In honor of the IPO Facebook is going back to its hacker roots, hosting an all-night employee hackathon: Hackathon 31. The 31st official hackathon held at Facebook, the event has just one rule: you have to work on a project that isn’t what you traditionally do in your position at Facebook.

Hackathons are traditionally timed events where groups of people work on a new innovative product (mostly computer based) that is then presented to all of the participants at the end of the event, often with a “winner” being crowned. Hackathons are a traditional at Facebook — and even have their own Facebook fan page — and have become a norm for Silicon valley companies, and are often where new ideas are formed for new products.

Hackathon 31 started at 7pm PST Thursday, and runs right up until Zuckerberg rings the opening bell Friday morning. All Facebook employees were encouraged to participate (whether they have coding expertise of not) and groups worked throughout the evening on projects of their choosing which may or may not make their way into Facebook products in the future. Facebook’s Timeline, for instance, got its start at a company hackathon.

Facebook employees who participated will also be each given a commemorative T-shirt, another tradition for the company’s hackathons.

Check out the gallery below for some pictures taken by a Facebook employee from inside where the hackathon is taking place:

Image credit: Francis Luu

Click here to view this gallery.

More About: Facebook, facebook ipo

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But there’s something missing. Even if you have an ironclad strategy, impeccable tactics and sterling branding, you can still fall flat in the social media arena. There is still one more thing you need to learn.

Are you ready for the final lesson? Is your mind prepared and your spirit pure? Can you snatch the pebble from my hand? Good. Because the final step to social media mastery (at the individual level, anyway) doesn’t come from a business-school textbook, a Fortune 500 CEO or a mountain of data. It comes from Bruce Lee.

When one has reached maturity in the art, one will have a formless form. It is like ice dissolving in water. When one has no form, one can be all forms; when one has no style, he can fit in with any style.

Lee’s awesomeness doesn’t lie in his ability to beat up Chuck Norris. (...)

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Here are the highlights from this week’s job board.

Best Article Contest

This posting is technically not a job, but a contest. If you are up to winning as much as $150, though, I suggest checking it out. Hey, even the smallest prize of $50 is worth a try!

Freelance Writer

March of Dimes, an entity aimed at helping to improve the health of babies, is looking for a freelance writer that can produce high quality pieces. You have to be based in White Plains, NY for this job.

Mom/Tech E-zine Writer

Women are some of the best workers these days, in spite of the fact that many of them have professional lives as well. If you are in a position to dish out advice to working women, this telecommute blogging gig is perfect for you!

Business Blogger

Do you friends call you a penny pincher? Can you give advice to small businesses on how to add to their bottom line? BuyerHive is looking for a business blogger on a telecommute basis.

Reality TV Show Blogger

Spend a lot of time watching reality TV? (...)

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Have you ever wondered about the blogging habits of others? If you’re like me, you often wonder if you’re doing it right.

• Do I post often enough?
• Am I promoting my blog and blog posts the right way?
• Do I comment enough on blogs?
• What social networks should I be hanging out on for maximum exposure.

While the short answer to that is there really isn’t a right or wrong way to blog,  the truth is, it’s interesting to learn how other people are blogging, using their blogs and sharing on the social networks.

For the next week, BlogWorld and Overblog are encouraging the blogosphere to take part in a  survey so we can provide a definitive report on how we all, blog. This results of this survey are going to be revealed to the BlogWorld community during a special session with Frédéric Montagnon, co founder of OverBlog,  Jason Falls, and Keenan Cahill,  at BlogWorld NY, on Thursday, June 7th at 3:45 pm, room 1A08.

This session will also be part of the BlogWorld Virtual Ticket and we’re sharing the information with our community on the social channels for those who can’t make it.

We hope you’ll help us with our survey, and share our survey with other bloggers. (...)

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If you’ve ever dreamed about connecting your entire home to the Internet — so that appliances could start by themselves or you could receive text message alerts to maintain housekeeping — it looks like your dream is ready to become a reality.

Electric Imp calls itself “a complete solution to connect devices to the internet, wirelessly.” The start-up, founded by former team members of the iPhone and Gmail, came out with a line of programmable, pluggable network cards that look like SD cards — except each Imp card actually contains an embedded processor and WiFi antenna. By installing these Imp cards to your devices using circuit boards (which Imp sells), you’re able to connect them to an “Imp cloud,” through which you can control them and program them.

Automated homes aren’t exactly new — for example, a student at UC Berkeley recently automated his dorm room. But Imp promises to be much easier than other current “Internet of Things” products.

For one, Imp cards don’t require you to hook up all your devices to a central controller. Rather, you can control all your gadgets and appliances individually online.

For example, as seen in the video, one theoretical application is having Christmas lights that flicker off when the water in your tree stand gets to below a certain level. Or, perhaps you could program water sprinklers to turn on when you notice that the weather is especially hot.

Users can set up commands to program their Imp cards using a drag and drop graphical interface on Imp’s web-based software. We haven’t tested it ourselves yet, but anything drag and drop is fairly intuitive and presumably easy.

In addition, as Gizmodo reported, connecting the Imp cards to your home or office WiFi network is not much trouble at all:

“Getting the Imps to work with a WiFi network is super easy, and ingeniously done. (...)

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Top 250 Internet Retailers

Social networking for retailers makes sense right? Make your brand visible where your consumers are spending the most time. This infographic from Campalyst shares information on one of the things that helps makes retailers successful online, a social presence. Key findings include:

• Number of followers by social platform
• How success on social networks is distributed
• The most followed industries on specific social channels

Featured Team Member Story

Mike Yanke – Who Will Win the War of the Sidebars?

