More artists are getting into the social network frenzy, including LL Cool J.

LL Cool J demoed his social network, Boomdizzle at CES on Tuesday.  Boomdizzle encourages musicians to collaborate and network on various projects through the web. LL Cool J demoed how those tools would work at CES and played a track he created with Ne-Yo. According to Mashable, he said his goal is for up-and-coming artists to have a place to share their music and then collaborate with recording tools available on the site.

Users can connect with each other via video chat  to create a track together. The site also  allows artists to display the tracks they have created. This is one of many platform that caters to independent artist, this is a space that could grow being that there are so many musicians trying to make a name for themselves. Myspace was were online stars were born, but now it could essentially happen anywhere, including Boomdizzle.

The NAACP launched a social network for members of the NAACP Youth and College Division and participants in the Academic, Cultural, Technological, and Scientific Olympics program called, NAACPConnect.

NAACPConnect was created to connect young leaders with each other and network with NAACP alumni. The official site for the network is NAACPConnect.org, but they will be utilizing various social media platforms young people use daily such as  Facebook,  Twitter,  Tumblr,  Youtube and Google+.

The new network from NAACP will offer written and multimedia content, skills trainings, micro-mentoring aimed at educational and professional development.  The site will also allow users to engage in regular online conversations with alumni from the Academic, Cultural, Technological, Scientific Olympics program.

Today at 7 pm EST ,Stefanie Brown, national field director and director of the NAACP Youth & College Division, will host a live video chat on NAACPConnect.org to discuss the different ways to engage with the network. Users will be able to interact and ask questions via Facebook and Twitter.

Combining the NAACP’s Youth & College Division and the Academic, Cultural, Technological, Scientific Olympics program will contribute t NAACPConnect being one the most useful social networks for young African-Americans.

Social groupware platform GROU.PS has just introduced several new features, the most notable of which is a Facebook template called “theBook” that lets you create your own private network with the same look and feel as Facebook.

According to GROU.PS founder Emre Sokullu, the use of the template has already increased the engagement rates within groups by over 50%.

The template’s addition was inspired by one of the company’s private groups, Lagbook, which uses a similar template to create an African-based social networking site. The group grew to 35,000 members in just six months, Sokullu said, after implementing this design.

Read the rest of this article at TechCrunch

MySpace finally sold for $35 million dollars to advertising network Specific Media. Starting out essentially making a name for what social networking is today, MySpace was one of the most popular online destinations in the mid 2000s; that is until Facebook came and reined on their parade. But now what? It’s sold, in someone else’s hands, Justin Timberlake has a stake, but what is to be done with MySpace?

It’s not completely down the tubes as it still has 35 million visitors a month according to comScore, but compared to a 175 million visitors Facebook sees a month, it doesn’t look good. Specific Media bought it, so they obviously have plans to revamp, start over, and try to make it the go to social playground it once was.

But with its competition growing by the minute, it’s hard to imagine what people’s use for MySpace would be at this point. Timberlake stated that he saw potential in it for celebrities to connect with fans, but is that enough?  Unfortunately, the public just doesn’t have that long of an attention span for mediocre ideas. Things come and go and MySpace has come and gone. To bring it back from the dead is really unnecessary in more ways than one.  I hate to say it but Facebook will not last forever either, it may stay popular for years to come, but we are talking about online, technology, the big World Wide Web, things change too often for these platforms to stay relevant for a lifetime.

It will be interesting to see exactly where they take MySpace, for all we know under new management it may actually give Facebook a run for its money, probably not though.

What do you think? Does MySpace still have a chance?

Google has finally unveiled Google+, the company’s top secret social layer that turns all of Google into one giant social network.

Google+, which begins rolling out a very limited field test on Tuesday, is the culmination of a year-long project led by Google Senior Vice President of Social Vic Gundotra. The project, which has been delayed several times, is — without doubt — Google’s answer to Facebook.

The search giant’s new social project will be omnipresent on every Google product, thanks to a complete redesign of the Google navigation bar. The familiar gray bar at the top of every Google page will turn black, and come with several new options for accessing your Google+ profile, viewing notifications and instantly sharing content at any time. The notification system is similar to how Facebook handles notifications, complete with a red number that increases with each additional notice.

At its core, Google+ is a social network. The first thing users are introduced to when they visit Google+ is the Stream. It’s much like the Facebook News Feed, allowing users to share photos, videos, links or their location with friends.

To read the rest of this article and learn more about Google’s new Google + go to Mashable

Twitter is a social networking tool therefore, it only makes sense that people are able to communicate with each other. But it can be annoying to have to see an actual conversation taking place, especially if it is personal and something that no one else wants to see or read. This can sometimes lead to unfollowing because of the lack of relevance to their conversation flooding their other follower’s timeline.

