Author: JD Rucker

There are two sides to the social media coin. On one side, it’s the perfect way to get the most up-to-the-second information about what’s happening around the world. On the other hand, it’s a way to make false information go viral and spread to the masses. Today, the latter occurred through a desecration of Back to the Future. Doc Brown would not approve. The image above, which is spreading around Facebook and Twitter, shows that today is the day that is dialed into the time-traveling DeLorean in the second installment of the trilogy. Unfortunately, as you can see in the video below, someone was just…

In the competitive world of telecommunications, it’s often a matter of name recognition and trust that help people determine which service to use and which product to buy. The mobile arena is particularly top-heavy with Verizon and AT&T ranking #2 and #3 amongst the top US ad spenders behind Proctor & Gamble Co. At nearly $6 billion in combined advertising spend between the two biggest US mobile service providers last year, the stakes are clearly high when it comes to buying exposure. Here, we take a look at the top spenders in US advertising dollars. This infographic from Kissmetrics…

When I first checked out Empire Avenue in May of 2011, I was disappointed. The concept was strong: a stock market game where the “companies” were people and their value was determined by the social capital they were able to accumulate through their activities on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks. The problem I had with it was that it required a further commitment of time; one does not simply grow through Tweeting alone. You had to buy other people. You had to be active in other social media sites like YouTube and Flickr. It seemed like another social media time suck. Fast forward to May,…

It’s just about time to pick up the suntan lotion, buy a pair of shades, and make plans to hit the road, the skies, the seas, or whatever form of travel will take us to our resting destination. It’s summer, and summer means vacation. Technology gives us the ability to streamline many of the preparatory and direct activities that go into vacationing. Apps from Trapster to TripIt and from iTranslate to iExit give you the ability to focus more and rest and relaxation and less on the mundane tasks that can make vacationing challenging. This infographic breaks down some of the best apps for summertime bliss….

It may sound like another example of Google turning evil, but in reality it’s just them being smart. Website searches can be challenging to master. The various plugins and custom solutions do not always get the exact right results for their queries and leave site owners stuck with relying strictly on proper navigation. This can be tedious to both the website owner and the visitors when multiple clicks are necessary to get to the right page. Google Custom Search enables website owners to plug in the power of Google directly into their site. This can be effective for larger sites with tons of content…

For the last few months, I have been asked on and off why I didn’t have a TECHi presence on Google+. There are many reasons: our focus on our Facebook page, our ever-growing Twitter presence, the lack of tools that integrate directly with Google+, and, of course, time (or lack thereof) all played a role. It’s not that we haven’t paid attention to Google+; on the contrary, we’ve been very active on it through our author accounts and through encouraging people to share on the social network. Now, the reasons to get on outweigh the reasons to stay off. Google+ is not only growing, but its importance from…

  Forget about Newt’s plan to settle the moon. The folks over at Mars One want to put a human settlement on Mars by 2023. The plan according to co-founder Bas Lansdorp is to get four people to the planet using a 4-step process. 2016 – A communication satellite and supplies will be sent first. 2018 – A large planetary rover capable will land and search the planet for an appropriate area to colonize. 2020 – Living units, life support units, another rover, and more supplies will be sent. The rovers will build the various components and make it habitable. 2022 – September, the crew of 4 will depart for…

Quick, what’s your Twitter handle? What’s your Facebook profile URL? What’s you Google+ address? You were probably able to answer the first two questions. The third one is a mystery to nearly everyone. Sure, it’s easy to find you, particularly if you have a not-so-common name. Just search for their name on Google and if they have an account it should be prominently displayed, assuming they’re using it regularly. Internally, all you really need is their name and a rough idea of what they look like to find them. Too hard. We should be able to tell people where to go. We should be able to put it on a business…

Kevin Rose has always been known as an “ideas guy”. His ventures haven’t always paid off as well as they could have with Revision3, Pownce, and Milk all selling for less than many would have thought and with Digg dropping out of prominence in the social news arena, but he’s tasted success with all of them at one point or another. Google is banking on that by moving him to Google Ventures after trying him out on the Google+ team for a short stint. Rose has had success in picking winners with a portfolio that has include Twitter, path, OMGPOP, and Foursquare. Three-year-old Google Ventures claims to have…

The Hollywood hype machine is already anointing this summer as the biggest one in movie history. The Avengers shattered records and it may not even be the biggest blockbuster of the summer if Bane (I mean The Dark Knight Rises) comes out firing. Beneath all of the hoopla surrounding comic book superheroes and recycled sequels, there are some really good movies that geeks and non-geeks alike shouldn’t miss. They don’t have the budgets. Some of them have the actors but many are relatively unknown. They have one thing in common – the likelihood of being solid movies that may get buried beneath the spiderwebs….