Google has been actively collecting feedback on Google Wavewith an ongoing survey, which was distributed via email, the help center, and Twitter. Today they’ve publishedthe initial findings for public dissection.So far results indicate that users love the concept of Wave, appreciate the collobartion features, and like the extensions, gadgets, and robots. On the flip side, however, the most perplexing part of the Wave experience is that users’ friends and contacts don’t have access to Wave. Respondents also complained of speed issues and indicated a desire for integration with more tools like email.Based on our experience with Google Wave, the results that Google has published are spot on and point to some of the reasons why the system is both a game changer and, on the other hand, still not ready for mainstream attention.Google does say that they will be acting on your feedback and opinions:“With these responses and other data, we’re organizing our team around the core issues that are important to making waving better. We’re working hard to scale our systems so you can invite your friends and colleagues to wave with you. We’re also thinking about how to integrate with existing communication and collaboration tools. And since we all know that fast is better than slow, a large portion of the team is working to make Google Wave faster.”Do your Google Wave likes and dislikes fall in line with survey data? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.Image from watch4uon FlickrReviews: Flickr, Google, Google WaveTags: Google Wave

  Android, Google’s mobile operating system, already has the Android Market as its official app store, but it may not be serving everybody’s needs, especially those of an adult variety.As it turns out a company called MiKandi(pronounced “My Candy”), who is not affiliated with Google, has launched a free Android app store of its own for porn and porn alone.The company is touting their one-of-a-kind store as a mobile revolution giving adult application developers a platform for distribution and porn consumers a means of accessing it. To download the independent porn store to your Android device, simply access MiKandi.comvia your mobile browser.Ideally those accessing the Adult News, Erotica, Eye Candy, Social, and Fun and Games adult app store categories via MiKandi will be over the age of 18, but that doesn’t appear to be strictly enforced.While there’s no shortage of stories about Apple’s restrictions around porn applications, there’s still a market and audience for porn on the iPhone via mobile-friendly porn sites. If however, you’re an app developer with something a little more elaborate in mind, then MiKandi’s porn store could be just what the dirty doctor ordered.[via The Next Web]Reviews: Android, GoogleTags: android, app store, porn

  This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here. The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark.Name: GuestlistQuick Pitch: Guestlist builds event pages, sells event tickets, and manages your attendees while utilizing an intuitive interface.Genius Idea: In an already-crowded online events management space, Guestlist tries to stand out with a simplistic and elegant interface. However, with established players like EventBrite, does it differentiate itself enough to compete?Guestlist includes all of the basics for creating and publishing an event. You can name your event, setdates and times, create tickets (paid and/or free), link it to your PayPal account, add a location and some descriptive information, and you’re up and running. Pretty much anyone can figure out the interface and get an event published. The company’s promise to be one of the “easiest way to sell tickets to your events” holds true for the most part.In fact, you can see the final result in this example Mashable event. It didn’t take more than 3 minutes to get this set up. Guestlist also comes with some simple attendee and order management tools.Unfortunately, the cold hard truth is that Guestlist doesn’t really add anything unique to the event management space. EventBrite is also simple to get started and has the same features, but adds things like vanity URLs, more control over event descriptions, and is far more customizable. Guestlist is dead-simple and is best suited for people that really don’t want a lot of hassle in getting an event page off-the-ground, but it won’t survive unless it adds value beyond what others in the market already provide.Spark of Genius Series Sponsored by Microsoft BizSparkBizSpark is a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.Entrepreneurs can take advantage of the Azure Services platformfor their website hosting and storage needs. Microsoft recently announced the “new CloudApp()” contest– use the Azure Services Platform for hosting your .NET or PHP app, and you could be the lucky winner of a USD 5000* (please see website for official rules and guidelines).â€�Reviews: PHPTags: bizspark, eventbrite, Guestlist

