Retweeting, as we explained in our article How To Retweet on Twitter, has evolved as the main way to reshare content you like on the social media service. There’s also a great deal of data we can glean from retweeting behavior, as we outlined in the article The Science of Retweets.

But apart from the obvious, what makes a retweet different from a tweet? What makes some types of tweets get shared more than others? And what can you learn from that data if you’d like to get retweeted more?

This week viral marketing scientist Dan Zarrella dug into the data on retweets and published some interesting stats about retweet behavior. These help us understand why people retweet things, and might help you too.

1. Retweets Contain More Links

Retweets tend to contain a link, Zarrella explains – 56.69% of retweets contain a link versus 18.96% of normal tweets. So retweets are being used to share content from around the web.

Key point: If you’d like to get retweeted, include links in your tweets more often.

2. Longer Words / More Syllables

Retweets also appear to have more syllables per word than ordinary Tweets – tweets have an average of 1.58 syllables/word, versus retweets at 1.62 syllables/word. This isn’t necessarily what you’d expect, since the most viral ideas are often said to be the simplest ones.

Key point: Using long words is not a barrier to getting retweeted – in fact it seems to help.

3. Higher Reading Grade / More Complex

Another unexpected finding, perhaps: Zarrella found that retweets require a “higher level of education to understand” – 6.47 years of education versus 6.04 years according to the Flesch-Kincaid test. The graph also shows the Simple Measure of Gobbledygook test, which found similar results: 6.13 years of education for retweets versus 5.88 years for tweets.

Key point: Tweets don’t have to be stupid-simple to get retweeted.

4. More New Words and Concepts

Perhaps unsurprisingly, retweets tend to add new information. By creating a “novelty” score that counted how many times a word appeared in the entire sample versus in the retweets, it was found that retweets tend to contain more unique words.

Using a sample size of over 10 million tweets, Zarrella discovered that “in the random Tweet sample, each word was found an average of 89.19 other times, while in the ReTweet sample each word was only found 16.37 other times. This shows us that while simplicity may not be very important to ReTweetability, novelty certainly is.”

Key point: If you want more retweets, try adding new information.

5. Less Self-Referential

Also unsurprising: retweets tend to be less self-referential than ordinary tweets. In other words: talking about what you had for breakfast is less likely to get retweeted than talking about what Obama had for lunch. This was found using the LIWC (“Luke”) method, which is a little complex to explain here but you can learn more on the site. Another LIWC finding: people tend not to retweet swear words.

Key point: Don’t talk about yourself too much if you’d like to be retweeted.

So there you have it: if you want to get retweeted, don’t talk about what you had for breakfast, don’t swear, and throw in a useful link from time to time.

Mashable’s Best Retweeting Resources

If you’re looking to continue your education in the art of retweeting, then we encourage you to read some of our most popular Twitter and retweeting posts:

- How To Retweet on Twitter– Ben Parr offers a primer on how retweeting works, plus tools to retweet more efficiently and track the most popular retweets.

- The Science of ReTweets– Dan Zarrella explains which factors make certain tweets more viral than others.

- Retweet iPhone App for Twitter– Our review of the Retweet iPhone App.

- 15 Fascinating Ways to Track Twitter Trends– Covers some of the best tools for tracking trends on Twitter.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: retweet, twitter

Retweeting, as we’ve mentioned before (see HOW TO: Retweet on Twitter), is an increasingly popular way to share content on the web.

Twitter is such a powerful tool for sharing media, in fact, that the former market leaders are racing to keep up. News sharing site Digg recently added short URLs and attempted to append a toolbar to those short URL clicks (Diggbar was later scaled back), while serendipitous sharing site StumbleUpon also got into the short URL game.

Both are under attack by new services like Tweetmeme, which provides blog buttons to help users retweet stories and provides a hub of the most shared content on Twitter. Earlier today the company announced a number of new features, all of which launch next week. The feature additions include:

- New image-based button: Use the retweet button in your RSS feeds, emails or on blog platforms that don’t support javascript (eg. WordPress.com)

- Retweet chicklets: Want to show off how many retweets you got this week? The new retweet chicklet will help you do just that, and post the numbers to your blog.

- Analytics package: Tweetmeme aims to launch more advanced analytics next week to help content providers understand their metrics better. It’s a development that might one day lead to a business model for Tweetmeme…if Twitter doesn’t get there first.

Tweetmeme has some tough competition: not only does it have multiple rivals, but bit.ly, the default short URL service on Twitter, has long been expected to launch something similar. In the meantime, you can catch up on everything retweet-related using the resources below.

Retweeting Resources from Mashable

1. HOW TO: Retweet on Twitter

2. The Science of ReTweets

3. Repeets Tracks Twitter’s Hottest Retweets

4. DailyRT Ranks Twitter Retweets

5. DMfail Fails, Reborn as Re-Twit’d

6. The Retweeting Movement Adds Some Powerful New Tools

7. Retweet iPhone App for Twitter

8. Facebook Needs Its Own Version of the Twitter Retweet

Reviews: Twitter, WordPress

Filed under: News Today, Oh Boy!

Not to be confused with the first music video about the iPhone 3GS (”Got My Mac on With iPhone 3GS“), the first video purportedly shot using the camera on the new device is making its way around the web.

The video – “Technologic Overkill” – is directed by filmmaker Steve Ellington, and shows “the plight of a little blue robot and his attempt to be relevant in an increasingly technological world,” set to a song by the band XFYA. Check it out below:

As we recently noted, mobile video certainly seems to be at a tipping point, with dozens of services offering apps to get your video from your phone to the Web, and YouTube seeing a huge upswing in mobile uploads since the iPhone 3GS launched. Technologic Overkill is perhaps a small symbol of this movement, in what will likely be just one of many firsts that we see as people get their hands on the new Apple phone.

See Also: HOW TO: Post Video to Twitter With the iPhone 3GS

Reviews: YouTube

Tags: iphone, iphone 3Gs, music videos, video

This week we ran a special Summer of Social Good charity promotion and many of you got involved. Mashable and the whole Summer of Social Good team would like to thank everyone who donated, tweeted, retweeted and showed their support. While the promotion might be over now, because of the great response we will be doing this every week rolled into our Monday announcement posts for donors over $20 and $100. Just make sure to read the rules and forward your receipt to SocialGood at Mashable.

On Monday we have a special fun week planned involving video and prizes, so make sure to stay tuned to @Mashable and @SocialGood for details.

Our $100+ Donors:

Shannon Raybold

Twitter: @skraybold

Facebook Causes: United Against Malaria

Facebook Causes: Nothing But Nets

Twitter: @uamalaria

Chris Bennett

Twitter: @chrisbennett

97th Floor: www.97thfloor.com

BlvdStatus: www.blvdstatus.com

Firefox Add-on: Social Media for Firefox

Steve Haweeli

Twitter: @SteveHaweeli

WordHampton: www.WordHampton.com

DishingOnDining: www.DishingOnDining.com

Chris Brogan: Shoutout to Chris Brogan

BuzzEdition

Twitter: @BuzzEdition

Twitter: @BCCF

Facebook Fan Page: BuzzEdition

Facebook Causes: Black Card Circle Foundation

Jeff Elder

Twitter: @JeffElder

About: Biz and Tech columnist at The Charlotte Observer

The Broprah Show: Broprahshow.com

Skafish

Twitter: @Skafish

Blog: Skafish Blog

Facebook: Facebook Profile

CollaborateMD

Twitter: @CollaborateMD

Facebook Fan Page: CollaborateMD

Blog: CollaborateMD Blog

Susan’s Soaps

Twitter: @SusanSoaps

Store: SusanSoaps.com

Blog: Susan’s Soaps Blog

Facebook Fan Page: Susan’s Soaps & More

B. Johansen Newman

Twitter: @JohansenNewman

Barbara Johansen Newman: johansennewman.com

“Thinking Out Loud” Blog: Cats and Jammers Studio

Design Blog: Design Rocket

Frank Barry

Twitter: @franswaa

Blog: NetWits Think Tank

Blog Post: Social Media For Nonprofits

Blog Post: Social Media Strategy: LIVESTRONG and the Summer of Social Good

Our $20+ Donors:

@nonprofitadvice

@globalmanners

@critiques4geeks

@NickMendoza

@kristinwolff

@wetoo

Michelle Farabough (Google Profile)

@LoriMoreno

@momsofamerica

@jupitersunrise

@jaycee419

@TweetFind

@btn

@Tinu

@orkaya

@jackiehonikman

@Lookaly

@robmuch

@moodtouch

@VisionaryAgents

@navi_ganancial

@jamahbags

Thanks to the Summer of Social Good Sponsors

Thanks to Zappos and MailChimp for sponsoring the Summer of Social Good. Their generous sponsorship covers the campaign and event costs, so that 100% of your donations and ticket sales go to the fund.

