Derek E. Baird :: Barking Robot

Trend Watch: Twitter, Facebook and Social TV

Twitter Embraces Its Social Role in TV: Like so many other things that the Twitter community has established on its own (hashtags and retweets, for example), the company is now fully embracing the role it plays in supplementing the TV-watching experience of millions of people. [RRW]

Social Media and TV - Who's Talking, When and What About? : Social media continues to influence how consumers interact with brands and share content every day. Increasingly, TV viewers leverage social media as a platform to talk about and engage with TV content.

These conversations are not only opening new channels for consumer engagement with their favorite TV shows and fellow fans alike, but also are providing insight into which viewers are driving the conversations and when. [Nielson Wire]

Yahoo's IntoNow Provides Signs of Life for The Premier Digital Media Company: Yahoo! is known for acquiring startups and letting them languish. But IntoNow cranked out a whole new product--and a possible game-changer for the TV industry--in six months. Is this the beginning of something new? [Fast Company] Get the free IntoNow App on iTunes

MTV Exec: Social is a New Programming Platform: Many people are talking about how TV networks can leverage the power of social networks to help build their show audiences. But they may be missing the point. According to Dermot McCormack, EVP of Digital Media for MTV, social networks aren’t just for announcing when the next episode of Jersey Shore airs, but a whole new platform for media creation and distribution. [GigOM]

TV Isn't What it Used to Be: According to a recent Ypulse report, only 28% of students say they can’t live without TV (referring to traditional viewing), compared to 83% who can’t imagine life without music. Some students even prefer streaming video to traditional TV viewing; after all, it gives them what they want when they want it. What’s a TV company to do? [MediaPost]

In the U.S., Tablets are TV Buddies: The Nielsen Company​’s most recent research on mobile connected devices sheds new light on how consumers are using their tablets, eReaders and smartphones – and where they are using them, too. [Nielson Wire]

Multask Mania | Viewers Watch TV, Discuss on Social Sites: Almost 40% of TV viewers are discussing TV shows on social media sites, with almost three-quarters of TV viewers with broadband access, generally using the Internet at same time, per U.K.-based Ovum, a business/technology research firm. [MediaPost]

What's the Future of Social TV Look Like?: Real-time entertainment is what people are looking for–we always want something fresh to keep us up to date.  But with this demand for real-time entertainment, how has it affected traditional TV? [Silicon Angle]

The Future of TV, From Apple to ZeeBox: “The future of TV” has become a buzzword over the last few years – but what if it was time to stop talking about it and acknowledge that the future has already arrived? [TNW]

Barking Robot > Category > Social TV

Common Sense Media Launches 'Power to the Parent' – A National Media Awareness Campaign

Common Sense Media, a nonprofit that provides families with information about media and technology, launches its new multiplatform public awareness campaign Power to the Parent.

 Designed to educate parents about the impact that media has on kids' live and the importance of parents (and parenting) in this picture, the campaign is supported by a $40 million TV ad campaign, online manner ads, a microsite, and a social media component.

The goal of Power to the Parent is to get parents to be involved in kids' lives and how they are using media to help them make educated and safe choices when using various media. The campaign includes three parent-targeted TV spots, tilted Role Models, Stadium, and Time Spent, which are already airing and will continue to run over the next year.

Comcast, Cox Communications, DirecTV, NBC Universal, and Time Warner Cable are supporting the TV campaign. The online initiative is supported by Common sense Media's partners Yahoo!, Facebook, GreatSchools, and Hulu, all of which will offer a connection to the campaign microsite via banner ads, links, and other content.

Trend Watch: Universal Pictures Adds 'i-Trailer' For Teen Movie Push

Universal Pictures launched an i-Trailer on August 4 to promote Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, debuting the marketing tool on the Yahoo! Movie site. The movie studio partnered with Mark Woollen and Associates to create it.

The i-Trailer has the look and feel of an 8-bit videogame and leads consumers who opt-in to comprehensive information about the film.

Individuals can control the path they go on as they discover facts and information about Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Examples of featured information are where a scene was shot, what the music cue was and how a particular scene in the movie relates to the graphic novel.

The goal is to better engage Universal Pictures' target audience for the film, 13 to 34 year olds, in a one-on-one experience. After its debut on Yahoo! Movies, Universal also made the trailer available on the film's official site.

via www.dmnews.com

Trend Watch: Connectonomics

Connectonomics, a newly-released research study from Yahoo! and marketing research firm AddedValue, takes a look at women’s needs and how they relate to the digital and social media channels they use on a daily basis.

