Entries Tagged 'Google' ↓
August 22nd, 2011 | Facebook, Google, Legal Issues, Online Reputation Management, Parenting, Privacy, Quick Hits, Social Networking | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about a lawsuit intended to overturn a new law preventing teachers from “friending” students online and why Facebook and dating don’t always mix.
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The Missouri State Teacher’s Association has filed a lawsuit challenging the state’s new law preventing teachers from interacting with students on Facebook and other social media websites. The law, which has been described as unconstitutional by Internet law expert Daniel Solove, was created to discourage teachers and students form having inappropriate sexual relationships, but has been criticized as overly broad by teachers’ groups. The law is set to go into effect on August 28th.
This article from The Campbell Reporter discusses how young teens are embracing “the raunchy, rude lingo of cyberspace” and what teachers are doing to help students exercise more responsibility online. Quoting the article, “Educators increasingly are joining in to challenge the crude culture of social networks, which they fear unleashes cyberbullying and sexting, heightens the social drama of puberty and teaches the wrong values.” Citing a number of examples from the San Francisco Bay Area, the article shares how digital literacy and education programs, along with anti-bullying legislation, have been proposed to help kids stay safe on the Web.
People might say and do stupid things on Facebook, but when they’re using Facebook to leave a comment on a website, they smarten up. According to Jimmy Orr at the Los Angeles Times, whose paper has been using Facebook comments and traditional anonymous comments side-by-side, the difference in the quality of discourse from Facebook commenters was “stunning.” Orr owes the improved comments to the fact that Facebook requires users to provide their real name. When individuals know that their real name and reputation is tied to their comments, they are more careful and less combative online.
Huffington Post advice columnist Michael Cohen answers three questions about the often confusing intersection of Facebook and relationships. For the most part, Cohen’s advice is to keep Facebook out of relationships, especially when dating, so as not to show off your entire life before you can even get to know your would-be date.
This interesting article from TIME explores how parents help their kids access Internet websites by lying about their age. Because of the federal law COPPA, children under the age of 13 aren’t allowed to access certain websites. However, some parents believe that there is value in giving their kids access to social networking websites like Facebook and Google+. The TIME piece discusses how Google’s efforts to keep a 10-year-old from accessing his Google+ profile led to his father setting up the boy’s account in his name.
August 19th, 2011 | Google, Search Engines | Rob Frappier
This week, Google rolled out a significant expansion of sitelinks, capping years of experimentation on the search feature. The changes have kicked off a big debate in the SEO community about how companies may be helped or hurt by the expanded sitelinks.
For those unfamiliar with sitelinks, they are links that appear underneath a search result that link to a sub-section of a website. As its “Inside Search” blog reveals, Google has been tweaking sitelinks since 2006, going from a small single line of sitelinks to the most recent version, which gives each sitelink its own full-size search result.
If you can’t see the expanded sitelinks yet, here are some illustrations using popular websites as examples.
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Some people, like Marketing Pilgrim’s Frank Reed, think that the new sitelinks are overkill. Others, like some of the commenters at Search Engine Land, argue that the sitelinks are fine, if only Google would allow site owners to change sitelinks via Google’s Webmaster Tools. The one thing everyone agrees on, however, is that the new-look sitelinks make it even more important for brands (and personal brands) to secure the number one spot in Google search results and maintain interesting, content-rich websites.
What Google’s sitelinks change represents more than anything else is that the Web is constantly in flux. People will always turn to the Internet to find information — about the weather, about a new restaurant, or even about you. The way that people access that information, however, will change. In order to stay on top of your online reputation, it is important to stay current on the way search engines and social networks index and share information.
That’s what we’ve been doing at Reputation.com since 2006, and it’s what we’ll continue to do now and in the future.
August 10th, 2011 | Facebook, Google, Legal Issues, Online Reputation Management, Parenting, Privacy, Quick Hits, Social Networking | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about the New York Police Department’s plans to use social media to catch criminals and the epic fight between Facebook and Google+.
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In an effort to capitalize on the number of criminals who boast about their crimes online, the NYPD has announced the formation of new units that will “mine social media, looking for info about troublesome house parties, gang showdowns and other potential mayhem,” according to the New York Daily News (via Mashable). This is not the first time that a law enforcement agency has used social media in its crime fighting efforts, as numerous local, state, and federal outfits have also turned to social media to help identify criminals.
In a note at its Facebook Safety page, Facebook announced several changes to how users report offensive content on the site. In a series of screenshots, Facebook shows how it has improved the reporting function so that users can better specify their issue, request to have a photo taken down, connect with a “trusted friend” for assistance, or block a bully. The changes are specifically geared at helping young Facebook users deal with online harassment and cyberbullying.