“Visit Zappos.com and outfit your life with a new head-to-toe wardrobe for men, women, and kids! Step into all the clothes, bags, shoes and more from all your favorite brand names! Plus, enjoy our 365-day return policy, fast & free shipping, free return shipping & 24-hour customer service!”

“MailChimp is a powerful, easy-to-use email marketing service. You design, me deliver.

We make it easy to send email newsletters to your customers, manage your subscriber lists, and track campaign performance. Unlike some of our competitors, we don’t ‘dumb things down.’ We take extremely powerful tools that sophisticated marketers use (like segmentation, a/b testing, and ROI tracking), and we make them accessible to anyone.”

Thanks to our Summer of Social Good Partners

Thanks to the following partners for lending their generous support to the Summer of Social Good.

Reviews: Facebook, Mashable, Twitter

With the 4th of July weekend just hours away, it’s time to wish our US readers a Happy Independence Day!

Hopefully you’ll be spending at least some of your weekend away from your computer and enjoying the festivities, but for those who have difficulty leaving the laptop at home, here’s a quick list of resources to help you spend less time online while getting more done.

1. A Guide to Better Web-Working From Your iPhone– One way to spend less time in front of a computer screen is to get more efficient at working from your phone. Elliott Kosmicki looks at applications to do more work on your phone, so you can do less when you get home.

2. HOW TO: Live Inside Twitter and Still Stay Productive– Addicted to Twitter? While the service is often thought of as a timewaster, this post explains numerous ways to get more done while you Tweet.

3. HOW TO: Make Firefox Your Productivity Machine– Firefox users have access to a wealth of add-ons that help you get more done during your time online. This article recommends the best picks.

4. 7 Productivity Tips, Plus Tools for Freelancers and Web Workers– So you want to get more work done on the web? You’ve come to the right place! This post provides top tips for freelancers and those who have made the web their workplace.

5. Top 30 iPhone Apps for Organization and Productivity– In this one-stop shop for iPhone productivity, Jennifer Van Grove tests 30 of the top iPhone apps to help you get more done on the go.

6. 9 Must-Try Adobe AIR Apps for Better Productivity– Adobe Air is known for running some of the most visually appealing apps on your desktop, but did you know some of these apps can make you more productive? We look into the unlikely candidates.

Have a great weekend!

[Image from Bitstrips via CenterNetworks]

Reviews: Firefox, Twitter

I guess the celebrations were premature. According to a China government official, Chinese authorities haven’t given up on web filtering program Green Dam; they’ve just postponed it.

The controversial program was supposed to be installed on all new PCs sold in China from July 1st onwards, but after strong protests from both the Chinese people and the PC sellers its launch was postponed indefinitely.

However, it’s bound to come back, according to an unnamed government official. Speaking to China Daily, he said:

“The government will definitely carry on the directive on Green Dam. It’s just a matter of time. What will happen is that some PC manufacturers will have it included with their PC packages sooner than the others. But there is no definite deadline at the moment.“

This was always a possibility. The implementation of this entire initiative was sloppy, and just as we’ve noted earlier, this was probably the cause for postponement, and not some sudden change in China’s policies with regard to censorship and the Internet.

*Update: AP reports that more companies have taken after Sony, including Green Dam bundled with new PCs sold in China. The list includes Benq, Acer, and Haier, with other companies, such as Asus, claiming they’re planning to start bundling Green Dam with their PCs. HP, Dell and Toshiba still haven’t decided how to proceed, but overall it seems that, regardless of its postponement, Green Dam has already won.

Tags: censorship, china, Green Dam

Filed under: Twisted Tales

Hans Pandeya, the CEO of Global Gaming Factory (the Swedish company that had recently acquired The Pirate Bay for $7.8 million) has an ambitious plan for the new Pirate Bay. It seems bold, perhaps even too bold at first, but Hans thinks he has a plan that will make everyone – the file sharers, the ISPs, the content providers – happy.

Talking to the BBC, Pandeya said that he plans to make legal file sharing (which is what The Pirate Bay will be focused on from now on) more attractive than illegal file sharing by paying the users for sharing files. He also plans to pay the content providers that provide the files, and he plans to raise money from the ISPs by reducing their traffic overload.

“Let’s say a popular song comes out. Rather than a million downloads from a site – which would cause a considerable strain on that ISP – we can take that song and put it out on P2P,” he says.

Unfortunately, when you try to put all of the pieces of this puzzle together, you’ll find out that one piece is always missing. Yes, The Pirate Bay is a huge source of traffic. But this traffic comes from file sharers who will not appreciate the fact that one day, The Pirate Bay will get a “temporarily closed” sign while they work out the deals with all the content providers out there. They’ll quickly move on to other torrent sites; yes, The Pirate Bay was much loved for their activism, but when your goal is to download a new Kanye West video, you’ll just take it from whoever offers it. Need examples? One word: Napster.

The file sharers might be inclined to stay on The Pirate Bay because they’d receive money for their troubles. But I’ve long held the theory that piracy is not only about money; it’s also about choice and availability. A torrent tracker needs to have a lot of content; if it doesn’t, getting paid a small amount to use it won’t help.

Now, about those content providers. There are a lot of them, and many of them hate The Pirate Bay with a passion. They probably don’t even like the name. Working out deals with all of them will be nearly impossible; especially since The Pirate Bay is surrounded by legal problems, recently losing a lawsuit from the same companies they should be doing deals with now. The content providers aren’t as passive as they used to be; they’ve got Hulu and Epix, and I’m afraid that few of them feel the need to deal with The Pirate Bay.

Finally, we’ve got the ISPs. Whether they would be willing to work with the Pirate Bay at all is questionable. Whether The Pirate Bay will remain such a huge traffic source to be interesting to the ISPs after the “true” pirates move on to other torrent trackers and after they’ve cut the deals with content providers is also uncertain. BusinessWeek raises several technical and legal issues surrounding such a deal.

Yes, the entire idea sounds nice on paper – after all, everybody wins, right? But transitions such as the one proposed by Pandeya are tough even when you’re not talking about one of the most notorious torrent trackers out there. In the end, The Pirate Bay might end up trying to sell traffic they don’t have, harnessed from content they also don’t have, to ISPs that are reluctant to buy it. It’s not a very promising future for the pirates, I’m afraid.

Reviews: Hulu

Tags: piracy, the pirate bay, torrent, TPB

Twitter is all about facilitating conversations, but until you’re following some people, it’s just a blank page. Once you find people to follow and talk to, however, Twitter becomes exceptionally useful. You can share thoughts, ask questions, get updates about news, music, brands, and businesses, and discover helpful links and information. Finding good people to follow, especially for new users staring at a blank page the first time they log in, can be a bit daunting, though.

Thankfully, there are a number of ways you can find people on Twitter. Here are ten sites you can use to locate “tweeps” to follow. Let us know in the comments if you know of any others.

People Search

1. Twitter People Search– Twitter’s built in people search isn’t the greatest way to find people on Twitter, but it’s probably where you should start. Twitter searches the “real names” people enter in their bio fields, but because there isn’t much accompanying bio information and because Twitter doesn’t have any sort of requirement to use your actual name, that can make it a bit difficult to find people, especially those with common names. It also makes it hard to verify that the people you find are actually who you’re looking for. Still, it’s a good place to begin your search.

2. Tweepz– Because the biographical information Twitter collects is minimal, no Twitter people search engine can improve on Twitter’s that much. Third-party site Tweepz does an admirable job, though. Tweepz lets you limit searches to specific parts of Twitter’s user information (like name, bio, and location), filter results by follower/following numbers, location, and other extracted terms, and greatly improves on the layout of the search results.

3. TweepSearch– TweepSearch lets you search by Twitter name or location, or search a specific username to get a list of all friends and followers. However, if the “indexing” number listed on their main page is accurate, they’re crawling about 600,000 less Twitter user profiles than Tweepz.

4. TwitDir– TwitDir is another search engine, but if the crawling stats are accurate, it’s well behind the curve, searching about 3 million fewer users than Tweepz. Still, it’s not a bad people search engine, and has some helpful “top” lists if you’re concerned with who the most popular or prolific people on Twitter are (then again, they’re also not that up-to-date — the site doesn’t seem to know who @aplusk is, for example).

