Author: Rahsheen on Black Web 2.0

Fast Company has set up a contest, The Influence Project, to find out who the most influential people on the Internet are. You would think this would involve fancy math and algorithms to measure the size of the competitors’ networks, track the reach of their voice across those networks, and figuring out if they can really move a crowd. Instead, Fast Company has simply set up a multi-level marketing scheme that drives traffic to their website.

The clicks and networking and connectivity (out to six degrees!) collected in this experiment will provide a compass for where real influence lies on the Internet. It’s something I’m sure every business is curious to know more about. I also think it’s a powerful bit of awareness for anyone who wants to know who in their network is fully engaged with them.

It’s actually a pretty smart way to get traffic to your website, but not something you would expect from a popular and respected publication like Fast Company. It follows the basic principles of network/affiliate marketing:

• You sign up by uploading a photo of yourself
• This gets you a unique referral link
• Your “influence” increases as you refer people to Fast Company via your link
• When people join The Influence Project using your link, you get a piece of their “influence”

This is a seriously flawed method for measuring real influence. Anyone who has ever used a traffic exchange or purchased social networking contacts could tell you this. Think about all the Twitter accounts you’ve seen from no-name spammers who have around 10-50k followers. Those followers have no interest in what that person has to say. The only thing being influencing is perception based on a single metric.

The definition of a pyramid scheme, a derogatory term for network/mlm marketing, is a network with no product. In this case, Fast Company is offering to put the winner’s face in an upcoming issue of the magazine. Doesn’t sound like much of a product to me. For some, this is worth the effort, but Fast Company will be the one making out like a bandit in ad revenues.

I’m not really sure what the folks at Fast Company were thinking here. This is a blatant attempt to drive traffic to their site, the type of contest you might see a new blogger run to boost their visitor numbers. The results won’t be useful because they only take one metric into account: how many people you can get to click your junk. Definitely not a good look for Fast Company.

See Also:

• Fast Company Creatively Combines Link Baiting With A Pyramid Scheme.
• How Fast Company Confused Ego with Influence

Today, former AOL Product and Programming Executive, Mike Rich, will join Interactive One as its Chief Product and Operating Officer. Interactive One, the largest online media company serving black Americans, is the digital division of Radio One Inc., the largest African American multimedia company. Rich will drive the direction and strategy for Interactive One’s network of sites and brands. Rich will also help “lead a differentiated multi-platform digital offering across radio, video and mobile in partnership with Interactive One’s parent company, Radio One.”

“We are excited to have Mike join the team and leverage his background to enhance our users’ experience and to build upon our strong growth and success,” said Thomas Newman, President of Interactive One. “We have a very large and highly engaged member base and we look forward to seeing Mike apply his proven talents to build upon our existing products and to create new offerings online and across mobile, video and other platforms.”

Rich is the man behind AOL BlackVoices, Moviefone, AOL Radio, AOL Latino, and AOL Studios which produced original high quality video content for AOL’s suite of sites. At AOL he was in charge of interactive product strategy, management, marketing, editorial, audience development and syndication for AOL’s flagship properties including AOL Music. Because of his leadership, AOL Music grew to be the #1 music destination from 2007-2009. Rich was honored by Hollywood Reporter as part of their 2009 Digital Power 50 list of executives leading the digital media industry.

“I am thrilled to join the Interactive One team and to further expand the opportunities for the current and future audience, so that they can enrich their lives with a compelling product and content experience,” said Mike Rich. “Radio One and Interactive One have built a truly cross-platform media company that is well-positioned to take advantage of the growth of digital on all platforms including mobile and next generation IP connected products.”

This could be a very important development in black media. Interactive One, launched by Radio One in 2008, has over 15 million members and reaches 7 million Black Americans each month with approximately 4 billion annual page views on its suite of sites. With Rich as Chief Product and Operating Officer, we will hopefully see some positive changes and growth for Interactive One.

It’s not as if there is a lack of buzz around Lebron James on the web, specifically on Twitter. Just a few days ago, we talked about how Lebron James was trending. This is because Lebron, Chris Bosh, Dwayne Wade, and a few other players are free agents and everyone wants to know where they will end up. To capitalize on this, the NBA purchased Lebron’s name as a Sponsored Trend.

