Would you use a time-tracking application to help you determine and manage your “real” social network? timeXchange hopes so, with some of its latest updates. Instead of becoming stagnant as a tool that merely tracks time for employees, contractors or the self-employed, timeXchange is going the social route, hoping to use its service as a way to provide more immediate value as a relationship-management tool that focuses on working relationships.

If you invite a collaborator to your project on timeXchange, you’ll now also have that person as a contact in relation to that overlapping project, making this service a multifaceted management tool for both projects and relationships. As we use Web-based services to handle more and more of our business and personal relationships’ transactions, we find that there are many groups that overlap with each other within our own social graph. And managing the overlap can be problematic–it’s an ongoing issue that has spurred the development of privacy settings for various types of networks, and helped niche networks remain so for all intents and purposes.

So when we look at the people we actually keep in contact with in person, via phone conversations or Web-based applications, we can begin to factor this into our “actual” social networks. Skydeck made this abundantly clear with the release of its phone call tracking service, which organizes your contacts based on your real level of interaction with each individual.

As Skydeck moves to integrate further with some of the other existing social networks out there through things like its developer tools and plug-in options, timeXchange will hopefully move in this direction as well, enabling users to continue their networking capabilities outside of timeXchange and carrying them over into other networks like Facebook. Perhaps timeXchange will even recommend who they should befriend on third party sites and integrate some of the scheduling and time-tracking capabilities. There’s a new iPhone app that timeXchange launched earlier this week, so additional integration on this end would be helpful as well (get it here).

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While Disney devotes most of its resources to entertainment for the youth of the world to consume and grow zealous over, the people dishing dollars for the company’s attractions - from theme parks to movies to books to toys and, more recently, online destinations - are naturally the adults of the world. So, after having constructed a thoroughly glitzy network on the Web called DxD (short for Disney Xtreme Digital), it has deemed it appropriate to launch another space, Disney Family, designed for use by “moms and dads to share the pride of being a parent, and have a lot of fun while (they’re) at it!”

The differences between Disney Family and Xtreme Digital are stark. While XD has no pretensions of being reserved in terms of the sheer volume of stuff presented for users’ eyes and ears, Disney Family is more basic. Its layout and color wheel are far more gentle on the senses. It is clearly meant for generations of people responsible for the those who spend their hours of playtime in XD land.

Disney Family is, in short, a content network. It does hold social aspects, mind you. But a quick glance at where among the main menu of options the ‘community’ tab is listed shows what Disney is prioritizing on the site.

Not that its slight understatement of the community feature is a bad thing. Disney is after all good with delivering material - whatever material it might be. So it is naturally going to trumpet reading material wherever it can. Sections for Food, Parenting, Travel, and Entertainment are all filled with things that typical Disney-aware family would likely appreciate. And the way each section is structured makes for an easy time. Dare I say appreciable as well?

Even if the Disney Family community isn’t writ large upon the site’s front page, it is there among the links. And like other facets accessible across the broader network, it is elegantly designed. Nothing alpha or beta about it, really. Everything seems to work as it should, and it’s all very intuitive to browse and operate. The only quibble I can make at this moment is that the site is very slow to load. Whether an intense traffic surge is to blame or that Disney Family requires more work behind the stage, I’m not sure. But going about the network is definitely not something I would currently call a speedy experience.

Also, though the sign-up process is simple enough, it is a bit tedious. Unless you desire to have your inbox stuffed with daily and weekly newsletters of all sorts, you’ll be unchecking at least a half dozen boxes before you’ve agreed to Disney’s terms and hit the registration button. And for those who tend to scramble through sign-ups on the Web, Disney Family by default selects female gender before male. So, all the dads out there, watch where you click. Of course, you can change this if you mistakenly choose wrongly out of habit of ignoring such particularities.

In all, I approve of Disney Family. I would certainly wish the site performance to be greatly improved, and soon, but the design itself is commendable. If Disney’s promotion of the new venue is effective, it will presumably fare very well.