Directories

5. Twellow– Your best bet for finding like-minded Twitter users might be to use a directory, and Twellow is certainly one of the most complete. Nearly 6 million Twitter user profiles are indexed in Twellow and placed into a huge number of categories. You can search the entire lot of profiles, or confine searches to a single category. Twellow also operates a local directory called the “Twellowhood.”

6. WeFollow– Created by Digg founder Kevin Rose, WeFollow is a Twitter user directory that organizes people by hashtags. WeFollow is user-generated and anyone can add themselves by tweeting @wefollow with three #hashtags that describe them.

7. Just Tweet It– Just Tweet It is another user created Twitter directory. It’s not quite as well organized or easy-to-use as Twellow or WeFollow, but it is certainly large enough that you should give it a browse when trying to locate people in your interest areas to follow.

Recommendations

8. Twubble– Twubble recommends people to follow by spidering the people you’re already following and recommending users that they’re following. The idea is that the people you’re following are interesting to you, so if more than one of them are also following another person, that person might also be interesting. Of course, that means that Twubble can’t be your first stop when finding people to follow — you already need to be following some people for the service to work.

9. Twitterel– Twitterel attempts to find people you might be interested in following by doing keyword searches of tweets. The service can update you by email, direct message, or @reply when it finds new people it thinks you might be interested in following. It’s kind of like Google Alerts for Twitter follow recommendations.

10. Who Should i Follow?– Enter you Twitter username into Who Should i Follow? and the service finds users who are similar to those you’re already following. The site doesn’t disclose information about how it works, but in my experience it is pretty accurate at finding users whose tweets are similar in content to your followers. The results can be filtered by how popular the people are, and how close they are to a specific location.

BONUS: Mr. Tweet– Mr. Tweet is a very popular Twitter app that lets you give and receive recommendations about Twitter users. The app also provides more helpful statistics about users, such as tweets per day or the percentage of tweets containing links. To get the most out of Mr. Tweet, consider installing the Firefox plugin, which gives you access to statistics and user recommendations while you’re browsing Twitter.

More Twitter resources from Mashable:

- 19 Twitter Desktop Apps Compared

- 6 Gorgeous Twitter Visualizations

- Top 7 Twitter Tutorials on YouTube

- 5 Ways Twitter Can Save You Money

Reviews: Digg, Twellow, Twitter, WeFollow

Tags: Just Tweet It, people search, tweepsearch, tweepz, twellow, twitdir, twitter, twitterel, twubble, wefollow, who should i follow

Filed under: Music Appreciation

Filed under: Free MP3 of the Day

Filed under: Video, Exclusive

Ideally, your brand has the same name across all of the social sites you use, and, it matches your domain name (for example, we’re mashable.com, twitter.com/mashable, and facebook.com/mashable).

Realizing this fact, popular domain registrar GoDaddy has integrated Twitter registration into its domain manager, allowing you to see if the Twitter username that matches your URL is available, and if so, register it.

The target here is GoDaddy’s small business users. The company explains in the tool that you can “Join today and start “tweeting” about your next sale, when you’ve updated pictures on your site, or other things that may be going on with you or your business.”

To use the feature, just login to your GoDaddy account and click on any of your domain names to access the manager (where you also go to do things like update name servers). There’s now a Twitter option under “Domain Enhancements” from which you can check your username availability.

While this probably isn’t a big deal for most our readers, it could be for Twitter. This integration puts the service in front of millions of people that are actively managing their online identity, many of whom have probably heard of Twitter, but haven’t actually signed up for the service. As if being featured on Oprah and on the cover of Time wasn’t enough free publicity …

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: godaddy, twitter

Today a fire hit a major datacenter in Seattle, taking money processor Authorize.Net down. This has caused many web-based financial transactions to grind to a halt, but Authorize.Net isn’t the only website that’s gone offline today.

Another popular website has fallen, Geocaching.com, a worldwide GPS-based treasure hunting game, leaving thousands of people trying to figure out just what’s going on and why it went down. Wikipedia explains the game’s worldwide reach:

Geocaching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game in which the participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers (called “geocaches” or “caches”) anywhere in the world. A typical cache is a small waterproof container (usually a tupperware or ammo box) containing a logbook and “treasure,” usually toys or trinkets of little value.

Geocaches are currently placed in over 100 countries around the world and on all seven continents, including Antarctica. There are over 820,000 active geocaches in the world right now.

While the fire may or may not be responsible for this specific outage (we cannot confirm), it’s clearly had an effect on the entire web. Even Microsoft’s search engine Bing was affected, specifically Bing Travel.

We will provide updates on Geocaching and Authorize.Net as we receive the information.

Reviews: Wikipedia, bing

Tags: geocaching

With 3.3 million+ YouTube views in the past two days, the video “Unknown Lifeform in North Carolina Sewer” (below) is taking the web by storm, becoming the most viewed video this week and beating out a performance of Michael Jackson’s Thriller. The clip, which shows an alien-looking life form living in a North Carolina sewer, was posted along with a claim that it was extra-terrestrial life.

Today mainstream news has taken notice and corrected the myth: the video is indeed real, scientists say, but the strange creature is very much a terrestrial phenomenon. News14 writes:

Ed Buchan, environmental coordinator at the Raleigh Public Utilities Department, said staff biologists have confirmed that the “creature” is actually a colony of tubifex worms. The colonies attach themselves to roots that gradually work themselves into weak points in the pipes. “They seem to respond to the light from the camera,” Buchan said. “That light is pretty hot.”

The worms naturally occur in sewage and pond sediment and are actually sold both live and dried as fish food in pet stores. He said other staff members in the department have seen it before, although sightings aren’t particularly common. “I’ve seen a lot of sewer TV before and I’ve never seen them,” he said. “We were surprised. We didn’t know immediately what it was.”

It’s unclear what made the clip such a YouTube phenomenon: most likely it’s explained by the mystery surrounding the strange creature, much like last year’s Montauk Monster mystery.

Reviews: YouTube

Tags: creature, lifeform, youtube

Social activity aggregator FriendFeed, which re-designed earlier this year to show updates from friends in real-time, has just extended that same functionality to search. Now, when you search for a given term – like “Michael Jackson” – you’ll see updates from FriendFeed users stream in real-time in your browser.

Just as on your homepage, you can hit “pause” on the real-time results, which, after a few minutes of staring at items about Jackson being shared, is definitely a needed feature if you’re actually attempting to keep up with a topic. After hitting pause, FriendFeed will tell you how many items have been queued, and you can then hit play to see them and resume the live streaming updates.

Personally, I’m not so sure that I don’t prefer the latter approach – simly checking search results for a given term (I generally keep “mashable” open all day on Twitter search) periodically rather than watching it constantly in the browser.

That said, the coolest aspect of FriendFeed’s real-time search might be that you can extend it to your own website via an embeddable widget. To embed a search, you can simply click the “Share / embed search” option that accompanies each search result and grab the embed code, like such:

Reviews: FriendFeed, Twitter

Tags: friendfeed, real-time search, Search

Thanks to this week’s advertisers and partners for enabling us to bring you the latest social media news and resources. We’re particularly inspired by those brands that are engaging with our readers as part of our Twitter Brand Sponsors program: Mashable’s sponsors are as social media savvy as our readers!

Advertise with us and get noticed.

Help us to help you. Mashable is seeking out site sponsors for our large, diverse audience — social media users, venture capitalists, early adopters, developers, bloggers, and many more. You’ll receive hundreds of thousands of views a day in addition to weekly recognition to thank you as our premium sponsors. Are you interested? Contact us for more information and to receive our media kit and rate card.

This week, our valued sponsors are Clickatell, Vivvo CMS, Influxis, EdgeCast, Microsoft BizSpark, MailChimp, Sun Startup Essentials, YieldSoftware, Eventbrite, Behance, and Livestream.

Clickatell offers bulk sms and mobile marketing solutions. Over 700 networks and over 200 countries covered.

Vivvo CMS is an intuitive content management system atop a powerful programming framework, empowering numerous industry leading online newspapers, magazines, journals, TV and radio stations. Vivvo will help you run your news or multimedia website seamlessly and with minimum hassle, providing you with premium exposure to search engines, syndicating your content and taking a good care of your visitors and users.

Influxis is an official Adobe hosting partner and resource for the Adobe Flash Media Interactive Server. Influxis provides Flash hosting plans for all levels of use – beginner to enterprise. With a reputation for exceptional customer service, Influxis provides an extremely reliable international network of FMS servers in the U.S., U.K., and Germany.

