Recently posted on Wired…. Need an e-mail list of customers or readers and want to know more about each ? such as their full name, friends, gender, age, interests, location, job and education level?

Facebook has just the free feature you’re looking for, thanks to its recent privacy changes.

The hack, first publicized by blogger Max Klein, repurposes a Facebook feature that lets people find their friends on Facebook by scanning through e-mail addresses in their contact list.

But as Klein points out, a marketer could take a list of 1,000 e-mail addresses, either legally or illegally collected and upload those through a dummy account which then lets the user see all the profiles created using those addresses.  Given Facebook’s ubiquity and most people’s reliance on a single e-mail address, the harvest could be quite rich.

Using a simple scraping tool, a marketer could then turn a list of e-mail addresses into a rich, full-fledged set of marketing profiles, with names, pictures, ages, locations, interests, photos, wall posts, affiliations and names of your friends, depending on how users have their profiles set.

Run a few algorithms on that data and you can start to make inferences about race, income, sexual orientation and interests.

While that information isn’t available for all users, Facebook changed its privacy settings in early December so that certain information can’t be made private, including one’s name, current city, profile picture, gender, networks and friend list (the latter can be somewhat hidden from public view).

Anyone with your e-mail address can harvest that information, the company admits.

That’s unacceptable, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Kevin Bankston, who says that’s not the Facebook people signed up for.

“Just because Facebook users want to share personal info with their friends does not mean they want to share it with any nefarious parties on the internet,” Bankston said, “but that is exactly what Facebook is forcing its users to do.”

With the new privacy settings, users can shut off being found by their name by changing who can find them on Facebook or by web searches.  But even if you restrict as much as you can, if an outsider knows your e-mail address, they can find the rest of your profile information that Facebook now designates as public, namely your name, profile picture (if you’ve uploaded one), current city (if you’ve filled one out), networks (if you’ve joined any) and pages you are a fan of, according to Facebook.

“If someone knows your e-mail address, they can find you even if you’ve restricted search privacy,” Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes told Wired.com.

That’s very valuable information to marketers, who can use it to evaluate their product, understand their user base better, create targeted marketing materials or sell the information to others.

But Facebook says it works to catch rogue marketers and sets a limit on the number of e-mail addresses that can be run through its system, according to Noyes.

“We’ve developed several systems to detect and block malicious use of the Friend Finder,” Noyes said. “For example, we don’t allow users to upload contact lists past a certain size. We also block users who upload contacts at an anomalous rate.

Still, the onus is on users to make a decision about their information, according to the company.

“However, we encourage people with concerns to configure their privacy settings appropriately,” Noyes said.

Users should know that the information exposed in this little hack is not unlike that which is turned over to third-party applications whenever you or one of your friends installs an application, including such things as quizzes to decide what kind of pet you are.

It’s not clear if any marketers are using this loophole, but it would be very difficult to know

Facebook is pushing its users to share information in an attempt to keep Twitter from eclipsing the site as the center of the net’s online conversations. The site hopes getting users to publish more publicly will make it the place people turn when they need to find recommendations, a function currently dominated (with great profit) by Google.

But privacy activists say Facebook has broken the contract with its users. Some groups have filed a formal complaint with the FTC, saying the recent changes are illegal.

Augmenting marketing data to learn even more about customers isn’t new, and has been offered by companies such as Choicepoint for years. Rapleaf offers a strikingly similar service to the demonstrated hack for companies willing to pay money.

(CNN) — If you like bold predictions, here’s one, courtesy of the president and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association, which hosts the massive Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, this week:

“In my 28 years of attending the CES and participating in it and being a part of it and running it for most of that time, I can honestly say there will be more innovation at this show than any one in history,” Gary Shapiro said.

This from the head of the yearly show that has launched such big tech ideas as compact disc players, high-definition television and Blu-ray.

CES is the year’s largest consumer technology trade show and one of the best chances to see new technologies before they hit the market.

Despite Shapiro’s enthusiasm, though, this week’s CES buzz may be dampened by the lingering economic recession and the fact that big announcements from Google and Apple are likely to bookend the show this month.

On Tuesday, Google is expected to launch its own mobile phone called Nexus One, and rumors are flying that Apple will unveil a touch-screen tablet computer January 26. Neither of the tech giants is scheduled to exhibit at CES, although Google said in an e-mail to CNN that it will attend a CES media event.

