racoma.com.phJ. Angelo Racoma on technology, economics, writing, problogging, and getting things done

News in the recent weeks involved much of Asia, particularly China. For one, the New York Times ran several features on why every gadget seems to be made in China these days, and how the region has taken middle-class jobs away from the Americans. However, this comes at the price of harsh working conditions, although working in gadget factories in China seems to be the better choice than starve elsewhere.

Meanwhile, another news-worthy issue involving Asia and social media is Twitter’s plan to censor tweets selectively on a per-country basis. Twitter says they are not doing this for censorship, but rather to comply with local laws.

Speaking of Twitter, experts have found out that Generation-Y does not take social media marketing too seriously. Studies say that word of mouth and viral marketing are more likely to sell brands than a social media push.

While tweeting or posting from your smartphone, though, consider that mobile phones are now a big threat to enterprise security, with businesses now being concerned about employees losing their smartphones and tablets to loss or theft, which can compromise data, including customer lists, passwords, and the like.

Meanwhile, if you don’t have a tablet or e-reader yet, consider that tablet and ebook reader ownership in the U.S. has doubled in the 2011 holiday season alone. Don’t wait for next Christmas to get your own tablet. With prices falling these days — and with the Chinese selling a $99 Android Ice Cream Sandwich tablet — you’d be crazy not to get one for yourself.

Twitter is all but necessary now to promote your site. Tweeting helps connect your product with current readers, and is greatly influential in reaching new ones. It is an amazing, public way to gauge what people are saying about you, your competition, and trends in your industry, and to respond and adjust your methods accordingly.

At the same time, it’s easy to misuse. Too many tweeters lose followers and tarnish their site’s brand by making common, easy mistakes. Follow these Twitter dos and don’ts to learn tweetiquette and promote your site effectively, gaining new followers and furthering your product.

If you’ve just asked your tween daughter to help you set up your own Facebook profile, you might want to think twice about spearheading your company’s own social media blitzkrieg. You could end up like Courtney Love, accidentally tweeting compromising photos of yourself to the company’s Twitter feed. With the lightning fast virality of the net, your bumbles could turn your company into the butt of an Internet meme (although, who knows, it could help your sales).

On the other hand, hiring a social media consultant can also take a chunk out of your bottom line, or at the least create another employee to oversee. How do you decide whether to embrace the DIY ethic of social media yourself or to find talent elsewhere?

URL shorteners may sound great, but there is now a virus powered by URL shortener goo.gl that infects social networking and microblogging website Twitter.

If the previous goo.gl virus on Twitter was in the form of pop-ups, this time it shows up in the form of tweets that start with goo.gl and end with “m28sx.html”.

The new virus is more difficult to determine because it entails a link to something that appears to be an anti-virus download. Upon arrival to that site, the virus starts to download the malware that will harm your computer.

Twitter users are warned about this spreading virus. It is best not to click on unfamiliar links otherwise you want to harm your system.

[via PC Mag]

A while back, Google launched its own URL shortening service, goo.gl . To those unaware, URL shortening services do just that–they shorten long URLs. These are useful when you are posting on services like Twitter or sending SMS, given the character limit. For example, something like http://racoma.com.ph/archives/how-fast-should-your-internet-connection-be can be shortened to goo.gl/LccO .

The good thing about Google’s shortening service is that it provides statistics on your shortened URL. Note that other services, like bit.ly, also offer such a feature. The advantage with goo.gl is that the service is also integrated with your Google account, so you don’t have to sign up separately for different accounts.

URL services are popular with social networks, but of course some have faced concerns about security. True enough, one might not know what exactly a short URL will be pointing to. Some have fallen victim to short URLs redirecting to malware-ridden sites or short URLs being hijacked to point elsewhere. This is why security-conscious users will preview shortened URLs first. Tinyurl.com offers such a feature (by using the “preview” subdomain).

Another advantage I see with Tinyurl is that you can define the short URL you want. For example, while goo.gl will shoten your URL considerably, you have no control over what comes after goo.gl/ . With Tinyurl, you can define this string. With our example above, you can shorten the same long URL to http://tinyurl.com/fastconn.

URL shortening services are increasingly going for two-letter TLDs rather than the usual dot COM. I usually prefer using Tinyurl for my custom short URLs, but I often leave it to the service I use to shorten URLs with their default service. For example, Twitter clients will usually give you a choice of shortening services to use. I just go with the most convenient one.

What’s your favorite URL shortening service? Why? And, do you think goo.gl will cause the demise of other URL shortening services?