Common Paradox Tech Blog

A t-shirt isn’t just a cotton garment, it’s a form of communication, a personal billboard that lets you get a message out to the world in a medium that offers the minimum of effort.

Whether your geek tendencies lean towards gaming, Apple, space, film or social media, we’ve got a sassy selection of tees that will have you reaching for the plastic before you can say “medium, in blue, please.”

After all, why go plain-chested when you can be spreading the word of geek? Emblazon your chest pronto with a themed tee that says it all.

Amazing Apple Tees

Apple fans tend to lean towards the fanatic side of fandom, and as such provide a ripe market for t-shirt designers to exploit. Heck, there’ve been so many Apple-flavored tees over the years some bloke has written a book about it. These three designs offer a call for Jobs to be President (after all, he’s no slouch in the success department) from Insanely Great Tees, a New York-based Apple tee specialist, a photo-real Mac from Print Liberation’s “Great Moments of the 20th Century” series and a cunning mash-up from MightTees which mixes Jobs and a Mac with John Cusack’s boombox-wielding Lloyd Dobler.

Cost: From left to right – $19, $18, $31.99

Magnificent Meme Tees

Nod to classic, recent and current memes with this trio of tees that celebrates the wonder of LOL cats with ThinkGeek’s customizable “im in ur” tee complete with wash-off-able marker pen, the randomness of keyboard cat with an instantly recognizable line drawing from Nerdy Shirts, and make a super in-the-know reference to Chat Roulette with the “Nexted” design from WeSaySo over on Spreadshirt.

Cost: From left to right – $19.99, $19.99, from $14.90

Fantastic Film Tees

While what makes a “geek film” is wide open for discussion, geeky film-lovers will no doubt appreciate a tee that references a fave flick in a subtle, insider sort of way. Here then, are three examples of such a garment, with a t-shirt promoting the Lighthouse Lounge made by LastExitToNowhere (the absolute t-shirt authority on made-up companies from films – recommended for a browse), an Inigo Montoya name tag from ThinkGeek, and a colorful effort celebrating the league championship win of the Rollers from 80sTees. Can you name all the films?

Cost: From left to right – approx $32, from $17.99, $20

Great Gaming Tees

The world of video games lends itself to t-shirts very well indeed thanks to its graphical nature. No matter what kind of gamer you are, you can be sure there’s a tee out there for you. We’ve plucked three from the internets that made us smile. Tell those young whippersnappers that you’re “classically trained” with this dark blue design from 80sTees, see behind-the-scenes at the space invader training academy thanks to Threadless, while ShirtCity’s video game t-shirt shows the evolution of the game controller across multiple platforms.

Cost: From left to right – $20, $18, $22,95

Rad Robot Tees

Everyone loves robots but as we haven’t yet managed to get to the stage where we can have our own robo-buddy, we can at least have a few decorating our clothing. There’s more than a few — 51 in fact — decorating ChopShop’s WeRobot tee. As well as the 50-plus bots it boasts glow in the dark eyes for the robots drawn from film, TV, literature, video games and more. “Robots Can’t Smile” is a whimsical take on a robot-themed tee from Design By Human’s il_Mostro, while RedBubble’s robots are livening things up by doing the YMCA dance.

Cost: From left to right – $20, $19, from $24.74

Marvelous Music Tees

While we wouldn’t dream about treading on that oh-so-personal area that is music taste, as far as t-shirts go, what we can offer is a selection of fun music-themed shirts. First up is Five Crown’s melting guitar, familiar to anyone who has seen the recent iPod nano ads, although we’re certainly not making any kind of comment about which came first. This is followed by a classic blank cassette tee from Forever21 which should appeal to anyone old enough to remember the pleasure of possibility a blank tape used to present. We round off the three with another Five Crown’s design that sees vinyl getting the spotlight – perfect for anyone who still enjoys sticking a record on the turntable.