Watch a video about what to expect from CES

Attendance at CES 2009 plunged 20 percent compared with 2008 numbers, largely because of the economic recession, Shapiro said. The number of people at CES this week is estimated to hold flat at about 110,000 people.

Still, after a slump in 2009, some market analysts predict a brighter future for consumer electronics this year — and the innovative CES that Shapiro predicts could blossom from this preliminary optimism.

Here is our take on eight of the hottest consumer tech trends to watch at CES. Add your ideas in the comments below. And reply to this CNN iReport assignment with questions you would like CNN to answer at CES this week or cool gadgets you want to see.

We will do our best to report back with answers.

Tablets and midsize screens

Size is everything in computing these days. Netbooks — those 8- to 10-inch dumbed-down laptops — were big news in 2009. This year, they may be eclipsed by an abundance of other midsize computing devices.
Video: Gadgets, gizmos galore
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“There’s the large screen, which is the television. There’s the small screen, which is the wireless phone or the smartphone,” Shapiro said. “Then there’s a middle category, where there’s a tremendous opportunity for growth.

“That’s the netbook, the smartbook, the dualbook, the nettop, the desktop, the laptop — tablets. There’s a lot going on in that middle screen-size space.”

Toteable “tablet” computers ditch keyboards in favor of touch-screen interfaces. Apple’s rumored tablet is getting all of the buzz from tech blogs, but Shapiro said CES will debut tablet computers that run on the Android operating system that Google produces.

Bloggers expect Dell to be among the companies introducing an Android tablet.

E-books and e-readers

Heard of the Amazon Kindle? The Barnes & Noble Nook? The Sony Reader?

All of these e-readers — portable devices that let readers consume digital books without the eye strain caused by computer monitors — will face new competition at CES this year.

Look for an ultralight e-reader from Plastic Logic that’s big enough to display a standard sheet of letter paper. It’s called the QUE.

Futurist Ray Kurzweil tells Wired magazine that he will debut a color e-reader interface at CES called Blio. The software is expected to work on a number of devices, from e-readers to tablets and phones.

Look for new e-readers with color screens at CES as well.

TV + Internet, or “Smart TV”

TVs will continue to morph into living room-based computers in 2010. The industry calls the new generation of televisions “Smart TVs” or “Connected TVs,” and they do things like download Netflix films, stream Pandora music, check e-mail and communicate with other electronic devices in the home.

The idea isn’t especially new, but the interfaces are changing. Plus, Shapiro said, Internet-connected TVs stand to shake up the cable industry.

“You may need the cable company to get broadband, but you may not need it to get cable services” when more TVs connect to the Internet, he said.

One spinoff trend to watch: Several new services, like Boxee, offer interfaces to help couch potatoes surf Internet video without having to jump from one TV network’s Web site to another.

The software side of Internet-enabled-television trend is likely to be hot at CES as well. Boxee is expected to offer hardware that connects TVs to Internet content, too.

Mobile TV

In June, the U.S. switched from analog to digital television (goodbye, rabbit ears!). A quiet side effect of that change: U.S. television signals now can be viewed on mobile devices like smartphones and portable media players.

Shapiro said mobile television will be a major focus of CES, and products that play live TV on the go should hit the market in 2010.

Cydle, a South Korean company, says it will debut mobile TV products for cars. And iMovee announced that it will unveil several mobile TV products.

Look for South Korean mobile phone and electronics maker LG to get in the U.S. mobile TV market as well, as is rumored by tech blogs.

3-D TV, games and laptops

In the wake of hit 3-D movies like “Avatar” and “Up,” several TV makers including Sony and Panasonic have announced plans to sell 3-D television to consumers in 2010. Most of the products demonstrated so far require viewers to wear clunky 3-D glasses in order for images to jump off of the screen.

New at CES, Shapiro said, will be 3-D technology from 3M that does not require glasses for viewing — as well as laptops and video games that display three-dimensional images.

AMD and Blu-ray also say they will demonstrate high-definition 3-D home entertainment at CES. In December, Blu-ray announced that it had arrived at a technology standard for producing content in three dimensions.

