The creation of a Hollywood movie started with a question on Reddit: Could a modern U.S. Marine infantry battalion destroy the entire Roman Empire during the reign of Augustus?
The head-scratcher of a query,
posted to the site in 2011, amassed nearly 4,000 comments and got
military historian James Erwin thinking about the answer. Erwin was so
intrigued that he sat down during his lunch break and wrote a short
story based on the question. By end of day, Erwin had 250,000 visitors
reading his blog post "Rome, Sweet Rome."
Erwin told The Financial Times
that within a week he had a Beverly Hills-based agent and a contract
with Warner Bros. Hollywood tossed "a pretty obscene amount of money"
(as Erwin described it) his way to write a screenplay based on his
initial post.
The Redditor turned Hollywood writer returned to his job as a technical writer after completing the screenplay. According to FT, he's currently working on a nove, which he hopes to fund with a Kickstarter campaign.
Showing posts with label Social Media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Social Media. Show all posts
How to See What Your Facebook Profile Looks Like to Others
Would you like to know what your Facebook profile looks like to other people?
Whether it's a job recruiter or a potential date checking out your online presence, it's a useful exercise to view just what you're putting out there via Facebook.
Take a look through our walkthrough to see what your public Facebook profile looks like. Let us know in the comments if you're happy with what your profile says about you.
Head to your profile page and click on the cog icon that appears at
the bottom right of your cover photo. Select the "View As" option.
Facebook will then show you what your profile looks like to the
average user, with whom you're not friends. You can scroll down your
timeline to see which posts are viewable to the public, and take a look
through your photos, "about" section, Likes, etc.
If you want to see how your profile looks to a specific Facebook
friend, click the "View as Specific Person" text at the very top of the
screen and enter his or her name. You will then see your profile
through their eyes.
Whether it's a job recruiter or a potential date checking out your online presence, it's a useful exercise to view just what you're putting out there via Facebook.
Take a look through our walkthrough to see what your public Facebook profile looks like. Let us know in the comments if you're happy with what your profile says about you.
1. View As
2. Public
3. Specific Person
Twitter Now Supports More and Longer Lists
Twitter lists got
a refresh on Thursday, giving users the ability to create more lists on
the social network and include more people on those created.
Previously capped at 20, now you can create up 1,000 lists on Twitter. Those lists can now include up to 5,000 accounts, substantially larger than the previous cap of 500 accounts.
Twitter announced the update via Twitter, of course, in a tweet from its @TwitterForNews account.
Previously capped at 20, now you can create up 1,000 lists on Twitter. Those lists can now include up to 5,000 accounts, substantially larger than the previous cap of 500 accounts.
Twitter announced the update via Twitter, of course, in a tweet from its @TwitterForNews account.
7 Social Media Tips for CEOs
Businesses can no longer afford to have top leaders sit on the social media sidelines, a new study finds.
More than three-quarters of executives worldwide believe it is a good idea for CEOs to participate in social media, the research from public relations firm Weber Shandwick and research partner KRC Research found.
The study identified a wide array of benefits that come with top executives who are socially active online. More than 70% of those surveyed said CEO sociability increases information-sharing throughout the business, improves company reputation, demonstrates innovation, humanizes the company and improves business results.
"CEOs are now expected to be chief content providers for their companies," said Leslie Gaines-Ross, Weber Shandwick's chief reputation strategist. "Social media is not only an efficient and engaging way to relay information but is also linked in executives' minds with being a better leader."
The research revealed that CEOs who aren't using social media aren't necessarily being antisocial. Half of CEOs who don't participate in social media are already communicating with employees through company intranets, while more than 60% make themselves visible to external constituents on their company websites.
"CEOs must strategically utilize the right digital platforms that advance their communications — ranging from their own intranet and website to social network pages and feeds to video and image-sharing platforms," said Chris Perry, global president of Weber Shandwick's digital practice.
As part of the study, researchers developed a profile of the most highly social CEOs, which includes these elements:
Photo: Twitter CEO Dick Costolo. Image via Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
More than three-quarters of executives worldwide believe it is a good idea for CEOs to participate in social media, the research from public relations firm Weber Shandwick and research partner KRC Research found.
The study identified a wide array of benefits that come with top executives who are socially active online. More than 70% of those surveyed said CEO sociability increases information-sharing throughout the business, improves company reputation, demonstrates innovation, humanizes the company and improves business results.
