Facebook is, according to AllFacebook, testing a new feature that allows users to ‘subscribe’ to other users’ feeds. This means that if you want to follow a specific friend’sactivity on Facebook, you’ll get notifications specifically about what that person is up to. Creepy? Definitely!
Writes AF:
While I’m not quite sure how advanced this feature will be, you could imagine a system in which you get a mobile notification every time one of your friends that you’ve subscribed to makes an update. I think that stalker aspect of the feature could also result in some backlash. Previously, it was chance if a friend’s information was displayed in your feed, however this will remove chance from the process.
Can we agree that this is ridiculously creepy, in a “Janie, I want to remind you that usually, on Fridays, you comment on four images. Today, only three. What the eff?” kind of way? Yes, we can.
1. It’s Not a Standalone Website or Mobile Application
Ping is only a feature within iTunes, in both the desktop application for Mac and PC and the mobile application for the iPhone and iPod Touch. The only thing you’ll find at www.ping.com (besides a lot of new traffic from confused people looking for music news) are golf clubs and golf bags. That’s not Apple’s Ping.
2. You Don’t Have to Use it
If the idea of yet another social network makes your skin crawl, have no fear – you can still update to iTunes 10 without being forced into the glamorous world of social sharing. Ping, available as an option on the left-side of iTunes, is turned off by default. If you want in, you have to push the big button that reads: “Turn on Ping.”
In a somewhat twisted game of social interaction, a digital culture centre in Australia has set up a Facebook page called Meat Eater. The site page is connected to a plant, and the more you interact with the page, the more the plant is fed/given nutrients. Basically, if no one uses the Facebook page, the plant will die. It somehow seems cruel, even though I buy plants and allow them to wither with some frequency.
Nonetheless the reason we’re sharing this story with you is because it demonstrates the power the digital world can have on the tangible world. Though our lives are affected daily by things happening on the web, this is a reminder that those effects manifest in many ways.
The red hub on the back of this bike is a self-charging electric motor. Its designers wanted it to fulfill the following four criteria (which it does):
1. All of the components should fit in the hub.
2. It should be easily retrofitable and modular, so that you could plug in different components such as a bigger battery if you live near hills or environmental sensors if you’re a city looking to gather data.
3. It should be your friend, and be able to tell you how well you’re doing.
4. It should have a social component that connects with your friends and encourages you to cycle.
The hub, designed by students at SENSEable City Lab at MIT for the city of Copenhagen (currently 36% of residents ride bikes, but they want to increase that to 50%), charges itself by absorbing brake-energy and momentum. It can be adjusted through your iPhone, to help you as much as 300%, or as little as you want.
Possibly the best part is that everything you need to power this bike goes on the back wheel.
In what may be the largest, or most expensive give-away garnered through a geo-location tool, airlin Virgin America gave away two-for-one plane tickets to Mexico today. and geo-location start-up Loopt. Per Silicon Alley Insider:
Anyone who checks in to select locations in Los Angeles and San Francisco using Loopt Star — Loopt’s deals app — will receive a voucher for two tickets for the price of one to Los Cabos or Cancun from either LA or San Francisco. Virgin is just now opening up service to Mexico, and is using the Loopt promotion to draw attention to the new routes.
Let’s think about the implications of such a large giveaway. Clearly, Virgin sees location-based promotions as a fertile territory for getting the word out about its new services. But we question if location is ‘there’ yet – meaning – will people download and use Loopt solely for the opportunity to get a great travel deal? If so, what does that say about this technology as a media channel – and is such behavior any different from forcing oneself to watch a commercial in order to learn more about an advertised product?
If users are signing up for Loopt just to get the tickets, we have to ask who this campaign is really benefitting.
Endorse for a Cause, a start-up, allows you to make micro-donations every time you buy something online. TechCrunch reports that when you log into EFAC’s site and make a purchase, .7-.8 percent of that sale then goes to a charity (of your choosing).
Well that may be a bit of an overstatement, but Google Priority Mail (Google’s tool for…prioritizing your mail) launched today and was shared with certain Gmail users, and has the potential to change how people read mail.
SKINNY concept designer Colin Murphy described the service simply, saying, “it basically makes your main inbox your spam folder” – except it separates the really important mail from the less important stuff. Example: something from your boss would go in the priority inbox and something from Zappos would go in the everything else folder.
STARRED GOODNESS
But there’s something else to whet your Gmail appetite. Starred items get a space below the priority stuff, but above “everything else”. This is an elegant solution to a problem Google created when it started allowing “starring”. Namely, that the starred item gets forgotten about. Now, it’s front and center (see image).
But will it work? We just got the service, so it’s too soon to tell, but we’ll report back later. Check out the video below, and an official story from the Detroit Free Press, here. Or get it from Google, here.
Stickers like this one could soon become a normal part of car shopping, according to Tech Crunch. Some cars already come with them, but the image you see to the left, with a giant letter grade, may be put to use. The thinking is that the large letter grade will give the buyer an immediate sense of how eco-healthy the car is.
The closest thing I can think of, as a consumer, is from the grocery delivery service, FreshDirect. Fresh foods are given a star rating (1-5) for how fresh they are. Most foods I buy are between 2.5 and 5 stars. In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t be so lazy that I settle for foods that rate 2.5, but I recall reminding myself that if they’re selling it it’s probably fine if I eat it. That’s terrible logic, and I hope that in the case of car-buying, buyers are wiser. I assume they would, since there are typically more options presented. With produce at a virtual grocery store, I have to buy them. Or walk to the Food Emporium and pay twice as much for something marginally better.
Carrots dressed up in junk food packaging is exactly the kind of smart work the industry has come to expect from Crispin Porter + Bogusky. Kudos to the team for taking inane work and making an example out of it. Read more at Salon.com. Then go eat some carrots.
Nick O’Neill over at AllFacebook (disclosure: I used to work with Nick) says that a brand’s Facebook fans, aka people who have pressed the ‘like’ button on a particular company’s page, may not be worth whatever you think they are. Why?
- You’re targeting the wrong people: “if you run a Facebook ad campaign which targets all people who like shopping for Versace clothes but you sell ebooks on making money online, you probably aren’t going to get much conversion.”
- Your brand has been co-opted into some kind of joke, ie the “Shut Up, I’m Talking” meme that started when author Gregory Levey’s book of the same name was recently published.
Um, well, now that I’ve gotten to the end of this post, I’m wondering if I fell for a link-bait and switch. Meaning, O’Neill’s story baited me because it was interesting – and he switched out the good story I expected with hyper-obvious answers. Sorry for wasting your time.
Facebook is, according to AllFacebook, testing a new feature that allows users to ‘subscribe’ to other users’ feeds. This means that if you want to follow a specific friend’sactivity on Facebook, you’ll get notifications specifically about what that person is up to. Creepy? Definitely!