Connected cars

Cars are turning into computers.  Ford and other automakers have announced in-car wireless Internet. Ford will offer one of the keynote addresses at CES, which emphasizes the growing importance of the in-car technology industry, Shapiro said.

“We expect them to say something fairly significant,” he said, adding: “They are also positioning themselves as a tech company rather than a car company.”

The emergence of mobile television also probably means live TV will come to automobile consoles and headrests soon.

Once that happens, Shapiro said, a whole new avenue for the advertising industry will open up. A family watching TV in their car while driving through North Dakota, for instance, might see TV ads about local attractions and eateries. A trip to New York might yield entirely different ads.

Android everywhere

Despite the recession, smartphones — those mobile devices like the BlackBerry and iPhone that work almost like computers — were hot buys in 2009.

Expect a fair bit of mobile-phone buzz at CES, although Google’s rumored announcement of its Android phone on Tuesday — and the absence of Apple, maker of the iPhone — could dampen some of the intrigue.

But Shapiro said new phones using the Android platform will be unveiled at CES.

The Android platform, which runs on phones like the Droid and myTouch, also is expected to extend its reach from smartphones into other electronics like televisions.

Apps and accessories

With consumer spending down, cheap buys like mobile phone applications and accessory electronics may take center stage at CES.

Apple’s iPhone is the dominant device for using mobile applications. The iTunes app store has sold more than 2 billion apps since it opened in July 2008.

An iLounge at CES will feature 100 exhibitors with Apple-related products, including new mobile phone applications, Shapiro said. Expect that to be a big draw as iPhone owners look for the next big games and app functions.

In addition to the apps, touch-screen cameras, a third generation of USB data cables and GPS add-ons for phones all could be big CES finds.

Today it seems that no matter what industry you’re in, your competition is stronger than ever.  How do you stand out and get that sale when people aren’t as loyal to brands as they used to be?   How do you get their attention in an ever growing sea of noise when they’re so often swayed by price rather than quality?   One answer is to become recognized as an expert in your industry, someone other people seek out for information.

The most important part to becoming known as an expert, of course, is that you know a lot about whatever it is you do.   That could be construction, public relations, HR, dogs — whatever it is, in order to gain the requisite knowledge to be regarded as a thought-leader in your field likely requires years of schooling or real-world practice, or both.   In addition, when your goal is to be recognized as an expert you need to always keep learning, and to constantly share that expertise. But first let’s talk about why you might want to be an expert.

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Benefits of Being an Expert

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Being an expert in your field makes you the go-to person for your industry. There are many people that I trust inherently on different subjects simply because they know their stuff, and they’re not trying to sell me anything.    They just want to be helpful in their own space.  These are people that I learn from, but also whom I would buy from because I trust their knowledge and expertise.

Being an expert helps you:

- Establish yourself as an industry leader
- Help others
- Become a trusted resource
- Get interviews and media coverage
- Gain access (via conference/speaking invites, etc.)
- Convert followers to sales

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Keep Up-to-Date

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Blogs & News – Blogs in your industry are a great place to find out the latest tools and news.   If you’re not already reading blogs, do a web search for to locate some blogs that cover your business niche.   Find ones that you like and subscribe to them by RSS so you won’t forget to read them.

It’s not a bad idea to set up a Google Alert to search for news about your industry.   Paying attention to news headlines is a great way to stay abreast of changes in your field.

Online Education – There’s no reason you have to enroll in college (again) to keep learning. There are a variety of online resources at which you can take free or cheap webinars or e-courses to keep the wheels churning.

Social Networks – Increasingly, social networks like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Digg, and Delicious are where people are sharing news and information that matters to them.   By following the already established experts in your niche, you’ll gain access to the information they possess, which will in turn increase your knowledge.

Conferences & Events – Every industry has conferences, trade shows, and other events, at which other experts in the industry gather to share their knowledge.   Attending these meetings can help you in your quest to continually learn new information.  You can find out about conferences by reading industry blogs, searching events sites like Upcoming.org, or finding local user groups on Meetup.

Imparting Your Wisdom

By sharing your knowledge with others, you’ll quickly become known for your expertise.   This can translate into sales, job offers, gigs, or other opportunities, as you build your personal brand as an expert.  Here are some ways you can share what you know.

