Pesky parents. In the good old days students could get up to whatever they wanted to at Uni safe in the knowledge that their parents would remain unaware of their midnight spin dryer riding habits (or was that just me?), and much worse.

Now though thanks to the wonders of Facebook drunken images are often accompanied by a cheery comment next day from a parent advising on hangover cures - or even worse disparaging comments and suggestions that you need to get back to your studies.

So what do you do? Well maybe use Facebook for nice shots of you in the library and post all your interesting stuff on a site that your parents can't see - like Unii a new social network for students which has just launched.

Its makers claims that uni is a place for experimenting and embracing new found freedom, so the last thing students want is their parents checking up on their every move. To prove the point they have commissioned a survey which discovered that over half of British dads confess to checking up on their kids via Facebook at least once a month

So with Unii, you need a university email address in order to sign up, which is perfect unless of course your mum is an academic.

The site has plenty of Facebook style networking facilities as well as places to post those oh so embarrassing night before photos and loads more. It laos has a serious aim too and feature a comprehensive jobs board showing the latest internship placements, helping students to find their first crucial placement when or before they graduate.The site is here.

Since we started tweeting, unfriending, retweeting, hashtagging, tagging, following, instagramming and blocking one another online we've started using a lot of crazy words that have well and truly ingrained themselves into our vocabulary. However, the French aren't happy that such ridiculous and anglicised 'words' are becoming so popular, so from now on the word 'hashtag' is no longer an acceptable thing in France.

Instead of saying 'hashtag' when they refer to... um... hashtags... French people now must say "mot-dièse", which translates to 'sharp word' in English. There's a department of the French government called Commission Générale de Terminologie et de Néologie, which was set up to promote the awesomeness of the French language (we're pretty sure they just can't get enough of the word awesomeness). It's these guys that have been working on the big ol' 'hashtag' dilemma, because they want to keep France hip and relevant to the internet, but not let any silly, English words infiltrate their beautiful language.

But don't worry, if you find yourself in France and accidentally say 'hashtag' you wont' be prosecuted by some crazy, Orwellian secret police service and even French Twitter users won't get told off, but it is now a legal requirement for official correspondence and legislation to use 'mot-dièse' instead.

As Mashable writes, it's not the first time the French have felt a little irritated by internet-y words, as the government replaced 'email' and 'courriel' with French ones, attempted to replace 'blog' and have banned the words 'Facebook' and 'Twitter' from TV and radio shows in order to stop the promotion of brands.

For many it can be seen as a positive nod to patriotism that a country would want to protect their language so fiercely, but as more and more similar words become commonplace in our everyday conversations we really wonder how long such strict protection can last and how much widespread impact governmental laws like this one banning 'hashtag' will actually have on the way regular people converse in their daily lives. We'd guess very little.

[Via Mashable]

It's been a while since anyone's stepped up to the plate and tried to compete with Twitter - or they just fail miserably from the word go and we never end up hearing about them - but now Twitpic founder Noah Everett thinks his for something that'll rival the micro-blogging platform.

The Twitter rival is called Heello, which is cute and catchy, and allows you to share posts, photos, videos and check-ins privately or publicly.

The micro-blogging platform is clearly trying to position itself as a Twitter rival and addresses issues of ownership and closed networks on its website:

"As other social networks are walling themselves off, we are committed to providing an open ecosystem for everyone, with our user's best interest always in mind.

"Also as a user you will always own your data."

The Next Web draws similarities between Heello and App.net, but it looks like Everett's offering will be more appealing to most for now because it's free.

We're not sure whether there's really a market for ANOTHER Twitter-alike right now, but it'll be interesting to see if some irritated users do start to jump ship and look elsewhere over the coming months, because if they do Heello is certainly a good option.

Check out: heello.com

[Via The Next Web]

Over the past few years a lot of interesting questions have been raised about whether what we say online should have serious consequences in the "real world", whether it's Frankie Boyle's crude jokes, a random person poking fun at an athlete or those in the public eye breaking the law by revealing sensitive information.

