lydecker

This meme is certainly making a strong case to be one of the biggest of 2012. Sure, the first episode of “Sh*t Girls Say” was uploaded at the end of last year, but who’s counting really? The results that Google yields when you start typing “Sh*t People Say” are as far-ranging in quality as they are in topic.

SEE ALSO: 15 Best ‘Sh*t People Say’ Videos

We’re sure you’ve got your own favorite quotes from the wide array of videos out there. These 15 favorites (and an honorable mention for each) should get the conversation started.

1. Sh*t Girls Say - Episode 1

The original that started a whole sh*t revolution. Many great lines, tough to choose a favorite, but this one stood out.

Honorable Mention: "You're the best!"

Click here to view this gallery.

More About: features, funny, humor, memes, quotes, videos

For more Entertainment coverage:

• Follow Mashable Entertainment on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Entertainment channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.

Name: ZangZing

Quick Pitch: Store and share your photos from multiple services in one place.

Genius Idea: Makes it easy to create and share group albums using email.

---

Some of my photos are stored on Instagram. Many more are saved across Facebook, iPhoto, Picasa, Flickr, Dropbox and in a stationary box on top of my dresser.

Earlier this week, I used ZangZing, a photo storage and sharing app, to bring them all together. (Well, most of them. The printed ones remain in the stationary box.) The clean, intuitively designed web app lets you quickly import your photos from your computer, iPhoto, Picasa, Facebook (including your friends’ photos), Flickr, Instagram, Shutterfly, Kodak, MobileMe, SmugMug, Photobucket and Dropbox. You can also automatically share out new uploads to Facebook, Twitter and email.

While it’s nice to have all my photos in one place, the best part about ZangZing is its group photo-sharing features. When you create a public or private album, you have the option to invite others to contribute. Friends can simply send a reply email to your album’s designated address (i.e., albumname@yourusername.zangzing.com) — no signup required — or they can head over to the album’s URL to import photos from any of the previously mentioned services that ZangZing supports. It’s an easy way to gather shots from a big group event like, say, a baseball game or a birthday party, particularly for those whose familiarity with the web doesn’t extend much beyond email.

Once photos are uploaded, viewers can leave comments and download high-resolution versions from the album.

ZangZing does have some drawbacks. It’s not easy to sort albums after you’ve uploaded your photos, for one thing, and there’s no option to create sub-folders. The service won’t automatically import any of your new uploads to Instagram, etc.; you’ll have to reimport them yourself. The site also isn’t fully optimized for mobile, although that — as well as an iPhone app — are currently in the works, ZangZing CEO and co-founder Joseph Ansanelli says.

The site launched in private beta last April, and launched version 2.0 last month. Unlike just about every other startup we write about, the company isn’t banking on ads or brand partnerships to support itself: Instead, ZangZing is hoping users will purchase prints and other photo products through the site. The startup is also planning to introduce a freemium payment model mid-year that would let users expand their storage space. Users are given 2 gigabytes of storage at signup, and can earn another 8 gigabytes by signing up friends. After that, they can opt to pay $5 per month (or $50 per year) for 25 additional gigs, or $10 per month ($100 per year) for 50 gigs on top of that.

---

Series Supported by Microsoft BizSpark

---

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

More About: bizspark, ZangZing

Each day, Mashable highlights one noteworthy YouTube video. Check out all our viral video picks.

An extensively choreographed “It Gets Better” music video — set to Lady Gaga‘s “Hair” — gained steam Friday after the mega pop star gave it her seal of approval on Twitter.

This is so AMAZING tinyurl.com/7jd638s #HairMusicVideo you guys did such an amazing job for #ItGetsBetter. The Choreo! I died!

— Lady Gaga (@ladygaga) January 27, 2012

The clip hit YouTube on Thursday, but the making of the video has been well documented on Facebook since August thanks to the project’s mastermind Colton Boettcher, who routinely posted updates on the CeeJbee Productions’ Facebook page.

The It Gets Better Project is an online campaign aimed at providing supportive messages for LGBT high school students who are facing discrimination and bullying. Since launching in 2010, It Gets Better has gained support from celebrities, athletes, the tech world and everyday people alike.

SEE ALSO: San Francisco Giants Are First MLB Team To Say “It Gets Better”

Boettcher teamed up with the LGBT community in Madison, Wis., and the It Gets Better Project to create the music video that looks like it came directly out of an episode of Glee.

“I want to let you know that it does get better,” Boettcher says at the end of the video. “We made this video in response to the number of suicides of gay kids in high school. … I’m gay and number of other people in this music video are also gay and we’re OK. We love our life.”

---

Bonus: Google Chrome’s “It Gets Better” Video

---

This “It Gets Better” video from the Google Chrome team aired during an episode of Glee in May 2011.

More About: Entertainment, it gets better, LGBT, music video, viral videos, viral-video-of-the-day

For more Entertainment coverage:

• Follow Mashable Entertainment on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Entertainment channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

The make-believe town of Beckinfield is the setting for the Mad Libs-style show of the same name, which uses crowd-sourced amateur actors from all over the world who create the show’s story by posting videos.

