Vine released its biggest update to date for iOS Wednesday, bringing a number of new features to the video service.

Included in the update are 15 new channels ranging from comedy to cats where you can submit your videos, a new “On the Rise” section that highlights Vine videos going viral on the service, and new capture tools — such as grid and ghost tools — to add flavor to your videos.

In addition to the app enhancements, Vine’s update also adds the ability to “revine” Vine posts to your followers, much like you might retweet a tweet on Twitter, as well as the ability to create a protected account on Vine that can be seen only by specified users.

Finally, users can now set focus and exposure for their videos.

You can download the Vine update now for iOS devices from the App Store.

Read More »

Lost luggage is one of the biggest buzzkills when traveling abroad. But did you know there's an app to help track it down?

Come trade other tech travel tips with us at @MashLifestyle as we join the Go Girl Travel Network this Monday, June 17 at 2 p.m. ET. Under the hashtag #girlstravel, we'll discuss restaurant discovery apps, high-tech hotels and strategies to unplug completely.

Even though the chat will cover female-centric travel, we invite all to contribute their own stories and advice.

Read more…

Read More »

We’re thrilled to announce Mashable's annual New York City Social Media Day event. This year, we're planning for the biggest Social Media Day celebration the world has ever seen.

On June 29, media companies Vice and Milk will join Mashable to host a massive celebration that redefines social media as we know it: The Social Media Day of Reckoning.

We're expecting the most diverse crowd yet as the three worlds of Mashable, Vice and Milk merge into a dynamic mix of creatives, artists and tech-savvy individuals.

This event will take place at Milk Studios, where fashion, music and art come together at one of the most preeminent venues in NYC.A newly revealed global malware campaign hit 350 high-profile targets in 40 different countries. The cyberespionage campaign, codenamed Operation NetTraveler, has been active since at least 2004, stealing more than 22 gigabytes of data from computers around the world.

The malware attacks were uncovered on Tuesday by Russian online security company Kaspersky Lab. The hackers behind the campaign used a data-exfiltration tool called NetTraveler — not a very sophisticated malware designed to steal sensitive data and information.

The name originates from a string contained in the malware code: "NetTraveler is Running!" Read more…

Read More »

Many are aware of Amazon's robust retail and web-hosting businesses, but less are familiar with its advertising business, which is rapidly becoming a significant player in the space.

Amazon brought in $450 million in advertising in revenue last year, according to eMarketer estimates published Tuesday. The company managed to increase its advertising business by nearly two-thirds between 2011 and 2012, and is expected to grow it by another half this year — to $660 million. This makes Amazon's ad business even bigger than Twitter's, which eMarketer previously estimated would generate $580 million this year. Read more…

Read More »

What a week. U.S. President Barack Obama's "Four More Years" photo — released just after he was re-elected Tuesday night — became the most-shared photo in Twitter's history. Other top photos this week ... well, they were all from Justin Bieber and One Direction.

Our friends over at Skylines went through 34,458,200 unique pictures and compiled the ones that were most shared and retweeted. Read more…

Read More »

Twitter updated its iOS and Android apps Thursday, adding new functionality particularly in the areas of Search and Discover.

Now you can preview article summaries and photos in both Search and Discover without tapping on those stories in order to so.

Just like on Twitter’s website, the Discover tab on mobile now lets you discover popular tweets. Tapping on the “View all Tweets” button will bring up a stream of stories, news, and photos being shared by people in your network. Read more…

Read More »

Earlier this month the BBC alleged on a news program that a former Tory politician was a child molester. The report, which didn’t actually name the man, was untrue.

But a frenzy of speculation began on Twitter, with thousands of people either tweeting or retweeting the name of Alistair McAlpine — a.k.a. Lord McAlpine, an adviser to Margaret Thatcher when she was prime minister. The BBC has since apologized for sloppy reporting and coughed up £185,000 ($294,000) in damages. But some of those who tweeted about it are facing a probable lawsuit.

Those who repeated the claim include everyone from ordinary tweeters with few followers to high-profile celebrities like British actor Alan Davies with hundreds of thousands of followers. The media is reporting that some 10,000 people could be sued, leading to the largest number of defendants in a case in British legal history.

Of course many of those people were merely doing what most people do on Twitter: passing along gossip, the way they would on Facebook, by text message or by email. But unlike those, Twitter is completely public.

“Twitter is not just a closed coffee shop among friends,” says Andrew Reid, McAlpine’s lawyer. “It goes out to hundreds of thousands of people and you must take responsibility for it. It is not a place where you can gossip and say things with impunity, and we are about to demonstrate that.” Read more…

Read More »

Twitter is only as useful as the people you're following. For many of us, that involves a gaggle of accounts from members of our industry: entrepreneurs, marketing pros, journalists and developers. But the premiere micro-blogging platform is a far cry from all work and no play.

That's why we follow the accounts on this list. These reality TV stars, comedians, celebrities, athletes and parody accounts are the ultimate guilty pleasures to follow. We're sorry we're not sorry. Read more…

Read More »

Twitter updated its iOS and Android apps on Wednesday by improving the photo uploading experience and making it easier to switch between multiple accounts.

Now when you add an image to tweet from Twitter’s mobile app, you’ll see a full preview of the photo rather than a cropped version. Images are also easier to upload; simply use a button in the bottom right corner of the compose box for a new tweet. When uploading a photo from the camera roll, images appear below the compose window, letting you quickly select your desired image.

When creating a new tweet, your avatar and username will now appear on the page, too. People with several linked Twitter accounts can toggle between the two by simply tapping on the avatar. This feature also makes it easier to quickly check which account you're tweeting from — with a visual verification — so you don't accidentally send out personal tweets from your business account, or vice versa. Read more…

Read More »

Facebook announced a new method of mobile messaging Thursday: A system where users can send and receive messages within other apps as to not disrupt their general workflow.

The name of this visionary technology? Chat heads.

(Pause for reaction.)

Of course, the Twitterverse instantly went to work questioning Mark Zuckerberg's sanity for approving the odd name. Read more…

Read More »

The folks from uptime monitoring company Royal Pingdom have assembled a gargantuan list of various internet-related stats from 2012, and it's a very interesting read.

Though we've seen nearly all of these numbers before — for example, we covered Facebook passing 1 billion users in October as well as Twitter's 200 million in December — seeing them all in one place reminds you of how small and insignificant we are in the vast ocean of data that is the internet. Read more…

Read More »