—Related Articles at Mashable! - The Social Networking Blog:Disney Acquires Club Penguin in $700 Million DealDisney’s Online “Theme Park” Heads to the UKDisney Acquires iParenting MediaDisney to Launch Social Network for Nintendo GamersDisney Launches XD with Parental ControlsVirtual Visits To Where Dreams Come True (No, It’s Not Neverland)Bring It On…Line. ABC’s CheerCamp Rallies Support for Films.

Editor’s Note: This post is part of an ongoing series at Mashable - The Startup Review, Sponsored by Sun Microsystems Startup Essentials. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.

STARTUP DETAILS:

Company Name: LeadVine

20-word Description: LeadVine is where you post sales leads or information you are searching for and have the community act as your sales force.

CEO’s Pitch: LeadVine is a new kind of social network where the community is the sales force.

LeadVine has two goals:

A. Simplify how companies find new customers by posting sales leads and referral bonuses on LeadVine. Obtaining new customers is a difficult and expensive process. LeadVine helps companies find new sales leads in an efficient way.

B. Have the community earn easy money for finding and sharing sales leads. Everyday people come across information that is useless to them but valuable to someone else. Use LeadVine to find companies willing to pay you $1,000s for valuable information you come across.

Mashable’s Take: Social networks have shown what Web-based interconnectivity unhindered by geography can do for personal association as well as professional. LinkedIn, for instance, has shown itself to hold ample value for its users - and vice versa. LeadVine, a new service launching this Thursday, August 14, walks a business-centric line as well. But rather than try to compete with a stalwart like LinkedIn directly, it tries to build on the market already established by facilitating connections for sales purposes or other business. Advisory and consultancy outfits, for instance.

Looking at the list of requests published to LeadVine in advance of its public debut this week, one might see some highlights that sport “finder’s fees” and think it peculiarly easy to interact with users. LeadVine’s promotion of users’ ability to “earn easy money” only makes the visitor’s double-take more pronounced. There’s considerable value being spoken of in some cases, a number of which are too grand and too playful it seems, especially given the site’s preview status.

Even so, LeadVine is at its core quite promising. Its design is meant to enable a three-step process: post sales leads; seek community assistance in finding those leads; conduct said business and add to sales. No mystery. Just the corporate world at work. Only with LeadVine, it is a bit more cloud-based than before.

Sponsored By: Sun Startup Essentials

There will be times that you have to contribute a post for your company’s blog and you just don’t have one idea that inspires you to start a conversation. We’ve all been there and that’s why we’ve created this resource with more than 40 topics for corporate bloggers to help provide that much need inspiration:

Press release – Read a recent press release from your company and write two paragraphs on its significance in plain English.

Industry news – Share your opinion about a recent story affecting your industry/audience.

Best practices – Provide an example of a best practice that you adhere to or that others could learn from.

Tradeshow 1 –  Prior to an industry trade show, share your list of interesting sessions, what to expect or what you’re looking forward to.

Tradeshow 2 – During the show, share images from the floor, notes from sessions or interviews with attendees.

Tradeshow 3 – After the show, write a quick wrap-up, discuss what you learned and who you met.

Find video – Search for a video related to your industry and embed it as your post with a bit of analysis as to why it’s relevant.

Plan a meet-up – Use your post to organize an informal meet-up with readers around one of your blog’s topics.

Current event - Leverage a current event in the news to discuss how your company handles adversity or crisis.

Holiday party – Take pictures at fun company events to show you don’t take yourselves too seriously.

Productivity tip – Email, Excel, PowerPoint… do you have any tips for how to be more productive that your audience might appreciate?

Email query – Send an email asking 5 people in your company the same question and share their responses.

Blog comment – Review some recent blog comments and choose one to discuss in detail.

Write a how-to post - Maybe it’s about your job or about your product, but create a tutorial to help your readers.

Address a post on a competitor’s blog – What is your competitor writing about? Are there any of these topics you’d like to address?

Corporate culture – What makes your company’s culture unique? Why would a prospective employee want to work there?

Humor – It might be a Dilbert cartoon or a video from FunnyOrDie, but everyone loves a laugh.