At first, many people thought Lebron himself was the reason behind his name showing up as a sponsored trend on the Twitter home page. The reality is that the NBA is trying to leverage his current popularity and buzz around his name to drive traffic to their own website. Clicking on Lebron’s name shows related organic tweets as well as a promoted tweet from the NBA itself that says “For all your LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh and other NBA Free Agency updates check out Decision 2010 on NBA.com http://bit.ly/924XL9.”

The link in the above tweet simply points to NBA.com, where they are doing a lot of coverage on free agents, the off-season, and their Decision 2010 page. This is a site dedicated to NBA Free Agency and provides all the latest news on who is meeting with who and what these free agents are doing. You can also access trackers for specific players you might be interested in, including Lebron, to see exactly what is going on with them.

This is a pretty slick move by the NBA. Popular sports figures are routinely used to market the sporting organizations, putting a face to the sport itself, but the NBA is taking this to a different level by doing so in the social media realm. They have grabbed a Promoted Trend based on Lebron’s popularity in the trending topics. This means that his name will show up at the bottom of the Trending Topics list even if other topics become more popular.

In addition, they have a Promoted Tweet in place that will show up once users click the Promoted Trend. This tweet shows up at the top of the search results related to Lebron, driving visitors to the NBA website. Since the NBA put this promoted trend in place, Lebron has gone from being mentioned about 500 times per hour on Twitter to 3,000 and rising.

TweetUp, the site that helps you find the worlds best tweeters, has announced their acquisition of both Twidroid and Popurls. Twidroid is one of the most popular Twitter clients for the Android platform. Popurls is a news aggregator that grabs the most popular content from sites all around the web and displays it in one neat page. Through this deal, TweetUp hopes to build a “broad distribution network on which to test and refine its platform for finding the world’s best tweeters.”

First order of business in the transaction is to change Twidroid’s name to Twidroyd. This is avoid confusion with products from Lucas Films, trademark owner of the term “droid.” The new Twidroyd client will come standard on millions of upcoming Android phones from five of the leading handset manufacturers. The bundling deals with Android device manufacturers are only the tip of the iceberg.

Acquiring Twidroyd provides TweetUp with a number of strategic advantages,” said Bill Gross, CEO of TweetUp. “Twidroyd (www.twidroyd.com) is widely considered the best Twitter client for Android phones and it leads in market share, so its growing base of users will be a valuable source of well-informed feedback on TweetUp search on mobile devices. In addition, the popurls website (www.popurls.com), which attracts users looking for a convenient guide to the most popular sites, news, videos and blogs on the Internet, will be a natural spot to display TweetUp search results and gain user feedback. This combination should enable us to more rapidly refine our offerings, generating better user experiences for distribution partners and for users searching for the world’s best tweeters regardless of their choice of devices.

TweetUp also has revenue-sharing agreements for it’s search results with a number of partners. These include some big names like Tweetdeck and Seesmic. The web’s leading provider of custom browser toolbars, Conduit, is also onboard. We also have Netvibes, Twitterfeed, Klout, BusinessInsider.com, Answers.com, TechCrunch, Topix.com and popurls.

TweetUp has definitely been on their grind, building relationships and planning a strategy. Some of these sites and services have already started serving TweetUp search results with the rest coming in the next few weeks. When all is said and done, TweetUp will gain 40 million unique users per month and serve more than 100 million impressions per month.

via TC and Engadget

Just a few days ago, an exclusive video of the unreleased Google Voice desktop application appeared online. It’s not the first we have heard of a Google Voice desktop application, but it’s certainly the first time we’ve had a chance to see it in action. Google has worked on this project internally for a while. The problem is that Google doesn’t actually plan to release this client to the public.

Google Voice has been in beta for a while now, but recently opened to the public. Many users enjoy making Google Voice calls from their mobile phones, but there is no software that lets you make a call from your computer. Google purchased Skype competitor Gizmo5 and we all hoped this would lead to a Skype-like desktop application, but Google wants to go in a different direction.

Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin don’t want to be in the business of creating applications outside of the browser. This is an understandable position given Google’s strengths, but this still leaves many users out in the cold. Many Google Voice users want a desktop solution so that they are not tied to a cell phone or a landline.

Users concerned with the future of the GV desktop client have started an online petition. Google has not decided if they will scrap the project or simply delay it. So far, over 1,500 concerned users have signed the online petition, urging Google to make the product available.

Google would rather offer this type of soft-phone functionality via the browser, but (according to TC) many experts say this won’t be possible any time soon. Even with advancements in web technology like HTML5, it may take as long as a year to get true Google Voice support in a browser. Even then, the encoding involved would probably need a browser plugin, which isn’t much of a leap away from a desktop client.

Do you use Google Voice? Do you want to receive and initiate GV calls directly from your desktop? Go sign the petition and feel free to share how Google Voice works (or doesn’t work) for you in the comments.

Friday night, Google released a new feature that allows Blogger bloggers to access near real-time statistics on their Blogger blogs. The new Stats feature is similar to the more advanced Google Analytics service, which many Blogger bloggers have already been using. The difference here is that Blogger Stats is integrated into the Blogger service, is easy to use, and keeps things simple.

To access Stats, navigate to draft.blogger.com and hit the Stats tab. You will immediately get an overview of your blog’s stats based on a specific time frame. This includes your hottest blog posts, audience region, and top traffic sources. The beauty of this stats feature on Blogger lies in the Now tab. This shows you what is happening on your blog in near real-time. Regardless of your blog’s topic or even it’s purpose, this gives you the ability to react quickly to your audience.

Google has said in the past that most users are not interested in real-time statistics, which is why no such feature exists in the popular Google Analytics package. You have to wait at least a few hours with Google Analytics to get an updated traffic report and this is sometimes a major annoyance. This makes it even more interesting that they’ve enabled such a feature on Blogger.

There are real-time analytics services like Woopra, Clicky, and Chartbeat, but most users are still going to use Google Analytics as well. It would be nice to have all this info in one place, robust analytics in real-time and also integrated with Google’s other services like Feedburner, Adsense, and Adwords. Does this feature being added to Blogger mean that Google is at least thinking about adding it to Analytics? Let’s hope so.

For you Blogger folks, the new feature keeps things simple and straight-forward. It has none of the bells and whistles of Google Analytics, like Campaigns and Adwords integration. You get basic statistics on your blog and you get them in near real-time. There are many users out there who would gladly trade most of the advanced features of Google Analytics for this one addition.

Will Google add real-time stats to Analytics? Are you interested in real-time stats on your blog?

Even though Apple talked about an anti-Google stance on serving ads back in April, it seems they haven’t actually banned anything…yet. It’s not just a ban on Google, but a ban on ad companies collecting usage data from applications, which would make it almost impossible to create or serve targeted ads and compete with Apple’s iAd service. These limitations were relaxed at the beginning of June, allowing these ad networks to collect data, but it was still believed that Google would still be barred from actually serving any ads. It turns out that Google /Admob ads are showing up just fine.

Software developers say their new and updated applications are getting approved by Apple, even though the apps are enabled to serve ads by third-party ad networks such as Google’s Mobile Adsense and AdMob.

Apple and Google have both declined to comment on the situation. The answer could lie in the fact that the Feds are already looking into iAds and Apple’s anti-Google policy. iAds works with brands to create and distribute interactive ads inside of applications. Apple charges $1 million to $10 million to iAds customers, giving 60% of the revenues to the developers.

While Apple’s changes in policy did not explicitly name Google, it seemed obvious that they would prevent Google from conducting business around the Apple platform and Google even publicly criticized Apple. Barring third-party ad networks while launching their own is definitely not a good move by Apple and it’s easy to see why the Federal Trade Commission has pricked up their ears and taken at look in Apple’s direction.

While some developers took a chance at getting their apps blocked, others completely avoided third-party ad networks. iAds is actually more lucrative for developers as it charges the advertiser a penny when the ad is viewed and $2 when the ad is clicked. This is a better return to developers, who usually expect fractions of a penny for clicks and views.

