An oft-quoted definition of social media (even Facebook uses it) is from Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein: ‘…a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user-generated content’.

Well, perhaps a more pertinent, and possibly even more important, definition would be: ‘A group of Internet-based applications that generate feelings of addiction similar to that of consumerism during the mid-2000s’.

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Google are continuing their determined push into the social world by incorporating Google+ commenting into YouTube, the major video service owned by them. However, such moves may have deeper cultural ramifications for the company.

Speaking to Reuters, YouTube Head of Operations Tom Pickett said:

“YouTube has been lacking great social features. Commenting and sharing have been part of YouTube, but the experiences could be much better than they are,”

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Today is the day many of us say goodbye to Ceefax after the analogue TV signal was switched off across London. The BBC’s teletext information service started transmitting back in 1974 and is still providing information on a wide range of topics covering news, sport, weather, TV listings and businesses.

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The Guardian has gone big with an interview today with inventor of the internet, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who warns against the dangers of big web firms controlling too much of our data.

He says consumers do not yet understand the value of the data held about them by big firms and he wants people to demand their personal data from the likes of Google and Facebook. Read More »

This post is provided by our partner Headstream, the social brand agency behind the Social Brands 100.

Domino’s Pizza appeared in last year’s Social Brands 100 Top 30.  The pizza delivery company has made a name for itself for using social media in an innovative way, most recently with #LetsDoLunch, a ‘reverse auction’ on Twitter that lowered the price of a large pepperoni pizza as more people tweet about it. We spoke to Multi-Media Manager Nick Dutch to find out more about the Domino’s approach to social. Read More »

Black holes are fascinating, aren’t they?  Mysterious, huge, invisible and dangerous elements of theoretical science.  Something which is an important part of how our solar system works but also something that we have never seen.

So this poses the question, if we can’t see them then how are black holes formed?  Well, the most common theory is that a black hole is formed where a colossal star, with a mass of more than 3 times our Sun, reaches the end of its life and gets crushed under its own gravity, leaving behind a compact black hole which sucks in everything in its path. Read More »