Yes, we know half of you are so sick of the Pinterest-related posts already and the other half of you are sat there furiously pinning away and sharing bags and books and blankets. But yesterday LLSocial uncovered something rather interesting about the 'website of the moment' that you may find a little surprising...

According to LLSocial Pinterest has been making money from affiliate links:

"If you post a pin to Pinterest, and it links to an ecommerce site that happens to have an affiliate program, Pinterest modifies the link to add their own affiliate tracking code. If someone clicks through the picture from Pinterest and makes a purchase, Pinterest gets paid."

The blog post goes on to state that Pinterest is using popular affiliate marketing service Skimlinks, and although many small sites use it too, it looks like Pinterest could be its biggest client to date...

Disclosure: Shiny Shiny is a Skimlinks partner

[Via LLSocial]

Now before I begin, know that I'm a big fan of Pinterest. I see how the very clever and popular visual inspiration site is useful to individuals and even brands alike. I use it for all different kinds of purposes from bookmarking articles, collecting images as inspiration for projects and just looking at places I'd like to go and hair I'd like to have (yes, sometimes I'm that shallow). But, I can't help but think there's something a little sad about sitting there collecting together beautiful and idyllic images day in and day out.

Yesterday as I sat there re-pinning all kinds of photos, I started thinking about how and why I use Pinterest. I've been using it for quite a while now (not in a cringeworthy "I had it before you" kinda way) and find that most of the things I pin are really useful to me. In many ways I use it as a way to bookmark sites and articles, whether it's a piece about a cool gadget or a make-up tutorial, and find that saving a photo rather than a link in some random bookmarks folder just works so much better for me and suits the way my brain is wired. I then save some things for future inspiration (like a tattoos board of designs I'd like one day) or motivation (a bit of a cheesy board with fitness quotes to get me out running) and I've never found a better way to store that kind of content before.

However, I've found that some part of my time on Pinterest is just spent looking at the lovely lives of others and re-pinning, re-pinning and re-pinning. Whether it's things I wish I was eating or places I wish I was or people I wish I looked like or a bag I wish I could afford. Although 90% of my time on Pinterest is productive and about collecting together images I need to refer to in the future (like a gadget I want to write about for Shiny, a recipe I want to cook or a place I want to visit in summer), others were pinned in a dreamy daze and I know I'm not the only one who's done that in the past few weeks, even if none of you are willing to admit it.

Part of me thinks there's nothing wrong with looking at lovely images because (despite the fact I have no experience in psychology) I imagine it has a positive impact on your well-being and mood. But, at the same time it seems there's something very sad about living your life through a series of beautiful, dreamy images when really we should be out there making them ourselves.

As I thought about Pinterest and how myself and all the people I follow are using it, I was reminded of a great piece by BitchBuzz editor, Cate Sevilla, a few months ago about how far too many of us are living our lives vicariously through photos on Tumblr. Although Cate was mainly referring to the lives of bloggers on Tumblr, I think in a way we're still living our lives vicariously through Pinterest photos, even if we don't know the identity of the people in them.

In many ways this has absolutely nothing to do with Pinterest, but more to do with the fact we spend so much of our time online looking at images. Images that will help us, motivate us and prove useful in the future, but also those that will make us day dream, waste time and make us want to be somewhere or even someone else.

As with every social network, it totally depends on how you use it, I'm sure a lot of users just pin the the sensible stuff and bookmark a cool article or a piece of street art they think is awesome. But you only have to go browse through other boards (and sites like We Heart It) to see that's not how everyone uses it. Maybe it's something wrong with me and the other day dreamers out there, maybe we're destined to be airy-fairy observers who don't JUST GET ON WITH IT.

But, from now on I certainly won't be giving up on Pinterest. After all, it's probably my favourite place to scurry away to online. However, I might not fall into the rabbit hole of pinning things because I want them in my life anymore and only collect together images that are useful and will get me out there doing things later and not keep me locked up in a little beautiful fantasy land.

How do you find yourself using Pinterest? There's nothing wrong with re-pinning lovely things, but do you think you get a little carried away?

We're no longer surprised when we come across research that claims checking emails, tweets and scrolling through Facebook is addictive. Just go into any office around midday and you'll see good, hard proof of that.

However, a new study of our everyday desires has found that the urge to keep on top of our emails and check what our friends are doing online is stronger than the desire to smoke and drink, which is pretty worrying given how addictive they are.

The research was published this week in a journal called Psychological Studies, which also found that our ability to resist a quick Facebook fix lessens throughout the day.

Dr Wilhelm Hofmann, the University of Chicago Booth School of Business who oversaw the study, said:

"Modern life is a welter of assorted desires marked by frequent conflict and resistance, the latter with uneven success. As a day wears on, willpower becomes lower and self-control efforts are more likely to fail."

However, although we admit to being completely addicted to checking emails, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram (the list really could go on and on) constantly ourselves, we're a bit wary about the conclusions drawn from a study that's only polled 200 people. Let's hope more conclusive research is carried out in this area soon before everything becomes a little too much like The Matrix.

[Via All Facebook Image via Geekosystem]

We've written about our love for blogging platform Jux a few times in the past, but have often felt it needs just a little bit more work before it's going to replace the likes of Tumblr and even Wordpress further down the line.