  Remember the odd Family Guy and Windows 7 sponsored rompthat never came to fruition? You may recall that Microsoft, anxious to push its newest operating system, set out to sponsor a special episode of Family Guy. Of course, they eventually came to their more conservative senses and backed out.Now that all is said and done, however, Microsoft has decided to upload and share the unaired clips on their YouTube channel. While we don’t exactly comprehend the motivations behind the maneuver, we can see we why they pulled the plug on these rather lackluster clips.Watch below and share your thoughts in the comments.[via Gizmodo]Tags: family guy, microsoft, Windows 7

  This postoriginally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.Weber Shandwickrecently released the resultsof their study on the Twitter accounts and behavior of Fortune 100 companies. They found that a majority of Fortune 100 companies are not following best practices, afraid to engage, and overall missing important opportunities that the medium allows. While there are thousands of businesses that get Twitter, it should come as no surprise that those at the top of the food chain are having the hardest time embracing Twitter as a medium.Fortune 100 companies have shareholders, board members, and a number of other factors that equate to red tape, making it difficult to engage in meaningful and public ways in 140 characters or less. As an SMB, you have an opportunity to best Fortune 100 companies with your Twitter presence. Here’s why.Smaller, Leaner, FasterYour small business is poised to succeed in a Twitter environment because you can act faster than your larger counterparts. With fewer employees and less corporate restrictions to factor in to the mix, your SMB has an opportunity to be quick, agile, and flexible on Twitter.It’s that agility that will make you standout, empower you to respond to all customer complaints in a speedy fashion, and develop real relationships with fans and followers. Consider yourself blessed in this capacity.Purposeful in PracticeOne of the more interesting findings of the Weber Shandwick study is that Fortune 100 companies appear to be directionless on Twitter and entirely self-serving. 26% simply use their accounts as newsfeed, 24% of analyzed accounts were simply used for brand awareness, and only 9% of Twitter accounts tackled customer service issues.Those numbers paint a very abyssal Twitter picture, but you can learn from the mistakes of the Fortune 100 companies and use your Twitter presence with purpose.Always remember that Twitter will best serve your customers if you use it as a two way communication channel. Marketing, advertising, and news pushing can be part of the experience, but they should always remain secondary to the primary purpose of serving customers first.Personality MattersWeber Shandwick also looked at the personality and tonality of Fortune 100 company tweets, and they found 53% of analyzed accounts did not display personality. There are a number of reasons this could be true, but most likely the bigger the company the harder it is for them to have a real voice in social media channels, especially one that may not align with carefully crafted corporate branding.As an SMB you’re poised to put personality into your tweets without repercussion. In fact, it would probably serve you if you used your Twitter presence to have opinions on top news stories, share music of your liking, and even divulge elements of your personal life. It’s these extra layers of character that will make your Twitter account more than just a Twitter name on a Twitter page.More business resources from Mashable:- Why Social Media Is Vital to Corporate Social Responsibility- HOW TO: Measure Social Media ROI- 5 Important Web Video Lessons for Small Business Owners- Top 5 Must-Read Social Media Books- HOW TO: Use Twitter Hashtags for BusinessImages via Chris Spooner, and courtesy of iStockphoto, GeofferyHolman.Reviews: Twitter, iStockphotoTags: fortune 100, List, Lists, small business, smb, twitter

  Last week at the Professional Developer’s Conference, Microsoft showed off the first developer beta of Silverlight 4, which includes support for Google’s Chrome browser. It turns out that Chrome isn’t the only competitor’s product with Silverlight in its future though. Betanews interviewed a Microsoft manager who revealed — and showed off — Silverlight video streaming on the iPhone.What’s even more interesting is that this wasn’t a skunkworks proof-of-concept project, Microsoft got the OK from Apple. This is in stark-contrast to Apple’s stance on Adobe Flash, which currently has plans for all mobile platforms except for the iPhone.How It WorksA big underlying concept behind Silverlight has always been about the ability to deploy the same content on multiple platforms without having to create a platform-specific version. The same concept exists for Adobe Flash and Adobe Air (and Silverlight has many of the same potential use cases as Air, Flash, and Adobe Flex).Although largely associated with streaming video, Silverlight actually has the ability to run full web applications. However, where Microsoft will first be focussing its efforts is in bringing Silverlight video streaming to the iPhone.Silverlight’s native content type is MPEG-2 v8. What Microsoft did was build a server-side solution with IIS Media Services. What this means is that when a content owner uploads content that has been optimized for smooth streaming, they can have the option of enabling that content on the iPhone. Then, using HTML 5’s <video> tag, Silverlight is able to communicate a QuickTime request to the IIS server, which then decodes the MPEG-2 v8 file dynamically and starts streaming it to the iPhone. This is extremely similar to how YouTube content currently works with the iPhone. Because Silverlight already supports GPU acceleration (a feature that is coming to future versionsof Flash Player 10), battery life and overall performance has the potential to be quite strong.This could be a big win for Microsoft and Silverlight content developers because having the ability to get content to mobile phone users is extremely important. Although Silverlight has uses far beyond video, it does streaming video extremely well.What do you think of Silverlight coming to the iPhone? Reviews: Chrome, YouTube, adobe AIRTags: Flash, iphone, microsoft silverlight, Silverlight, streaming video

