Google Plus is quietly creeping into the mainstream. While many disparaged it as a flash and burn site, the social network is continuing to grow. It now has 400 million users and, according to Casey Newton of c|net, 100 million of those are active users. Compare that to Facebook’s latest numbers, 955 million users with 552 …
Continue reading “Google Plus releases more user stats – is it now valued at $10 billion?”
From Cyprus Mail (the island in the Mediterranean): Find out how much electricity you consume compared to your friends, those in your neighbourhood, or even your district with Facebook application ‘Social Electricity’, which uses data from the Electricity Authority of Cyprus (EAC) to help people save energy. I love this idea. I’ve always wanted to know …
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“The idea was to build every possible tool for nonprofits, social fundraising, skills based volunteerism, a blog network…really big, unobtainable objectives,” said Ben Rattray who, at 22-years-old, founded Change.org. “We failed.” Rather than giving up, he pivoted. Instead of attempting to provide every technological service to anyone trying to make an impact, the business narrowed …
Continue reading “How change.org was turned into the internets biggest tool for social change”
The early Digg was brilliant and honest and democratic. Each digg was a vote and each vote counted towards the ultimate objective: moving a story closer and closer to the top position on the Digg homepage. Today, we vote on Facebook with every share and on Twitter with every tweet, and conversations take place across …
As Independent Booksellers Week gets into full swing, the Booksellers Association has released figures to suggest outlets with cafés are likely to have higher sales than those without. Figures based on a survey of 40 BA members reveal that bookshops with cafés saw a 3% growth in overall turnover in 2011, whereas those without experienced …
Continue reading “Modern world: Bookstores with cafés increase sales – those without decrease”
Rakuten (the Amazon of Japan) has led a $100m funding round into Pinterest, which values the online “curation” community at around $1.5 billion. The Japanese ecommerce giant won out over major US venture capital firms who were vying for a piece of Silicon Valley’s new sweetheart, which lets users clip images to a virtual pinboard. The FT spoke …
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B Corporations are a new kind of company that uses the power of business to solve social and environmental problems. (It’s like a LEED certification or Fair Trade certification, but for a business, not just a building or a bag of coffee.) B Lab, a non-profit, describes the B Corporation movement like this: When you support …
Continue reading “New corporation type – B Corporation – for sustainable “benefit corporation””
Click for the full infographic. Ok, this is a pure advertisement for Google+, but I do love the social network. Partially because competition is always good (Facebook needs a kick in the teeth sometimes) and because I’ve never like the blue boxes of Facebook. The design and flow of Google+ works better for me…it feels …
Continue reading “Infographic – 20 reasons to switch to Google+”
Online educational marketplaces are on the rise, with tools like Udemy and Khan Academy allowing people of all ages to become an expert in any topic. New company Coursera is targeting higher education by offering university-level courses from top institutions to students all over the world, all for free. The company launched with $16 million in Series A funding and is announcing …
The Full Infograph