Here in the UK the laws are still rather blurry and there's no hard and fast rules about what's considered right and wrong. In a way this means there's a lot of confusion, but it also makes sense to take everything on a case by case basis.

Well that definitely isn't the situation in Kenya anymore, as the government has declared it'll be making a commitment to monitor social media and take serious action against those who incite violence or use hateful language.

The decision has been made recently in order to keep an eye on the way people talk about the candidates and political parties involved in the general election that's taking place on the 4th March.

According to The Next Web, the Secretary at the Ministry of Information and Communication in the country, Bitange Ndemo, has declared that huge fines and jail terms of up to three years could be issued to those who use "abusive or threatening words on the likes of Facebook and Twitter". This is obviously a one off case for now, but it's interesting that a whole government would look to introduce such a broad brush approach. We just wonder how the Ministry of Information and Communication is looking to define what's "abusive", which is clearly very subjective.

Related: TWITTER: So what can and can't you REALLY say online?

[Via The Next Web]

Normally the term "eye candy" refers to half naked guys and girls, but here at Shiny Shiny we unashamedly get all hot and bothered when it comes to themes. Especially Tumblr themes.

The popularity of what we've dubbed "the Pinterest look" (think grid-like posts and lots of lovely images) means that everyone from The Next Web and eBay to our gran has been changing their website to mimic the just-can't-get-enough layout of Pinterest that has users hooked for hours on its virtual crack.

Although some might argue it's just a trend, there's no better way of browsing through photos, galleries and portfolios, so here are our all time favourite Tumblr themes that are hot, sexy, minimal and look a bit like Pinterest.

Enjoy (and then go take a cold shower).

When we see a new site, gadget or app described as "the next big thing" we usually run for the hills, but Snowglo, a social network, game and reviews site rolled into one, definitely looks interesting, full of incentives and uh... snowy.

To get started with Snowglo you need to create a profile and from there you can collect friends, follow others and most importantly review things, like a film, a product or just anything else. The site tries to be friendly and quirky by telling you that you can review a rainbow or the view from your window, but don't expect many other people to really care about any of that stuff, at the moment games, films and tech products are proving to be the most popular.

You can browse through reviews and if you find someone who writes about things you like in a way you like then you can follow them and gather followers yourself by writing awesome stuff. Other followers give you kudos for your content and you can earn badges, awards and eventually money the more you write. Of course adding in gaming features isn't really new or surprising, but it's a nice touch and a way to incentivise people to leave more reviews of a better quality.

We don't mean to sound fluffy here (alright, sometimes) but we kinda love and hate the fact you work your way up through different animals as you get more kudos, starting off as just a snowflake then becoming a yeti or a wolf and stuff. Oh and did we mention the logo is a big polar bear? Yep...

We're not sure whether Snowglo should really be described as a social network, but it's admittedly a pretty subjective term. Just because you're kind of interacting with other people online are you on a social network? Maybe, but it seems much more of a review platform than anything else.

We're not sure Snowglo will take off given there are so many similar offerings and places people turn to for reviews already, like Amazon, but it's an interesting concept and the inclusion of game mechanics, the light hearted tone and easy-to-use features may certainly pull in a jolly reviewing crowd.

There are all kinds of cool things to do and visit in London, like museums, art galleries and historical stuff, but arguably the best thing about the capital is the FOOD. But the thing is it can be really hard to keep up with the latest hot dog joints, pop-up restaurants, dining experiences, outdoor eating feasts, we really could go on and on. Then there's the issue of who you take to watch you eat those burgers like a cannibal, you said you'd go with a friend from work, your flatmates, but you'd also like to meet new people and chat about new things. OK, OK we know it's a #firstworldproblem, but it's a problem nonetheless.

Well enter nibblr, a social network that aims to connect you with fellow food lovers, plan meals at great venues and most importantly eat to your heart's content.

So let's address the name, yep it's totally cliche (let's just add an R to the end, yeah? YEAH?), but it's also cute and catchy, so we'll let it slide...

