Funding for 'IT Lab' Project, Phase 1: Progress of sticker sales. Purchase a sticker to help us reach our target.Updated: 2010-02-28 11:53
Current IT news
by Akila Mendis
1. Early Microsoft Store plans leaked
Microsoft has confirmed that store plans posted
on Gizmodo are genuine, but represent the company's early thinking and that
no final decisions have been made on how the company's retail stores will look
when the first ones open this year.
The designs, which include a giant video wall, Surface computers, and an "answer bar”, were leaked to the gadget site. Microsoft plans to start with just a few stores this year with more to open in 2010. At least some of those locations will be in close proximity to Apple stores. Microsoft first announced its plan to enter the retail arena in February, when it hired David Porter, a Wal-Mart veteran.
Source: http://news.cnet.com
Picture source: http://gizmodo.com
Are people who search on Bing more commercial than Google searchers? According to a study by search-advertising network Chitika, visitors who arrive at sites from organic search results on Bing are 55 percent more likely to click on an ad than if they arrived from Google.
Chitika looked at the clickthrough rates from 32 million ad impressions across its network of more than 50,000 sites in a week in July. Visitors from Bing clicked on an ad 1.5 percent of the time on average, versus a 0.97 percent clickthrough rate for Google visitors and a 1.24 percent clickthrough rate for Yahoo.
3. Facebook’s Offical User Count Now 250 Million
Facebook has officially grown to 250 million active users across the world, according to a post on the company blog by CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
"For us, growing to 250 million users isn't just an impressive number; it is a mark of how many personal connections all of you have made, and how far we at Facebook have to go to extend the power of connection to the billions of people around the world," Zuckerberg wrote.
Facebook announced that it had reached 200 million members barely over three months ago. Then, Facebook commemorated the occasion with the launch of a new nonprofit-focused initiative, Facebook for Good.
"Today (15.07.2009) as we celebrate our 250 millionth user, we are also continuing to develop Facebook to serve as many people in the world in the most effective way possible," Zuckerberg wrote.
Following is a heat map, showing the global distribution of Facebook’s growth
Source: http://news.cnet.com
Read more on http://www.techcrunch.com
4. News Corp sees MySpace as a place for video games
News Corp hopes to transform MySpace, which has been losing users to Facebook, into a stronger online video gaming platform as it works to re-position the six-year-old site as an entertainment destination.
News Corp digital head Jonathan Miller has stated that he wants to expand the video game platform on his company's sagging social networking site, which lags Facebook in number of users.
Miller has further stated that he saw opportunities to make MySpace's gaming platform better geared to video game suppliers who then will want to launch their products on the site and employ its user data to better develop games.
Source: http://in.reuters.com
5. Facebook Relents, Lets You Change Your Username
Last month, Facebook finally announced that they would allow users to pick out custom usernames for use in vanity URLs that read www.facebook.com/username. At the time, users were advised to "choose wisely" because the username they selected would be stuck with them for life.
But now it appears that Facebook has quietly launched a new option in the settings area called "username" where you have the option to change your Facebook username. To find this option, go to "Settings" at the top-right of the Facebook page and then click on "Account Settings." The second option from the top is "Username." Press "Change" to enter in your new username and then click "Confirm" when you're ready to set it.
Source: http://www.readwriteweb.com
Twitter has just launched a Twitter 101 “Special Guide” that explains the various aspects of the service in an overview format. The guide is broken down into 6 main sections: “What is Twitter”, “Getting Started”, “Learn the lingo”, “Best practices”, “Case studies” as well as an “Other resources” section.
The guide sits on the business.twitter.com sub domain and is clearly marketed towards businesses. It was written by Twitter along with Sarah Milstein, who is the co-author with Tim O’Reilly on The Twitter Book - a book that discusses how to use Twitter for business.
Read more on http://thenextweb.com
Post new comment