Articles about Twitter

Phew! Well it seems that 2014 is finally in full swing -- the past seven days have been the busiest in a while. It was a busy week for security. A piece of malware came to light that was using Windows computers as a means of infecting the Android devices connected to them. Yet another security breach meant that the credit card details of Michaels customers were compromised.

While the computing world worries about whether or not the NSA is reading their email or recording their phone calls, school children in Britain learned that their computing activities are being monitored in the classroom. There was celebration as companies such as Microsoft and Google won a lawsuit that means they are now able to reveal more information about US Government data requests.

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Due to my geeky nature I am prone to making rash decisions. If something interesting grabs my attention chances are I will want to try it out right away, without giving too much thought to the possible implications as curiosity gets the best of me. More often than not (luckily), I enjoy the experience from the get-go and end up accepting the new, but this has not been the case with my switch from Windows 8.1 to Mac. Things just did not make sense to me right from the start, it did not feel natural and it did not just work. I have since wanted to go back more times than I can remember.

Years and years of muscle memory and computing habits, that I developed whilst using Windows, went down the drain as I started my Mac experiment (a costly one at that). Bye, bye! The software that I needed or wanted to use was simply not there, or working as I would have liked it to, on OS X. I definitely did not enjoy this part, nor the one where I had to find good alternatives to my favorite programs, learn how to do basic things again, and adapt to what was basically a quirky new platform for me. I am not a masochist, I enjoy trying out new things, but even I had to admit that I was in over my head.

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Twitter is rarely out of the headlines, but this week two legal cases surrounding the social network slash micro-blogging service brought it to attention for slightly different reasons than normal. On one side of the Atlantic a couple fell foul of the law for using Twitter to make threats to a feminist campaigner, while on the other a celebrity managed to avoid prosecution for libel after managing to plead ignorance about the falsity of a claim made online.

For a court case victory, it was announced in a very restrained, quiet way... particularly when you consider that the victor was none other than Courtney Love. The celebratory tweet reads simply "I can't thank you enough Dongell Lawrence Finney LLP, the most incredible law firm on the planet. We won this epic battle. #justiceprevails", and the decision to use Twitter was slightly ironic considering the fact that the court case stemmed from a previous tweet made by Ms. Love.

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There are many social media networks nowadays. However, one of my favorites is Vine. If you aren't familiar, it is a video-sharing service with a twist -- the videos cannot be longer than six seconds. Not surprisingly, Vine is owned by Twitter -- another service that limits the duration of a user's communication. Both services teach us that limits breed creativity. In other words, forcing the user to make do with less creates unique solutions.

Vine takes this even further by introducing easy to use stop-motion. This allows the user to create things that appear magical, such as a person disappearing. While the video-service still feels fresh, surprisingly it is already a year old today!

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It's starting to feel as though the myriad of social networks that exist are homogenizing. As one site introduces a feature, it is not long before the rest follow suit. Now it is Facebook's turn. Occasional leader, but often a follower, Facebook now boasts a trending topics feature. Simply known as Trending, the new feature borrows the idea used by Twitter and countless news websites to provide a constantly updating list of topics that people around the world are talking about.

In fact, Trending acts as a sort of blend between Twitter's Trends feature coupled with content suggestions. This is not a straight list of the subjects that are proving most popular around the world, but, theoretically, the list should be personalized with content that you have an interest in. That’s the theory at least.

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It was announced very casually with very little fanfare. Twitter is getting a new look. It is in the process of rolling out around the world and when the revamped interface hits your account you'll find that the new look closely mimics that found in the iOS and Android apps. The redesign follows a recent update to the mobile apps, and while there are not many dramatic changes, the standardized look helps to create a more uniform experience moving between devices.

The tweet composition section is now found to the left hand side of the screen -- gone is the pop-up box in favour of an inline option. The two-column design has a very neat look to it, and does an excellent job of keeping related data together. The left hand column houses the profile box and composition field, and beneath this you'll find suggestions for who to follow, as well as a list of trending topics.

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Jerry Lee Lewis famously sang "there's a whole lotta shakin goin on". Lately, it feels like there is a whole lot of hacking going on. While the world is still reeling from the Target hack, it seems that Microsoft and Twitter have unwillingly joined the retailer as victims.

Today, one of Microsoft's Twitter accounts, @MSFTnews was infiltrated by The Syrian Electronic Army -- a group that claims to be supporters of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. But who is at fault, Microsoft or Twitter?

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Michael Bay -- yes, he of Transformers fame -- managed to get Samsung some attention with his performance at CES 2014... but not necessarily the sort of attention the company was hoping for. The idea behind the director's appearance was that he would showcase Samsung's latest range of curved-screen TVs. As a director, Bay probably has an eye for such details. He would seem to be well-positioned to extol the virtues of the new ultra-high definition. But it seems that speech making is not a forte of his. A mini-meltdown saw him fleeing the stage after an apparent auto-cue problem.