Writers outline the plot and email a “town happenings” newsletter to actors each week. Each actor tells a small piece of the story in their video, adding their own flair. Related segments are linked together to create a kind of webisode that will be unique to every viewer depending on which videos they watch.

Beckinfield is a production of online network Theatrics.com. Friday, at Macworld, director Jonathan Frakes (Ryker of Star Trek fame) presented the winner of Theatrics’ “Ultimate Online Audition Contest,” with $10,000 and a vacation to Hollywood, Calif. Entrants selected one of six characters and showcased their acting chops in videos posted to the site.

Billed as “mass participation television,” Beckinfield is like a soap opera where anyone can be an actor. Three minute recaps are posted once-per-week on theatrics.com and pick-up where the previous week’s plot line left-off.

Here’s the confusing part: There is no one weekly episode. Actors submit their videos to the site, ranging from 30 seconds to 5 minutes. In theory, this lets every viewer creates their own experience. A short summary video is posted the following week.

It makes more sense when you consider that Beckinfield was originally created as a tool for actors’ character development. Co-creators Bob Gebert and Tracy Evans launched the site at South by Southwest in 2011 — then soon found out how many non-actors wanted to be part of Beckinfield, Evan said.

There are around 4,000 actors involved with Beckinfield, although most do not get chosen to be in webisode wrap-ups. You can sign up to be a performer anytime. At the moment, the number of viewers is roughly the same as the number of actors.

The question is whether there is a larger audience for do-it-yourself compilations of YouTube videos of varying quality. The movie Life in a Day managed to stitch together a story arc from YouTube videos, drawn from people around the world aiming to document one day on Earth.

Life in a Day, however, was a curated experience. Beckinfield is scattered and difficult to follow. Without a clear plot line and no direct character interaction, it seems unlikely the show will garner a mass audience.

But it does point to a possible future trend — crowdsourced entertainment. Cable networks have already tuned-in to consumers’ eagerness to integrate social media and their favorite TV programs, sometimes known as transmedia.

With the integration of social media and television, Evans says it’s possible this will become a niche interest for super-fans who want to act out their favorite characters and create a community who wants to watch the result.

What do you think about crowdsourcing talent for a show? Tell us in the comments.

Beckinfield "Crowd Sourced TV"

Beckinfield is a crowd-sourced show on theatrics.com. Anyone can audition to be an actor and post a web-cam created video. The videos are linked together to form a story.

Click here to view this gallery.

More About: Social Media, television, YouTube

For more Entertainment coverage:

• Follow Mashable Entertainment on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Entertainment channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

The Republican presidential candidacy is still far from decided, based on the split primaries and mixed polls so far. So here’s another source for trying to figure who’s really pulling ahead — the number of new Facebook fans that each candidate is getting, according to the Inside Facebook Election Tracker.

Mitt Romney is finally making some strong gains this month, in contrast to his Facebook performance over December. By “strong gains” I mean he’s been attracting a roughly similar number of fans to Ron Paul, the candidate who normally dominates on the web (and the clear leader last month). The two have fought for the daily lead for most of January, except for when Rick Santorum surged around his Iowa primary win on the 3rd.

Newt Gingrich, meanwhile, managed to win South Carolina on the 21st, which corresponded with his biggest gains on Facebook. But he’s still way weaker than the others. And the rest of the candidates are no longer registering any meaningful gains, whether or not they’ve officially dropped out.

Overall, Romney still has the most Facebook fans among Republicans, with 1.39 million. Paul is a distant second at 800,000. Gingrich is down at 250,000 and Santorum a pitiful 90,000.

Of course, these numbers only say so much about who’s actually the most popular. Fan growth can come through inorganic methods like Facebook ads, fan page promotions, or clever use of the news feed. And fans can come from anywhere in the world; they’re by no means primary voters. But, the gains made by Santorum and Gingrich right when they won their primaries suggests many new fans are Liking candidate pages organically, at least in the sense that users are acting on their because of larger events. Certainly, the low fan counts that these candidates are showing overall on Facebook suggest that they are not doing much of anything to reach more voters.

Paul’s fanbase could also be discounted because he consistently does well in online matchups like these, even though he has trouble winning primaries. But maybe that will change in Florida? He had the biggest day of the month recently, at 9,500 new fans on the 24th. As Brittany Darwell notes over on Inside Facebook regarding the other primary winners, the fan counts seem to start climbing right before they do well with the vote counts.

Otherwise, Romney’s position is looking stronger than ever, similar to the latest polls.

It’s no secret Apple, one of the most valuable public companies in the world, is making major cash off today’s tech gadgets — but how much?

This week, the company reported a record net profit of more than $13.6 billion for its quarterly report lasting 14 weeks and ending Dec. 31, 2011. Apple’s income is 207 times the average annual salary for a U.S. worker. A rumored summer release of the iPhone 5 will help keep the money flowing in this year for the more than $400 billion company.

“We’re thrilled with our outstanding results and record-breaking sales of iPhones, iPads and Macs,” Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO, said in a statement. “Apple’s momentum is incredibly strong, and we have some amazing new products in the pipeline.”

