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What Social Signals Do Google & Bing Really Count?
Both Google and Bing have added many social search features over the past year. There’s also been talk about using “social signals” to help rank regular search results. But are either of the major search engines actually using those social signals to rank regular search results? A bit, they tell me. In particular, your stature […]
How Did The Beatles Sell 2 Million Songs On iTunes? Mostly Facebook (Not Search)
Although at least one recent study says search beats social media when it comes to product discovery, those rules don’t apply to The Beatles. When you’re known worldwide and have set the standard for commercial and critical musical success, social media is where it’s at in 2010. Billboard magazine reports that The Beatles sold more […]
Facebook Drops Gmail As Find Friends Option
TechCrunch reports Facebook has removed the Gmail option of finding friends on Facebook. If you go to the find friends section on Facebook, you will find options to find your friends via Skype, AIM, Windows Live Hotmail, Yahoo, AOL, Comcast, MSN, sbcglobal and verizon.net, but you won’t see Google’s Gmail as an option: This doesn’t […]
Facebook Getting Almost 25% Of All US Page Views
New statistics out today from Experian Hitwise show Facebook’s continued spread into the average US internet user’s daily activities online. Hitwise says Facebook received nearly 25% of all US page views for the week that ended on November 13, 2010 (last week). Comparatively, a year ago at this time, Facebook generated 16.7% of all US […]
Report: FBI Talks To Google, Facebook About Wiretapping
The New York Times is reporting that FBI Director Robert S. Mueller met this week with executives from several tech firms — including Google and Facebook — to talk about a plan to make Internet wiretapping easier. The Times says the US government is looking to expand a 1994 law, the Communications Assistance for Law […]
Google & Facebook: If You’re So Smart, Work It Out!
Last week, things boiled over between Google and Facebook over data sharing. This week, the CEOs from both companies took the stage at Web 2.0 Summit. Despite the obvious conflict, neither CEO would just clearly say what they wanted from the other. It’s a pity two innovative, groundbreaking companies can’t show any innovation when it […]
Live Blogging Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg At Web 2.0 Summit
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg will be speaking today at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco. I’m here and will be live blogging his remarks, when the session begins. Zuckerberg was set to speak at 4:50 Pacific Time, but it’s looking more likely he’ll be on around 5:10. He’ll be interviewed on stage by John […]
How The New Facebook Messages & Email System Works
At one end of the spectrum, Facebook says it’s “simple” and “fun.” On the other end, some are saying it’s Facebook’s version of Google Wave. And just about everyone spent the weekend suggesting that it’s a “Gmail killer.” “It” is Facebook’s new, Whatever-you-do-don’t-call-it-email-but-hey-here’s-a-Facebook-email-address-for-you email and messaging system. Facebook says it’s more like chat; and it’s […]
Facebook Messages: Export Of Facebook.com Addresses OK
How well can the new Facebook Messages interact with other email services? Pretty much not at all, Facebook told me. You can export some addresses, and you can forward email into Facebook, but that’s about it. I spoke with Facebook’s director of engineering Andrew Bosworth after today’s Facebook press conference about the new Facebook Messaging […]
Live Blogging The Facebook Messages / Email Event – With Screenshots!
Today, Facebook is widely expected to announce that it is offering email to its members. Will that be the case? We’ll all find out soon enough. I’ll be live blogging the Facebook event that begins at 10am Pacific Time. Also see our expanded piece: How The New Facebook Messages & Email System Works
Google/Facebook Saga Continues: Google Warns Not To “Trap” Your Data
Continuing on from Danny’s Facebook: You’ve No Right To Export Email Addresses , it appears Google has upped the ante. ReadWriteWeb noticed that when you try to export your contacts to Facebook, Google gives you a big warning. This warning stems from Google recently changing their terms of service of their contacts API to prevent […]
Facebook: You’ve No Right To Export Email Addresses (Unless It’s To Yahoo & Microsoft)
The Google-Facebook wars have heated up this past week over the ability for people to swap contacts between the services. In the latest round, a Facebook engineer says people have no right to export the email addresses of their contacts. Unless, of course, you’re exporting to Yahoo and Microsoft. I’ve been watching the events unfold […]
Will Facebook Lose Google’s Contacts Integration?