Cost: From left to right – $26.99, $24.99, $14.90

Spiffy Space Tees

Rather than go down the NASA tee route (we’re so over that) we’ve got three space-themed shirts for your consideration. First up is “A Flying Dog in Outer Space” from Threadless that see’s man’s best friend conquer the final frontier complete with helmet and doggie jet pack. We stay space exploration-related with the next t-shirt, an Etsy offering that depicts the Pioneer Plaque (familiar to space geeks everywhere), the pictorial guide to life on Earth stuck on Pioneer 10 and 11 in case they were intercepted by alien lifeforms. Last up is “Spacemen Rock,” another colorful effort from Threadless, which has four astronauts getting their groove on.

Cost: From left to right – $18, $14, $20

Super Social Media Tees

You’re well taken care of over on Zazzle for your Mashable t-shirts needs – where there are tons of designs to chose from that are customizable in enough ways to make your brain boggle. Next up, you can social bookmark yourself in the real world with this text-based effort from Nerdy Shirts. Finally, Twitter users get a “Follower” option from ShirtCity.

Cost: From left to right – Varies, $19.97, $19.95

Groovy Google Tees

What could be better than a t-shirt with the Android robot on it? How about the Android robot walking a dog? An official gProduct, its coolness is only eclipsed by our next g-themed option – the Sesame Street-themed doodles now available as tees from the Google Store. Big Bird is our fave, but there’s also Elmo and The Count options. While you’re asking yourself how your wardrobe has survived so long without Sesame Street/Google tees, take a look at our last option from CultClassicTs, which asks another question – what would Larry & Sergey do? (Answer: acquire it, shut it down, open in again in restricted beta and fail to integrate it in other Google products).

Cost: From left to right – from $14.80, $20.10, $22.99

What geeky t-shirts are in your wardrobe? Let us know in the comments.

Tags: apple, geek, Google, t-shirts, tees, twitter

Tomorrow, the United Nations will be announcing a special Social Media Envoy group that will use the power of social media over the next year to raise awareness for malaria control in African countries.

The special envoy is made up of well-known figures from both the social web and broadcast media, including Mashable’s own Pete Cashmore. Those that have joined the group have pledged to take one “social” action — such as a tweet or a Facebook post — every month for the next year starting from World Malaria Day on April 25, which last year saw Malaria No More also use Twitter for the cause.

The hope is that the tweets, posts and other social actions will inspire and motivate social media audiences in support of malaria control. The UN’s goal is to provide all endemic African countries with malaria control interventions by the end of 2010, working towards the aim of near-zero deaths from malaria by 2015.

We’re very happy to see the UN enlist the power of social media in the fight against Malaria. The disease kills one million people each year with over 90% of the world’s malaria deaths occurring in Sub-Saharan Africa. Universal bed net coverage is the UN’s chosen prevention tool to fight the diseases; it has delivered over 192 million insecticidal mosquito nets since 2007, covering nearly 400 million people.

However, there is more money to be raised and more work to be done. We hope that the social media envoy will go even farther than their commitment to one social action per month, because Malaria is a battle where every little bit helps.

The 2010 Social Media Envoys

* Derrick Ashong, Musician, Social Activist & Oprah Radio host

* Veronica Belmont, Host of “Tekzilla” and “Qore” and Internet Personality

* Mayor Cory Booker of Newark, New Jersey

* Sarah Brown, of MillionMums.org and wife of Gordon Brown, the UK Prime Minister

* Pete Cashmore, CEO and founder of Mashable

* Anderson Cooper, CNN Anchor of “Anderson Cooper 360″

* Dennis Crowley, Co-founder of Foursquare

* Anil Dash, Director of Expert Labs and Partner at Activate

* Justine Ezarik, “iJustine”, Internet Personality

* Jack Gray, CNN Producer/Writer for “Anderson Cooper 360″

* Arianna Huffington, Co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of the Huffington Post; www.twitter.com/ariannahuff

* Guy Kawasaki, Co-founder of Alltop.com

* Larry King, CNN Host of “Larry King Live”

