Twitter Replies Kerfuffle

Not sure what a “kerfuffle” is, but I’m pretty sure it means Twitter screwed up a fundamental feature of the service. They’re saying only 3% of users are actually affected by the change, but I think those 3% might be the ones who actually use this thing. In the past, you had a few options as far as what replies you would see from those you followed:

• You could see all @ replies
• @ replies to people you’re following
• No @ replies

Well, it seems this was causing excessive load on Twitter’s servers, confusing some users,  and messing up other unrelated features, so @ replies now work as follows:

• Updates beginning with @username (that are not explicitly created by clicking on the reply icon) will be seen by everyone following that account
• There will be some new feature in the future to give us further control over what we see from specific accounts

All this sounds pretty confusing but, even with the replies feature suddenly crippled, you may still be able to discover new people to follow based on who your friends are talking to. It just depends on if they actually hit “reply” or not. This means that #followfriday is still alive and kicking.

FriendFeed Enables Stalking Individual Notifications

You now have the option to receive email, IM, and desktop notifications for individuals and groups. Hit “Email / IM” on any profile page and you’ll see all the options available for keeping tabs on an individual feed. Once you have turned on the notifications for a feed, you can manage them on your notification options page.

Contenture emerges from the shadows…

“Adsense is nonsense.” “Goodnight AdBright.” These are a couple of messages featured on the Contenture home page. This new service from the creators of Clicky web analytics wants to help bloggers make money without all the flashy ads. Let’s face it, most sites won’t see much income from page views and ad-placement. It’s good to see something new in this area. Also, their web comic ends with the Twitter fail-whale having a cocktail in a hammock. They’re officially launching on May 21st.

In case you missed it….

• AOL Acquires SocialThing
• Google’s Feedburner Switches to Adsense
• Yahoo Board Adds Icahn Nominees Chapple, Biondi
• Twitter Cuts U.K Texting
• Facebook Sued over Beacon

Layoffs at AOL’s Platform A

Technorati b5 media merger, goes kaput

AOL buys Sphere

Yahoo to offer free Analytics Suite

Last but not least:
Why is everyone (Mashable, RWW) doing “ways-not-to-pitch-to-us” posts this week?  We’ll take ‘em!

Hulu will go international.

Yahoo runs 2 week trial of Google AdSense in Yahoo search results.

AOL launches Technology network.

Yahoo Maps in living color.

Google crawls HTML forms.

Dell layoff woes.

Kanye launches Travel website?

Universal Music Group + MySpace + Sony BMG Music Entertainment + Warner Music Group = MySpace Music

Twhirl acquired by Seesmic

Radiohead launches Social Network.

Facebook lets you ignore app invites.

CNET and DoubleClick layoff.

10 Millionth Article Written on Wikipedia.

Google and Yahoo release video ads in search results.

Judge rules in favor of Diller.

Apparently if you don’t like Twitter you’re a bitch.

Facebook recommends friends.

Adobe launches Photoshop Express.

Tezaa
A self proclaimed “opinion engine” and an online search community driven by polls. Straight from their About page on how Tezaa can benefit its users: “Tezaa can help you make better choices by knowing what your peers think.” Check it out and judge for yourself.
Socialgrapes
Can help you search user profiles from most of the major social networks. Pretty cool I guess if you are looking to connect with a specific person and don’t want to bother to go to each individual social network. On first glance I thought it was a search engine for wine, go figure.
Explode!
Similar to Sociagrapes but better presentation and easier to use.

oSkope visual search
My favorite of the bunch. Nice presentation and handy if you ever find yourself looking for images for hours and want to shake it up a bit. Because it it pulling images from other sites such as Flickr and Amazon it can be painfully slow to load at times.

Hungry for more Search? Check out Mashables list of 40+ Social Search Engines.

Outlook + Twitter = OutTwit
This might help some of you Twitter users.

The Black Digital Elite: African American Leaders of the Information Revolution
Good Read.

AIGA Diversity Initiative
If you are a designer or a member of AIGA they have a Diversity Initiative. You may have to verify they have one in your local chapter, they are supposed to have someone on each local board to run the local aspects of this. I know it is in full effect in ATL, not so much in Charlotte.

Mashup Challenge
Every 90 days a new Mashup Challenge starts so don’t worry if you haven’t quit thought of that perfect Mashup yet. FYI they also have a Mashup Awards.

10 Tools to Help you Select a Web 2.0 Color Palette
BookmarkBliss.com has found the perfect solution for your Web 2.0 color problems, and they are web based!

Virtual Video Map
Lets you see YouTube videos from specific areas in the world, kinda sorta like TwitterVision.

Dack.com Web Economy Bullshit Generator
Very funny, comes up with crazy Web 2.0 phrases that don’t really exist like “facilitate ubiquitous web services” or “scale frictionless technologies”

visualcomplexity.com
A visual exploration of mapping complex networks such as a favorite of mine “Who Owns the Internet?” Verizon, Sprint, At&t, or Qwest?

Stripemania
Stripe background generator

Walk2Web
Visualizes connections between websites.