Facebook slammed for heavy handed approach to charity drive

Facebook are being blasted by the news media for their heavy handed approach to the latest Facebook meme designed to raise money for cancer research. After the earlier No Make Up Selfie craze, in which women posted selfie snaps of themselves sans make-up and then donated to cancer research by text message,  raised more than £2 million for cancer research, the men decided to get in on the act too and the latest meme was cock in a sock in which men posted snaps of themselves wearing nothing but a sock over their penis. But Facebook removed many of the pics, calling them obscene. Strange given that the socks were bigger than the average bikini shots which are rife on Facebook.

The cock on a sock meme soon went viral and created a stir right across the world wide web.

Check out some of the pics HERE

Check out the news story HERE

No doubt, there are many on social media who have woken this morning to the images of men who are naked, save for a sock on their parts.  Your social media platform of choice has not suddenly become lewd and lascivious; there is a social media campaign afoot to raise awareness about testicular cancer.

The movement started in the United Kingdom and while it is not known who exactly started the awareness campaign, awareness about testicular cancer has gone up significantly over the last 48 hours.  Philly Morris, founder of Manchester-based charity Checkemlads, says he has no clue as to who started the campaign, but he is glad they did, as the charity has gained several hundreds in donations since the spontaneous campaign began two days ago.

Essentially, men wanting to get involved in the campaign strip down to their birthday suits and take a naked selfie, ensuring that their private parts are covered with a sock of their choosing.  The campaign appears to have sparked some creativity as well, as men have chosen long hockey socks, socks with cartoon characters, and socks in very vivid colors, among others, and it continues to spread.  Each shot on social media has featured either the #sockonacock or #checkemlads hashtags, and the involved men thus far have continued to donate to testicular cancer awareness.

While some may exclaim, “Sock on a what?!”, the social media campaign has exploded in a flurry of selfies of men wanting to promote testicular cancer awareness.  The Sock on a Cock Facebook page has gotten over 24,000 likes, and while it is a closed group, it is a virtual certainty that the numbers of likes continue to grow.

Testicular cancer survivor Ryan Farrington, just 26, ensured he had his selfie done, complete with bright pink sock.  He says Checkemlads was a lifesaver for him, as Philly Morris even came to offer his support in hospital.  Farrington says he posted his selfie before he was even aware anyone else was doing it, and he even nominated some of his buddies to do the same.

This is perhaps one of the most unique challenges out for men today.  While the no makeup selfie for women has gotten a lot of press of late, the social media campaign for testicular cancer awareness may take people in North America by surprise.  Certainly, disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong is likely one of the most prominent faces of testicular cancer, having had it years ago, but it is a condition that remains one of the easiest to cure.  It has a relative 5-year survival rate of 99 percent, and even if the cancer has spread beyond the lymph nodes to organs, the 5-year survival rate remains at around 74 percent.  If it has spread just to the lymph nodes, 5-year rates sit at around 96 percent.

It is definitely a cancer many men do not want to discuss, as men are notoriously…well…private about their parts.  It leaves many men with many questions, such as their ability to father children later on.  However, like other cancers, testicular cancer is one that needs discussion.  The Sock on a Cock campaign may be just the way to do it.  It is silly, fun and a way to get people talking about it.  A social media campaign designed to raise awareness – even one where people may ask, “Sock on awhat?” – cannot ask for more than that.

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It's eFacebook

Now that Facebook are allowing users to rent movies over their site, there is speculation that the company are planning to do the same thing for eBooks. Facebook have made no official statement, but it is widely expected that Facebook members will be able to download, time limited eBooks from the home page before 2011 is out.

Even Batman's on Facebook

The allure of Facebook continues to mesmerise many, beyond mere social networking or gaming. Warner Bros. and Facebook are giving you one more reason to stay connected to the ever-growing influence of the social network in our online lives -- digital movie renting and viewing. That's right, Warner Bros. has started renting digital movies over Facebook, starting with Christopher Nolan's Batman: The Dark Knight.

For renting the Batman: The Dark Knight digitally, Facebook users will have to visit the movie's official Facebook page to apply Facebook Credits (Facebook's virtual money), according to The Hollywood Reporter. The cost per movie rental (for The Dark Knight) is 30 Facebook Credits or US $3. Visit The Dark Knight's Facebook Page and click on "Watch".
After the purchase, Facebook users will have 48 hours to watch the movie which is streamed online. During that time users will still be able to use Facebook without any restrictions and the streaming rented movie will have pause and resume functionality.

"Making our films available through Facebook is a natural extension of our digital distribution efforts. It gives consumers a simple, convenient way to access and enjoy our films through the world's largest social network," said Thomas Gewecke, president of Warner Bros. Digital Distribution, The Hollywood Reporter quoted.
With over 500 million users, why wouldn't you want to make money and serve fans better by allowing streaming movies on Facebook? It's an untapped market and props to Warner Bros. for at least embarking on the road less travelled. Warner Bros. has said it will release more movie titles for renting online through Facebook in the coming months.

The most popular writer is:

Forget the bestseller lists, the true test of a writers popularity is how many friends he/she has on their Facebook fan page -

Based on overwhelming popularity on Facebook, the top author on the social networking site is Stephen King with 1.3 million fans. Perhaps more surprisingly is George Orwell's ranking at number three, followed by Twilight Saga author Stephenie Meyer in sixth.

