There is so much awesome going on in the world of social media this week, that we couldn’t help but do two likes!

Like I

Flickr is making a comeback. The photo sharing site faded into the background since its Yahoo! takeover and the release of more mobile (and hipster) friendly apps like Instagram. It’s had a total revamp of design and updated features, including:

- A terabyte of free storage for users (this can be doubled for $499.99 per year, bargain!)

- Can upload HD videos up to 1GB

- A shiny new android app

- New formats available for advertisers, and an ad-free site is also available to users for $49.99 a year.

The redesign has taken a darker turn, dominated by photos. As an old Flickr user, it’s taking some getting used to, but it does look like it will provide a better user experience on mobile than the previous site.  As with most site redesigns, there’s a few glitches to be ironed out, but so far so good Yahoo!

With this redesign launched only a day after the announcement that they were buying micro-blogging site Tumblr and integrating Twitter into their News Feed, Yahoo! obviously sees social media as key to its strategy for the rest of 2013. Let’s hope they don’t screw it up!

Like II 

Our second like goes to first ever YouTube Comedy Week! Some of the best on and offline comedians including Smosh and Ricky Gervais are taking part. Here are some of our favourite videos so far:

The History of YouTube

Internet Stalker – YouTube Comedy Week Special

Life on the road

Thanks to our pals over at The Online Video Company for telling us about this one!

Like

Our favourite addictive image sharing social network, Pinterest, has taken yet another step towards improving the site for business. Pins from brand partners will now include more detailed, targeted, information in the description (rather than just a link and the small description box). This will include ratings, ingredients for a recipe or pricing. For example, Netflix pins will be accompanied by information about the cast or a rating. It’s currently only available to select brand partners but we expect to see it roll out for other business profiles eventually.

 

The update could see users spending more time on Pinterest rather than visiting external sites. Although Pinterest is relatively new to the social network game, all updates and improvements have been fantastic. We look forward to seeing this feature roll out so we can use it ourselves!

Fail

The IOS version of the infamous Bang with Friends app has been removed from the app store after just 10 days. The  mobile app, which allows users to rate whether or not they would ‘bang’ their friends – only notified if the other feels the same. Bit weird if you ask us, but each to their own!.

The app supposedly violates rules on nudity and sexuality, but it’s dissimilar from apps such as the location based dating app Grindr, which hasn’t been removed.

Here’s what’s been happening in social media land over the weekend:

1.  A study following 1 million Facebook reveals the lifestyles of the average male and female users. Results include the average age of peak interest in topics such as : Books (Men – 50, Women – 22) and Sports (Men – 14 and 18, Women – 48)  Via Daily Mail

2. Twitter was dominated by #eurovision tweets (some of which were shown on the red button screen). We spotted a few brands  rocking at Twitter with shameless, but effective, plugging of their products:

We’ve said it before, we’ll say it again, we stock wax for that. #hairstyles #sweden #eurovision

— Ocado (@Ocado) May 18, 2013

 

If the sound of #eurovision is too irritating, why not test your smoke alarm? It’s the annoying noise that might save your life!

— Kent Fire and Rescue (@kentfirerescue) May 18, 2013

3. The internet was/still is rife with rumours that Yahoo was going to acquire Tumblr for $1.1bn.  Edit: It is happening! Marissa Meyer announced it over on her Tumblr. This day shall go down in history, or Tumblr will go down and we will forget about it…we’ll see. Read more on TechCrunch

4. There are now 100 hours of video content uploaded to YouTube every minute.  That’s quite a lot. The video sharing site recently celebrated it’s 8th birthday and has over 1 billion visitors each month.

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Yahoo has partnered with Twitter to enhance the user experience, with tweets integrated into the news feed. Announced yesterday, the feature is set to create a more personal experience for users and will show relevant tweets from popular figures, media outlets and politicians.  We’re not sure when it will be coming to the UK, but it is set to roll out in the US over the next few days.

Good move for Yahoo, as there don’t seem to be any other news sites doing this, but if you spot any let us know!

An ABC News tweet shows up in the news feed

Yahoo are also apparently in talks to but Tumblr, so it will be interesting to see what becomes of that rumour…

Fail

Today’s fail goes to Facebook for not letting us have Graph Search yet *sadface*.

Facebook is rolling out a star rating feature for TV Shows, Books and Movies, and the data from user ratings should help to provide more relevant content in users’ News Feed and improve Graph Search results.

We have, however, seen statuses sharing ‘How I’m feeling’ and ‘What I’m doing’ updates. We’re pretty convinced it’s only a matter of time until these become incredibly annoying…

Just when you thought you couldn’t take much more form this afternoon, we’ve got the answer. It’s case study blog time. This week, it’s an outside broadcast from sports writer James Baylis, or @imbongochrist if you want to follow him on Twitter.

So put the kettle on and settle yourself down for an afternoon read. This week, it’s Citroen who get prestigious ‘ASMA’ case study trophy.