  It’s Black Friday and while there’s plenty of offline deals to be had, and you can use social media to find them, one online retailer is dominating its offline competition when it comes to Twitter.Data from Trendrris showing that Twitter buzz around Amazon leading up to Black Friday far surpasses that of the Twitter buzz surrounding some of the nation’s leading offline retailers, including Target, Best Buy, and even Walmart. Data also shows that Amazon Black Friday tweets accounted for almost 32% of all Black Friday tweets yesterday.Amazon Black Friday tweets peeked at more than 22,000 tweets on Tuesday, with an additional 17,000 plus tweets yesterday on Thanksgiving. Walmart, on the other hand, barely cleared 7,000 Black Friday tweets on Thursday, while Target tweets jumped around all week, but only saw 6,900 tweets on turkey day. At least in terms of tweet quantity, Best Buy is performing at the bottom of the bunch with less than 4,000 tweets per day.Of course we know that Twitter demographics are not representative of the entire population, and that people are more likely to tweet about online deals when they’re in front of their computers, but we still find it a little surprising, given Experian Hitwise datashowing that all three big brands — Target, Best Buy, and Walmart – are receiving traffic boosts from Black Friday ad sites. Still, Amazon reigns supreme when it comes to brand-centric Black Friday Twitter buzz. It will also be interesting to see if this Twitter data reflects actual in-store and online purchase behaviors.Reviews: TwitterTags: amazon, black friday, twitter, WalMart

  World champion golfer and sports icon Tiger Woods is in serious condition after his car crashed into a fire hydrant and a tree near his home in Isleworth, Florida. The Orlando Sentinelreports that Woods hit the hydrant with his 2009 Escalade after pulling out of his driveway at around 2:25 A.M. this morning. According to Florida Highway Patrol reports, he subsequently drove into a tree on a neighbor’s property. He is now at the Health Central Hospital in Ocoee, Florida.Woods is one of the world’s most iconic sports figures as well as a husband and father. The Mashable team offers its best wishes for Tiger and his family.Update: According to a statement form Tiger Woods’ publicist, he was admitted, treated, and released from Health Central Hospital today. He is being described as being in “good condition.”Tags: sports, tiger woods

  For many Americans, Thanksgiving is a time for family gatherings, football, and gorging ourselves on Turkey, stuffing, dressing, sweet potatoes and plenty of pumpkin pie. Hey, it’s tradition right, right?So just how big are these Thanksgiving meals? According to the website Allrecipes.comthe average Thanksgiving meal in 2009 averaged 2,225 calories per serving! Wow. Allrecipes.com says this is a 5 percent increase over 2008.Allrecipes.com data isn’t purely scientific, as they based the figures on the most searched recipes by demographic and location. Still, the figure of 2,225 calories per meal sounded about right to the Mashable team.According to Allrecipes.com, Iowa and Minnesota averaged the fewest calories — just 1,797 per serving (that’s still more than many of us consume in an average day), while South Carolina averaged 2,690 calories per serving.How do you think your Thanksgiving meal measured up? Did you stuff yourself silly, or did you manage to resist the call of double deserts?Let us know!(Photo Courtesy of Stu_Spivackon Flickr)Reviews: Flickr, MashableTags: food stats, thanksgiving

