Paul Allen, the man who has been tracking the growth of Google+ using name statistics, has posted some interesting new stats on the social network since it became open to the public last week. Since shedding beta status, the site has apparently added 30% to its user base. In terms of individual people, that’s about 10 million new members. Amazingly, most of the growth occurred in the 48 hours since the site opened its doors to any and all interested parties.

As always, Allen’s research is interesting but also far from hard and fast. His system relies on looking at the frequency of names that are, statistically speaking, rare. With that in mind, his numbers are estimates and not a headcount of total users. However, he believes that the fledgling social network is now packing some 43 million total users.  That’s a far cry from the over 800 million Facebook members, but it is a nonetheless impressive jump.

Now if someone could get a count of active users on those networks, we could get some really interesting analysis.

(via Search Engine Land)

We’re living in a digital age, always social networking, always connected. Do you really need anyone to tell you that? Probably not. Do you really need anyone to give you statistics on it and crack jokes about it at the same time? Probably a little more likely. This infographic hailing from OnlineSchools.org, totally everyone’s number one source for infographics, put together this infographic that, while telling you statistics about something you probably already know, is at least artistic and snarky about it.

The art style is straight out of a comic book and presents with our hero who looks decidedly too heroic for someone who “star[es] at glowing rectangles” all day. His words, not mine. Take a look at the full infographic after the jump.

According to a document that has been floating around, it appears that the Pentagon is putting out the call to social networkers, not to run a Twitter account, or collect Lolcats for internal distribution, but to help them use social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook as resources and weapons in the future. Social networking will doubtless change the face of modern warfare and it appears that the Pentagon wants to be on board for a variety of reasons and are chiefly concerned with information monitoring and, presumably, distribution. Makes sense, but smells a little propaganda-y.

While this project amounts to what is basically meme-tracking, it doesn’t sound like the memes would be particularly fun ones. In the solicitation, DARPA lays out the following hypothetical situation:

Rumors about the location of a certain individual began to spread in social media space and calls for storming the rumored location reached a fever pitch. By chance, responsible authorities were monitoring the social media, detected the crisis building, sent out effective messaging to dispel the rumors and averted a physical attack on the rumored location.

After reportedly being banned from Google+, a number of Anonymous members and affiliates have banded together to introduce Anonplus.com, a social network with a decidedly Anonymous spin. The site, inactive for the time being, consists of a splash page describing the site’s intended purpose with that famous Anonymous flavored fanfare.

It appears that the site, while presumably including more recent social networking features and technology, will also hearkenback to Anonymous’ roots in the unregulated, largely anonymous 4chan image-board /b/. The site’s tagline, “Social Networking Anonymously” certainly raises some questions we probably won’t see answered until the site’s actual launch, which is currently unscheduled. Take that as you will.

Flooding the intent with videos of crazy cats, puppies being cute puppies, and parrots that say the darndest things is nowhere near enough for pet lovers who want to share with the world (or at least their many Facebook friends) how awesome their pet is. According to a new study in the United Kingdom, 1 in 10 pets have their own profile on Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube.

The study, commissioned by pet insurance company PetPlan, suggests that that more than half of pet owners in the UK are sharing photos or videos of their pet on the internet, and are branching out into setting up profiles for their pets. According to PetPlan director Neil Brettell, this is because animals on social networking sites are more popular than even celebrities.

So, while it seems unlikely that the neighbor’s cat is going to wind up with more friends than say, Lady GaGa, seeing pets pop up on Facebook and other social networking sites is definitely on the rise. Pets with profiles is really nothing new, but if this study shows us anything it’s that social networking for pets certainly seems to be a big trend. I guess we all just want the world to know who our real friends are.

(via Mashable)

Today, Google announced its long-rumored entry into the world of social networking. The project is called Google+ and appears to be trying to introduce nuance, tact and discretion into the over-sharing, tell-everyone world of modern day social networks; no small task. So far, no social network has ever had its genesis around the idea of privacy, so the project may have a chance to squeeze into an already packed market through the use of this unique angle. They’re also Google, so that’ll probably help.

At the time of this announcement, the features of Google+ have been divvied up into four bite-sized sub-services that cater to specific aspects of social networking. The sub-services, +Circles, +Sparks, +Hangouts and +Mobile, deal with typical online communication between friends, sharing and liking items, meeting up in real-life, and mobile accessibility respectively. Google+ seems to be taking some interesting approaches to providing these services, approaches that take advantage of the Google+’s “think small” mindset as well as Google’s position towards the top of the internet food-chain.

Marketing by social media just got a little bit harder in France. While the Oxford Dictionaries Online is actively expanding into social networking, going so far as to add “twittersphere” and “unfollow” last week, France appears to be moving in the opposite direction. The French government has banned the words “Facebook“ and “Twitter” from being spoken on the radio or television.

In a move based on legislation from 1992 that decrees mentioning services by name is a form of advertising, use of the words “Facebook” and “Twitter” will not be allowed on French radio or television, unless part of a news story. France’s Conseil Superieur de l’Audiovisuel (CSA) says the reason for the ban is to avoid giving the American social networking giants an edge over smaller sites.

Amanda Peyton, the creator of social messaging service MessageParty, has posted this intriguing image of the web, re-imagined as neighborhoods of Manhattan. She took her inspiration, she says, from the East Coast origins of many of the services, along with what she sees as a New Yorks mindset to services like Twitter.  On her blog, Peyton discusses her reasoning behind the placement:

Twitter + Wall Street: Frenetic, Jumbled, Terse, but incredibly powerful

Tumblr + West Village and Meatpacking: Coolness to a fault

Email + Chelsea and Times Square: Large, unmanageable, swelling, but ultimately the pulse of everything

Facebook + Upper East Side: The center of the “establishment”

Hacker News + Spanish Harlem: Steadfast, growing like a weed though few people notice, culture-rich but somewhat insulated

The full list can be found on her site, but it leaves one question unanswered: what is Central Park? In my mind, the beautiful and massive anchor to the city could be Google, or some other essential service. Readers, what do you think?

(Amanda Peyton via Beta Beat)

Well, Microsoft did tell us they were going to tell us something today. And now they’ve told us. It was not, as some had speculated, the near-mythological Microsoft Courier, a tablet computer. Instead it was a new line of phones, oriented at the person who is deeply, deeply into social networking.

Says The Next Web:

Microsoft are quick to point out that this is a completely different offering from Windows Phone 7. Instead of being a smartphone with hundreds of different applications at your disposal, the Kin One and Kin Two exist to keep you in constant contact with friends whilst your on the move, sharing photos, videos and status updates on the go without an app store in sight.

It seems someone has taken the Twitter mold and made something useful with it (or, at least, more useful). A new site called Dribbble is soon to open up to the public and allow developers to showcase the projects they’re working on.

From website’s official blog:

“Dribbble is show and tell for designers, developers and other creatives. Members share sneak peeks of their work as “shots” — small screenshots of the designs and applications they are working on. It’s also a place to talk design, give and receive feedback and iterate toward better work.”

Read on...