The perpetrator of nearly 30 million Facebook spam messages surrendered to authorities last week. “Spam King” Sanford Wallace faces criminal charges that could land him in jail for perhaps more than 16 years. Wallace is alleged to have hacked roughly a half-million Facebook accounts, sending those obnoxious (and dangerous) wall posts which fool users into visiting websites that steal their personal information. READ MORE >>
The web is buzzing with discussion of the case of Deborah Copaken Kogan, a writer and Financial Times columnist who discovered—via Facebook—that her child had a rare and dangerous disease. Kogan’s story began when her four-year-old son developed a stubborn rash, followed by a fever and intense swelling. After Kogan began to post photos of her sick child on Facebook, she received a panicked phone call from a former neighbor who had seen the photos. READ MORE >>
Don't Be Evil
In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives By Steven Levy (Simon & Schuster, 423 pp., $26) The Googlization of Everything (And Why We Should Worry) By Siva Vaidhyanathan (University of California Press, 265 pp., $26.95) I. READ MORE >>
President Obama’s Twitter Town Hall was kind of lame. Admittedly, it wasn’t as lame as I thought it would be. But it still showed the White House has yet to fully embrace social media, at least when it comes to the president himself. READ MORE >>
Myspace and the Curse of Success
Today, Specific Media, a digital advertising company, announced that it has purchased Myspace (remember Myspace?) from News Corp. Just five years ago, News Corp paid $580 million for Myspace, but since then, the once-powerful social networking site has shed users and been overtaken by Facebook. In January, Myspace laid off nearly half its staff, and Specific Media, according to a number of reports, paid just $35 million for it. How could Myspace have fallen so far, so fast? READ MORE >>
Slideshow: Saudi Arabian Women Defy the Driving Ban
On Friday the women of Saudi Arabia staged a protest against the nation’s unwritten but often brutally enforced rule that only men may drive. The protest was called for by activist Manal al-Sharif, a 32-year-old Internet consultant for the state-run oil company Aramco. Al-Sharif had been arrested on May 21 after posting this video of herself driving on YouTube. READ MORE >>