To get started with nibblr you sign yourself up for an account with all the usual stuff, like your basic details, a photo and a bit about who you are and why you'd be interesting to eat with. If you're not interesting don't worry, you can still sign up or just lie.

Once you've got an account you're ready to go and can start browsing eating experiences in your local area that have been submitted by local restaurants. You can read a bit about what you'll get, how much it'll cost and who'll be joining you.

If you're into networking nibblr is a brilliant tool because you can view (read:stalk) the people that'll be joining you before you sign up yourself. But don't worry you don't have to be some neurotic social butterfly all the time, you can put your name down for a meal on your own so you can meet a whole table of new people or bully your friends into joining you too.

Neil Rafferty, nibblr's CEO, said:

"Eating has always been a social thing, but finding a restaurant is a social experience too. We're trying to bring people together over a shared love of food in a way that is useful and exciting. The whole process of deciding where and what to eat, organising who we're eating with, through to reviewing how the night went is why we decided to launch nibblr - we felt there needed to be a place to do all of that online."

We can't wait to get started, get meeting new people and obviously get eating. Our only problem with the nibblr experience is that in the dining tips section users are urged to not sit and Instagram their food or overshare too much with people they've just met, which are both integral parts of our eating experiences....

Visit nibblr.co.uk and stuff your faces.

if you're a gif-loving, photo collecting hipster you'll have already logged into your Tumblr account today to find that the site will be down for maintenance this weekend.

According to the message that pops up on your home screen, the team are working hard to improve the performance and reliability of the blogging platform, but that means the site will be down for at least a few hours starting at 9am here in the UK on Saturday morning.

You know what this means boys and girls? We may have to all face up to the shocking prospect of a morning (or god forbid, whole day) without dancing gifs. We know, it's hard, we might not all make it, but we'll be here to help you on the other side. Good luck.

Related: 5 Laugh out loud Tumblr blogs to follow: When in London, Suri's Burn Book

Do you ever wonder whether your incessant checking of your ex's Facebook page around 5,696,393 times a day or that 12 hour long Pinterest session till 4am could mean there's something actually wrong with your brain? No? Just us? Well according to reports over in the US, the American Psychiatric Association is ready to add "Internet Use Disorder" to its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which is a long-winded way of saying your worrying addiction to Facebook could become an actual, like, THING.

Although we receive stats and studies about internet addiction all the time, and many in the field have commented on it being just as hard to kick as nicotine and even drugs, an actual internet disorder hasn't been officially recognised. However, now it might be added into the APA's big book of mental disorders there could be a number of implications for how we view and treat those who claim to have an actual addiction to the web and cat videos and Facebook stalking.

According to Digital Trends and the New York Post, some of the symptoms include:

Preoccupation with online gambling and a need to spend more time wagering via the Internet.

Withdrawal symptoms when computer use is denied.

Continued excessive Internet use by an individual, even if he or she knows how dangerous the problem has become.

Lying to shrinks and loved ones about excessive Internet use and online gambling.

Losing interest in other forms of entertainment and hobbies.

Just don't take a week off in the coming months and claim you're drained and battling an internet addiction, that's not going to be a valid excuse. Not yet anyway.

[Via Digital Trends]

Yesterday the whole of the world imploded when Metro France reported that old private messages are now appearing on user's timelines for all of their friends to see. OH DEAR LORD.

Although the rumours began over in France it wasn't long before people from all over the globe were scrolling back through their timelines (most of the problems seemed to occur in 2007, 2008 and 2009) and finding that some of their once private messages had been made visible.

Since everything started kicking off yesterday evening A LOT has happened, the story was picked up by every major news outlet, people started freaking out about what they'd said, others were frantically going through their Facebook accounts and making everything private and some users even went to extreme measures and deleted their profiles. FOREVER.

This morning, after an official statement from Facebook in TechCrunch, it seems that most agree there wasn't a private message security breach after all, but the messages we're seeing on our profiles are just old wall posts that were written back when we were all excitedly using Facebook, back when timelines didn't allow us to dig up the past, back when comments and likes didn't exist and back when we didn't have as much self restraint about what we said for all to see.