While Google made headlines this week with the launch of its Knowledge Graph (ie a new sidebar element designed provide facts the search giant has amassed on people, places and things), emerging force Bing made its own announcement last week with a platform relaunch, complete with a social sidebar. So what sidebar format will most engage users – a vast collection of knowledge on people, places or things you may never see – or a vast collection of facts on people, places and things you may see every day? Check out Search Engine Land for more on both Bing’s social sidebar and Google’s Knowledge Graph.

This Week in Online Marketing News

Who Invited Penguin & Panda to the Party?
Google’s new penguin update has many organizations confused, frustrated, and angry. It seems that many sites have seen a sudden drop in traffic, and are blaming “Penguin” and “Panda” for the decline. This article covers the importance of knowing which update affected your traffic as well as tips for gaining some of your traffic back. Via Yoast.

57% of Facebook users Never Click Ads
Facebook’s public offering has generated a lot of buzz and anticipation. (...)

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What is marketing?

Is it a process of gathering as much money as you can, throwing it to the “creative” winds, and hoping something will come back?

Is it a practice of interrupting as many people as possible with a message they don’t care about, and never asked to receive?

Is it a performance you frantically stage around your product, service, or idea, in the final moments before launching it into the world?

Or is it something else entirely? And if it is, how and when do we employ it?

Seth Godin has been asking, answering, and living out these questions for decades. In the process, he’s written thirteen best-selling books, built dozens of companies, and crafted one of the most influential blogs on the planet.

He’s on the show today, delivering a fast and elemental definition of marketing, and what it means to engage an audience in the post-industrial era. Don’t miss this …

In this episode we discuss:

• Seth’s definition of marketing
• When you should start marketing your product, service, or idea
(...)

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Facebook IPO Stock Price and Predictions

Facebook’s IPO has definitely been the story of the week, and it’s definitely been a busy week for both current and future shareholders of the company.

Yesterday, Facebook has confirmed that it will price its stock at $38, raising $16 to $18.4 billion in the IPO, making it the largest tech initial public offering in the history of the US.

What everyone wants to know, however, is the closing price on Friday afternoon, and Twitter-based crowdsourcing might just have an answer.

Meanwhile, Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin denies he renounced his U.S. citizenship in order to escape taxes. Saverin said his decision to do so is “based solely on (his) interest in working and living in Singapore.”

Steve Jobs Dreamt of an iCar

Steve Jobs dreamt of designing an iCar, claims J. Crew CEO and Apple board member Mickey Drexler. Unfortunately, Jobs never got to design it, claims Drexler, shedding some light on Apple’s immediate plans. The living room is something Apple is “dealing with at some point in the near future,” said Drexler. (...)

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The CW revealed the audience voting addition, a new judge and a new stylist Thursday during its programming upfront in New York City. Meanwhile, the show’s Twitter account spent the day sharing the news and retweeting excited fans.

For 18 seasons, creator Tyra Banks and her ever-changing judging panel have chosen the eliminated contestant. But now viewers get to vote at CWTV.com. Adding online voting for the college-themed cycle 19 in the fall season will give fans only some power, however, as their votes and the judges’ votes will collectively decide who stays.

Reality shows — new and old — are trying new ways to keep viewers engaged, particularly with fresh social media-driven voting methods.

Most recently, The Voice introduced for season two voting via a Facebook Timeline app. In October 2011, X Factor began allowing votes to come in from direct messages on Twitter. And for season 10 of Idol, producers let viewers vote on a dedicated Facebook page.

The CW also announced Rob Evans, a globally known model will join Banks and fashion publicist Kelly Cutrone on the judging panel. Stylist Johnny Wujek will become part of the cast, too. Evans and Wujek replace America’s Next Top Model staples Nigel Barker, J. Alexander and Jay Manuel. (...)

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Samsung’s smartphone factory in South Korea is running at full capacity, which is 5 million units per month, according to the same report.

This is more good news for Samsung, which became the world’s biggest phone maker in Q1 2012. The company is also the undisputed king of the Android market: Its smartphone sales represent about 40% of all Android-based smartphone sales worldwide.

Samsung Galaxy S3 hits Europe on May 29, followed by a US launch in June.

It sports a 4.8-inch touchscreen, a 8-megapixel rear-facing and 1.9-megapixel forward-facing camera, and comes with the latest version of Android — Ice Cream Sandwich.

[via Reuters]

More About: samsung, Samsung Galaxy S3

For more Mobile coverage:

• Follow Mashable Mobile on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Mobile channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

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So what if you applied that brave new world of expert prediction markets, of crowdsourcing the future, to the Facebook IPO?

That’s what famed investor Chris Sacca wondered aloud on Twitter, and programmer James Proud endeavored to find out. And thus was born Facebookipodayclosingprice.com, Proud even buying the exact URL Sacca had idly requested Tuesday.

By end of day Thursday, it had garnered more than 1,400 predictions, mostly from the Valley’s top luminaries — entrepreneurs, investors, analysts and others who know a thing or two from IPOs. And it was getting up to 20 visitors every second.

Pollsters and prediction market experts will tell you you need more than a thousand inputs for a good aggregate result with a low margin of error. So what did this prediction market come up with? And could you — or Sacca — get very rich in one day by banking on the result?