So, it's pretty exciting that Jux has this week announced it'll be hooking up with Instagram to allow users to share their blurry, retro shots alongside images from the likes of Facebook and Flickr too.

The main thing we love about Jux is that it makes our images look AMAZING. They're displayed in a fancy grid-like layout, can be swiped and moved around easily and take up the whole screen. So, it makes sense that Jux would team up with an awesome photo editing tool to make our photos and blogs look even slicker.

It really comes as no surprise that the FBI is looking to monitor social networks even more closely than it (presumably) already does. However, up until now there's been no official evidence as to what its online activities are, other than being wary of Second Life of course. Well, until now.

According to New Scientist, earlier this month a document was released that revealed the FBI is on the lookout for companies who would be willing to build an advanced social media monitoring system. From the document it seems that the FBI hopes to be able to automatically search for any material on social media sites that mentions specific keywords relating to terrorism and FBI operations.

The FBI then wants to be able to display this kind of information onto a map, to get a better understanding of where problems are breaking out and find out straight away where the nearest US embassies and military installations are.

As the main aim is to monitor what's being said, the FBI is hoping to locate and get a grip of crises as they're happening, but there's also a large focus on predicting problems before they occur, which makes us think back to the supposed online planning that went on before the riots here in London.

Other than details from the document there's been no official word from the FBI about its social media plans and monitoring ideas moving forward. The thing that we're most interested to see is whether the bureau will be given any access to private updates and posts on the likes of Facebook and Twitter, even though we doubt that social networks would cave to the FBI's demands it could be something that shifts in the future. On the one hand it may seem intrusive, but if global security is threatened would you really mind if someone was peering at your private Facebook updates about nights out now and again?

[Via New Scientist]

The online personalities we've created for ourselves nowadays may be much more realistic than they were back in the Myspace years (I know I'm not the only one guilty of posing, applying tonnes of make-up and Photohopping EVERYTHING, right?!), but even now they're still not completely accurate representations of our real lives. After all, you can't possibly express everything that happens from day-to-day online! So although someone may seem to have only the most idyllic, fun-loving, photos and status updates on Facebook, that doesn't mean every second of their life is filled with holidays, gorgeous friends and lovely clothes.

Although I'm sure we're all well aware of this, it's sometimes hard to not feel a little envious of that blogger with the designer wardrobe, time to cook cupcakes every night and a seemingly perfect job. But that green-eyed 'Facebook envy' feeling is only natural, right?

Well, a new study conducted by a team of sociologists at the Utah Valley University found that the way we view our lives and ourselves could very much be dependent on how much time we spend online, which is hardly good news for those of us who need to constantly check social media a lot as part of our jobs...

The research took around 400 students and asked them a series of statements about their lives, such as "life is fair" or "many of my friends have a better life than me". They were then asked all kinds of questions about Facebook, including how much time they spend on the social network, to see if there was any correlation.

The team soon found a pattern in that those who spend more time on Facebook start to think other people have a much better life than they do, which is a little worrying, but hardly surprising.

Two members of the team, Hui-Tzu Grace Chou and Nicholas Edge said:

"Those who have used Facebook longer agreed more that others were happier, and agreed less that life is fair, and those spending more time on Facebook each week agreed more that others were happier and had better lives. Furthermore, those that included more people whom they did not personally know as their Facebook "friends" agreed more that others had better lives."

It's sad to think that browsing through the lives of your friends could have a negative impact on how you view yourself and your little place in the world. But, although in many ways the likes of Facebook and Twitter mean our online and offline lives are more closely connected than ever before, you still need to remember that photos, status updates and seemingly perfect lives can be tweaked, exaggerated and manufactured. The quicker you realise that and tear yourself away from the computer the happier you'll be - which sounds easy in theory...

[Via Digital Trends]

Ahh Pinterest, we've professed our love for the quirky virtual pin board website many times in the past, but over the last few weeks it's gained a huge following very very quickly.

It's always had a fairly active community, but now everyone (and we mean everyone) has woken up to the site. If you don't believe us, then log into that Pinterest account you registered then swiftly abandoned a few months back and we bet you've had a sudden influx of new followers, despite the fact you have no idea what 'pinning' really is.

There's been a lot of speculation about why Pinterest has become such a big hit, but whether it's due to the fact it's been featured on a tonne of "networks to try in the new year" lists, because the site has started giving out more invites, or everyone's decided to follow our social media resolutions for 2012 (we know this is the real reason), there's no hiding from it.

What is it?

Pinterest is best described as a "virtual pinboard", so you collect content you've found from across the web and then "pin" it to different boards. You can create as many different boards as you like (like say "Tattoos" or "Travel), attach as many pins as you want to them and then browse the boards of others.

Why does it rock?

The 'Pin It' button that you can add to your browser makes pinning all kinds of images and photo content really easy. Once you've done it for a few days it'll come as second nature when you see anything that interests or inspires you.

You can use it however you please. Even though many non-users make fun of Pinterest for being all about cute things and crafts, there are really no limits to how you can use it, and as more and more users sign up, the content added by the whole community gets even more diverse.

It's so easy to re-pin content that others have uploaded. Although we wouldn't advise you only re-publish images from other people, Pinterest makes it so easy to share among the community.

You can tag, like and comment among the community, which makes it a great place to share ideas, find relevant content and make connections with those who have similar interests.