Cook alone raked in $378 million last year, naming him the highest-paid CEO. In the past three months, Apple brought in four times more profit than Walmart, the world’s largest retailer.

It seems unimaginable to see how far $400 billion could be used. The infographic below puts into perspective Apple’s monetary power and influence around the world. First off, $400 billion could cover 42% of the United States if dollar bills were laid flat across the South.

Apple could pay off the public debt of eight European Union countries. Apple could also write $6,622,516 checks to each of its employees before exhausting its fortune. More than $97.7 billion of Apple’s money is in cash reserves, and two-thirds of the money is stored offshore.

How could Apple’s money be better spent? Should Apple spend more money on its China suppliers to improve working conditions for workers?

Infographic created by MBA Online; Thumbnail image courtesy of iStockphoto, wdstock

More About: apple, infographic, ipad, iphone, ipod, tim cook

For more Tech coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

It’s not always clear how Facebook apps interact with the data you share on the social network. Are they allowed to broadcast it? Sell it? Compile it in a way that you never intended?

“When you turn all Platform applications off, your User ID is no longer given to applications, even when your friends use those applications,” says a portion of Facebook’s privacy policy. “But you will no longer be able to use any games, applications or websites through Facebook.

Simply, should you choose not to share with apps at all, they are taken away from you. If you want to use some, but limit their functionality, you have to carefully customize your privacy settings in order to ensure your information is used appropriately. With the Open Graph, which can push any information to your Facebook page without explicit permission each time, it becomes more of an imperative.

Here are seven things you may not realize that Facebook knows, and is using to interact with your friends or advertisers. Concerned about what you share on the social network? Be sure to check the Apps You Use in the Privacy Tab to ensure that you have full control of your privacy in a way that makes you feel comfortable.

---

1. Where You’ve Been

---

You’ve always kept your location up to date on Facebook, ensuring everyone knows when you change cities — but you’re not interested in geotagging. Watch out, because your exact location can still be picked up by Facebook and broadcasted.

One of the more prominent design features in Facebook’s new Timeline is the “Maps” feature, which gathers the meta data from a user’s location and prominently displays check-ins, life events, photos, and the like on the map. The issue is, for those who aren’t necessarily keen on sharing discrete location details, this feature is virtually unavoidable. According to Facebook’s privacy policy: “We receive data from the computer, mobile phone or other device you use to access Facebook. This may include your IP address, location, the type of browser you use, or the pages you visit.” This data is collected every time, even when a friend of yours has GPS turned on and tags you in a picture she’s uploading from her mobile phone.

Even if you’re stringent about your whereabouts not making it to a highly visible plane, Facebook has already gathered data from you retroactively, ensuring that every time you’ve changed your city location — or listed your home town– it will show up on the map as well.

---

2. What You’re Listening To

---

You just downloaded Spotify and you’re really excited to get started. You signed up and were asked to link to Facebook before launching the app, so you clicked the boxes and everything seems ready. But don’t click play on that MC Hammer track just yet…

Since September, Spotify has required that new users sign in through Facebook, thanks to a partnership forged after the music giant hit the U.S. Essentially, anytime a regular Spotify user turns on the app and clicks play, whether via desktop or through mobile, the app can beam information right into Facebook and broadcast it to friends without prior notice. In response to major backlash, Spotify now includes a “Private Listening” mode, which blocks sharing immediately to Facebook. However, it will turn off after a restart or an extended period of time.

The only way to circumvent the compulsory posting is to turn it off permanently in both places. Spotify’s desktop app does have a “turn off publishing to Facebook” within its settings, but the only way to ensure posting does not occur is to revoke Spotify’s publishing abilities within Facebook apps.

---

3. When You’re Creeping

---

That girl you met at the event you went to last week. Your ex from college. Your worst enemy from middle school. Odds are, they’re all on Facebook, and you can’t resist the urge to creep. Just remember that Facebook is watching, too.

Naturally, anything you do on Facebook is seen and gathered by Facebook, and creeping on people is no exception. Facebook specifically tracks all clicks done within its platform in order to better tailor an experience for the user. Do you ever wonder why certain people show up in your feed, while others are hardly ever reported on? That’s your creeping doing its work. Visit your frenemy’s page enough times, and he or she will end up gracing your feed more often than you may like.

Don’t worry, Facebook does not specifically share this data with other users, though it will assume that this person is important in your life. Marking someone as a VIP can lead to their appearances more often in your advertisements or apps in addition to the extra face time on the feed.

---

4. Where You Run

---

Social running is all the rage these days, and you’re ready to load up your iPhone with RunKeeper, connect it to Facebook and get to stepping. But there’s more, and it has to do with that sneaky little GPS…

Runkeeper is one of the poster children for Facebook’s new “frictionless” user experience. A social network for avid (and aspiring) runners, Runkeeper packs sophisticated technology usually reserved for GPS watches and other athletic gear into a handy iPhone application and has the option of linking material to Facebook. Except, with the Open Graph, linking gives companies an opportunity to simply push all of the info that they collect into a user’s Timeline. And in this case, that means valuable GPS data.