Here's a snippet of the statement:

"Every report we've seen, we've gone back and checked. We haven't seen one report that's been confirmed [of a private message being exposed]. A lot of the confusion is because before 2009 there were no likes and no comments on wall posts. People went back and forth with wall posts instead of having a conversation [in the comments of single wall post.]"

And...

"A small number of users raised concerns after what they mistakenly believed to be private messages appeared on their Timeline. Our engineers investigated these reports and found that the messages were older wall posts that had always been visible on the users' profile pages. Facebook is satisfied that there has been no breach of user privacy."

Although all of that certainly seems plausible (and makes perfect sense in retrospect), there are still many users who are still adamant the messages they saw were private and claim that Facebook is just trying to cover up its mistake by calling them all crazed liars.

Obviously it'll be fascinating to see how this all pans out, whether there has in fact been a leak among some users or whether it's all just us working ourselves into a frenzy. However in the cold light of day we don't think it matters too much whether it's true or not, because it's taught us some very, very interesting things about how we behave, our attitude to Facebook and all of the bitchy things we've been saying.

We're all saying too many bitchy things online

I was with a few different people when I heard about the "Facebook message leak apocalypse" and followed the story really closely online. The main thing that became apparent from everyone's crazed tweets was just how many people were worried that the scandalous/dirty/cheating messages or those bitchy things that were said by X about Y could be exposed (myself totally included).

Poppy Dinsey (@poppyd) the founder of WIWT.com summed it up brilliantly in a tweet last night:

"You know the scene in Mean Girls where photocopied pages from the burn book go all around the school? That's Facebook's privacy leak."

We don't think a (maybe fake) Facebook security breach will change humanity and stop us all being such dirty little gossipers, but maybe we should all take a long, hard look at ourselves and the things we've been saying and just be a little, well, nicer because there's always a chance someone else (i.e. Mark Zuckerberg) could get their hands on your burn book at anytime they please.

We now use the social network in very different ways

Even if some of those old posts were private messages and others were wall posts, it's clear that we did use Facebook in a totally different way a few years ago.

Now users generally write on timelines when they want to ask a quick question, share a link or post a photo, but back in 2007 posts that we know were on our profiles are much longer, rambling and full of things we wouldn't want others to be reading nowadays. We imagine a whole research paper could be written on this very subject, but it's partially to do with the design of the social network changing dramatically over the years and partially to do with us getting more savvy (or secretive and bitchy) when it comes to what we say and share online.

We probably need to spend less time on Facebook

When you found out about the security breach what were you most worried about? Bitchy things? Personal information? Those drunken messages you sent to your crush? (NOT GUILTY) Whatever it was it's scary to think many of us use the social network so much to write about super personal things and even if there wasn't a breach, just imagine if there was one an even more epic scale in the future? Scary, huh? Maybe we should take things into the realms of emails, call people or oh god talk about our feelings face to face? Scrap that, we'll stick with emails.

Some people get REALLY aggressive if someone tries to prove them wrong

It's no surprise that last night some users were getting really upset about having their private messages exposed and others thought they were all just being hysterical.

Twitter arguments are always fascinating, but last night it was even more interesting to see how defensive others got, so as well as being less bitchy, let's all be a little less agressive too, OK?

Looking like a Pinterest for your personal and branded social media platforms, RebelMouse aims to gather most of your digital footprint in one handy place for others to see (Facebook, Twitter and Instragram for now but we expect them to tie in other channels as the platform matures).

Besides the initial questions surrounding Facebook and how its privacy settings work, this startup looks promising. Still in beta, with a growing list of tech titans and social media personalities signed up to it already, the service could just be exactly what we've been waiting for.

So what is it that could make RebelMouse the next big thing in social curation?