A solution to this problem have been personal twitter chat rooms where a conversation about a particular topic can take place without other followers seeing. Another twitter chatting tool just became available called ChittyChat. ChittyChat is an instant messaging platform  that lets you chat privately and securely with multiple people straight from Twitter. Instead of going back and forth for hours mentioning people in your tweets, you can simply use ChittyChat to communicate more effectively.

ChittyChat is now available in public beta at chittych.at/

 If you have a bunch of tag-happy Facebook friends, you may want to read this. Facebook has been rolling out a facial recognition feature that makes it easier to tag friends in snaps, and it has introduced this feature as a default setting.

We first heard about Tag Suggestions back in December.

The feature basically means that whenever you’re offered the chance to tag groups of your friends in an album, Facebook will use its facial recognition technology to group similar faces together and automatically suggest the friend you should tag them with.

Read the rest of this article at Mashable

There’s been a lot of discussion this year on how African Americans are using social networking, most notably Twitter. Celebrity digital deaths and Twitter beefs aside, we use it to discuss topics relevant to the community, one such discussion is currently being led by @rolandmartin on the use of the N-word. We use it for social good and we also use it for politics.

Cory Booker, mayor of Newark, New Jersey is a serious about his social media. Like President Barack Obama, Mayor Booker has employed social networking to get his message out to his constituents, but he has taken it much further. The mayor has used Twitter as a sounding board to identify the problems in his city. Since Snowpocalypse 2010 has buried the Northeast under mountains of snow, stranding travelers and residents alike, Booker has been using Twitter to manage the cleanup.

Instructing Newark residents to Direct Message him if they are stuck or if their streets need plowing, Mayor Booker is sending help as necessary. In a few cases, tweeters have reached out to the mayor for help digging out their parents.

In addition to city employees, Booker has also been showing up to personally help dig people out. In one instance, he called out a fellow Newark resident and Twitter user for leaving his mother and sister to dig themselves out. It all ended well as the mayor commended the young man for coming to talk to him face to face regarding the situation.

Earlier this year Booker was on hand to receive a $100 million donation from Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg that will be put towards improving Newark’s school system. Mayor Cory Booker is a great example of how politics and social media can come together for the greater good.

Do your local politicians use social media to stay in contact with their constituents? Share your thoughts in the comments section.

Many families can’t wait for soldiers to return home from the places they are serving whether they are deployed to Afghanistan, Iraq, Korea, or even an American military base.  This anticipation can be even greater during the holiday season.  However, there is good news for military families who have access to online social networking sites.  The military’s decision earlier this year to allow the use of social media by soldiers provides families with tools to send a little bit of home to those on active duty no matter where they are around the globe.

Social Networking Sites

Just as they are the most popular social networking sites in the civilian world, Facebook and Twitter are also popular tools for soldiers.  Facebook is particularly useful for young children of deployed soldiers.  These soldiers can set up a routine where they post daily personal messages and pictures for their children to read in their home time zone.  Families can also post pictures of traditions like putting up decorations or holiday meals.  This gives soldiers a sense of life at home despite being away from their loved ones.

Twitter doesn’t have the multimedia capabilities of Facebook, but the 140 character messages allow the exchange of quick updates between soldiers and their loved ones that are harder to do on Facebook.  Twitter is also useful when soldiers are in areas with low bandwidth.

Online Video Calls

While most social networking sites allow the posting of pictures and videos, they don’t provide a way to actually see and talk with a deployed solider in real time.  However, there are several free online services that let users make video calls.  Soldiers and their families only need an internet connected computer and a low cost webcam to use these services.  Skype is a popular item, but there are other options like ooVoo, TinyChat, and TokBox that can allow more people to join the video call than allowed by Skype.  Online video calls provide soldiers with real time interaction with their significant others, and many get a live view of milestones like the first steps and first words of their children.

Blogs

Blogs provide a way to create an online archive of experiences.  They can easily be set up using free services like WordPress and Blogger.  Soldiers and families can share their daily activities with each other in a longer format than is possible on most social networking sites.  Also, it is easier to go back and read earlier posts on blogs than on sites like Facebook and Twitter.  Children can create blog posts chronicling the completion of school projects and read comments left by their deployed parents.

While these tools can provide powerful ways for soldiers to stay connected with loved ones, they must be carefully used. Soldiers should not post sensitive information or use classified government computers to access social media sites.  Also, it should be understood that all information transmitted by soldiers on social media sites is closely monitored by the military.

