O.C. Teenager Pleads Guilty in Facebook Feud That Escalated to Violence

Online debates can get pretty nasty. And around here people have crossed the line. I'm still getting threats on RACIST = REPSAC = CASPER'S blog.

That kind of craziness never turns out well. At O.C. Register, "Teen pleads guilty in Facebook stabbing."

SANTA ANA – A teenage boy from Laguna Beach has been sentenced to a year in jail after pleading guilty to stabbing a former classmate in a feud authorities say started on Facebook.

Michael Jason Wilson, 17, avoided a possible 15-year sentence if his case had gone to trial and he was convicted of felony aggravated assault against the victim and two of his friends.

Wilson pleaded guilty Monday to felony assault with a deadly weapon with a sentencing enhancement for inflicting great bodily harm.

As part of the plea agreement, two other felony counts of assault with the same sentencing enhancements were dismissed, according to court records.

*****

According to authorities, Wilson and a former high-school classmate had an ongoing rivalry through Facebook. The dispute included text messages and e-mails, though authorities did not disclose the nature of the argument.

Wilson agreed to meet his rival, identified only as 17-year-old Julian C., at his home. Julian C. brought along three friends who waited in a nearby car.

Wilson stabbed Julian C. in the stomach with a 12-inch knife and also slashed the hands and arms of two of Julian C.'s friends when they intervened and were able to take the knife away from Wilson, according to authorities. The third friend of Julian C. was not injured.

Crazy people.

Robert Stacy McCain Slushee Blogging

You gotta love this. Cute kids making the pitch for dad:

See: "How to Be the Best Dad Ever."

This is funny:

Newt Gingrich announced his presidential campaign raised $2 million in three months. Newt endorsed Scozzafava, went cruising the Aegean Sea, has a million-dollar line of credit at Tiffany, and Republican donors give him $2 million for a campaign that was doomed before it ever started. I fought the good fight for Doug Hoffman in NY-23, yet I can’t even get enough money for a trip to Alabama.

This is whiny:

In response to that [Althouse] post, at least three of my “friends” in the blogosphere accused me of mere traffic-baiting. Of course, Little Miss Attila’s malicious jest was to be expected, but the others surprised me.

And, well, I was just giving ole' R.S. McCain a hard time, but Stogie was a little more pointed: "When News Is Slow, Invent a Controversy: R.S. McCain vs Ann Althouse." And in the comments there, Adrienne from Adrienne's Corner:

I think Stacy is a brilliant writer and a really bright person. He doesn't need to do things like that to get hits.

Ann Althouse's popularity is a mystery to me...

Actually, my first quotation above attests to Robert's talent (and more on Althouse later), although I'm not going to put a little link-baiting past him. Heck, I got some traffic out if it myself! Learn from the master!

And about that "'friends' in the blogosphere" line? Friends are friends, right? I mean, when I meet Tim Daniel for a political event, and we share a few beers, I'm not separating him into "friends" vs. "friends in the blogosphere." And I've met Robert Stacy McCain a number of times now, and we spent a couple of days together last year, when the Crimson Tide went to the Rose Bowl. Shoot, we're BFF dude! (Added: How do you make BFF plural? BFFs doesn't really work, but BFsF? That doesn't look so cool.)

Anyway, hit the guy's tip jar. Those kids are persuasive!

Marc Andreessen on the Tech-Sector Bubble

Or non-bubble, to be precise.

At New York Times, "Bubble? What Bubble?":

Contrary to all the recent hype about a bubble, you’ve said that tech companies are actually undervalued. So in true 1999 fashion, should I take my life savings out of mutual funds and toss it into tech stocks?

I’m certainly not an investment adviser, but on a 30-year basis, these things are cheap. If you compare how big industrial companies like G.E. are valued compared with big tech companies like Microsoft, Cisco, Google and Apple, tech stocks have never been valued more poorly in comparison. So not only is there no bubble — these prices are reflective of the fact that the market still hates tech. This bubble talk is about everybody being unbelievably psychologically scarred from 10 years ago.

Your venture-capital firm, Andreessen Horowitz, is heavily invested in Twitter, Facebook and Foursquare. You’re hardly an unbiased observer.

True, but the counterargument is I put my money where my mouth is.

Continue reading.

Google Makes Facebook Look Socially Awkward

At Wall Street Journal:

Mark Zuckerberg might want to fast-track Facebook's initial public offering.

In what appeared to be a hasty response to the launch of Google's rival social-networking product, called Google+, Mr. Zuckerberg on Wednesday unveiled Facebook's new video-chatting feature. He called it "super awesome." Too bad Google made the same feature available in 2008. Indeed, Facebook suddenly looks vulnerable. This could be bad news for investors who have recently paid top dollar for stock in Facebook in private sales.