In theory, yes. Facebook’s launch price Friday morning will be $38. This site is predicting, in aggregate, that the stock will hit $54 by close of market Friday, for a total valuation of $135.7 billion.

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Remember the jaw-dropping vinyl record tricks we showed you Wednesday? Well, they’re still amazing. The video is real. But the reason given for the making of it is not.

The five guys in the video repeatedly claimed to have done those stunts purely as a cure for “boredom”. That wasn’t exactly true — in fact, vinyl video star Jason Richardson tells Mashable, this is an unbranded guerilla marketing campaign for the app MusicBunk

When originally pitching the video, Richardson and his team shared a link from various Gmail accounts, each purporting to show “a video he made with some of his roommates and friends.” The video received no paid distribution, and its audience — more than 400,000 views, at last count — are completely organic.

As the video caught on, other major media outlets reached out to Richardson and his friends. When asked why they made the video, the reply was always “boredom” or “it was just a spur-of-the-moment thing.”

In reality, the video was created and produced over the course of two days by Conscious Minds, of which Richardson is the creative producer. The stars of the film are friends, not actors.

“I don’t feel like we tricked anyone,” says Richardson, “We told you a story about what happened, and we left you to figure out what MusicBunk is.

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Albert Brooks

The film star, director and author breaks the news to the star of the Social Network.

Click here to view this gallery.

In case you’ve been living under that metaphorical rock these past several weeks, Facebook‘s much anticipated IPO happens on Friday. The Facebook IPO will mark the final step in the evolution of Mark Zuckerberg‘s social networking baby, all the way from Harvard dorm room to publicly traded company.

Facebook’s (FB on the Nasdaq market) official IPO share price was officially set on Thursday. Hundreds of Facebookers will become millionaires once the stock becomes tradable, and many observers have ideas for how they can avoid common pitfalls of the newly rich.

Others have speculated that Facebook could — just possibly — become the world’s first trillion dollar company one day. Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin made news this week when it was revealed that he had renounced his U.S. citizenship, which helped him sidestep millions upon millions of dollars in capital gains taxes.

And then, of course, there are the folks who got out of Facebook at just the wrong time.

As IPO angst and anticipation crested Thursday techies, comedians, writers and everyday Americans took — ironically enough — to Twitter to weigh in and riff. Some jokingly lamented the effect a new crop of IPO millionaires would have on real estate prices.

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You’ve likely heard that the secret to building relationships with your customers is to “be everywhere your customers are.” As a result, you’ve probably signed up for a dozen social networks hoping that just showing up will turn out to be enough.

But being everywhere is only the beginning. It turns out that online, just like in real life, the key to building relationships is trust. Cultivating trust online is tricky and takes work, but is by no means impossible. When you respond to your customers in the right way, you earn that trust and build the foundation for a real, long-term relationship. Here’s what you need to consider as you do that.

1. Acknowledge with Empathy

Also, when a customer has a good experience with your brand, amplify it. Thank them and then share their feedback socially. (...)

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None of the 52 possible candidates — not even popular mavericks such as Rep. Ron Paul and Gov. Buddy Roemer — gathered enough support to make it to the online convention process scheduled for June, per the platform’s rules. Americans Elect had previously delayed the convention, reportedly because of the unusually long Republican primary.

Ileana Watchel, the group’s national press secretary, announced in a statement Thursday afternoon that Americans Elect would not alter its procedures any further to accomodate the current top candidates.

“Americans Elect, from the outset, has been a rules-based process, with the rules publicly available and open to debate by the delegates,” wrote Watchel. “The rules, as developed in consultation with the Americans Elect delegates, are clear.

“As of this week, no candidate achieved the national support threshold required to enter the Americans Elect Online Convention in June. The primary process for the Americans Elect nomination has come to an end.”

Americans Elect is not a political party, but rather a vehicle for getting presidential and vice presidential candidates on ballots nationwide through a process that lived almost entirely online.

The idea, according to the organizers, is to capitalize on the Internet’s ability to connect like-minded people to disrupt the two-party system and revolutionize how the American political system works.

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C.C. Chapman will be at BlogWorld & New Media Expo signing his book, Content Rules.

Today, C.C. Chapman is our featured “Five Questions with” guest in the latest episode of BlogWorld TV. We’ll find out what C.C. is looking forward to at BlogWorld & New Media Expo New York (he’ll be signing his book, Content Rules, there!) and his plans to visit Book Expo America (BEA), which is co-located with BlogWorld.

Cliff Ravenscraft talks about putting together the Podcasting Track at BlogWorld & New Media Expo

In this installment of BlogWorld TV, Jeffrey also talks with Cliff Ravenscraft about his involvement in BlogWorld & New Media Expo, his revamp of the podcasting track, and the new podcast he is producing for BlogWorld, called The Podcast Report. Finally, we’ll hear from Rick Calvert (CEO, BlogWorld & New Media Expo) and Scott Monty (Head of Social Media for Ford). All within this BlogWorld TV episode.

Click here to view the embedded video.

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Facebook is currently valued at around $100 billion, though it made less than $4 billion in revenue last year. Still, if the social network with more than 901 million users plays its cards right, it could be the world’s first $1 trillion company by 2014.

The Facebook IPO is slated for Friday. New investors can potentially buy around 421 million shares of Facebook stock at $38 a pop.

The big question is: should you buy Facebook stock while it’s hot? Multiple financial experts told us no — at $38 per share, the stock is overpriced.