It has a simple and intuitive interface, which puts great looking content at the centre of the site and doesn't waste any space or fuss on unnecessary details.

How do I get started?

It's pretty simple, which is another reason we think it's just so awesome. Once you've signed up for an account, added your details and uploaded a photo, you need to start making boards.

To add boards, simply click "add" in the top right hand corner and go to "create a board". This is where you can give your board a name, a category and then decide whether it's just you who can pin to it or other contributors.

To add pins you need the "Pin It" button and then as soon as you see an image you want to pin you simply press that, select the right image, select the right board, add some tags and then decide whether you want to share it with your Facebook or Twitter followers.

To find the right images, it's best to name boards and tag pins in an explicit way. However, sometimes a board called "Eats & Treats" is much more fun than one just called "Desserts".

To search for content or people, use the "search" bar in the top left hand corner and you can find other users, pins and you can even search within your own pins too.

Related: Pinterest: Is it just full of crafts, cookies and kittens?

The new year isn't just about throwing out your Christmas tree and eating a few salads to make up for all the mince pies you stuffed your face with. If you really want to be more happy and efficient in 2012 you're going to need to give your online life a bit of a tidy up too.

Here are a few online ideas to make this year the best yet, after all, you should never under-estimate the impact a messy email inbox or an annoying Facebook friend can have on your happiness!

1. Use Pinterest to keep all your favourite images safe and organised

Every time you see an image online that interests or inspires you what do you do with it? Sure you can save it to your computer, but what if you want to reference it later? Or find similar images from the same blogger?

Pinterest allows you to 'pin' content to virtual boards, so you can collect together all kinds of images, keep them super organised and then share them with your friends. This is invaluable for making collections of photos that inspire you, creating mood boards or storing pictures you want to use in blog posts at a later date.

Of course you don't have to use Pinterest, but find an image curating and bookmarking tool that lets you add a bookmarklet to your browser so you're much more likely to actually use it!

2. Clear out your Google Reader

If you actively use Google Reader (or any other RSS reading tool), then chances are you've been collecting together lots of interesting sites and blogs over the past few years.

However, this means that sometimes you can wake up with 1000+ unread articles that you're never going to get round to reading. So sort through your Google Reader and if a blog isn't useful, interesting or inspiring to you anymore, then unsubscribe.

3. Get rid of Facebook and Twitter 'friends' that wind you up/annoy you/just aren't relevant

How many times have you heard someone say they hate Facebook or Twitter? Really they don't hate the social network (not usually anyway), but they're sick of friends and followers who post boring and irrelevant updates.

I think we've all gotten over the fact we get unfriended and unfollowed from time to time, so just bite the bullet and get rid of anyone who writes anything that's annoying or offensive.

Yes it sounds a bit harsh, but you'll start to find more interesting content, connect with the people that matter and see Twitter and Facebook as useful rather than just time suckers.

4. Find the blogging platform that suits you...

In our opinion if you want to write lengthy posts and use an intuitive interface then Wordpress should be your new BFF. If you prefer short pieces of content that's SUPER easy to publish then try Tumblr. Or, if you want to try something new and love big, beautiful images then try Jux. It doesn't matter which you choose, just set up an account and get blogging!

5. ...then actually use it to blog

It's easy to set up a blog, make it look lovely and write that witty, engaging and all important 'about' page, but then you need to actually write something and keep it up throughout the year.

Unless you blog for your day job, for many blogging should be a retreat from the big nasty world of work. However, approaching a blog as "just a bit of fun" often means many people don't keep it up or stay disciplined. Therefore, don't make it a chore but schedule in some time each week to make sure you've got something to publish.

6. Don't waste away the day stalking and aimlessly browsing

We waste an insane amount of time stalking old photos and scrolling through tweets. If you're still finding yourself getting distracted after culling a whole load of people, then read our post about how to stop procrastinating online and get blocking those time sucking websites.

7. Embrace a new network or cool app

You're probably thinking that you can't squeeze another social network into your day, but you may find you like something much more than what you're using at the moment. If you haven't tried them already check out some of our favourites, Instagram, Path and Google+.

8. Get the new Facebook timeline and sort through it

Everyone should be able to activate the new Facebook timeline by now, so go get it and sort through your old stories and any embarrassing photos you don't want anyone to see.

9. Organise your Twitter followers into lists

If you're following lots of people, sorting them into lists can take so long, but it's worth it in the long run and makes Twitter so much easier to digest once you're done.

10. Unsubscribe from emails and updates you don't need

If you've bought anything online, chances are you've been forced into getting a newsletter at some point or getting updates from social networks or discount websites. Instead of just deleting these annoying emails every morning force yourself to unsubscribe.

[Image via Pinterest]

Although using social media can be a great way to catch up with friends and switch off, many of us use it as part of our jobs, so it can sometimes feel a bit too much like work to tweet and update and snap filter-y photos when we're trying to get away from it all and have a holiday.

So how many of you will be having a social media blackout this Christmas?

Well according to stats from Sky over the past few years, people are less likely to be online over Christmas but do love to watch TV. No surprises there really, we like to replace mundane tweets with mundane TV.

Sky Broadband reports that both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day have 27% lower peak traffic than on an average week day, and the total data downloaded is 20% lower than an average weekend day, which means it's usually the internet's quietest period of the year.

