Salesforce.com Debuts New Social Media-Derived Business Collaboration Tool

CNET News reports that Salesforce.com has released its new social media-based collaboration product, which has been in beta testing since February. The new Chatter product is described as a “sort of Facebook for business” by Salesforce.com and is meant to compete with business collaboration offering such as IBM’s Lotus Notes and Microsoft’s SharePoint.

Chatter lets people follow the update of co-workers along with tracking individual business documents and pieces of data. For example, a sales rep could follow the details of a pending new client contract or a customer support manager could track a bug report until a solution is found. Information shared on Chatter will remain safe because it runs behind a firewall, protecting it from people outside of the company.

“We feel very excited that we have a killer app on our hands with Chatter,” said Salesforce.com Senior Vice President Kraig Swensrud. “Facebook has really trained the entire Internet on how to collaborate. No one has to go to a training class to figure out how to use Chatter.”

Military Intelligence Utilizes Social Networking Skills

While social networking is more commonly used to stay connected with friends and family, the U.S. military uses it for communicating vital information during American wars. The New York Times reports that U.S. intelligence officers are using social networking skills to locate insurgents and save American lives in Afghanistan. According to the article, although more than 7,000 miles away, analysts are able to sign in and out of military chat rooms to inform Marines about possible dangers such as roadside bombs and Taliban gunfire. Earlier this month, for example, analysts helped guide Marines into Marja in southern Afghanistan with minimal causalities by utilizing data about nearly 300 possible roadside bombs.

B2B Marketers Making Use of Social Media

According to a new survey conducted by White Horse, B2B marketers are keeping up with their B2C counterparts when it comes to adopting social media marketing tactics but complete acceptance is based on executive approval.

The new study, conducted in March 2010, B2B Goes Social: A White Horse Survey Report reveals that 86 percent of B2B marketers are using social media, compared to 82 percent of B2C marketers. However, the figures reveal a big difference between the degrees of engagement: 52 percent of B2C marketers are engaged in daily social media marketing, while only 32 percent of B2B marketers use the services on a daily basis.

The survey also revealed the use of specific tactics among both groups. “B2B marketers use podcasts and participate in third-party forums slightly more often than B2C, and they rely on mobile applications and user-generated content significantly more often.”

According to White Horse, the survey highlights the need for “better internal education tools for B2B marketers to prove the value of social media.”Among B2B marketers, 46 percent said perceived irrelevance as an obstacle to executive approval, compared to only 12 percent for B2C marketers.

Yahoo!, Facebook and eBay Aid Legal Defense of Google

While Yahoo! might seem like a strange “friend” for Google to have, that’s just what a major court case has brought about. CNET reports that companies like Yahoo!, Facebook and eBay have filed “friend of the court” briefs to support Google and YouTube in their defense against a $1 billion copyright infringement case brought by Viacom in March 2007.

The filings in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York urge Judge Louis Stanton to dismiss the suit, which revolves around copyright-protected content by Viacom entities such as MTV, Paramount Pictures and Comedy Central being uploaded on YouTube. Viacom claims that Google - YouTube’s parent company - “encouraged” users to upload pirated digital media files and benefited financially from illegal sharing.

The consortium of companies defending Google and YouTube told Judge Stanton that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act protects Internet service providers from liability for copyright violations committed by users and that a ruling against Google would have a chilling impact on future digital innovation.

Microsoft Unveils New Social Media Tool

Microsoft announced today a new test project called Spindex, designed to aggregate social media streams, making it easier for users to find new information, view customized trending topics and get the most out of their social media experiences.

Currently in its early stages, Spindex offers users an overview of the entire social media world, allowing them to simultaneously connect and interact with multiple networks on one page. For example, users can find articles and content based on personal interests in their friends’ messages and comments. The new tool also allows users to keep track of the information they are saving via Evernote.

According to Microsoft, “Spindex is not just a social reader — as you browse your friends’ updates, Spindex continually suggests related content from Bing — giving you better insight into the topics and trends spinning around you.”

As the latest test project within Microsoft’s FUSE Labs, Spindex is available in early technical preview form.