"CEOs are now expected to be chief content providers for their companies," said Leslie Gaines-Ross, Weber Shandwick's chief reputation strategist. "Social media is not only an efficient and engaging way to relay information but is also linked in executives' minds with being a better leader."
The research revealed that CEOs who aren't using social media aren't necessarily being antisocial. Half of CEOs who don't participate in social media are already communicating with employees through company intranets, while more than 60% make themselves visible to external constituents on their company websites.
"CEOs must strategically utilize the right digital platforms that advance their communications — ranging from their own intranet and website to social network pages and feeds to video and image-sharing platforms," said Chris Perry, global president of Weber Shandwick's digital practice.
As part of the study, researchers developed a profile of the most highly social CEOs, which includes these elements:
- Use an expansive set of social tools: Hyper-social CEOs realizesociability goes beyond dropping messages into a Twitter or other microblog feed. World-class sociability requires a strategically crafted plan for driving the company's content across several channels.
- Keep a blog: Highly social CEOs see the value in long-form content creation as a way of giving their perspectives context, meaning and depth.
- Leverage the website: These leaders realize that the website remains "digital ground zero" for company information-seekers and offers a platform for content to be delivered in multiple formats.
- Self-author: By taking a DIY approach. Their frequent postings influence their determination to author everything themselves, although they probably take input from their marketing and communications executives.
- Be forward-looking: These CEOs intuitively understand that technology and social media are the future of content distribution and they want to be part of this communications revolution.
- Be spontaneous yet not too informal: Socially adept CEOs maintain the formality of their office but let stakeholders know that they can react quickly and seize opportunity.
- Engage stakeholders. These CEOs see the value in sociability and use it to reach out to a wide portfolio of stakeholders.
Photo: Twitter CEO Dick Costolo. Image via Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Updating Your Twitter Profile Is Now Much Easier
Twitter has now made it even easier to upload a new profile picture, header image or background image to your profile.
You can edit profile photos by clicking the “Edit Profile” button at the top of your Twitter profile page, which will allow you to click and edit individual parts of your profile –- such as the profile picture, background image and even your personal description.
For profile photos, access the forward-facing camera on your computer
and snap a quick profile pic. For header and background images, just
drag and drop photos from your computer and make quick, on-the-fly
adjustments.
Once uploaded, images can be dragged around on the page until you select just the right area to hone in on.
Watch the video above for a quick play-by-play on how to use the new profile editing features.
You can edit profile photos by clicking the “Edit Profile” button at the top of your Twitter profile page, which will allow you to click and edit individual parts of your profile –- such as the profile picture, background image and even your personal description.
Once uploaded, images can be dragged around on the page until you select just the right area to hone in on.
Watch the video above for a quick play-by-play on how to use the new profile editing features.
Turn Your Facebook Timeline Into an Actual Book With Likebooks
These days, your Facebook Timeline
can serve as a digital scrapbook of your life: birthdays, graduations,
weddings, trips to Disneyland and, yes, the time you got a puppy. A new
service wants to help Facebook users move those memories from the cloud
into a permanent, physical keepsake.
Likebooks will convert content from your Facebook Timeline and print it in a physical book, as shown in the video above. Your status updates, photos and comments from friends can be printed in your custom book. Content is either pulled from a specific date range or an entire year (as far back as 2007).
Depending on how much content you choose to archive, a Likebook can cost from $12 to $137 and can range from 25 to 500 pages. They even come in soft or hardcover.
Likebooks says Facebook users create enough content on the social network to fill about 100 pages of a physical book per year.
“Users already have several years of their personal life story on Facebook," Patrick Osinski, marketing director of Likebooks, said in a news release. "We provide a way to respond to the basic human need to gather, archive, and share the personal stories that are stored in social networks."
With most things moving from analog to digital nowadays, this is a definitely a reverse approach. But this physical memento could be fun as a coffee table conversation piece or simply on your own bookshelf when you want to casually stroll down digital memory lane.
Likebooks will convert content from your Facebook Timeline and print it in a physical book, as shown in the video above. Your status updates, photos and comments from friends can be printed in your custom book. Content is either pulled from a specific date range or an entire year (as far back as 2007).
Depending on how much content you choose to archive, a Likebook can cost from $12 to $137 and can range from 25 to 500 pages. They even come in soft or hardcover.