In contrast, figures from Sky TV show that we remain a nation of TV lovers during the festive period, with Christmas Day being the most popular day of the year in terms of watching the telly.

It'll be interesting to see whether these stats change year upon year as more people give internet connected gadgets to one another, or as watching content online as a family becomes even more popular.

It's crazy that so many brands are desperately trying to bump up their Twitter and Facebook numbers when in actual fact a small pomeranian dog will probably always have a much larger following than most of them combined. Here are our top 10 internet animals of the year, some are extremely popular, some are laugh out loud funny and others are just a bit weird.

1. Boo

The most popular dog on the internet, Boo the pomeranian has well over two million fans on Facebook and there's even been a plush toy made of him and a book written about his life. He's really made it.

2. Cookie the laughing penguin

The cutest little penguin you ever did see.

3. Maru

Maru loves boxes and bags and small spaces. He's probably the cutest cat we've ever seen. And the craziest of course.

4. Cheeky cat

Not as much of an online personality as the others on the list, but this has got to be one of the best cat videos of the year.

5. Raccoon Willie

A weird little raccoon that's made friends with humans. Check out the YouTube channel for more videos.

6. Beast

The Facebook page for Mark Zuckerberg's dog, Beast.

7. Bully cat

Another brilliant cat video.

8. Fenton

We get that the Fenton/Benton video is hilarious, but we can't quite believe how HUGE it's become all over the world, with coverage of the video on major news outlets and a whole range of parody videos.

9. Guilty cat

We only recently came across this video on Buzzfeed's list of the most important cats of 2011 and felt the guilty cat deserved a place on this list. That look is PRICELESS.

10. Sockington

There's nothing particularly weird or unusual about Sockington, but he tweets a lot so has amassed more than 1.4 million Twitter followers.

When question and answer community Quora launched to the general public last year, social media geeks were calling it the 'next big thing' and now just over a year later a select few are admittedly still dedicated fans, but most of us have forgotten all about it.

Now in an attempt to make it relevant to a wider audience, Quora is becoming much more like a curation tool than a simple question and answer website. Yesterday Quora Boards was launched, which gives users the means to curate posts from Quora and content from round the web and then save it to a board. Sound familiar? Well yep, that's because one of our favourite sites, Pinterest, uses boards as a way for users to bookmark things too, but from what we can tell Pinterest is much more visual and Quora Boards will allow users to curate all kinds of content.

Just like on Pinterest too, these boards can be public or private and you can have multiple users adding content to each board if you'd like. There's also room for descriptions and comments under the boards too to spark discussions and further sharing.

Don't worry if you're one of the few that loves Quora just how it is, all the regular functionality will still be the same, Quora Boards is just an interesting new add-on. Although, judging from initial responses, dedicated users are worried the new feature could mean the site is full of rubbish content instead of more exclusive, valuable conversations. Only time will tell whether Quora Boards is any good, but it's risky changing the focus so much, although it may draw more people in, the changes could in turn drive the site's biggest advocates away.

[Via All Things D]

If you've got something to share with your significant other you'd usually text them, email them or DM them on Twitter, right? Well, a new app and social network called Between wants to give you a special little virtual place to cosy up to your girl/boy instead of having to contact them through other channels. It sounds kind of sweet, but is it also utterly pointless?

Between is what you'd imagine, like a mini Facebook just for you and your partner where you can share content, photo albums and memories (awh), all you need to do is enter their phone number into the app and you can start sharing.

According to The Next Web, the minds behind Between are mainly targeting Asian users, who (judging from behaviour on social networks) are a little more uncomfortable about sharing personal details online than us party-loving Brits. Therefore the app has been released in English, Japanese, Chinese and Korean in recent months. And, although it may seem very twee and stupid to some people, the 62,000 who have downloaded it and are actively using it worldwide would probably disagree.

It kind of makes sense that an app which encourages couples to communicate more would be healthy for modern day relationships, after all if women's glossy magazines are anything to go by (probably not), lack of communication is one of the main reasons happy couples break up. However, if you're already content with emailing, texting, DMing, Facetiming, Skyping or calling (we could go on and on here) your significant other, then we're not sure Between will crowbar its way into your daily routine.

Between is available from both iTunes and the Android Market for free.

[Via The Next Web]

If you're the type of person who signs up to every new social network as soon as it launches, tweets, updates their status and likes everything on Facebook, snaps photos for Instagram and Flickr, pins a load of photos on Pinterest and reads all kinds of blogs, then just getting through the sea of information on a daily basis can lead to what's commonly known as 'social media meltdown'.

Well according to Mashable this morning, a new service called Bottlenose aims to cherry pick the best bits of your social networks and feed them to you in a way that doesn't lead to lots of panicking and procrastination.

Bottlenose basically works by allowing you to customise what you can see into feeds. So for instance, you can make sure you see all of your friend's work related posts from every network in a feed, but nothing to do with their kids. The same goes for different topics and industries, things that are trending and content from highly influential people.

This all sounds interesting but a little dull and the thing that really stands out about Bottlenose is instead of viewing all of these feeds in a long list or RSS reader format, you can see it as a node map. Bottlenose also employs an advanced kind of linguistic analysis tool too, in order to better understand the information it filters and make sense of it at the other end.