* Loic Le Meur, Founder and CEO of Seesmic

* Alyssa Milano, Actress

* Dave Morin, Former Facebook executive- responsible for Facebook Connect and Platform

* Jeff Pulver, Founder of 140 Characters Conference (#140conf) and Co-founder of VoIP (Vonage)

* Kevin Rose, Founder of Digg

* Chris Sacca, Founder of Lowercase Capital

* Ryan Seacrest, Founder, Ryan Seacrest Productions

* Biz Stone, Co-founder of Twitter

* Padmasree Warrior, CTO of Cisco

* Jon Wheatley, Co-founder of DailyBooth.com

* Randi Zuckerberg, Director of Marketing, Facebook

You can show your support for the UN’s cause by following these “Social Media Envoys” and find out more about the United Nations Special Envoy for Malaria at its dedicated site.

Tags: facebook, malaria, social good, social media, social news, twitter, United Nations, world malaria day

At last night’s “Bigg Digg Shindigg” in Austin, TX, Digg CEO Jay Adelson briefly revealed plans for a massive overhaul of the social news site. This morning, I had an opportunity to chat with Adelson in-depth about the new Digg and what users, publishers, and the web as a whole should expect.

To sum it up, Adelson says the new strategy will “enable social curation of all the world’s content and the conversation around it.” To get there though, Digg has re-built its entire site from the ground up, with dramatic changes that will be rolled out over the coming weeks and months.

New User Experience

The days of the Digg homepage as we know it – the most recently popular stories on the service as a whole – are numbered. The site is shifting towards a personalization model, where the homepage will be based on characters like a user’s interests, location, who they follow not only on Digg but services like Twitter and Facebook, and other “signals” from around the web like retweets, Facebook shares, and more.

But Adelson notes that not all of these signals are created equal – for example, a retweet from a Twitter user with millions of followers will weigh much more heavily in the site’s ranking algorithms than one from a user with a few dozen. The concept of a Digg account is also changing. While you can already use Digg via Facebook Connect, the site plans to support logging in with Twitter, Google, Yahoo, and OpenID, among other identity providers.

It goes even further than that though – users will be able to Digg and submit stories anonymously. Adelson says that this fundamental change will move the site from 20,000 submissions today to millions. Those submissions will be sorted into an infinite number of categories, with Digg auto-suggesting them with users able to make additions and help rearrange miscategorized posts.

Digg has also been watching what companies like Twitter and Facebook are doing for brands. The new Digg will eventually support publisher and brand profiles. Further, we might see something akin to Twitter’s suggested user list, where publishers and brands that accrue a large following and continually have popular content get recommended to Digg users.

Along those lines, Leaderboards will also be making a return to Digg, but not in the old form of showing just the most successful submitters site-wide. Instead, Adelson envisions leaderboards for the infinite topic and vertical pages that will emerge, letting Digg users become trusted sources in a given niche. Expect some sort of achievement system that will reward Digg users for “good behavior” as Adelson put it.

Because of all these changes, Digg’s suite of mobile apps is also going to be completely revamped, with changes closely mirroring those on the site.

A New Paradigm for Publishers

Adelson says the Digg we know today is “a bit like gambling” for publishers, where a story either hits the homepage and sees an enormous one-time spike in traffic or sits in relative obscurity. With the new Digg, Adelson says publishers should expect a “more predictable” stream of traffic, as many more stories receive placement on an infinite number of personalized user homepages.

Digg has a lot of new features in store for publishers too. The new Digg button – which we’re testing here on Mashable – lets users Digg a story without leaving the site. Duplicate submissions will also no longer be an issue on Digg, because all submissions will be URL-based.

But Digg has much larger ambitions for publishers as well. Websites like Mashable will be able to include Digg comments (which are being re-done again) right underneath stories. But it goes further than that – third-party comment services like Disqus will be able to integrate the comments right into their platforms, making Digg a much more relevant part of the distributed conversation game.