Say that you go on a run with Runkeeper around the park. The GPS data routes the run you made and then pushes it to Facebook so your friends can see where you’ve been and for how long. This may not be much of a problem for you, but what if one day you forget to turn off Runkeeper and go to work? Anywhere you go from that point on is at risk of becoming common knowledge among your social circle, which can be unnerving at best and dangerous at worst. Runkeeper does a great service for those motivated for fitness, but in participating in the Open Graph, the information is fair game.

---

5. Your Saturday Night Plans

---

Your local bar is having a comedy night, and you have to RSVP on Facebook to get on the guest list. But when you click “Attending,” your plans can be broadcast to your social network — whether you realize it or not.

One of the trickier features of Facebook is the “sponsored stories” section, which is a particular form of advertising. Companies can sponsor particular Facebook actions, called “stories,” that double as advertising for a brand. However, this also means that your information could be used as an advertisement for another brand.

“Sponsored Stories” are a possibility every time you like a brand or location or respond positively to a public event. When you do this, companies can tap into your friends and let them know that you like or are attending an event — with the hopes of getting them involved, too. Liking a brand or attending its event automatically makes your information available for brand ambassadorship, and you can become an advocate for the event or the brand without implicitly signing up.

---

6. When You’ve Slacked on Your Diet

---

You have a Fitbit and you’re ready to get your connected fitness in gear. You allow your account to connect with Facebook so you can broadcast your successes to friends and family, but the Open Graph does change things.

Fitbit is not currently on Facebook’s list of fully-adopted Open Graph apps, but its potential (and partnership with Runkeeper) can create quite an issue for users who are concerned about privacy. The nuances of Facebook’s Open Graph mean that everything is done for the user as soon as permission is granted, rather than approving every singular action within an app. Combine that with an app that already makes those decisions for you, and the possibility of sharing information you actually don’t want to share is high.

The key issue with Fitbit is that it already uploads very personal information automatically whenever the portable device is near its connected docking station. Combined with Open Graph, data could be broadcasted to friends without even logging into Facebook.

---

7. What News Articles You Just Read

---

A friend read an article that catches your eye through the Washington Post Social Reader. You click on the title and realize that the app requires permission before linking to the article. You may think little of it and click through to the article, but Facebook watches as you keep reading.

The main news app that has adopted Facebook’s Open Graph structure is the Washington Post Social Reader. You may have already seen the app in your News Feed, highlighting some articles read by friends that could be of interest to you. However, if you’re interested in one of the articles, you’re going to have to allow the app to access your personal information.

That can be an inconvenience for some, but the real issue lies after you read that first article. Because of the app’s structure, you aren’t prompted whether you want to share a particular article with your peers. So, once you begin clicking around the Post’s website, all of your articles become fair game for posting onto someone else’s mini-feed. The result is, from that point forward, even without accessing the app directly through Facebook, your connection to your reading habits is already cemented and anyone can access it.

More About: apps, Facebook, facebook open graph, features, mashable, Open Graph, privacy, trending

Twitter‘s new approach to censoring tweets has users rallying around the hashtag #TwitterBlackout — a call to boycott the microblogging service Saturday.

The change lets Twitter withhold content on a country-by-country basis, when a government deems the tweets inappropriate. Rather than wholly removing the content from the site, it will now only be blocked locally.

“When we receive a request from an authorized entity, we will act in accordance with appropriate laws and our terms of service,” a Twitter spokesperson told Mashable Thursday.

Many users have expressed dissatisfaction with the change. Tweets have been streaming in, in various languages, Friday with the #TwitterBlackout hashtag.

Anonymous has also supported the blackout. One of its tweets read: “SPREAD THE WORD #TwitterBlackout I will not tweet for the whole of January 28th due to the new twitter censor rule #Twitter #J28″

On the other hand, as Mashable‘s Josh Catone argues in this column, this change could be good — not bad — for activists. Instead of blocking tweets globally, they’ll only be blocked within specific countries.

Check out the video above to learn more about the boycott. And tell us in the comments: will you be participating in the blackout? Do you think Twitter’s new method of blocking tweets makes sense?

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, SimmiSimons

More About: censorship, mashable video, Twitter

For more Social Media coverage:

• Follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Social Media channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

CBS has shown the door to the blogger who tweeted an erroneous report of legendary Penn State University football coach Joe Paterno’s death last weekend.

Blogger Adam Jacobi wrote on Friday, “I had an awesome 17 months with CBSSports.com. I’m sorry to everyone, most importantly the Paterno family, for how it ended.”

He followed it with this message:

In the end, CBS had to let me go for the Paterno story going out the way it did, and I understand completely. Thanks, everyone, for reading.

— Adam Jacobi (@Adam_Jacobi) January 27, 2012

The fiasco began last Saturday when Onward State, an online publication run by Penn State students, tweeted that Paterno had passed away. The 85-year-old coach was previously reported — and confirmed — by many news outlets to be gravely ill with lung cancer and in the hospital.

The @OnwardState Twitter account posted this: “Our sources can now confirm: Joseph Vincent Paterno has passed away tonight at the age of 85.”

The story quickly spread online as an attributed rumor, while many news outlets held off on reporting it as fact. But CBSSports.com tweeted that “Joe Paterno has died at the age of 85.” The message was ostensibly sent by Jacobi, and did not name a source.