Blogs – The easiest way to start sharing is by creating a blog.  Blogs are fantastic if you’ve got a ton of information in your head and need a place to dump it.  The bonus is: you can help others through that information.  Blog about what you know.  Share news, offer advice, give your opinion, and make yourself the go-to resource for what you do.  The key to successful blogging is to consistently put out good, original, and useful content that encourages readers to engage with you and with each other.

Social Media – Social media sites are designed for experts! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a question about something, tweeted it, and gotten free advice back, later, the people who provided me with expert advice are the people I buy from when I need their services.  By providing free advice on Twitter or Facebook, you will build a base of fans that both trust you and look to you for expert advice.  These fans will seek you out and recommend you to others seeking advice and information — in other words, by sharing your knowledge and gaining trust, your network will grow on its own.

Video – Don’t underestimate the power of video. For those who do well in front of a camera, sharing free how-to videos on sites like YouTube or Vimeo can lead to increased awareness. It also demonstrates to television producers how well you do on camera, which means online expert videos can lead to television appearances.

Speaking Up – You should already be attending industry conferences, trade shows, and user group meetings, and you should make sure to assert yourself as a knowledgeable voice in the community while at those events. Whether that means lining up formal speaking engagements — which will be easier to do the more you grow your personal brand as an expert — or just networking and sharing your expertise with other attendees, speaking up is helpful in building your expert brand.

Consulting – Offering consulting services can do two things: first, it can make you a little money, and second, it can help you establish yourself among industry insiders as someone who knows their stuff.  One consulting gig can lead to many based on referrals and having a list of business owners willing to give you a recommendation can be invaluable.  If you plan to offer consulting services, put information about your services on your blog and in your social profiles, and consider offering phone consultations.

The momentum, was too strong. Real-time search — and Google’s (Google) inability to beatTwitter at it — became a huge trend in 2009. Everyone wanted a piece of it, and Twitter had the goods. When you want to find out what’s happening right now, this very minute, Twitter’s search trumped Google, and Google had no choice but to react. Luckily for Twitter, the reaction came right on time. Both Bing (Bing) and Google signed a deal with Twitter to incorporate real-time results from Twitter into web searches, just as Twitter’s flat traffic figures became impossible to hide. The effect of this deal is still unknown, but when Google sends you traffic, you can bet it’s going to be noticeable.

Twitter’s future is still uncertain. We still don’t know the overall business plan beyond a few hints at at least some current revenue, and we still don’t know if the service’s huge popularity boom in 2009 was just a passing fad. One thing is certain, though: The Google deal was the adrenaline injection Twitter needed. If Twitter is really destined to become the world’s new SMS, 2010 is the time to do it, and we’re happy to be along for the ride.

Details we’ve all been waiting for… the Google Nexus One phone.  We posted a Nexus One Android 2.1 walkthrough video earlier this month and today Engadget has managed to score a full spec sheet for the phone, as well as some details about its release date.

According to Engadget’s source, the phone will initially be available by “invitation only.”  It looks like Google will be deciding who gets invites (hey, Google, call me), but the specifications also indicate that T-Mobile will be able to sell the phone directly to the customers in the future.

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The Breakdown

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Here are some highlights from the screenshots that Engadget posted:

- 512MB RAM, 512MB ROM, included 4GB microSD card, expandable to 32GB

- 5 megapixel camera with LED flash and mechanical autofocus

- 3.7″ WVGA AMOLED screen — in other words, as big as the Droid and brighter

- Worldwide GSM/EDGE, but 3G only on T-Mobile in the US (supports 2100, 1700 and 900 frequencies, meaning Europe should be covered)

- 1GHz Qualcomm chip — if accurate, that would make the Nexus One one of the fastest — if not the fastest — smartphones on the market.

- Wi-Fi A/B//G/N

- Bluetooth 2.1

- GPS

- Accelerometer

The specs look solid, the phone matches or beats every competing Android phone on the market (aside from having no physical keyboard) and also compares quite favorably to the iPhone (faster processor, nicer screen, wireless-N).

The only caveat for potential U.S. buyers is that, barring some sort of firmware upgrade (assuming the 1900 band is just disabled), this phone will only work in 3G in T-Mobile’s network.  If you live in a large city, that might not be a problem, but T-Mobile does have the smallest 3G footprint of any of the major U.S. wireless carriers.

