A niche social network that focuses on music-related topics, Ping allows users to post thoughts and opinions about a particular song, album, or artist and share it with their friends. You can also view concert listings and tell your friends what concerts you’re attending.

Ping also allows users to follow their favorite artists. Similar to Twitter, MySpace, or Facebook, following an artist on Ping will allow users to view artists’ activities. You can see photos they’ve uploaded, videos, announcements on tour dates and much more. Perfect for the stalker who has a lot of free time on their hands!

Ping will also be offered on Apple mobile devices including iPhone and iPod touch. This will allow users to take their social music experience on the go.

Oneupweb Reviews: Thumbs Sideways

I think I’ll wait to give a solid rating on this one. If you’re like me, you’re thinking Ping sounds a lot like Bing, and functions a lot like MySpace. Then again, this is Apple and they tend to come up with some pretty cool stuff.

What do you think? Does the world need another social network like Ping? Let us know in the comments below.

But that was another time — long ago. It was before the World Wide Web, before Wikipedia and before kids knew they could sue their parents for emotional abuse (you’re safe dad).

Now we have sites like Digg.com that we can go to and learn about the top voted content all over the web. And today, Digg just got an upgrade!

The first change you’ll notice (besides the blue theme) is the sign-up process. You’ll be encouraged to connect social networks like Facebook to your Digg account. The reason for this is that the new Digg will list the top stories that have been Dugg by your friends. Giving you news that only you and your friends care about.

But this is only an add-on to the “normal” Digg experience. You can still access the old style Digg feed by clicking “Top News” at the top left of the page.

The submission process also has a few improvements. Most notably, Digg now pulls thumbnail images from the links you submit, similar to Facebook.

Oneupweb Reviews: Thumbs Up!

In case you haven’t noticed, the world is going social. Digg understands this and has made the adjustments to keep pace with Facebook, Twitter and other social services. Semantic web, social revolutions… call it what you will. It’s here and it’s here to stay. Need some social help (of the inter-web kind)? Check out Oneupweb’s Award Winning Services.

You can now let all your friends know exactly where you are and what you’re doing!

You also have the ability to tag others who are with you at a location. This can be a lot of fun, but be careful. As I found out, the wording can give the wrong impression. For example, if you said you were maxing and relaxing at the mall, and then tagged a friend it would read: John Smith is maxing and relaxing with Sally Sue at the Mall. Maybe not the idea you were trying to get across. This is very similar to photo tagging in that the person tagged can also remove the tag.

If you’re a business, you have the option to claim your new Facebook Place. Facebook.com says,

“To claim your Place, search for your business name on Facebook via the normal Search bar. If your business’s Place already exists on Facebook, click on it to visit its page. At the bottom left side of your Place there will be a link that says “Is this your business?” Click on the link and you will be directed to a claiming flow.

We will ask you to verify that you are the owner through a phone verification process, or you may be asked for document verification. Once your claim is confirmed, you will own your Place on Facebook.”

Oneupweb Reviews: Thumbs Up!

It’s about time Facebook got into the location wars. Although, with Facebook being the behemoth it is, it’s less like a war and more like mosquitoes (Foursquare/Gowalla) vs. a flame thrower.

I understand that I can make my location available only to friends, but even still, making this information available to anyone seems creepy. However, I’m not exactly a socialite, and there are a lot of people out there who love Foursquare, Gowalla and location based services. But there have been some growing pains along the way. Foursquare and Gowalla have had problems with the accuracy of GPS, with users able to check-in to places without even being there.

One company, called Shopkick, has created an entirely new location type service, which claims to bypass many of the problems that Foursquare and Gowalla face.

Instead of using GPS like traditional location based apps, Shopkick has technology installed within each store that detects when someone arrives. And unlike Foursquare and Gowalla, this does not rely on GPS, which can be  tricky in malls because stores are so closely placed together.

With Shopkick,  the moment a customer using the app walks in the store, they are notified of their savings. The technology is installed within the store itself and turns the entire store into an interactive experience. Plus, the signal can’t pass through walls, making it much more accurate and trust worthy for businesses than GPS services. Check out the video demonstration of Shopkick in this article.

I think that this service—for now—is better for businesses than Foursquare or Gowalla. Accuracy combined with security is a riddle that location based services have yet to solve. But we don’t know the cost of this technology. It’s possible that not every small business will be able to afford Shopkick, where with Foursquare or Gowalla there is no cost.

Shopkick is an interesting idea and could become very successful in the location based arena. It’s really too early to tell if this will gain widespread adoption, but it’s certainly something to keep your eye on.

Oneupweb Reviews: Thumbs Sideways

We’ll keep our eye on this one. Would you install this app on your phone to get a discount? Let us know in the comments below.

Booshaka!.com

With booshaka! (laka)— so fun to say—you can search specific keywords. If someone’s profile is public, and they are chatting about that keyword, their conversation will show up in your search results. But if you just want to search a broader topic like news, music or sports, you can also search by category.