The false reports were soon debunked by the Paterno family. Joe Paterno died the next day.

Onward State‘s managing editor resigned from his position shortly after Paterno’s family denied the premature reports.

Jacobi’s dismissal announced Friday is not the first time CBS has cut ties with a blogger over erroneously tweeted reports. In September, blogger Shira Lazar was let go after tweeting that Steve Jobs had died. Jobs died the following month.

Media commentator Alan Mutter, who writes the blog Reflections of a Newsosaur and is a former newspaper editor and Silicon Valley CEO, said that the recent propensity of false reports like the one that cost Adam Jacobi his job are symptomatic of today’s perpetually in-motion news cycle.

“It’s been a great tradition in the news business to always want to be the first with the most, but the problem is that the traditional latency between news gathering and news production — the different editing layers and time it took to actually go to the press and things like that — is gone today, ” he told Mashable.

“The good news with tools like Twitter is that we have many more people contributing to the conversation,” Mutter said. “But if they’re wrong, or especially trying to mislead or missing the facts, then that’s the price we pay for instantaneous communication.”

What’s more important to you — the speed or accuracy of news delivery? Do you think people such as Adam Jacobi deserve to be fired, or do large publications like CBS deserve equal blame? Let us know in the comments.

More About: Media, sports, Twitter

For more Social Media coverage:

• Follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Social Media channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

As just about everyone should know by now, the seeds of what grew into Facebook were planted at Harvard. Might there be a bunch of mini-Zucks lurking in the dorms of Cambridge? If so, a new venture capital firm — the first housed right on the Harvard campus — wants to find them.

Dubbed The Experiment Fund, the firm describes itself as “a bridge between America’s oldest universities and storied venture capital firms.” Backed by New Enterprise Associates (NEA), the firm is made up of Hugo Van Vurren, NEA co-head Patrick Chung, and NEA General Partner Harry Weller — all of whom have a degree of some form from the school.

When I say it’s “right on the Harvard campus”, I’m not kidding — it’s going to be based out of 33 Oxford Street, which is Harvard’s School Of Engineering And Applied Sciences. It’s a bit more than a stone’s throw from Harvard Yard. With that said, the fund operates with complete independence from the university.

And if you’re not a Harvard student? Don’t sweat it too much. The fund says they’re open to anyone, “regardless of university affilation, nationality, age, or prior experience.” Being a Harvard student — or at least a Cambridge local — probably wouldn’t hurt, though.

While it seems the size of the fund isn’t set in stone yet (or at least, it wasn’t disclosed — I’ll look into it), the team says they expect to seed “several” companies with up to $250k over the next two years.

Two years ago this Friday — Jan. 27, 2010 — Apple unveiled the iPad to the world. At the time, critics and analysts were quick to mock the name, criticize the devices shortcomings and predict that while the Apple name would sell the product, it wouldn’t create a new market.

Boy, were they wrong. The device was an immediate success, quickly becoming the fastest-selling gadget of all time.

Even those of us who were bullish on the iPad have had our expectations blown out of the water.

As a company, Apple just had its most successful financial quarter ever and sold 15.4 million iPads. Apple CEO Tim Cook says he can envision a time when the tablet market will be larger than the PC market, at least in numbers of units sold.

Looking at the trends in computing — especially with the rise of Ultrabooks — the merging of the tablet and the computer into one device certainly seems possible. Some Windows laptop makers are already attempting such a hybrid, with mixed success.

Two years after its introduction, the iPad has not only created the modern tablet market, it has had a transformative effect on publishing, education and entertainment. The rate at which the iPad has become a widely-adopted piece of technology — from the car service in my neighborhood to hospitals to airlines — is staggering.

---

Why the iPad Matters

---

I was discussing with a friend the changing nature of entertainment, and the role that the iPad has had in convincing networks and content producers to embrace the future.

I remarked that the iPad is the first device that has shown what can happen when you meld the TV and the computer. The size, touchscreen and supported applications has turned the iPad from a simple consumption device to something much more robust.

Two years ago, I watched Steve Jobs unveil the iPad. My reaction: This is the future. Two years later, I’m even more convinced. This is why the iPad matters. No other device in memory has had the ability to integrate into so many different worlds so quickly and will so little resistance.

---

All Hail the King

---

Over the last two years, plenty of so-called “iPad Killers” have entered the market. Very few found success. The Kindle Fire, the first product to significantly undercut the iPad on price while matching its content ecosystem, has garnered a decent amount of interest — especially at Best Buy. But as Apple’s first-quarter figures showed this week, it’s not eroding iPad sales.

Android is the leading platform on mobile. But on the tablet, the number of optimized apps are still extremely low. I’d be surprised if there were as many tablet-specific apps for Android now as there were for the iPad at its launch.

This isn’t to say that competition is impossible. With Windows 8 and the Metro UI, Microsoft has shown that it has some chops. Still, as Marco Arment is fond of pointing out, “we still don’t know if there is a tablet market. We know there is an iPad market.”