Former NYU Stern School of Business finance professor Kenneth Froewiss believes adding Facebook to a portfolio early on is risky for experienced pros and investment amateurs alike. It’s like playing the lottery, he says.

“Even for those individuals with above-average net worth, purchasing shares at an IPO, especially a ‘hot’ one that has been widely hyped, is rarely a good idea,” Froewiss says.

“Might someone on occasion reap a tremendous windfall by doing so? Yes, but then again, on occasion someone wins the lottery. That does not make the lottery a great investment in general.”

Factors that can affect Facebook stock are legion. (...)

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Shipments of both phones has been delayed in U.S. customs due to a “review of shipments that is required after an ITC exclusion order.”

The ITC exclusion order in question dates back to last year when HTC was accused of violating 10 Apple patents. A judge ruled in favor of Apple on two of those claims, and handed down a limited exclusion order at the end of last year prohibiting devices that infringed on the patent from being imported into the U.S.

The patent infringement in question in this case is giving users the ability to click on a phone number on a webpage or email to call that number. In an official statement HTC acknowledged the issue and indicated it is working with customs officials on getting the handsets in stores.

“We believe we are in compliance with the ruling and HTC is working closely with customs to secure approval. HTC One X and HTC EVO 4G LTE have both received enthusiastic support and we appreciate customers patience as we work to get these products into their hands as soon as possible.”

While the court ruling came down last year, it only started being enforced on April 19 -– the idea being that the court was giving HTC time to comply with the order. Even if the phones are in compliance with the ITC ruling they would still need to be inspected before they could be sold.

The HTC One X was released on May 6 on AT&T and is currently labeled as “out of stock” of AT&T’s website.

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For years now, marketers, businesses and, well, everybody have touted QR codes as the next big thing. That’s largely because QR codes offered a glimmer of the future, a way to bring physical interactions into the much more malleable (and trackable) digital space. But despite the overwhelming push by marketers to stick a QR code on anything they are publishing, marketing, and eating (yes, eating), there’s been increasing skepticism about its real-world use.

The skeptics have some pretty good facts on their side. In 2011, a Forrester Research study pegged adoption of QR codes by U.S. adults at 5%, up from a meager 1% the year before. Then, in April, a Temkin Group study found that only 24% of U.S. adults are using these codes, a statistic that is a little encouraging but still tepid. These figures coupled with some serious dismal marketing anecdotes might make you think QR codes are ineffective, and you’d be right. Here’s why.

1. Worthless Content

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Deanna Jump, a kindergarten teacher from Georgia, has made $700,000 selling her lesson plans on Teachers Pay Teachers, an ecommerce startup where teachers offer their lesson plans to fellow educators.

Paul Edelman, the founder of Teachers Pay Teachers, created the platform following a four-year stint as a New York City public school teacher.

“I had an insight that the materials teachers created night after night had monetary value, so I set out to create a marketplace called Teachers Pay Teachers,” Edelman told Mashable. “Teachers are now making a pretty significant supplemental income and creating higher quality materials.”

During the first two years of Teachers Pay Teachers, teachers would pay for the lesson plans they wanted to use, though many would then be reimbursed by their schools. On Wednesday, Teachers Pay Teachers launched a purchased orders option, which allows schools to purchase several lesson plans directly for their teachers.

Edelman expects schools will become the primary buyers with the new purchasing option.

Teachers Pay Teachers focuses on lesson plans for pre-K through 12th-grade classrooms. The most popular subjects are English and language arts, science, social studies and math.

The site has about 700,000 registered users, of whom 10,000 are sellers. Edelman estimates that of the sellers about 6,000 are earning money. The teachers earning money have so far earned $7 million selling their lesson plans, once Teachers Pay Teachers takes out its commission. (...)

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Comcast announced on Thursday that it is transitioning away from its static data limit policy into a more flexible allotment model.

In the coming months, the company will start testing new options that will offer users more bandwidth as part of their cable Internet plans, as well as the ability to purchase additional bandwidth if necessary.

In 2008, Comcast started enforcing a 250GB usage cap amongst its residential subscribers. Comcast’s rationale at the time was that only a small fraction of users ever came close to using 250GB of bandwidth each month — and that even fewer users actually exceeded that cap.

The move was enacted in part to limit what Comcast deemed “illegal” uses of the Internet; in other words, they wanted to stop users from downloading movies and music over BitTorrent.

At the time, there was a lot of user outcry over the new usage cap limit, however in practice, few users actually reached that limit. (I was one of those Comcast users who bumped against the usage limit on more than one occasion, thanks in part to my $100-a-month business-speed Internet plan.)

These days, the situation has changed. Users frequently use more bandwidth. Not only are average access speeds faster (which makes it possible to consume more data), the way we consume content has changed.

Thanks to connected devices such as Roku and Apple TV, over-the-top streaming services such as Netflix and Hulu and Amazon Prime are increasingly becoming the way that many users watch content on their television sets.

Even though this content is consumed on a TV set, the bandwidth still counts against a customer’s data cap.

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It’s the first time the hockey league has relinquished control of its @NHL handle to a celebrity.

But Milano is a perfect fit — she’s a noted social media enthusiast, and tells Mashable she’s a “huge Kings fan” as well. NHL reps say the takeover will be a treat for fans.

“You may see a celebrity on the jumbotron, but fans don’t usually get an opportunity to interact with them around hockey,” Devi Mahadevia, the league’s director of digital business development, told Mashable in an email. “This Twitter takeover gives fans the opportunity to ask questions and talk hockey with a well known celebrity.”