RebelMouse clearly got the memo that visual content is compelling. Taking the formula of bite sized posts with a header, subheader and an image (already proved popular through the success of Pinterest), you're instantly drawn into the stories or updates as you scroll through a user's profile.

To remind you of that all-important image, RebelMouse has created its own share button 'Stick it!' (like the 'Pin it' of Pinterest or 'Take it to Branch' of.. well Branch) for when you want to share a story you've stumbled across on the web.

This brings me to the next point. RebelMouse also focuses on the user-experience. Like a blog come Twitter come Facebook, it makes it very easy to (re)produce content with just a couple of clicks. Hassle-free content creation and aggregation!

From the opposite perspective, for visitors it is a great way to learn about the person or brand in one go without having to look at all three of their social streams. Who knows what you might have missed when you were busy doing other things?

You can also invite 'collaborators' to appear in your stream, which will be very handy for companies or publications where their employees' social media activity is as important as the company's.

Design wise you are fairly limited to what your profile looks like. The current minimalistic look appeals to me, but when coming out of beta and into advance mode you will be able to 'hack your own CSS for your RebelMouse site.

But how does RebelMouse plan to make any money off its free service, besides the planned personalised iOS apps? According to Mashable '"[it] hopes to monetise organically by providing businesses an e-commerce platform, allowing people such as photographers and fashion designers to sell their wares in a dynamic, visual way. Another form of monetization they plan on is sponsored content'.

A note of warning though. When you sign up to RebelMouse (using your Facebook, Twitter or Instragram log ins), you're giving it access to grab your content from these profiles. If you, like me, use social networks for different purposes - private (Facebook) and public (Twitter/Instagram) - you should perhaps think twice before granting RebelMouse access to all networks. From what I could see, it only curated my 'public' Facebook updates, but I revoked access either way just to be on the safe side.

Are you ready to be curated?

This story was first published by digital content agency Sutro Digital.

We all know that there are hundreds of ways to share important events, holidays and trips with our friends and family, whether it's constant updates on Twitter or some dreamy photos over on Instagram. However, this means that often everything has been fragmented across multiple platforms and we don't have a big, accurate picture of what we really got up to while we were away.

Well now a new service called Irrive (which only exists online right now, but would make a great app), which is being described as a "social scrapbook" aims to streamline all your photos, updates, check-ins and any other kinds of things you do online and bring them together in one place.

You begin by providing Irrive with access to your social networks and it'll then use that data to collect together everything about your holiday or road trip or life event in a way that makes much more sense and seems like you're telling a story rather than just sharing random snippets.

Now admittedly it looks a little bit twee and will no doubt appeal to those who create irritating things, like wedding pages and Facebook events for their cat's birthday. However, what we do find interesting is the very different approach to storytelling, instead of separating data across multiple platforms based on different types of content and different audiences, it's being squeezed together in a way that makes much more sense, like a proper story about what happened.

[Via Gigaom]

Another day another legal battle in Zuckerberg land as Facebook is being sued by a Chinese company, which claims to have created a feature identical to the Timeline long before the social network implemented its own version.

Cubic Network, a Pinterest-style start-up founded by Harvard graduate Xiong Wanli, has been using a chronologically scrolling page to present videos and pictures since February 2008. While it'd certainly be easy to mark the similarities to Facebook's Timeline (which was rolled out incrementally to users from November 2011) as purely coincidental, things take a slightly more suspect turn once you learn that Zuckerberg attended a talk by Wanli detailing the timeline feature. SCANDALOUS.

Wanli also claims the logo to Facebook's annual F8 developer conference is very similar to Cubic Network's own, and that the Chinese network's R&D centre was called F8 long before Zuckerberg founded his annual event.

Inspired, a rip-off, or merely coincidence? Well no one's quite sure and the courts will undoubtedly have to make that decision, but it's not as if Zuckerberg is one to back down from a controversial legal spat. Watch this space.

[Via Tech Digest Via The Register]

Oh don't worry, we've all been there. You got a bit drunk, you dropped your phone down the toilet, or left it on the bar, or just threw it somewhere and now you have no phone and no numbers. Awhh lots of sad little emoticons for you :( :( :(. But fear not because a clever new service called NeedNumbers.me is here to piece your life back together one Facebook friend at a time.

