Celebrity Gossip, Technology News, Movies, Trailers, Phones

Complaints about surveillance trended in today’s Twitter-Wood feed. ” Eclipse ” actor Alex Meraz credited photo-enabled radar detection for a speeding ticket he received, while Ken Jeong harped on Twitter’s new location identification system and asked whether or not his fans would want him to use it. In a rare Twitter appearance, Elizabeth Taylor unleashed some pointed complaints over post-Oscars stories written about Kathy Irelend. I’ve retweeted one of those, but you can click on over to her account to read the rest. Meanwhile, check out some photos from Tom Hanks in Washington, D.C., Christian Serratos with a hot dog and a posting from the “Office” writers room. It’s all in Twitter-Wood for March 11th, 2010. Twitter Pic of the Day: @TheAlexMeraz Got a photo radar ticket for speeding earlier today! I probably shouldn’t drive like this anymore huh? http://www.twitpic.com/17ybrb -Alex Meraz, Actor (“Eclipse,” “New Moon”) @tomhanks Veterans. Heroes. Boys in Old Men clothes. Honored on the Mall in DC. http://twitpic.com/17y5s6 -Tom Hanks, Actor (“Saving Private Ryan,” “Big”) @kenjeong Why is twitter nagging me to disclose my location? Does the public really need to know that I’m @ an all-u-can-eat-buffet @ Strippy McNudes? -Ken Jeong, Actor (“The Hangover,” “Community”) @DameElizabeth I heard that some scum magazines, print and internet trashed Kathy Ireland on Oscar Red Carpet night. -Elizabeth Taylor, Actress (“National Velvet,” “Cleopatra”) @MirandaBuzz Caught up with @justinbieber for a second today at the nickelodeon upfronts. He’s so sweet. -Miranda Cosgrove, Actress (“The School of Rock,” “iCarly”) @rainnwilson this was on the wall of the writers’ room http://post.ly/S9QW -Rainn Wilson, Actor (“The Rocker,” “The Office”) @AnnaKendrick47 Ah… home sweet second-home. Nothing like being back at work, especially back in Canada. *rock-star-voice* GOODNIGHT! -Anna Kendrick, Actress (“Up in the Air,” “Twilight”) @cserratos http://twitpic.com/17sy2u – I have a HOT DOG. -Christian Serratos, Actress (“Twilight,” “New Moon”) @lloydkaufman If Toxie dies in Toxie 5 in 911 WTC attack,Is that a stupid idea.Guatemala is affecting me! -Lloyd Kaufman, Actor/Director/Producer (“The Toxic Avenger,” “Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D.”) Don’t forget to follow @MTVMoviesBlog on Twitter for all the latest updates and colorful commentary from the world of movies.

Complaints about surveillance trended in today’s Twitter-Wood feed. ” Eclipse ” actor Alex Meraz credited photo-enabled radar detection for a speeding ticket he received, while Ken Jeong harped on Twitter’s new location identification system and asked whether or not his fans would want him to use it. In a rare Twitter appearance, Elizabeth Taylor unleashed some pointed complaints over post-Oscars stories written about Kathy Irelend. I’ve retweeted one of those, but you can click on over to her account to read the rest. Meanwhile, check out some photos from Tom Hanks in Washington, D.C., Christian Serratos with a hot dog and a posting from the “Office” writers room. It’s all in Twitter-Wood for March 11th, 2010. Twitter Pic of the Day: @TheAlexMeraz Got a photo radar ticket for speeding earlier today! I probably shouldn’t drive like this anymore huh? http://www.twitpic.com/17ybrb -Alex Meraz, Actor (“Eclipse,” “New Moon”) @tomhanks Veterans. Heroes. Boys in Old Men clothes. Honored on the Mall in DC. http://twitpic.com/17y5s6 -Tom Hanks, Actor (“Saving Private Ryan,” “Big”) @kenjeong Why is twitter nagging me to disclose my location? Does the public really need to know that I’m @ an all-u-can-eat-buffet @ Strippy McNudes? -Ken Jeong, Actor (“The Hangover,” “Community”) @DameElizabeth I heard that some scum magazines, print and internet trashed Kathy Ireland on Oscar Red Carpet night. -Elizabeth Taylor, Actress (“National Velvet,” “Cleopatra”) @MirandaBuzz Caught up with @justinbieber for a second today at the nickelodeon upfronts. He’s so sweet. -Miranda Cosgrove, Actress (“The School of Rock,” “iCarly”) @rainnwilson this was on the wall of the writers’ room http://post.ly/S9QW -Rainn Wilson, Actor (“The Rocker,” “The Office”) @AnnaKendrick47 Ah… home sweet second-home. Nothing like being back at work, especially back in Canada. *rock-star-voice* GOODNIGHT! -Anna Kendrick, Actress (“Up in the Air,” “Twilight”) @cserratos http://twitpic.com/17sy2u – I have a HOT DOG. -Christian Serratos, Actress (“Twilight,” “New Moon”) @lloydkaufman If Toxie dies in Toxie 5 in 911 WTC attack,Is that a stupid idea.Guatemala is affecting me! -Lloyd Kaufman, Actor/Director/Producer (“The Toxic Avenger,” “Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D.”) Don’t forget to follow @MTVMoviesBlog on Twitter for all the latest updates and colorful commentary from the world of movies.