Stumble – Install the StumbleUpon toolbar and discover new blogs/websites to introduce to your audience.

Delicious – Search for keywords related to your blog and write about what you find.

Digg – See what stories are popular today and share your opinion about it.

Facebook – Look for a group related to your industry and share some thoughts about it.

LinkedIn Answers – Find a question someone has asked related to your industry, answer it, and invite your readers to do the same.

White paper – Is your company publishing new research? Do you subscribe to any analyst reports? Read the white paper and share your perspective.

Flickr image – If you had to pick one Creative Commons licensed image that reflected your mood/industry/workload, what would it be and why?

Make a list – Kind of like this, except related to your industry. People love lists!

Start a meme – Pick a conversation topic, discuss it and then tag a few other bloggers to post on the same topic.

Answer a customer support question – Does your company have forums? If so, pick a support question to answer. If not, ask your sales team for customer feedback and tackle one common issue.

Buck the status quo - Take the opposite view on an industry issue.

Does size matter? - Compare/contrast your product with a competitor.

Share a problem – Sometimes your community can offer insight into a problem that you’re not able to solve on your own. Just positing these types of queries will at times help your readers to feel closer to your brand.

Twitter – Posit a question to your Twitter community and use the collected responses for the basis of your post.

Try a new application and review it – Is there a new software app or a new version of an old app that your industry uses on a regular basis? If so, take the time to delve into it.

Start a series – Take a topic that you’re passionate about and create a series of posts examining it over the course of several weeks.

Take a picture – Use your mobile phone to take a picture of a cool part of your building and discuss it.

Share a PowerPoint – If you create a lot of presentations, pick out a slide (assuming it’s okay to share it publicly) to write about. You can also upload a deck to SlideShare to make it more interactive.

Get personal – Share a story from your own life. Although this is a corporate blog, it’s always nice to know about the people behind the brand.

Conduct an interview – There are many people in the company that aren’t blogging, but probably have some great stories to tell. Find people doing interesting work and sit down for an informal interview with them. You don’t need fancy equipment. In fact, you can probably do it with your digital camera.

Look for trends – What new innovations are igniting conversations in your industry? How is your business changing? Share some insights on the future of your industry. Maybe Trendpedia can help.

Random Thoughts on X – Set aside 15 minutes, pick a topic and start writing. See what you’ve got and post it under the title, “Random Thoughts on…”

Test a pitch – If you’re trying to figure out how to best position your product, use your blog post an opportunity to test what messages resonate with your audience.

Ask the intern – After all, they have a whole different perspective on the company than you do. Some of them are already blogging.

Presentation creation – We all have to create presentations, either for internal or external use. If you’ve got some tips, share them!

Remember, what makes a good corporate blog post is the passion of the writer. Find the topics that you are most interested in and help your readers to feel that same type of excitement.

[Aaron Uhrmacher is a social media consultant. In addition to his posts on Mashable, he blogs about social media and communications at DISRUPTology.]

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Source:Mashable!

BakeSpace, one of the niche MySpace clones (for chefs and recipe swapping) that launched two years ago at a peak of online social networking launches, is relaunching today, with several new features designed to provide more meaningful experiences for users, effectively extending the value that BakeSpace can provide.

Aside from a new design (interface and navigation), a primary new feature is BakeSpace’s mentor program, which is something you don’t typically see as an explicit feature on a recipe-sharing site. What the mentor program does is connect knowledgeable chefs with less experienced members, as peers. This is accomplished with tagging capabilities that help users find each other, which can be narrowed down by specific types of food and cooking techniques. The matching option is also tied in with any BakeSpace search, so that when you peruse BakeSpace’s recipe database, you’ll also see a list of related tips and mentors that can give both direct or indirect advice.

Other new features on BakeSpace include a custom recipe feed that expands BakeSpace’s existing automatic update system outside of users’ direct friends’ content, allowing them to subscribe to the types of recipes they’d like to receive. This new feature offers users customization in that the updates they’re receiving are based on pure interest, as opposed to just the recipes that friends are publishing. Profiles themselves can also be customized, with background images, slide shows, videos, and more.