The iPad represents the cornerstone of the next era of computing, both for Apple and for the industry. Here’s to many more years of disruptions.

More About: apple, ipad, Opinion, steve jobs, tablets

It isn’t just the sun’s radiation storm getting all up in Earth’s face this week. An asteroid the size of a school bus, discovered mere days ago, came about five times closer to us than the moon Friday.

The good news is an asteroid that size would have burned up in the Earth’s atmosphere. The bad news is there are still plenty of larger near-Earth rocks we haven’t discovered yet — and we may not discover them until they come flying at us.

Asteroid 2012 BX34, after all, had plenty of company. It was the 873rd space rock detected by NASA in the last two weeks. Only in the last couple of days did we discover that its orbit would bring it within one-fifth of the distance between here and the moon — which is just what happened at 10 a.m. EST Friday. In cosmic terms, that’s a hair’s breadth. (Check it out in the video below.)

Had 2012 BX 34 been larger — the size of a mountain, say — gravity may well have put it on a collision course with our planet. At that scale, given mere days to prepare, we may have been looking at a Deep Impact-style scenario. We can only hope that the next civilization-ending rock we detect isn’t quite so keen to meet us.

Suddenly, President Obama’s priority for NASA in the next 10 years — to land astronauts on an asteroid — makes a lot more sense. Not only are there trillions of dollars in mineral wealth in those rocks, but the more we get to know them, the better we can detect and deflect their orbits.

[via Space.com]

---

Bonus: 23 Must-Follow Twitter Accounts for Astronomy Lovers

---

1. @NASA

A convenient feed for all things NASA, including launch news, astronaut updates, space discoveries and interactive media.

Click here to view this gallery.

More About: Asteroids, space

For more Tech coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

By now you’ve probably heard the news: Facebook could be filing its papers for IPO as early as next week.

A Wall Street Journal report, siting some anonymous sources, spilled the news that many of us may have been suspecting following a week of big Facebook events.

On Tuesday, Facebook announced that all users would have the “new profile,” a.k.a. Timeline, within the next few weeks. While some may see this as a “product push,” stronger predictors to an IPO unraveled later in the week.

SEE ALSO: How Facebook’s Expected $100 Billion IPO Breaks Down [INFOGRAPHIC]

The next day, Facebook halted secondary market trading with no explanation, leading many to suspect an IPO was on the way. The WSJ report suggests investment bank Morgan Stanley will manage the IPO, rather than Goldman Sachs, the bank many assumed would fill that role.

Facebook is currently valued between $75 billion and $100 billion — making it the largest in tech IPO in history. Check out the video above to see how that compares to other Internet companies.

SEE ALSO: Everything You Need to Know About Facebook’s $100 Billion IPO

If you’re an averaged investor looking to buy a piece of Facebook, you have two options: investing in a mutual fund that invests in IPOs or buying on the aftermarket.

What else do you want to know about the Facebook IPO? Let us know in the comments.

---

BONUS: How Does Facebook Compare to the World’s Biggest IPOs?

---

1. General Motors

Headquartered in Detroit, MI, GM owns Chevrolet, Buick, Cadillac and GMC.

Proceeds: $23.1 billion

Year: 2010

Image courtesy of Flickr, Crouchy69

Click here to view this gallery.

Thumbnail image courtesy of Flickr, GOIABA (Goiabarea)

More About: Facebook, facebook ipo, ipo, mashable video

The Windows release of Kinect is coming up in a couple days, but for most people that won’t be a major event: the Kinect they have is sitting on their TV or in a drawer, waiting to be taken out for an impromptu Dance Central 2 party. Of the 10 million Kinects out there, the only ones connected to computers are the ones being fiddled with by the various hackers and students making science projects out the things.

But according to the Daily, Microsoft is hoping to remedy this particular situation by building Kinect sensors right into your laptops. TechCrunch alum Matt Hickey got to handle a pair of prototypes, which were confirmed to be official, not just one of the many experiments that hide within Microsoft’s various lairs.

Unfortunately the laptops were not ready for their debut and no pictures seem to have been permitted. But they are described as netbook-like, with a number of smaller sensors instead of a webcam, and what could be an IR LED at the bottom of the screen.

The inclusion of depth-sensing cameras on a laptop is an interesting idea, and if they can drive the price of the sensor array down, it might become a standard feature. Microsoft has clearly also been focusing on miniaturizing the Kinect hardware, as the bulky original would seem somewhat out of place on a petite netbook. Whether this smaller sensor set has the same capabilities as the larger isn’t clear and wasn’t discussed.

A smaller Kinect would also suggest that Microsoft’s next console, rumored to have Kinect built in, is nearing readiness. While many gaming industry insiders have discounted the idea that the next generation of consoles will be announced this year, the rumor mill says otherwise.

A lot of digital ink has been spilled about Twitter’s announcement that it can now censor tweets on a country-by-country basis. The move has prompted a growing number of users to organize under the hashtag #TwitterBlackout and pledge to boycott the service on January 28 by refusing to tweet. But these users are misguided — Twitter’s new policy is actually good for activists.