Bottlenose is a great idea, as it puts the power into the hands of the users. If people can be bothered to sort through, make feeds and get used to the crazy node map interface then it could certainly be an invaluable tool for social media addicts. But then again a lot of services aim to help us manage our social networks and just end up confusing the matter even more.

Take the tour of Bottlenose and tell us what you think.

[Via Mashable]

This week sees Google+ launch its long awaited brand and business pages, rumour has it Instagram may be adding video sharing, how Tweet life and Klout scores are connected, romantic relationships in a social media world, Drinkify and Burberry continues its digital content endeavours.

Google+ launches brand and business pages
After waiting for what seems like forever (in digital time) Google has finally unveiled its Google+ Pages for brands and businesses, and they're... not so different from the personal ones. Having got over the initial disappointment, we've had a play around and checked out some of the brands, like Burberry, that have already extended social initiatives to include Google+. With the launch Google hopes that brands will now share the vast amount of content they are churning out to create a richer experience for its users, and in turn making people use the service on a more regular basis. Google has also introduced an official Google+ Pages guide.

Key points of Google+ Pages
You can +1 a Page to show support or add them to your Circles
No Google+ Page can follow you until you follow them
Google+ Pages will unfollow you automatically if you unfollow them
You can find Google+ Pages in Google+ Search

Burberry attempts 'mass customisation' as it truly establishes itself as a media-content company
Social media forward brand, Burberry is making its first attempt to let people design and purchase their own, personalised version of the company's iconic trench coat. With prices expected to start at $1,800 to $8,800, Burberry Bespoke will see almost 12 million combination, ensuring unique designs are obtainable. If you can't afford the real thing, you can still create a design and share it on Twitter and Facebook.

Instagram to introduce video sharing?
We love Instagram (so much that we've run an Instagram photo competition with our sister company) and apparently the photo sharing iPhone app is now looking to introduce video sharing according to The Next Web. As these rumours excite us iPhone users, it seems like Android users will have to wait a while still to take part in the photo and possibly soon video sharing fun as there is no news on an Android app.

Tweets by users with high Klout scores last up to 67 times longer
We're on the fence with Klout and what it has to say about your influence, but apparently a fleeting tweet may last up to 67 times longer if it was tweeted by a user with a high Klout score compared to other users. The results are presented in this infographic and interestingly tweets from users with a Klout score less than 40 actually have an identical half-life to those with a score between 70 to 75, which compares well with other studies on the half-life of sharing writes Mashable.

Romance and social media
Personally, romantic relationships and social media intrigues me as it is always interesting to see how people flirt, communicate and possibly break-up for everyone connected to them to see. Lab42 have taken the pulse on today's relationship seekers as well as established loves and conducted a survey this October, asking 500 social network users over 18 some fairly personal questions about meeting people, cheating, communication and more.

If you're looking for love, only 11% said 'physical attractiveness' was the most important trait their significant other should possess (no need to panic too much about your avatar then...), with 23% opting for 'other' (political views, religion, career oriented, financially stability and taste in music). Other findings show that an astonishing 75% believed there is ONE true soulmate for every person, and Facebook appears to be the preferred way to find out more about someone you're interested in with 57% of the singles asked saying they would Facebook friend someone after meeting them.

Drinkify will tell you what to drink while listening to your favourite music
We're all for things that can make our lives easier, and to have the hassle of deciding which drink to have when listening to Little Dragon, Casiokids or even Metallica can be such a pain - not really as the answer must surely Gin at all times! New site Drinkify aims to make your music experience a bit different, teaming up your musical taste to the best beverage along with a recipe on how to prepare it.  Not sure about the blood and cough syrup mixture for Cradle of Filth though...

Disney and YouTube signs video content deal
According to The New York Times, Disney and YouTube are set to announce a content deal worth between $10 to $15 million, which will see YouTube invest millions on an original video series produced by Disney and distributed exclusively through a brand new co-branded channel on YouTube and Disney.com.

US Starbucks launches augmented reality app for Christmas season
Avid coffee fans will know that when the red cups hit Starbucks Christmas is just around the corner (I love the eggnog latte, but I'll let the discussion about the quality of the coffee take place elsewhere), and this holiday season Starbucks is launching its first augmented reality app - Starbucks Cup Magic - that will let customers animate their coffee cups with their smartphones. Unfortunately for us European dwellers, the app will only be available in the US, but check out this video on how it works.

Adidas launches the world's first social football boots
Football clubs are becoming more aware of the importance of social media, and the likes of Manchester City and Manchester United are both breaking new ground in the social and digital sphere. So it was only a matter of time before brands that cater for one of the most popular sports in the world got on the bandwagon big time. Adidas has now revealed a new design that could change the playing field completely. With an on-board computer that stores data, the new boots measure speed, distance travelled and top speed. As soon as the game has stopped, the data is transmitted wirelessly to your phone, tablet or computer ready to be analysed. With top players having their own football boots sponsorships it will be interesting to see how this will impact clubs who will no doubt be eager to discover in more detail how their players are performing.

Glamour gains 50,000 'Likes' by marrying Facebook and 2D barcodes
The September issue of Glamour magazine got over 50,000 Facebook Likes for advertisers by including 2D barcodes in the adverts. The codes could be found throughout the magazine and was put there to see if codes invoking Facebook would spur more readers to action. Results show a high level of interaction, proving that readers do enjoy a more interactive magazine experience.