Key insights

• Need States – the common ground: Despite demographic differences, women share the same core needs which revolve around personal growth and a shared interdependence on others.  Companies may be better served by understanding women’s core “needs” or what drives and motivates them rather than subscribing to existing stereotypes about Xers vs. Millenials, moms vs. non moms, stay-at-home moms vs. working moms etc.  Understanding women’s need states allows marketers to have more relevant conversations with them.

• Different strokes for different channels, not just different folks: Various online channels cater to different need states.  Women receive, share and are receptive to information in varying degrees on each of these channels.  Understanding this is key to media and marketing effectiveness.

Connectonomics

View more presentations from The Added Value Group.

• Power of Anonymity: The study found that the anonymity that content channels offer can lead to deeper emotional connections for women. Women said these sites offer users access to like-minded women and solutions to problems without the risk of being judged by people they know in real life.

• Social media is not a silver bullet: Also surprising is the insight that social media is less relevant in the context of shopping, brands and purchase decisions. Content channels such as lifestyle and special interest sites offer 3x the impact on purchase decisions compared to other online channels, creating much better opportunities for advertisers to build relationships.  Marketing messages resonate more with women when presented in the context of content channels as opposed to social media sites.

You can download an executive summary of the Yahoo! Connectomic study here (pdf).

In Google We Trust: Young Adults’ Evaluation of Web Content [Research]

ReadWriteWeb has an interesting piece about a research study, Trust Online: Young Adults’ Evaluation of Web Content, out of Northwestern University which found that the much lauded "digital natives" aren't so savvy and that they may trust Google a little too much.

Sure those digital kids can surf the web and text, but when it comes to web credibility and media literacy, they are lacking the skills necessary to properly vet digital resources.

As readers of this Barking Robot are aware, this is a topic that I've been talking about for some time.

Here's the RWW with a breakdown of the study:

"In Google we trust." That may very well be the motto of today's young online users, a demographic group often dubbed the "digital natives" due their apparent tech-savvy.

Having been born into a world where personal computers were not a revolution, but merely existed alongside air conditioning, microwaves and other appliances, there has been (a perhaps misguided) perception that the young are more digitally in-tune with the ways of the Web than others.

That may not be true, as it turns out. A new study coming out of Northwestern University, discovered that college students have a decided lack of Web savvy, especially when it comes to search engines and the ability to determine the credibility of search results.

Apparently, the students favor search engine rankings above all other factors. The only thing that matters is that something is the top search result, not that it's legit.

During the study, one of the researchers asked a study participant, "What is this website?" Oh, I don't know. The first thing that came up."

That exchange sums up the overall results from this study: many students trusted in rankings above all else. In fact, a quarter of the students, when assign information-seeking tasks, said they chose a website because - and only because - it was the first search result.

Trust Online: Young Adults' Evaluation of Web Content

Using Facebook in the Elementary School Classroom [Prezi]

When it comes to classroom management and keeping parents informed, a lot of teachers use the trusty ol flyer that they send home with students. Another popular tool for classroom management are Yahoo! Groups.

It may come as a surprise to a lot of people, but teachers and other educators are among the highest user demographics of Yahoo! Groups and this is also why we were integrating them into Yahoo! Teachers.

One of the big hurdles for teachers to use Yahoo! Groups was trying to get the parents to sign up and join the group. Given that Facebook has just crossed the 500 million users mark, chances are that most parents already have a Facebook account which makes it the next best choice for student-teacher-parent communication.

I was happily surprised to stumble on (thanks Matt!) this very well done Prezi on using Facebook Pages as a classroom management tool. Erin Schoening, the author of this Prezi, uses Facebook in their 1st Grade classroom to keep parents in the loop and provide narrative feedback to students. This is pretty ingenious.

1st Grade Facebook on Prezi

Are you or any teachers you know using Facebook in the classroom? If so how's it working out? What are the concerns of parents? If you do use Facebook (or Yahoo! Groups for that matter) don't forget to get those permission slips signed.

Update: I've recently partnered with Facebook and co-authors Linda Phillips and Dr. BJ Fogg to write the official Facebook for Educators Guide! The guide is also available in Spanish, Portuguese and German. We also have a Facebook Page (come join us!), free handouts and more!