Beyond that, Adelson wants to provide publishers with analytics and even share revenue with them down the line in an effort to better monetize traffic that comes in via Digg.

Digg the Business

Beyond the publisher revenue share opportunity – which is likely well down the road – Adelson sees significant page view growth coming from the thousands of new categories we’ll see in the new Digg. However, he’s not in a hurry to monetize them with ads, saying the company is in good financial shape.

In the long-term, he sees Digg ads – which the company says are seeing some success – as the primary driver of revenue. Digg’s also in serious hiring mode, with plans to add 50 engineers this year to help them deal with the inevitable question of …

How Will Users Respond?

Digg’s notoriously vocal community is in for some major changes, but the company is taking a very measured approach in rolling them out. Users will start receiving invites for the alpha site, which you can sign-up for at new.digg.com, within the next few weeks. From there, Digg plans “continuous iteration,” to address user feedback, a process Adelson says is made possible by the site’s recently announced architecture changes that he believes will let them scale indefinitely.

Nonetheless, Digg is committed to its new vision. Within the next few months, the Digg we know today will be shut down, and the company will embark full speed ahead on its plan to be the most relevant aggregator and curator of the world’s news. How Digg’s rabid base of current users respond and if the new strategy is able to bring new people under the Digg tent will ultimately dictate the success of the ambitious new direction.

Reviews: Digg, Disqus, Facebook, Google, Mashable, Twitter

Tags: digg, facebook, jad adelson, social media, twitter

OMGTwitterisdownagain. Or extremely flaky, at least. This time, the problems seem to occur only when trying to access the Twitter website, as the API seems to be fully functional and thus not causing any trouble for third-party clients.

Search also seems to work fine, as you can tell from all the people tweeting that Twitter is down for them – go figure.

We’ll keep it short and sweet: use a third-party client for your tweeting needs or find something else to do (like blog about the fact that Twitterisdownagain).

OMGTwitterisdownagain. Or extremely flaky, at least. This time, the problems seem to occur only when trying to access the Twitter website, as the API seems to be fully functional and thus not causing any trouble for third-party clients.

Search also seems to work fine, as you can tell from all the people tweeting that Twitter is down for them – go figure.

We’ll keep it short and sweet: use a third-party client for your tweeting needs or find something else to do (like blog about the fact that Twitterisdownagain).

While a lot of the smaller startups like Foursquare and Gowalla are getting much of the buzz at SXSW, Twitter isn’t sitting idly on the location sidelines. Sure, they launched location integration on their site a few days ago, but they’ve also apparently set up a sub-site totally around location for SXSW. But here’s the weird thing: It’s only for stalking their employees.

As co-founder Evan Williams tweeted out earlier, sxsw.twitter.com shows you a Google map of Austin, Texas (where SXSW is held) with tiny Twitter logos overlaid on it, showing Twitter employees at the conference tweeting.

Hooray for Hollywood! — the big winner this week in our roundup of the top 10 Twitter trends. From the Oscars to Alice in Wonderland (and of course, Justin Bieber), celebrity — whether be it music or film — dominated the Twitterverse.

The latest data, which comes from our friends at What the Trend, gives us a snapshot of what topics dominated Twitter. Given the topical nature of the list, hashtag memes and games have been excluded.

Tween-favorite Justin Bieber lost his spot at #1 to the Big Show — AKA the Oscars. The 82nd Academy Awards dominated Twitter on Sunday night and was the most discussed topic of the week as a whole. Don’t feel bad for Bieber though: he’s still number two on the list.

Now, who’s hot who not/Tell me who rock who sell out in the stores. Well, that would be B.I.G P-O, P-P-A, also know as the Notorious B.I.G. The legendary Brooklyn rapper, who was murdered 13 years ago this week, was #5 on this week’s list of trends. More than a decade after his tragic death, Biggie continues to be a larger than life figure.

Music continues to be a big topic of discussion on Twitter, with artists like Lady Gaga, Bieber and the Jonas Brothers all appearing on the list. We expect to see Lady Gaga next week too, given the camp-infused epic music video for “Telephone” that was released at the end of the week.

