Author: Connor Livingston

Facebook is going the way of Twitter and Google+ in the way they allow people to view others’ feeds. By introducing the subscribe button, Facebook is allowing users to follow people within their stream even if they are not friends. It is much the way that Twitter has always been and is akin to what Google+ offers in allowing people to add others to their circles. What does this mean for business? Will big-ticket businesses like real estate and the automotive industry be able to use this feature to help with their business? Absolutely. All it takes is an email address. If that email address is attached…

The closed-platform style of an intranet (not to be confused with the internet) allows for secure distribution and communication of information within a company or organization. In the good ol’ days (a decade ago) company intranets were extremely useful in transferring data, sharing files, and collaboration. Today, it’s much less useful. The speed in which information is able to travel with today’s technology makes the intranet a much-less valuable part of the business world. Still, it’s not dead, and as more exploits are found to gather data from companies using internet-only protocols,…

If you pull this into Photoshop, you can check the colors. The “blue’ and “green” are actually the same. In the RGB format, the way we perceive colors is affected by the surrounding colors. If you pull out the other colors and leave only the blue/green, you’ll see what we mean. Sort of trippy. …

There are memes out there that make fun of people who pretend to be geeks because “geek is chic” in 2011. In many cases, it has given the real geeks of the world a bad name. Thanks to the good folks at Uncommongoods, you can keep a good test on your wrist at all times. Just whip this puppy out to so-called geeks and ask them to decipher it. No, it’s not good enough for them to know that 3! is six just because it’s at the bottom. They need to know that it means 3 factorial (basic stuff for many juniors in high school, let alone a true geek). If they can get 4 or 5 of them right, they might be a geek. Half or more and you’re…

The Netflix Android app was updated to support mobile devices running Android 2.2 Froyo and Android 2.3 Gingerbread. Users who have a Netflix unlimited membership will be able to watch television shows and movies streaming directly from Netflix on their Android devices. Being unlimited, the only limitations would be data plans from the ISPs. The app also allows users to continue watching where they left off on their television or computer. Check out this infographic that compares Netflix vs Redbox….

When Yelp denied Google’s $500 million bid to buy them in 2009, many believed that the location/reviews company was positioned to fight the search giant in their niche and win. That has been the case so far, but Google is making strides to change that, including today’s announcement that they had purchased the venerable restaurant resource and ratings company Zagat. Restaurant reviews have always been the cornerstone of Yelp’s service. Most major restaurants are loaded with Yelp reviews and consumers tend to trust them more than they trust other online services. Zagat has been the exception,…

Teachers have had had challenges since the dawn of schooling to make children learn things that may not interest them. Science, particularly the tougher disciplines such as quantum physics, is an acquired taste. For many, it is flying over their heads and they don’t mind as long as they can make the grade. One tool that teachers have often used is presentation in different mediums. How do you make something more interesting? Give it visuals. Give it sounds. Make it appealing beyond the equations. What Symphony of Science did with their most recent video may not be the answer, but it’s still pretty…

In case you missed the whole CrunchFund and Michael Arrington vs AOL debacle that has been raging for nearly a week now, the good (albeit weird) folks over at NMA.tv give us a clever digital depiction of the events. They take a minor stab at the fact that after Arrington was fired, he threatened to leave if they didn’t meet his demands. Remember the stapler guy in Office Space? Seems a little similar. …

In their biggest hack to date, the hacker group known as Cocain TeaM continues to replace websites with an ominous map, seemingly random messages, and the Pink Panther theme song. This time, their victim was the Swaziland subdomain on the United Nations website. The screenshot above still appears for some as of the time of this story but in most places it has been replaced by a text message: “har kos kholi vase ma hacker shode lol )” Cocain TeaM has been very active this month taking down websites. It may be random but the choice of websites seems to have some hacktivist leanings. Their goals are still…

Seven states are currently taxing out-of-state online retailers. The practice, called the “Affiliate Taxes” or “Amazon Taxes”, are spreading rapidly as the catalog loophole that has protected them for years is being re-evaluated. What does this mean from one state to the next? Which states are doing it, which states are considering it, and which states are safe. Perhaps most importantly, what does all of this mean for the future of online retailers? These and other questions are discussed in this infographic by our tax-talented friends at Intuit. Click to enlarge. …