Yogi Land

Mashable hosted its second stop on the U.S. Summer Tour in San Francisco Wednesday night. The event brought hundreds from the San Francisco community together for networking, an open bar, food and awesome prizes from our sponsors, which included iPads, tickets and much more. We were also joined by Rachel Sklar, who interviewed event attendees and readers participating remotely in our Watchitoo live stream.

Below are some of the highlights from the event, thanks to photos from Lisa Bettany and Kenneth Yeung. To see more pictures of the event, go to our Facebook album or Flickr Set. Also, check out the Bing Photo Booth pictures.

SummerMash San Francisco

More than 600 tickets were sold to San Francisco's Summer Tour stop, filling the Grand Hyatt venue with local techies, entrepreneurs, marketers, and social media mavens.

Live Stream Interviews

We were joined by Rachel Sklar, who interviewed event attendees and readers participating remotely in our Watchitoo live stream.

A Warm Welcome from Pete Cashmore

Pete Cashmore gives an opening welcome to the San Francisco community, noting the the purpose of Mashable's U.S. Summer Tour is to connect with readers and local communities.

SES Ticket Giveaway

Co-editor Ben Parr and Events Director Karen Hartline, both of whom are based in San Francisco, show-off a drawing for a pass to attend SES.

Intel Prizes

Regan Fletcher of Intel talks about what the company is working on and announces a giveaway for a netbook.

Lots of Swag to Go Around

T-shirts and swag from sponsors lines a table for attendees to take a grab at.

Drew Olanoff and Brett Petersel

Drew Olanoff and Mashable's Brett Petersel pause from mingling for a picture.

Pete Cashmore and the Mopho Panda

Mopho, a location-based photo sharing application, had a panda mascot. Mashable's Pete Cashmore stopped to take a picture with the friendly creature.

Bing Photo Booth

With props in hand and costume items, attendees were able to get their photos snapped and printed on the spot at the Bing Photo Booth.

Mashable Team

Mashable team members from San Francisco, New York City and Phoenix attended the event. Back: CEO and Founder Pete Cashmore, Business and Development and NYC Events Director Brett Petersel, COO Adam Hirsch, Designer Louis Dorman and Social Media Reporter Jenn Van Grove. Front: Co-editor Ben Parr, Tech Reporter Jolie O'Dell, Events Director Karen Hartline and Community Manager Vadim Lavrusik.

Attendees

Attendees included Mashable readers, tech entrepreneurs, movie industry directors, social media enthusiasts and more. Here Lisa Bettany stops to take a picture with attendees.

iPad Giveaway

Gotelo, which is giving away iPads at each event, awarded one to a lucky attendee.

TechKaraoke Afterparty

Festivities wrapped-up around 10 p.m., when people started making their way to the afterparty TechKaraoke event for some singing and more prize giveaways.

We’re excited for our next stop in Washington D.C. on Thursday, August 5. We hope you will join us in person or participate in the livestream with Rachel, and suggest questions for her to ask in interviews with the local social and tech community. We also encourage you to help facilitate some of the discussion on Watchitoo by joining us on camera to ask attendees questions and answer some social media trivia. We had several participants for our first stop on the tour, including Brian Flaccus, who submitted this great video for the contest.

If you’re interested, the details are outlined below. You’ll also have a chance to win tickets to attend the events through the contest.

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Summer Tour DC

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USA Today HQ
7950 Jones Branch Drive
McLean, VA 22107

Thursday, August 5
Time: 7:00 – 10:00 p.m.
Mashable Presence: Adam Hirsch, Sharon Hirsch, Adam Ostrow, Vadim Lavrusik, Brett Petersel, Brenna Ehrlich, Erica Swallow, Lauren Indvik, Matt Silverman, Stefanie Rennert, Stephanie Marcus, Zachary Sniderman and Karen Hartline
Tickets: Tickets are available through Eventbrite.
Socialize : Facebook, Foursquare, Plancast, Twitter (#summermash), Meetup

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Mashable Watchitoo Summer Tour Contest

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Contest Submission Criteria: Upload a 14-second YouTube video explaining why you should be brought on live to chat with hosts/attendees at the Mashable 2010 Summer Tour.

• Answer the question: “Why are you the one to be featured LIVE on the Mashable Summer Tour Live stream?”
• YouTube video link must be posted to Facebook/Twitter with appropriate hashtags #summermash #watchitoo
• Become a fan of both Mashable & Watchitoo on Facebook. (Please use your real identity so we can confirm).
• After uploading to be picked for the contest, please email: hila@watchitoo.com with your contact information
• Prize: Winners will be selected to participate live in the show. Mashable & Watchitoo will select winners. If you’re chosen to participate, you will get to ask some of the virtual hosts live questions & answer social media trivia.
• Grand Prize: Mashable will award the best video with 2 tickets to the west coast event in San Fransisco, and then 2 tickets for each subsequent city: DC, NYC, & Chicago.