Yahoo! Style Guide: Writing, Editing, and Creating Content for the Digital World

To help writers, editors, and content creators write effectively for the Web, Yahoo! has published "The Yahoo! Style Guide: The Ultimate Sourcebook for Writing, Editing, and Creating Content for the Digital World," the first guide of its kind to focus on the specific issues associated with developing content for the online medium.

The Yahoo! Style Guide takes the best of the decades-old AP Stylebook and combines it with the new grammar rules that apply - or should be applied - in today’s online content world.

Yahoo! editors discuss effective writing and editing for an online audience, techniques for streamlining copy, basic Web codes, Internet law, search engine optimization, content strategy and more.

The Yahoo! Style Guide shows how to write for an international audience, an audience that has no borders, significant because the Web has become a one-stop shop for people communicating with others around the globe. The guide is an essential tool for anyone who must write for the Internet with clarity and precision.

The companion website not only features content excerpted from the book but also offers more help and resources from Yahoo! editors. The Yahoo! Style Guide is available in print and digital versions, such as those for iPad, Nook and Kindle.

Follow Yahoo! Style Guide on Twitter.

Report: Twitter Referrals to Videos Result in Longer Viewing Times

A curious bit of data emerged from yesterday's study of Q1 2010 video metrics from Brightcove and TubeMogul.

Twitter referrals to videos on every major category of destination resulted in longer viewing times than any other traffic source. A Twitter referral to a music video averaged a 2:33 viewing time compared to 2:01 of time spent by people coming from Google.

Tweets drove viewing sessions of 1:52 on broadcast locations, but traffic coming from Facebook, Bing and Google were all in the 1:37 to 1:38 range. The exception to this rule was Tweets landing on newspaper sites, where Yahoo! customers viewed one second longer than Twitter refers.

Still, it is an interesting exercise to ponder why a Twitter referral would tend to stay more engaged. Clearly the social affinity aspect is at play, because Facebook refers, while not quite as high, are also stronger in engagement than most other sources.

After all, a refer from a friend compels a viewer to watch longer, if only to "get" what the friend wanted you to see in the video or just because your social graph can target your tastes even more effectively than a straight search.

The full report is available at Brightcove [PDF].

via www.mediapost.com

Weekly Wrap: iPad Demographics, Geolocation Wars, Twitter + Blackbird Pie, Facebook Privacy Translated, TED TV, Nintendo DS Glucose Meter, iPad Apps for Kids & More!

Apple iPad User Analysis: Just a week after the iPad’s launch, we began to analyze the behavior of the first iPad users on the Yahoo! network. While some of the findings were expected, there were a few surprises that popped. Related: US Twitter Demographics & Stats [Yahoo! Mobile] [Barking Robot]

Facebook Set to Add Geolocation Features: Watch out Foursquare, information has leaked that Facebook is set to roll out location-based features for users and brands as soon as this month. According to Advertising Age, users could see location options any day now. [Mashable]

What is Twitter Really Up to With Blackbird Pie?: Following a bit of online buzz yesterday around embeddable Twitter quotes for online publishers, Twitter Media made it official today by unveiling a new tool dubbed 'Blackbird Pie'. [Social Media Today]

Facebook-to-English Translator: Despite the voluminous buzz, many commentators have missed the most confusing announcement of all — new Facebook jargon. So, in the interests of helping users understand what's going on, we've put together a rough Facebook-to-English translator. Think of it as a handy phrase-book that could help you navigate through the more common situations you'll find yourself in. [Electronic Freedom Foundation]

Kids Blood Glucose Meter Attaches to Nintendo DS: Every time a kid uses Didget to check his blood glucose level, it awards points that can be used to buy items and unravel new game levels within an associated game. The idea behind Didget is to encourage kids manage their diabetes by rewarding them for regular blood glucose testing. [BoingBoing]

Why Does the BBC Want to Send Its Readers Away?: The BBC aims to double the number outbound clicks from its site by 2013. That’s double the number of people sent away from the BBC site — intentionally. [Nieman Journalism Lab]

TED TV: The new initiative will allow television broadcasters around the world to air the talks for free as well as create programming around them. One of the primary goals behind the project is to extend the reach of TED’s idea-spreading mission into the developing world. [JED] 

Millennials Tech-Dependent, But Not Necessarily Tech-Savvy: One of the biggest myths about Millennials is that they are all digital natives, blogging and tweeting their way through life.  The truth is a bit more nuanced. Related: The Myth of the Digital Native [Millennial Marketing] [Barking Robot]