Looking forward, we predict Justin Bieber, the iPad and Twilight: Eclipse to all appear on the chart next week.

You can check past Twitter trends in our Top Twitter Topics section as well as read more about this past week’s trends on What The Trend.

Top Twitter Trends for 3/7 – 3/13

Rank

Topic

Top Index This Week

Change

Description

#1

Oscars

1

1

The Academy Awards, or Oscars, are film awards given annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles, California. The 82nd annual show aired in the USA on 3/7/2010. (Subtrends: Oscars, Sandra Bullock, Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker, Avatar, James Cameron, Academy Awards, Kathy Ireland, Red Carpet, Precious, Crazy Heart, Tyler Perry, Best Picture, Jeff Bridges, District 9, Molly Ringwald, Zac Efron, SJP, Best Supporting, Food Inc, Robert Downey Jr, Kristen Stewart, Farrah Fawcett, Mo’Nique, Best Director, George Clooney, Fisher Stevens, Amanda Seyfried, Meryl Streep, Barbara Walters, ABC, Sandy Powell, Tom Ford, Christoph Waltz, Best Documentary, Sarah Jessica Parker, Colin Firth, Penelope Cruz, Tina Fey, Tom Hanks, An Education, Matt Damon, James Taylor, Hattie McDaniel, Chris Pine, Cablevision, NPH, Ryan Bingham, Steve Martin, Congrats Monique, Frog, Sigourney Weaver, Miley’s, Best Animated, Anna Kendrick, Art Direction)

#2

Justin Bieber

1

Justin Bieber’s new album My World 2.0 comes out on March 23rd & his fans are excited. (Subtrends: Justin Bieber, My World 2, #weadorejustin, #BieberHasMyHeart, QVC, #KingstonFollows, #bieberismyidol, #ripmary, #InLoveWithBieber, Big News, AXns5tC-dgk, Eenie Meenie, #Biebershirtless, RICK, BBC1, Cmon, Let’s Dance, #OMJDByeah, #omgbiebertrue, NcvLuIHIo10)

#3

Follow Friday

1

Follow Friday is a tradition where people tweet people they believe are fun/interesting to follow (on Fridays).

#4

Alice In Wonderland

2

2

Tim Burton’s eagerly anticipated movie, Alice in Wonderland, opened in cinemas worldwide March 5th and stars Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter and Anne Hathaway. (Subtrends: Alice, Alice in Wonderland)

#5

Notorious B.I.G.

1

NEW

This week marks the 13th year of the death of the The Notorious B.I.G. The legendary rapper from Brooklyn, NY was murdered tragically 13 years ago on March 9th. (Subtrends: #ripbig, Biggie, Name Ya Top 5 Biggie, Happy BIG Day, Juicy, Christopher Wallace, #Biggie)

#6

Lady GaGa

3

1

Lady Gaga’s new music video with Beyoncé, Telephone, premiered this week. (Subtrends: Lady GaGa, Telephone, Beyonce, #telephonevideo, GQ95z6ywcBY, #TelephoneThursday, Jonathan Ross, GaGa)

#7

Jonas Brothers

1

NEW

The Jonas Brother announce a tour with Demi Lovato, discussed sweater colors, joked about the paparrazi, and Nick Jonas continues to act as a spokesman for diabetes. (Subtrends: #JonasAreBack, #JoeEatsFood, #YoureANileyFan, #itsagreysweater, Houston, #NickJonasDay, #WelcomeKevinJ, Everybody)

#8

Chuck Norris

2

NEW

Chuck Norris turned 70 years old this week, March 10. As a result, people are tweeting Chuck Norris facts. (Subtrends: Chuck Norris, #iheardchucknorris, #chucknorris)

#9

Happy Women’s Day

1

NEW

International day to celebrate the economic, political and social achievements of women. It is celebrated in many different countries around the world on March 8th.