Fans are encouraged to use the #AskAlyssa hashtag. Milano told Mashable in an email that she’ll “attempt to stay unbiased,” despite her love of the Kings.

Milano’s Twitter takeover is part of a growing trend for sports brands. NFL legend Deion Sanders answered questions and provided commentary from the @UnderArmour account during this year’s draft combine, and Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo tweeted from the @StarterBrand handle during this year’s Super Bowl.

For an actual league to hand over its account, however, is a pretty unusual move. Major League Baseball did a similar promotion last summer, when Stephen Colbert took over its official account. (...)

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For everyone at Facebook, the company’s IPO is a moment to take stock of the tremendous value that’s been created –- for customers, for the company, and certainly for individual employees. In fact, the impact on many employees will be profound, vaulting them from salaried professionals to millionaire investors.

But anyone who’s been in Silicon Valley for a decade or more, has witnessed the cycle of booms and busts in the tech sector, the economy, and to individual themselves. What financial lessons have come of this, and how do they apply to this new crop of tech titans? Here are three key ways.

1. Plan: Create a Personal Financial Strategy

2. Diversify: Build a Global Asset Allocation

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I do enjoy my cycling and it is a great way to keep fit, socialize and  enjoy coffee all in one capsule of time.

It also is one way of refreshing the body, mind and soul from the the pressures of work and life.

Cycling though can be dangerous, with trucks and cars and other immovable objects threatening life and limb.

But there is a new and alarming epidemic and trend that is making the roads more dangerous and it is the addicted Facebook user checking their timeline on their mobile.

Luckily the police have realized this and in fact in Fort Lee, New Jersey in the USA they have started booking “dangerous” walkers who are not obeying the rules of the road“.

It certainly is about time because it would be embarrassing to report to my friends that I was injured cycling not from a hitting a bus but by being taken out by an over zealous and jaywalking Facebook user on their mobile!

Facebook Understands the Importance of Mobile

Facebook must have been talking to the police about this mobile addiction trend because they have just bought  Instagram which isn’t even a social media website but just a mobile app (a mobile app that just happens to have nearly 40 million users).

Additionally Facebook has increased its focus on mobile in preparing for a mobile and social web that goes  beyond the Instagram acquisition with the purchase of the Android  photosharing app developer “Lightbox” as reported by Techcrunch.

Lightbox creates photo blogs from a users uploads and has been described as the “Lazy man’s Tumblr”

Now before you rush off and try and sign up to Lightbox, the acquisition is not the business or the app but only the team, as it will be closed down by June 15 and you will see its technology emerge as a Facebook mobile feature sometime in the future.

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Studies have shown that the amount of time American’s spend sitting increased by 8% between 1980 and 2000, while obesity rates doubled. Other factors played roles in fostering flab, but consider these numbers — nearly 300 million Americans don’t get the minimum level of exercise required for good health.

Americans burn about 50,000 fewer calories per year than they did 50 years ago, and the portion of jobs that require physical activity has declined by about 30% since 1960.

So how can you fight your desk job’s slow but steady stranglehold on your health and maybe live a few years longer?

The American Heart Association recommends taking at least 10,000 steps per day, so take the stairs instead of that tempting elevator. Ten minutes of climbing stairs each day will burn 150 calories for a 150-pound person.

And there are actually several exercises you can do at the very desk that’s trying squelch your life force. Simple motions such as picking up your chair, doing pushups against your desk and leg squats can inject a bit of activity back into your day.

The infographic below, from the sports medicine company KT Tape, lays out some of the dangers of a sedentary work life and what you can do defeat desk-bound death.

Have you found ways to get a bit of exercise at work? (...)

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Saverin said in a statement following a press conference held earlier by two senators who accused him of “tax dodging” that his relocation decision was “based solely on my interest in working and living in Singapore, where I have been since 2009,” according to Reuters.

The move has drawn ire from Senators Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Bob Casey (D-Penn.), who accuse Saverin of taking advantage of the United State’s relative economic strength and stability, only to leave without contributing his fair share back to the country where he built his fortune.

“Mr. Saverin has decided to ‘defriend’ the United States of America just to avoid paying his taxes,” said Sen. Schumer in a statement. “We aren’t going to let him get away with it so easily.

“It’s infuriating to see someone sell out the country that welcomed him and kept him safe, educated him and helped him become a billionaire. This is a great American success story gone horribly wrong.”

The senators introduced a bill under which any expatriate with either a net worth of $2 million, or an average income tax liability of at least $148,000, will be automatically presumed to be leaving the country for tax purposes — enabling the IRS to impose a tax on any investment gains that person makes in the future.

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The company is beginning to tailor suggestions for new users — according to their past web browsing history, as well as whom other Twitter users follow.

The project is still in an experimental phase and only being tested in some countries, but all indications are that it points to a more permanent shift.

Before, new users would be presented with nearly identical suggestions for users to follow when they got started.

“Since you have individual interests, you should get individual suggestions,” Othman Laraki, Twitter’s director of growth and international, wrote in a blog post Thursday. “After all, even though millions of people love Justin Bieber, FC Barcelona or Kim Kardashian, not everyone using Twitter may want to follow them.”

Like many social networks, Twitter gets visitor information from websites that have integrated Twitter buttons or widgets, so it knows which users have been on those sites.