Teenage Homelessness on the Rise: In Minnesota, the number of 18- to 21-year-olds in shelters more than doubled in the past three years. [StarTribune.com]

Top 10 Entertainment iPad Apps for Kids: Sure, the new gadget isn’t perfect, but not to worry—techie geniuses have been up since its release, working through the kinks and quirks. Nothing left to do but the fun stuff; grab your kids and try out some of the latest entertainment apps, adapted or created for the iPad. [Kideos]

2010 Totally Wired Teacher Award: After listening to feedback from our friends in the educator community, we've made some important changes to this year's Totally Wired Teacher Award provided by Dell. Please help us spread the word to any public school teachers you are in contact with. [Ypulse]

Digital Parenting Resources: Teens, Social Networking & Cyberbullying

One of the things I enjoy most about my work is having the opportunity to talk with parents, educators and brands to dispel some of the myths or fears around kids' use of social media.

No matter the audience, my message is pretty consistent: Don't panic!

I'm also frequently asked to share some of my favorite digital parenting links, tips and other resources. So here we go! I've sorted through my bookmarks and put together this (hopefully) handy handout. Feel free to print it, tweet it and share it with anyone you think would find it helpful.

Digital Parenting

I'll be updating it as new issues and resources pop up on my radar. If you have a great resource, please feel free to share it in the comments section and I'll add it to a future draft of this handout.

Weekly Wrap: Fisher-Price Facebook Apps, I Want My Android TV, Justin Bieber for Old People, UK Entertainment Convergence, SXSW Roundup & More!

Fisher-Price App Aims for Moms on Facebook: Targeting the many moms online, Mattel’s Fisher-Price is launching a Facebook app Thursday that allows mothers to be more selective in choosing which of their friends can see photos of their children. Mothers who go online, particularly the influential group of “mommy bloggers,” present an important market for toy makers. [WSJ]

Android TV! | Google, Intel & Sony Join Forces: This trend is potentially much more disruptive than the introduction of 3D displays. Now a secret joint effort by Google, Intel and Sony to enter this field in partnership has been revealed. It will bring Google’s Android operating system and Chrome browser to TVs and set top boxes.

The technology has the potential to be disruptive to traditional TV by making the full range of Internet content available on television. [Collaborative Creativity]

What's TV's Next Business Model: It's hard to find TV content today that does not contain Web site addresses, Twitter mentions, and text-based messages throughout. It's accepted that even with these "light" reference points, as it stands now TV's long-term prospects pale in comparison to those of the Internet, mostly because TV content still has no direct-response mechanism.

Blending Internet elements into TV content makes for a seamless experience - and, in my opinion, is tomorrow's preferred business model. Related: Business Exchange > "Social Television" [MediaPost] [Business Weekly]

US Children get Playboy, not Bugs Bunny in Cable Mix-up: Young viewers of children's television programs in North Carolina got a glimpse of something far more risque than their favorite cartoons, when a cable glitch broadcast two hours of the Playboy channel. (Oooops!) [Yahoo! News]

Entertainment Convergence in the UK Digital Home: The UK is still at a relatively early stage of convergence when it comes to digital entertainment such as TV shows, films, short-form video, games, music and social networking. But momentum is building. [eMarketer]

Vodafone gives $1 million grant to Web Foundation for Web-enabling entrepreneurs in Africa: While only 25 percent of the world population uses the Web today, more than 70 percent of the world’s population has access to mobile or fixed communication devices capable of displaying Web content.

In Africa, where the Internet penetration rate is approximately 6.8 percent, furthering Web access can create learning opportunities for local entrepreneurs and support the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals to end poverty by 2015. [WWW Foundation]

SXSW Video Interview Roundup: SXSW 2010 was a gathering of innovative companies, forward thinking people, and interactive influencers. While I didn’t have a chance to talk to all 15,000 attendees, I was able to speak to a few choice companies that have progressive products in the social media and technology realm. [Edelman]

India's Rural Cell Movement: Just last month, nearly 20 million new mobile accounts were opened. That’s more than double the people than have high speed Internet in the entire country. Even in slums where people live on less than $2 a day, everyone has a phone. If “Slumdog Millionaire” was more accurate, Jamal wouldn’t have had to go on TV to find Latika. He could have just called her, or worst case, called a few friends until he found her number. [TechCrunch] [Yahoo! Movies]

Content Strategy is Much More than Web Copywriting: Where there should be content strategy and SEO strategy, we're often on projects where we're focused much more on target audience personas, design standards and project management charts, instead of content. The web writer is then brought in, given the creative brief, the wireframe and two weeks to "crank out the content." [Ignite Social Media]