EdgeCast Networks offers a superior, cost-effective, global content delivery service that gives our customers competitive advantage in the delivery of digital media. Our world-class content delivery platform provides customers the cost benefits and flexibility of controlling their own content delivery network while liberating them from ISP contracts, capital investments and operational hassles.

BizSpark is a program which offers new software businesses and entrepreneurs access to Microsoft design, development, and production tools with no upfront costs for up to three years. Members can also connect with a nationwide community of Network Partners – investors, incubators, service providers, and entrepreneurial organizations – who are keen to help.

For more information, or to connect with a Microsoft BizSpark advisor, please visit MicrosoftStartupZone.com/BizSpark.

MailChimp is a powerful, easy-to-use email marketing service. You design, me deliver.

The Sun Startup Essentials program extends to startups all the benefits of our program; benefits designed to get startups sailing to success with the right IT infrastructure. These include introductions to interested investors; discounted servers, storage and desktops; open source software such as MySQL; discounted web hosting; and free technical support and advice from Sun engineers.

Yield’s Web Marketing Suite is a fully automated, integrated search marketing system that optimizes natural search, paid search, and landing pages. Accessible via any web browser, it is a complete, easy and profitable way for businesses to generate new traffic and get better conversion rates at a lower overall cost.

Eventbrite is an online events marketplace where tens of thousands of individuals, businesses and organizations of all sizes manage, promote and sell tickets to their events. Make your event a success on Eventbrite.

Behance is on a mission to organize the creative world. The Behance Network is the leading online platform for creative professionals to showcase their work and develop their careers. The Action Method (actionmethod.com) is a revolutionary “action management” tool that is replacing traditional project management applications across industries.

Livestream democratizes television on a global scale. The technology provides a highly effective, easy to use TV studio, with the power to create live original programming, controlled by users, and embeddable on any website. Livestream has introduced several new groundbreaking innovations, in addition to paying homage to traditional TV, and has even bigger plans for innovation and interactivity on its roadmap.

Additionally, thanks to the following partners for making Mashable happen:

Thanks to ConVerdge for implementing our My Mashable social network and W3 EDGE for the development and maintenance of Mashable.com

Mashable would also like to thank AttentionPR for their PR support. AttentionPR proves that PR today is measurable, transparent, and yes, social. Learn more about AttentionPR.

Rackspace is the better way to do hosting. No more worrying about web hosting uptime. No more spending your time, energy and resources trying to stay on top of things like patching, updating, monitoring, backing up data and the like. Learn why.

JESS3 is a creative interactive agency led by Jesse Thomas. Jesse is as much a entrepreneur as he is an innovator, designer, visionary and eager learner. When it comes to the worlds of branding, data visualization and social media, Jesse is constantly pushing the limits and exploring new frontiers. JESS3 has the pleasure to design innovative solutions, directly or through other agencies, for: Mashable, National Journal, Microsoft, Marriott Intl, Ace Hardware, C-SPAN, AARP, PepsiCo/Tropicana, Dow Jones/The Wall Street Journal, Nestle, Pfizer, Shopzilla, SnagFilms, IndieWire, Advertising.com, National Press Foundation, Webgiftr, Busboys and Poets, New Media Strategies, Ashcroft Group, Heritage Foundation, Blue State Digital, Widmeyer Communications, DBC PR, Adfero and many more. In addition, JESS3 enjoys participating in the industry through partnerships with organizations such as WOMMA, Social Media Club, Barcamp, Facebook Developer Garage, AIGA, and Art Directors Club.

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ConcentricSky offers web development and strategic consulting services with a focus on emerging technologies such as Social Media and iPhone Apps. From simple websites to integrated web applications, we deliver innovative solutions that exceed your expectations – not your budget.

Vladimir Prelovac is the author of WordPress Development book and popular articles about WordPress SEO, website optimization, customization, security and maintenance. He actively uses WordPress as a base for Internet enterprise strategy for small & mid-sized businesses.

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Tags: advertisers, mashable, Sponsors

Google Blog Search has just added a few features that users of other Google services are likely familiar with.

First, you can now subscribe to any topic via RSS or Atom, like you already can do in Google News. This means every time there’s a new story in the “Technology” category, or more specifically a search term like“social media” you can get that update pushed to your RSS reader. There’s also a new iGoogle gadget if you’d rather access the topic or search term via iGoogle.

The Google Blog Search homepage now also features a “Hot Queries,” which, is similar to Google Hot Trends. This shows what searches are currently hot in Blog Search, as opposed to Google Trends, which shows what’s hot in the broader search engine. That said, both lists appear to be fairly similar, though Blog Search only shows a top ten at this point.

There’s also a new “Latest Posts” feature on the homepage that simply lists new posts that Blog Search has picked up. It’s a nice update, but one that makes me wonder how much utility separate blog search really has at this point. Google News already includes plenty of blogs in its database (there are now more than 25,000 sources in total), and as evidenced by the similarities in Google’s two different trend lists, users are generally searching for the same things at any given point in time. In other words, blog search might be filling a need that no longer exists.

Are you still using blog search engines regularly? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Reviews: Google

Tags: blogging, Google, google blog search, Search

Filed under: Free MP3 of the Day

Surf the web for a couple of minutes, and – usually without anyone asking you – you’re giving away a lot of personal data to the various companies that are tracking your browsing habits. Yes, you can set your browser security to high and turn off cookies, but then half of the web won’t work properly. In the end, people just accept the fact that they’re being tracked and stop caring about it, even if it has serious implications for their privacy.

This might change soon, as a new set of guidelines for web tracking are due to be unveiled today. These new guidelines are set forth by trade associations representing some of the biggest companies out there, including Google, Microsoft, Coca-Cola and Procter & Gamble. It’s an attempt at self-regulation; the US Congress and the Federal Trade Commission have recently been looking into online advertising practices, and the major companies probably decided it’s better to act now than have to adhere to more strict guidelines set by someone else in the future.

So, what do these new guidelines mean for your privacy? Well, companies can still track your online behavior. However, they need to tell you you’re being tracked, explain to you what it means, and (most importantly) provide you with an easy way to opt out of web tracking. In practice, it also means we soon might see a uniform link or an icon that’ll take you to a disclosure page. Finally, companies will have to ensure that the data collected from the users is stored securely; moreso if it’s sensitive data such as children’s personal information, financial data and medical records. Companies will be monitored for their adherence to these guidelines, and answer to federal agencies if they don’t adhere.

Is it enough? Well, it’s an ongoing debate. Measures such as this will provide the users who are concerned about web tracking and their online privacy with a way to ensure they’re not being tracked. On the other hand, one could say that web tracking should be opt-in instead of opt-out; that consumers should be tracked only if they willingly approve of it beforehand, and that no one should be tracked by default. When you consider that cookies change or get deleted, that users often change browsers and work on several different computers, opting out of every web tracking attempt out there might become a never ending chore.

The new guidelines are definitely a step forward; we’ll be able to judge how big when we see some of them implemented in practice.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, caracterdesign

Reviews: Google

Tags: online privacy, privacy, web

A few months ago, we reviewed a unique reminder app: Task.fm. In our assessment, we noted its Twitter-like approach to reminders and its ability to decipher human language – you can tell it Task.fm “I need to call mom at noon tomorrow” and expect a reminder the next day. We did note though that you couldn’t set reminders via email, SMS, or Twitter, which decreased its utility.

Since then, Task.fm has been busy adding new features to its app, culminating in the release of Task.fm 1.0 earlier today. Now not only is the interface much more elegant, but you can set and receive reminders via Twitter, SMS, and email.

The big feature in this release is Twitter integration. You can direct message @taskfm with your task and you can then set the reminder. This is on top of the recent additions of setting reminders via SMS and email.

In addition to Twitter integration, Task.fm sports a sleeker, curved design (look at their previous blocky design to see the difference), offers new pro accounts that replace the old credits system, and adds more natural language support. Task.fm 1.0 also improves its To-Do list functionality.

Three months ago, Task.fm was unique for its language parsing ability, but didn’t have the tools necessary to be truly useful. Today, the story is different – with the ability to set and receive reminders nearly everywhere, it can compete with the likes of RememberTheMilk, although there’s still plenty it can do.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: task.fm

This week we ran a special Summer of Social Good charity promotion and many of you got involved. Mashable and the whole Summer of Social Good team would like to thank everyone who donated, tweeted, retweeted and showed their support. While the promotion might be over now, because of the great response we will be doing this every week rolled into our Monday announcement posts for donors over $20 and $100. Just make sure to read the rules and forward your receipt to SocialGood at Mashable.

On Monday we have a special fun week planned involving video and prizes, so make sure to stay tuned to @Mashable and @SocialGood for details.