This week, numerous reports declared that factions of the hacking group Anonymous were planning to hack Facebook later this year. Now, several of the loosely-knit group’s more prominent voices have declared that the Facebook operation is the work of only a few members and is not supported by Anonymous as a whole. According to ZDNet, the Twitter account for AnonOps wrote in a message, “#OpFacebook is being organised by some Anons. This does not necessarily mean that all of #Anonymous agrees with it.” The apparent lack of support for the campaign is a good indication that it will not have a strong impact on Facebook’s operations.
It is no secret that Europe and the United States of America have widely divergent views on personal privacy policies, but this article by Suzenne Daley in the New York Times shows just how much European governments are doing to give people a “right to be forgotten.” It would seem that European citizens agree, as well. According to the Times, “Three out of four [European Union citizens] said they were worried about how Internet companies used their information and wanted the right to delete personal data at any time. Ninety percent wanted the European Union to take action on the right to be forgotten.”
Since Google rolled out its Google+ social network earlier this summer, nearly every story on the service has focused on whether it will be able to compete with Facebook. Taking that question to a whole new level, SingleGrain devised a special infographic pitting Google+ against Facebook. The infographic, shared via The Atlantic, details the rapid rise of Google+ in comparison to the sheer size of Facebook.
August 9th, 2011 | Facebook, Google, Legal Issues, Online Reputation Management, Privacy, Quick Hits, Research | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about prisoners on social media and how social media might help send some London rioters to prison. Also, news on how Facebook affects children’s brains.
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As violence continues to grip parts of London, a loose coalition of citizens are turning to the Web to clean up the city and bring looters to justice. TechCrunch writes about one Google group that plans to use facial recognition technology to identify rioters. A similar tactic was used following the post-Stanley Cup riots in Vancouver. TechCrunch asks whether this practice is ethical, calling it “crowdsource justice.”
In a first of its kind case, a teacher in Northern Ireland has been granted an injunction preventing her ex-boyfriend from posting a sex video of her online. The woman alleges that her ex had threatened to post the video on Facebook, and also to send it to her bosses and her students. According to the BBC, the woman’s lawyers correctly claimed that “any clips could spread uncontrollably if they were allowed to be uploaded,” which is why a preemptive injunction was necessary.
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has asked Facebook to assist in removing the Facebook profiles of criminals in state prisons. According to Corrections Department Secretary Matthew Cate, “access to social media allows inmates to circumvent our monitoring process and continue to engage in criminal activity.” In some cases, prisoners also use Facebook to harass their victims from afar.
Psychologist Larry D. Rosen recently presented a report entitled “Poke Me: How Social Networks Can Both Help and Harm Our Kids” to the American Psychological Associtation. In his presentation, Rosen highlighted numerous findings about Facebook’s impact on children, including both positive and negative effects. The Atlantic Wire reports some of Rosen’s discoveries, including the good news that Facebook makes kids more empathetic and the bad news that Facebook can lower kids’ self-esteem.
Black Hat, the famous security conference attended by the world’s foremost experts in hacking, is well-known for exposing significant security vulnerabilities in popular technology. CNET’s Declan McCullagh writes that Black Hat researchers recently showed how it is possible to bypass Windows’ built-in encryption tools to access password data for e-mail and websites like Facebook that has been stored in the cloud. In response to the vulnerability, Microsoft encouraged its users to use its BitLocker tool to encrypt their hard drives.
August 5th, 2011 | Facebook, Google, Online Reputation Management, Parenting, Privacy, Quick Hits | Rob Frappier
In today’s Quick Hits, we talk about the history of photo sharing on Facebook, why real name policies online are revolutionary, what one mom found when she went undercover online, and the growth of facial recognition technology.
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PCMag shares an interesting infographic from Pixable.com that details how photo sharing has changed over Facebook’s history. The information is very interesting and reveals the many subtle ways that Facebook has pushed users to share more and more photos on the site. Facebook predicts that by the end of the summer, there will be more than 100 billion photos on the site.
In a very engaging article for The Atlantic, Alexis Madrigal explains why Facebook and Google’s policies of requiring real names are revolutionary. Quoting the article, “In real life, we expect very few statements to be public, persistent, and attached to your real identity… Online, Google and Facebook require an inversion of this assumed norm. Every statement you make on Google Plus or Facebook is persistent and strongly attached to your real identity through your name.” Madrigal’s assessment reflects the growing importance of online reputation management.
An Australian mother wanted to see what her 15-year-old daughter might face online, so she set-up a fake Facebook account pretending to be a 14-year-old girl. After gaining 76 friends, the mom set out to see the kinds of things teenagers share online. She was quickly shocked to see cyberbullying, pornography, and vulgar exchanges. While the mom’s actions violated Facebook’s terms of service, they did provide insight into why Australia is debating a possible resolution to allow parents access to their children’s social media accounts.
Despite considerable concern from privacy advocates, facial recognition technology continues to boom, particularly within consumer tech products.This piece from The Atlantic Wire discusses how consumer interest in facial recognition technology has led to the development of a range of products, including a device that uses facial recognition to customize TV programming based on a scan of who is watching.