As brands look to established niche sites for marketing purposes, site owners have responded with many types of platforms, custom and self-service options continue to attract more brands for this reason. BakeSpace is doing the same, with better sponsor integration for brands that would like to do things like contests or engaging marketing campaigns on BakeSpace’s network.

According to BakeSpace founder Babette Pepaj, “You could say that we’ve developed a new “recipe” for brand integration that enables brands to create promotions that really engage members by giving them something of value. In most cases, the value comes in the form of sought after recipes and kitchen tips.” Allowing brands to integrate into BakeSpace’s networks offers a deeper level of brand interaction between users and advertisers, with a concerted effort at providing value to both parties in the end–something increasingly important to brands.

—Related Articles at Mashable! - The Social Networking Blog:BakeSpace Cooks Up Another MySpace CloneiWon’s Relaunch: Does it Need a Social Network?Rootly’s Third Relaunch Offers More CustomizationShelfari Relaunches (Again) with Better SearchMeeVee’s Acquisition of Top 10 Sources Enhances Site Relaunchmywaves Relaunches with New Mobile Features and Support from Nokiacrackspace Loses the “Bad” Name, Becomes ihiphop

The question of how Apple should use the App Store blacklist has been bandied about lately and so far, no one really has the answer.  Should Apple act unilaterally and remove apps without any warning?  Should it ask for user input?  The questions are numerous and the answers are in short supply.  I think it needs to have a full-fledged plan that’s made available to the public so developers and users alike will know what to expect.

So what exactly should Apple be doing?  It should first start out with a real policy.  How can it summarily remove applications from the App store without warning the developer or user?  It doesn’t make any sense.

Included in that policy, it should develop an understanding between both the user and Apple that makes both entities work together to achieve the lofty goal of making it a better service for all parties involved.

First and foremost, Apple needs to install a “report” button that lets the users alert the company to ridiculous applications like “I am Rich” and helps them sift through the good and the bad.

By doing that, it also helps create a rapport between Apple and users, who have been kept in the dark so far about what’s really going on when it removes applications like NetShare, Box Office, and others.  Let’s face it – users are downloading these applications and they have every right in the world to know what’s going on with them.  I don’t think that’s asking too much.

Secondly, Apple needs to set parameters for how apps should be priced.  I have no problem with developers assigning prices to their work, but $1,000 for an iPhone application that gives you a mantra isn’t worth $1, let alone $1,000.

So how does it achieve that goal?  Easy: ask the users again.  With each purchase, Apple should include a link taking users to a survey asking them if the app is worth the suggested price.  This will give the users the opportunity to have a say in the matter that goes beyond simply buying an app or not, and also eliminates any suspicion by users that Apple is pulling down applications without cause.

Granted, many users will probably complain about pricing, so Apple will need to keep a level head and decide, based on customer response and developer input, if it’s really worth what developers are charging.  I realize this sounds a bit anti-capitalist and freedom is being taken from developers by the retailer, but let’s not forget that Apple has a vested interest in seeing people buy apps too.  And if the companies are gouging you at checkout, Apple looks bad in the process too.

Lastly, Apple needs to give developers the opportunity to stand up for themselves.  So far, Apple hasn’t given developers any chance to save their apps and has instead chosen to remove them without warning to anyone.  By giving the developers the chance to respond and adjust issues (if need be), Apple will stop looking like the bad guy and start looking like the voice of reason – something it’s severely lacking right now.

There’s no easy solution to the App store and chances are, we won’t see any major moves for a while.  But something obviously needs to be done and Apple needs to be at the center of that movement.

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Source:Mashable!

Facebook is getting itself into all kinds of trouble in Germany with the country’s top social network, StudiVZ.

According to reports, Facebook is suing the German leader for copying its “look and feel” on its own site and believes it’s misusing Google’s intellectual property.  But in a twist that Facebook failed to mention, the company has tried to acquire StudiVZ numerous times and has failed each step of the way.