NeedNumbers.me removes the need for you to set up one of those "OMGZ I LOST MY PHONE AGAIN, WHAT A LOSER" groups and re-add each number separately, instead it connects up to your Facebook account and gives you a breakdown of every group and event you're part of. It'll then create a list of all of your friends and the phone numbers they've shared with everyone recently.

There's bound to be some repetitions and incorrect numbers, so you can then go through them, amend the contact details and have the numbers and contact details saved directly to your phone.

Now admittedly this isn't always going to work and people have pseudonyms and some people don't share their correct numbers, etc, etc, but it's certainly a clever and handy idea for the clumsy phone losing people amongst us.

[Via TechCrunch Image via Jo Jakeman Flickr]

Many of you probably didn't know that in the past if you tried to delete a photo on Facebook of you looking particularly drunk/falling over/kissing a random person, then it would have been removed from your profile straight away but stayed right there on Facebook's servers, meaning it still existed somewhere in the dark depth of the internet with a long and confusing URL.

Now admittedly it'd be hard to ever find those incriminating photos, but it's kind of not right that deleting something never actually, well you know, deleted it. But now the social network has finally got round to deleting the photos. Like actually. For good.

According to Cnet, Facebook will now only be holding onto photos for 30 days in its content delivery network (CDN) until they're gone forever:

"As a result of work on our policies and infrastructure, we have instituted a 'max-age' of 30 days for our CDN links."

However, the statement from Facebook spokesperson Frederic Wolens also stated that all photos still disappear from profiles straight away, and some of the CDN links could be gone in a matter of hours.

It's a little irritating that Facebook hasn't been deleting deleted content sooner, but it's probably only those who have no lives or have terrible things to hide that are really that bothered, right?

[Via Cnet]

We haven't been excited about the launch of a new social network since Google+ (you know, the one with the dancing circles), but over the past week we've heard a lot of interesting things about the subscription-based alternative to Twitter, App.net, which is currently in development...

So what is it?

On its home page right now App.net is described as a "real-time social feed without the ads", so just think Twitter but for those who get irritated by some of the annoying things it does and want a platform that's dedicated to them and not advertisers:

"We believe that advertising-supported social services are so consistently and inextricably at odds with the interests of users and developers that something must be done."

Awh what a lovely little online utopia.

However, it's not just about creating a nicer online space for users, but after growing concerns about Twitter's relationship with developers the App.net creators aim to keep the platform as open as possible.

The catch with App.net is that unfortunately you do have to pay for it because, let's face it, the creators have to bring money in somehow. You can sign up now to become a member for a year and it'll cost you $50, although there's no indication of whether that number will get higher or lower in the future.

But is it actually going to be any good?

Well it's hard to say given the fact it's not properly up and running yet (and obviously because we don't have $50 to just throw into the online ether right now), but regardless of whether you think App.net is genius or ridiculous it seems plenty of others are really buying into the idea of a fairly ad free online space. This morning The Next Web reported that the creators have already surpassed their funding goal of $500,000 and big tech names as well as celebrities have already signed up, such as Stephen Fry.

The main problem with the idea behind App.net is that we wonder how many people out there (other than social media geeks, of course) REALLY care about an ad or two in their Twitter feed or the fact an app has been granted access to their account? The answer is probably very few, so whether App.net will be successful among anyone but techies in the future remains to be seen, but we guess that's kind of the whole point...

Find out more about App.net.

The term "early adopter" was first used by Everett Rogers in his Diffusion of Innovations theory to describe an adopter category of individuals who are often early customers of any given company or product or technology. However, it's often used as a bit of an insult to take the mickey out of those who brag about being one of the first to try this product or one of the earliest to start using that.

Well now if you're interested in learning just how early you really are when it comes to adopting new social networks (or really just Instagram, Google+ and Twitter), then a new site called idego.co tells you when you first signed up and where you stand in relation to the rest of your friends.