The biggest difference I’ve noticed between Twitter search results and booshaka! is the length of the results. With Twitter search results, it’s easier to get a snapshot of what’s going on because the results are only 140 characters in length. With booshaka! the posts are naturally longer because Facebook allows longer posts.

Twitter Search Results For Movies

booshaka! Search Results For Movies

So as you can see, there might be a little more scrolling going on while using booshaka!. Then again, who would want to scroll when Vin is the top post? He’s so… beautiful.

Another difficulty booshaka! might encounter is the privacy issues that Facebook has had to deal with. Services like booshaka! only make Facebook users more aware of how public their information is. Which, I maintain, would not be a problem if Faceabook would have operated without subterfuge concerning the Open Graph. Let people know up front that their information is public, and they won’t be so surprised when they find out it is. Seems simple enough to me.

booshaka! also offers the ability to sort search results by most popular, trending now, most buzz, and most recent—as seen below. Also seen below is Vin laughing. You’re so funny Vin, you always know how to make us smile.

booshaka! Filtering Options

The ability to search public Facebook posts for keywords that are relevant to the user is pretty cool. And I like the filtering options as well. For making it easier to stalk celebrities… I mean search Facebook for Vin Diesel related news… I mean, awe forget it. We give booshaka! a…

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

It wasn’t until government regulators got involved that the wealth began to spread to more than just a few lucky ones. The profit motive in America, aka capitalism, has been a driving force in our economy for a long time. And because of this, you can count on big business to do whatever it takes to ensure they remain the lucky ones at the top. When big businesses begin taking advantage of people, the hope is that the government will step in and bring balance. After all, the only power us little guys have is the ballot. Big businesses hold the rest of the cards.

Well, here we are again. The internet is the Wild West, and everyone has rushed in to take advantage of the many opportunities this tool presents. But this time, it was the little guy who was given the power, and not just big business. We’ve seen internet campaigns win presidencies, change policy and allow voices to be heard (especially those that would otherwise have been drowned out). This is largely in part due to the internet not being controlled by big business—at least not yet.

This video was released a few years back, but explains net neutrality pretty well.

In a confusing move by Google (confusing because their pledge is to not be evil), the company released their “policy framework”. To further explain, Huffington Post’s Craig Aaron describes Net Neutrality below:

Real Net Neutrality means that Internet service providers can’t discriminate between different kinds of online content and applications. It guarantees a level playing field for all Web sites and Internet technologies. It’s what makes sure the next Google, out there in a garage somewhere, has just as good a chance as any giant corporate behemoth to find its audience and thrive online. What Google and Verizon are proposing is fake Net Neutrality. You can read their framework for yourself here or go here to see Google twisting itself in knots about this suddenly “thorny issue.”

So here’s the bottom line folks—if the little guy doesn’t stand up to the big companies, by encouraging the FCC to stop big business from abolishing Net Neutrality, then the future looks pretty dim. Click this link to see a possible world without Net Neutrality. (Oops, wrong mental picture, sorry!) Try the one below instead.

So what can you do to get your voice heard? Well, you can start by joining the campaign at SaveTheInternet.com. And continue to do what the little guy has always done: use the channels that are available to get your voice heard (and hope that the FCC listens). Use these channels my friends… use them while you still can.

Google and Verizon’s Net Neutrality policy…

Oneupweb: Thumbs Down

What are your thoughts concerning Google’s recent policy? Let us know by commenting below.

It’s abundantly clear—the Teen Choice Awards heavily markets to the teenage demographic. It’s the demographic the show was built for, so no surprise there. But this year, like Pepsi moving much of its budget from TV to social media, the Teen Choice Awards moved its focus to where its target market is—online. And to do this, they took the awards social.

In fact, the combination of social media services used to promote this event is dizzying: streaming live through UStream, then on to Fox’s Teen Choice Awards Facebook Tab, and finally integrating Facebook’s Live Stream plugin. Wow! Take a look at the Facebook tab below.

On Twitter, they created an account to share news concerning the Teen Choice Awards. Then, Fox took it one step further by creating a persona called the Teen Choice Girl. This persona claimed to have the inside scoop on all the latest TC news. It’s  smart marketing, since much of Twitter consists of a younger female demographic. Check out the Twitter profile below.

Though much of MySpace is a desert wasteland compared to Facebook and Twitter, for music, it’s still an ideal place. Which is exactly why the Teen Choice Awards chose to create a MySpace profile as well.

Facebook, Twitter and UStream were strong for The Teen Choice Awards, but I think that they missed out by not using YouTube. While they did have the host of the popular YouTube show What the Buck hosting live on the red carpet, they simply did not have any sort of YouTube presence, which is unfortunate. I think it’s safe to assume that Fox was nervous about copyright laws, etc—but why not have its own channel featuring stars, or even internal employees, talking about the upcoming show?