“Users already have several years of their personal life story on Facebook," Patrick Osinski, marketing director of Likebooks, said in a news release. "We provide a way to respond to the basic human need to gather, archive, and share the personal stories that are stored in social networks."
With most things moving from analog to digital nowadays, this is a definitely a reverse approach. But this physical memento could be fun as a coffee table conversation piece or simply on your own bookshelf when you want to casually stroll down digital memory lane.
How to Create a Top Secret Facebook Group
Did you know that you can create a totally, top secret group on Facebook that only you, and people you invite to join, can see?
We have taken a quick look at how to make such a group, and some essential settings once you've got it all set up.
Take a look through our easy-to-follow walkthrough in the how-to gallery above. Let us know in the comments if you use private Facebook Groups — and what you do with them (without giving away all your secrets).
We have taken a quick look at how to make such a group, and some essential settings once you've got it all set up.
Take a look through our easy-to-follow walkthrough in the how-to gallery above. Let us know in the comments if you use private Facebook Groups — and what you do with them (without giving away all your secrets).
Will Facebook's Account Verification System Discourage Impostors?
When Victor Diaz Zapanta was featured on Mashable for his Facebook account's creative timeline
design, he was excited. But that sweet feeling soon soured slightly
when the 29-year-old designer's account was parodied by impostors
claiming to be him.
It happened at least four times, and at one point Facebook even suspended his profile, forcing the Washington, D.C., resident to verify his account way before Facebook introduced its new page and profile verification on Wednesday.
"I've been playing whack-a-mole with reporting fake profiles on Facebook every couple months," he says. "I'm guessing people were into the Facebook timeline I made and just don't think it's a big deal to impersonate someone."
That's because Zapanta thinks people were fascinated with his timeline-within-a-timeline image. Within hours of the Mashable story, which published in late 2011, Zapanta says he was inundated with friend requests and soon a slew of impersonators, mostly from Asia. He admits the attention was mildly flattering at first, but it soon turned into a headache "to explain to people when they try to add me on Facebook, that at this point, more often that not, there's somebody posing as me on Facebook. As a fairly social person, this is something that comes up for me pretty often."
So often, in fact, that
"We've built enforcement mechanisms to quickly shut down malicious pages, accounts and applications that attempt to spread spam by deceiving users or by exploiting several well-known browser vulnerabilities," Facebook told Mashable. "We have partnered with the leaders in the security industry to both block malicious websites and offer our users free security software to better protect themselves, no matter where they are on the web."
Specifics are still being ironed out as the Menlo Park, Calif.-based company refines the process, looking at tools to determine grounds for verification. But already, one potential problem with this fledgling system is that there is no way to request verification beyond contacting Facebook's help center.
More than 140,000 people follow LockerGnome founder and tech personality Chris Pirillo on Facebook. He's also had trouble with parody accounts. And his own family has even been fooled by impostors.
"My wife added the wrong Chris Pirillo," he admits. That profile had Pirillo's same avatar and profile background. He says she was fooled because she didn't notice the different vanity URL. "It's easy to mistake the wrong person for the right one on Facebook, or any social network. The higher their profile, the higher the likelihood of their name or brand being spoofed and fans misled."
Pirillo said he was surprised that despite having mutual friends with his wife, Facebook didn't steer her to the right profile. "Why didn't Facebook say: 'Hey, that's probably not the person you're wanting to add. There's a 'Chris Pirillo' that shares 'n' friends with you over here. Shall we do this for you?'"
Facebook says it shuts down profiles spewing nothing but spam. But the social network's not implementing automated verification when it comes to protecting our profiles. Which means it's up to us to monitor our own accounts. Perhaps in the next iteration of this program this will be addressed. It's a wait and see. And the irony is that this system doesn't protect people's privacy as much as their intellectual property, says Rebecca Jeschke, a digital rights analyst at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
"It's a way for folks to be clear about the source of a social media account," Jeschke explains. But it's not a cure-all if someone wants to impersonate you. "If you're verified, it doesn't prevent someone from making a fake account about you."
She says accounts that parody well-known personalities, like those on Twitter, are important forms of discourse. "It would be good if this verification policy encourages services to be more tolerant of parody accounts." But with Facebook's real name policy, she says she's not sure if that could even happen.
Zapanta, whose own online life has been disrupted by impersonators, isn't as open or confident that the new system will curtail this behavior.
"I do hope verification will help, but it's hard to predict," Zapanta laments.
