Social Media Coverage on Mashable

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Sunday, February 12, 2012
SOCIAL MEDIA TOP STORIES Top 6 Mashable Comments This Week Where to Find Mashable at Social Media Week 2012 15 Fascinating Twitter Employees You Should Follow ALL STORIES SOCIAL MEDIA Knicks' Jeremy Lin Continues Domination of Social Media and NBA Saturday, February 11, 2012 10:10 PM Sam Laird Welcome to the Linternet. After a 38-point outing to lead the New York Knicks over Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers on Friday night, point guard Jeremy Lin has tightened the stranglehold he's had on the World Wide Web since his improbable surge to NBA stardom began just several days ago. His name and the hashtag #Linsanity have trended on Twitter multiple days in the past week. He has added more than 130,000 followers on the network over that time span as well, according to the stat-tracking website TwitterCounter.com. He's added about 40,000 of those followers just since outdueling Bryant on Friday, according to the site. He's even inspired spinoff accounts, such as the @Linterest page, which provides fictional updates of famous people's "linboards" in a parody of the white-hot social network Pinterest. An underground rapper posted a tribute rap to YouTube on Tuesday. Two days later, the well-known rapper Jin posted a tribute of his own. How much has the digital hysteria exploded since Mashable first wrote about Lin earlier this week? On Friday night, the tech news website All Things D, which typically gives sports a wide berth, published a service piece titled, "Who Put Sports in My Twitter Again? The Jeremy Lin Explainer." Lin has a number of things in common with Tim Tebow. Tebow, quarterback of the Denver Broncos, was the last professional athlete to take the Internet by storm, and inspired one especially viral meme last fall. Both he and Lin are devout Christians. Both are seen as model citizens who "play the right way" and offer a counterpoint to many of the boorish aspects of pro sports. Both are seen as heavy underdogs at the professional level. The son of Taiwanese immigrants, Lin was an un-recruited high school player in Palo Alto, California. After none of his dream schools offered a scholarship, he played four years at Harvard University, leading the fabled academic institution to new heights on the hardwood. He went un-drafted out of Harvard but made the Golden State Warriors as a free agent, becoming the NBA's first Asian-American player since 1947, then bounced around some more before the Knicks picked him up. Indeed, Lin's status as the rare Asian-American NBA player has contributed to his popularity on social media -- but led to some ugly moments as well. Lin's Chinese name, Lin Shuhao, was among Monday's most-searched terms on Sina Weibo, a Chinese service similar to Twitter, according to The Wall Street Journal. Then, on Friday night, scores of people called for Fox Sports columnist Jason Whitlock to be fired after he posted this tweet. What do you think of #Linsanity so far? How long do you think it will last? Let us know in the comments. Photo courtesy of Jeremy Lin's Facebook Page Dad Addresses Viral Laptop Shooting After Daughter's Facebook Post [QUOTES] Saturday, February 11, 2012 6:53 PM Sam Laird The tech-savvy, gun-toting father who blasted nine hollow-point rounds into his daughter's laptop after she wrote a disrespectful Facebook post is dealing with his newfound notoriety much the same way he handled the girl's rant: publicly and proactively. If you haven't seen the now-viral video, here's what happened: Tommy Jordan of North Carolina has a 15-year-old daughter who posted an indignant note to Facebook in which she complained about and harshly criticized her parents for forcing her do too many chores around the house and generally making her life a hassle. She thought she'd hid it from her parents using privacy settings, but her father works in IT and found the note anyway, he said, when he was uploading photos to the family dog's profile page. (She didn't think to hide it from the dog.) So he decided to reprimand her publicly, saying in the video that "since you want to hide it from everyone, I'm going to share it with everybody." He posted an eight-minute video to YouTube on Wednesday, refuting her key points and reading the entire note aloud while smoking a cigarette and sitting in a wooden chair in a grassy field. After about seven minutes of preamble, he gets up, points the camera at a laptop on the ground, introduces a pistol into the frame -- "This right here is my .45" -- and blasts away. Not surprisingly, the video took off. When Mashable wrote about it the day after it was posted, it had just over 5,000 YouTube views. Now it has 15 million. SEE ALSO: Dad Shoots Daughter's Laptop Over Facebook Post/a> According to Facebook posts by Jordan, he has since received more media inquiries than he can handle, sponsorship requests, and a deluge of both hateful and supportive messages from people eager to provide feedback on his parenting methods. Jordan addressed the laptop shooting and subsequent hullaballoo in a recent Facebook post that begins, "Attention Media Outlets:" While we appreciate the interest you're all putting forth to get in touch with us regarding the video, we're not going to go on your talk show, not going to call in to your radio