After attempting to "wing it", Bay fluttered off stage muttering "I'm sorry". He appeared incredibly uncomfortable from the moment he started speaking, but it wasn’t long before he said that the text was "all off". The situation was handled slightly more professionally by the Samsung representative who tried to cajole Bay into explaining how the curved screen would enhance the viewing experience -- but to no avail.

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The Syrian Electronic Army is no stranger to the headlines, and the group's latest exploits have gained it further attention. This time the target is Microsoft, specifically Skype. The SEA target the Skype Twitter stream, as well as Facebook page and blog in what may be the first high-profile hack attack of the New Year.

The group defaced the blog with a message to Microsoft that read "Hacked by Syrian Electronic Army.. Stop Spying!". A message posted on the Skype Facebook page read "Don't use Microsoft emails (hotmail,outlook), They are monitoring your accounts and selling the data to the governments."

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Once the darling of the social networking world, it looks as though Facebook is falling out of favor. At least that seems to be the case with teenagers. An extensive and ongoing study into social media finds that huge swathes of 16 to 18 year-olds are abandoning Facebook and jumping ship to the likes of Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat. In total, nine different regions are being studied over a course of 15 months.

As Professor of Material Culture at University College London, Daniel Miller says, Facebook is now uncool. Mum and Dad are now not only using the social network (which is an immediate nail in the coffin), but actively encouraging their kids to share details about what they're doing: "Parents have worked out how to use the site and see it as a way for the family to remain connected".

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If you had access to 500,000 pieces of Lego (yes, they are Lego bricks or pieces, not Legos!) what would you build? When Steve Sammartino, an American entrepreneur, joined forces with "crazy Romanian teenager" Raul Oaida the answer seemed obvious -- build a full sized car capable of hitting 20km/h. Sammartino and Oaida met online, came up with the wacky idea for the plastic vehicle and tweeted to ask for help with funding.

The tweet lead to the birth of the Super Awesome Micro project. Having read the tweet -- "Anyone interested in investing $500 - $1,000 in a project which is awesome and a world first tweet me. Need about 20 participants" -- Ford Australia pledged some funding, as did some other investors, and the project was able to get off the ground.

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The customer is always right, right? As a customer it is understandable that this old adage seems like something set in stone, but looked at from a company's point of view things are rather different. A large proportion of customers are in fact idiots. While it is reasonable to expect a company to listen to what its customers have to say, does this risk stifling innovation as customers demand that things be done a certain way?

Here on BetaNews we've had a little debate about whether Microsoft should reintroduce the Start menu. Despite the number of people calling for its return, Brian does not think it is a good idea saying that "the company should ignore these customers, even if they are the majority". I am of the opinion that it would be good to at least make it optional, particularly for enterprise customers.

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Things are starting to get festive, and that means there's also a lot going on. This past week has been quite a busy one! It might not come as a surprise, but the figures are in -- Windows 8.1 is not performing anywhere near as well as Windows 7 in terms of sales. Part of the reason for the slower adoption could be the Start screen and the absence of the Start menu. There has been some debate here at BetaNews about the possibility that the Start menu could make a return. Brian is very much opposed to the idea, I think it's probably a good idea, particularly for business users, while Wayne showed us how to get the Start menu back right now.

The backlash against NSA surveillance continues, and now Microsoft, Apple, Google and a number of other big names have joined forces and written to President Obama asking for reform. Joe was not impressed. To help protect user accounts, Microsoft beefed up security.

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A number of YouTube users who post game walkthroughs and feature footage from games in other ways are finding that their content is being flagged for copyright violation. It seems that uploaders are falling victim to YouTube's automated ContentID system which is responsible for weeding out all manner of copyrighted material. What is interesting is that videos are not being removed from YouTube, but are unable to earn money from advertisements, leading to a loss in revenue for a lot of people.

Uploaders are warned that their videos are still viewable but told that the flagged video's copyright is owned by someone else. What is confusing is the fact that the companies named in relation to the warnings do not actually seem to be the copyright holder. For example, VentureBeat cites the case of warnings being handed out for videos featuring footage from the game Metro: Last Light.

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It's not all that long ago that the idea of posting news, thoughts and ideas on a social network (or "micro-blogging service" as it is infuriatingly referred to) that imposed a limit of 140 characters on posts seemed absurd. Now Twitter is so commonplace that any company, or even TV show, worth its salt has its own account. The word hashtag entered the technical lexicon a little while ago, but such is Twitter's dominance that it is now spoken aloud: hashtag yousoundstupid.

2013 has been a big year for Twitter, perhaps most notably due to it starting to trade on the NYSE. But there have also be great strides made in how Twitter is used. Of course it is still home to vainglorious, the trolls and celebrities, but 2013 is also the year in which Twitter proved itself to be genuinely useful.

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