You simply visit the website and then give it access to your Twitter, Instagram, Foursquare and Google Plus accounts to see where you rank.

The Next Web says it seems a bit like navel gazing, and it is, but if you're obsessed with being the earliest (you're just so cool), want to see where you stand in relation to your mates or you're just intrigued to see when you signed up, then give it a try.

Do bear in mind that you're giving the app access to your social media profiles, so you may want to go and revoke access quickly after...

[Via The Next Web]

Facebook has taken a leaf out of Pinterest and Tumblr's book and will be rolling out a brand new look for photos over the next few weeks, which it claims will be "more beautiful" and "make viewing photos more enjoyable".

The changes will mean that your photos no longer neatly sit side-by-side one another below all of your albums, but instead they'll stretch to fit the whole screen. You can showcase the ones that make you look awesome by highlighting them in the same way you can draw attention to certain pieces of content on your timeline.

The new layout makes a lot of sense, because instead of seeing albums followed by photos you're tagged in there are now just three tabs, "photos of you", "photos" and "albums". After all, it's only the elite stalkers who really bother to browse through albums anymore, right?

Some users are noticing the new "mosaic" layout right now, but we expect you'll all start to see it over the next week or so.

[Via Facebook's Newsroom]

A group of clever Facebook engineers have finally brought us a way to see upcoming events in a calendar-style layout. So you can view everything you've been invited to in a given month at once, which is usually how calendars work...

Facebook's new Events Calendar feature allows you to flick between a list or calendar view and not only do you see the events you've been invited to, but you can see suggested events, events that friends are attending, photos of people who have a birthday coming up soon and even take a look at things going on at places you've checked-in to before and events pages you've liked are holding, whether it's a venue or a band. Wow, we're all going to be REALLY busy once the new feature kicks in.

You click on any event to be taken through to the dedicated page set up for it and can move back through months too, just as you would with a regular calendar. It's not particularly exciting or innovative, especially if you're good at organising your commitments elsewhere, but it's handy for Facebook social butterflies and will probably make us more likely to turn up to things.

Facebook product engineer Bob Baldwin told Digital Trends:

"A few of us created a Facebook group called "Social Calendar Dreamers" to spark discussion around making Events more visual. At the next hackathon, engineers from the events, photos, messages and other teams hacked through the night to build a better way to view events. By 6 a.m., we had a prototype that worked."

Some users have already noticed the added feature once they click through to Events Calendar, but if it's not been rolled out to you yet expect it in the next few weeks.

[Via Digital Trends]

Our sister site Connected Health explores the latest idea to get people moving from Nike Mexico, a Facebook auction that allows you to win cool stuff the more you run...

Most fitness apps reward users the more they workout, whether they get a shiny little badge (on their phones, not in real life unfortunately), climb up a leader board above their friends or gain access to exclusive content. But why not add a REAL incentive and allow users to win things for their efforts too?

Nike has a range of fitness apps, gadgets and apparel, but in Mexico the brand is working on a new Facebook application called the Subasta de Kilometros, which according to Springwise translates into runners' distances into currency action.

Users must download the Nike+ Running app that we've got here in the UK, or buy one of Nike's many training products that can also track important data like pace, distance and time, such as the FuelBand. Every time a user runs they must then take the gadget with them, collect the data and build up as many kilometres as they can over seven days. Each week a new auction is added to the Subasta de Kilometros app and users can bid based on how many kilometres they've managed to clock up (there's a minimum, so don't take a brief walk and expect to get in on the action, Nike are serious bad asses). If you've got the right amount of kilometres you bid and whoever has the longest distance under their belt wins the prize, which includes Nike clothing, Nike+ equipment and fancy footwear.

For now the Subasta de Kilometros app and challenge is only being held in Mexico, but we can see the idea of gaming within fitness apps being taken even further by other brands in other countries as an extra incentive to get people moving and keep them motivated.

[Via Connected Health Via Springwise]