show, and not going to be in your TV miniseries. Some of you think I made an acceptable parenting decision, and others think I didn't. However, I can't think of any way myself or my daughter can respond to a media outlet that won't be twisted out of context. The Dallas news TV news already showed that in their brief five-minute interview with the psychologist. Jordan goes on to say that exploiting the media glare would send his daughter the wrong message "that it's OK to profit at the expense of someone else's embarrassment or misfortune, and that's not how I was raised, nor how she has been raised." Jordan says in the post that he will make any further comments through his Facebook page, not through the media. "My daughter isn't hurt, emotionally scarred, or otherwise damaged," he writes, "but that kind of publicity has never seemed to be to have a positive effect on any child or family." In subsequent posts, Jordan sheds more light on the zoo his life has become, further explains the reasoning behind his laptop assassination, solicits funds for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, and promotes a social selling website he's been helping to build. Many of his posts have received well over a thousand comments. Here, in the gallery below, are several snippets of what Tommy Jordan has had to say over the past couple days. For the full versions, head on over to his Facebook page. What do you think about this video going viral and Jordan's following response? Let us know in the comments. 42 New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed Saturday, February 11, 2012 5:36 PM Matt Petronzio Take a break from planning the perfect Valentine's Day (or planning an enjoyable Tuesday nonetheless) and catch up on the valuable digital resources we've covered with our weekly roundup of Mashable features. This week we have the most romantic Pinterest boards, ways that social media can improve public safety and what is absolutely essential for your business website. You'll also find free iPhone apps you can use every day, the best Super Bowl memes readers sent in to us and new sites to help you navigate the online dating scene. We've even covered how to be funny in 140 characters or less. So, what are you waiting for? Take advantage of these resources! Editor's Picks Pinterest: How Do You Turn Pins Into Projects? Mashable and CNN iReport want to see how your Pinterest projects have come to life. How New York City Went Digital in 2011 New York City's Digital Road Map has 4 pillars: Access, Open Government, Engagement and Industry. See how tech has improved each one. 10 Valentine's Day Cards for Your Special Tech Geek Don't send a boring card to your sweetie this year, send a geeky one! We've picked our 10 favorites. 8 Amazing Green Buildings That Break Even on Energy Consumption As zero-energy housing becomes an increasingly successful industry, home owners are taking notice. Check out these sleek options. Twitter Comedy: How to Be Funny in 140 Characters Humor is a great way to gain followers and build your brand on Twitter. We asked advice from 10 well-followed professional comedy writers. Social Media 3 Shoe Brands Kicking Butt With Social Media A look at how Puma, Jimmy Choo and Bergdorf Goodman are using social media to sell footwear online. How Social Media Could Improve Public Safety When it comes to public safety, forward-thinking government agencies are using social media to improve situational and emergency awareness. 20 TV Shows With the Most Social Media Buzz This Week/a> Which TV shows generate the most buzz on social networks? Find out each week from our new chart. The Top 15 Tweets-Per-Second Records Twitter records continue to fall as 100 million active users continue to use the service. These 15 moments caught their attention the most. 5 Ways to Find Travel Deals Using Social Media Looking for a great deal on a getaway? You may find some steals on social media -- if you know where to look! Top 5 Social Sites for Film Fans Here are five great sites that help you connect with film fans from all over the world. 12 Pinterest Boards for Valentine's Day Inspiration To celebrate the season of love, we found some of the most romantic Pinterest Boards out there. 7 Pinterest Clones: Can You Tell the Difference? Just like the world now has a Groupon and a Birchbox for everything, Pinterest is creating a wake of copy-cat sites. 5 Essential Spreadsheets for Social Media Analytics Social media analytics and tracking can be very time-consuming and expensive. Here are five ready-made spreadsheets you can copy for free. 17 Most-Popular Photos From Flickr Commons The Flickr Commons has released 17 of its most-popular photos in a special gallery for its fourth anniversary. Online Dating: 7 Fun New Sites for Finding Your Match The latest wave of online dating sites forgoes mysterious equations in favor of straightforward, sometimes unexpected, matching techniques. Grammys 2012: Who to Follow on Twitter The 2012 Grammy Awards are going to be more modern than ever. To keep up, follow our extensive list of celebrities and others. 9 Ways Students Can Use Social Media to Boost Their Careers Here are nine things students should consider when starting to use social media professionally. 