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SummerMash Tweets

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Thanks to our Local Sponsors:

Bing helps you find the information you need faster, and with fewer clicks, so you can make better decisions. It’s different than a typical search engine—it’s your “decision engine.”

Mopho is simply the best way to capture and share mobile photos. More than a check-in, Mopho tags your photos with a location or event and shares them with your friends. Mopho saves you time and effortlessly gives your photos more context, allowing you to capture and better reflect all of your experiences. Start sharing more with your photos — Download Mopho today from the iTunes app store and see more on the Web at http://mopho.to.

Discover the tools of engagement at SES San Francisco, Aug. 16-20. No longer just lecturing your customers, learn to listen and converse in a more social world. Our experts will show you how integrating search, social media, and video, in even basic ways will transform both your sites visibility and profitability. Packed with sessions on PPC management, information architecture, social media, local search, mobile application development, video optimization, and other advanced topics, we have created an educational and networking environment designed for both beginners and veterans in digital marketing. Register by July 30^th and SAVE up to $554. Enter MBL15.

Sessions Include: Social & the Marketing Mix, Search, PR & the Social Butterfly, The Business Value of Social Media, Local Search Ranking Factors

Thanks to our TechKaraoke Sponsor:

Yahoo! is the place where hundreds of millions of people go every month to connect with the people and things that matter to them most. Yahoo! develops innovative technology to create unique, relevant and engaging experiences for users. We bring together the best of the world – information, knowledge, news, entertainment, editorial – with the best of consumers’ worlds – friends, families, interests, locations, communities, tasks – to provide engaging content and experiences on top-rated sites across the global Web. Our massive and dedicated users make Yahoo! one of the world’s most visited Internet destinations and a world class online media company.

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A Special Thanks to Our Tour Sponsors

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Join Gotelo.com and choose where you want to be found, anytime, in one easy step.  It’s fast, free, and launching this summer. Gotelo simplifies the way you connect with people you know and businesses you like by directing you to their most current web page.

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The Intel® Atom™ Developer Program provides software developers with everything you need to easily develop and sell applications for Intel® Atom™ processor-based products starting with netbooks, and eventually supporting tablets, smartphones, consumer electronics and more. Program features include: Powerful tools—including an SDK, easy deployment and validation, Revenue and marketing opportunities, Developer Catalog to buy and sell application components, Application Labs in addition to a vibrant online community for support.

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Weber Shandwick is a leading global public relations agency with offices in 76 countries around the world. The firm’s success is built on its deep commitment to client service, our people, creativity, collaboration and harnessing the power of Advocates – engaging stakeholders in new and creative ways to build brands and reputation. Weber Shandwick provides strategy and execution across practices such as consumer marketing, healthcare, technology, public affairs, financial services, corporate and crisis management. Its specialized services include digital/social media, advocacy advertising, market research, and corporate responsibility. In 2010, Weber Shandwick was named Global Agency of the Year by The Holmes Report for the second year in a row; an ‘Agency of the Decade’ by Advertising Age, Large PR Agency of the Year by Bulldog Reporter, and Top Corporate Responsibility Advisory Firm by CR Magazine. The firm has also won numerous ‘best place to work’ awards around the world.

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A Special Thanks to Our Multi-Streaming Partner

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Watchitoo is an embeddable, live multi-streaming platform that allows 10+ participants to communicate via a web-cam in real time, while collaborating around a custom designed rich media playlist. A passive audience of thousands can view the show online. Any viewer can be added into a show via a virtual green room, where a moderator can adjust their microphone, have a private one-on-one chat, and vet their overall suitability to participate. Streams can be inserted, removed, re-arranged and re-sized in real time. Watchitoo has a rich feature set that includes Twitter and Facebook integration, chat, questioning, recording, screen-sharing and white-boarding.

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Thanks to Our Official Ticketing Partner

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Eventbrite is the world’s largest self-service online ticketing site. Eventbrite makes it easy for anyone to sell-out an event.

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Reviews: Bing, Facebook, Foursquare, Internet, Mashable, Twitter, YouTube

More About: Events, gallery, kenneth yeung, lisa bettany, mashable, mashable summer tour, mashable summer tour 2010, photographs, photography, Photos, pics, rache sklar, San Francisco-San Jose, summermash, summermash 2010, watchitoo

For more Social Media coverage:

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Your profile photo is an important part of your online personality, offering a glimpse of you to the wider world. We’ve previously brought you tips for creating the perfect profile pic, and in this post we’ll be looking at some great online services that can help you create a variety of fun, vintage-looking pics for your profile.

So, for anyone who doesn’t have photo editing know-how, expensive editing software and a load of time to spare, here’s how to create a retro profile pic in a matter of minutes using some absolutely free, entirely online services.

Let us know in the comments if we’ve missed any!

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The Original Shot

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This is the photo we’re editing, shown here as a control pic so you can gauge how dramatic the effects we’ve picked really are. A standard snap from a point-and-shoot camera, there’s nothing wrong with this image, but read on to see how it can be made so much more fun in just a few clicks.