For international users, this is really enticing, because the phone should be compatible with all UMTS bands in Europe, Asia, South America and Australia/New Zealand.

Now all we need is a solid release date and a price.  My friends are ready to buy this sight-unseen.  What about you?  android, Google, nexus oneWhat do you think of the Nexus One?

LinkedIn came out with the latest version of their iPhone app today. As you might expect from a 3.0 release, the app has been much improved, namely in its user experience.  In fact, it looks a lot more like Facebook’s iPhone app now.

As you can see, there is a new main screen that features 12 main buttons.  Yes, this is just like the new Facebook app main screen that features big buttons.  With LinkedIn’s you’ll get easy access to “All Updates,” “Status,” “Profiles,” “Discussions,” “Connections,” “Favorites,” “Inbox,” “Invitations,” “Recents,” “Reconnect,” “In Person,” and “Themes.”  Of these, the Reconnect, In Person, and Themes areas are entirely new.   Reconnect allows you to find people you likely know on LinkedIn with the click of a button. In Person lets you use the iPhone’s Bluetooth to easily swap contact information with any other LinkedIn iPhone use you happen to be nearby at a conference or event.  And Themes allows you to change the color of the main screen icons — you can choose pink, orange, gold, and a bunch of other crazy colors to ugly-up your app to your heart’s content.

Previously, the app featured a more standard bottom-bar iPhone navigation where you could switch between updates, your inbox, search, and other elements. This new layout gives you access to a lot more information quickly. The updates areas (All and Status) has also been been made more Facebook-like as each now features a user profile picture next to each update. You can also now comment on each of these updates right from within the app — again, yes, just like Facebook.

It’s also now very easy to “star” any profile to mark it as a favorite, to give you easy access to it.  Doing this also creates a filtering mechanism for the update streams.

Find the 3.0 version of the LinkedIn app, available for free in the App Store here.

Google’s Feedburner allows you to set up free email updates based on your RSS feed.  Here’s an easy tutorial on how to set it up.

Burn Your Feeds

You first need to head over to Feedburner to claim your blog’s RSS feed.  Log in with your Google account and enter the URL of your feed into the “Burn a feed right this instant” box:

Click next and you’ll be asked to choose a title and address – the defaults are usually fine.   Follow the rest of the instructions through and you should arrive at the Feed Management page.

Enable Email Subscriptions

Hit the “Publicize” tab and select “Email Subscriptions” from the left hand side.

Click “Activate” to enable the feature.

Customisation

In the left hand navigation you should now see four more options below “Email Subscriptions”.

“Communications Preferences” allows you to change the from address and subject/body of the confirmation email your readers will receive on subscription.

“Email Branding” lets you edit your email’s subject, fonts, colors, and allows you to add a logo.

At this stage it may be wise to edit the subscription email and subjects so that the tone is consistent with your blog.  The applies to fonts and colours too – leaving the email as it came out of the box looks dull and lazy.

Finally the “Delivery Options” page lets you customise the time zone and delivery window.  Ensure that the time zone matches that of the geographic location of the majority of your readers (check this in Google Analytics) and think about the best time of day for your email to go out.  The nature of your content may dictate this, but generally just before lunch is a good shout.

Add to your Blog

Go to the “Subscription Management” page to get the code to add a means of subscription to your blog.  The Subscription Form Code adds a form like this:

The Subscription Link Code adds a straight link.  There are also widgets available for TypePad and Blogger.

Simple!

Improving collaboration between people and between organizations is no longer optional if you want to survive in today’s hyper connected businesses world.

Social media marketing (SMM) announces your presence to the world.  It’s a reliable marketing trend to build your network online for success, for the world of tomorrow.

SMM is about finding the right way to promote and introduce exciting ways of communicating to consumers of internet and brick and mortar businesses.

If you think about it, social media is the new yellow pages.  Social media is an innovative tool that will help local businesses pump out all types of information, from the latest in local news, to their promotions and coupons.

Social media allows you to be in control of your marketing, you’re able to reach out to your consumer through non-traditional channels and still have them listen to your message.  SMM allows you to be in control of your business advertising, drive traffic to your site, where you want to place your promotions and coupons, with little or no cost.