A new social network, which calls itself the 'anti-Facebook', is open to beta testers today and many are wondering whether the claims that it's a much more honest and open platform than anything we've seen before are actually true.

The social network called Unthink is all about unthinking the idea of social media and gaining more control over our personal data and online lives. Unthink's about page reads:

"UNTHINK is an all-in-one social media platform that enables you to connect with the world around you and collaborate with others to bring the change you want to see in the world.

"Our mission is to emancipate social media and unleash people's extraordinary potential. Our -not so covert- mission is to spark a revolution that will change the world."

It all sounds inspiring, but a bit cheesy and too good to be true, right?

Although we're not sure whether it'll really make a large number of Facebook's 800 million users immediately ditch the most popular social network and opt for one which is much more about freedom, determination and rainbows, it's good that a platform exists which seems to be about using online networks to create things, learn things and share things rather than see so many be made into pawns by businesses and advertisers.

However, just because Unthink is all about freedom and control it doesn't mean the social network won't open up a lot of new opportunities for brands. According to Techcrunch, users will own all of their data all of the time but can choose a brand to sponsor their page, which means they then become an advocate of that brand. Brands can also engage with users too, but the users have the control to decide which they want to hear from, what kinds of updates they want to hear and how often, which will be a welcome change for many.

It seems that Unthink will be the ideal haven for the "we hate big corporations" crowd who despise the thought of their data being used in advertising, but for everyone else for now it's just interesting and could have potential in the future, once we can finally get an account, sign in and put it to the test.

This week sees that the number of visits to online video sites in the UK has increased by 36% since September 2010, four new social media magazines launch, the optimum length of a Facebook post, watch Florence + the Machine new album launch gig online for £3.99, Google makes changes to Reader and are brands 'over-reliant' on Facebook?

Visits to online video sites has increased by 36% in UK since 2010
New stats from Experian Hitwise show that visits to online video sites grew by over a third in the UK over the past year, with over 785 million visits to sites like YouTube in September.  From 2010 to 2011 traffic increased by 36%, truly demonstrating the increasing popularity of online video. If anything this shows the importance of incorporating video into brand campaigns.

How consumers interact with brands on social media [infographic]
A pan-European study has found that one third of Facebook and Twitter users in the UK follow brands, which apparently is more than twice the percentage of other markets on the continent, writes Wall Blog. Other stats include:
- Twitter has the highest sharing rate of branded messages and content (18%)
- Consumers want brands active in social media channels to be 'informative', 'entertaining' and 'interactive'

Social media magazines hit the shelves
At a time when most magazines and newspapers are gravitating towards tablet apps, digital editions it is interesting to learn that GSG World Media is publishing four new monthly magazines dedicated to Twitter, Facebook, Google and LinkedIn. The freshly pressed magazines are 'aimed at helping business owners harness the power of the social sphere' and come at $7.95 each.  But if you'd rather keep things digital, they are also available for free via a digital subscription. Is this the way forward: Offer print editions at premium prices and give the content away for free digitally? Not the best business model is it...

Does size matter when it comes to Facebook updates?
Apparently so. Publishing platform Vitrue has looked at over 11,000 posts made by the 150 largest Pages on Facebook to see if there is an optimum length on Facebook posts when it comes to engagement. Taking the Likes and comments and dividing them by the number of fans they ended up with an engagement rate as a percentage. The result: the longer the post gets, the more the engagement rate decreases... So what is the optimum number of characters? Well the study didn't say but ensure to keep Facebook posts as concise as possible while still fully communicating what you want.

Watch Florence + the Machine new album launch gig online
The gig is long sold out, but courtesy of theguardian and LoveLive fans of Florence + the Machine can see the album launch performance at Hackney Empire tonight, 25^th October, online. Just request your access code, pay £3.99 and you're there (almost). Definitely cheaper that going to the gig, but the atmosphere won't be the same...

Are brands over-reliant on Facebook?
With brands investing millions into developing excellent Facebook pages, could they be at risk of trading in their privacy? A leading analyst at Constellation Research Group - quoted in Marketing Magazine - thinks so and has now warned brands that they are 'over-reliant on Facebook and it will come back and bite them'. An interesting notion, but we'd like to think brands are using Facebook in a way that doesn't put privacy or customer data at risk. However with Facebook's many 'privacy issues' over the past years, it's worth thinking twice about how your brand's customer data is stored. Are brand owned platforms the future?

Google makes changes to Reader
Google is definitely working on cleaning up its social/digital footprint. Not long after announcing Google Buzz is to become extinct, they've now revealed that they will be making changes to Google Reader. The service will get a brand new design and be brought closer to Google+. In a few weeks you'll no longer be able to friend, follow or share linked blogs inside of Reader. This will now be integrated into Google+ so if you're an avid user of Reader you best start working on your Circles now!

LinkedIn launches new tool to help you stay in touch with old school friends
First and foremost a place to keep your professional connections organised, LinkedIn is launching a new tool called 'Classmates' which aims to help you stay in touch with fellow graduates and alumni. Personally I welcome this as I sometimes feel that my Facebook is crowded with people whose holiday photos I don't necessarily want to see, but who I keep on there because I once went to school with them and it would be a shame to loose contact completely. What do you think?