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1. Phixr’s Cross Process Effect

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The Effect

In film photography, the cross processing effect was achieved by switching different chemicals used to process print or slide films. This made for dramatic colors, contrast and grain.

Although the effects of cross processing have been known since the 1960s, it was in the 1990s that the effect reached the height of its popularity with photographers like Nick Knight bringing cross processing to fashion and studio work.

How to Get the Effect

It’s possible to recreate the effect using photo software by playing around with the color balance and contrast ratios (there are plenty of tutorials around the web to help). If you don’t have the time/inclination/correct software, then Phixr offers the effect at the click of a button.

Simply head to Phixr and hit “get started,” which will bring up account options. If you want to set up a free account you can do so from here, but you can also skip this step, which will give you access to Phixr (as long as you’re not on it for more than six hours straight, which, trust us, you won’t be).

You then need to upload your chosen pic from your computer (or via a URL) and hit the upload button, at which point the pic will be be resized if it’s too big.

After your photo has loaded, select the “color effects” button from the icon menu on the left hand side and scroll down one line to select “cross process.”

At this point there are options to adjust the brightness, contrast and opacity, but for the effect in the image above we kept it all at the auto levels pre-loaded by the site. The effects are previewed, however, so if you’d like to play around, you won’t be committed to the changes until you click “execute.”

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2. Picnik’s 1960s Effect

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The Effect

Although many technical advances have been made now, back in the “old days” the colors in photo prints were made up of dyes that decay with age — especially if exposed to light — hence why so many of your parents’ or grandparents’ photos take on pink or yellow tones as the years go by.

The faded color helps to date a photo almost as much as the outlandish fashions that might be found in it, and is a great effect to give your modern pic a vintage feel.

How to Get the Effect

Drop into Picnik and click the “get started now” button. Upload your chosen photo, hit the “create” tab along the top, and select “effects” from the secondary tab menu. Now scroll down the menu on the left hand side of your display and choose “1960s” which brings up further options.

You get the option to keep the round corners (we did, as it helps achieve the dated look even more) and what color you want to fill them in with (we chose white for a subtle effect) as well as how much “fade” you want. We maxed our fade in the pic above (zero percent) but again, you can play around with a preview, so feel free to experiment before hitting “apply” and saving the photo back to your computer.

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3. Rollip’s Styled Lenses Effect

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The Effect

In the 1960s, cheap cameras like the Holga and Diana were mass-produced as “toys” and were predictably made of cheap construction and parts, including such photographic abominations plastic lenses.

Of course, though poorly made, these low quality cameras actually produced really interesting effects such as light flares, blurs, distortion and vignetting (darker or blurry edges) that have, in recent years, gained the cameras a cult following (best seen from the Lomography movement) by those interested in the unpredictable and often beautiful results.

How to Get the Effect

If you’re at all interested in super-simple retro photo effects then you need to head to Rollip pronto as it offers over 40 options. We narrowed our choice down to this “Styled Lenses” option which emulates the kind of effect you could hope to get from a quirky old-school film camera.

To find it on the Rollip site, hit “click here to start” on the home page and then scroll through the “more effects” option until you get to page 5/10. Click “Styled Lenses” and select the photo in the top left hand corner. Once you’ve done this, it’s just a matter of clicking to browse your computer for a photo and wait for Rollip to work its magic.

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4. Photobucket’s Color Splash Effect

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The Effect

Coloring black and white photographs by hand using photo oils or tinting pencils was popular in the first half of 20th Century before the advent of affordable color film. Recreated digitally, it makes for a nostalgic effect and can increase the emphasis to a certain part of an image, such as a person, or a features like lips or eyes.

How to Get the Effect

You do need an account to use Photobucket, but it’s a simple email and password affair, so not too arduous to get set up. Once you’re good to go, upload an image from your computer and then hit “edit.” After your photo has loaded, select “effects” from the tab menu at the top of the page and choose the first option called “color splash.”

The software will then greyscale your photo to black and white, leaving you to choose which part you want to fill in with color. The actual coloring in is super-easy: Just dab the circle over the area you want the color restored too. We stuck to the standard size blob in the image above, which worked fine, but if what you want colored is smaller, or more detailed, you can change the blob size to suit.

Finally we took advantage of another free effect from Photobucket to complete our image and employed the “blur edges” tool (on the default setting) from the effects menu to give a blurry vignette feel. This helps focus the eye on the colorful figure.

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5. Picnik’s Polaroid Effect

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The Effect

Polaroid photographs are iconic and immediately recognizable as the instant photo format of choice. Polaroids ruled up to the start of of digital photography when slower, film-based formats were pushed out of the market.

Since Polaroid’s decline, nostalgia for the product has seen various groups campaigning for a revival of the format. With some success, film and cameras are now back on the shelves. It looks like Polaroid will live on for a few more years yet.

How to Get the Effect

There are various Polaroid-erizing tools on the web, the most notable of which is Poladroid, however, this requires a download and we’re nothing if not impatient. We wanted an in-browser service.