Our $100+ Donors:

Shannon Raybold

Twitter: @skraybold

Facebook Causes: United Against Malaria

Facebook Causes: Nothing But Nets

Twitter: @uamalaria

Chris Bennett

Twitter: @chrisbennett

97th Floor: www.97thfloor.com

BlvdStatus: www.blvdstatus.com

Firefox Add-on: Social Media for Firefox

Steve Haweeli

Twitter: @SteveHaweeli

WordHampton: www.WordHampton.com

DishingOnDining: www.DishingOnDining.com

Chris Brogan: Shoutout to Chris Brogan

BuzzEdition

Twitter: @BuzzEdition

Twitter: @BCCF

Facebook Fan Page: BuzzEdition

Facebook Causes: Black Card Circle Foundation

Jeff Elder

Twitter: @JeffElder

About: Biz and Tech columnist at The Charlotte Observer

The Broprah Show: Broprahshow.com

Skafish

Twitter: @Skafish

Blog: Skafish Blog

Facebook: Facebook Profile

CollaborateMD

Twitter: @CollaborateMD

Facebook Fan Page: CollaborateMD

Blog: CollaborateMD Blog

Susan’s Soaps

Twitter: @SusanSoaps

Store: SusanSoaps.com

Blog: Susan’s Soaps Blog

Facebook Fan Page: Susan’s Soaps & More

B. Johansen Newman

Twitter: @JohansenNewman

Barbara Johansen Newman: johansennewman.com

“Thinking Out Loud” Blog: Cats and Jammers Studio

Design Blog: Design Rocket

Frank Barry

Twitter: @franswaa

Blog: NetWits Think Tank

Blog Post: Social Media For Nonprofits

Blog Post: Social Media Strategy: LIVESTRONG and the Summer of Social Good

Our $20+ Donors:

@nonprofitadvice

@globalmanners

@critiques4geeks

@NickMendoza

@kristinwolff

@wetoo

Michelle Farabough (Google Profile)

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@momsofamerica

@jupitersunrise

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@TweetFind

@btn

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@jamahbags

Thanks to the Summer of Social Good Sponsors

Thanks to Zappos and MailChimp for sponsoring the Summer of Social Good. Their generous sponsorship covers the campaign and event costs, so that 100% of your donations and ticket sales go to the fund.

“Visit Zappos.com and outfit your life with a new head-to-toe wardrobe for men, women, and kids! Step into all the clothes, bags, shoes and more from all your favorite brand names! Plus, enjoy our 365-day return policy, fast & free shipping, free return shipping & 24-hour customer service!”

“MailChimp is a powerful, easy-to-use email marketing service. You design, me deliver.

We make it easy to send email newsletters to your customers, manage your subscriber lists, and track campaign performance. Unlike some of our competitors, we don’t ‘dumb things down.’ We take extremely powerful tools that sophisticated marketers use (like segmentation, a/b testing, and ROI tracking), and we make them accessible to anyone.”

Thanks to our Summer of Social Good Partners

Thanks to the following partners for lending their generous support to the Summer of Social Good.

Reviews: Facebook, Mashable, Twitter

For marketers, Twitter has been a dream come true. It’s an open platform growing at a phenomenal rate. This combination can allow a single tweet to be seen by thousands of potential customers. But as Twitter continues its mainstream ascent, it has been targeted by spammers and scammers, something that doesn’t help legitimate marketers or users at all.

Yet despite its spam woes, Twitter has somehow avoided an overflow of content from one of the Internet’s biggest industries: porn. Well, until recently that is. An interesting article in MediaPost describes both marketers and Twitter users noticing an increase in pr0n-related spam, and they are not liking it. The issue makes us wonder: should Twitter stamp out pornography; and how should they go about it?

Twitter Users’ Feedback on Pornography

The MediaPost piece essentially quotes some of Twitter’s active marketers on the issue of Twitter and porn. What they have to say, though, is not pretty at all. While you can guess how users react in the piece, Ben Smith of MerchantCircle sums up the problem best:

MerchantCircle has begun to offer a portfolio of local city-specific coupons via Twitter feeds. “As we have found with any new communication form, pornography and other types of issues creep in,” says Ben Smith, MerchantCircle CEO. “The problem with this type of activity is that it undermines the trust in the communication channel, which will have a disastrous effect on the channel.”

Has pornography taken over Twitter? No, not by a longshot. Is it a growing problem? Absolutely. Things like Twitter porn trojans make it clear that Twitter is not impervious to porn-related spam and malware.

What Do Twitter’s Terms of Service Say?

We took a look at the Twitter Terms of Service, which governs user interactions with the Twitter platform. While it mentions that they can “remove Content and accounts containing Content that we determine … are obscene or otherwise objectionable,” it makes no specific reference to pornography.

Compare this to the terms of service of other social media companies, such as the Facebook Statement of Rights and Responsibilities, which specifically states the following:

6. You will not post content that is hateful, threatening, pornographic, or that contains nudity or graphic or gratuitous violence.

Does this mean that Twitter doesn’t care about porn? Absolutely not – Twitter has addressed pornography spam in the past and we doubt that it would let the Internet’s underground industry tarnish its strong reputation.

And yet Twitter needs to monitor the situation. Porn should not be acceptable on Twitter, especially an open platform that millions of companies and users use for business and marketing every single day. It may be a relatively small issue now, but it will grow more prevalent unless they put a stop to the problem early. It’s easy to forget just how much of the Internet is entirely porn.

First though, Twitter needs to build a search spam solution ASAP. It’s all part of the same core problem that Twitter will need to address.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: porn, pornography, twitter

Filed under: News Today, Oh Boy!

As a lot of e-commerce businesses and Twitter users are noticing, the entire Authorize.Net infrastructure crashed a few hours ago. For anyone who makes a purchase online, this is huge; Authorize.Net is the largest service for accepting credit cards and e-checks through the web. This means that millions of web-based transactions and purchases have come to a halt.

Luckily, Authorize.Net understands the usefulness of social media in situations like these. They set up a new Twitter account, @AuthorizeNet, earlier today to keep users informed about the recovery of one of the web’s most important payment systems. So what took Authorize.Net down anyway? And when will it be 100% back?

Twitter and the status of Authorize.Net

According to AuthorizeNet, the cause of the outage was a fire at their datacenter in Seattle. This impacted not only their website and transaction platforms, but even their backup center. Couple this with the fact that today starts the 4th of July holiday weekend, and you have a recipe for disaster.

Luckily, it seems that transaction processing has returned, although global processing is still down:

This is the most important aspect of the outage – without the payment system, merchants couldn’t accept credit card payments, which could result in millions of dollars lost among all of its vendors. The website is still down, meaning that accounts can’t be accessed. Luckily, the company had the foresight to use Twitter to keep merchants and users informed. We will update this post with any new developments on the situation.

Update: From the Authorize.Net Twitter account:

#authorizenet Full transaction processing has now been restored with Concord EFS.

The website seems to be loading now too, albeit very slowly.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: authorize.net, payment

Filed under: Potent Quotables

With the 4th of July weekend just hours away, it’s time to wish our US readers a Happy Independence Day!

Hopefully you’ll be spending at least some of your weekend away from your computer and enjoying the festivities, but for those who have difficulty leaving the laptop at home, here’s a quick list of resources to help you spend less time online while getting more done.

1. A Guide to Better Web-Working From Your iPhone– One way to spend less time in front of a computer screen is to get more efficient at working from your phone. Elliott Kosmicki looks at applications to do more work on your phone, so you can do less when you get home.

2. HOW TO: Live Inside Twitter and Still Stay Productive– Addicted to Twitter? While the service is often thought of as a timewaster, this post explains numerous ways to get more done while you Tweet.

3. HOW TO: Make Firefox Your Productivity Machine– Firefox users have access to a wealth of add-ons that help you get more done during your time online. This article recommends the best picks.

4. 7 Productivity Tips, Plus Tools for Freelancers and Web Workers– So you want to get more work done on the web? You’ve come to the right place! This post provides top tips for freelancers and those who have made the web their workplace.

5. Top 30 iPhone Apps for Organization and Productivity– In this one-stop shop for iPhone productivity, Jennifer Van Grove tests 30 of the top iPhone apps to help you get more done on the go.

6. 9 Must-Try Adobe AIR Apps for Better Productivity– Adobe Air is known for running some of the most visually appealing apps on your desktop, but did you know some of these apps can make you more productive? We look into the unlikely candidates.

Have a great weekend!

