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Linkedin and Twitter used at higher volumes in one country

Social Media Trending Results

Research regarding the usage of social networking in the Netherlands was put together by a company that deals with media studies. There are some interesting incites that come from it too.

One of the most interesting parts of the research done, is that Hyves is still leading the way, though that is not expected to last forever. If I was Twitter or Facebook, I would highly consider focusing on this market and see if they can win it over. They certainly have the muscle to do so...

Many unique characteristics came from the usage of social media in the Netherlands. In many ways they are unique to the whole craze and will continue to reflect a deeply influenced societies habits. There are many people all over the world that use social media, but I think the people over there have learned to make it a part of their lives at a greater scale. 

With more usage of social media, it was easy to see that the Eleven Million mark being surpassed would lead to attention. The major take away here is that with so many people using it per capita, you find a new dynamic in a social structure. In some countries there are just a small cross section of teenagers and young adults using social media, where as in the Netherlands you find that there are many age groups, thus changing the activity and relationships of families and friends at new levels. 

Microsoft Announces Facebook and Twitter Integration

The search engine Microsoft Bing decided to include Tweets within its news results and a Facebook integration in its search results. This decision aims to help users "make more informed decisions in search by surfacing the kind of information you can only get from your friends, often in real-time.", according to the Bing Team.

Bing’s attempt comes almost as a response to Google’s announcement last month saying that it would start basing its search results according to whether or not certain content had been shared by your friends. Bing has brought a slightly different interpretation on the matter. Relevant tweets will appear next to the headlines on Bing News and they will not alter search results according to what your friends share. But when it comes to Facebook, Bing’s initial approach was pretty much similar to Google’s and it did alter the search results according to your friends’ shares. However, the newest update did a 180 on the subject, enabling users to post to Facebook directly from Bing search results related to movies, artists, musicians and television shows.

Research Reveals Who Says What to Whom on Twitter

Twitter has become a new age very important communication tool with a very large spectrum area that goes from personal to business and mass media. That’s why researchers Shaomei Wu from Cornell University and Winter Mason, Jake Hofman, and Duncan Watts from Yahoo decided to take a closer look on who says what to whom  and who listens to whom on Twitter. The research revealed that only 20,000 Twitter users, called the “elite users”, generate almost half of all the tweets out there.

The researchers classified these users into four categories: celebrities, bloggers, media outlets, and organizations. This classification was mostly based on the frequency these users show up on Twitter. They’ve also made a list of the top 5 users in each of these categories. The celebrities category listed aplusk, ladygaga, TheEllenShow, taylorswift13, and Oprah, the media category included cnnbrk, nytimes, asahi, BreakingNews, and TIME in its top 5, the organizations were best represented by google, Starbucks, twitter, joinred, and ollehkt, whereas mashable, problogger, kibeloco, naosalvo, and dooce were listed as the 5 most active bloggers.

Although the media outlets were represented as the most active users on Twitter, it appears that only 15% of common users receive tweets directly from the media. This means either that the tweets are not directly received from the media, but come as retweets, or that people simply find other sources of information more attractive.

However, the most relevant part of the study was not that these categories generate the largest fraction of tweets, but that these four main categories have the tendency to be exclusive, meaning that they mostly tweet and retweet within their own circle or category. It is a basic tendency of individuals to associate and bond with similar others, and in fact the research shows that celebrities mostly interact with other celebrities, and media actors consume information from other media actors and tweet in the same circle. There is however a small exception when it comes to organizations, which seem to pay more attention to bloggers than to themselves:  “Bloggers, unlike those in other categories, are more likely to retweet information outside their own categories, reflecting the "characterization of bloggers as recyclers and filters of information."

Chrome Extension Has Over 11,000 Installations a Week

The Personal Blocklist Chrome extension launched by Google on February 14, 2011, is being used by over 129,000 people. This extension was released before the Panda Update, which can completely block domains from ever appearing in the users’ Google search results.

The fact that the domain-blocking Chrome extension is getting installed over 11,000 times a week is amazing, especially since it has only been released for over a month and it is available for only one browser.  But this “shortcoming” will apparently not last for long, as Google was so excited about the progress of this Chrome extension that the company decided they will include similar functionality into the Google experience and that there will be no extension required. With this many people already using the Chrome extension, just imagine how many Google users would take advantage of this feature if it were merely a click away. According to a Google spokesperson, the feature is already functional on google.com in English for people using Chrome 9+, IE8+ and Firefox 3.5, and they will soon expand it to other regions, languages and browsers. This seems to be a lot more useful than the Panda update. The Panda update is trying to make a judgment call on what people should see, whereas this feature allows people to choose what they want to see.

Microsoft Files Complaint Against Google

Microsoft has filed a complaint with the European Commission as part of the Commission’s investigation into whether Google has breached European competition law. To make the story short, Microsoft is concerned that Google might be using some less than orthodox techniques to stop their competition from creating a solid alternative to their search engine.

It turns out that Microsoft is only one of the many companies concerned about the fairness of the European search market. As indicated by the European Commission itself, 95% of the search market in Europe is dominated by Google, whereas in the United States around a quarter of Americans use Microsoft when it comes to their search needs, either through Bing or through the company’s partnership with Yahoo!.

Microsoft points out that they’ve invested billions of dollars per year into Bing, which is regarded as one of the most innovative search engines, but they admit that they need a fair and competitive marketplace for their hard work to pay off.  The Department of Justice has filed suit against Google twice, once for its unlawful attempt to tie up and set search advertising prices at Yahoo!, and the second time for trying to monopolize book content. However, this doesn’t seem to have stopped Google from its attempts to impede fair competition, and the situation is worse in Europe than in the US.

Among Microsoft’s main concerns addressed in this filing is Google’s acquisition of YouTube and its restrictions that make it virtually impossible for competitive search engines to properly access YouTube for their search results. This places Bing and other search engines in an unequal position compared to Google and forces users to turn to Google. Due to Google’s intervention, YouTube does neither work properly on Microsoft’s new Windows Phone. The YouTube application on Windows Phones is therefore just a browser displaying YouTube’s mobile website, without the functionality that Google has enabled its Android phones, and even Apple’s iPhones with. Android phones and iPhones enable users to search for video categories, find favorites, see ratings, and so on. Microsoft has also created a high quality YouTube application for its Windows phone, but Google is refusing their permission to access YouTube in the way that other phones do.

Google Launches the +1 Recommendations Button

In an effort to make your search results as relevant and efficient as possible, Google has introduced a new technique to help people find the best recommendations in their search results.

After introducing the Google Social Search in 2009, which included more information that people you know share on Twitter, Flickr and other such websites, Google is now taking this approach to the next level, by enabling you and the people you know to share recommendations right in Google’s search results. They simply call it +1. All you have to do is click +1 when you find an ad or webpage that is useful to you and the +1 will then appear next to the search result you’ve marked whenever there is a relevant search on that subject.

For instance, if you’re looking for a lemon bars recipe, you may get a +1 next to a cool cooking website from one of your friends whose cooking you happen to love. Or maybe you want to buy a new dress and you find a +1 from one of your fashion victim friends.

The most important advantage to +1 recommendations is their relevance, because they come from people who matter to you, whenever and wherever you need them.

If you’re wondering how Google knows which +1’s to show you, there are different signals used, such as people you are already connected to through Google, like chat buddies and contacts. Other signals such as your connections on sites like Twitter might also be incorporated in the future to make sure they keep your recommendations as relevant as possible.