Picnik offers a Polaroid look as part of its “frames” options, but that doesn’t give the image an aged look. We countered this by using the 1960s effect (detailed above in number two) but nixing the round corners and setting the fade to 40 percent for a less dramatic effect.

Once you’ve applied that, go to the frames menu under the “create” tab and select “Polaroid.” We opted for a white background color and a five percent angle. When you’ve made your choices, it’s just a matter of saving the pic down to your computer and you’re all done!

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More Tech Resources from Mashable:

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- 4 Tips for Producing Quality Web Videos
- 50+ iPhone Apps to Enhance Your Photo and Video Experience
- 20+ Great Adobe AIR Apps for Photos & Videos
- 5 Ways to Share Images on Twitter
- Top 10 Robot Videos on YouTube
- Top 10 Wedding Dance Videos on YouTube

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, kevinruss

More About: Phixr, photo editing, photobucket, photography, picnik, polaroid, profiles, retro, rollip, vintage

For more Tech coverage:

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• Subscribe to the Tech channel
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This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.

Gathering friends, followers and “likers” online can only take you so far in the world of networking. Organizing a Meetup is a great way to move your virtual network to a tangible territory.

Quite simply, a Meetup is a planned event where like-minded people meet and typically chat over cocktails and listen to a guest speaker. Organizing one of these events is an excellent way to establish yourself or your business as a “go-to” person in your industry.

Yet it is easier said than done. Anyone who has ever tried to organize a dinner with just a small group of friends knows that preparation is the key to any successful event. Meetups require planning, and given that you want to make a good impression you should take your time to make sure everything goes smoothly.

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1. Why Your Meetup?

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First, consider why you want to organize a Meetup. Do your research and find out what groups are already meeting, and decided what your Meetup could bring to your industry. Sign up on Meetup’s website and create a personal profile to see what the scene is like already. Search for terms that pertain to your field, and decide on what is missing so you can position your Meetup to satisfy that void.

Next, you need to craft a clear lead statement that explains exactly what your Meetup is about. Break it down so that people will understand what type of conversations you hope to develop.

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2. Create a Meetup Group

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Meetup’s services make it easy to get the group rolling. Create your group, and choose your location, the group’s name, headline and your lead statement describing what the group is all about. Pick a theme for your group’s page; you can choose from several templates or create your own.

The next step is important. Pick up to 15 topics that describe what your group is targeting. Picking the right keywords is how you’ll find the right members for your group. Meetup’s site offers some good suggestions and shows you how many groups already exist under each umbrella topic.

Then pick a pricing plan. Meetup is free to join, but if you want to actually start a group, pricing will run as low as $12 a month. With more than 6.5 million people signed up and over 60,000 groups formed it’s the simplest way to organize a group and reach out to the most people.

Now that you have created the group, you’re officially the “organizer.” 72 hours after you have created the group the site sends out an alert blast to everyone who has listed the topics or keywords you choose to categorize the group, and invites them to join.

If you have contacts who aren’t members of the site but that you know you’d want to attend, send off a personalized e-mail informing them of your new group. You can also tweet the link to your group’s page so your Twitter followers get the message as well.

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3. Grow Membership

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Don’t rush to create an event right away says Yuli Ziv, who organizes the Meetups for her group Fashion 2.0 and is the co-founder of My It Things and Style Coalition. Ziv’s group has more than 1,000 members, and she has organized 20 Meetups since 2008. She advises that you wait for the membership to grow before you announce your first event.

Once you decide to put a Meetup event on the calendar make sure you announce it and give yourself some time to promote the event so that people can RSVP.

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4. Format

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Meetups don’t have to adhere to one format. Most include networking over cocktails and often feature a panel discussion or guest speak and Q and A session from the audience. If it’s you’re first event, you may want to try something more informal.

Julia Kaganskiy organizes the 1,300 member strong Arts, Culture and Technology group. A former social media strategist and community manager for an entertainment agency, and current Digital Learning department intern at the MoMA, Kaganskiy held her first meet up nearly two years ago as a way to meet people in the specific communities she wanted to work in.

For her first event, Kaganskiy says she ran more of relaxed gathering because she wanted to get a feeling for who would come out. “I wanted to see what fields people were in and find out what they were really interested in. I worked the room and got a sense of what kinds of questions people wanted to explore.”

Fourteen Meetups later, Kaganskiy now creates each event with a different theme or topic and invites top industry leaders as guest speakers. Sometimes she’ll invite a few speakers to speak for 30 minutes or she’ll invite four or five guests with a variety of viewpoints to each speak for 10 minutes. Either way, the goal is to get the conversation flowing.

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5. Venue

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Once you decide what you’ll be doing at the event, you need to tell people where to actually meet. Finding a venue to hold your event can be the most difficult part. Depending on where you live there may be more or less available space. The key is, and both Kaganskiy and Ziv agree, is to find somewhere for free.

