Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg caused quite a stir on Tuesday with his announcement of the new Facebook 'social ads'. Unlike other advertising initiatives that stress product placement, the new Facebook advertising initiative focuses on enabling the social network's users to endorse products and software.
According to Zuckerberg, companies will now be able to create Facebook ad pages where people can become fans of a product. Once they have, the popular Facebook news feed will show that a person's friend has become a fan of the given product. This endorsement can be linked to other websites as well, so advertisers can enjoy even greater product awareness.
How much does it cost?
Facebook will allow advertisers to create profiles for free, but it will charge companies a fee if they want to include an advertisement in the news feed. According to Zuckerberg, these adverts will be in the form of banner ads on the site and will feature a picture of your friend who has endorsed the product.
Whether or not this new form of advertising will catch on remains to be seen, but the Facebook CEO seems quite sure his company is onto something. "Nothing influences a person more than the recommendation of a trusted friend."
Read: Facebook + your face = social ads
A new generation of sound quality?
Motorola has announced the MOTOPURE H12 mobile Bluetooth headset that aims at producing the best audio quality in even the noisiest environments. The headset offers three ear cushion options to maximise your comfort and comes with a desktop charger, shirt clip and charging case. It will be available later this year for an undisclosed price.
Nokia, one of the few major phone manufacturers that has opted out of the Open Handset Alliance (OHA) with Google, went on record on Tuesday saying that it would not rule out the possibility of joining the Alliance, but it would rather wait and see what happens first.
Nokia has decided to opt out of the agreement with Google because of its 48 per cent stake in the Symbian operating system, which currently runs on one-third of the world's smartphones. But according to Nokia, regardless of Symbian, if the OHA eventually made sound business sense, it would definitely join Google and co.
Microsoft will be discontinuing MSN Messenger for Mac and will replace it with a yet-to-be announced software solution. Most have speculated that such a move would be coming, given the lack of updates in recent months in spite of it trailing far behind the Windows version. A release date has not been announced, but a new version is expected next year.