The real question is whether Apple has the right to block these other ad networks. They are creating a monopoly, but it’s limited to their own ecosystem of apps and devices. On the other hand, should they be able to create such restrictions on developers? It will be interesting to see what they do here as one false move could bring them a world of trouble.

Androids Continue to Multiply

Even though the iPhone 4 is taking much of the spotlight since it’s release last month, the Evo 4G has actually held its own against the established Apple device. Even still, it looks like Android devices roll in packs. Shortly after the iPhone 4, we learned about the Droid X from Verizon, which seems about as powerful as the Evo. Samsung is also dropping 4 new Android devices that will available on all four major US carriers.

Foursquare Gets a Gang of Funding and Patches Holes

It seems like privacy breaches are all the rage these days. White Hat Jesper Andersen found a privacy glitch within the Foursquare system that allowed access to private check-ins. The bug involved the pages for each venue, where people who checked in recently are shown in a grid. Even the faces of those with private accounts were showing up. It seems this bug was simply overlooked as Foursquare grew, but has been fixed at this time.

It seems this story was completely overshadowed by the fact that Foursquare secured Series B Funding of $20 million. This after they almost sold to Facebook. Remaining independent should keep things exciting for Foursquare and it’s growing base of users.

Amazon Acquires Woot

The one day one deal site with the quirky sense of humor, Woot, was acquired by Amazon for rumored $110 million in cold hard cash. Woot will continue to operate as usual, but under the Amazon umbrella along with Zappos and Audible. Woot paved the way for sites like Groupon and Gilt. In a letter to his employees, CEO Matt Rutledge says, “For Woot, our vision remains the same: somehow earning a living on snarky commentary and junk.”

Best Buy Goes After Evo 4G vs. iPhone Video Creator

Did you catch that Evo 4G vs. iPhone video? It’s absolutely hilarious and has been making the rounds for a little while, now. The problem is that Best Buy is not too happy about the video, which might possibly make some iPhone customers look bad and adversely effect Best Buy’s brand. The catch is that Best Buy is never mentioned or displayed in the video in any way. Even so, the creator of the video (who happens to sell mobile phones at Best Buy) may be losing his job over this. Best Buy was able to connect the dots based on other unrelated videos on the guy’s account. Bad move, Best Buy. This had nothing to do with you. Now, let’s all watch together and imagine it takes place inside of Best Buy with a Best Buy employee instead of in a random open field with two cartoon characters.

To expand their efforts in travel search, Google has acquired ITA Software. ITA is a key player in the online travel business, providing data to companies like Kayak, Orbitz, Bing, Expedia, TripAdvisor, and a number of other air travel websites. According to Google, almost 60% of airline tickets are purchased online. ITA tried to hold out for a $1 billion, but Google snatched them up at their original offer price of $700.

In a post on the official Google blog, they explain that the current landscape of online travel search is cluttered, confusing, and frustrating. Even for a simple flight from point A to point B, you have to dig through hundreds or thousands of options to find what you’re looking for. Google aims to make this entire process easier.

While online flight search is rapidly evolving, we think there is room for more competition and greater innovation. Google has already come up with new ways to organize hard-to-find information like images, newspaper archives, scholarly papers, books and geographic data. Once we’ve completed our acquisition of ITA, we’ll work on creating new flight search tools that will make it easier for you to search for flights, compare flight options and prices and get you quickly to a site where you can buy your ticket.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt explained to the press that he believes Google can “help solve the online travel problem and help improve the online travel ecosystem.” He also say that Google could drive more business to airlines and offer an innovative approach to the online travel business.

Having the largest and most successful provider of search tackle the problem of searching for flight data seems like a good deal. Google is in a good place to make search easier for users and drive more sales to ticket sales portals. Many don’t see it that way, including the companies that rely on ITA’s services. They even attempted to counter Google’s offer.

Google promises to honor all existing contracts and is “enthusiastic” about signing new ones. They still faces the issue of the deal being killed by regulators. Schmidt is confident that the deal will go through. Google doesn’t own any of the travel segment at this point and is only stepping into airline travel, not hotels or rental cars. These factors may help them in getting the deal done. You can check out some facts on the merger here.