About 54% of Americans have substituted internet search engines and local phone books for social media.  More content is created, distributed, and advertised online, and more advertising dollars are moving towards social media.  If your campaign is executed correctly, social media will get you more referrals, generate more leads and help you share information used to educate prospects.  The all new SMM requires different skill sets and strategies when compared to traditional marketing.  You can hire firms who specialize in this type of marketing or simply try it out for yourself.  It is important to note, that is as in any form of marketing, consistency is the key to success.  So, don’t expect to get a ton of new business from just starting a Twitter and Facebook account.

The public has turned to social media sites such as, Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, and Linkedin to reach their audience.  Social media activity also helps your businesses improve search engine rankings through link building. There are now more and more companies that are seeking out alternative and effective marketing strategies, because the phone book is no longer providing what they need.  Many would argue that SMM is the new yellow pages.

The API (Application Programming Interface) has been an essential component for creating applications that hook into or utilize web apps such as Twitter and Facebook.  With it, developers have been able to create some amazing mashups and tools.   Some of the most helpful and oft-used applications on the web wouldn’t be possible without APIs.

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1. Google Maps

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Google Maps is one of the hottest APIs on the web.  The ProgrammableWeb API Directory tracks over 1800 mashups for Google Maps, which is more than three and a half times as many as the next most popular API. Google Maps perhaps did more to popularize the concept of web application mashups in the middle part of this decade than any other API.

1. Google’s Official Documentation for the Maps API is probably the best place to start. The site offers a developer’s guide, code samples and demos, case studies, and even a sandbox where you can test stuff out while you learn.

2. Earlier this year, Google abandoned its official Google Maps API blog in favor of a new Google Geo Developers Blog. The new blog encompasses all of Google’s mapping APIs, including both Maps and their Earth program. The blog is filled with useful posts about using the API, frequent news updates about changes and developments with the API itself, and links to creative uses by other developers.

3. The Official Google Maps API Group is probably the first place you should check out if you need help with your Maps-based project. The extremely active group hosts hundreds of thousands of discussions and is frequented by both seasoned and rookie developers, as well as Google Maps API core contributors. It is often the first place that upcoming API changes are made, so if your project hinges on the Google Maps API, then you should definitely keep an eye on the official group.

4. Mapki is an unofficial Google Maps API wiki at which Maps developers come together to discuss and document the API. The site has a huge list of developer’s tools and tutorials, as well as code snippets and FAQs.

5. Mike Williams’ Google Maps API Tutorial is an excellent and up-to-date overview of the API. It’s a great getting started point for anyone trying to get into mashup development with Google Maps or integrating maps into an existing project.

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2. Facebook / Facebook Connect

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Over a million developers have created over 350,000 active applications on the Facebook Platform and Facebook Connect has been adopted by more than 15,000 web sites, according to official stats. That easily makes Facebook’s platform and Connect API among the hottest development platforms on the web today.

1. The Facebook Developers site is one of the most complete and well-made and maintained developer sites on the web. It has a great getting started guide, as well as super active forums, an official blog for developers, and more.

2. If you’re developing anything for the Facebook Platform, then Facebook Developer Tools page is a must-bookmark resource. The tools, including test consoles for the API and FBML, as well as a playground environment for Facebook Connect, are super helpful for anyone working with the app platform or Facebook’s other developer APIs. They also recently released the Facebook Connect Wizard that makes integrating Facebook Connect with your site a snap.

3. Facebook’s Wiki offers a plethora of useful information for developers from guidelines to how-to guides to code examples and more. The site hosts over a thousand articles ensuring that if you need to do it with Facebook’s APIs, there’s a good bet you’ll find the information you need to know to learn how to do it somewhere in the wiki.

4. Though it hasn’t been updated in just over a year, the unofficial Facebook Developer online magazine is still an amazing resource for Facebook developers. It has an incredible archive of useful articles, tutorials, guides, and case studies that are still available for viewing.

5. It may just be a clever marketing tactic to get people to sign up for its hosting services, but Joyent’s popular Facebook Applications Developer Program, which offers free hosting for app developers for one year, is nonetheless a great resource. Especially for developers just getting into Facebook, Joyent’s program offers a no-risk way to test the waters.

