Curated Stories September 7, 2010

Broadway Meets Hollywood Boulevard
There’s a New Yorker cartoon that shows a Hollywood producer in his office on the phone saying: “There are two ways we can go here, 2% of the gross or 99% of the net.”

During a keynote at the IFA in Berlin, Eric Schmidt topped off presentations on Voice Powered Search, Street View Search and Google TV by emphasizing how much Google values being fast and that current technolog…

Do you ever plug in your wired network card while your Wi-Fi connection is still enabled? Here’s how to see which network interface has priority, and how to ch…

An overview of marketing to the affluent psychology of the elite.

Marketing – Business – Marketing and Advertising – Consulting – Direct Marketing

If you’ve been having problems with the Apple MobileMe iDisk app, or even if you haven’t noticed anything weird, it’s a good idea to get the latest update. The newest version (1.21) fixes a problem opening Key…

Suggested formula for figuring out how long online videos should be: 1 minute of a web video = 1 hour of a feature film. So keep web videos under 2-3 minutes unless you’ve got a really compelling reason to go…

Oh for Pete’s sake! Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Summer is Sarah Palin’s merciless assault on the Queen’s English, “refudiate,” and only because refudiate has been the most searched-for non-word on…

By now you’re certainly familiar with the concept of product placement, and the fact that it’s been growing and growing and growing these days. Well, how about a counter-clockwise twist on the concept? Church…

We use the word “FAIL” with such abandon today – even with a taste of vindictive enthusiasm – and often in the instant someone or something rubs us the wrong way, most especially a business.
We have mic…

Facebook has launched a new security feature that will let users log out from any device remotely. This is designed to protect users who access Facebook from multiple devices, but will also help safeguard users…

My wife and I have been attempting to hit the local farmer’s market every Sunday. Our intention is to eat healthier and support some local businesses. This last Sunday marked our second trip a…

My point, and I will make one, is that it doesn’t matter if you’ve got great social media presence if you don’t fix the basics.
I’m so frustrated right now, for something very simple. I received my fi…

Last week we told you about some of the celebrity professors who have turned up on college campuses in the past. Today, let’s take a look at some big names who are going to be sharing their intellects and ex…

In honor of Mashable’s five-year anniversary, this series is supported by IDG. Matt York, President of IDG’s Strategic Marketing Services explains why now is the time for marketers to conduct social experim…

Trailrunner7 writes “The United States has a responsibility to take a leadership role in securing the Internet against both internal and external attackers, a duty that the federal government takes very serious…

Two dozen or so purported webOS 2.0 screenshots have fluttered out onto the web, and while their origins are a bit hazy, they show plenty of interesting new fe…

When I was in elementary school, kids walked around the schoolyard with their miniature boomboxes blasting whatever they could get their hands on. They sat on the steps showing off cassettes, unfolding liner no…

Unemployed construction workers can’t meet the growing need for nurses without time- and cost-intensive retraining.

When it comes to applications, how do the emerging app platforms compare to one another? Whether it’s Facebook apps, iPhone apps or Android apps, each of the platforms are competing for developer attention….

This post is part of a series on How to Silo Your Website. The other parts in the series are: How to Silo Your Website: The Masthead, How to Silo Your Website, The Breadcrumb , How to Silo Your Website: The Co…

I’ll admit it: I’m addicted to speed.
No, not the psychostimulant; I’m talking about website speed.
I’m not alone, either. Google recently announced that they consider website speed when determining s…

Google CEO Eric Schmidt discusses Google TV live and on television at the IFA (Internationalen Funkausstellung) conference in Berlin, Germany.
BERLIN – Google gave a live demonstration of Google TV at Berlin�…

You’re ready to jump into Facebook advertising and test out the waters, however you haven’t figured out how much you want to spend yet. Also, you don’t know the most effective way of optimizing your ads….