15 Fascinating Twitter Employees You Should Follow You may follow lots of interesting people on Twitter, but do you follow any Twitter employees? We've picked 15 that are definitely follow-worthy. For more social media news and resources, you can follow Mashable's social media channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. Business & Marketing How to Fix Best Buy Some insist that Best Buy is dying a slow death. Here's what the company can do to recover its losses before it perishes. The Rise of the Sharing Economy Discover what startup founders and users have to say about the current state and future potential of the shared economy trend. 8 Legal Steps for Starting Your Business You're ready to start up your startup? Make sure you follow these tips to avoid legal drama. What Digital Non-Profits Can Learn From Companies Like Google While fundraising and advocacy are still crucial to most non-profits, some have set their sites on building scalable digital platforms that empower supporters. 3 Ways to Optimize Search on Your Ecommerce Site Try these strategies to improve your ecommerce company's search functionality, both on-site and via organic search. 10 Essential Features of Every Good Business Website Skimp on these necessary website components, and you'll risk losing customers. How to Structure Your Startup to Avoid Double Taxation When it comes down to choosing a business structure, small business owners are typically concerned about one thing: taxes. 4 Ways to Boost Your SEO With Google+ Can you +1 your way to SEO glory? We spoke to the experts. 8 Powerful Tips for Marketing Your Business With Ebooks Eight successful entrepreneurs share how to use ebooks to grow your business and establish yourself as an industry authority. How to Crowdfund Your Next Big Idea Crowdsourcing may be the latest and most promising source of startup capital. Here's how to get started. 5 Ways to Market Your Brand on LinkedIn LinkedIn provides plenty of marketing opportunities, but lets take a look at some of the lesser-known tools. For more business news and resources, you can follow Mashable's business channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. Tech & Mobile The 5 Best New Apps This Week We've trekked through the overly frivolous, the ugly and the downright impractical in our search for these five recently launched apps worth downloading. 20 Best (or Most Annoying) Animated Super Bowl GIFs The best Super Bowl moments - plays, the halftime show and commercials- have all been turned into animated GIFs to annoy your friends with. How Digital Tools Help Companies Offer Better Health Care Today's health risk assessments use digital technology to individually tailor health assessments, findings and feedback. 8 Adorable Pixel Heart Gifts for Valentine's Day We have found eight great accessories -- for both sexes -- that celebrate the classic 8-bit heart. Pandora vs. Spotify: Who Will Win the Battle for Streaming Music? Once upon a time, the future of streaming music rested squarely on the shoulders of Pandora Radio. Then came Spotify. 10 Classy Speakers to Match Your White iPhone We have found 10 speaker solutions -- docks, speakers and clocks -- that come in a ice-white finish to match your favorite handset. Hands On With Google Chrome for Android Google's Chrome browser for Android is on its way to 4.0 devices, and it has a number of features you'll want to check out. Here's our first look at the new mobile web browser. 10 Free iPhone Apps You'll Use Every Day We've compiled a list of free, everyday iPhone apps, whether to help you wake up in the morning, access the news or manage your to-do list. 5 Essential Classroom Management Tools for Teachers These classroom management tools -- from apps to videos -- offer tips for both new teachers and vets alike. 7 Epic Videos of Gadget Destruction What is it about eviscerating gadgets that makes people so happy? We picked 7 of our favorites. Why iPad Textbooks Are Still Too Expensive for Schools/a> When Apple announced its initiative to bring iPads into schools, the reaction among many was enthusiastic. But there are major reasons why iPads are too expensive for schools. 15 Best Super Bowl Memes You Sent Us For the Super Bowl, we challenged you to turn Patriots coach Bill Belichick into a meme using the cropped image of him we provided. You responded in full force. Here are the best submissions. For more tech news and resources, you can follow Mashable's tech channel on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, scanrail Top 10 Twitter Pics of the Week [PICS] Saturday, February 11, 2012 5:06 PM Charlie White What a difference a week makes! This week's batch of top 10 Twitter pics were terrific, thanks to an immensely popular Super Bowl game, snowstorms all over the northern hemisphere, Lady Gaga and a lot more. It looks like our new algorithm is working, finding the most popular pics out of millions on Twitter . The top 10 selections are the brainchild of our cherry-picking stats experts at social media search engine Skylines, they're narrowing down the most popular hash tags, and then culling the most popular pictures from there. If you'd like to know more about the selection process, see the full results from Skylines. If you missed them, here are last week's Top 10 Twitter Pics. Top 6 Mashable Comments This Week Saturday, February 11, 2012 2:40 PM Stephanie Haberman Another week, another round-up of top comments on Mashable! In this post, we showcase the week's