To all those stealing his likeness and identity, Zapanta has a message: "Stop being a creep and create your own compelling online persona. I put genuine effort into my online presence and it's something I pride. It's unfortunate that people are trying to fool others in stealing that."
It happened at least four times, and at one point Facebook even suspended his profile, forcing the Washington, D.C., resident to verify his account way before Facebook introduced its new page and profile verification on Wednesday.
"I've been playing whack-a-mole with reporting fake profiles on Facebook every couple months," he says. "I'm guessing people were into the Facebook timeline I made and just don't think it's a big deal to impersonate someone."
That's because Zapanta thinks people were fascinated with his timeline-within-a-timeline image. Within hours of the Mashable story, which published in late 2011, Zapanta says he was inundated with friend requests and soon a slew of impersonators, mostly from Asia. He admits the attention was mildly flattering at first, but it soon turned into a headache "to explain to people when they try to add me on Facebook, that at this point, more often that not, there's somebody posing as me on Facebook. As a fairly social person, this is something that comes up for me pretty often."
So often, in fact, that
Zapanta still regularly finds new impostors, causing him to have trouble when he meets new people he'd like to be friends with online. Because people are pretending to be him online. Facebook's new verification process was developed, in part, to help people like Zapanta curb these problems. The verification badge is now visible as a checkmark on accounts, much like the system employed by Twitter.Zapanta still regularly finds new impostors, causing him to have trouble when he meets new people he'd like to be friends with online
"We've built enforcement mechanisms to quickly shut down malicious pages, accounts and applications that attempt to spread spam by deceiving users or by exploiting several well-known browser vulnerabilities," Facebook told Mashable. "We have partnered with the leaders in the security industry to both block malicious websites and offer our users free security software to better protect themselves, no matter where they are on the web."
Specifics are still being ironed out as the Menlo Park, Calif.-based company refines the process, looking at tools to determine grounds for verification. But already, one potential problem with this fledgling system is that there is no way to request verification beyond contacting Facebook's help center.
And the problem with the system is that it seems to be primarily designed to help people find and interact with high-profile accounts. In other words, mainly those that belong to celebrities. Which is exactly what concerns Zapanta with the program. He says he's glad to see Facebook starting to verify accounts, but is worried that they'll focus more on people "with an extremely high number of subscribers." But the fear is that the verification system is targeted to famous people as opposed to regular folk. And that could expose a weakness in the system.And the problem with the system is that it seems to be primarily designed to help people find and interact with high-profile accounts.
More than 140,000 people follow LockerGnome founder and tech personality Chris Pirillo on Facebook. He's also had trouble with parody accounts. And his own family has even been fooled by impostors.
"My wife added the wrong Chris Pirillo," he admits. That profile had Pirillo's same avatar and profile background. He says she was fooled because she didn't notice the different vanity URL. "It's easy to mistake the wrong person for the right one on Facebook, or any social network. The higher their profile, the higher the likelihood of their name or brand being spoofed and fans misled."
Pirillo said he was surprised that despite having mutual friends with his wife, Facebook didn't steer her to the right profile. "Why didn't Facebook say: 'Hey, that's probably not the person you're wanting to add. There's a 'Chris Pirillo' that shares 'n' friends with you over here. Shall we do this for you?'"
Facebook says it shuts down profiles spewing nothing but spam. But the social network's not implementing automated verification when it comes to protecting our profiles. Which means it's up to us to monitor our own accounts. Perhaps in the next iteration of this program this will be addressed. It's a wait and see. And the irony is that this system doesn't protect people's privacy as much as their intellectual property, says Rebecca Jeschke, a digital rights analyst at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
"It's a way for folks to be clear about the source of a social media account," Jeschke explains. But it's not a cure-all if someone wants to impersonate you. "If you're verified, it doesn't prevent someone from making a fake account about you."
She says accounts that parody well-known personalities, like those on Twitter, are important forms of discourse. "It would be good if this verification policy encourages services to be more tolerant of parody accounts." But with Facebook's real name policy, she says she's not sure if that could even happen.
Zapanta, whose own online life has been disrupted by impersonators, isn't as open or confident that the new system will curtail this behavior.
"I do hope verification will help, but it's hard to predict," Zapanta laments.
To all those stealing his likeness and identity, Zapanta has a message: "Stop being a creep and create your own compelling online persona. I put genuine effort into my online presence and it's something I pride. It's unfortunate that people are trying to fool others in stealing that."
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