“Find a bar on a Monday or Tuesday, and most places will be thrilled to have you. If it’s a low traffic area they’ll be more than happy to have you bring in 50 people for a couple of hours,” says Kaganskiy.

Once you have space set there is always the question of if you’ll have enough. In places like New York City, space is often an issue.

As Fashion 2.0 has grown in membership, Ziv says that they have outgrown the venues where past events have taken place. To avoid turning people away, Ziv suggests capping the number of people admitted if there is enough interest. “Some events are better in an intimate setting,” she says. “A big event doesn’t mean a great event. It could be 30 people and be just as relevant and interesting as one with 100.”

Once you have established yourself as a group, Ziv suggests making a wait list if too many people RSVP to your event. “It can make people more excited. It means it’s a special event and people want to be a part of it. This way you can encourage people to RSVP early,” she says.

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6. Day of the Meetup

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For everything to run smoothly, it’s important that you do some last-minute preparation before your group meets. Call the venue to confirm, and make sure they have all the equipment you need (microphones, speakers, screens). If you’re bringing your own supplies, make sure the venue knows that ahead of time and confirm that you’ll be their early to set up.

If you’re in a private room at a bar or restaurant, try to make sure that the staff know who you are and that they’ll communicate to arriving guests where the event is being held.

On the day of, don’t forget your Sharpie pens, name tags, and the RSVP list. Have someone besides yourself man the door, so you can take care of last-minute needs. If you decide not to cap your admission number, make sure to have a sign-in sheet so you can get everyone’s contact information.

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7. Sponsorships

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Initial Meetups tend to be low-key affairs, but once you’ve organized a few and keep gaining members, sponsorship is a great way to make your Meetup more professional and enjoyable, while taking the costs off your hands.

Getting sponsored can happen in different ways. Fashion 2.0 was lucky enough to find some of its sponsors within some of its own members according to Ziv. “We have executives in the group and it’s to their benefit to tell their companies about a relevant group with great people who they would want to reach out to.”

The benefits of being sponsored mean that Fashion 2.0 can afford a bigger venue and host events with an open bar, which definitely attracts people. “It really takes it to the next level and makes it a serious event. The fashion industry has high standards and people expect a big production,” she says.

Another way to find a sponsor is through Meetup’s website. Three years ago the website noticed that groups were starting to get sponsored by local businesses.

“Running groups were sponsored by the neighborhood running store, and we saw that there was an opportunity for big brands to come in and support these groups,” said Cindy Laning, the account manager for Meetup sponsors. Since organizers pay to use the site, Meetup is committed to supporting the success of each group, and found that groups grow, on average, 7% faster with a sponsor.

Laning explained that organizers have the option of whether or not they would be interested in sponsorship, and Meetup reaches out to groups who they think would benefit from working with, including dozens of top brands like Columbia Sports, Dove, Vitamin Water, Equinox, Blackberry, Huggies and Microsoft.

“The point is to get as many groups sponsored as possible. We reach out to the group and act as the middleman between them and the brand.”

According to Laning, Meetup has a 75% opt-in rate for sponsorship, which insures that brands are welcomed into the community. “We get qualitative feedback; brands come in and they recognize these communities by financing them or with other things. The groups are so grateful for that support, that when it comes time to make a purchase decision they are likely to use the brand that has been helping them out. It’s a pay it forward mentality.”

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8. The Future

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Once you’ve organized your first Meetup, start thinking about the next. Talk to people to find out what will keep bringing them back, and try to come up with innovative ideas that will place you where you want to be in your industry: a connected, relevant contributor.

“Running the Meetup was the single most important move I’ve made in my professional career thus far,” said Kaganskiy. “It positioned me at the center of this community that I was just making my way into. It allowed me to create my own networking opportunities. Because I’m creating a public service by organizing these events, I’ve gain a lot of respect.”

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9. Keep Connected

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The event may be over, but your work is far from done. Now that you’ve met all these new people, it’s your job to stay connected with them via your group’s Meetup page, but also through other social media platforms. Follow your members on Twitter and Facebook. Keep your community buzzing. Was there a controversial question that generated a lot of discussion? Tweet it after the event and keep people thinking about you so that they can’t wait for the next event. For example, John Hyland and Anthony Quintano of the NYC DSLR Meetup, keep up with their members via Twitter to keep conversation rolling before, during and after their Meetups.

At Fashion 2.0 there is a whole conversation on Twitter in addition to the event. Ziv says members all follow and support each other, and foster new discussions.

Kaganskiy uses her personal Twitter account to promote the group and says that following up with members on other networking sites really helps to cement the relationships. She reflects, “I was an outsider looking in. Now I have friends at every major museum in the city, and it is because I maintained those connections I made at the Meetups.”

Have you organized a Meetup in your community? Add your own tips on organizing a successful Meetup in the comments below.