Amazon Adds Social Media Integration to Kindle

The Associated Press reports that Amazon has updated its Kindle e-reader to include social media components. The Kindle 2.5 software is an automatic update which Amazon says has already been sent wirelessly to some owners and will be rolled out more broadly in late May. The update includes Facebook and Twitter integration, allowing users to share passages from books, magazines and other text they are reading on their Kindle with the Facebook and Twitter friends.

The new Kindle software will also let you share opinions and information on books with other readers. According to a post on the Amazon.com blog, you will now be able to rate certain passages from books and see which passages other readers thought were the most interesting.

College Students Can’t Live Without Social Media

Most college students are functionally unable to be without their media links, according to a new study conducted by the International Center for Media & the Public Agenda (ICMPA).

The study, titled “24 Hours: Unplugged,” asked 200 students at the University of Maryland, College Park to abstain from using all media — including cell phones, iPods, TV, car radio, magazines, newspapers and computers — for 24 hours, according to the blog A Day Without Media.

Among many notable findings, the study revealed that most students used literal terms of addition to characterize their dependence on media. Phrases used to describe their reactions included “in withdrawal,” “frantically,” “craving,” “very anxious,” “extremely antsy” and “jittery.”

“I clearly am addicted and the dependency is sickening,” said one student in the study. “I feel like most people these days are in a similar situation, for between having a Blackberry, a laptop, a television, and an iPod, people have become unable to shed their media skin.”

In addition, students agreed that going without media was the same as going without their friends and family. Of all the media technologies, most students felt lost without their cell phones or the ability to text, tweet and Facebook.

iClimber Victim of Attack by Turkish Cyber Terrorist

The iClimber Website was the victim of a cyber attack this week. The attack appears to be carried out by a hacker who goes by the Internet handle of “Ghost61” from the Turkish Website Turksec.info. iClimber was one of many Websites impacted by cyber terrorism directed at a server hosting several Armenian-themed pages, including Armenian.com, ArmeniaChat.com and ArmeniaSearch.com. The attacks appear to be related to the upcoming commemoration of the Armenian Genocide on April 24.

“Ghost61” recently was blamed for the hacking of more than 600 Swedish Websites after the country’s parliament passed a resolution recognizing the slaughter of more than 1.5 million Armenians by the Ottoman Empire in 1915. Several other Armenian-themed sites have also been the victim of cyber terrorism attacks since March 1, including the home page of the Armenian National Olympic Committee.

iClimber’s staff has worked diligently to repair damages caused by the attacks and take preventative steps to ensure future security.

SAS Institute Launches Social Media Analytics

SAS Institute, a leader in business analytics software and services, announced Monday a new social media solution designed to help medium and large companies understand, predict and act based on social media data.

According to the company announcement, SAS Social Media Analytics allows businesses to archive and analyze more than two years of social media conversations from Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, discussion forums, blogs and more. SAS Social Media Analytics tells marketers what people think about their products or brands, who is influencing them and how social media conversations affect business results.

“Consumers are online right now talking about your products and services, their experience, and their likes and dislikes. Smart marketers aren’t just listening to online chatter; they are analyzing it to better focus resources and build engagement and loyalty,” said Mark Chaves, Director of Media Intelligence solutions at SAS. “SAS Social Media Analytics helps marketers combine data from online conversations with other data to build a more complete picture of each customer. And then use these analytically driven insights to predict and act.”

Social Media Access via Mobile Browser Sees Triple-Digits

Access to social media sites via smartphones has increased 8.3 points in the past year, from 22.5 percent in January 2009 to 30.8 percent in January 2010, according to recent data from comScore. Access to Facebook via mobile browser increased 112 percent in the same time frame, while Twitter experienced a 347-percent increase.

The study also found that 11.1 percent of all mobile phone users accessed a social networking site via mobile browser, an increase of 4.6 percentage points from last year. According to comScore, much of this growth has been attributed to smartphone owners, 30.8 percent of whom accessed social networking sites on their mobile browsers.

ComScore also revealed that a whopping 25.1 million mobile users accessed Facebook via their mobile browser in January 2010, a 112 percent increase from the previous year. MySpace attracted 11.4 million users in January, while Twitter attracted 4.7 million users.

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