Tag Archives | Facebook

Facebook The Latest To Join Online Coupon Frenzy

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 26, 2011 at 2:54 pm

The online coupon industry is getting crowded. Facebook is the latest to announce, launching Deals on Facebook in five cities on Tuesday. The first cities to get the service will be Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, San Diego, and San Francisco, although if you live elsewhere and are interested you’ll be able to sign up to be notified.

Of course if Facebook is involved there’s going to be some kind of social aspect, so the company says it will make it easy for users of the service to share the deals they find, as well as helping “find interesting experiences around you to do with friends.” You’ll also be able to “Like” the deal in true Facebook fashion.

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Facebook Has News on Thursday

Posted by Harry McCracken on April 6, 2011 at 11:49 pm

Facebook is holding a press event on Thursday morning at 10am PT. I’ll be there–and as an experiment, instead of liveblogging the news here on Technologizer, I’ll cover it on Twitter, where I’m @harrymccracken. See you there, I hope…

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Facebook For iPhone Gets “Unfriend” Feature

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 5, 2011 at 2:11 pm

Has somebody made you so angry that you couldn’t wait until you got home so you could unfriend them on Facebook? If you have an iPhone, you won’t have to wait. As part of the new update to the Facebook app, an “Unfriend” button has been added to the application, allowing users to dump their pals on the go.

The functionality is not yet in the Android version, and the company has not said when it expects it to be. In addition, we’re all still waiting for an official iPad app–something that I’m beginning to think may never materalize!

All kidding aside on the unfriending front, there were also some other really nice additions to the app. You may remember my post on event check-ins from last month: the feature is now available within the app.

Users will also now be able to use a map to view the locations of friends rather than the standard list that the app has been using since Places was introduced last August. This makes the feature a lot more like Loopt, which has always displayed the locations of friends on a map — which just seems a logical move to me.

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Spammers Like “Use Facebook as Page”

Posted by Michelle Castillo on March 25, 2011 at 8:09 am

Do you “like” things on Facebook? Spammers like things, too, and they’re using Facebook’s “Like” function to put their obnoxious schemes and shameless missives everywhere.

Facebook assumed they were doing Facebook Page administrators a favor when they added the option to “Use Facebook as Page.” This meant that customized Facebook pages could Like, post, and comment around the site just as regular profile users do.

It didn’t take long for spammers to realizes by using their page as a profile and “Liking” others’ pages, they could spread their message and elude the Facebook police.

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Your Take on This AT&T-T-Mobile Thing

Posted by Harry McCracken on March 24, 2011 at 4:47 pm

I spent the last few days at the CTIA Wireless show in Orlando, and the big news at the show wasn’t big news from the show. It was, of course, the proposed merger of AT&T and T-Mobile US. Everyone at the conference seemed to still be processing it in their minds–and I decided to ask my friends over at Twitter (where I’m @harrymccracken) for their takes as of right now.

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Facebook Testing Checkins for Events

Posted by Ed Oswald on March 21, 2011 at 2:41 pm

Facebook is apparently set to expand what its users can check in to, testing out a new “check in” button for events that’s available to users of its iPhone/iPod Touch mobile website, according to AllFacebook.com. While the button is not visible to those using the app just yet, those visiting the Safari version should see it.

The social networking site hasn’t provided too much information other than that the functionality is in testing and that the company plans to include it in the next release of the iPhone app. It is not clear whether or not the button would also be included in the Android app as well, but I am betting it will.

Checking in has become a much more popular activity on Facebook, as the company steals more and more of Foursquare’s thunder In fact, there really isn’t much that Foursquare does when it comes to checking in that Facebook hasn’t added itself.

By adding the functionality to events, Facebook could help those promoting these events better gauge how well their promotions on Facebook work. We all know folks who mark themselves as “attending” but never show up. (Hey, it happened to me this weekend. )

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Facebook Comments Expose a Flaw in Zuckerberg’s Vision

Posted by Jared Newman on March 7, 2011 at 9:43 am

“You have one identity. The days of you having a different image for your work friends or co-workers and for the other people you know are probably coming to an end pretty quickly … Having two identities for yourself is an example of a lack of integrity.”

-Mark Zuckerberg, as quoted in The Facebook Effect

It is with Zuckerberg’s remarks in mind that I read a couple of conversations over the weekend about Facebook’s new comment system for blogs and other websites. Although many websites — including this one — allow commenters to sign in with Facebook, some high-profile sites, such as TechCrunch, have switched over the new system, which is run entirely by the social network. This requires commenters to write under their real names, provided they aren’t using an alias on Facebook, and by default displays the comment on the user’s wall and friends’ news feeds.

Not surprisingly, the switch had a chilling effect on TechCrunch, according to MG Siegler. Although the venomous remarks that once dominated the site’s peanut gallery are gone, in their place are “comments that gush about the subject of the article in an overly sycophantic way,” Siegler writes. There are also fewer comments overall.

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Angry Birds’ Next Conquest, and Biggest Challenge, is Facebook

Posted by Jared Newman on March 6, 2011 at 3:51 pm

Although Angry Birds got its start on the iPhone, it didn’t linger there for long. The hit bird-slinging puzzle game has since migrated to Android, iPad, WebOS, Windows, Mac and the Playstation Network.

Next up is Facebook, where Angry Birds will be landing later this year, according to Develop. And because of the game’s existing popularity — it’s been downloaded 75 million times on other platforms, and some pundits have compared its cultural impact to Pac-Man — Angry Birds has a decent shot at stealing the Facebook gaming throne from Zynga, developer of Farmville, Cityville and Mafia Wars.

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Once Again, Facebook Will Share Personal Data with Third Parties

Posted by Ed Oswald on February 28, 2011 at 5:15 pm

Social networking site Facebook created quite a stir last month when it announced that it would share much more personal details of its users — such as addresses and phone numbers — with third party developers. The move was so controversial that the company quickly reversed its plans and delayed the offering while it weighed its options. It also attracted the ire of Congress.

In a response to Reps. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Joe Barton (R-Texas), the company now says it plans to go ahead with offering the functionality. “We expect that, once the feature is re-enabled, Facebook will again permit users to authorize applications to obtain their contact information,” the company wrote, adding it was looking into ways to “further enhance user control.”

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