For more Business coverage:

• Follow Mashable Business on Twitter
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• Subscribe to the Business channel
• Download our free apps for iPhone and iPad

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More business resources from Mashable:

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- HOW TO: Improve B2B Sales Productivity with Social Media
- 13 Essential Social Media Lessons for B2B Marketers from the Masters
- 10 Essential Social Media Tools for B2B Marketers
- HOW TO: Build A Twitter Strategy for Your Business
- Why Small Businesses Shouldn’t Take Social Media for Granted

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, iofoto

More About: business, meeting, meetup, networking, social networking

A social media marketing company called Syncapse surveyed [PDF link] 4,000 people who have “Liked” the top 20 brands that have pages on Facebook and figured out exactly how valuable those “fans” are.

The study (“The Value of a Facebook Fan: An Empirical Review”) estimates that someone who has Liked a brand will spend an average of $71.84 more each year on that brand’s products or services than will someone who has not Liked it on Facebook, for a total average annualized value of $136.38.

This method is very different than the one employed by Vitrue in another fan value study a month ago. Vitrue’s method valued fans by figuring out how much it would cost to buy advertising on a website to reach the same people.

Product spending was only one of six fan benefits that Syncapse studied. The others were loyalty, propensity to recommend, brand affinity (“perception and recall”), media value (efficiency of Facebook vs. other ways to reach consumers) and acquisition cost.

In most cases, the average fan was more valuable to the brand than the average non-fan, though results varied widely on an individual basis. For example, some fans spent no money at all on a brand and never recommend it to friends.

Note that this was just demonstrated as a correlation, nothing more. Nabbing someone as a Facebook fan hasn’t been proven to increase spending in this study. The study just demonstrates that people who become fans of brands are more likely to spend and evangelize. If they liked the brand enough to “Like” it on Facebook, they might have done those things anyway.

Disclosure: Syncapse was a sponsor of Mashable’s 2010 Media Summit.

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Reviews: Facebook, Mashable, Twitter

Tags: brands, facebook, fans, MARKETING, social media, social networking, study, syncapse

Bangladesh ended its ban on Facebook today after the social networking company agreed to block access to the images that the government deemed offensive, according to the AFP.

Depending on which region’s news outlets you trust, the ban was imposed either because of “obnoxious” images of prominent Bangladeshi politicians, a user-hosted Facebook group that encouraged members to participate in a competition to draw the Prophet Muhammad, or both.

Many Muslims deem any visual depiction of Muhammad to be blasphemous.

As we predicted, Facebook blocked access to the controversial images for users within Bangladesh, but they remain accessible for users in other countries — except Pakistan, which had also blocked Facebook access but restored it earlier this week for the same reason. One man was arrested in Bangladesh over the political cartoons, but the Muhammad contest group originated outside of Bangladesh.

Bangladesh’s one million Facebook users will be relieved to have access to the majority of the social network restored; protests were organized after it was first blocked.

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For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook

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Tags: bangladesh, censorship, facebook, islam, politics

Mashable Co-Editor Ben Parr appeared on Al Jazeera English this weekend to address questions about the dangers posed by Facebook, including the privacy concerns and the recent spat of out-of-control parties organized on the social network.

Facebook’s Open Graph platform could be a huge boon for web businesses, but the privacy-related complications it brings up are little understood by Facebook users, many of whom still don’t even know how to disable instant personalization or just don’t bother.

A vocal minority of users have planned a mass exodus from Facebook this May 31, but Ben points out in the video interview below that the network is still growing despite the backlash.

Ben also wrote a column on Mashable this weekend titled “In Defense of Facebook,” providing an alternative viewpoint to the Facebook privacy backlash that we’ve been seeing over the past few weeks. He made the same point in that article as he did on Al Jazeera (among others): “Protecting our privacy starts with us, not Facebook.”

Do you agree or disagree with that statement? Let us know in the comments here, or join in on the conversation on the column.

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Ben Parr Talks Facebook Privacy on Al Jazeera

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Reviews: Facebook, Mashable, Twitter

Tags: al jazeera, Ben Parr, facebook, interview, mashable, Open Graph, privacy, social media, social networking, video

Ever had such a bad date that venting to your friends just wasn’t satisfying enough? Well, you might want to check out BadOnlineDates.com.

The world of online dating is exciting, ridiculous, comical and sometimes depressing. No matter how carefully you screen your dates, veterans know that you’re going to eventually end up with a bad one. Still, if you’re fortunate, you’ll end up with at least a few hilarious stories.

BadOnlineDates.com is a social networking site for online singles to share, laugh and commiserate about their awful dating experiences. Users can set up individual blogs, join chat rooms, and post photos and videos.

Recently, the site launched a free iPhone app [iTunes link], perfect for not only venting about your bad date while you take yet another long bathroom break, but theoretically for getting advice from other members of the site while you’re out and about.

You’ll have to be patient, though, as the only way to communicate with others on the app is by posting to your blog; chat features have not yet been integrated.

At the very least, if your date has likewise found an excuse to wander away from you for 20-going-on-30 minutes, you can peruse the blogs and videos of other users while you wait.