Rule No. 1 when launching a social network: Make everyone wait in line. Exclusivity was how, in its early days, Facebook built buzz. For more than two years, you couldn't get in unless you had an email address ending in .edu. Google is using a similar strategy with Google+.

Facebook should take note that Google used the strategy before to kneecap Yahoo in all-important email, a key driver of Yahoo's traffic. Then Google rolled out Gmail—but only by invitation at first.

Rule No. 2 is to deliver a better service. Adopting a new social network could prove similar to adopting a new email address: Many will try it out, but to keep using it, they have got to be given good reason. That Gmail offered significantly more storage space than typical Web mail meant millions were willing to make the switch. Similarly, Google+ offers upgrades on what many perceive to be Facebook's shortcomings.

For starters, Google+ gives users a handy way to organize their social contacts into different "circles"—friends, relatives, colleagues, etc.—with which they can share appropriate things. Though Facebook now offers the option to create "Groups," users broadcast their information to everyone by default.

Google+ also offers group video chats. That is why Facebook's announcement of one-on-one video on Wednesday seemed to fall short. Facebook has yet to introduce group video chat.

The biggest hurdle for Google+ is getting users, of course. But it is integrating the service with Gmail, which already has 240 million unique users world-wide, according to comScore. Meanwhile, the user experience on Facebook is a victim of the site's success. Users have accumulated so many online "friends" it can be difficult to organize them. And users often feel assaulted by too much or irrelevant social information, like Zynga game updates. Ultimately, Google+ is a chance for social networkers to start over.

Still more at the link.

Interesting.

And see Midnight Blue, "My Thoughts on Google +."

RELATED: "Managing Google Plus Privacy Settings [Google+]." And, "How to Disable Google Plus Email Notification."

7 Million Down, Only 33 Million to Go...

Robert Stacy McCain previewed his 7 millionth hit the other day, and then Smitty recorded the moment: "7,000,000 Hits, 7-Minute Blogs."

And I just want to say, "Hey, guys, congratulations — and don't be getting too cocky, alright? Ha!"

It turns out Ann Althouse had a blogging milestone the other day as well, 40 million hits!

Now that's some traffic!

And how's it done? Well, Doug Ross offers a 10-trick guide: "Advice for a Young Blogger: How to get a million or less hits on your blog over some unspecified period of time, maybe." I like this part, tip #4:

Try to keep content fresh and stories flowing, even if it means running a group blog or having guest bloggers. People don't visit sites that are static. If nothing changes between visits, there's really not a reason to surf to your site. As for myself, each day since January 9, 2009, I've posted Larwyn's Linx, my roundup of important stories. No matter what else is happening, regular readers can at least get a daily snapshotof my favorite articles.

Excellent advice (and RTWT), and I want to give Doug some extra kudos for keeping up the Linkfest with such consistent excellence. That's an achievement all by itself. Meanwhile, Robert Stacy McCain takes a bit different approach: "‘Like Losing Your Virginity …’"

I've written about blogging success numerous times before, and I hope readers have learned something. Checking back on some of the old posts I'm reminded of political science research on the gatekeeper effect in the blogosphere, which holds:

Blogs with large numbers of incoming links offer both a means of filtering interesting blog posts from less interesting ones, and a focal point at which bloggers with interesting posts, and potential readers of these posts can coordinate. When less prominent bloggers have an interesting piece of information or point of view that is relevant to a political controversy, they will usually post this on their own blogs. However, they will also often have an incentive to contact one of the large “focal point” blogs, to publicize their post. The latter may post on the issue with a hyperlink back to the original blog, if the story or point of view is interesting enough, so that the originator of the piece of information receives more readers. In this manner, bloggers with fewer links function as “fire alarms” for focal point blogs, providing new information and links. This reduces the need for bloggers at the top of the link structure to engage in “police patrols” to gather information on their own...

The point still holds, although at the time of publication social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter hadn't taken off, so I'm convinced that self-promotion and networking can help newbies break into the top tier much more quickly than in earlier days of the blogosphere. And frankly, I think there's less consensus on the "top tier" itself, since reader self-segregation and the sheer number of excellent blogs makes those earlier hierarchical effects less meaningful or pronounced.

In any case, here's an interesting flashhack: "Blogging While Female: 5 Conservative Women Bloggers Talk About Gender Issues And The Blogosphere."

Google to Retire Blogger!

The brand name "Blogger," that is.

With the launch of Google+ there's some other developments in store as well, called "brand unification."

See Mashable!, "EXCLUSIVE: Google To Retire Blogger & Picasa Brands in Google+ Push."

Say goodbye to the Picasa and Blogger names: Google intends to retire several non-Google name brands and rename them as Google products, Mashable has learned.

