NEW YORK (AP) — Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other Silicon Valley leaders have formally launched a political group aimed at revamping immigration policy, boosting education and encouraging investment in scientific research.Zuckerberg announced the formation of Fwd.us (pronounced “forward us”) in an op-ed article in The Washington Post late Wednesday. In it, he said the U.S. needs a new approach to these issues if it is to get ahead economically. This, he wrote, includes offering immigrants a path to citizenship.”We have a strange immigration policy for a nation of immigrants,” Zuckerberg wrote. “And it’s a policy unfit for today’s world.”The move comes as a bipartisan Senate group is expected to roll out a comprehensive immigration bill in the coming days. Zuckerberg’s goal echoes the proposed legislation. Zuckerberg, whose great-grandparents were immigrants, said he wants “comprehensive immigration reform that begins with effective border security, allows a path to citizenship and lets us attract the most talented and hardest-working people, no matter where they were born.”Continue Reading… … Read More
Facebook Home capitalizes on Google
NEW YORK (AP) — Facebook Home, the new application that takes over the front screen of a smartphone, is a bit of a corporate home invasion. Facebook is essentially moving into Google’s turf, taking advantage of software the search giant and competitor created.Facebook Home will operate on phones running Google Inc.’s Android software and present Facebook status updates, messages and other content on the home screen, rather than making the user fire up Facebook’s app. The software will be available for users to download on April 12 and will come preloaded on a new phone from HTC Corp., sold by AT&T Inc. in the U.S.Google gives away Android, the most popular smartphone software in the world, in the hope that it will steer phone users toward Google services, such as Maps and Gmail, and the ads it sells. Compared to ads targeting PC surfers, mobile ads are a small market, but it’s growing quickly. Research firm eMarketer expects U.S. mobile ad spending to grow 77 percent this year to $7.29 billion.Continue Reading… … Read More
Is Facebook over?
Less than a week ago, Facebook made a stunning disclosure in its 10k annual report: teens might be finished with the social network altogether. “We believe,” the report’s authors note glumly, “that some of our users, particularly our younger users, are aware of and actively engaging with other products and services similar to, or a substitute for, Facebook.” A new study released Thursday suggests the company’s problems extend beyond the waning interest of its youngest demographic.
According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project, as many as 61 percent of Facebook members are tuning the website out for weeks and sometimes months at a time. The reasons listed for these extended breaks are as banal as they are predictable: 21 percent of those surveyed “were too busy/didn’t have time for it”; 10 percent “just weren’t interested/just didn’t like it”; and another 10 percent simply thought it was a “waste of time.”
CNET’s Jennifer Van Grove has isolated some of the more biting — and comical — remarks of those polled:
Facebook users raise privacy concerns as company tweaks security settings
Reports – and myths – about user privacy abound on Facebook. Is it time for the social network to be more open with users? In the weeks since Mark Zuckerberg trumpeted Facebook’s growth to 1bn monthly users, there has been a lot of focus on the social network’s struggle to convince…
eBay relaunches look to be more mobile and social media friendly
EBay unveiled a new look for its website Wednesday inspired by social networks, giving consumers personalized shopping suggestions and a new emphasis on mobile Internet. The ecommerce giant with 105 million active users will start giving its users a “newsfeed” and a “personalized…
New York cracks down on local gangs via Facebook monitoring
The New York Police Department is deploying a surge of detectives to patrol an increasingly mean new beat: Facebook and other social networks. Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Tuesday that he’s doubling the number of detectives assigned to combating local teen gangs and that increased…
Feds snoop on social-network accounts without warrants
Under Attorney General Eric Holder, one form of real-time Internet surveillance used by the Justice Department increased 80 percent in … Read More