If you’ve tried online dating, what was your experience like? Would you vent about or seek advice during your date with your iPhone?

image courtesy of iStockphoto, CREATISTA

[screenshots via: iTunes]

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For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook

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Reviews: Facebook, Twitter, iStockphoto, iTunes

Tags: iphone app, iphone apps, online dating, social networking

The online nature of Twitter means that it’s highly unlikely you know the physical addresses of many of the people you follow, which if you want to send them something in the real world, could be problematic.

Whether it’s a Twitter buddy’s birthday, someone’s a little under the weather, you want to say thank you, or just be awesome, there are a variety of services out there that can help you out in such a situation.

We’ve pulled together a list of five websites that, utilizing just a Twitter handle and a credit card, will have actual gifts winging their way in the real world to your online friend in no time at all.

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1. ParcelGenie

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Perhaps aimed at the younger Twitter user, ParcelGenie offers affordable gifts across the categories of “fun,” “flirty,” “cheeky,” “cult” and “celebratory” with Love Hearts and strawberry lip gloss the current most popular items while we were visiting. Basically, if you’re looking to send a Twitter contact a Whoopee cushion, or a badge that reads “boob inspector” then this is your new go-to place.

Once you’ve signed in via oAuth, the site auto-selects a gift and someone from your followers to send it to as a kind of demo. This is unnerving at best, and frankly terrifying at worst as you sit petrified, scared to move the mouse as the site lines up “After Dinner Willies” for your boss, complete with an auto-generated message. Obviously you have to actually add the item to your cart before anything really happens, but it’s a point worth noting for the faint of heart.

On the practical side of things, you can only send gifts to people that are following you. Once you have selected an item and a recipient, you choose whether you want the gift to be public, private or anonymous, after which ParcelGenie messages the giftee asking for an address and, assuming your buddy provides the requisite info, the parcel is then sent.

Delivers To: The U.S., Canada, UK, Australia, plus some European countries
Gifts Available: Keyrings, badges, candy, drinks, mugs, magnets, various other low value items

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2. Tigerbow

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This good-looking site offers a more grown-up selection of giftery with books and movies catering to any get-well soon scenario, flowers and food great for thank yous, and comedy tees. There’s also a card-sending service which is available worldwide (unlike the gifting that’s currently U.S.-only), with the nifty option to design your own.

Once you’ve registered, verified your email and selected your gift, it’s just a matter of signing in to Twitter, selecting a contact from the list and then adding a Twitter message (there’s a separate option later in the checkout process to add a message to go with the actual gift). At this stage you can chose whether you want the recipient to be able to see the gift they are getting, or keeping it a surprise.

The giftee then gets a message from Tigerbow, can view your message on the site and then decide whether they want to accept, and if so, where they want the parcel sent. If the recipient refuses the present, then you won’t be charged and at no point is any address info shared.

Delivers To: The U.S. only for gifts, cards worldwide
Gifts Available: Flowers, cards, foodie items, t-shirts, books, movies

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3. Twitgift

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Twitgift currently offers a very limited selection of items made up of mostly cookies and a few geek-themed phone cases and jewelry. However, the site is actively looking for suppliers with “interesting, unique or tasty” products, and is supposedly making plans for expansion to other countries, so it’s definitely worth bookmarking.

Boasting a super-simple user experience, you simply sign in via oAuth with your Twitter account, select the gift you want to send, enter the Twitter name of who you’re sending it to and enter payment info.

The recipient then gets a tweet that is customizable, but along the lines of: “I just bought you a @twitgift! Claim your @twitgift at http://twitgift.me/claim/” The recipient can then visit Twitgift to add their shipping details (at which point the service tweets you to let you know the gift has been accepted). Alternatively, if the gift is not claimed in a week, the order is canceled and nothing is charged to your card.

It’s worth noting that unlike other services, the @mention nature of the notification means you can use Twitgift to send gifts to people who don’t follow you.

Delivers To: The U.S. only
Gifts Available: Cookies, phone cases, jewelry

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4. Twegistry

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Once you’ve oAuthed the sign-in on Twegistry, you can browse the online present selection which includes some nice gifty bits as well as some sexy underwear – so, clearly ideal for the stalker market.

Simply enter your recipient’s Twitter name and select the gift (prices include both shipping and taxes) and then checkout via PayPal.

Twegistry will then send a message containing an @mention to the person you’re sending the present to with a link so that they can either accept or decline. Like Twitgift, the way this system is set up means the person you want to send something to does not need to follow you back in order to generate the message.

If they do decline, then your purchase will be refunded, otherwise the gift will be sent off to them pronto.

Delivers To: The U.S. only
Gifts Available: Flowers, candy, cakes, teddy bears, saucy undies

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5. SendSocial

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In addition to being UK-only at this stage, SendSocial works on a different principle than the services outlined above as it does not restrict your choice of gift. It’s more a social delivery service that will help you send anything to a Twitter user.

