social media

[ By Steph in Gadgets & Geekery & Technology. ]

Social media was invented to bring people closer, but the more antisocial among us can use it in a different way: to avoid the people we know. ‘Hell is Other People‘ is an interactive smartphone app that will show you exactly where your friends are based on Foursquare check-ins, and provide ‘safe zones’ where you can hang out without fear of being recognized.

Using the GPS function on your phone and your contacts’ public check-ins or location updates on Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and other social media, the app will show you yellow points on a map that indicate where your friends are. The green points represent ‘safe zones.’

Of course, the map only works if your friends are avid social media users, checking in to virtually every place they go, and you still run the risk of running into them when they’re in route. You also might be relegated to unexpected places in the city. But as creator Scott notes in the video, “It’s kind of nice that I’ve been pushed into parks.”

[ By Steph in Gadgets & Geekery & Technology. ]

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Photos from the archives of The New York Times have found a new home away from the filing cabinets and manila folders that have housed them for years - on Tumblr.

Seth Casteel's photos of goofy, gangly and bug-eyed pups - teeth bared in dogged pursuit of plastic ball or some phantom prey - are quickly gaining the Internet's stamp of approval.

Paired with a photograph, something as insignificant as a Twitter post becomes almost poetic.

Several Web sites have written about the Flickr page of a Canadian haunted house. We couldn't help but wonder what it was that scared all of the visitors documented in the viral pictures.

Contest juries are usually composed of professional photographers, photo editors and art directors. This one is a little different.

Photographer Teru Kuwayama of Lightstalkers and a Knight Fellow at Stanford University just won a $202,000 grant to support his project proposal summarized here:

“Broadening the perspectives that surround U.S . military operations in Afghanistan, this project will chronicle a battalion by combining reporting from embedded journalists with user-generated content from the Marines themselves . The troops and their families will be key audiences for the online journal steering, challenging and augmenting the coverage with their feedback . The approach will directly serve the stakeholders and inform the wider public by bringing in on-the-ground views on military issues and the execution of U .S . foreign policy. The troops were recently authorized to use social media while deployed, and this project will also study the impact of that decision on the military.”

Congrats to Teru and all of the winners for their great ideas. It’s exciting to see good journalistic and reporting ideas get some real money behind them. More details on the winners here. http://www.newschallenge.org/knc-2010-winners