Do you think this deal will have a positive effect on the online travel market?

Lebron James is a free agent and Twitter is buzzing with speculation as to what will happen. The attention this is getting on Twitter has many users wishing it would stop, while others point out that the Lakers are going to three-peat anyway, so his choice is irrelevant. Even Conan chimed in to give his take on Lebron James, saying “I don’t care where Lebron James ends up…as long as it’s not at 11pm on TBS.”

Lebron has already met with the Nets and has plans to meet with the Knicks this afternoon. This meeting has been confirmed on Twitter by @thenyknicks.

Nets billionaire owner Mikhail Prokhorov, rap mogul Jay-Z, coach Avery Johnson and other team officials spent more than 90 minutes making a presentation on Thursday to James, the two-time MVP and budding global icon who became the most celebrated free agent in history at 12:01 a.m. via MSNBC

The launch date for LeBronJames.com is nearing. This site is to serv as his online home and it’s likely the site will go live once LeBron has chosen a home team. For now, you can go to the site and sign up to catch the latest updates. Maybe he will announce his choice via SMS.

ESPN has actually launched a site devoted to tracking LeBron. The aptly-named LeBron Tracker has all the LeBron news you could shake a stick at. Including Podcasts, gear, polls, news, and a free agent slot machine to help you guess which players are going where.

Expect to see more of LeBron all over Twitter in the next few days. He still has upcoming meetings with the Miami Heat and the Chicago Bulls on Friday. The Cavs will talk to James on Saturday. It’s speculated that LeBron will announce his final decision on Monday, July 5th. Let’s just hope he doesn’t deliver his announcement alongside Justin Beiber at a Twilight screening and completely break Twitter forever.

As of today, July 1st, Finland is guaranteeing every citizen of Finland at least a 1Mbps broadband connection with a promise to bump this up to 100Mbps by 2015. This puts broadband internet on the same level as other legal rights in the country like healthcare and education.

Net Law Man reports, that Finland is the first to make this a legal right, with Spain to follow suite. The UK has also passed legislation regarding broadband, guaranteeing 2Mbps connections to all citizens by 2012. They have not actually made broadband a legal right, though. On other related news checkout this blog about car accidents.

This means that broadband companies in Finland will be required to offer broadband internet to all customers, at least 1Mbps, starting July 1st. Finland’s communication minister Suvi Linden explained the thinking behind the legislation, which seems to mirror many sentiments about the digital divide in the US:

“We considered the role of the internet in Finns everyday life. Internet services are no longer just for entertainment. Finland has worked hard to develop an information society and a couple of years ago we realised not everyone had access,” she said. via BBC News

Here in the US, the Internet has become an important part of our daily lives. It has definitely moved beyond entertainment and become a necessity for success. Important things like looking for a job are almost impossible to do with no Internet. Gone are the days when we kept an encyclopedia in the home. Most are outdated by the Internet by the time they print.

While broadband internet as a legal right is a positive for many people, there are also other implications according. If the government is giving you your high-speed connection by law, it’s sure to come with a few unwanted bells and whistles. File-sharing is a hot topic as far as broadband goes and government mandated broadband connections might come with restrictions on what you can download.

The UK and France say they might cut off or limit the connections of those downloading movies, music, and other media for free. Finland will take a lighter approach in simply sending letters to the offenders and hoping they comply. As far as the US goes, there is no telling where the music and film industry might take things. The legal right to broadband is definitely a double-edged sword.

Google has just done a complete redesign of the Google News site which should make it much more interesting for users. Rather than a simple static page full of news you may or may not be interested in, Google is now making it possible for you to customize your sources and articles. This should make it easier to find news relevant to you.

The primary news feed on the site is now called News For You and you have almost complete control over what shows up. The next time you visit Google News, you should see a customization dialog mid-way down the page. This wizard will let you rate what topics you want to see based on how often you read them. You can specify Never, Sometimes, and Always for each topic.