[Image from Bitstrips via CenterNetworks]

Reviews: Firefox, Twitter

I guess the celebrations were premature. According to a China government official, Chinese authorities haven’t given up on web filtering program Green Dam; they’ve just postponed it.

The controversial program was supposed to be installed on all new PCs sold in China from July 1st onwards, but after strong protests from both the Chinese people and the PC sellers its launch was postponed indefinitely.

However, it’s bound to come back, according to an unnamed government official. Speaking to China Daily, he said:

“The government will definitely carry on the directive on Green Dam. It’s just a matter of time. What will happen is that some PC manufacturers will have it included with their PC packages sooner than the others. But there is no definite deadline at the moment.“

This was always a possibility. The implementation of this entire initiative was sloppy, and just as we’ve noted earlier, this was probably the cause for postponement, and not some sudden change in China’s policies with regard to censorship and the Internet.

*Update: AP reports that more companies have taken after Sony, including Green Dam bundled with new PCs sold in China. The list includes Benq, Acer, and Haier, with other companies, such as Asus, claiming they’re planning to start bundling Green Dam with their PCs. HP, Dell and Toshiba still haven’t decided how to proceed, but overall it seems that, regardless of its postponement, Green Dam has already won.

Tags: censorship, china, Green Dam

This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.

Name: Launchly

Quick Pitch: Launchly showcases new websites to an audience to help site owners get the attention and feedback necessary to succeed.

Genius Idea: It’s hard to stand out and get attention for web applications and new websites. You can build a Twitter app over a weekend and get no traction because you don’t know where to promote it. Or maybe you need some feedback and advice on your newly launched website. Launchly does this, but instead of just showcasing a startup and letting it fall by the wayside, Launchly allows apps to resubmit new iterations and build on their ideas.

Essentially, Launchly is a Digg for startups. You submit your site to Launchly and include a short sentence description, a long description, the type of feedback you’re seeking, screenshots, related tags, and you can be up and running on the Launchly homepage. After that, it works a lot like Digg, in that users can rate your website up or down, comment on it, and share the webpage via Facebook, Twitter, and Digg. This can really affect how visible your web app is on the site.

The key to Launchly though is the iterations feature, which allows you to take the feedback you receive and submit a new version of your website to the service. This allows for a new round of feedback once you’ve made upgrades. You also receive some analytics on Launchly user engagement and social media buzz.

The catch, of course, is that this service isn’t free – the lowest-priced plan costs $40, with more expensive and feature-rich plans coming soon. The price is understandable, when you consider that valuable feedback can make or break a website. However, Launchly is very new itself and thus hasn’t hit the critical mass necessary to really get the community needed to justify the cost yet.

Launchly’s value is directly correlated with its community. As it grows, the value of a launch on the website will grow, but this also means that in its early stages, it is tough to shell out $40 for such little visibility. Launchly would do well to focus on building a strong community and offering promotions or discounts to startups to get the ball rolling. If it can gain enough momentum, there could be some real value.

Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark

BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest– use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines).”

Reviews: Digg, Facebook, PHP, Twitter

Tags: launchly

Google Blog Search has just added a few features that users of other Google services are likely familiar with.

First, you can now subscribe to any topic via RSS or Atom, like you already can do in Google News. This means every time there’s a new story in the “Technology” category, or more specifically a search term like“social media” you can get that update pushed to your RSS reader. There’s also a new iGoogle gadget if you’d rather access the topic or search term via iGoogle.

The Google Blog Search homepage now also features a “Hot Queries,” which, is similar to Google Hot Trends. This shows what searches are currently hot in Blog Search, as opposed to Google Trends, which shows what’s hot in the broader search engine. That said, both lists appear to be fairly similar, though Blog Search only shows a top ten at this point.

There’s also a new “Latest Posts” feature on the homepage that simply lists new posts that Blog Search has picked up. It’s a nice update, but one that makes me wonder how much utility separate blog search really has at this point. Google News already includes plenty of blogs in its database (there are now more than 25,000 sources in total), and as evidenced by the similarities in Google’s two different trend lists, users are generally searching for the same things at any given point in time. In other words, blog search might be filling a need that no longer exists.

Are you still using blog search engines regularly? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Reviews: Google

Tags: blogging, Google, google blog search, Search

Jammie Thomas-Rasset, the woman who was charged with copyright infringement through online file sharing, tried to fight, and subsequently lost, will appeal the verdict in her case, which ordered her to pay $1.92 million in damages to the recording industry that sued her.

As we’ve noted, her case was always on shaky legs, and it was probably taken into account by the jury which set a very harsh penalty. However, it’s questionable whether the verdict is constitutional, and Jammie Thomas-Rasset will appeal on that grounds.

“She’s not interested in settling. She wants to take the issue up on appeal on the constitutionality of the damages. That’s one of the main arguments–that the damages are disproportionate to any actual harm,” her attorney Joe Sibley told CNET.

And disproportionate they are. 80,000 dollars for sharing a song – one song – on an online network? However you look at it, it’s an arbitrary number. If you tried to apply the same standards in other cases, you’d get ridiculous results. Together with the fact that Thomas-Rasset doesn’t have that kind of money, trying to appeal the verdict is a logical choice.

No one can tell whether she will succeed or not, but in a case as important as this one, it’s good that she’s putting up a fight. Awarding such huge damages for online file sharing is a dangerous legal precedent that might result in further pressure on ISPs and governments to implement draconian measures to stop it, as well as give them more rights to monitor online activities not only of file sharers, but all of us.

Tags: Jammie Thomas-Rasset, lawsuit, riaa

Today a fire hit a major datacenter in Seattle, taking money processor Authorize.Net down. This has caused many web-based financial transactions to grind to a halt, but Authorize.Net isn’t the only website that’s gone offline today.

Another popular website has fallen, Geocaching.com, a worldwide GPS-based treasure hunting game, leaving thousands of people trying to figure out just what’s going on and why it went down. Wikipedia explains the game’s worldwide reach:

Geocaching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game in which the participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers (called “geocaches” or “caches”) anywhere in the world. A typical cache is a small waterproof container (usually a tupperware or ammo box) containing a logbook and “treasure,” usually toys or trinkets of little value.

Geocaches are currently placed in over 100 countries around the world and on all seven continents, including Antarctica. There are over 820,000 active geocaches in the world right now.

While the fire may or may not be responsible for this specific outage (we cannot confirm), it’s clearly had an effect on the entire web. Even Microsoft’s search engine Bing was affected, specifically Bing Travel.

We will provide updates on Geocaching and Authorize.Net as we receive the information.

Reviews: Wikipedia, bing

Tags: geocaching

Filed under: The Chum Bucket

Tweetdeck users have noticed tonight that their hourly API call limit has been increased from 100 to 150 per hour, essentially meaning you can get more frequent Twitter updates if you require them. Twitter, however, has made no announcement, and the API Wiki still states 100 as the limit.

It’s not just TweetDeck that saw the change: we’re seeing rate limit increases in Twhirl: this would suggest a rate limit increase across the board, although that’s yet to be confirmed. The blog SocialGeist also spotted the change, and sent us the news.

If the change applies beyond TweetDeck, it’s great news for developers and those who use Twitter with remote applications.

Have the rates increased for your app? Let us know in the comments.

Reviews: TweetDeck, Twhirl, Twitter

Tags: api, twitter

Filed under: Twisted Tales

As a lot of e-commerce businesses and Twitter users are noticing, the entire Authorize.Net infrastructure crashed a few hours ago. For anyone who makes a purchase online, this is huge; Authorize.Net is the largest service for accepting credit cards and e-checks through the web. This means that millions of web-based transactions and purchases have come to a halt.

Luckily, Authorize.Net understands the usefulness of social media in situations like these. They set up a new Twitter account, @AuthorizeNet, earlier today to keep users informed about the recovery of one of the web’s most important payment systems. So what took Authorize.Net down anyway? And when will it be 100% back?

Twitter and the status of Authorize.Net

According to AuthorizeNet, the cause of the outage was a fire at their datacenter in Seattle. This impacted not only their website and transaction platforms, but even their backup center. Couple this with the fact that today starts the 4th of July holiday weekend, and you have a recipe for disaster.

Luckily, it seems that transaction processing has returned, although global processing is still down:

This is the most important aspect of the outage – without the payment system, merchants couldn’t accept credit card payments, which could result in millions of dollars lost among all of its vendors. The website is still down, meaning that accounts can’t be accessed. Luckily, the company had the foresight to use Twitter to keep merchants and users informed. We will update this post with any new developments on the situation.

Update: From the Authorize.Net Twitter account:

#authorizenet Full transaction processing has now been restored with Concord EFS.