Every year year the World Economic Forum names its Young Global Leaders, a list of up-and-comers from the worlds of business, politics, culture, and non-profits. Last year’s list included YouTube founder Chad Hurley,, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Digg founder Kevin Rose, and Skype CEO Josh Silverman. Today, the World Econmic Forum named its 2010 Young Global Leaders. There are 197 people on the list overall, including celebrities like musician Wyclef Jean and fashion designer Stella McCartney. Some of the startup CEOs and tech execs on this year’s least include: Evan Williams—CEO and co-founder of Twitter Marissa Mayer—VP, Search Product and User Experience, Google Steven Chen—Co-founder, YouTube Peter Corsell—CEO, GridPoint Calvin Chin—CEO, Qifang Heather Fleming—CEO, Catapult Design David Rosenberg—CEO, Hycrete CrunchBase Information Evan Williams Marissa Mayer Steve Chen Information provided by CrunchBase

Steve Ballmer recently revealed that he has a secret Twitter account which he uses to “blast out the scores of his kid’s high school basketball games.” We did a few quick searches and we think we may have found it. Based on a few old stories we know that Steve’s son, Sam, attends Lakeside School in Seattle, so we searched for Twitter accounts announcing scores for that school’s basketball games. There were some accounts which tweeted scores here and there, but there was one which was simply dedicated to one thing and one thing only: LakesideBball . This particular Twitter account doesn’t appear to be affiliated with the school itself, so it would make sense that an athlete’s proud parent was behind it. Possibly Steve himself? While LakesideBball doesn’t follow anyone, it does have a fellow by the name of Sam Ballmer among its followers. I didn’t discover any other Sam Ballmer ’s mentioned on any of Lakeside’s sports teams, and this particular one is rather excited about his school winning a game: He also mentions playing on a team several times: So, it’s pretty reasonable to think that this particular Twitter user is Steve Ballmer’s son. (Heck, even Fake Steve Ballmer thinks so and follows him.) Anyway, between that family connection and the fitting tweets, we’re led to believe that LakesideBball is very likely the secret Twitter account Steve Ballmer says he has. Either way, I’m sorry if anyone feels that this spoils a little mystery, but c’mon! Steve teased us with a secret.

Over the weekend, Citysearch pushed out an update to its iPhone app with a much smoother user interface, better local search, and maps are now the default view. I am happy to report that it no longer looks exactly like Yelp’s iPhone app. The improvements should help it close the gap (Yelp is currently the No. 4 free Travel app, while Citysearch is No. 36). In fact, it now does some things Yelp’s app cannot do, the most important of which is that Twitter is baked into it in a very smart way. Just like on Citysearch’s website, an increasing number of the local listings are associated with what people are saying about those restaurants, bars, and stores on Twitter. In addition to Citysearch user reviews, you can also see recent Tweets about the listings. And the app acts as a limited Twitter client in that you can Tweet out a short review from each profile page. The app prompts you to sign into your Twitter account and autofills a tweet with a link to the Citysearch page of that business. It is still a work in progress though. Right now the Tweets are filled in with an @citysearch handle and thus don’t show up on the Citysearch’s page for that business. By the next update that will change to the @handle of the business, and it the Tweets will start showing up on the Website as well. Citysearch is building out a directory of business Twitter accounts and is beginning to catch Tweets about its millions of local listings. Within the next few weeks, the Twitter account names will start to become part of teh profile data available to developers via its CityGrid APIs Some other nice touches to the app include a sliding icon menu bar at the top, which let you filter different types of listings (restaurants, salons, shopping, clubs, bars, cafes, arts & entertainment, banks, gas stations, movie theaters, pharmacies, bakeries, attractions, parking, and hotels). And if you shake the iPhone while looking at a listing, an offer might pop up. The “Shake For Offer” feature isn’t as cool as the augmented reality easter egg in Yelp snuck into its iphone app, Here’s a video showing off the features of the new Citysearch iPhone app: CrunchBase Information Citysearch Yelp iPhone 3G Information provided by CrunchBase

HootSuite, the Twitter clients that dubs itself as a social media dashboard for professionals, is launching an Android app, a new version of its iPhone app with Facebook integration and is integrating targeted ads in both apps via recently launched Twitter ad network, 140 Proof. HootSuite’s features are targeted towards helping marketing professionals keep track of the Twitter conversations happening on the web. The startup offers a free and paid version of its web app, and mobile clients. The Android app features much of the same functionality as the iPhone app, including the ability to manage multiple Twitter account, create streams for hashtags and searches, schedule messages for the future, add followers to lists and accounts, share photos and shorten URLs. The paid versions allow for unlimited Twitter accounts plus on-board, click-through statistics tracking. The updated paid version of the iPhone App will include Facebook integration and landscape view. And in an effort to boost revenue, HootSuite is partnering with 140 Proof to serve ads on all versions of its mobile offerings. Ads are served within users’ Twitter streams on and are clearly marked as ads, but act as Tweets that can be retweeted. HootSuite is taking the advertising risk on 140 Proof because the startup promises highly targeted advertising. Twitter clients pass 140 Proof a user ID list (with no names) and the public information contained in a Twitter users profile, and on the advertiser side, advertisers bid on ads to be directed toward users based on keywords in tweets, followers, as well as device, location and platform. 140 Proof’s algorithms calculates Twitterer’s “persona” based on public tweets and who they follow and serves ads to users based on this data. The deal with HootSuite is a big coup for 140 Proof, which just launched its network a few weeks ago. OneRiot is doing something similar with its realtime ad network RiotWise, and is seeing promising results during its private beta. And we are anxiously awaiting Twitter’s new advertising model which may or may not be revealed in the near future. CrunchBase Information HootSuite 140 Proof Information provided by CrunchBase

