Did Oprah Make Twitter’s Numbers Look Bad?
Earlier today, we looked at some numbers that didn’t exactly look great for Twitter. While the numbers certainly shouldn’t be ignored, nobody ever said they were concrete or indisputable fact.
The fact is, that numbers supplied from research firms are often off a bit, and they should usually be taken with a grain of salt. The indication however, was that Twitter growth had pretty much screeched to a halt. That really might not be the whole picture though.
UK Hacker Fights US Extradition
A British computer hacker wanted by the United States for "the biggest military hack of all time" begins a final fight today to avoid extradition.
Lawyers for Gary McKinnon, will argue in London’s High Court today that he is too ill to be sent to the United States for trial because he has Asperger’s syndrome, a form of autism.
Wolfram Alpha Already Gets a Big Update
Wolfram Alpha has made its first major update, just three weeks after the much-hyped search/answer engine was launched. So what does this update include?
TechCrunch Dethroned by Mashable as Top Tech Blog
Michael Arrington’s TechCrunch has been the top tech blog for quite some time in terms of traffic. It has been discovered that Pete Cashmore’s Mashable has actually overtaken that title now.
IT Departments Cut First Quarter Budgets
In the first quarter of 2009, 42 percent of CIOs decreased their IT budgets with an average cut of 4.7 percent, according to a new survey by Gartner.
CIOs were expecting a minor budget increase of 0.16 percent in the first quarter, but due to the economy were forced to cut costs. More than 90 percent of firms changing their budgets made a reduction in the first quarter, with the average being 7.2 percent. Forty-four percent of respondents reported no change in their IT budgets, with just 4 percent reporting an increase in their IT budget.
Blogs or Mainstream News, Where’s The Real Information?
I know what you’ve been thinking: man, I’m tired of reading unfounded rumors reported as news. Yeah, me too. Really, I am. So let’s fix this. Let’s stop reading blogs—I mean, you know all they do is just post anything that comes into their heads, foundation or not—and stick to the venerable guardians of all truth, the mainstream media.
eBay Challenges Sellers to Use Only eBay
eBay aims to "spark the entrepreneurial spirit" among its sellers with today’s launch of the eBay Sellers Challenge. The challenge is for sellers to answer the question: "How would you use $25,000 go grow – or start – an eBay business?"
Are Local Businesses Trying Hard Enough with Paid Search?
On Friday, the Interactive Advertising Bureau announced that the US had reached $5.5 billion in online ad revenue for the first quarter. This was down a bit from last year, but that’s not too bad considering the state of the economy. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find other ways to advertise your business that are as cost-effective.
New York State Embraces Social Media
The New York State Office for Technology has launched Empire 2.0, a social media networking initiative with the goal of promoting government participation, increase collaboration and to improve the state’s ability to share information with social media users.
The Empire 2.0 strategy is a roadmap for state agencies to use Web 2.0, new media and social collaborative tools and technologies to improve communications and services while being more transparent and open.
Facebook Moves Further Into Twitter Territory
Facebook is now offering its users the ability to receive their friends’ status updates via text message on their phones. If you click on the "subscribe via SMS" link below your friends’ profile pics, you get their latest updates this way.