43% of Londoners use social media to find jobs [infographic]
A nifty infographic by LondonLovesJobs shows how Londoners search for a job and how social media is changing this. No surprise that people are using social media in the hunt for the next step on the career ladder, but the research also shows that employers have yet to fully tap into this trend - as are the recruitment teams! Other stats worth nothing:
- 25% of Londoners look for a job on LinkedIn
- Only 14% of job sites and companies advertise or promote openings via social media
- More men than women search for jobs via social media channels - 30% of men use LinkedIn to find a job compared to 18% of women

More mums use Facebook and other social networks than average internet users
New figures by eMarketer show that an estimated 23 million US mums are on Facebook this year, using the site at least once a month, representing well over two-thirds of all online mothers in the country.  This means that more mothers use Facebook and other social networks each month compared to average internet users. Luckily my mum is not on Facebook - have yet to convert her to Skype - but I do have a few aunts and friends that have offspring of their own.

Toyota launches Facebook game ahead of Tokyo Motor Show sports car debut
Japanese car manufacturer Toyota has launched a Facebook game to promote the production model sports car that it plans to debut at the Tokyo Motor Show in December. Dubbed the Social Network Racer the game is now live and will run through 31 December, allowing racers across the globe to 'test-drive' the new car and compete for a super prize: a free trip to Japan. Start your engines!

Personal sharing network Path closing in on 1 million users
I tried Path - the mobile app that lets you share images and the personal things with friends - when it first launched a while ago. To be honest, I never used it again. But good news for the company as it is apparently closing in on 1 million users.  Path enables you to share the most personal things with a limited number of your nearest and dearest  (50 last time I checked), such as first dates, deaths or injury that perhaps might not be sharable on other social networks like Twitter and Facebook. Do you use Path?

This morning we came across an interactive Youtube channel called the Museum of Obsolete Objects, which gives users a quirky look at some of the products that are becoming more and more obsolete, like calculators, record players and quills.

However, it's not just the products and videos that really stand out, but the way the YouTube channel has been constructed to not only be super interactive, but look so polished and well designed too, so it's no surprise that it's been dreamt up by digital creative agency Jung von Matt

It seems a little bit strange for a YouTube channel to look like this, doesn't it? Well, that's because it's part of a German Creative Brand Channel competition. So, even though the channel may have only been created to show others what brands can do with YouTube, it's certainly fun to play around with and gives other businesses some food for thought next time they decide to create just another boring background.

Last month when Facebook made all kinds of changes, like the news ticker and important stories and announced even more, like gestures and timelines, some people were excited but lots of others got VERY angry.

Every time Facebook tweaks it increasingly popular platform we expect its users to get a little bit frustrated, but this time it seemed different. People vented in their status updates and others threatened to leave (LEAVE?! I know, insanity).

However, recent research from Experian shows that traffic to Facebook actually increased over September. Fair enough it only went up by around 3.08%, but that's still kind of a big deal if you look at figures for the rest of the year. In fact more people logged onto the site than they did over July and August, so it seems that although the changes annoyed a lot of people, the mass exodus that at one point seemed likely just didn't happen. At all.

James Murray, a marketing research analyst at Experian Hitwise, said that this kind of mini surge often happens at this time of year:

"With the summer holiday season now over, Facebook has bounced back to take nearly 52 per cent of all visits to social networking sites. Social media as a whole experiences a dry patch during July and August, but September always kick starts usage again with students starting university terms, kids going back to school, and the working population returning from holiday."

However, it's still a testament to Facebook and shows that even when people get angry, changes are made and competitors come onto the scene (we see you lurking there Google+), THE social network still has the biggest market share and will do for some time.

The two big names behind Napster, Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker, are launching a new venture called Airtime.

According to Techcrunch, Airtime is similar to Chat Roulette in that a big part of it will be about meeting people you don't know, possibly through random, real-time video chatting, which sounds interesting yet a little uninspiring at the same time.

Sean Parker says:

"Your social network has become too rigid and constraining [...] Facebook is about identity, the people you already know. [...] It has little to do with people you don't know."

Now he makes a good point. I'm sure there are plenty of people we don't know that we'd get on really well with and it'll be interesting to see whether Shawn and Sean can provide us with a way we can connect with randommers without the creepiness/nakedness that seems to come hand-in-hand with the likes of chat rooms and Chat Roulette.

However, a lot of the time it's the people we don't know as well that just seem to annoy us the most on Facebook, so do we want to connect with more people like that? The Facebook team have made no secret in the past that they feel it's better to have a smaller number of friends, because then recommended content is likely to be much more valuable to you if someone you know, like and have things in common with is sharing it.

But then again, maybe that's a problem with Facebook and the kinds of people it attracts into our network (people we knew from primary school, our friend's chavvy brother) rather than a problem with connecting with people we don't already know well. After all, most of our Twitter connections may be born out of shared interests and contacts, but a lot of the time we don't really know them before we hit follow.

It'll be interesting to see whether Airtime can really bring something different to the table, or whether it'll just squash Chat Roulette, Facebook and chat rooms together and expect us to be impressed.

This week sees Nielsen release some stats and facts about the state of social media from the third quarter of 2011, Oscar de la Renta crowdsources catwalk coverage live on Tumblr, Brits would prefer to live without a flushing toilet than without Facebook, Facebook fans are useful to brands, a fashion party for the social savvy, is social media stopping you getting a good night's sleep?