For a number of reasons, Twitter’s new policy is a win for freedom of speech advocates. The first thing to keep in mind is that Twitter’s guidelines have long said that, “International users agree to comply with all local laws regarding online conduct and acceptable content.” According to last year’s official blog post on censorship, Twitter did already sometimes take down tweets that were deemed “illegal.”

Most or all of those removed tweets so far have, it seems, been related copyright violation takedown requests under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in the U.S. The takeaway here, though, is that Twitter’s rules have always allowed them to remove illegal content at the request of governments, and they never said they wouldn’t. So what has changed? Technology and transparency.

The new censorship technology announced by Twitter allows the company to block tweets or users on a country-by-country basis. Previously, blocking tweets had to be done globally, meaning if an oppressive regime asked Twitter to remove a tweet or block a user, it had to be done for everyone in the world. Now, Twitter can remove that tweet in that country, but allow the world to see it.

But wouldn’t it be better for activists if Twitter just refused to comply with requests from oppressive regimes? Actually, no.

If a government asks Twitter to remove an offending tweet, the company essentially has two options: Comply and block that single tweet or user in that country (while still allowing the rest of the world to see), or refuse and risk the government itself blocking Twitter for everyone in that country. So which seems better for activists? I’ll pick the former any day — it still allows activists to speak to the world at large and draw attention to their treatment. That’s something Reuters’ Anthony DeRosa posits could be more powerful.

Further, because Twitter has promised to increase their transparency about takedown requests, it should become easier for activists to monitor which countries are censoring their citizens. As NPR’s Andy Carvin noted on Twitter, every social media platform faces these same sorts of requests. Twitter is just being more transparent about how they deal with them.

But what about Twitter as an organizing tool? Surely this will make it impossible for protesters to use online tools like Twitter to organize, as they did during so many uprisings and political movements in 2011. There are two reasons to be hopeful that Twitter’s censorship policy will not have an appreciable impact on the ability of people to organize locally using Twitter.

First, Twitter’s technology appears to be easy to circumvent. And further, Twitter appears to clearly be telling users how to get around its censors.

Second, activists are smart. They always have been. Last year in Libya, for example, opposition leaders reportedly used coded messages on dating sites to avoid detection by secret police. A Twitter spokesperson has indicated that the company will only block tweets or users “in the face of a valid and applicable legal order.” In other words: Twitter won’t just block a user any time a government asks, so activists should still be able to communicate on the network, assuming their tweets don’t run afoul of local laws.

At face value, when a company announces plans to censor its users at the behest of governments, it is alarming. But when you dig down into what Twitter announced, it is actually a win for freedom of speech and a long-term benefit for anyone who fights for openness and democracy.

More About: censorship, features, law, Opinion, Social Media, Twitter

Yesterday’s announcement that Twitter would be selectively censoring tweets based on country was not well-received. But part of that announcement was the assurance that the process would at least be transparent. A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.

They also mentioned that they were working with Chilling Effects to make notices and orders sent to Twitter publicly available. At the time of the post yesterday, the site wasn’t up yet, but you can now browse it at chillingeffects.org/twitter.

It’s a good thing, certainly, though not quite a successful saving throw versus the localized-censorship piece. The database has several thousand DMCA takedown requests right now, but is not quite up to date — it isn’t clear at what rate they’re updating the database, but there aren’t many from this month so it seems to be something less than weekly.

Browsing the listings is a good way to waste 15 minutes, looking at the different ways people tend to provoke a DMCA takedown request. There’s a lot of cricket being linked to, apparently. And there are the inevitable copyrighted avatars.

What’s interesting to me is that there are a number of requests that in themselves request dozens of tweets to be taken down; this one, for example, points out a number of pirated movies being linked to, and the accounts are clearly bots. The DMCA request is only for the movies the rightsholder is concerned with — which is at once both correct and perverse. The account only exists to link to copyrighted material and has done so thousands of times, but everyone involved would rather snip out individual tweets one by one. Talk about a Sisyphean task.

Presumably this database will also house the official requests by governments who wish to restrict tweets based on content. While most won’t agree with Twitter’s decision to accede to these repressive entities’ wishes, it can at least be hoped that it will be done so with maximum transparency. The best thing Twitter users can do, perhaps, is to make sure this database is up to date and reflective of the restrictions being placed on tweets. Until a solution comes along, reducing the harm this new policy does and making sure it’s well understood should take priority.

Now that it looks like Facebook is (finally!) going to file for an IPO, plenty of potential investors want to know how they can get in on the action.

Mashable is not a financial publication, and we’re not in the business of giving stock market tips. But we can break down the IPO process — and gauge the likelihood of a regular investor getting in on the ground floor.

---

Don’t Get Your Hopes Up

---

We’ll cut to the chase — unless you’re a close personal friend or relative of a Facebook executive, or you manage an enormous amount of capital, you have almost no chance of getting IPO pricing on a stock like Facebook.

Why? Well, as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) points out, “the underwriters and the company that issues the shares control the IPO process.” The SEC doesn’t regulate how these primary shares are allocated.

In Facebook’s case, the Wall Street Journal reports that Morgan Stanley will likely be the lead underwriter for the IPO, with Goldman Sachs also expected to play a large role.