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3. Twitter

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Anyone who reads this blog is well-aware of just how fast Twitter is growing. According to Compete, Twitter has grown over 650% this year, and it’s popular with developers too; Twitter application directory oneforty tracks over 1,800 Twitter-based or connected tools and applications.

1. The place to start, of course, is the Official API Wiki, which Twitter has packed with documentation, guides, tutorials, known issues, and FAQs for dealing with the Twitter API and OAuth.

2. Being Twitter, the Twitter API team naturally also has a Twitter account (@twitterapi). The account is updated by 5 core API developers at Twitter with news about the Twitter API and offers support to developers using it to build applications.

3. Twitter also has a blog, on which the company posts updates about their developer tools, as well as links to content that is helpful for developers, and spotlights of exceptional API uses. Also be sure to keep an eye on the service’s status blog to keep track of downtime issues and scheduled maintenance.

4. The Twitter Development Talk group/mailing list, which is hosted by Google Groups, is one of the best places to go to for help when you’re stuck with a Twitter API development problem. The site has had over 20,000 messages posted to it and is frequented by the API team. Twitter also operates a group for API announcements, which is a must-follow for developers craving the latest Twitter API news.

5. A search for Twitter on GitHub will return a ton of useful resources for developers, including over 13,000 code snippets and over 1,300 repositories, including many of the most popular Twitter libraries and wrappers. You can also find some of the open source technologies that actually power Twitter on GitHub.

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4. Flickr

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Flickr just recently passed 4 billion photos, so it’s no wonder that developers are excited to use it. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of mashups that rely on the Flickr API to add a little bit of visual appeal.

1. code.flickr is the home of Flickr’s official developer blog, and their official forum community. There are thousands of discussions in the Flickr API pool, as well as developers sharing screen shots of their creations, and the site also hosts the official SVN and Trac pages for the Flickr API, as well.

2. Yahoo!’s impressive Developer Network hosts a helpful Flickr section with a basic overview of the API, and links to the API key application form and information about rate limits and commercial usage. However, if you want meatier documentation, you’ll need to check out Flickr’s Official Flickr API documentation page, which offers a ton of information about using the API and links to third-party API kits for languages including ActionScript, Java, .NET, Objective-C, PHP, Python, and Ruby, among others.

3. If you’re still stumped, a good place to turn for an answer would be the YWS-Flickr Group on Yahoo! Groups. The active discussion list has over 3,000 Flickr developers that regularly share tips and tricks and help each other out.

4. The Ultimate Guide to Decoding the Flickr API is a very impressive tutorial from Nettuts+. Though just a single tutorial, it is a very good overview that is definitely a good place to start for developers interested in utilizing the Flickr API.

5. GitHub has a collection of over 200 Flickr code repositories including libraries and other helpful tools for developers. Ruby, JavaScript, Python, and PHP are the most popular languages among Flickr developers on the code sharing site.

A study conducted by Harvard Business Review reveals that most Twitter users don’t actually use the service much, or even at all.  In fact, 10% of active users are responsible for over 90% of all Tweets.

According to the research, conducted on a random sample of about 300,000 Twitter (Twitter) users in May 2009, 25% of Twitter users don’t tweet at all, while 50% of users tweet less than once every 74 hours.  Active users, on the other hand, tweet a lot, which makes Twitter a lot more like Wikipedia (Wikipedia) than an average social network (see graph below, courtesy of HBR).

Although this may sound strange at first, Twitter really is more like Wikipedia than, say, Facebook (Facebook). Twitter is not so much about connecting with your friends, it’s about broadcasting information.  Although it doesn’t necessarily take much creativity to create a tweet, only the most creative users actually persist in tweeting every day over a longer time period.

However, Twitter is also similar to a instant messaging tool, which should have a very different curve, with a larger proportion of users contributing to the number of overall tweets. It seems that Twitter’s micropublishing component is winning over its chatting component.

The Harvard Business Review study reveals another interesting tidbit: men seem to follow men more than women on Twitter. There are more women than men on twitter – approximately 55% of all users are female – but an average man will follow a man in 65% of all cases, while a woman will follow a man in 56% of cases. It’s hard to pull any meaningful conclusions from this anomaly, except one: Twitter is different than other social networks. But you already knew that.