The Justin Bieber Guide for Old People: Bad news, Old Person: No matter how much you try to avoid it, you will have to eventually interact with someone to whom Justin Bieber (BEE-BURR) is the sun around which their little life revolves. So we present this Justin Bieber Guide for Old People to help you avoid embarrassing yourself in front of your offspring, students, or patrons of your candy shop. [Gawker]

Flemish Digital Youthwork Practices: On the 8th and 9th of February 2010, Steunpunt Jeugd, Flemish knowledge and expertise center on youth, youthwork and youth policy, organized a big congress (JET) centered around youth, youth work and youth policy. One of these sessions is labeled "the 'e' in youthwork" that collected e-practices in Flemish youthwork. [Youth Work Online]

Weekly Wrap: Democrats & Millennials, Disney's "Alice" Goth Party, Vancouver 2010 Social Media Experiment, John Lennon Education Bus, Google Buzz Lawsuit & More!

Democrats Edge Among Millennials Slipping: While the Republican Party picked up support from Millennials during 2009, this age group continues to favor the Democratic Party more than do other generations. And the underlying political values of this new generation continue to be significantly more liberal than those of other generations on many measures. [Pew Research]

Harvard Law Student Files Class Action Suit Against Google Over Buzz: One of her attorneys, Gary E. Mason of Washington, D.C.-based Mason Law Firm LLP, said, "It's not so much that we're expecting to get millions of people hundreds of dollars. What we'd like to see as result is a commitment from Google that they're not going to do this again the next time they launch a product." [ABC News]

Why Gen Y Isn't Buying Your Products: To put it bluntly, if you’re uncomfortable with marketing to Generation Y, or refuse to understand our unique demographic, your store will not see 2020. To understand Generation Y is to overcome many obstacles in the retail industry. [Retail Customer]

Twitter Users Do It In the Car: Twitter is checked more often while driving than other sites, such as Facebook, according to a recent survey by research firm Crowd Science. Sounds like it's time to take Oprah's No Phone Zone pledge! [NBC San Francisco] [Oprah.com]

John Lennon Educational Bus: Throughout TEDActive, TEDsters had a chance to participate in something truly magical: the making of a music video. The John Lennon Educational Tour Bus, a nonprofit mobile recording studio, travels all around the country 10 months out of the year, providing free hands-on workshops to students of all ages, working with both audio and video projects. [TED Blog]

Tweet O' the Week: RT @henryjenkins: Whatever people are doing in World of Warcraft, it isn't "bowling alone." http://bit.ly/dhrSeI

High School Kid Uses YouTube to Land Prom Date with Maxim Model: In a move sure to inspire hundreds of copycats, 17-year-old Dakota Ridge High School senior Conner Cordova used a series of YouTube videos to get UFC Octagon Girl and Maxim model Arianny Celeste to go to the prom with him. [Asylum]

A Conversation About New Media & Education: It is about a world where students learn with a book in one hand and a mouse in the other, rather than one where they are taught that book culture is so fragile it needs to be protected from the computer. [Danielsaurus.com]

Disney Invites 'Goths' to the Party: Disney, the company that created "the happiest place on earth" and cornered the market on pink, is embracing a darker aesthetic as it reaches out to an unlikely audience for new merchandise: female "goths." [WSJ, Registration Required]

Welcome to Vancouver, the World's Largest Social Media Experiment: Social media was around for the Summer Games in Beijing, but this is the first time it will be deployed in a free and democratic regime.

There's good reason to expect that the Olympic experience will be transformed by the social media presence: it's already changed the Olympic planning process for both the Games organizers and the media that's now descending on the city. Related: Olympics Must Embrace Digital & Social Media Or Risk Losing Youth Audience [Harvard Business Review] [Barking Robot]

Yahoo's #Olympics Website Beats NBC's in Traffic: According to comScore, Yahoo's Olympics site and Yahoo Sports are the top websites for coverage of the first weekend of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics. [The Wrap]

R.I.P. MTV 'Music Television'

After 29 years, MTV has redesigned its logo and finally dropped "Music Television." Basically it looks just like the old logo, only with some cropping.

Having "Music Television" on there was just a constant reminder that MTV was branding itself one way, programming itself another.

Here's the new logo...

 

via www.thrfeed.com

Related: Yahoo! TV: MTV's Big Change

After 29 years, MTV has redesigned its logo and finally dropped "Music Television." Basically it looks just like the old logo, only with some cropping.