With a combination of contemporary and classic writers, the eclectic group listed has been compiled according to the number of Facebook fans, gathered with statistical tools from the website AllFaceBook.com.

These were the top 10 authors, as of November 11:

1. Stephen King (1,302,973 fans)
2. Nicholas Sparks (506,300)
3. George Orwell (399,403)
4. Shakespeare (356,920)
5. Nora Roberts (290,836)
6. Stephenie Meyer (261,176)
7. Jane Austen (230,814)
8. Anne Rice (229,192)
9. Jodi Picoult (209,637)
10. Sidney Sheldon (207,727)

Others in the top 20 include the venerable Agatha Christie with 191,972 fans at 11, J.K. Rowling with 186,942 at 13, Edgar Allen Poe at 14, suspense author Tom Clancy at 17, Kahil Gibran at 18, Paulo Coelho at 19, and J.R.R. Tolkien at 20. And poor old Jack Martin (me) is placed somewhere around number 9000,65.

Facebook founder hates movie of his life

After initially telling the world+dog that he would not see the flick about his life, Zuckerberg's ego apparently got the better of him and he settled down with his popcorn to watch it.
Apparently he is miffed that the film made it look as if he started Facebook 'to get girls'

According to the Independent, In a stinging review of the film, he told a crowd of aspiring entrepreneurs at an event at Stanford University that its producers "just can't wrap their heads around the idea that someone might build something because they like building things."
The movie looked at the early days of the foundation of the website, while Zuckerberg was an undergraduate at Harvard.
He is shown as ambitious, driven and intent on success for Facebook and is keen to get rid of his image as an isolated geek in his dorm room.
Zuckerberg said that it was interesting the stuff that they focused on getting right – like every single shirt and fleece they had in that movie is actually a shirt or fleece that he owned.
But the plot is based on the fact that a woman who never existed in real life, dumped him.
Now while he was dumped a lot in real life, the idea of the movie is that the whole reason for making Facebook is because he wanted to get girls, or wanted to get into clubs, he moaned.
The real story was that Zuckerberg has been with his current girlfriend, Priscilla Chan, since before the advent of Facebook.

Zuckerberg's comments have been greeted with surprise, partly because the thought of him having a real girlfriend had not occurred to most, but also because Facebook has been careful not to attack the film.
This is because the successful film is free publicity and doing no harm to the company's image.
However, Zuckerberg's claims that the woman described in the film was entirely fictitious may not be true. The Facebook Effect, an earlier book, claimed Zuckerberg had dated a Berkeley undergraduate during a break in his relationship with Chan.
Zuckerberg has always worried that people will look at the film and see his character when he was 19 and say 'Oh, well, he was like that... He must still be like that, right?'" 

FACEBOOK SECURITY ISSUE

From Denver 7 News


How private is the information you publicly display on Facebook? What you write may be seen by more than your Facebook friends.

"Openbook" (caution: some adult language) is a new Web site created to get Facebook to tighten its security settings, but showing just how public some of your private Facebook information can be.

With a simple keyword search, you can read the status updates of Facebook users who you have no connection with. Based on those people's privacy settings, you may see information they wouldn't want complete strangers knowing.

7NEWS found Miguel, a Denver-area resident whose status update included, "So long Denver," in a post referencing a vacation. Ninah also referenced Denver International Airport writing, "I'm really on vacation." Ada, wrote "Bye Colorado," in her reference to her vacation.We were able to read the status updates of thousands of Facebook users we weren't friends with.Angela lives on the western slope. 7NEWS found her status update that referenced an upcoming vacation, with extensive detail to when she would be gone and where she would be."It's kind of scary really. I'm sitting here thinking of things that I've written on Facebook and how many people have actually seen that now," said Angela. "You think that that's open to your friends, and you don't think that just anybody can get on there."After Angela was told her status update could be seen by non-friends, she planned to change her status."You've opened my eyes, and I'm sure by doing this piece that you would open other people's eyes to stop and think before they actually enter something," said Angela.Even though Openbook put her personal information out there for anyone to see, Angela said she didn't think there was anything wrong with what the site revealed."I really do think it's going about it the right way," said Angela. "Really makes you stop and think before you post certain things.""Yes, it's ironic, and it will cause people pain, but it's the least evil way we could come up with," said Openbook developer Will Moffat.He said the point of the website is to educate Facebook users on privacy just as much as it is about trying to get Facebook to change the way it sets up privacy. He wants people to understand how to lockdown their pages, and to realize Facebook is more like a blog than private e-mail."Privacy should be there by default, and there should be a simple way to do that," said Moffat, who said Facebook users often have to "opt out" of privacy options, instead of "opt in.""I actually think it's a good message," said Denver-area Facebook user Theodore Furr. "I think it's good and I think maybe it will help people realize that they need to set their privacy settings higher."Furr checked his privacy settings and found out that he's not as secure as he thought. His friendship sharing settings showed that his friends could accidentally share his personal information."I think anybody with good 'Googling' skills could probably do the same thing this is doing," said Furr. "I think it's good because it's making maybe parents or middle-aged people realize the risks that their kids are at.""It's kind of cool, but I can see where it can go wrong," said Facebook user Matthew Van Deventer. "(Although, Facebook users) choose to put that out there for public information."

Billy no mates...

There is now Facebook group for my western writing alter ego, Jack Martin.

Go on befriend this old hack - join Here