  View All Videos |  | GoAnimate Puts Politics in Flash Videos – Let the Fun Begin!
Since cartoons and satire go hand in hand with politics, GoAnimate decided to make it easy for anyone to make their own political animated video for free. The company recently released new features that include a collection of political characters and backgrounds focused around the U.S. Presidential election. The characters specifically include all the current Republican candidates, President Barack Obama, Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner, as well as other political media personalities. |
 |  | | +1 button - the terms of use | By: astro
I have noticed on a well known holiday (cruise) web site a note by the plus one button saying "Google plus one us!" is this not against the terms and conditions when deploying the +1 button?
This must be seen as as soliciting clicks, thus against the terms of use surely? It has not seemed to have effected them adversely in the ranking results, do you think it will?
The biggest problem with the plus one button is outside of the internet industry the great unwashed are not aware of what the button is, or even what it is designed for. Never mind to click on it if they wish to share information at a later date within their circles of friends who may be searching for a similar item.
Within or outside of the rules?
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 | Tuesday, October 18, 2011 |
iOS 5 Twitter integration already a huge benefit for company
As you might imagine, there's been a lot of talk about social networks at the Web 2.0 Summit, and particularly the escalating three-way battle among Facebook, Google and Twitter. While Google and Facebook have had their fair share of announcements recently, Twitter just added some major firepower to its arsenal, courtesy of Apple.
What do you think? Can Twitter win the social network market share war? Let us know what you think in the comments. Find this topic interesting? Why not share it on StumbleUpon, Facebook, Twitter or Google+?
One thing does seem clear. Deep Twitter integration with Apple's iOS is huge for Twitter.
"The iOS integration is going to be absolutely huge for us, even better than we thought it was," CEO Dick Costolo is quoted as saying at the Summit. "I didn't realize how frictionless this would be. It's so native."
As far as Costolo is concerned, it is Twitter's simplicity that is its biggest weapon against Facebook and Google+ (although I'd say that iOS integration is a pretty helpful weapon). He says part of the reason that Twitter has become so popular is because of its simplicity, and the fact that they've refrained from adding too many features, implying that this will continue to separate them from the pack as competitors continue to add more and more features.
That's an interesting point, because Facebook and Google are basically in a "feature race" as Google's Bradley Horowitz recently put it. In fact, Google CEO Larry Page touted the fact in the company's earnings call last week, that Google+ added 100 features in 90 days.
Facebook certainly keeps changing things up.
Costolo's comments are also interesting considering that this year, Twitter has perhaps added more features than any other time in Twitter's history (since co-founder Jack Dorsey returned to the company). Dorsey, by the way, has recently even been called "the next Steve Jobs," and by an early Apple employee. He does also run Square, which many see as a revolutionary product in the payments industry. It can't hurt Twitter to have this kind of leadership at the core of its product development.
Perhaps the more important battle, however, is that for identity, rather than features, and that's another area where that tight iOS integration might come in handy for Twitter. Apple announced that in its first 3 days of availability, it sold 4 million iPhone 4S devices (which run iOS 5). iOS 5 is also available for the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPad, iPad 2, iPod Touch 3rd generation, and iPod Touch 4th generation. Word is that a third of eligible devices have already been updated (which means potentially 2/3 more could still be upgraded), and Costolo says daily iOS Twitter sign-ups have already tripled due to the new iOS integration.
The description of the Twitter integration from Apple says: "iOS 5 makes it even easier to tweet from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. Sign in once in Settings, and suddenly you can tweet directly from Safari, Photos, Camera, YouTube, or Maps. Want to mention or @reply to a friend? Contacts applies your friends' Twitter usernames and profile pictures. So you can start typing a name and iOS 5 does the rest. You can even add a location to any tweet, no matter which app you're tweeting from."
Once iOS 5 was finally released last week, Twitter wrote a blog post about it saying: "Simply enter your Twitter login information into your device settings, and you'll always be connected to your Twitter account. This means you can tweet directly from Apple apps like Camera, Maps, Photos, Safari and YouTube, along with third party apps, such as Chomp, Flipboard, LivingSocial, Instagram, MadPad, PopSugar, Showyou,SoundTracking and Zynga's Words with Friends."
And it's not as if you have to use iOS to use Twitter.
"We think we can reach every person on the planet, we think the way to do that is to simplify it," Costolo is quoted as saying. "Over time, Google+ and Facebook will be more and more different than the experience we want to pass onto our users."
What do you think? Will Twitter ever be able to surpass Facebook? Share your thoughts in the comments.
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