Having "Music Television" on there was just a constant reminder that MTV was branding itself one way, programming itself another.

Here's the new logo...

Dan Rosensweig becomes CEO of Textbook Rental Service Chegg.com

Dan Rosensweig is leaving his job overseeing Activision's Guitar Hero video game franchise to run Chegg. Chegg.com has been trying to shake up the college textbook industry by allowing students to rent the material required for their courses. The hiring was announced Tuesday.

Rosensweig is best known for his four-year stint as Yahoo's chief operating officer, where he worked closely with the Internet company's former CEO, Terry Semel. Rosensweig left Yahoo! after a management reshuffling in 2006.

This isn't Mr. Rosenweig's first foray into the education technology space. While at Yahoo! he was actively involved with my team on the Yahoo! For Teachers project. You can catch Dan's cameo in this promo video for Yahoo! Teachers. Dan is also current member of the DonorsChoose National Advisory Board.

Yahoo! For Teachers @ Yahoo! Video

Weekly Wrap: Slacktivism, Open Source Social Innovation, Boomers & Social Media, Helping Google Get Social, Sundance 2010 Round-Up, Texting Party in the USA, Steve Jobs' Wardrobe & More!

A Time and Place for 'Slacktivism': Slacktivism; (v.) action 4 social change w/o much effort beyond a click/text. Known causes: social media, cellphones. [Ypulse]

Baby Boomers Get Connected with Social Media: Boomers are turning to social media, where they keep up their offline social connections and make new ones. Online marketing messages that help them build on their connections—and foster other online relationships—will get their interest. [eMarketer]

Lady GaGa's Lessons for the Music Business: Underneath Gaga's haystack wigs is a case study of what it takes to succeed in the music business today. Gaga, 23 years old, has made shrewd use of new digital platforms, while still leveraging the clout of a major label, an institution deemed obsolete by many proponents of DIY culture (Thanks Ypulse!). [WSJ]

Conan O'Brien's Fate a Sign of the Times: While the "Tonight Show" ratings fell under O'Brien's tenure as a whole, ratings amongst the younger demographics were better than those of Jay Leno's "Tonight Show." According to the New York Times, the median age of "Tonight Show" viewers fell by 10 years, from 55 to 45, in O'Brien's first month alone. [Colorado Daily]

Social Media Marketing, How Pepsi Got it Right: Social media marketing campaigns are proving to be goldmines rich with customer engagement and insight that companies wouldn’t likely have otherwise. Companies like PepsiCo are going to extensive lengths to foster this type of collaboration with fans, and the payoff has been big. [Mashable]

Will Creating a SWAT Team Help Google Get Social?: As successful as Google has been with plenty of other things — including a little thing called search-related advertising — it has struck out big-time in virtually every attempt at the social side of the web. [GigaOM]

Reflections from the Sundance Film Festival: Lois Vossen, ITVS vice president and Independent Lens series producer, shares her reflections on this year’s festival, which wraps up this weekend. [Beyond the Box]

College Students Hate Email: In fact, the student joked that she only uses her email to “communicate with her boss and adults.” She uses Facebook as her preferred method of peer-to-peer communication – she has had a Facebook thread running between the three of them for three years now. [Off Campus Media]

Tweet O' the Week: Can someone please buy Steve Jobs a new outfit! The man has more money than God and Oprah! A simple button down will do!" (via Scott Nevins) [Twitter]

Americans Sending 4 Times as Many Texts as Brits:There was a turning point a couple of years ago when it was suddenly undeniable: It was either text message or be left behind. If you were paying for it by the message, you suddenly had to find a plan, because you started having more and more friends that wouldn't talk any other way. Well, we're wondering if it has finally reached that point in the U.K. - or if it's yet to come. [ReadWriteWeb]

Teen Drinking May Cause Irreversible Brain Damage: For teenagers, the effects of a drunken night out may linger long after the hangover wears off. A recent study led by neuroscientist Susan Tapert of the University of California, San Diego compared the brain scans of teens who drink heavily with the scans of teens who don't. [NPR]

Open Source Social Innovation: Last week Bill Gates entered the digital publishing world by establishing the Gates Notes - an online evolution of his now annual January letter sharing his thoughts on the progress of the issues central to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It’s interesting and symbolic that the next chapter of his life story would include an “open source” platform for sharing IP on social innovation. [Cheskin]