If you look at one thing this week
WTF Is My Twitter Bio (NSFW)
Crafting an interesting, relevant Twitter bio has never been easy. They can enviable, insightful or a source of cringeworthy hilarity (and not always intentionally), and this Random Twitter Bio Generator takes its inspiration from that. Not for the easily offended, it generates surprisingly realistic spoof Twitter bios, some of which you could easily believe were real. Click the yellow link under the bios to refresh the page and show more.
Also on our screens this week
Olympic Pride Google Doodle
Russia’s anti-gay legislation (we must protect the children) has been somewhat brushed under the carpet for the Sochi Olympics so it was nice to see Google draw some attention to it with a doodle incorporating a subtle Gay Pride rainbow and accompany it with the text, taken the from the Olympic charter:
The practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have the possibility of practising sport, without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play.
Facebook turned 10
The personalised Facebook Lookback videos were a nice touch and showed how, despite the day-to-day experience of Facebook being mostly about sponsored posts and pictures of cats, Facebook has become a significant part of our lives and the way we share our experiences. This being the interweb, it didn’t take long to get spoofed:
Yahoo Goes Down
For those of us responsible fopr keeping our clients’ sites up, it’s always reassuring to know even the big boys have their off days. Google lost gMail & Google+ for about an hour at the end of January in entertaining circumstances and February was Yahoo’s turn to have technical issues with services.
Twitter Data Grants
Researchers can now gain access to masses of data from twitter’s archive to help
Google Slaps a Phishing Warning on Republican Propoganda Site
Regardless of your politics, you have to admit that spoofing a site and taking money under (allegedly) false pretences is not a respectable thing to do, so when the US Republican party started spoofing the sites of Democrat candidates and, most importantly, accepting donations under some very suspect misrepresentation, it was good to see Google slap a phishing notice on the sites, warning visitors of untrustworthy behaviour on the site.
Facebook Paper
Facebook launched Paper, a news-curation and publishing app but, while it’s a pretty straightforward app in itself, it does hint at a possible future for Facebook which may be quite different from the social network as we currently know it.
The Winter Olympics of our Discontent
No sooner had journalists arrived than tales of stray dogs roaming the hotels, shower curtains on the blackmarket and other problems with the Winter Olympics in Sochi, including the Live Feed link on the website showing a 404-not found.
#sochiproblems The Commerative Tshirt. pic.twitter.com/rBnCsMkaT8
— Michael Miller (@mychelmiller) February 7, 2014