TechCrunch reports Google has made a small but significant change to their Google Contacts API terms of service that technically prevents Facebook from using it to improve their friends database. When users sign up to Facebook, they are prompted to add friends. They can do so manually or by uploading their contacts or email lists. […]
Facebook Tweaks Its SERP Interface
Facebook does many things well but search still isn’t one of them. Over the past year Facebook has taken steps to improve its search usability; and Microsoft has been working with Facebook to do a better job with web search on Facebook. Search remains a major opportunity for both Facebook and Bing, which hasn’t yet […]
Big Deal: Facebook Emerges As Major Player In Mobile And Location-Based Services
The world of location-based services changed dramatically today. And the changes that Facebook announced place the company firmly in the center of that very dynamic universe and ecosystem. Toward the end of becoming a “platform” for mobile, Facebook made several significant announcements aimed at developers. There were also announcements aimed at consumers and marketers, “Deals” […]
Bing Says Its New Facebook Like Integration Really, Really Is Live
The Bing Search Blog officially announced that the Facebook integration on Bing is live. Last week, we reported some were already seeing “liked results” on Bing. But now or by the end of today, “all US users” should have access to this feature. Personally, I still do not see it, but you may. To test […]
Google Spends $1.6 Billion (So Far) On 40 Acqusitions In 2010, Loses Key Personnel
Google just filed its quarterly 10Q statement. Among the things in the filing is detail about Google’s acquisitions in 2010. There were 40 costing Google a total of $1.6 billion and change. There were three substantial acquisitions (mostly bought with stock) and a whole bunch of smaller acquisitions that Google lumps together in the filing: […]
Bing Finally Getting Facebook “Liked Results”
Earlier this month, Bing announced a new deal with Facebook, where it would be showing you what your Facebook friends liked within search results. People are now reporting seeing the personalization appearing. Bing originally said the new feature was rolling out in the US when it launched on October 13 and that it would be […]
Yandex, Facebook Strike A Deal For Status Updates
Yandex, the number one search engine in Russia, has struck a deal with Facebook to get some updates for its search engine index. As announced today, the deal has two parts: First, Facebook will supply Yandex with a data feed of status updates from Facebook Pages. This is similar to the Facebook-Google agreement announced last […]
Yahoo To Offer Y Connect; While Facebook Undergoes Privacy Scrutiny
Yahoo to Offer Media Links from the Wall Street Journal reports Yahoo will create a similar tool to Facebook connect for their media publishers, web developers and other websites to integrate with. Yahoo would not comment on the new system, but the purpose behind it is to help Yahoo better track users around the web, […]
Facebook On Social Search: ‘We Want To Work With Everybody’
That was a statement Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg made in response to a question at the end of the Bing-Facebook press event today. He expressed openness to working with others (read Google or Yahoo) as a philosophical matter. I followed up with Brett Taylor, Facebook CTO and former Googler, about Zuckerberg’s remark. I said to […]
Bing, Now With Extra Facebook: See What Your Friends Like & People Search Results
At long last, Facebook’s social data is coming to search in a big way. Bing is now making use of it to show new “Liked By Your Friends” matches and Facebook-powered people search results. The move offers a huge amount of promise, and perhaps gives Bing a edge that Google can’t quickly replicate. But at […]
Live From Today’s Bing/Facebook Announcement
We’re here at Microsoft’s Mountain View campus, waiting for news from Bing and Facebook. I’m liveblogging the event; Greg Sterling is sitting next to me ready to provide the color commentary, and Danny Sullivan has written an in-depth analysis of the new features that we’ll link over to as soon as the embargo lifts in […]
Bing (+ Facebook) Event Later Today — And We’ll Be There
As you’ve no doubt already seen, Bing is holding an event at Microsoft’s Silicon Valley Campus at 11:30 Pacific/2:30 Eastern. Microsoft’s Qi Lu will be speaking and Facebook will be there. There should be some interesting news coming out of the event and we’ll be in attendance to report and “live blog” it here. The […]
Yahoo Returns To No. 2 Video Site, Ahead Of Facebook
Facebook’s tenure as the number two video site in the U.S. was short-lived. According to the latest comScore video rankings, Yahoo returned to second place in September after Facebook held the spot in August. Here’s the chart for September: Video viewing overall was down slightly in September in the U.S.
