Recent Stories with tag facebook

Facebook offers a wide assortment of NAMBLA groups your prankster "friends" can add you to.

Facebook's 500-million-strong user base was built on the power of weak social ties; "friendship" got defined down significantly to include "anyone I've interacted with." But Facebook's new group feature lets all those low-bar friends decide what groups you are in. The blowback has been immediate, and in a twist, involves Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg.

Area resident Michael Arrington, upon discovering that he had been added to a joke NAMBLA group, added Zuckerberg as well. As a squeaky-clean new AOL employee, Arrington naturally wants this cleared up as soon as possible, so a little fuel was added to the fire. This is possible because since only "friends" can add you to groups, there is no query to you for confirmation. (Ironically, Zuckerberg pitched groups as offering Facebook members "more control.")

Meanwhile, Seattle's Health Month inventor, Buster Benson, made the rueful discovery today that any potential competitor of yours can claim intellectual property infringement, and Facebook will take down your page immediately without checking with you, or offering recourse. (Lifehacker explains what Health Month is all about here.) Benson has since discovered that the person who complained to Facebook about the "infringement" can be found in the comments section of various Health Month mentions online, remarking anonymously on the superiority of his product. [UPDATE 10/12/10: Benson reports his page has reappeared.]

On the plus side, perhaps even now Facebook ads are recommending local legal services.

In a city famously known for geeks and tech, the success of a movie about Facebook might seem like a gimme. But the producers of The Social Network aren't taking Seattle for granted. In addition to pre-screening the film for blogs like Mashable and Girls in Tech, Scott Rudin and company have also shown the film at local cinemas over the past month. City buzz about the movie spiked when CEO Andrew Zuckerberg was spotted at one of these events early last week. Based on the book The Accidental Billionaires by Ben Mezrich, The Social Network tells the story of Harvard undergrads Eduardo Saverin and Mark Zuckerberg, the developers of Facebook.

The Social Network is a harder sell than it might first appear. Seattle's geek elite is notoriously contemptuous of Facebook, and the choice of former 'N Sync lead Justin Timberlake to co-star (as Sean Parker, i.e. The Bad Guy) goes against the city's threadbare, but still influential, grunge grain.

In response, PR efforts have reached out to what is arguably the most sociable of Seattle's subcultures, local GLBTs. Tonight, venerable Seattle gay bar Neighbours will be giving away free passes to a special advance screening of The Social Network during the club's weekly "Seattle's Got Talent" event, hosted by Gaysha Starr. (The show starts at 11 p.m.) Two lucky dogs per pass will get to see the movie (and perhaps JT's famous abs) tomorrow at an undisclosed location. A limited number of passes are available, so get there early.

An ExactTarget study makes the claim that your Twitter followers are more valuable than Facebook fans. Summarizes eMarketer: "Daily Twitter users who followed a brand were more than twice as likely as daily Facebook users who 'liked' a brand to say they were more likely to purchase from the brand after becoming a social media follower." (NB: What people say they are likely to do is highly dubious data.)

I'd argue that for a media site, the value runs the other way. Our Twitter engagement is with colleagues and fans who enjoy a more active, thumbnail-news alert presence. We sometimes have back-and-forths on Twitter, but mostly we're pinging people with news-bites. If it's highly clickable, sure, we'll see retweets, but if it's a quiet, unassuming little story, then not so much. On Twitter, that is.

The people on Facebook I think are also fans but not of our "performance" necessarily--they are fans of sharing. It's not a study, but I do have data for this. We've not been fanatic about our social media presence in any way. We have 585 Twitter followers, and we have 187 Facebook fans. Guess which group provided 35 percent of our referral traffic the last 30 days?

Twitter brought in just seven percent of our referrals, despite The SunBreak appearing on 60 lists. (Admittedly, we did have a very popular story about Facebook members during that time. But still, the previous 30 days yields a 26 percent Facebook to 9 percent Twitter split.)
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August 11th marked the last day of the National Scrabble Championships, an event that America's geeks and freaks watch with all the fervor that our more sportif friends and neighbors reserve for, er, whatever those sorts of people watch. The Olympics, or something. Live coverage of the event was streamed on the internet, reaching even more millions of viewers than tuned in last year to watch tiles click.

Rafi Stern, a University of Washington student, played FINFOOTS for a whopping 203 points. The play was featured in an interview with Stefan Fatsis on NPR's All Things Considered. Fatsis is the author of (the very entertaining) Word Freak: Heartbreak, Triumph, Genius and Obsession in the World of Competitive Scrabble Players and a competitive Scrabble player himself.

Competitive Scrabble, and the game in general, has seen an upsurge in popularity since the publication of Fatsis's book. Contributing to the wave of younger players picking up the game is Hasbro's Facebook Scrabble game, which allows Facebook users to play "friends" or to start and join open games. The game is smartphone-compatible, which makes it relatively popular with mobile addicts.

The NSC grand prize of $10,000 went to Nigel Richards of Kuala Lumpur. Tough break, Rafi.

As it's a slow news day so far, let me catch everyone up on ways to read and support The SunBreak. Huzzah! (Yes, public cheers are a great way of showing support.)

And now you can also purchase one- or two-year subscriptions (see PayPal button in the sidebar), which is on the honor system. If you read enough TSB that you'd miss it if we vanished, you can support the work we do for just $1 a month.

Secondly, how you read TSB is up to you! You can bookmark the site, follow the fun via RSS, get a daily email digest, receive updates on Facebook, or put us in your Twitter stream. You can do all of the above, if you want. We don't judge. You can even read us on our iPhone app.

You've also probably noticed you can recommend posts you like to Facebook, or share the link, by clicking on the FB icons up top of each post page. If you haven't, hey, the internet is not a test. Relax. But it is convenient, and it lets us know what you're interested in reading about.

Anything else? Let us know in the comments.

Just a quick note that we've gone a step further with our Facebook integration. You've probably noticed that on the post page you now have the choice to Share or Recommend posts via Facebook. Now you can log in to the site using your Facebook ID, too, so you can comment and all your FB friends will go, "OMG ZING! LMAO." Or perhaps they'll enter a considered, thought-provoking debate with you. We don't know, we're just putting it out there. We didn't pick your friends. Anyway, if that's been your excuse for not spouting off, by god, consider yourself unmuzzled.

Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman

Last week, Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman was quoted by CNBC's Diana Olick, saying:

The real estate market is like a fat man that can't get up. The U.S. government has modified loans, extended tax credits, lowered interest rates; we've fired a lot of our guns, and at this point the market is just going to have a long slow period of decline.

(Kelman is good with quotes: "I've sometimes wondered if God calibrated the size of our brains and the amount of fuel in the sun to give us just enough time to figure out the universe & send a space-ark toward a new galaxy, but the only guys who could figure this out are working for Wall Street.")

This is the kind of wry observation that appeals to skeptical inquirers like Seattle Bubble, who have applauded Redfin's entry into monthly real estate data reports: "Redfin has taken a page from the NWMLS playbook, torn it out, shredded it, burned it, flushed it down the toilet, and written a whole new book from scratch on the subject of monthly data releases."

Full disclosure: the Bubble's Tim Ellis contributes to Redfin's "Sweet Seattle Digs" blog, but this would only seem to add to Redfin's credibility, since the Bubble's readership is, if anything, more critical than Ellis, and would probably turn on him in minutes if he slipped up. (In this I seem to disagree with 360Digest's Marlow Harris, who couldn't see any point to noting real estate was over-priced, back in November 2008, and questioned Redfin's viability. She will have to wait a bit longer for Redfin to fail.)

But Redfin's credibility isn't simply derived from a refreshing bluntness. Old school real-estate watchers often sound like they have a crystal ball secreted away somewhere--they employ the astrologer's and psychic's tools of saliency and confirmation bias. They are exquisitely sensitive to the "mood" of the market, so far as ad hoc rationalizations go. In the absence of a testable, fresh-data-driven model, there's a tendency toward superstition and making bets. (As Dan Ariely points out, our intuition works best when drawing on observable cause-and-effect, throw in a time-delay and we're mainly guessing.)... (more)

AUGH! Cliff Mass had us hoping for a sunny Sunday, but "new shit has come to light." His new Sunday forecast says to expect more clouds and rain by early Sunday afternoon.

On the bright side, all seven of our Seattle farmer's markets are in full swing this weekend.

A few local stories we didn't cover this week but which nonetheless happened: the author of Drugstore Cowboy was arrested for robbing a drugstore; a UW study found that HIV treatment dramatically reduced transmission rates; and failing Washington banks made the Wall Street Journal.

WSDOT announced the tunnel may take a year longer to complete than thought.

