@Publish

“Internet Everywhere means that our old conception of the world separated into an online and an offline space is no longer relevant. Traditional social media required that we live experiences in the offline world, record those experiences, and then post them online to recreate the experience and talk about it,” Spiegel said. But constant connectivity means there’s no longer a disconnect between when media is taken and when it could be shared. Or, as Spiegel said, “We no longer have to capture the ‘real world’ and recreate it online – we simply live and communicate at the same time.”

“The selfie makes sense as the fundamental unit of communication on Snapchat because it marks the transition between digital media as self-expression and digital media as communication,” he said.

According to GWI, mobile access to social media sites actually overtook traditional PC access in Q4 of 2013, as 66 percent of users accessed their social networks by mobile compared to 64 percent by computer. However, microblogging sites — which include Twitter and Tumblr — are apparently best reserved for the tablet, dominating over both traditional computers and mobile for usage.

No matter what the device, Facebook remains top dog across the board overall – account ownership, active usage and visit frequency, across all regions — although it has seen minor decline as other social networks gain mindshare. The key winner in this year’s new class of social networks is Instagram: A nearly 25% rise in active users betwen Q2 and Q4 of 2013 bring the estimated total of active users on the website to more than 90 million. It’s also popular for the kids, too, as teens represent the dominant demographic on the site, with a 39 percent share of active users. According to GWI, the only other social networks that can boast teens as their dominant users are Youtube and Tumblr.

GWI’s data only indicates that Facebook’s teens shrank two percentage points, leaving a rough user estimate of 34.19 million

Brands with fraudulent fans have a potentially significant handicap when it comes to organic reach. When a brand posts, Facebook trickles that post out initially to a tiny fraction of the brand audience. Based on those fans’ initial engagement with the post, Facebook determines post quality and what percentage of the brand’s full fan base to feature that post to. If 50 percent of fans are fake and never engage, the post will perform one-half as well as it should on the initial test run, and, therefore, suffer from low organic circulation, a very common gripe for brands.

The most basic change is to stop counting likes. Focus on engagement. As the founder of a company that’s positioned itself as “after-like marketing,” I’ve long emphasized engagement as primary, and like counts as secondary, but in light of what we’re learning, it might be best to remove likes even as a secondary success metric.

We don’t allow schemes that buy and sell Pins or pay people per Pin, follow, etc. We know that some popular Pinners have relationships with approved affiliate networks or participate in paid social media campaigns, and that’s still okay, as long as they’re not being compensated for each action on Pinterest. So if you're in a deal to earn $1 every time you pin a corporation's products, you're out of luck. But if you’re a highly influential blogger in a five-figure partnership with a brand, making money is A-OK. Here's more: A business can pay someone to help them put together a board that represents their brand. For example, it’s okay for a guest blogger to curate a board for a local boutique’s profile. We don’t allow that boutique to pay the blogger to Pin products to her own boards. A person can be given commission by an approved affiliate network. For example, it’s okay for a blogger to get paid when someone purchases a product that blogger has Pinned. However, we don’t allow the blogger to be paid just to Pin. In other words, Pinterest isn’t trying to keep brands or bloggers from making money. It just doesn't want anyone paid for filling up its network with garbage images.

“[Pinterest] will be a tremendous type of ad unit—truly based on your interests as a person,” Gupta said. “In a traditional demographic based ad, I might give you an ad for camping equipment because you’re 25 to 35 and male. But on Pinterest, I’d advertise it because you’re pinning a lot of camping equipment. I don’t care that you’re actually 55. I know you’ll be a buyer.”

It’s clear that Pinterest is simply trying to keep its content authentic, not transactional. But when you’re weighing that against a billion dollar valuation, the company has to move carefully.

At a time when every new piece of tech or service seems to be an app or digital entity, we’re craving the tangible.

Here are five tips to help you write the ultimate press release 1. Develop and tell a coherent, compelling story. What makes your company tick? How do you delight your customers? What sets you apart from the pack? 2. Don't just tout your product or service. Develop key messages that answer the question: Why should anyone care? 3. Use plain English. Avoid obscuring your message by using industry jargon and talking “inside baseball.” 4. Get your reader to engage. Use compelling elements such as data, visuals, and infographics to illustrate your points. And include a call-to-action that drives people to a landing page. 5. Hook yourself to a star. Tie what you’re doing to something happening in the news--especially if it’s in your sector or a targeted vertical market. Shine brighter in the reflected light of someone in the news.

Ember’s library size and support network are its two greatest strengths, but if you’re only trying to create a small widget or single-page app, it might be overkill for you. If you’re working on a multipage, navigational, long-term project, Ember might be your pick.

more than 85% of U.S. adults turn to social media for connecting with friends or family, according to Pew Research. News is not the primary reason we turn to Facebook.

According to Digimind, 62.5% of companies use Twitter to glean market intelligence, surpassed only by LinkedIn (69.4%). Facebook? Less than 50%. 

Pew Research finds just 4% of people list Facebook as the primary way they get news, even though a whopping 78% stumble upon news while on Facebook despite not looking for it. Newsy information, in other words, is not Facebook's raison d'être. Friendship and personal communication are.

As many page admins and marketers rage against Facebook for perceived and real drops in page post reach, a new study by Neustar shows that Facebook advertising is actually an effective way to achieve reach, compared to other methods such as ad networks, ad exchange platforms and portal websites.

UK digital retailers appear to be embracing customer engagement on Twitter, with the majority now responding to questions via the social network, according to recent research.

Shareaholic also found that Facebook mobile drove 8.25 percent of visits to its network of sites in January, while Facebook overall was responsible for 16.21 percent, meaning that mobile accounted for more than one-half of referrals from the social network.

These are showing up for people who aren't logged in. This is content originally created in Google+ ranking highly in the results. This is powerful stuff!

The New York Times says Starbucks, “Updates its Google+ page for the sake of good search placement, and takes advice from Google representatives on how to optimize Google+ content for the search engine.”

While The Economist’s senior director of audience Chandra Magee did say journalists at The Economist take advantage of Google+ features like Hangouts, she also commented on how Google+ improves the brand’s SEO efforts. “There is potential there [on Google+] to help us get in front of new audiences,” Magee told the New York Times, “But it also helps with our SEO strategy because our posts on Google+ actually show up in our search engine results.”

The New York Times says nearly half of 540 million monthly active users on Google+ do not visit the social network.

Facebook announced the purchase of the mobile messaging service WhatsApp on Wednesday, in a $19bn deal that represents the social media company’s biggest acquisition yet.

The deal is a big bet for Facebook, which has until recently struggled to convince investors of its strategy for mobile.

Facebook’s successful bid comes after Google reportedly made a $1bn offer for the company last year.