“Facebook may have the superior technology, but it doesn’t have the users in Germany,” said an executive, who insisted on anonymity because the talks were confidential. “That is what Facebook wants with StudiVZ.”

That’s exactly what Facebook wants.  And why wouldn’t it?  In order for Facebook to truly become an international powerhouse in the social networking space, it needs to expand its presence internationally and finally create a real value proposition in places other than the US.  And what better way to achieve that goal than by acquiring the leader in the major strategic countries?

As I mentioned yesterday, Facebook is still lagging far behind its competitors in most countries throughout the world and although it’s growing quite rapidly, it has little chance of catching up anytime soon.  But with the amount of revenue it incurs each year in the United States alone — about $350 million — there’s no reason to suggest it can put some of that to good use and start acquiring major social networks abroad to increase its presence throughout the world.

At first glance, some might wonder why Facebook should even consider buying a leading social network overseas, but it makes total sense and should have been the company’s course of action a year ago.

International expansion is vitally important to the growth and continued strength of a major social network.  The walled garden mentality that has developed in the social networking space has seen most major networks die quicker than they should after users become fickle, move to the next offering, and leave their former service behind.  But with international dominance, that issue can be resolved and even if Facebook loses its dominance in the US, it can still cling to it overseas.

And that’s precisely why Facebook needs to start acquiring other social networks across the globe and ensure that it’s the top service for people anywhere in the world.  It may be a daunting task and it may cost the company quite a bit in the short-term, but I truly believe that it’s an investment worth adopting and should reap huge rewards for Facebook over the long-term.

—Related Articles at Mashable! - The Social Networking Blog:Is Facebook Eyeing an Acquisition in China?Facebook Boasts About International GrowthA Look at Social Network Popularity Around the GlobeFacebook IM Options TweakedReport: Facebook to Launch Non-English SitesSocial Network Ad Spending to Reach $2.5 Billion in 2011Is Facebook’s Usage Declining?

SocialGO is a new Ning competitor that is currently testing in private beta. You begin using SocialGO by creating your own network, which features tabs for events, forums, and media (i.e. photos and videos). There’s also a Magazine tab, which is a different way of saying Blog; it allows group members to write their own blog posts so that any group member can contribute to the network’s public content. This is a good way of formatting user-generated content, as it’s very specific in its purpose and can easily be understood by most people running or participating in a SocialGO network.

SocialGO helps new users get the ball rolling by inserting a handful of news feeds in the News tab. This feature could be greatly improved if the default news feeds were relevant to the new group based on keywords and the network description–they currently offer generic news from sites like The New York Times.

The potential customization of the News tab also speaks to larger issues SocialGO has with administrative modifications that can be made to a given network. The ability to customize a network beyond its name and template isn’t a prominent task and should be addressed (it currently resides at a separate URL that isn’t clearly marked on the network itself).

Having a large set of customizable options for users and their privacy settings are imperative to network-creation sites, and once you get to your SocialGO admin, the custom options are pretty good. However, it’s important to remember that easily developed applications for a fluid and personalized experience are also key, as we’ve seen with the launch of sites like Soceeo and others.

It’s difficult to compete with existing social networks like Facebook, and additionally difficult to overcome the dominance of sites like Ning, without having a fluid experience allowing administrators to further customize their networks so that they’re tailored for administrators and end users alike. In SocialGO’s case, the more features it provides for its administrators, the better these administrators will be able to market their networks to their own end users.

UStream, the free video streaming service, has added announced more social features very akin to the features YouTube and MySpace have available. Amongst the new features you’ll recognize, they’re adding bulletins, subscriptions, and followers (as well as a few management tools to go along with).

These additions make the social features somewhat more complete on the system. Before there was only the ability to subscribe to other producers and maintain your subscriptions, but with the addition the bulletins features (and the other management tasks relating to your followers), has the potential to really cement the developing community at the site with bi-directional communication.

As those of us who have decided to wade in hip-deep to Twitter and FriendFeed know, just as important as the tools to connect are the tools to block. Included in the update is just that functionality, which not only prevents you from seeing their updates but them from seeing yours as well.

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