best comments on our site. We expecially look for thoughtful comments that engage the community and drive more conversation, as well as those that make us laugh. Take a look at this week's top comments on Mashable: If you haven't commented on a Mashable article before, check out Mashable Follow, our content curation and social tool, as well as our comment guidelines to learn more. We'd love for you to join the conversation. Be sure to comment, and check in next week to see if you make next week's top comments roundup! Galaxy Note Super Bowl Ad Inspires Twitter Backlash How Social Media Can Help You Snag Top Talent For Your Company Saturday, February 11, 2012 12:45 PM Curt Finch Curt Finch is the founder and CEO of Journyx, a company that offers time-tracking and resource management software. Connect with him and Journyx on Facebook and Twitter. Social media has emerged like an errant piece of debris from a tornado, and has smacked the world of business in its metaphorical face. Depending on who you talk to, this emergence of no-holds-barred communication has resulted in either the apocalypse for privacy and internal practices, or the advent of a new dawn of profitability and success. In any case, the plethora of social networking sites has led to a reevaluation of business practices. It's no mystery that the area with the most important long-term implications for an organization is recruiting and staffing employees. One of the biggest and oldest problems for companies revolves around acquiring a talented and creative team -- and digital gives the old, traditional methods a new spin. According to a studyby the workplace psychologist group OPP, 39% of leaders said they still rely on gut instinct when making hiring decisions, and a quarter admitted that whether they liked someone personally was a major influence. These findings demonstrate that traditional hiring metrics, including quality of the cover letter and interview, compete in importance with the personal preferences of the hiring manager. Second, employers base hiring preferences on the applicant's personality, sometimes even more than on the hard skills an applicant brings to the table. Social media tools and applications can offer a glimpse into these more personal aspects of an applicant beyond traditional hiring materials. But are businesses actually using social media tools to hire? Importance and Prevalence The answer to this question is surprisingly murky. A survey by CareerXroads, a company that's been tracking hiring sources for the past 10 years, found that 57.1% of respondents report that social media plays an important role in their direct sourcing program. A 2011 study undertaken by Jobvite goes further, stating that 89% of companies planned to use social media in their hiring process that year, and that 64% of companies directly used social media to hire an applicant in 2011. On the flip side, Gerry Crispin, who co-authored the CareerXroads survey, levied some skepticism on the numbers he found for companies using social media. In an interview conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management, Crispin states, "Some of the respondents stated that social media played a part in only 2-3% of their new hires, and other respondents reported that social media sites were used in 50-60% of their hiring decisions. When you have numbers that widely divergent, I think it clearly shows that employers are struggling to understand the real impact of social media." Regardless of the confusion surrounding social media (which, by the way, should be expected given its rapid escalation in importance), there are proven techniques and applications in place, should a company wish to expand its hiring arsenal to the social sphere. Passive Strategies The truth is, even if a company doesn't actively include social media in its hiring strategy, it still plays a role in determining the talent pool. If a company has any form of online social presence whatsoever -- and who doesn't? -- the odds are that it has influenced who has applied for a position within that company, at least within recent years. Much buzz has been made about businesses screening the social profiles of prospective employees, but it goes both ways. Emily Bennington, co-author of Effective Immediately: How to Fit In, Stand Out, and Move Up at Your First Real Job, says, "Naturally, candidates can use the same tools to screen you and -- just like you -- if they don't like what they see, they move on." Since most companies would like to have a large pool of talented applicants from which to choose, it behooves them to spend some time creating a dynamic social footprint. Alison Doyle, the job search guide for About.com, believes that some basic steps can improve the quality of applicants who find their way to a job through social media. For instance, publish engaging content focusing not only on what your company does, but how the company culture operates, to give insight into the inner working of the business. Also, create a strong employment brand on larger social sites such as Facebook. Doyle also points out that employees who post positive things about their employer on personal social platforms make the company very attractive to prospects. For this reason, she encourages companies to allow employees to access social media during work hours, as they are more likely to post about