social networking

Twitter started prioritizing money talk on its site today with the announcement of "cashtags." These are clickable ticker symbols, like $AAPL, $GOOG, and $FB, which take users to search results about the company's finances and stocks.

Twitter made the announcement via a tweet in which it wrote: "Now you can click on ticker symbols like $GE on http://twitter.com to see search results about stocks and companies."

According to The Verge, the cashtags come on the heels of other user-created Twitter innovations, such as the @reply and the #hashtag. (The hashtag, for instance, evolved … Read more

Instacollage lets you combine and manipulate multiple photos into a single collage before sharing with your social networks. It gives you 18 different collage styles to choose from, including a single square picture layout (similar to Instagram), and layouts with up to four different panels of varying arrangements. After you pick your style, the empty collage template pops up so you can add your photos to the panels. The interface here is perfect, as it lets you simply tap a panel to insert a photo from your gallery, then drag and pinch to move and resize. Unfortunately, though, Instacollage does … Read more

Google+ is growing rapidly, according to new data from research firm ComScore.

The social network's U.S.-based unique visitor tally jumped to 27.7 million last month, up 82 percent over the 15.2 million people who used the service back in November. On a worldwide scale, Google+ had a similarly strong performance, jumping 66 percent from 66.8 million unique visitors in November to 110.7 million in June.

The data, which ComScore furnished to CNET, was first reported by Kontxt communications consultant Morten Myrstad on his Google+ page.

Google+, which launched last year, got off to … Read more

As Instagram users update their smartphones with the newest version of the photo sharing app that came out today, they'll see something missing: Find friends on Twitter.

Instead, they'll get a message that says this, "Unable to Find Friends. Twitter no longer allows its users to access this information in Instagram via the Twitter API. We apologize for any inconvenience."

According to TechCrunch, Twitter has decided to turn off its API for Instagram although other social apps, such as The Fancy and Foursquare, still get access.

There could be many reasons for this. It could be … Read more

Latest update: 11:46 a.m. PT

Twitter is officially back up and running, a spokesperson has told CNET.

Today's outage started at around 8:30 a.m. PT. The social network announced the outage on its Status page this morning, saying that "users may be experiencing issues accessing Twitter." The company didn't say what the issue might be, but did say that its "engineers are currently working to resolve the issue."

After about an hour, some users were able to start logging into their Twitter accounts and post tweets. A Twitter spokesperson informed … Read more

Path, the social-networking app designed to keep users in touch with family and close friends, rolled out a major update this evening for the iPhone and Android platforms that brings a variety of new features, including the ability to "nudge" friends.

Version 2.5 of the app, the first major update to the mobile app since November 2011, introduces book and movie sharing, larger images, and new photo editing tools.

Photos will now appear larger in home feeds, and users will have the option of adding filters. Users can snap photos by touching the volume button or immediately … Read more

Zynga reported a disappointing second quarter, cut its outlook, and saw its shares plunge after hours. The big question: Is the social-gaming run over? 

The company behind Farmville, Words With Friends, and other games distributed mostly via Facebook reported a second-quarter net loss of $22.8 million, or 3 cents a share, on revenue of $332.5 million. Non-GAAP earnings, which exclude charges, were a penny a share in the second quarter. Wall Street was looking for Zynga to report earnings of 5 cents a share on revenue of $344.1 million. 

Zynga's outlook was also … Read more

Twitter is developing a new tool that will let users export their whole tweet history -- everything from smart observations to those embarrassing tweets that people may not want to remember.

"We're working on a tool to let users export all of their tweets," Twitter CEO Dick Costolo said in a meeting with The New York Times yesterday. "You'll be able to download a file of them."

As of now, users can only search back through the last few thousand posts. And even though third-party sites and apps let users backup their tweets, they … Read more

Facebook will report its first quarter as a public company on Thursday and could face a rough crowd as worries persist about growth rates, the social network's mobile strategy, and monetization. 

Welcome to the public markets Mark Zuckerberg. 

Depending on Wall Street's reaction to the second quarter results, Zuckerberg may wish Facebook was still private. At least Zuckerberg has his net worth as balm for any really tricky questions.

Wall Street is expecting Facebook to report earnings of 12 cents a share on revenue of $1.15 billion. 

According to Thomson Reuters, analysts project Facebook'… Read more