  The story of Michaele and Tareq Salahi should serve as a lesson in the wrong way to seek fame. The couple, which is being considered by Bravo for the DC version of The Real Housewives series, somehow managed to make it past a security checkpoint to attend the White House state dinner on Tuesday evening, where they proceeded to party with the political elite.It also just so happens that Michaele Salahi has a public Facebook Page, which she used to post a smattering of photos from the evening, including one of her and her husband with Vice President Joe Biden.It’s not all glitz and glamor for the limelight seeking couple. According to an update from CBS, the couple may soon face a rude awakening as the Secret Service’s active investigation into the matter could result in criminal chargers.According to CBS, “Secret Service spokesman Jim Mackin says the agency is moving closer to beginning a criminal investigation. He says that’s one reason the Secret Service hasn’t yet explained what happened when Michaele and Tareq Salahi arrived at the security checkpoint Tuesday for the dinner honoring Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.”Interestingly enough, as the investigation unfolds, those widely shared Facebook photos from Salahi’s page could prove to be the couple’s worst nightmare, especially should criminal charges be filed.Reviews: FacebookTags: salahi, state dinner, whitehouse

  When Twitter Listswere first rolled out to everyone, some people questioned how the feature would effect the long tradition of #followfriday, a weekly event on which Twitter users recommend different tweeps they enjoy for various reasons. Though Twitter Lists are changing the way some people participate in #FollowFriday, they have have actually not lowered the number of tweeps participating.#FollowFriday recommendations come in all shapes and sizes. Some people broadly recommend their favorite followers and others are more specific to a subject area or industry. Twitter Lists have followed largely the latter, and often include specific tweeps that tweet about specific subjects. And though the majority of people are continuing to make recommendations using the traditional route of including the usernames of tweeps people should follow, some people are beginning to create #followfriday Twitter Lists or are linking to one of their lists in their #followfriday tweet.#FollowFriday Still Going StrongThe number of tweets each Friday that contain the hashtags #ff or #followfriday have actually increased in the last month following the rollout of Twitter Lists in October, according to Trendistic. The percentage of tweets containing #ff have gone up slightly from 2.09 percent on October 30 to 2.45 percent on November 20. The results for tweets containing #followfriday have fluctuated a bit, but have mostly remained consistent.This graph doesn’t show any changes in #FollowFriday behavior — any of these tweets could point users to lists or use the traditional method of recommendation — but they do show that just as many Twitter users are participating in #FollowFriday as ever. There was some concern, when the list feature was first announced that users would simply create lists and start recommending other tweeps on #FollowFriday altogether. That has clearly not happened.#FollowFriday With ListsSome people are starting to change the way they participate in #FollowFriday, however, by recommending one of their Twitter lists for people to follow instead of specific users. Others are creating special #FollowFriday lists and updating them each week.It’s hard to tell how many people exactly are participating in this trend, but for Friday, November 20, we found more than 400 examples of tweets that contained the hashtag #followfriday or #ff that included the word “list” and a link pointing to a Twitter list. Though it’s a small amount of people that are starting to use #followfriday this way, it may be a precursor to a change in how people participate in #FollowFriday, changing the way people recommend their tweeps.How Lists Could Change #FollowFridayBecause Twitter Lists are relatively new to Twitter users still, the trend of people using lists for recommendations instead of actually including usernames has the potential to catch on. This would change the feel of #FollowFriday significantly and perhaps some of its effectiveness.Creating a Twitter list designated for #FollowFriday allows users to recommend more people and brings down the noise of people who use multiple tweets to recommend followers. It also makes the recommendations more specific because users could update the description of the list each Friday. This method also has more shelf life than just recommending specific users each Friday. After all, the usernames attached to the #FollowFriday Twitter list would remain there for a whole week for people who stumble across your profile or your tweet linking to it. This has the potential to give those you recommend more exposure.However, it may not necessarily translate into followers for those you are recommending. If you create a Twitter list for #FollowFriday, people will likely just follow the list and not necessarily the people on it. Also, including a link to a list for #FollowFriday instead of @usernames of each tweep you recommend creates an extra step for your followers to see the people you are recommending. You can’t just click on the username and assess your interest in following that person, now you’d have to click on the link and run through the list of people.Whatever the outcome of this potential trend, people should remember that #FollowFriday is about the people that you recommend that bring you value and think are worthy of being followed by those following you, regardless of how you do the recommending.Image courtesy of iStockphoto, mattjeacock.Reviews: Twitter, iStockphotoTags: followfriday, List, trending, twitter, Twitter Lists

