LinkedIn Steps Up to the Plate

LinkedIn, the social networking site used predominantly by professionals, has apparently felt neglected as of late. It's been wondering why its 90 million users haven't been giving it as much attention as they've been directing towards Facebook, Google News, and Yahoo News. LinkedIn has been taking this sort of abuse for quite some time now, but it appears that the site has finally decided to act on its dissatisfaction.

A New York Times article has announced the company's new service which provides relevant links to and summaries of the daily news on its site in a move that places the site in direct competition with other new aggregators such as the aforementioned Google and Yahoo general news services.

“We want to give you what you need to know to be better at what you do,” said LinkedIn's chief executive, Jeff Weiner.

To gain access to one of their newest features, "Maps," click here!

YouTube Prepares for Battle

It was only a matter of time before YouTube (owned by Google) made a definitive move to branch outside of its current role as merely a video hosting site. According to a New York Times article, last week (Monday, 03/07/2011), YouTube acquired Next New Networks, which is a video production company. It appears that YouTube hopes to break into the markets where sites like Hulu, which (legally) provides episodes of many television shows and movies. The appeal to Hulu is that viewers can depend on the site for providing the television shows and movies listed on the site, whereas YouTube can not necessarily make these same guarantees due to copyright laws, among other issues.

If my memory serves me correctly, YouTube provides a movie rental service as well, though this has not, apparently, garnered enough of the market for the company to remain satisfied. The acquired company was reportedly acquired for less than $50 million, which seems like a steal for YouTube. Next New Networks has already established itself among its various projects, including Barely Political, Indy Mogul, Hungry Nation, and it's various works on iTunes and Vimeo.


One of the most visible changes viewers can expect from YouTube is the production value of the videos created and uploaded by YouTube's many partners, who are determined based on how many unique hits they receive on their videos and how many subscribers they accumulate. But the bottom line is that Google has got its eye on bigger and better things and is currently preparing it's visual media arm, YouTube, for war over the growing market segment currently dominated by Hulu and a few other sites. So long as this healthy competition breeds higher quality products and services, I don't see how we can complain!

*UPDATE*

Facebook enters the arena!

"App"sorbed

In response to our recent class discussions regarding smartphones and our immense reliance on them, I decided to dig deeper into the topic. For about the past ten years laptops have been all the rage. In today’s society, one is considered abnormal without a laptop and the wifi to come with it. The trend is shifting and smartphones are becoming the new laptop.

One definition of smartphone is a phone that has computer like qualities such as internet access. Although the “first” smartphone was released in 1992, what many consider the smartphone revolution started with the iPhone. The first iPhone was released in June 2007. Since the iPhone release, many other companies have developed smartphones similar to it such as the Blackberry Storm, the Android, the HTC Thunderbolt and the Samsung Galaxy. Most of these share common characteristics: internet abilities with access to wifi, e-mail, music players, and a touch screen.

Currently, it is application abilities that distinguish these phones and in general the iPhone contains the largest quantity and most current “apps” of all the smartphones. Some of the most common apps today include GPS, Facebook, Words with Friends, and Urban Spoon. Apps are providing so many resources that are just at the touch of the screen, however soon we may not even need to make the effort. In a recent New York Times article, Jenna Worthman reported on the Mobile World Conference taking place in Barcelona. During the conference, the chief executive of Google, Eric Schmidt talked about the future of smartphones. He explained that smartphones will become more intuitive. Schmidt used the example of a civilian walking through the streets of Barcelona. Using previous knowledge and Google activity, one’s smartphone might alert the individual of something they have expressed great interest in like a Spanish architecture museum.

To many people smartphones may seem excessive but the benefits and possibilities seem to be endless. Any user has the opportunity to create an app, opening doors for a million more ideas in the future. I believe those who do not join in the smartphone revolution will be left behind. In answer to our class conversation; yes we can do homework online but I don’t think that’s even the starting point to where smartphones will take us.

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