Just sign in with your Twitter ID via oAuth, enter your name, email and address info (and go through the email verification process) and select the Twitter name of the person you want to send something to.

The service then generates a tweet along the following lines “@[recipient] I would like to send you [item], via SendSocial. To accept, go to http://sendsocial.com/r/[unique link]” Once the receivee accepts and enters their address, SendSocial creates a barcoded address label (so the actual location is not revealed at any stage) for you to print out, stick to your parcel and wait for the courier to collect.

Pricing is worked out on a weight basis, with anything up to 2kg costing just £3.99 (around $6) to send and the service takes between three to five days once the parcel has been collected.

Delivers To: UK only
Gifts Available: None – send your own

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For more social media coverage, follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook

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More Twitter resources from Mashable:

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- 5 Free Services for Pre-Scheduling Your Twitter Updates
- What Twitter’s New Ad Model Could Mean for Small Business
- 10 Dos and Don’ts for Brands on Twitter
- HOW TO: Spring Clean Your Twitter Account
- 4 Tips for Tapping Into Twitter Conversations

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, fotosipsak

Tags: parcelgenie, sendsocial, tigerbow, twegister, twitgift, twitter

Controversial Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez said during a visit to Bolivia that he would like to invite Bolivian President Evo Morales and Cuban political leader Fidel Castro to join him on Twitter, according to Reuters.

Chavez joined Twitter on Tuesday, taking the username @chavezcandaga. His arrival on Twitter was a surprise, in one part because only 30% of his country has Internet access (though that figure is far higher than it was before he took office) and in another because he raised concerns about Twitter just two months ago, calling it a potential “tool of terror.”

Chavez — who describes himself as a Bolivarian soldier, a socialist and an anti-Imperialist — said he would use the site to spread Bolivarian revolution. Castro and Morales are two of his strongest allies in anti-American sentiment.

Chavez has acquired more than 100,000 followers since signing up. “This has been an explosion,” he said. Of Twitter in general, he was quoted by Reuters saying: “The potential this has … it’s not capitalist, it’s not socialist, it depends on how it is used.”

So sit tight and you might soon see the South and Central American political leaders retweeting one another.

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Reviews: Twitter

Tags: bolivia, cuba, evo morales, fidel castro, Hugo Chavez, politics, social media, social networking, twitter, Venezuela

Last week, Facebook added a suite of new features that let websites like Pandora and Docs.com access some of your personal information and use it to instantly personalize your experience. Pandora, for example, will recommend streaming music stations built around artist’s you’ve Liked on Facebook in the past.

Most of the time this information is harmless and you shouldn’t worry too much about it being used for nefarious purposes, but if you want to err on the side of caution, you can actually opt out of the program for privacy reasons — the option is called “Instant Personalization” and it’s sitting deep inside of Facebook’s privacy settings pages.

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Opting Out at Specific Sites

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You can either turn Instant Personalization off entirely at Facebook, or you can opt out at individual websites on a case-by-case basis. The latter is easy; the first time you arrive a website that uses Instant Personalization, a bar will appear at the top of the page letting you know that’s what’s happening and giving you the option to either accept that or to tell it “no thanks.”

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Blocking Instant Personalization For All Sites

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The feature is on by default when you first arrive at a site, though, and if you’re sure you never want to use it anywhere, you can dig deep from your Facebook home page to make sure no other website can ever access your Facebook information for Instant Personalization purposes. To do that, start by clicking on “Account” in the upper-right corner of the Facebook homepage. Select “Privacy Settings” from the list that drops down below.

You’ll be presented with a list of five privacy settings pages. You can do a lot with these pages — customize who can see your profile info and news feed updates, for example — but the option we’re looking for now is right in the middle: “Applications and Websites.” Give that a click.

There it is at the bottom of this list: “Instant Personalization.” Consider clicking “Learn More” by the top item, too, though, as it explains exactly how your other privacy settings affect what information is shared with other applications and websites. Anyway, click “Edit Setting” by “Instant Personalization” at the bottom.

This last stop in the rabbit hole tells you what Instant Personalization does, and provides a lone check box at the bottom to enable or disable it. It’s on by default. Click the check box to turn it off.

There you go. It’s done! Facebook won’t share your personal information with websites for Instant Personalization again until you re-enable this feature. You can do that by going back and re-checking the box at any time, so if you decide you want the new features after all, this isn’t irreversible.

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Preventing Friends From Sharing Your Info

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You should be aware that friends can still sometimes share your information from their own profiles with websites even though this is turned off. This is easy to change. Just jump back one level to “Applications and Websites” and click “Edit Settings” by the second option — “What your friends can share about you” — instead of “Instant Personalization.

Here you can check and un-check boxes to specify what information your friends’ connections can share with other applications and websites. If you un-check everything here, none of your information will be shared. It’s nice to be able to choose exactly what you are and aren’t comfortable with, though.

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Tags: docs.com, facebook, how to, instant personalization, Open Graph, pandora, privacy, social media, social networking, social plugins, yelp