The move is part of a larger effort to unify its brand for the public launch of Google+, the search giant’s social initiative.

Blogger and Picasa aren’t going away, of course — they’re two of Google’s most popular products. Instead, according to two sources familiar with the matter, Google intends to rename Picasa “Google Photos” and Blogger will become “Google Blogs.” Several other Google brands are likely to be affected, though our sources made it clear that YouTube would not be rebranded. The technology giant shut down Google Video, its failed web video service, in May.

Meanwhile, it looks like Ann Althouse has gotten the full archives from Google, and should be making her switch-over soon. See, "'Hello. I am on the Blogger team and am one of the guys who has been helping Ann with her blog...'"

'Twitter and Facebook are like personal wire services that filter the constant flow of information across the Web'

Says Washington Post ombudsman Patrick Pexton. See, "At The Post, reporters get socialized to social media."

And here's this from Post writer Jura Koncius, who has 1,300 followers on Twitter:

Part of being on Twitter is “shameless self-promotion,” Koncius says; “you are your own public relations person” in journalism today. But another part is to engage in a conversation with sources and readers, showing them what interests you and what might interest them. And they respond in kind, showing her things she didn’t know before, Koncius says. “It enhances my day, it provides a smile.”

I've been on Twitter over two years now. I enjoy it. But I don't use it aggressively or addictively. Frankly, I should be using it more. The one thing about it that can't be beat is the instantaneous news reporting. I was blown away at the power of Twitter during the Iranian democracy protests in 2009. The quantity and quality of all kinds of news and social media at the time was transformational. I spoke differently about technology during my lectures. This kind of thing happens often if you're on Twitter quite a bit, but the last time I felt like that was when U.S. forces killed Osama bin Laden. Keith Urbahn, a former staffer for Donald Rumsfeld, tweeted it, and it took off around the Twittersphere. By the time President Obama gave his national address I'd been tweeting for more than 90 minutes, and I was able to post on the release of the initial fake pictures to great effect. Thus it seems really weird that Washington Post writers are just now getting seminars in social media. None of these tools are new. It's the professional norms that are lagging.

Federal Regulators to Probe Google

Google seems like it pisses off a lot of people, but this is an even larger thing.

At WSJ, "Feds to Launch Probe of Google":

Federal regulators are poised to hit Google Inc. with subpoenas, launching a broad, formal investigation into whether the Internet giant has abused its dominance in Web-search advertising, people familiar with the matter said.

The civil probe, which has the potential to reshape how companies compete on the Internet, is the most serious legal threat yet to the 12-year-old company, though it wouldn't necessarily lead to any federal allegations of wrongdoing against Google.
While Google has faced several antitrust probes in recent years, the U.S. has limited its investigations largely to reviews of the company's mergers and acquisitions. The new inquiry, by contrast, will examine fundamental issues relating to Google's core search-advertising business, its biggest money maker, said the people familiar with the matter.

I was reminded of the Microsoft anti-trust lawsuit, and the comparison is made further down at the report. Obviously other search companies have complained:

Those companies said that Google's anticompetitive practices include using other companies' content without their permission, deceptive display of search results, manipulation of search results to favor Google's products, and buying up competitive threats to its dominance.

Google—which handles about two-thirds of all U.S. Web searches, according to comScore Inc., and more than 80% in many parts of Europe—has denied doing any of these things. It argues that users can easily navigate to other choices on the Web. In statements, the company has said it "built Google for users, not websites, and our goal is to give users answers."

RTWT.

I enjoy Google products. Blogger and G-mail work well together, and I'm told Blogger blogs search better on Google than Wordpress. We'll see, for like Legal Insurrection, I'm considering a switch-over. Not only because of Blogger's blackout issues, some of the progressives who've attacked American Power long ago threatened a demonization campaign at Blogger to get this blog deleted. I'm sticking with Blogger for now, but one of the biggest reasons folks bail on Blogger is to gain some security and independence for themselves.

Facebook Restores Roger Ebert Page After 'Jackass' Controversy

His Facebook page is here.

Lame though.

Turns out that Ebert was on both Facebook and Twitter, talkin' trash on Ryan Dunn, who died Monday in a car crash in West Goshen, Pennsylvania. CNN has a report. And Philidephia Inquirer and Wall Street Journal. Also at Gossip Cop, "Roger Ebert’s Facebook Page Taken Down Amid Ryan Dunn Controversy."

Ebert has a write up at his blog, "Friends don't let friends drink and drive." The dude loves the controversy.

Background on Ryan Dunn at The Other McCain, "‘It Appears He Was Drinking Heavily Before Climbing Behind the Wheel …’"

The Internet Lets It All Hang Out

See Gordon Crovitz, at Wall Street Journal. A great piece.