These investment banks are going to target large customers and institutional investors. The goal is to move shares by the millions, not the hundreds or thousands.

Even if you have an account with Morgan Stanley or Goldman, you’re probably not going to get to make any purchases as an individual — not unless you are a big-time celebrity or business mogul. (Ashton Kutcher, it’s your lucky day.) In most cases, the underwriter will call you and let you know if you can get in on the action.

---

What Can Average Investors Do?

---

Aside from buying pre-IPO shares on something like SecondMarket — which, again, has some basic financial requirements that will exclude most individual investors — investors interested in a Facebook IPO have a few options:

• Buy into a mutual fund that invests in IPOs. There are a few of these funds in the market, such as the Global IPO Plus Aftermarket fund from Renaissance Capital. The returns on these funds tends to be flat, however — and with a stock like Facebook, it’s unlikely that this fund will get much of the action.
• Buy on the aftermarket. This is where it can get tricky. Putting in a market order the day a stock opens can be risky. In fact, many retail investors were burned during the dotcom era for moving too fast on IPO stocks that never again exceeded their order price. Placing a limit order or stop market order can help alleviate some of the risk, but it won’t guarantee a buyer a piece of the action.
• Watch from the sidelines. Sometimes it pays to take a step back and watch the market from afar before jumping in. An IPO Facebook could be the next Google — but there’s also a chance it could also be the next Yahoo. Wait and see.

Image courtesy of Flickr, GOIABA (Goiabarea)

More About: Facebook, facebook ipo, investing, ipo, trending

For more Business coverage:

• Follow Mashable Business on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Business channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Y Combinator has just announced the newest partner to join the prestigious firm: Geoff Ralston. Ralston’s previous credentials include founding Four11, which was acquired by Yahoo back in 1997 for $96 million and served as the foundation for Yahoo Mail. Ralston spent eight years at Yahoo, eventually becoming Yahoo’s Chief Product Officer. Several years after leaving Yahoo he was named CEO of Lala, before it was acquired by Apple in 2009.

Most recently he cofounded Imagine K12, a tech incubator for education-related startups, which presented at TechCrunch Disrupt SF (you can find the incubator’s first batch of companies here). In his post announcing the news, Y Combinator’s Paul Graham writes that Ralston will continue as a full partner at Imagine K12. He also writes that he’s known Geoff for 13 years, ever since his days at Yahoo (Graham’s startup, Viaweb, was acquired by Yahoo in June 1998).

The news comes only a few days after YC announced two other new partners: Garry Tan (formerly of Posterous) and Aaron Iba (formerly of Appjet/Etherpad), both of whom are YC alumni. The timing probably isn’t a coincidence — YC just opened up applications for its Summer 2012 batch yesterday, and a bigger team will doubtless help the firm deal with the growing number of inbound applications (and larger batch sizes).

Fun sidenote: Ralston holds the honor of taking part in one of the most entertaining startup pitches I’ve ever seen, when he and fellow Lala execs Bill Nguyen and John Kuch (now both at Color) explained how Lala — whose previous incarnations included a CD swapping and a failed music hub — was being reborn as an innovative streaming music service.

It took around an hour (and a lot of hilarious handwaving and bickering between the three then-Lala execs as they debated what they could tell me — in front of me), but I went from being convinced Lala was launching something completely illegal to believing it was a taste of the future. Lala never got too much traction, but it was great, and it had a nice exit: Apple acquired the company for a reported $80+ million.

The Gillmor Gang – Danny Sullivan, John Taschek, Kevin Marks, Doc Searls & Steve Gillmor – is recording live today at 1pm PT. Recording has concluded.

What could be more romantic than playing Angry Birds on Facebook with your sweetheart or with a social network of relative strangers? The highly anticipated Facebook version of Angry Birds will officially be landing in a browser near you on Feb. 14, Valentine’s Day.

Rovio, the studio behind the game, has put out a trailer (above) and dropped lots of little hints that the Angry Birds on Facebook won’t be exactly like its mobile counterparts. Rovio CEO Mikael Hed said the game will have completely new aspects and a more collaborative feel. It’ll also focus more heavily on the hapless pigs.

From the trailer above it looks like the same gameplay that made Angry Birds a viral (and financial) sensation are still the focus: Flinging birds across a screen to knock out pigs and build high scores. This being Facebook, expect social posts and friend challenges to play a role, though Rovio so far has stayed mum on what those “collaborative” features will be.

It may seem like a bad idea to launch a game on Valentine’s Day, but given Angry Birds‘ success, Rovio can pretty much do what it wants. The game — and its spin-offs — have been downloaded more than 500 million times, prompting Rovio CMO Peter Vesterbacka to say the company was worth more than $1.2 billion.

Angry Birds games have been developed for nearly every major mobile platform or device but this is the first time the game will be coming to a browser on the social network. It’s a move designed to get the game into more hands and more news feeds, but at some point will we just be Angry Bird-ed out?

Is the Facebook launch a cause for celebration or just more of the same? Let us know in the comments below.

More About: angry birds, Gaming, social gaming, trending, video games

For more Entertainment coverage:

• Follow Mashable Entertainment on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Entertainment channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad