The government has backed away from its proposals in the Digital Economy Bill to cut off people who have illegally shared files online.

Public service organizations around the world are jumping on the web 2.0 bandwagon— engaging citizens through social media, blogging, social networking; developing ever more sophisticated  government web 2.0 sites; investing in “Enterprise 2.0” platforms and even encouraging the public to create mashups and apps using government data.  The challenge for public servants is to look past the hype to understand the real benefits of web 2.0 and the actions required to maximize these benefits for their organizations and for citizens.

In 2007, Twitter had only 5,000 Tweets per day, a number that jumped to 300,000 in 2008 and 2.5 million in 2009. Throughout last year, however, average number of Tweets jumped 1,400 percent to 35 million each day.

So your business is on Facebook, and brand engagement is up thanks to some savvy social media strategy. You may even be interested in further distinguishing your brand by building a custom landing page for your account.

But what kind of value does a custom Facebook Fan Page offer? What are your fans looking for on a social network that they can't get from your business website?

Almost all young men use the internet every day, and it is the technology they are most attached to, according to new study.

Research conducted by Sparkler for Microsoft Advertising across the UK found that 99% of young males go online either every day or nearly every day, and half of them already use their mobile phones to do so. And 80% even go so far as to say that they would be lost without it.

Over the years, Social Media experts attempted to redefine ROI for a new era of influence. While some introduced alternative philosophies for measuring the nuances tied to social media, others wondered aloud whether ROI simply wasn’t necessary as the tools and methodologies for analyzing yields didn’t yet exist. And furthermore, by focusing on justification and metrics, we were distracted from the primary objective of building relationships and cultivating dialogue.
The debate over ROI inspired certain brands to cannonball into popular social networks to join the proverbial conversation without a plan or strategic objectives defined. At the same time, the lack of ROI standards and established authorities, unnerved many executives, preventing any form of experimentation until their questions and concerns were addressed.
But that was then and this is now.

Advertisers and brands can rest easy. Facebook is full of real people representing themselves realistically according to a new study from Back et al (2010).