If a specific topic seems to be missing, you can add it using the search box. For instance, type African-American in the box, click Add, and you can see the latest news related to the AA community. You can be pretty creative with what you specify here to get exactly what you want. You specify whether the layout is divided into topic sections or just a river or list of news stories. Once you find a story you like, you can hover the title to display more related stories.

You don’t have to customize your Google News. Simply close the personalization box without making any changes and Google News will work like it always has. If you have made customizations and are not happy with the results, simply open the customizations box and click Reset Customizations.

For more fine-tuned control, click the arrow on any cluster of stories and choose whether you want to see more stories from that source or less. From this menu, you can also shore the cluster via Email, Google Reader, Facebook, Twitter, or Google Buzz.

Last, but certainly not least, you can now navigate Google News using keyboard shortcuts. There are only a few now, but they come in very handy:

• j or n – next story
• k or p – previous story
• . or f – open the options menu
• s – star a story
• / – search

Have you tried the new Google News?

Whether you are trying to prepare for your future or correct the mistakes of the past, money is always a factor. No matter how good we think we are at keeping track of our money, it often seems like it’s gone as soon as you get it. Goals that we set get pushed farther and farther back until they’re just distant dreams. Regardless of your income level, you need a clear and detailed management and tracking strategy to step your game up.

Mint.com offers an almost complete solution for your money management troubles. Not only will it help you keep track of transactions and balance your checkbook, but it will act as your assistant in planning for the future. If you’ve been banging your head against a hard object or avoiding the subject of money management entirely, Mint may be the solution you need.

Adding Accounts

Your first step will be to add your bank accounts. Mint has connections with most major financial institutions, so simply search for your bank and provide the relevant information. Mint downloads your transaction history and keeps it up-to-date when you login. Behind the scenes, Mint is also figuring out what you’re spending money on. In addition to your standard bank accounts, Mint also lets you add loans and investment accounts so that you can keep track of big-ticket items like your car or your home and also pay off those student loans.

Mint supports your PayPal and even some prepaid gift cards and credit cards. If you do a lot of cash transactions, Mint still has you covered. You can manually enter transactions as cash or check and even connect them to your most recent ATM withdrawal. If you are looking for an income-based repayment plans services,
visit loanforgiveness.org for more info.

The Dashboard

The Mint dashboard shows you lots of useful information. Your accounts and balances are listed down the left side along with your Assets, Debt, and Net Worth. You will also find Trends here that may clue you in to things you didn’t know you were doing. Click the Trends tab across the top of your dashboard and you can really dig into where you might be making mistakes. Did you really spend 50% of your income on eating out last month? Should you really be devoting 25% of your income to random shopping?

Assigning Categories

To make sure you’re getting a good picture of where you’re spending your money, hit the Transactions tab and take a look at how Mint has categorized your transactions. Many may show up as Uncategorized so you will want to go through and pick a valid category for these. The easiest way is to select one of these transactions, choose “Show all Uncategorized” from the right sidebar, and then go down the list and fill in the blanks.

Setting Goals and Budgeting

Once you have the basics together, your next step is to start setting Goals. This is actually a new feature that was recently added to Mint. While the existing Budgets feature is good for setting up simple goals, this new feature lets you go into detail without being a financial expert. If you want to calculate what type of savings plan you need to get on to afford a new car, your dream house, or that vacation you’ve been thinking about, Mint can help you work out the details. Get the car of your dreams, get the best no credit check auto loan and get the car you deserve! The Goals feature asks you a few simple questions and figures out the rest for you. Check out the details on Goals here.

Ways to Save

Another section to investigate is the Ways to Save tab. This area will help you find the best financial tools for you based on your current situation. Everything from Credit Cards and Savings Accounts to Brokerage Accounts and Auto Insurance. It’s fine to just balance your checkbook, but the goal is to step your financial game up. Mint can help you track the basics and also show you how to make your money work for you.

According to Bloomberg, the phone that has so many customers buzzing will finally be available on a carrier other than AT&T.

Verizon Wireless, the largest U.S. mobile-phone company, will start selling Apple Inc.’s iPhone next year, ending AT&T Inc.’s exclusive hold on the smartphone in the U.S., two people familiar with the plans said.

The largest carrier in the US will get the most popular phone as well. The news isn’t supposed to be public yet and neither Verizon or Apple will confirm or deny the leak.

Apple has had the iPhone on lock since 2007. During that time, they have made a ton of money from being the exclusive dealer for the iPhone. This is even amid complaints about their network being able to handle the load and a bunch of security mishaps surrounding the latest iPhone 4 launch. The relationship between Apple and AT&T has been trending downhill for a while now. We even asked the question here: Is exclusivity in Apple’s best interest? Apparently, the answer is “No.”

Apple sold 1.7 million iPhones in just three days after the iPhone 4 came out. Many speculated just how much more ridiculous those numbers would have been had Apple not been limited to a single carrier: AT&T.

“Apple is going to dramatically increase the number of devices it sells in the U.S. when exclusivity at AT&T ends,” said Hodulik, who is based in New York and rates Verizon shares “neutral.” “It’s hard to ignore the quality issues that AT&T has faced.”

Now, we will get to see exactly that. The iPhone has people buying phones at a time when the mobile market is near saturation and most people already have a phone. With that type of pull and the network reliability that Verizon offers, we should be in for some big numbers from Verizon and Apple next year.

One third of AT&T’s activations in the first three months of this year came from customers who were new to the carrier. I suspect that many iPhone activations involve people terminating their current contracts or otherwise jumping through a lot of hoops just to get the Apple device. I predict a similar move away from AT&T to Verizon when they officially launch the iPhone.

Mint.com just added a feature that may make your life that much easier and help you reach those financial goals you’ve been dreaming about. There are many tools out there for tracking your finances and setting up budgets. These range from desktop applications to web apps like Mint, Buxfer, and Xpensr. Most will tie into your bank accounts and keep your financial data updated directly from the source.

While this gives you a clear picture of where you stand, it doesn’t really do much for you in the long run. You know how much money you have in savings, but what are you saving for? You have a clear snapshot of what’s available in your checking account, but what should you do from there? This is where financial planning comes into play and it’s probably a topic that most people cringe from. Even if you have clear goals in mind, it’s often hard to see the path to those goals in your daily transactions.

In the past, you would need to do a lot of guess-work to figure out what type of budgets to set. Even with the advanced budgeting features in Mint, while they take your activity and other variables into account, still require you to make stuff up. Mint’s new Goals feature aims to take some of the burden from you and make this type of planning simpler.

As we dig ourselves out of debt or try to figure out the right decisions to make for our future, Mint’s Goals is the perfect companion. Once you’ve logged into Mint, you should see a new tab labeled Goals which takes you to the overview page. Most of the common goals that you might have are already here: paying off a credit card, saving for a car, going on vacation. If none of these presets fit for your goal, you can choose to create a Custom Goal.

Each goal runs you through a series of questions specific to that goal. Your answers help Mint figure out what your next steps should be. For instance, if you want to buy a new car, Mint will ask you whether you have a price in mind or a specific type of vehicle. It also offers a link to the KBB to estimate the cost of your dream car. There is also a feature where you can upload an image of your goal. Imagery definitely goes a long way to helping you stay focused.

Once your goal is set up, in can be tracked using an existing bank account or a new one. If you do not attach the goal to an account, it obviously cannot be tracked. Once you have assigned a goal to an account, you cannot assign any other goals to that account. This will help you to keep things simple and do one thing at a time. You can, however, attach a goal to multiple accounts. This comes in handy if you want to include your regular savings account and a long-term investment account.

Mint does a good job in pulling out the details necessary for you to reach your goals, but you have to actually do the work. A few tips from the Mint blog include:

• Creating a separate account – it’s hard to mentally separate your money when you’re in a fix, so just make a separate account. You will be less likely to spend your savings if you make them a little harder to access.
• Be realistic – you know how much you make a month, so don’t go budgeting for a house you saw on cribs just because the computer says you can.
• Use automatic deposits – don’t rely on yourself to put the money away. Take advantage of direct deposit and make it so that you never even see the money.

via All Things Digital