We shouldn’t pick on Fox too much, though. After all, not utilizing YouTube is a small missed opportunity when you compare it to all of their other great uses of social media this year. So we give the marketing strategy of the Teen Choice Awards a…

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

Do I love Star Trek, you ask? Does a Farangi love Oo-Mox? You bet they do! And as much as I love Star Trek, blogging comes in a close second. So if I discover a new way to make blogging that much more convenient and fun, you bet I’m gonna write about it!

Enter Posterous (queue 2001: A Space Odyssey theme).

I think a lot of bloggers love to write and share ideas, but don’t necessarily have the technical skills to setup a WordPress blog. So when it comes to blogging, the easier the better. This is where Posterous comes in.

For example, to setup your account, all you have to do is send an email to Post@posterous.com. That’s it. It really couldn’t get much easier than that. Don’t believe it? I know, it sounds too good to be true, but try it. We won’t spend too much time on the setup because it really is easy as pie. So let’s look at some Posterous features.

Posterous boasts the ability to create blogs on the go. You can write a blog on your laptop or mobile phone, email it to Posterous, and your blog will be created for you. Want a few images in your blog? Simply attach them to the email and they will be uploaded and posted quicker than you can say, “Engage”! You also are given a robust set of controls to manage your blog.

But possibly the most attractive feature that Posterous offers is Auto Posting. If you suffer from IAD—Internet Addiction Disorder like I do—then you have several social networks to update (Not sure? Take the Internet Addiction Test.). Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, Vimeo, Tumblr, and Wordpress to name a few. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to push your blog to these sites automatically? (I know, an obvious segue right? Just go with it.) Well, with Posterous you can!

For filling in that small spot somewhere between desktop blogging (Wordpress) and micro-blogging (Twitter), we give Posterous a

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

Guy Walks Across America:

Speaking of journey (Don’t stop believing! Oops, wrong Journey.), the creators of this next video took a very long journey across America, and the result is quite impressive. Now I know that no one would want to watch a video of some guy walking across America in real-time (I have a feeling a video like that would exceed even YouTube’s newly extended 15 minute limit). But never fear! These creative folks applied some nice stop-motion and time-lapse video to create a short-attention-span-friendly video for the rest of us.

Look behind the scenes of this epic video by clicking Behind the Scenes of Guy Walks Across America.

Best Celebration Ever In Football:
Everyone loves a good celebration dance; unless you’re on the opposite team, of course. But we have to give it to this team. This is a new one!

Newport (Ymerodraeth State of Mind):
Comparing Newport (located in the United Kingdom) with New York, as this song creator alludes to, is like comparing Apples to Tangerines. But the extreme differences didn’t stop this professional rapper from creating the massively viral music video you’re about to see.

Basil Marceaux—The Next Governor of Tennessee:
There are some things that you don’t have to speculate about, and in this case, there’s no doubt that Basil Marceaux is the next governor of Tennessee. I had our team of experts look at Basil Marceaux’s website, and for the first time in Oneupweb history, we realized that we really just couldn’t make it any more perfect than it already was.

All kidding aside, Basil’s offer to “IMMUNE YOU FROM ALL STATE CRIMES FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!” if you vote for him is a tempting offer, you have to admit.

Jane Austen’s Fight Club:

Two things at the opposite ends of the spectrum: movies I love, and books my wife reads. I suppose that if you meshed the two together, you would have something similar to this.

Oneupweb Reviews: Thumbs Up!

Well, I hope you enjoyed the videos. Make sure and let me know what your thoughts are by commenting below. And please be sure to let me know if there are any I missed this week that you think are worthy of a Fun Friday Review.

To read more Fun Friday reviews, click Oneupweb’s Fun Friday Reviews.

The YouTube video above has received over 3 million views in 6 days. StarCraft, the original game, also holds several marks in the Guinness Book of World Records.

StarCraft II YouTube Channel: Total Upload Views = 4,602,811

In addition to the StarCraft II YouTube channel, the game has made waves by effectively using social media channels like Facebook and Twitter. With over 370,000 Facebook Likes, it’s safe to assume creating StarCraft II’s Facebook page was a good move for Blizzard Entertainment, the creators of the game series. Blizzard has also setup individual Facebook pages to target several countries, including Korea, Italy, Singapore, and Russia.

StarCraft II’s Facebook Page: Over 370,000 Facebook Likes

Last night, Blizzard Entertainment held midnight premiers all over the world to kick off the launch of the highly anticipated game. Photos of the Global Midnight Launch events were also uploaded to Facebook.

StarCraft II’s Twitter profile has also been very effective – having already acquired over 38,000 followers. Similar to its Facebook Page, separate Twitter profiles have been created to target several different countries.

StarCraft IIs Twitter Account: Over 38,000 Followers

Being a Gold Level beta tester (this simply means I’m awesome, he he) I can vouch for the game itself. It really is something else, and certainly lives up to all the hype. But the use of social media for marketing and promotion of the game is what I wanted to focus on with this review.

Blizzard Entertainment has done a great job connecting with fans of the game on almost every social media channel possible. For great use of YouTube videos, Facebook Updates, Tweets, and much more on Starcraft2.com, we give the marketing strategy for this epic strategy game a…

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up!