When I first started this blog five years ago, I imagined that I would blog a lot more about storytelling and blogging than I turned out to do. I don’t see a lot written in the blogosphere about storytelling…

The New York Times will launch its latest hyperlocal offering, an East Village community news blog produced by students from NYU’s graduate j-school, on Monday, Sept. 13, NYU announced this morning.
“The Loca…

You know how important strong passwords are, but youve got a huge backlog of passwords—some you cant remember, others youve been using for years. Heres how t…

Google Voice now has the option to deliver missed calls to your Gmail inbox or you Google Voice inbox. To enable missed call notifications for either, go to yo…

Its Labor Day in the U.S. as I write this post. To my own amazement, Ive spent most of the past month truly relaxing — reading lots of books, playing tennis, running, hanging out with my family and eating foo…

In a Huffington Post op-ed, danah boyd argues that pressure to censor Craigslist, which recently resulted in the company’s removal of its “adult services” section for users in the United States, actually “helps…

This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.There are a lot of WordPress themes…

“The internet needs you,” I said to Howard Stern when I called into the show this morning as he was ranting about his contract negotiations with Sirius XM and the possibility that he could take his show and…

Typing a search query into Google.com is such old news. Google CEO Eric Schmidt gave a much-hyped keynote talk at Berlin’s IFA home electronics event today and said that his vision for the future of search loo…

The Internet of Things took a step closer to mainstream adoption today with the announcement of Pachube’s first enterprise offering. Pachube (pronounced “patch bay”) shares real-time sensor data and enables us…

Tristan Louis, an internet technology veteran and tech reporter, has an interesting series of posts over at his blog, TNL.net. He divides the entire tech industry into four different kinds of companies based on…

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has produced a patient safety video about the importance of handwashing for hospital patients and their healthcare providers. The instructional piece entitle…

The public doesn’t trust Google as much as it does Apple…

Business Insider has compiled a list of the 10 best free iPhone apps for business and the 20 best iPad apps for business travelers. The lists are pretty comprehensive, and just because you don’t fly around from…

Posted by Dennis SellersApple has tweaked its new Ping social network for iTunes over the Labor Day weekend, cleaning out spams and scams that had appeared shortly after it launched last week, notes the San Jos…

New $2 iPhone app from Justin Williams at Second Gear; lets you compose HTML email messages using Markdown.

A new app, MarkdownMail, lets you send HTML-formatted e-mail from your iOS device, via the Markdown formatting language.

A number of iTunes 10 users are having issues importing CDs after installing the updated software. In a lengthy Apple Support Discussion thread, users are claiming that upon inserting a CD, it is recognized by…

Macworld’s new premium online product, Macworld Insider, has arrived! Get full-text RSS feeds, a back-issue PDF archive, ad-free layouts on our Website, and more.

Does the phrase “open source” scare you? You’re not alone. Many marketers hear the phrase and cringe. However, open source not only offers the collective creativity of a large, vibrant community but also promis…

It’s a global trend: Consumers want to buy from, employees want to work for, and other businesses want supplies from, socially responsible enterprises. Small-business owners can use the corporate social respons…

Marketers have rushed to embrace Facebook, Twitter, blogs, customer ratings and reviews, and other social media platforms—inviting customers to comment on their products and services across the Web. The resul…

The newspaper business may be old and stodgy, but it’s quite evident
that its future depends on embracing the internet. And internet
technologies.One of those technologies: web analytics. Yesterday, The New Y…

Much like life, websites have to adapt over time. When they don’t, they risk becoming stagnant, outdated, stale, and boring. As times change, so should your content. Content that was once relevant becomes irr…

Brandon Walters interviewed me kind of on the fly last week about the upcoming Social Story conference (Greenville, SC – September 24). The interview was obviously completely unscripted (at least for me). I…

Samsung today introduced Orion, the company’s next-generation, dual-core smartphone chip based on the ARM Cortex-A9 architecture. Orion uses two 1 GHz processors and includes an embedded GPS radio for native…

When texting one’s drug dealer, certain rules of etiquette apply: Don’t explicitly name the product. Keep any identifying personal details out of it. And make…

The Words episode of Radiolab (iTunes link) features an interesting segment on how Shakespeare behaved like a language chemist, combining words like elements. The relevant story starts at 22:00 in of the episod…

Location-based mobile applications, also now being called “check-in services” to differentiate themselves from other geo-aware apps like Google Maps, are the hottest new social applications on the mobile scene…

This series is supported by Gist. Gist provides a full view of the contacts in your professional network by creating a rich business profile for each one that includes the most news, status updates, and work d…

Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American philosopher, poet, lecturer, and essayist. Emerson is most noted for leading the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was also regarded as a chief leader of…

5 Ways For Small Businesses To Get In The Location GameThis content from: Duct Tape Marketing
Location based check-in type services are this year’s overhyped topic – with good reason. While you may not unde…

I’ve had a post in my head for months – maybe longer – about the role of a CEO. My primary role was “chief psychologist” and as I’ve learned over the past few years the same has been true as a VC. B…

Here’s a strange piece of gossip we heard from a plugged-in industry source last week: Bill Gross spent the summer asking venture capitalists for enough money to launch a consumer-facing rival to Twitter itsel…

Long before we were involved in running the first London Pro SEO seminar, I was a big fan of the ones SEOmoz ran in Seattle. I spoke there in 2008 and learned lots of great SEO tips, and also about how I needed…

Interesting short clip of Tom Peters talking about the importance of storytelling for brands. In fact, for Peters, storytelling isn’t just important, it can be more powerful than the brand itself.

Author: Griffin Farley, Strategy Director, BBH New York
Image Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture
I have returned from the promise land, a place of myth and fable among ad agencies. We have many names for th…

Overwhelmed by information? Using Yahoo’s Pipes you can create your own custom RSS feeds that filter information from other RSS feeds, Web sites, and more. Glenn Fleishman shows you how.

For those of us who use Twitter tags purely for adding a layer of sarcastic commentary to our tweets, the idea of using tags properly — to categorize tweets and make them easier for others to find — may s…

Back when I worked in the corporate world, I used to get called naive at least once a week.
I kept treating my employees like adults, instead of like naughty children. Naive.
I tried to lighte…

Big, successful, first-novels are usually followed by more. But here are 7 that, for one reason or other, qualify their authors for the One-Hit Wonder category:
1. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
This insta…

The CFO charged with analyzing the pros and cons of a new product line wonders whether its time for her to stop facilitating — and start leading.

Editors’ Note: This fictional case study will appear in a for…

We are getting close to 500 copies sold of our book, 100 Writing Mistakes to Avoid, so I wanted to give you guys a couple of updates.
First of all we are working to get both a paperback and a Kindle version of…

Evan Jacobs is one of the developers doing some really interesting things with the Twitter API. Instead of using Twitter as a means of broadcasting information, Jacobs’ apps are actually gathering information…

There were some interesting reactions to my recent Jack Bauer post on and off this blog. Aside from those who enjoyed the analogy, those who disagreed responded (predictably) with comments such as:
But we can…

When it first launched, I couldn’t figure out how Apple was positioning the iPad. Was it meant to be a laptop replacement or a complementary device? It was meant for more casual usage, but then why make iWork (…

It’s not every day we get to post about venture capital flowing to a Southern African company with global ambitions, but here goes:
FireID, a provider of security applications for mobile authentication, has…

It seems like age-old advice to find a quiet, clean space and stick with it to do real studying. But cognitive scientists are finding that varying your environ…

A guest post by Larry Brooks, of Storyfix.com
Or she.
Regarding the title… it’s just a saying, no penis required. It’s not your father’s media anymore. Hard to cull the gender-based colloquialisms…

“This book is for the timid, forlorn, and clueless,” Carolyn See says in her introduction to Making a Literary Life: Advice for Writers and Other Dreamers (2002). It’s good stuff. See writes in a down-to-…

GSMA, the organizers of the annual, massive Mobile World Congress, have announced a couple of new developments this morning. For one, the organization is to expand the developer-focused programme at the event…

Want access to Gmail’s fancy new Priority Inbox sorting on your portable browser? You can view the messages you’ve trained Gmail to consider Priority through a…

by Kevin Pho, MDNothing polarizes the heath care debate more than defensive medicine. A recent study from Health Affairs will only add more fuel to the fire.Here’s what I wrote a couple of years ago in USA T…

Apple is a company renowned for the sheer intuitiveness of its products. The first Macintosh was a marvel in user experience. The first iPod was a delight to navigate around, it all made sense! This delight is…

