Tomorrow, Friday, April 29, the penultimate space shuttle mission launches and a 30 year shuttle program draws to a close. Mark Kelley, NASA Commander of Space Shuttle Endeavor's final flight, aka mission STS-134, will take questions live on May 2.
Kelley and his crew will take questions via YouTube and Twitter and their responses will be broadcast live over the PBS News Hour's YouTube channel. Miles O'Brien, a space reporter with decades of experience in broadcasting, will moderate.
You have done it. Your co-workers have done it. You have seen it effect companies, athletes, celebrities. It is the curse of Stupid Tweet Syndrome.
Well, it is time to get some Stupid Tweet Insurance.
Kiln Group, an insurance specialist underwriting firm at Lloyds of London, wants to protect companies from the damage that Stupid Tweet Syndrome (our name for the disease) can cause. Details are not clear as to what exactly the insurance would pay out but if a brand is substantially damage by a vindictive or careless tweet, Kiln Group would be able to cover it.
The stormy relations between Twitter Inc. and the sprawling developer community that surrounds it may have taken a big turn for the better. Longtime developer relations manager at Google and Facebook Jason Costa announced on the Twitter developers email list today that he has joined Twitter as the company's Developer Relations Manager. "I'll be 100% focused on ensuring the best possible developer experience for those looking to build on the Twitter Platform," Costa wrote.
On paper at least, Costa looks like the ideal candidate: He's got a BS in Computer Science from USC, an MBA in Entrepreneurship & Innovation from MIT, he was a Technical Programs Manager on Google products and APIs for 4 years and most recently he was at Facebook working on that site's mobile product. The first initiative Costa has begun discussing is a number of on-site developer events.
Calling it a re-imagining à la Hollywood's recent Batman movies, TweetDeck has released a redesigned iPhone app. The new version takes "the essence of what made it so popular" (TweetDeck that is, not Batman) and ses that to rethink the app's design and functionality.
For those who use TweetDeck on your desktop computer, you'll probably agree that that means a focus on columns. The standard columns are still available: Mentions, DMs, Lists and so on. But now you can also have combined columns (adding your Home, Me, and Inbox columns so you can see updates from multiple Twitter accounts you might have). You can also customize the appearance of feeds in your columns.
In a blog post on the OpenNet Initiative blog, Rebekah Heacock notes that "most of sub-Saharan Africa has historically been free of technical filtering." No more.
Uganda, at the insistence of its national police commissioner, has sent its three largest ISPs a memo requesting they begin blocking what they called "Tweeter" (presumably Twitter) and Facebook, in order to "eliminate the connection and sharing of information that incites the public."
Popular Twitter client TweetDeck, previously reported to have been acquired by Ubermedia, is now said to be in talks with Twitter for an acquisition that would nearly double its former $30 million price tag.
The Wall Street Journal reports today that Twitter is "in advanced talks" to buy the client for around $50 million, according to "people familiar with the matter."
Last month at SXSW, Infochimps, the self-described "Amazon of data," unveiled thousands of new API calls. The API calls, or plug-and-play bits of code that developers can insert into their applications, were released in hopes of soothing the headaches inherent in making data-dependent applications.
This weekend, a few developers took three headache-free days to make three awesome Twitter apps built on the Infochimps API calls.
Check 'em out.
I'm an avid Twitter user. I spend much of my day monitoring tweets for news stories. As Marshall Kirkpatrick wrote almost 4 years ago, Twitter helps me do my job better: "Twitter pays my rent." But I don't actually use any Twitter's own clients or website to do this, with one exception: Twitter for iPhone.
And as of the release last night of Tapbots' new Twitter app, Tweetbot, I think I'm ditching the official Twitter app on my iPhone now too.
Some people watch television with a bowl of popcorn at their side, while others curl up with a blanket. Others still can't turn on the tube without their smartphone, laptop or tablet in their hands so they can Tweet and read others' Tweets as the action unfolds on the big screen.
But what about those time-shifted viewers - those Netflix and DVR devotees - who watch their shows at a different time but still want to see all those Tweets? TweePLayer offers a way to "take part in great online conversations synced with videos of your favorite events hours or years later, just like you were chatting live."
TweetDeck's Web application, which made its Chrome Web Store debut back in December, has generally proved to be a worthy alternative to the TweetDeck AIR application for the desktop. However, up until today, the Web app only worked with Google's Chrome Web browser. Now, says the company, TweetDeck is coming to all the major browsers, including Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer and Opera.