“By recognizing which accounts are frequently followed by people who visit popular sites, we can recommend those accounts to others who have visited those sites within the last ten days,” Laraki writes.

So it appears no coincidence that Twitter announced earlier Thursday that it had added a “Do Not Track” feature for users to opt out of the network keeping tabs on other sites they visit. “Do Not Track” is a cookie-blocking option in the Firefox browser that the Federal Trade Commission has been promoting.

Now, when new users sign up for Twitter, they will be given an option to “Tailor Twitter based on my recent website visits,” according to the blog post. They’ll also be able to follow a link to learn more about what that means.

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For the Mashable Photo Challenge this week, send us your best photo of reflection.

We encourage you to interpret reflection how you see fit. In addition to a physical reflection, you might explore emotional reflection through an image. For example, Memorial Day is this upcoming Monday, May 28 in the U.S. — the nation will take a day to reflect on the sacrifices made by our armed forces.

As always, we want you to be as creative as you can. Just make sure you send us a short description along with your photo. Use this challenge as an excuse to explore the world around you and capture a meaningful image.

(Note: Mashable does not endorse the use of Myspace-style mirror photos circa 2005.)

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Small business analytics accompany has released an infographic that looks at the top 85 U.S. cities and ranks them by social media presence and daily deal activity.

San Francisco topped the list of the most social small business cities in the U.S., followed by (in order) Los Angeles; Washington, D.C.; Seattle; San Diego; Chicago; New York; Dallas/Fort Worth; Phoenix; and Tampa, Fla.

Although New York is ranked seventh — following the news that more tech companies are expanding in the Big Apple — many other major East Coast cities such as Boston didn’t make the top 20. However, Washington. D.C.. was ranked third.

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We’ve seen tips for developing your voice and message, creating stronger calls to action, and increasing traffic.

If you’re already working on those aspects of your blog, and are happy with your approach, you’ll probably be hungry for other ideas, looking to the future, and trying to predict what will be most successful tactics for you.

I know I do this myself—I’ll get an idea like the QLD blogging challenge and throw myself into making it happen.

That’s great—one of the best things about blogging is that it lets us pursue our passions!—but I have noticed a tendency to let things drop off my To Do list as these new ideas pop up. An example was pointed out by Ed Boyhan on my Google + post. He wrote:

“Seems kinda odd: here you are providing some useful info on how some use G+, but nowhere on this page is there a “+1″ button to let me share with a circle I have for future reference. Makes me doubt your involvement in the G+ community.”

This is a valuable comment for two reasons. First, it’s a reminder of something I need to do, which dropped off my list. Whoops! Second, it explains what the implications of that oversight are—how that looks to my readers, which gives me motivation not just to get that task back on the To Do list, but also to actually act upon it and make that change to my blog.

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ZombieSmash is a tower-defense game where you flick, drag, scrape and smash zombies to protect Joey, the only human survivor in the zombie apocalypse.

Joey is back in the newest installment, as are the zombies. Taking on many of the core concepts from the original game, Zombie Swipeout lets you use a host of weapons to slash and beat zombies. The only difference this time is they fly rather than walk across the screen.

Your only goal while playing the game is to destroy the zombies without hitting Joey, who will occasionally fly across the screen alongside the undead. Slashable coins also fly by along with zombies you can collect to buy new weapons or replenish turns.

“The only one rule there is don’t hit the good guy,” Matthias Hoechsmann, Director, Zynga Mobile Germany told Mashable. “If you hit him it’s going to be game over. Everything else is optional.”

As the game progresses you can unlock new features such as grenades, liquid nitrogen and a slow-mo effect. You can also unlock new weapons ranging from knight swords to baseball bats that offer different perks to help you in your quest against the projectile dead.

Weekly tournaments let you battle your friends for the highest score. (...)

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Facebook may be cashing in on its intial public offering this week, but it wasn’t the first to introduce the world to online social networking — many other sites were once recognized as the most popular. What made them fall by the wayside?

For some, it was server instability or lack of financial support to hit the ground running. Other formerly popular networks received the necessary monetary backing, but were inhibited by the corporation that had acquired them — and some went on to morph the company into something broader than just social networking.

But perhaps the most important reason why other sites couldn’t compete with Facebook’s current growth is timing. Today, the web is stronger, faster and more crowded than ever — people rely on an Internet connection to communicate, earn revenue and entertain, among many other things. That wasn’t the case 10 to 20 years ago.

Take a look at some of the past social networking kings that existed before Facebook. That’s not to say all weren’t successful. Most are still around, but in a different form from which they originated.

1. AOL

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Donna Summer

The five time Grammy winner’s hits include songs such as “Last Dance,” “Hot Stuff,” “Bad Girls,” and “She Works Hard for the Money” and “This Time I Know It’s for Real.”

After Twitter exploded with the news, first reported by TMZ, Summer’s family released the following statement:

Early this morning, we lost Donna Summer Sudano, a woman of many gifts, the greatest being her faith. While we grieve her passing, we are at peace celebrating her extraordinary life and her continued legacy. Words truly can’t express how much we appreciate your prayers and love for our family at this sensitive time.

Neil Portnow, the President and CEO of The Recording Academy, also expressed his condolences:

Five-time Grammy winner Donna Summer had a dynamic voice and unique musical style that helped define the dance music genre in the ’70s. She also was an artist who crossed many musical genres, as evidenced by her Grammy wins in the R&B, rock, inspirational and dance categories. Her talent was a true gift to the music industry, and our thoughts and sympathies are with her family, friends and fans throughout the world during this difficult time.