Facebook – Citroen

Likes – 609,524

Citroen utilise Facebook very well. The car manufacture celebrates everything their brand has to offer on their Facebook page, commending their classics just as much as they push their latest models. This week sees the company celebrate the 45th birthday of the legendary Mehari. Happy Birthday to the coolest off-roader circa 1968 from us.

Plenty of videos and photos help the page remain interesting and attractive, and also ensures the feed doesn’t get too text heavy. Any text used is brief and easy to read (no car jargon that hurts your brain) and the tone is light, friendly and, at times, humorous.

The brand engages well with the users, posting regular competitions and humorous posts, such as the Citroen Concept UFO. It’s working too, with Citroen’s posts racking up thousands of likes.

Finally, to demonstrate what a truly global brand they are, the company has individual Facebook pages for numerous countries around the globe, including the Brasil, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia!

Twitter – Citroen 

Followers – 9,130

Just like their Facebook page, Citroen have numerous official accounts, including an official Citroen Racing feed, Citroen UK, Citroen Argentina and Citroen France.

The feed is kept up to date with all the latest Citroen news and interacts well with their followers, inviting them to submit photos of their favourite models or their own beloved Citroen. These are then shared across the brand’s social media channels, with the best being selected as fan picture of the day.

‘What if I have a problem with my beloved Citroen?!’ I hear you cry! Never fear, you can just head on over to the Citroen Twitter account. That’s right, the brand use their twitter feed for customer support too. All Citroen users need to do is tweet the company using their official #CitroenSupport hashtag and they are on hand to help you with your motor.

Instagram – Citroenworld

Followers – 2,956

Citroen have made some truly beautiful cars over the years, and what better way to show them off than via the beautifully filtered world of Instagram?!

Like the rest of their social media outlets, their Instagram feed features a great mixture of past, present and future cars, with a handful of rally action shots thrown in for all you motorheads out there.

If Sebastien Loeb driving a Citroen DS3 rally car through a big puddle isn’t the most beautiful and artistic shot on the whole of Instagram, then I don’t know what is!

YouTube – theofficialcitroen 

YouTube might be Citroen’s most successful social media platform. With videos covering the everything from the unveiling of concept cars, to Citroen’s adventures at some of the world’s greatest car shows, there is something for everyone here.

The brand’s videos attract thousands of viewers; the unveiling of the Wild Rubis Concept Car last month has already attracted well over 80,000 views alone, whilst the channel as a whole has racked up a whopping 2,781,665 views.

Citroen have been responsible for some of the coolest car adverts in recent years and a great touch from the brand sees them dedicate a whole playlist to these groundbreaking television spots. John Lennon and Marilyn Monroe both make an appearance, as does Obi Wan Kenobi (aka Ewan McGregor). Unfortunately there is no comeback for the frankly awesome transforming robot featured in the brand’s C4 adverts in the early 2000′s. Damn that robot was cool…

Google+ – Citroen

Google+ is far from the forefront of social media, but fair play to Citroen, they keep their account up to date as regularly as their other social media outlets. The brand posts highlights from their other social media feeds and get regular responses from their users, including numerous posts from people obsessed with flying Citroens…

Pinterest – Citroen

Followers – 653

With 24 boards and over 690 pins, Citroen are certainly busy on Pinterest. With individual boards for each of their current models as well as boards dedicated to highlighting their activities within the World Rally Championships and concept cars to name but a few, their Pinterest account really shows all that the company has to offer all in one place.

Vine – Citroen

Citroen have really embraced social media and are covering all channels, even the newly introduced Vine. It can be hard to think of things to push out on Vine, but luckily Citroen are blessed with a very visual product! It’s great for using at events such as motor shows and press conferences.

Like

Google+ has rolled out a new design, making it a lot more image based (not unlike certain other social media sites that we can think of…). Photos take centre stage of the redesign and fill the entire width of the stream, as a part of an effort to make it easier for users to scan the site.

Google have added 41 new features to Google+ as a part of an effort to make it smarter and more intuitive, with the help of bigger pictures and related hashtags.

The update includes a multi-column layout which, depending on the screen size and orientation (and the kind of device you’re using) there will be one, two or three columns.

Apparently, Google announced that 190 million people are now active in the Google+ stream, while 390 million are active across Google, including +1’ing apps in Google Play, making video calls in Gmail and sharing videos from YouTube.

Fail

LinkedIn has made a decision to prevent prostitutes from using the site to market themselves, which hasn’t gone down well in the sex trade.

The business networking website announced a new privacy policy and user agreement, which you can see here, that prevents members from creating profiles or providing content for promoting escort services or prostitution.

Like

Well this is pretty frickin’ cool, and we’re in a very scientific mood as we’ve been filming with our very own scientist for the past two days. Anyway… we digress.