You’ve probably noticed odd status updates like this on Facebook over the past couple of days: “#101 You’ve always had my back, and I will always have yours.”  These Facebook postings are part of a viral game called “The Number Game”, and there is even a Facebook page dedicated to it.  Coming on the heels of the meme that changed profile pictures into cartoon characters, it seems that user generated games on social networks are here to stay.

The mechanics of the game are straightforward.  Person X sends a number to Person Y via a Facebook Message or by using Facebook chat.  Person Y then creates a wall post that starts with the number (which only lets Person X know who it’s about) and then shares what Person Y thinks about Person X.  So, the Facebook Number Game has the paradox of sharing information with a lot of people while still maintaining a secret that is shared by only two people.

While the popularity of the game cannot be denied, it seems that for everyone who plays the number game an equal number criticize it.  Most of the criticisms focus on the way the game clutters Facebook feeds or that is it little more than an online version of the grade school game where a note would be passed saying, “Do you like me? Circle yes or no.”

However, I think that the Facebook Number Game offers interesting insights into the nature of humanity.  After seeing the explosion of similar user-generated games like the bra color game or the “I like it on . . .” game, I think these memes provide hints into why human beings prefer information instead of data, enjoy anonymity, and love to share secrets.  I am also particularly interested in the large number of black Facebook users who take part in The Number Game.  Here are a few things we can learn from this latest Facebook trend.

Information is Better than Data

The vast majority of status updates posted to Facebook consist of simple data.  Data is the presentation of facts.  These are updates like the time you woke up, what you had for breakfast, what happened at work, what a celebrity did at a televised awards show, etc.  However, information is the interpretation of data in order to determine meaning and find value.  The Facebook Number Game changes the Facebook experience from the simple consumption of data into the presentation of meaningful information.  This effect is made more potent because personal information is being shared with a large number of people.  This raises the value of the stream of updates that flow through Facebook and increases the usefulness of the experience.

Anonymity and Secrecy Are a Powerful Combination

As demonstrated by the extreme statements people make online when given a sense of anonymity, human beings like speaking their mind when no one knows their true identity.  We also like to share secret information with each other because it gives the impression of belonging to an exclusive club of people who know the secret.  The combination of anonymity and the ability to share secret information in a public forum makes The Facebook Number Game a very addictive experience.

Black People Continue to Represent in Social Media

The past few months have presented several stories about how black people use social media.  Ranging from academic research from Pew Internet to the infamous brown Twitter bird article published by Slate, it’s clear that black people use social networking sites in large numbers.  While it’s unscientific research, I have seen this trend continue with The Facebook Number Game.

My Facebook social graph, while not perfectly diverse, does contain a representative number of different races.  I have witnessed far more black Facebook users playing The Facebook Number Game in my status update feed than other races.  I then removed the bias of my personal Facebook circle of friends by using Openbook to do a search of public Facebook profiles using the keywords “number game.”  These random results showed Facebook users discussing the game, and every refresh of the search showed several black Facebook users either taking part in the game or discussing it.  I did the same thing using Twitter search.

While I continue to look for further research into how black people use social networking sites, I think that the historical ability of blacks to form virtual family ties is one reason why social media is so popular with blacks.  During slavery, slave masters could break up families as they saw fit.  Husbands, wives, children and other family members could be separated at a moment’s notice.  To gain the human need for a sense of family, slaves often designated virtual “aunts” and “uncles” despite the lack of actual blood relations.  This legacy can be seen today when black people refer to each other as brothers and sisters even when there are no shared parents.  Since black people have long formed virtual relationships in the physical world, perhaps that gives us an enhanced level of comfort when forming virtual relationships on online social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Predicting the Next Meme

The Facebook Number Game and the memes that preceded it will probably be followed by similar games.  I think that the powerful combination of personal information, secrecy, and anonymity will be a part of how these games are played.  Additionally, minorities will be visible participants in the games, and future memes will probably be tied to some altruistic cause.

Facebook itself could leverage the power of these viral Facebook games by letting users create “secret” posts.  This feature would work as follows.  Person X writes a post confessing some type of secret.  The Facebook interface lets the user mark the post as a “Secret” so that it is not handled like a conventional wall post.  Instead, all of Person X’s Facebook friends see the post but don’t know who posted it.  They only know that it was one of their Facebook friends.  Person X and his or her Facebook friends can all comment on the posted secret while maintaining Person X’s anonymity.  Perhaps such a Facebook feature will take the best of The Facebook Number Game and allow candid discussions of topics that people are afraid to discuss outside the cover of anonymity.  This could lead to better understanding of controversial positions and maybe even reduce divisions in the real world.