one, particularly when you consider that English text can expand in character count when translated into other languages. Translating for this kind of platform requires not only timesaving software solutions, but seasoned human translators, as well. Multi-language tweets can be a valuable tool in numerous communities around the world, but 140 characters in English do not neatly translate into 140 characters in Arabic, for example. To communicate convincingly with multilingual audiences via social networks, companies need more human involvement. Engagement is key. 4. Register a Local Domain and Apply ISEOGlobal search marketing requires local domain and IP registration, as well as meaningful and fresh content that is keyword-specific. It demands descriptive tagging, rich media, social media distribution and internal and external links. These elements must take into account the search habits of target audiences and the algorithms of the search engines they are most likely to use. There is little value in going live with a website that is not optimized with these needs in mind. Only when ISEO and design are done in conjunction can a business be certain that customers will find it online. This principle applies to social media as well. 5. Get to Know Your AudienceInternet World Stats show that 86% of web users live outside North America. Many of them speak languages other than English, and capturing their business depends upon quality website translation, localization, and smarter ISEO. Increasingly, that business opportunity also hinges on extending multilingual campaigns to social media platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter. To break into promising regions in the Americas, the Middle East, Europe and Asia, enterprises are applying these principles to all of their electronic communication points with customers, and therefore maximizing their prospects for success. Know your audience's lingo, its concerns and its preferred platforms so it can quickly and easily find and do business with you. Use social media to show that your company took the time and effort to communicate with global customers in a meaningful and authentic manner. Interested in more Business resources? Check out Mashable Explore, a new way to discover information on your favorite Mashable topics.Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Brasil2 More About: business, facebook, Google, international seo, iseo, MARKETING, Search, SEO, social media, twitter For more Business & Marketing coverage:
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| Should Your Company Offer an API? Posted: 08 Apr 2011 06:10 AM PDT   This post originally appeared on Dyn.com, a world leader in managed DNS, powering the best brands on the web including Gowalla, Mashable, Twitter, Wikia and more. Follow @DynInc on Twitter. APIs are a hot topic among developers these days. Companies ranging from startups to large enterprises are offering them, and APIs have, to an extent, become the lifeblood of interdependent web services. So how do you decide whether or not your company should offer an API? To deliberate this question (and to learn about some of the tools available for offering APIs), we’ve turned to a panel of experts whose daily business is the building, distribution, management and monetization of APIs. Here’s what they have to say about choosing whether or not to offer that kind of access in the first place. To API or Not to API?Oren Michels is Mashery‘s CEO; his company does API management and strategy for more than 100 brands and 25,000 applications. He told us in an email, “”Ultimately, the API is a means for growing your business — and I use the term ‘business’ to include whatever your mission is, be it traffic or commerce or a nonprofit improving the world or a government entity serving its constituents — faster and larger by virtue of engaging with others. Understand how and why your API can do that and you will be successful.” Shanley Kane works on the product team at Apigee, a company that offers a range of API tools for developers and software companies. She says the first thing to do when considering building an API is to identify the goals and audience for that API. “This will inform every step of the API strategy,” Kane says, “from design to go-to-market. Companies open APIs for many reasons — to encourage developer innovation, monetize data, connect with partners or get to mobile and connected devices. Setting out with a clear objective that is tied to business goals and has a defined target market — whether large partners or independent developers — is critical to successful API programs.” Kane also says to keep an eye on your competitors. APIs are products like any other, and the current ecosystem of platforms and services is vast and intricate. If your API is meeting the same need as a competing product, Kane says you have to ask yourself what makes your service or your API different — “How will your API stand out and win?” Augusto Marietti founded Mashape, a marketplace for building, distributing and hacking with APIs. He gives decision makers a thorough checklist of questions to consider when thinking about whether or not to offer an API. Take these questions into early meetings and make sure each one is thoroughly answered before you move forward.