The website seems to be loading now too, albeit very slowly.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: authorize.net, payment

Filed under: Video of the Day

Not to be confused with the first music video about the iPhone 3GS (”Got My Mac on With iPhone 3GS“), the first video purportedly shot using the camera on the new device is making its way around the web.

The video – “Technologic Overkill” – is directed by filmmaker Steve Ellington, and shows “the plight of a little blue robot and his attempt to be relevant in an increasingly technological world,” set to a song by the band XFYA. Check it out below:

As we recently noted, mobile video certainly seems to be at a tipping point, with dozens of services offering apps to get your video from your phone to the Web, and YouTube seeing a huge upswing in mobile uploads since the iPhone 3GS launched. Technologic Overkill is perhaps a small symbol of this movement, in what will likely be just one of many firsts that we see as people get their hands on the new Apple phone.

See Also: HOW TO: Post Video to Twitter With the iPhone 3GS

Reviews: YouTube

Tags: iphone, iphone 3Gs, music videos, video

A few months ago, we reviewed a unique reminder app: Task.fm. In our assessment, we noted its Twitter-like approach to reminders and its ability to decipher human language – you can tell it Task.fm “I need to call mom at noon tomorrow” and expect a reminder the next day. We did note though that you couldn’t set reminders via email, SMS, or Twitter, which decreased its utility.

Since then, Task.fm has been busy adding new features to its app, culminating in the release of Task.fm 1.0 earlier today. Now not only is the interface much more elegant, but you can set and receive reminders via Twitter, SMS, and email.

The big feature in this release is Twitter integration. You can direct message @taskfm with your task and you can then set the reminder. This is on top of the recent additions of setting reminders via SMS and email.

In addition to Twitter integration, Task.fm sports a sleeker, curved design (look at their previous blocky design to see the difference), offers new pro accounts that replace the old credits system, and adds more natural language support. Task.fm 1.0 also improves its To-Do list functionality.

Three months ago, Task.fm was unique for its language parsing ability, but didn’t have the tools necessary to be truly useful. Today, the story is different – with the ability to set and receive reminders nearly everywhere, it can compete with the likes of RememberTheMilk, although there’s still plenty it can do.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: task.fm

This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.

Name: Launchly

Quick Pitch: Launchly showcases new websites to an audience to help site owners get the attention and feedback necessary to succeed.

Genius Idea: It’s hard to stand out and get attention for web applications and new websites. You can build a Twitter app over a weekend and get no traction because you don’t know where to promote it. Or maybe you need some feedback and advice on your newly launched website. Launchly does this, but instead of just showcasing a startup and letting it fall by the wayside, Launchly allows apps to resubmit new iterations and build on their ideas.

Essentially, Launchly is a Digg for startups. You submit your site to Launchly and include a short sentence description, a long description, the type of feedback you’re seeking, screenshots, related tags, and you can be up and running on the Launchly homepage. After that, it works a lot like Digg, in that users can rate your website up or down, comment on it, and share the webpage via Facebook, Twitter, and Digg. This can really affect how visible your web app is on the site.

The key to Launchly though is the iterations feature, which allows you to take the feedback you receive and submit a new version of your website to the service. This allows for a new round of feedback once you’ve made upgrades. You also receive some analytics on Launchly user engagement and social media buzz.

The catch, of course, is that this service isn’t free – the lowest-priced plan costs $40, with more expensive and feature-rich plans coming soon. The price is understandable, when you consider that valuable feedback can make or break a website. However, Launchly is very new itself and thus hasn’t hit the critical mass necessary to really get the community needed to justify the cost yet.

Launchly’s value is directly correlated with its community. As it grows, the value of a launch on the website will grow, but this also means that in its early stages, it is tough to shell out $40 for such little visibility. Launchly would do well to focus on building a strong community and offering promotions or discounts to startups to get the ball rolling. If it can gain enough momentum, there could be some real value.

Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark

BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest– use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines).”

Reviews: Digg, Facebook, PHP, Twitter

Tags: launchly

Filed under: Twisted Tales

We’ve noted before that China’s Green Dam, web filtering program supposedly designed to block pornography, but in reality a serious threat to privacy and security, was obviously created in a haste, with many of its shortcomings being revealed as the story unwinds.

Now, besides the fact that it doesn’t work on 64-bit operating systems, we have another one: it doesn’t support Macs. Thus, Apple’s computers seem to be – at least for the time being – exempt from the order that all PC makers must include Green Dam with new PCs sold in China.

This is probably just another temporary setback to the controversial Green Dam initiative, as the program will undoubtedly get updated to include support for currently unsupported operating systems. IDG writes:

“A service representative at a sister company to Green Dam’s main developer, Jinhui Computer System Engineering, said the company is testing the software on non-Windows platforms and will release an updated version if compatibility is added for other OSes.“

Yes, the program is a possible security threat, and yes, the entire initiative was launched before it was actually possible to implement. But judging by the fact that mostPC makers have already started to comply with the demands of Chinese authorities – even with the actual initiative being postponed– proves that all those shortcomings probably won’t be enough to stop it.

Tags: censorship, china, Green Dam

Twitter’s trending topics are a great way to find out what’s hot in the Twitterverse, but they’re also a haven for malicious hackers and spammers who are constantly finding new ways on how to abuse them.

This time, an odd, vulgar hashtag has appeared in the trending topics, as you can see in the image below. It obviously doesn’t belong there, and it doesn’t lead to any actual Twitter conversations, but someone, somehow, managed to put it there.

*Update: this time, it’s a legitimate trending topic. Commenter Mark Nagurski explains: “British actress Mollie Sugden died yesterday. She played Mrs Slocombe in UK comedy Are You Being Served and ‘Mrs Slocombe’s Pussy’ was a running joke. This is a tribute from fans.” However, Twitter is not showing any results for it, probably because its anti-spam filters have activated.

We’ve seen this done before via an onslaught of spammy or malware-infected messages send through dozens of bogus accounts, but this time the spammer seems to have reached trending topics with other methods. In any case, the topic will probably soon be removed, but Twitter definitely needs to work on better spam prevention methods.

The sentence above still stands, but in a completely different context which we haven’t encountered before. It’s possible that Twitter’s anti-spam detection has worked all too well, removing the results for a legitimate trending topic. You can’t really blame it: joke or not, at first glance the hash tag seems vulgar, but it can also be completely innocent, depending on semantics.

Again, Twitter needs to work on spam detection; not only to prevent spammy topics from entering the trends, but also to prevent legitimate topics to be labeled as spam.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: spam, twitter

This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.

Name: UserTesting.com

Quick Pitch: Provides real users who record their screen and voice as they use your website. $29 and 1-hour turn-around.

Genius Idea: If you’re launching a new web app, ideally you’ll have time to organize a focus group and watch real users interact with your software, and tweak it based on the feedback. Unfortunately, that can be both expensive and time consuming. UserTesting.com looks to solve this problem by bringing together users that are willing to do usability tests (for $10 each) with companies that need testing done on their products (who pay $29 per user for the service).

When you request a test, UserTesting claims it can start returning results within an hour from members of its panel, though that can be delayed a bit if you request specific demographics. Nonetheless, the final result seems like a good value: a video that shows how the user interacted with your site (essentially a screen cast) with their voice commentary. The user also submits a written report detailing what the user liked, disliked, or found confusing.

Here’s a sample video for a usability test done on behalf of TripAdvisor:

The idea seems to fill an obvious need, and UserTesting.com has received some fairly high profile endorsements, including Evan Williams of Twitter, as well as executives from Amazon.com, Justin.tv, oDesk, and lots of other prominent websites. Between a great name, a valuable service, and lots of success stories, UserTesting.com seems like a winner.

Sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark

BizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platform for their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest– use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines).”

Reviews: PHP, Twitter

Tags: usability, usability testing

For a complete collection of Twitter resources, check out The Twitter Guide Book, Mashable’s hub for all things Twitter.

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Most Twitter users probably follow under a thousand other people, but that’s enough to make it hard to keep track of the real-time stream. I actually started having trouble keeping up when I hit about 50 follows — and depending on how prolific the people you’re following are, you could be dealing with a hard-to-parse Twitter stream even following just a handful of people. But while people like social media fanatic Robert Scoble, who follows over 100,000 people, appear to have the superhuman ability to stay on top of things, the rest of us need help filtering the Twitter stream.

Fortunately, there are a good number of methods and applications we can put to work to filter tweets from the people we’re following. Which work best for you? Let us know in the comments.