their company then. Active Strategies For companies ready to dive headfirst into social hiring, there are a number of applications and tactics that make navigating the occasionally chaotic waters of Facebook, LinkedIn and their ilk more manageable. That being said, sometimes the most effective strategies occur when a company creatively uses the tools at hand. Matt Simpson, director of marketing at Bulbstorm, relates the following story: "My company, Bulbstorm, found me by Googling 'Phoenix Marketing Copywriter' and landing on my freelance website. My experience with social media and blogging related to my old sports website particularly piqued their interest. When I considered turning them down to focus on my freelance business, the CEO trash-talked me on Twitter. I loved how unconventional he was. That got my attention, and I signed on." This story illustrates two levels of active social hiring. First, the company found an employee that matched its criteria by examining his social sites online. Then, using those social sites, it appealed to his personality. Even though he was not interested at first, its knowledge of his persona enabled the company to obtain a perfect hire. Innovative Systems So, harness the power of social media to reach talented people and land key hires within a company -- that is the perfect scenario, right? Here are some of the most innovative tools I've found that can help you navigate the social hiring landscape. CrowdHired: CrowdHired works through social crowdsourcing which, aside from being an overused buzzword, offers a dynamic approach to finding employees. The process is fairly simple: An employer selects advocates from his existing contacts and submits a bounty, or payment, that will be paid to both the advocate and the employee hired as a result of the recommendation. The advocate then recommends individuals from his network who he thinks would be a good fit. If the recommended person wants to apply for the position, he chooses whichever of his social networks he thinks will represent him best. CrowdHired works well by eliminating the need to dredge through a large number of potentially unqualified applicants, and instead operates through the popular method of using recommendations to find the top people. The bounty simply adds an extra incentive for advocates to get on board and really recommend the best of their contacts. HirePlug: This is an app that sits on top of your company's existing Facebook Page. It adds a tab that says "We Are Hiring" and allows applicants to view openings and apply directly from there. HirePlug not only leverages the network of your company but also employees' networks. A company that uses this app can encourage employees to place the "We Are Hiring" tab on their profiles as well. The app also matches the skills from listed positions to profiles of friends within the employees' networks. Employees can then send a recommendation from Facebook and via email. It tracks referrals so employees can be rewarded if their recommendation results in a hire. Unrabble: Unrabble attempts to alleviate the issue of applicants submitting resumes that are, shall we say, a bit fluffed up. Instead, it institutes a relatively simple system of social "bragging" that requires proof to substantiate the claim. Each time an applicant "brags" about an accomplishment (increasing sales, successfully revamping a site, etc.), they must also provide an introduction to a contact on Facebook or LinkedIn who will vouch for him. While the system isn't foolproof, it offers a convenient alternative to wading through the piles of resumes from apparent miracle workers who single-handedly saved their company from financial bankruptcy, yet mysteriously received little enough compensation that they are now applying for another job. Takeaways Social media offers a whole slew of new and exciting avenues for hiring, but it will not always provide the best solution for every company. That being said, a company that integrates social hiring practices into its repertoire will undoubtedly be able to reach many applicants who might otherwise have gone unnoticed or undervalued. Plus, they will be able to claim that they are "hip" and/or "cool," or whatever the devil the kids are saying nowadays. Social Media Job Listings Every week we post a list of social media and web job opportunities. While we publish a huge range of job listings, we've selected some of the top social media job opportunities from the past two weeks to get you started. Happy hunting! Senior Web Developer at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City Brand Promotion Supervisor at Boston Beer Company in Boston Public Relations Manager at Beyond Marketing Group in Irvine, California		TOP STORIES TODAY Knicks' Jeremy Lin Continues Domination of Social Media and NBA Dad Addresses Viral Laptop Shooting After Daughter's Facebook Post [QUOTES] Top 10 Twitter Pics of the Week [PICS] 42 New Digital Media Resources You May Have Missed How Social Media Can Help You Snag Top Talent For Your Company TOP TOPICS Trending 4,053 followers Social Media 61,089 followers Business 30,832 followers Facebook 74,499 followers Startups 7,919 followers Apps And Software 644 followers Twitter 48,956 followers Entertainment 2,828 followers Mobile 4,252 followers Marketing 7,559 followers
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