In tribute, we’ve compiled a Spotify playlist of her songs, as well as a roundup of some YouTube covers of her hits that made us smile.

Jamie Lono & The Feel Good Nation - Hot Stuff (Donna Summer Cover)

Jamie Lono and The Feel Good Nation performing "Hot Stuff" by Donna Summer. Appearances by Erica Iozzo, Paulo Apuli, Joe Sena, and Michael Vuckovich. Video by Mike Danenberg Photography. (...)

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Facebook officially files its long-awaited IPO Friday. To help the company celebrate, we decided to put together a playlist on Spotify.

Many people are going to make a lot of money when the company goes public with a valuation of approximately $100 billion. This includes Mark Zuckerberg, who stands to make upwards of $1 billion himself.

As such, our Spotify playlist features a good number of songs about getting money and spending money. However, we also tried to include songs about dreaming big, including “If I had $1,000,000″ by Barenaked Ladies. Of course, Zuckerberg probably carries that much in cash on him these days, but it certainly wasn’t always that way.

You’ll also find the rambling, nostalgic “All My Friends” by LCD Soundsystem, which ends with James Murphy repeating the line “If I could see all my friends tonight.” You can’t really see all your friends on Facebook, but you can at least stay in touch.

We thought it was fitting to end with the classic Nas anthem, “If I Ruled The World (Imagine That).” We’re not sure what Facebook’s version of this track would be, but we’d like to hear what you think. Check out our playlist above, and let us know in the comments what else you would add.

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Second grader Dylan Hoffman from Caledonia, Wisconsin won the 2012 Doodle for Google contest open to U.S. students from kindergarden through 12th grade, it was announced Thursday. Hoffman’s doodle will be displayed on Google’s homepage on Friday, May 18 for millions of people to see.

The doodle, titled “Pirate Times,” was inspired by this year’s theme of time travel. The Doodle for Google contest began in 2008 and is held in 17 countries, each year bringing a new theme.

Hoffman’s drawing will also be the first Google Doodle to be featured on a Crayola box.

What did Hoffman get for his efforts? He’ll be awarded a $30,000 scholarship plus a $50,000 technology grant for his school.

114,000 students submitted their works of art this year. You can view the works of state winners and finalists here. All 50 state finalists get to have their Google Doodles shown in a special exhibit at the New York Public Library from May 18 through July 19.

The four top finalists are:

• Talia Mastalski, 5th Grade, East Pike Elementary School, Indiana, Pa. (...)

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Facebook Timeline officially rolled out to Brand Pages on March 30, but we’re guessing that many marketers still don’t know how to milk the new design for all that it’s worth. A recent study found that fan growth after Timeline has “slowed slightly”– is your company experiencing a bit of a slowdown? If so, we have some tips for you.

Some best practices apply to all social media platforms — be human, be genuine, reply to fans, foster conversation, don’t be gimmicky, and don’t syndicate the same content to every social channel, etc. But the tips below apply specifically to Facebook Timeline Brand Pages and are geared to take your company’s fan base — and revenues — to the next level.

If yours is a small business with little budget for social media or marketing, you need not worry — you can get a lot out of Facebook for free merely by doing it well. The more compelling and engaging your content is, the more it will be “liked” and commented on, thus catapulting your content — and brand — into organic buzz through more and more news feeds.

1. Embrace Images

Timeline is much more image-focused than earlier iterations of Brand Pages, so start snapping. You don’t need to invest in a fancy camera — in fact, it’s a lot easier just to use a smartphone. Show fans what goes on behind the scenes — sketches and mockups always make for good fodder, and “food porn” shots tend to make mouths water and Likes escalate. (...)

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A giant printer is painting 40-character life-size tweets about world hunger and poverty across roadways — it’s all part of the ONE Street Tweet campaign.

The street-tweeting campaign launched on Wednesday. The advocacy group ONE started the machine’s engines in Maryland and will continue printing tweets for two days until May 18. People in more than 34 countries have contributed tweets so far. The ONE team wants the leaders at G8′s 3rd Annual Symposium on Global Agriculture and Food Security to take notice.

“Remember — the whole goal of this action is to take your messages to the G8 on global agriculture to the streets — literally,” the advocacy group wrote in a blog post.

ONE is looking for about 1,000 more tweets. Shortened messages are selected from tweets sent to the @ONEStreetTweet account. Even politicians are submitting their own G8-themed tweets.

@ONEStreetTweet: 3 priorities-children, children & children

— Nancy Pelosi (@NancyPelosi) May 16, 2012

Watch the video above to see the giant ink-jet on wheels in action.

What’s the 40-character political statement you would like the world to see? Share with us in the comments. (...)

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The IPO may be the second-largest ever in the U.S., next to Visa’s. It will also be the biggest tech IPO. Facebook will start trading Friday on Nasdaq under the symbol “FB,” Facebook confirmed Thursday afternoon.

The price is on the high end of the $34-$38 range that Facebook had disclosed in an amended S-1 earlier in the week.

Image modified, courtesy Robert Scoble, Flickr.

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Those are the famous stories. In reality, there are probably dozens of people who can legitimately claim to have missed their chances to latch on to the Beatles and Apple in the early days. Usually their names are only of interest to biographers and lovers of schadenfreude.

Now, all eyes are focused on Facebook‘s impending $16 billion-plus IPO — and the social network certainly has its own Pete Bests and Ronald Waynes, too.