Our top two stories were about the Sonics fan fracas over on Starbucks' Facebook page and whether your grocery store makes you fat. Mayor McGinn had questions about the tunnel, and kept hammering away about cost overruns. Seattle made it on a Top 10 Cities list and hosted the world's largest 3D TV (from LG) at SID 2010 (photos!).

If all goes as planned, all major Puget Sound roadways will be tolled within the next 10 to 20 years, primarily to deal with congestion. Seattle is still arguing over in-city "road diets." The closure of the NE 45th Street Viaduct draws near (June 14). What's going on with the unsold condos at Thornton Place? The owner and their PR firm didn't respond to my calls, so not a lot, I'm thinking.... (more)

Starbucks' Facebook fan page is the epicenter of Sonics fan protest this morning. It all starts rather innocently, with Starbucks announcing the "We love you Seattle" promotion. Every Friday through June 18, you can pick up a special gift at "local participating Seattle Starbucks."

A nice gesture, sure to engender smiles of gratitude from happy Seattleites, yes? Well, in the unlikely event that this blog post is optioned for a movie, the trailer might say: "But Starbucks forgot one thing..."

Sonics fans. Who have not forgotten that Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz' spearheaded the team's sale to Oklahoma Cityites, the overwhelming factor precipitating the team's desertion of Seattle. Sonics fans are not feeling the love. To put it lightly. And they aren't being shy about it.

"f*** starbucks an howard shultz, c***sucker!!" comments one Kyle Mortensen on SBUX Facebook.

Thomas Kohnstamm is a little more coherent: "Thanks for the offer of a free coffee, but I'd rather have the basketball team that I grew up on."

The directors of Sonicsgate have even chimed in with a link to their Webby-award winning film about the team's departure.... (more)

That's right, our brand spanking new light rail system will be hosting a half-off event this Sunday.  Well, not half off ticket prices, more like half of people's clothes off. And, Sound Transit didn't plan it--the No Pants Light Rail Ride was conceived and organized by our own Emerald City Improv as an extension of the New York No Pants Subway Ride (see video). They've already had a few years of practice, but us Seattle folk are quick learners.

Now is your chance to get famous for taking your pants off, just like mom always wanted. It appears that everyone in the city is already aware of the event (850 people are signed up on Facebook and countless more have seen it on Yelp) and even major media will be in attendance. This timid SunBreak reporter plans on being there and will bring back pictures and/or video if at all possible. Actually, you may just want to skip those--there hasn't been sun here in years.

Seattle's experiment with not wearing pants on public transportation will occur sometime in the early afternoon. It will cost you a light rail ticket to experience the moment. More information is available here and here.

Ex-Green Beret Michael Yon has been making a good living as an independent war correspondent, blogging his way through Iraq and Afghanistan, for some years now. He's been in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, on CNN and FOX News.

But when he refused to tell "border bullies" (customs officials? TSA?) at the SeaTac airport how much money he made, they handcuffed him. He was eventually "rescued" by Port of Seattle police. "No country has ever treated me so badly," he added in another Facebook update, and included Afghanistan and Singapore in that list.

Airport security is understandably tight at the moment, following the Christmas Day failure to prevent a bomber from boarding not one but two flights. But it's difficult to see what self-reported income would add to airport security. And I'm not aware of any rules stating that U.S. citizens have to declare their income before being readmitted to the country.

Hey, welcome to Seattle, Michael!

Someday, you will do it. You won't have a co-worker's birthday party, a seasonal gutter cleaning, or brunch with an ex. Someday, you will watch sports all weekend. If, perchance, this is the weekend, here's how it should go:

FRIDAY
5 p.m.: Leave work, drive towards Hec Ed for the Athletes in Action Classic. Stop at Bartells and buy some socks on the way.

Melvin Jones

5:30-6:30 p.m.: Watch the second half of Belmont/Portland St. Cheer on PSU's Melvin Jones, a Chief Sealth grad who got his life on track after a rough start to high school.

6:30 p.m.: Dinner at Hec Ed. Recommended--Porters Place BBQ. Not recommended--Everything else.

7-9 p.m.: Watch the Huskies avoid a letdown like in last year's opening-game loss to Portland, and lay an ass-whooping on outmanned Wright St. The Raiders may stay in this game early if their shooters are hot, but UW's depth will mean WSU will be run ragged by the second half.

9-10 p.m.: Sit in the traffic lineup to get out of the Hec Ed parking lot. While you're at it, check ESPN 710 to see how Seattle U did in their opening game, at Oklahoma State. 