(Please note that a few of the apps in this post actually do multiple types of filtering, and so could have theoretically been added to more than one category.)

By Keyword

One way to filter Twitter is by keyword. Filttr is a full-featured, web-based Twitter app that includes keyword-based filtering. You can both blacklist and whitelist key phrases and Filtter will block or allow those tweets. Flittr, though, has a pretty steep learning curve, and before I even added any keywords it started filtering tweets — and took a particular dislike to a few of my Twitter friends. I’m not sure what criteria it was using for those initial filters.

Another full web-based client that includes keyword filtering is Mixero, which is in private beta.

Philtro, which is also in private beta, learns what types of tweets you like based on your ratings. Give thumbs up and thumbs down ratings to tweets, and Philtro slowly figures out what you like and attempts only to bother you with tweets you’d be likely to want to read.

By Links

About 19% of all tweets contain links, but if your Twitter stream moves quickly, you may miss many of the best unless you use a filter. MicroPlaza organizes the links tweeted by out by your followers by recency or popularity. MicroPlaza personalizes the concept employed sites like Tweetmeme, Twitt(url)y, and dailyRT, which assume that the more a link is tweeted, the more worthwhile it is of your attention.

MicroPlaza not only looks at which links are being tweeted and retweeted the most, but also which are being tweeted specifically by the people you’re following. The idea is that you’re most interested in things your followers are saying (otherwise, you wouldn’t be following them), so if they tweet about popular links, they’re more likely to be of interest to you.

One of the coolest features of MicroPlaza, though, is that you can assume the identity of any other Twitter user — so if you follow someone very connected to a specific industry, you can see the links that their friends are sharing.

By Grouping

Another way to filter Twitter, is by organizing your friends into groups. By putting the people you’re following into groups, you can break up and effectively slow down your Twitter stream, making it easier to follow tweets from your friends, colleagues, and family members.

There are a ton of different ways to organize you friends into groups, but one of the easiest is to use a Twitter client that supports grouping, such as desktop heavyweights Seesmic Desktop, Destroy Twitter, and TweetDeck (which has a complimentary iPhone app that also supports groups), or a web-based app like PeopleBrowsr.

Another option is to use a service that helps you create channels or groups of Twitter users and monitor their tweets. Floxee is one of the most full-featured such sites. It not only lets users monitor the tweetstream of a predefined group, but also displays stats about the activity of that group (or “flock”). Other sites you could use include TwitHive, Tweetizen, Twhanel, Crowdstatus, TwittGroups.com, and TweetChannel.

Disclosure: TweetDeck partnered with Mashable to create MashDeck, a branded version of the software.

By Favorites

Favorites aren’t the best way to filter tweets, because the reasons you favorite tweets might not be the same as other people. However, by the same token, tweets that have been favorited by multiple users are generally worth reading for some reason: they’re interesting, funny, clever, extraordinary, etc.

Favrd keeps track of the most favorited tweets, but is limited to those users who have signed up with the service to have their favorites watched. (Careful: Favrd is often NSFW.) Favotter is another favorite tracking site, but again, watches a limited number of users (due to API limitations, according to the site’s about page).

BONUS: TwitterForBusyPeople doesn’t really filter Twitter, but it does organize your recently active follows in a way that you can get an “at a glance” view of the activity of people you’re following. Once you get used to it, it is potentially a good way to make your Twitter stream more manageable.

BONUS 2: Twalala does keyword filtering, but where it really shines is the ability to mute certain users to remove their tweets from your twitter stream temporarily.

Bird illustration via Flickr user matthamm.

Reviews: Flickr, Mashable, Mixero, Seesmic Desktop, TweetDeck, Tweetizen, Twitter

Tags: filter, twitter

Filed under: Free MP3 of the Day

With the 4th of July weekend just hours away, it’s time to wish our US readers a Happy Independence Day!

Hopefully you’ll be spending at least some of your weekend away from your computer and enjoying the festivities, but for those who have difficulty leaving the laptop at home, here’s a quick list of resources to help you spend less time online while getting more done.

1. A Guide to Better Web-Working From Your iPhone– One way to spend less time in front of a computer screen is to get more efficient at working from your phone. Elliott Kosmicki looks at applications to do more work on your phone, so you can do less when you get home.

2. HOW TO: Live Inside Twitter and Still Stay Productive– Addicted to Twitter? While the service is often thought of as a timewaster, this post explains numerous ways to get more done while you Tweet.

3. HOW TO: Make Firefox Your Productivity Machine– Firefox users have access to a wealth of add-ons that help you get more done during your time online. This article recommends the best picks.

4. 7 Productivity Tips, Plus Tools for Freelancers and Web Workers– So you want to get more work done on the web? You’ve come to the right place! This post provides top tips for freelancers and those who have made the web their workplace.

5. Top 30 iPhone Apps for Organization and Productivity– In this one-stop shop for iPhone productivity, Jennifer Van Grove tests 30 of the top iPhone apps to help you get more done on the go.

6. 9 Must-Try Adobe AIR Apps for Better Productivity– Adobe Air is known for running some of the most visually appealing apps on your desktop, but did you know some of these apps can make you more productive? We look into the unlikely candidates.

Have a great weekend!

[Image from Bitstrips via CenterNetworks]

Reviews: Firefox, Twitter

Filed under: Songs, Free MP3 of the Day, New Music

Retweeting, as we explained in our article How To Retweet on Twitter, has evolved as the main way to reshare content you like on the social media service. There’s also a great deal of data we can glean from retweeting behavior, as we outlined in the article The Science of Retweets.

But apart from the obvious, what makes a retweet different from a tweet? What makes some types of tweets get shared more than others? And what can you learn from that data if you’d like to get retweeted more?

This week viral marketing scientist Dan Zarrella dug into the data on retweets and published some interesting stats about retweet behavior. These help us understand why people retweet things, and might help you too.

1. Retweets Contain More Links

Retweets tend to contain a link, Zarrella explains – 56.69% of retweets contain a link versus 18.96% of normal tweets. So retweets are being used to share content from around the web.

Key point: If you’d like to get retweeted, include links in your tweets more often.

2. Longer Words / More Syllables

Retweets also appear to have more syllables per word than ordinary Tweets – tweets have an average of 1.58 syllables/word, versus retweets at 1.62 syllables/word. This isn’t necessarily what you’d expect, since the most viral ideas are often said to be the simplest ones.

Key point: Using long words is not a barrier to getting retweeted – in fact it seems to help.

3. Higher Reading Grade / More Complex

Another unexpected finding, perhaps: Zarrella found that retweets require a “higher level of education to understand” – 6.47 years of education versus 6.04 years according to the Flesch-Kincaid test. The graph also shows the Simple Measure of Gobbledygook test, which found similar results: 6.13 years of education for retweets versus 5.88 years for tweets.

Key point: Tweets don’t have to be stupid-simple to get retweeted.

4. More New Words and Concepts

Perhaps unsurprisingly, retweets tend to add new information. By creating a “novelty” score that counted how many times a word appeared in the entire sample versus in the retweets, it was found that retweets tend to contain more unique words.

Using a sample size of over 10 million tweets, Zarrella discovered that “in the random Tweet sample, each word was found an average of 89.19 other times, while in the ReTweet sample each word was only found 16.37 other times. This shows us that while simplicity may not be very important to ReTweetability, novelty certainly is.”

Key point: If you want more retweets, try adding new information.

5. Less Self-Referential

Also unsurprising: retweets tend to be less self-referential than ordinary tweets. In other words: talking about what you had for breakfast is less likely to get retweeted than talking about what Obama had for lunch. This was found using the LIWC (“Luke”) method, which is a little complex to explain here but you can learn more on the site. Another LIWC finding: people tend not to retweet swear words.

Key point: Don’t talk about yourself too much if you’d like to be retweeted.

So there you have it: if you want to get retweeted, don’t talk about what you had for breakfast, don’t swear, and throw in a useful link from time to time.

Mashable’s Best Retweeting Resources

If you’re looking to continue your education in the art of retweeting, then we encourage you to read some of our most popular Twitter and retweeting posts:

- How To Retweet on Twitter– Ben Parr offers a primer on how retweeting works, plus tools to retweet more efficiently and track the most popular retweets.

- The Science of ReTweets– Dan Zarrella explains which factors make certain tweets more viral than others.

- Retweet iPhone App for Twitter– Our review of the Retweet iPhone App.

- 15 Fascinating Ways to Track Twitter Trends– Covers some of the best tools for tracking trends on Twitter.

Reviews: Twitter

Tags: retweet, twitter

Filed under: Video, Exclusive