Marketers who are used to the traditional ways of buying media and working outbound marketing are having a hard time understanding how social media works. They made a habit of thinking that marketing eq…

Facebook has come along way from being Mark Zuckerberg’s afterschool project. In fact “The Facebook Effect” author David Kirkpatrick implied at TechCrunch Disrupt that Facebook was so influential it shoul…

Nike has released the Nike+ GPS iPhone application to help you track, map and analyze your runs. It is a paid $1.99 application. Without needing the shoes, wristband, and/or monitor, the Nike+ application uses…

Take Twitter, add its concepts as a platform to banking and you get BankSimple, the unlaunched startup that you will definitely want to keep your eye on. BankSimple is a new take on online banking created by Tw…

There is no rule on how to write. Sometimes it comes easily and perfectly; sometimes it’s like drilling rock and then blasting it out with charges.
ERNEST HEMINGWAY

Hope those of you in the U.S. had a great Labor Day holiday. The McGee family enjoyed a spur-of-the-moment drive over to Seattle and an otherwise relaxing long weekend. Here’s the latest batch of hyperlocal h…

A rather simplistic storybook with many underlying messages that pull at the heartstrings of every society member.

Arts – Shel Silverstein – Children – Bobby Bare – Giving Tree

So, I’ve created a Facebook page to promote my work… now what do I do with it?
I’ve been thinking about writing this post for a while, but was holding back because there’s so much I don…

This is a guest post by Michael Martine of Remarkablogger.
When we try to tackle the idea of thoughtwrestling, what we’re doing on a deeper level is tackling a very messy subject: self-mastery. When you app…

then do marketing.
You can learn finance and accounting and media buying from a book. But the best way to truly learn how to do marketing is to market.
You don’t have to quit your job and you don’t need your…

This is a guest post from Articulate intern, Laura Connell.
This week’s theme: “It doesn’t matter how good your marketing is if …”
In my previous life as the marketing manager of a student start-up…

With the many benefits of Twitter, it’s no wonder so many people are using it as part of their personal branding strategy. Not only can you market yourself and your expertise, but also you ca…

TweetThe new book UnMarketing from Canadian viral marketer and Twitter gadfly Scott Stratten takes the rules and purees them, Blendtec style.Here’s what makes UnMarketing an unusual, yet worthy use of your ma…

There comes a point in every businesses’ life when those reams of hand written notes, whiteboards and password locked laptops won’t cut it anymore and you find yourself needing to automate, share and communicat…

by Josh Bernoff
Starting today and continuing until this Friday September 10, you can download Empowered to your Kindle at no charge.
You want to know how to manage your company in the age of empowered custome…

Despite soaring profits, high-tech companies have been slow to hire — a sign of just how difficult it will be to address persistently high joblessness.

Companies including Volvo, HM and MTV are testing merchandise in virtual worlds to raise awareness of their brands.

Link up Docs.com with your Facebook account and you can create a resume based on your profile and graphs from statistics about the friends you keep. More …

Mac OS X and iOS: The lastest update of media center app Plex brings support for iOS devices. Here’s how to get Plex going on your HTPC and your mobile. M…

NOTE: This blog post is going to be all jumbled up. I am trying to show the Live Writer developers a problem that exists with the current beta and WordPress 3.o
I love Live Writer. I’m even willing to lea…

Sometimes I question my own existence, but—thanks to Google and the words of this modern day René Descartes—I now know how to easily find the reassurance…

The best compliment I ever receive about my blog is that my posts are short, simple, and actionable. Any time I get that response, I feel that I’ve hit the mark. When I get a lot of comments about uncertain…

Open data is all the rage these days, but is simply opening up aggregate public information for outside analysis enough to change the world for the better? A new article by Mike Gurstein, Editor of the influen…

I am contemplating obtaining and securing domain names for my teenage children. Are they starting a business?….No. Have they a great idea and they want to encapsulate that intellectual property with an online…

Neat idea, free PDF… will differently (definitely) make you think. HT to Lucas.

We’ve taken a look at how trapster.com can help you avoid speed traps, but now you can locate speed traps in real time while you’re on the go. More »…

We’ve talked a lot about getting great color our of your photos, but if you don’t like the color you have you’re not necessarily stuck with it. Here are two…