More stats, now to satisfy your curiosity about the visitors heading to some of the biggest websites out there.
http://www.mediabistro.com/alltwitter/website-showdown-twitter-infographic_b11727#more-11727
Contributed by Scott Shue
We’ve been talking about the future of this a lot lately, and here’s a nice little infographic that sums up mobile payment growth and the overall landscape.
Mostly correct but American Express’ Serve supports Visa, Mastercard, Discover, and debit cards.
https://www.gplus.com/Mobile-Payments/Article/INFOGRAPHIC-Goodbye-Wallets-How-Mobile-Payments
Contributed by Collin Whitehead
A new social car swapping site, this service allows individuals to put their own vehicles up for rent at an hourly rate they get to set (e.g. Tesla Roadster $50/hr).
No idea how it all works or whether it will catch on, but it’s pretty interesting.
Test driving is becoming a lot more “social” and “consumer driven” than before.
Contributed by Ralph Paone
Kinetic type video of social media stats from Erik Qualman’s Socialnomics v3 book.
The choices brands make to cultivate their own unique voice and personality on the Internet are often interesting. Here, a well-established brand, General Electric, takes a trendy approach toward blogging.
By posting vintage shots — mostly using Instagram — of significant laboratory tests and research from the past 130 years, GE manages to create more of a niché web presence for their brand, thereby making it more intriguing, and perhaps more accessible, to a larger demographic.
http://generalelectric.tumblr.com/
Contributed by James Craig
Toronto Tourism has created a “cheating wall” where visitors can see via video screens into Montreal, and vice versa.
Equipped with video and audio, it’s a live portal enabling people to even chat with their counterparts in the other city.
Much like TinEye, Google has launched their version of search-by-image.
Contributed by Ricardo Hieber
This is big news – ICANN just approved newly purchasable top-level domains.
If you can afford the $185,000 application fee, and the $25,000 annual fees, the options are pretty open, eg. .advertising. .milk, .this, or .that .
http://mashable.com/2011/06/20/icann-top-level-domains/
Contributed by James Craig
Living Social is on the verge of launching Living Social Instant. Business owners can set up deals on the fly and offer them to people nearby that moment.
http://www.businessinsider.com/tim-oshaughnessy-livingsocial-instant-2011-5
A new startup is seeking to reinvent the short URL by turning it into a promotional tool for brands and causes.
At its core, Bre.ad is a URL shortener. It shortens links, syncs to Twitter and Facebook and provides click analytics. But its big selling point is helping users promote brands, interests, and charities through a full-page interface.
http://mashable.com/2011/05/18/bread/