Dimitri Sirota is an executive for Layer 7 Technologies, which offers its own suite of API management tools for the enterprise. Accordingly, he comes to the table with a different perspective from that of the typical web startup developer. He says companies should consider whether “the benefit of opening up my data in terms of reach and revenue outweigh the risk and cost.” He also cautions larger companies to fully define which department or specific personnel will “own” the product. He says to start out with a clear picture of your long-term goals — why are you offering an API? Is it for “revenue, retention or reach?” Finally, if you’ve decided that the product in and of itself is a good idea, Kane says you have to plan for money and personnel. “Successful APIs need care, feeding and love,” she says. You must determine if your company is willing and able to devote the resources needed to build a successful API team and program, which includes the the need to “adapt the API and respond to user feedback, employ marketing resources to get the word out, and hire a community manager or developer advocate to make sure developers are taken care of and getting what they need.” And while you might not need or plan to make money from your API (more on that in later posts), monetization discussions should occur early on, Kane says. “It’s very important to determine if monetization is a main goal of your service and if so, how you intend to charge or benefit from it. Offering a free service, then charging for it later, can have negative community backlash, so monetization is important to think about early and often. And if you decide to go free and open, identify the business metrics for it and how it fits into your business model.” Michels also added that, when considering your API options, you need to consider the different types of devs that may be using it. “There are three major developer audiences for APIs: internal developers, second-party partners like biz dev partnerships or contracted outside app developers or affiliated companies, and third-party independent developers who may be developing new innovations that the API provider won’t even know about … Each audience has different needs and presents different opportunities, and you may want to address a few major second-party partners’ needs first before opening it up to a broader developer community.” The Best Tools for the JobOf course, our experts all work for companies that specialize in API management, so you’d likely be in good hands going to any of these companies when offering your own API. But we also asked them for basic advice on the kinds of tools you’ll need to use and understand when building and managing an API for your company or service. Sirota says, “You need an API proxy, a gateway to regulate what APIs get exposed to whom and when. The gateway is where you define the security policies, SLA controls and any integration/data mapping requirements. You also need API monitoring and lifecycle management … to address versioning of APIs and delivery of APIs across development, test and production. You also need visibility into usage.” Finally, Sirota adds that you’ll need to create a developer portal of some sort. “This is the developer-facing piece, and it addresses all the developer onboarding, plan management, information discovery about the APIs, etc.” Kane recommends GitHub as “a great resource for tracking issues, sharing code and documenting your API.” She also says that having clear and accessible documentation is “essential” for developer onboarding, and she recommends Google Groups for communicating with third-party devs using your API. Kane says companies should be sure to get their APIs listed in ProgrammableWeb’s directory, and she recommends checking out Stashboard, an open-source status dashboard for APIs. Stay tuned for more posts on getting started with offering APIs. And in the comments, let us know your own recommendations for offering APIs.  Interested in more Development resources? Check out Mashable Explore, a new way to discover information on your favorite Mashable topics.Image based on a photo from iStockphoto user alxpin More About: api, api management, APIs, business, developers, Web Development For more Dev & Design coverage:
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| YouTube to Roll Out Live Streaming to Select Partners Posted: 08 Apr 2011 05:59 AM PDT   YouTube has been dabbling with live streaming across a variety of sectors in recent years — from concerts to Q&As with U.S. President Barack Obama — and now the video-sharing site is ramping up those efforts by expanding its live streaming efforts and opening them up to select partners. Live video will be curated on a page dedicated to the medium, titled www.youtube.com/live, where users can find out what’s currently streaming, add events to their calendars and subscribe to channels so as to be notified of events. The beta program will be gradually rolled out to partners in good standing with the site, allowing them to interact in real time with their audiences. Live streams will also feature a chat module so viewers can ask questions and give feedback, according to Josh Siegel, YouTube product manager.  “YouTube’s vision is to become the premiere destination for all video on the web,” says Chris Hamilton, product marketing manager. “This enables partners to have a deeper level of interactivity with the audience that they work so hard to build.”  Partners who could soon be live streaming content include select musicians, The Gregory Brothers, The Mystery Guitar Man, Rutgers University, Stanford University and select gaming channels. The first live stream will be The DigiTour: Live from Google HQ at 7 p.m. PDT, which is a touring show featuring popular YouTube musicians. “We’re curious to see how our partners leverage and use this platform,” Hamilton says. The team also told us that the site is working to bring live sports to YouTube but didn’t elaborate on specific deals. YouTube has already live streamed Indian Premier League cricket matches, and we’ve heard rumblings that other leagues soon might be featured on the site as well. The team also declined to comment on recent rumors that YouTube will be upping its curation efforts by organizing its content into channels packed with professionally produced videos. However, we can easily see live content fitting very well within the framework of such a curation effort, especially since YouTube is maintaining quality control by limiting who has access to live streaming capabilities. Photo courtesy of Flickr, Evelyn Proimos More About: livestreaming, video, youtube For more Video coverage:
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