  Black Friday is upon us and retailers online and off have brought out the big guns for the busiest shopping day of the year. While most of the doorbusters are long gone, you can still catch some terrific bargains online.We scoured ads, online deal sites, and our Twitter accounts (hey, if we have to work today, we’re going to try to shop at the same time) and found five can’t miss deals.Amazon.com $150 off MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops— Edited to add: Amazon.com has sold out of the regular MacBooks (other retailers offer them through Amazon but not at a discount) so the $150 off only applies to the MacBook Pro models at this time. Lots of sites have Apple stuff on sale today — even the Apple Store— but only Amazon offers free shipping, no tax (unless you live in Washington), and an instant $150 off either the 13″ MacBook($849 today only), the 13″ MacBook Pro($1049 today only) and the 15″ MacBook Pro($1549 today only). If you are looking at getting a portable Apple laptop, think about doing it today.1 TB LaCie External hard drive— BH Photo Video has the fashionable and spacious Lacie external hard drive for $90. It’s one of the best prices you can find on a 1 TB external drive right now.$30 Canon Multifunction Printer— Office Depot has the Canon PIXMA MP490 for just $30 after a $70 instant savings. The price is good through tomorrow. Printphotos, make copies and scan documents.Sony HDTV and Blu-ray Combo— BH Photo Video has a Sony 42″ LCD HDTV (120hz) and a Sony Blu-ray Live enabled Blu-ray player paired together for just $804. If you’re looking at upgrading your home theater this season, this is a great package.$529 Toshiba 40″ HDTV”– Tiger Direct is selling a 40″ Toshiba 1080p HDTV for $529 plus shipping. It’s a great deal for this particular set and Tiger Direct is donating at least $100,000 to the Susan G. Korman Foundation this weekend.What are the best deals you’ve managed to find? Share them in the comments!Reviews: Blu, TwitterTags: black friday, online shopping

  Want to buy some of Apple’s beautiful gear, and save thousands hundreds dozens of dollars in the process? There’s no better day to do that than today, because Apple’s one day special shopping eventis now live. As you may have expected from Apple, the savings aren’t huge; the biggest we’ve seen (in absolute amount) is a $101 dollars cut for the iMacs and the MacBooks Pro. However, if you look closely, you can save a decent amount of money on certain items; for example, the 64 GB iPod Touch is now $358.00 (down from $399.00).It’s not only Apple gear that’s on discount; many other Apple-related products are going cheap today in Apple’s online store. For example, Creative Inspire T12 Speakers are only $48.00 (down from $69.95), while the Sanyo Dual Camera Xacti VPC-FH1ABK is $428.00 – a $71.95 discount from the regular price. Tags: apple, black friday

  Antivirus company Sophos warns that a new trojan is on the loose, packed in an email that promises photos of sexy girls (don’t they all). The malicious campaign is widely spread out, mainly through emails with the subject line “Do you like to find a girlfriend like me?” with an attachment called “my photos.rar”. Of course, the attachment actually contains a trojan horse called Troj/Agent-LVF which tries to steal login info for popular MMORPG World of Warcraft.The email in question contains the following text, written in inexplicably bad English:“Wish to have a boyfriendBe able to protect me, take care of meIntolerable lonely night and would like to have your care.do you Willing?This is my photos.”If you receive this email, delete it. If you think your computer is infected with the trojan, you can find more information about it over at Sophos. Image courtesy of iStockphoto, TalajReviews: iStockphotoTags: trojan, world of warcraft