Spire Bushey Hospital in Watford recently used Twitter and Vine to tweet and record LIVE SURGERY in the OR for educational purposes. Yup, you read that correctly, they live tweeted a surgery.

One of the pictures from the surgery

The procedure was captured in 13 short videos, photos and regular live tweets.  The OR team helped the ‘tweeter’ by offering clarification and insight into the procedure, ensuring that the surgeon was free from distractions.

You can see all the Tweets here on Storify. Thanks to Social Media Today for bringing the story to our attention.

MIND. BLOWN.

Fail

Instead of having a fail today, we’re going through a bit of a mid-week rebellion, so we’re going to have two ‘Likes’. DEAL WITH IT. Seriously though, this was too cool for us to wait another day for.

As part of its Star Wars Weekends event (running from May 17 to June 9), Disney is giving fans the chance to… wait for it… put their face on a 3D-printed Stormtrooper figurine. YOU CAN PUT YOUR FACE ON A STORMTROOPER.

This could be you

The ‘D-Tech Me’ experience at Disney’s Hollywood Studios uses a high resolution single-shot 3D face scanner, created by Disney Research labs, to make the personalised storm troopers.

The 10-minute experience captures an image of you, which is later sent to a high-resolution 3D printer to create a figurine.

Disney is also apparently resurrecting a popular “cast yourself in Carbonite” option inspired by a scene from The Empire Strikes Back. Fans will receive either a Carbon-Freeze Me light-up band or a collector button depending on which option they choose.

Unfortunately, the Star Wars D-Tech Me experience is not cheap, coming in at $99.95, plus shipping and applicable sales tax. But, that’s only around £65, and we think it’s DEFINITELY worth it. TO HOLLYWOOD.

Like

This awesome graph visualises data from public Reddit posts, created on an open source data visualisation software called Gephi.

The image is fully interactive; head over to the original post to zoom, click and explore your way through the various weird and wonderful sub cultures/sub-reddits. It provides a simple way to understand how vast and interconnected just one social network is.

Fail

The Facebook Phone, which was announced early last month, is already rumored to be discontinued by AT&T, the US’s biggest phone network. The HTC First was the first phone be built around the Facebook Home modification, which aimed to make the social network at the forefront of mobile activity.

As with the Facebook Home app, the phone just hasn’t been popular with customers. Perhaps it’s time for Facebook stop trying to completely takeover the mobile market?

Like

Chris Hadfield has been the commander of the International Space Station for the last 6 months. He’s also been rocking at social media, with frequent updates via Twitter and YouTube channels. Always informative and funny, he’s totted up millions of views and thousands of followers. Yesterday, he uploaded the first ever music video shot in space – a cover of David Bowie’s ‘Space Oddity’. It’s pretty awesome:

Nice work Chris!

Fail

Find yourself instagramming all the food you eat? Well, just a heads up, it could land you in jail one day (if you happen to already be a wanted criminal).

Investigators managed to track down a couple of identity thieves after one of them uploaded an image of their dinner on to Instagram. An IRS informant met the pair at a restaurant in Florida, and whilst Troy Maye told the investigator his first name, the IRS couldn’t crack their full identities. They then met again two days later at Morton’s restaurant  After the lunch date, a special agent Googled Maye’s name, which then turned up his Instagram account, with a picture of  steak and macaroni cheese meal entitled Morton’s’ from the same day as their meeting. He is now facing 12 years in prison. NAILED IT.

Here’s an update of what went on over the weekend in social media:

1. Facebook Home finally hit the 1 million download mark, however it took twice as long to reach it’s second 500,000 milestone than its first, suggesting that users continue to be unimpressed with the service. The app has been awarded a paltry two stars from the more than 16,000 reviews on its Google Play page. (Via Cnet)

2. Facebook is rumoured to be close to purchasing Israeli Sat-Nav company Waze for £650 million. Waze uses satellite signals from members’ smartphones to generate maps and traffic data, which it then shares with other users, offering real-time traffic information. If it turns out to be a success, the deal could see Facebook compete with similar mapping systems from Apple and Google. (Via The Drum)

3.  Twitter Inc chief executive Dick Costolo has quit as director of Twitter UK Ltd, just days after Twitter subsidiary TweetDeck was dissolved as a separate U.K. business by business registrar Companies House. It all seems a bit cloak and dagger to us, so we’re waiting to hear more!

4. NBC’s Today Show revealed that Pinterest is stressing out mums. Apparently over 42% of Pinterest-using mums have some level of personal stress derived from their time surfing the good idea-filled network, and it’s the ‘perfection’ of other people’s lives that’s getting them down. (Via Technorati)

5.  Business Insider called Google + a desolate wasteland, as big brands neglect the site. Using Dominos Pizza as an example, they note how the brand festooned their Facebook page with Cinco de Mayo offers, but their Google+ page hasn’t been updated since October 12th. What are your thoughts on Google+; useful tool, or outdated platform?