Filed under: Gaming , Freeware , Internet , Apple , iPhone , sxsw Happy March! The super hip and trendy South-by-Southwest music and tech festival is coming up this month, and like many tech conventions these days, AT&T is working on a plan to keep their network up and running as thousands of iPhones descend on Austin, Texas to send around voice, texts, and data. GigaOM has a little insight into how they’re planning to do it this year, and if you’re interested in the nuts-and-bolts of keeping a cell phone network up and running (or at least trying to — this is AT&T, after all), it’s worth a read. They’re beefing up the cell towers in the city’s vicinity, setting up a whole new system around the convention center itself, and putting money into the backend as well, to try and increase bandwidth coming into the region. I don’t know if they’ve done anything like this before (I can’t really judge with Macworld — while my iPhone worked fine most of the time, I still only have a 1G, and I was using Sprint MiFi on my Macbook most of the time), but it sounds like a pretty comprehensive setup. Of course, the other reason AT&T is pushing to get ready for SXSW is that the convention has become sort of an unofficial testing ground for the next big social apps. A few years ago, Twitter made its first big push around SXSW, and last year, Foursquare was the app to use (which has since spawned a brand new genre of app, the “check-in” network). So what’s going to be the app pushing data through the AT&T network this year? The buzz so far is around Twitter’s coming ad platform , though it’s hard to think that an ad platform could be a killer app. My money’s on some sort of location-based social game — while Foursquare has gaming elements, I think an app like MyTown could take the concept even farther, and we still haven’t really seen an actual GPS-based RPG or MMO break out. Even those of us who aren’t at SXSW this year will be paying attention to what people are doing on their iPhones there, because odds are good that the app that clicks with attendees there will be what we’re all playing with in a few months. TUAW AT&T plans for SXSW 2010 originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Read

Well, here’s a bit of a twist on the ever popular DIY Twitter gadget . Rather than controlling a device via Twitter, or having a device simply display or read tweets aloud , the folks behind this LED-stuffed table have taken a slightly more artistic approach by relying on the tweeting masses to generate patterns of light on the table. That’s done with a combination of a hashtag and a specific format for entering colors and coordinates, which head first for a MacBook Pro before being transmitted to the table via Bluetooth. Not content to leave it there, the table’s creators have even set up a live USTREAM feed to let you see the results of your tweet. Hit up the link below to try it out for yourself. Twitter-enabled LED table lets you get your Lite-Brite on from afar originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 27 Feb 2010 05:46:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

I don’t think I have to tell you folks just how absolutely gorgeous Blake Lively is, if she wasn’t always working so hard or hanging out in her bikini with some co-star douche or ignoring all my twitter advances and inappropriate twitpics or pretending I don’t exist all together, I think our relationship would be much stronger. I don’t really care, I know that every relationship takes work and I’m not afraid to put in the time and effort to make this thing work… Even if I’m not allowed within 200 feet of her.

Oh the Associated Press, our most favorite banned new source. It seems almost monthly they do something that defies logic and/or looks to be a suicidal act. And today brings another oddity. The AP is using their Twitter feed to tweet out their stories — nothing new there, obviously — but every single one of them links to the story on their Facebook Notes page. It’s not clear how long they’ve been doing this, but Search Engine Land’s Danny Sullivan noted the oddness of this, and how annoying it is, tonight. The AP obviously has a ton of media partners, and they could easily link to any of those, or even the story hosted on their own  site . But no, instead they’re copying all these stories to their Facebook page and linking there for no apparent reason. As Sullivan notes in a follow-up tweet , “ i really miss when people had web sites they owned and pointed at. why lease your soul to facebook. or buzz. or whatever. master your domain .” What’s really odd about this is the AP’s recent scuffle with Google over the hosting of AP content. The two sides appeared to reach some sort of deal earlier this month (after months of threats and actual pulled content ), but now the AP is just hosting all this content on Facebook for the hell of it? Sure, maybe they think that by hosting the content on Facebook, they’re being impartial with the tweets. But again, why not just use their own site? When I asked Sullivan to elaborate on this issue, he made a good point, “ funny, they seem to get social (twitter & facebook) more than basic SEO (the core of their issues with Google) .” Oh the AP; the amusement never ends. CrunchBase Information Associated Press Twitter Facebook Information provided by CrunchBase