Bartz: ‘Creepy’ Facebook Could Be Yahoo’s Top Competitor
Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz says Facebook has a “creepy” amount of personal information about its users, and could become Yahoo’s number one competitor because of the value of that data. Her comments came about 10 days ago at the USA Today CEO Forum in Atlanta, and have just been published today on the paper’s website. […]
Irony: Facebook’s New Groups Give Me Less Control, Not More
I missed Facebook’s press conference yesterday about the new Facebook Groups feature that promises that you can share comments, photos and other information more tightly among only people you trust. But I learned about the feature firsthand soon enough, when I found myself added to a group without being asked. And that was worrisome. Robert […]
Twitter Hits 1 Billion Queries Per Day, Announces New Search Tech
If Twitter were like an old-style McDonald’s, the sign outside would have changed to “1 Billion Queries Served” today. And to keep serving up those queries to humans and machines alike, Twitter is now using a new underlying search technology. The news was announced in a post on Twitter’s Engineering blog today. Let’s take the […]
Facebook Introduces Private Groups, Allows Export Of Personal Data
In a bid to give users more tools and control over the sharing of information (and perhaps preempt Google) Facebook introduced a new way to create and communicate with small private groups of people. Through an API this same functionality will be extended to publishers and third party developers like Facebook Connect is today. The […]
Facebook Tops Yahoo As No. 2 Video Site
There’s no drama or news when talking about the most popular video site on the web; that battle was won long ago by YouTube and doesn’t seem likely to change anytime. But after that, the landscape changes a bit. Hulu and VEVO seemed like they might be on the rise, but now it’s Facebook that’s […]
Mobile Monday: Google Voice On The iPhone, The “Facebook Phone” & Google To Distribute Mystery Devices To SMBs
Over the weekend there were two much-discussed mobile-related rumors, both coming out of TechCrunch. The first — still a very hot topic on Techmeme this morning — is that Facebook is building a branded phone or mobile operating system. The original rumor yesterday was that Facebook was working on a mobile OS with a hardware […]
Schmidt: Listing Google’s 200 Ranking Factors Would Reveal Business Secrets
Google’s been under fire in various quarters, including the New York Times, that it should open up about how its ranking algorithm works. I think offering the exact formula would be difficult plus potentially give away trade secrets. But how about just listing some of the basic “ingredients?” Nope, said Google CEO Eric Schmidt, this […]
Report: Google To Leverage Other Social Networks To Make Itself More Social
The unconfirmed “Google Me” appears not to be a product per se rather a placeholder for a broader social strategy. According to reports coming out of Google Zeitgeist (Danny’s there so he can expand on this) Google is going to integrate a “social layer” into more and more of its products over time. According to […]
Facebook Passes Google In “Time Spent,” What Does It Mean?
Yesterday morning Citi analyst Mark Mahaney put out a research note with comScore data that showed Facebook had passed Google in terms of time spent online. Mahaney observed: Looking at % of Total Time Spent by the top 5 sites in August, Facebook, for the first time took the top spot with 41.1B minutes followed […]
Facebook Adds Popular News Articles To Search Results
It’s sort of a baby step in Facebook’s efforts to improve its search results, but certainly worth noting here: Facebook is now showing news articles in its search results and ranking them by how many “likes” and “shares” the articles have received from Facebook users. The All Facebook blog says the number of friends who […]
Paul Allen Sues Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Others Over Patents
Paul Allen, the Microsoft co-founder and one of the richest men on earth, has filed a patent infringement suit today against several Internet titans, the Wall Street Journal reports. The lawsuit centers on technology developed a decade ago by Interval Research Corp., a technology lab that Allen owned between 1992 and 2000. Eleven companies are […]
Survey: Older Americans Flocking To Social Media
Teenagers have been grappling with a tough question lately: What do I do when mom tries to friend me on Facebook? Well, you ain’t seen nothing yet, whippersnappers. There’s a new dilemma you better start thinking about: What do you do when grandma sends a friend request? That’s more and more likely according to a […]
Making Sense of Facebook Places
One of the questions that came up after the formal launch of Facebook Places last night was: how will this affect Google Places (among others)? As an aside, I have to say it’s really strange that these products have nearly the identical name. It’s almost like Honda offering a car with a particular name and […]
The One Thing That Could Doom Facebook Questions
Launched last week, Facebook Questions has a great opportunity to become the most popular question-and-answer destination on the web. With a built-in audience of 500 million users worldwide, Facebook could surpass Yahoo Answers and its 200+ million users in relatively quick order. But for all of its interesting features (see my article, Up Close With […]
Facebook: No Plans To Give Search Engines Access To Facebook Questions
That’s one of the big questions people are asking after yesterday’s launch of Facebook Questions. While many have assumed the answer would be “yes,” a Facebook spokesperson tells us that assumption is wrong. Currently, search engines cannot access questions and answers through our Questions product. That may be something we consider for the future but […]