The state of social media in Q3

Nielsen has just released some great stats and facts about the state of social media in the third quarter of 2011 (predominantly US though). The study shows that social networks and blogs reach nearly 80% of active internet users in the US and makes up the majority of Americans' time online. The same report also shows that American's spend more time on Facebook - Liking and Tagging away - than on any other US website. Another interesting finding is that accessing social media content from mobile phones is continuing to rise with the over-55s driving this growth. Time to target those silver surfers!

Oscar de la Renta to crowdsource catwalk coverage live on Tumblr

The fashion community and its photography loving crowds has embraced blogging platform Tumblr for a while now, and tomorrow American fashion designer Oscar de la Renta is looking to capitalise on this trend. He's planning on creating a new style of online presentation to his Spring 2012 collection at odlrlive.tumblr.com which will show all photos that are uploaded to Tumblr with the tag #odlrlive in real-time, enabling editors, bloggers, models and viewers at home to  contribute to the display. We'll be watching for sure - mostly to see if anyone tries to hijack it!

Brits would prefer to live without a toilet than without Facebook

This is social media addiction at its best. When the London Science Museum surveyed 3,000 adults on 50 things they couldn't live without, Facebook landed on 5^th place right up there with sunshine and clean drinking water. You can find out what the 50 things were here, but it is rather astonishing to think that Briton's would now rather have access to Facebook than a flushing toilet, central heating, a shower and fresh fruit and vegetables.

Tumblr has second most page views in UK as 10^th billion post is published

Things are looking good for Tumblr which can now claim to have the second most page views on any social network or blog in the UK... after Facebook of course (Source: Nielsen). UK internet users viewed a total of 229.6million pages on the popular blogging platform in the third quarter this year. The New York City based startup had more reason to celebrate this week as it could also announce its 10 billionth post, having grown from 7 to 28 million blogs over the past year. If you're wondering which ten Tumblr blogs to follow these are pretty good and here are five reasons why you need Tumblr in your life.

Twitter has 100 million active users - will they show Twitter the money?

Microblogging site Twitter celebrates having 100 million active users a month - that's apparently up 82% since the start of the year - with half of these clocking in every day amid a flurry of new statistics announced by Twitter CEO Dick Costolo. He could also reveal that Twitter.com now sees 400 million visitors a month, an increase of 70% from the start of 2011, while 55% of active users are on mobile. The real question though is if its new advertising system will be able to exploit the audience and start making the company some real money.

Facebook fans are useful study finds

New research shows that Facebook Fans are in fact useful, so if you're working with someone that's still hesitant to join the party here are some facts to bring to the next meeting. The study found that people are more likely to recommend brands to their friends after becoming fans themselves and that they are more likely to buy products or services from brands after becoming fans. It also appears that Facebook is the preferred platform for interacting with brands (well after 'none of these' so take it with a pinch of salt) and that once they've liked a brand they rarely 'unlike' it (76% said they had never unliked a brand)

What's your Klout? A Fashion Night Out party for the social savvy elite only

It was bound to happen sooner or later; if you not social savvy you're not getting 'in'. This week an invite to a VIP Fashion Night Out VIP party in Florida was sent to various people with a Klout score of 40 and above. OK granted this was part of a plan to get online communities talking about the party - mission accomplished - but it is likely a sign of things to come. Klout is a metrics system that rates your social influence score based on reach, user engagement and how many followers you have. How accurate Klout results are has been discussed for a long time, but it is a fun way of using social media metrics to ensure the most socially engaged will be in attendance at your event (in other words those most likely to tweet, check-in and Instagram your event to the masses).

Facebook introduces Smart Lists
Yes, you've guessed it. Facebook's Smart Lists is pretty much the same as Google+ does when it allows you to group your friends to decide who gets which update or not. However, Smart Lists appear to organise your friends for you which takes away the hassle of having to allocate people to certain lists manually. It is on the other hand somewhat worrying that Facebook appears to know EVERYTHING about your life and those you are connected with by doing so... While still being rolled out, it looks like your 'friends' will be divided into three categories: those you work with, those you went to school with and people who live within 50 miles of you. Have you got this new feature yet?

Is social media stopping you getting a good night's sleep?

A new study shows that social media could have an impact on how well we sleep, with 86% of those questioned saying they spend time on social networking sites when they really should be sleeping. Over half of the respondents (52%) admitted they tweet and like from their beds, which isn't surprising considering how many of us depend on our smartphones to wake us up every morning.

Are we a nation of online spies?
A survey by Norton (the anti-virus company with the Dolf Lundgren vs a Unicorn ad) finds that more than one in five women check their partner's emails, messages and social networking accounts - only one in ten men do the same... Apparently more than half of Britain's couples share their passwords openly with each other and 15% of those that snoop have found something upsetting by being so curious. As they say, curiosity killed the cat - and perhaps a relationship or two.

Twitter sues company to get the rights to the word 'tweet'

Uh oh, looks like a service called Twittad has registered 'tweet' before Twitter could do it. And guess what, Twitter doesn't like it! Twitter is apparently suing Twittad - which filed for the rights for the word in 2008 - to have the trademark registration cancelled so that it can file for the rights.