10 p.m.: Drive home--you've got a big day tomorrow!

SATURDAY
7:30 a.m.: Drag yourself out of bed and drive to the George and Dragon for World Cup Qualifying soccer.

8 a.m.: Russia v. Slovenia begins. Here's the deal--eight European countries are getting their last shot at qualifying for the 2010 World Cup. They are paired into four groups of two, each pair plays a home-and-home with the winner going through to the Cup.

9 a.m.: England v. Brazil begins. This is just a friendly, with no World Cup qualifying implications, but c'mon. It's England/Brazil!

10 a.m.: Greece v. Ukraine! Ouzo v. Vodka! Who wins? Everyone!

Noon: Ireland v. France. Even more testy after an Irish diplomat gravely insulted French PM Sarkosky this week.

2 p.m.: Drive to The Dutchess and catch the second half of the Washington/Oregon St. football game. Will the Beavers knock Jake Locker senseless again?

2:30-3:30 p.m.: Probably some sort of silly play by the Husky special teams that costs us the game late, ending slight hopes of a Husky bowl appearance.

3:30-4:00 p.m.: Enjoy a chicken sandwich so you don't have to consume any Hec Ed food.

4 p.m.: Walk down to Hec Ed. Yeah, it's a trek, but do you really want to sit in that post-game parking lot traffic again? Not worth it. Plus, those fries you just ate have a ton of calories.

4:30-6:30 p.m.: Wright St. vs. Portland St. This will probably be the most competitive of the six games to be played this weekend.

6:30-7 p.m.: Check Facebook on your phone. Note how many "status updates" are actually just people whining about pointless shit.

7-9 p.m.: UW vs. Belmont, which I'm hoping will be very entertaining. Both the Huskies and Belmont were among the 50 fastest-tempo teams in the NCAA last year. If Belmont plays their style instead of trying to slow the game down, the Dawgs could hit 100.

9-9:30 p.m.: Healthful walk back up to The Dutchess.

9:30-Midnight: Buy repeated rounds for everyone at the bar (or just me).... (more)

What is going on over at Microsoft? They're acting like winners. It's crazy.

First they're about to release Windows 7, that rare thing, a "liked" operating system, and now they have stolen a social media march on Google. Today they made the dreams of exhibitionists and stalkers everywhere come true, with the announcement that they're (non-exclusively) integrating Twitter and Facebook into Bing search results.

You can already experiment with the beta TwitterBing, but the Bingbook status search results will have to come later. Presumably one reason for the delay is because certain people may not want their FB statuses showing up in searches. (Only modesty prevents me from telling a gobal audience that I am currently "looking out for numero uno...and pi. No one looks out for pi.")

For those of you who don't use Twitter or Facebook, I actually have much bigger news for you about something called the internet, so I'll come back to you later. Everyone else--especially anyone fed up with internal Twitter and Facebook search failure--can imagine why this is a useful move on Microsoft's part.

I know I followed the "balloon boy" story primarily in my Twitter stream, but there are any number of searches that will give better immediate searches on Twitter: traffic jams, black helicopters, late night gunshots, and whether Ken Griffey, Jr., was just on the escalator at Pacific Place.

Given the widespread media adoption of Twitter as an volunteer wire service, Microsoft can't lose. A better search experience means a highly influential group of people will be using Bing daily starting...now. UPDATE: Uh oh, now Google's in the pool, too.

As the sign says, we're a Seattle news and culture blog. You can subscribe to our home page RSS, or if you want all the sports Seth is capable of (that's a lot, we kid you not), click the sports tab and subscribe to that page. And so on, with each tab. Not everything ends up on the home page. We're coy like that. You can (and probably should) also follow us on our amusing Twitter feed: @thesunbreak. We've also got a fan page on Facebook. Thanks for reading!

Advertisers, you won't even believe how cool our self-service ad platform is. Sometimes I just stare at it. Update your artwork on the fly? Yes, you can! Our ad rates range from $8 CPM for a text ad, to $18 CPM for a mid-page rectangle, to $30 CPM for a top banner or RSS feed banner. We're worth every penny, know why? We're about real, repeat Seattle readership, not fly-by search engine traffic. Non-profits, talk to us. We understand. And, by the way, if you want to sponsor a section or a contest, we can do that, too. Email us ideas: advertise (at) thesunbreak.... (more)