The following list features eight people who were at the right time and place to cash in on Facebook, but didn’t, and six companies that knew Facebook was onto something, but underestimated its value. Finally, there’s Harvard University, which will not benefit in the slightest from Facebook’s IPO, even though it was integral to the company’s formation.

1. Joe Green

The next time your parents offer you their advice, consider the case of Joe Green. Green was one of Mark Zuckerberg's roommates at Harvard in 2004. He worked with Zuck on the "Facemash" concept that got both in hot water with university officials, but turned down Zuck's advice to leave the school to start his new company. The reason? Green's dad, a professor, talked him out of it. If Green had followed Zuck, he might be worth as much as $400 million today. (...)

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When a Firefox user enables Do Not Track, the browser prevents websites from using cookies to track the user’s behavior and personal information. Do Not Track only works on sites that have signed on to the service — a list which now includes Twitter.

Cookies can be used for many purposes, including storing information that some, including Google, argue makes browsing the web easier (a weather site might remember your postal code, for example). However, some believe that cookie-based tracking is a breach of privacy. Facebook has previously come under fire for following users around non-Facebook sites.

Cookies are also an essential ingredient for websites serving up advertisements based on user’s behavior or location, called “behavioral ads.”

Different sites use cookies for different purposes. According to Twitter’s privacy guide, Twitter uses cookies to learn how users interact with its services, monitor web traffic and improve its products. It will now also use them to suggest new accounts for users to follow based on their interests.

If you enable Do Not Track, you’re opting out of having your data collected for those purposes, making you, your profile and your tweets more anonymous. Wave goodbye to the new account suggestions — but that may be all you’re missing out on.

Do Not Track is, at its core, a trade off. It asks of you: Do you prefer ease of use and customized user suggestions or more anonymity from web services? (...)

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Employers plan to hire 8.5% more interns in 2012, meaning more applicants will be pursuing a larger number of competitive internships. As a potential intern, your social media profiles will serve as an indicator of your skill set.

This Online Colleges infographic shows why applicants should be giving the same effort to their social media profiles as to their resumes and cover letters.

Take a look through these tips for job seekers and let us know in the comments what has worked for you.

Thumbnail image courtesy of iStockphoto, JulNichols

More About: infographic, internships, jobs, Social Media, trending

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Netflix seems to be recovering from the worst blunder in its 15-year history. Many customers who left the online movie hub after last year’s price hike — an epic fail — are returning.

In July 2011, the movie rental subscriber separated its popular unlimited DVD-and-streaming duo into two separate businesses: Netflix and the widely ridiculed “Qwikster.” We wondered if it was “the worst product launch since the new Coke.” Users who only paid $9.99 for the combined unlimited service for years were forced to fork over $16 for the two separate plans — at $7.99 each.

Netflix took a nosedive, immediately losing 800,000 customers in its third quarter. At its peak, Netflix stock traded for around $300. Today, it’s trading on the Nasdaq around $72. But on Thursday, Netflix CFO David Wells announced the company is doing better with a wave of repeat customers, rejoining Netflix for its online streaming and DVD services, according to a CNET report.

So, what’s bringing customers back? Could it be the fancy new Netflix web video player that expands to fit your web browser? Or maybe it’s the new original series appearing on the service. See the video above for more.

Have you ever been a Netflix customer? (...)

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A lot of beginner bloggers do a heavy about of sinning when they first start out…

I’m not saying they’re bad people, it’s just that they are committing nearly all of the deadly sins that bloggers need to look out for.

“But wait, aren’t there 7 deadly sins?”

In the religious context, yes, but as a blogger, there are really only 5 sins you need to worry about…

1.) Gluttony

“What does gluttony have to do with blogging?”

Simply put: when you “consume” too much and don’t create some kind of output, you are being gluttonous.

For bloggers, this comes in the form of information rather than things like food.

The over-consumption of information is dangerous, it leads to someone who is always out on the prowl for the newest trick or tactic, but who has never put them into practice.

This is especially important if you read a lot of “blogging about blogging” blogs (hey, I’m just being brutally honest, as usual).

It’s not that they don’t provide value, it’s that they can get you captivated in the “ooh shiny” mentality, getting caught up in the so called ‘latest and greatest’ when you should be busy implementing a solid foundation of techniques that work, including things like creating great content and writing guest posts to promote that content.

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The domain had previously been registered to a company in Australia, but it now belongs to Corporation Service Company in Wilmington, Del., a domain-name registrar company. As The Next Web first reported, Apple probably contracted the Corporation Service Company’s services to take ownership of the domain.

Currently, visitors of iPhone5.com are greeted by a completely blank page, without even a single note or “under construction” notice. Before it was shut down, the site campaigned to have the domain stay independent, telling visitors, “Call Corporate Of Apple and tell them to stop there persuit!! Blow up there phones, Spam there emails, call there Administration! Do something to get our point across.[sic]”

It’s not the first time Apple has publicly wrestled over domain-name ownership prior to a major product launch. Shortly before Apple first unveiled iCloud in 2011, it obtained the iCloud.com domain from Xcerion, a Swedish software company. In that case, the exchange was amicable, with Apple reportedly paying $4.5 million for the URL.

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Editor’s Note: To see Chris live and in person, come check out his keynote presentation at BlogWorld New York, “Power Up Your Blog: Lessons Learned Over 11 Years of Blogging.”

Future of Publishing is sponsored by VigLink.

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