#10

Corey Haim

1

NEW

Canadian actor Corey Haim, best remembered for roles in films ‘The Lost Boys’, ‘Lucas’, and ‘License To Drive’, was found dead March 10. It appears to have been a drug overdose. (Subtrends: Actor Corey Haim, Lost Boys, RIP Corey Haim, #RIPCoreyHaim, LAPD, Goonies, North Hollywood, Corey Haim, KNBC, Frank Albarren, Lucas)

Tags: top twitter trends, twitter, What The Trend

Geoff Livingston co-founded Zoetica to focus on cause-related work, and released an award-winning book on new media Now is Gone in 2007.

Addressing the very private nature of intimacy remains the most difficult aspect of sex-ed on the social web. While “Public Health 2.0″ is a top priority for related causes and organizations, it can be difficult to approach from a social media standpoint. Because it’s the most private and sensitive of issues, many people are embarrassed or offended by conversations about sex.

However, many organizations, from mass media outlets to cause-specific efforts, are still attempting to use social tools to address reproductive health issues. The difficulty in running a successful effort lies in navigating the troubled waters between an individual’s right to privacy and the public need for sex education online.

Finding the Balance Between Public Education and Privacy

A very provocative effort may raise some eyebrows, but at the same time fail to generate conversation. The issue may be too sensitive for most — except for a minority of outgoing, extroverted online citizens.

For example, Sex Really discusses violence towards women in dating situations. Sex Really takes the initiative on pointing out tough topics and assumes conversation will occur offline, though some folks do choose to interact with the Sex Really team online. The effort uses a variety of media from its own site, as well as a Twitter account.

The site takes a rightful strong stances against violence towards women, yet the public conversational results vary. That doesn’t mean the effort isn’t successful in educating readers.

“This campaign has made effective use of social content, messaging related to social behavior change, and content aggregation,” said Beth Kanter, author of the popular Beth’s Blog.  “It’s hard to tell why there isn’t more conversation on the site from the target group (e.g. comments on the podcast posts) — they do have an active Twitter stream.   They also have a link to [Planned Parenthood] where [users] can get private information or connect with a health counselor for advice.”

Another example of an open site that gets some decent participation (but still less than similar non sex-ed campaigns) is MTV’s GYT (Get Yourself Tested). Because the effort is tied into the popular TV show 16 and Pregnant, there are a lot of eyeballs landing there.

Integrating traditional media into a social web campaign is one way to incite conversations about getting tested for sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). While educating themselves, participants not only sound off, but in some cases could win an opportunity to appear on the cable network — a great motivator to get people talking. There’s a GYT Facebook Group with 2,500 fans (which is comparatively low, considering other teen-oriented Pages get tens of thousands), and some decent online conversation.

Clearly, though, openness can actually act as a barrier to communication for such a sensitive issue.

Full disclosure: Beth is a business partner of mine.

Privacy Protections Can Drive More Participation

One organization committed to the sex ed space is ISIS, Inc., a non-profit organization based in Oakland, CA. They have had two very successful efforts: The Say What Contest and the inSpot notification service. ISIS efforts use technology to provide privacy guarantees first, then encourage the social conversation. By putting privacy at the forefront of what they do, ISIS is able to boost participation.

The Say What Contest uses incentives to get youth and young adults to talk. Specifically, the contest asked teens and twenty-somethings what the worst advice they got from their parents was. The goal was to highlight misnomers passed on from generation to generation. User stories are posted in podcast format.

“Youth used their own cell phones or landlines to call a private digital phone number and tell their stories,” said Deb Levine, Executive Director and Founder of ISIS. “Entrants’ phone numbers were stored in a data file that was password-protected and only available to contest sponsors in order to contact contest winners. We used a moderation feature for the widget such that we only included entrants who did not state their full name or location. No phone numbers were associated publicly with entries selected to be included in the widget.”

“The Say What campaign was a compelling contest that focused on the gold mine of good and bad sex advice teens have heard,” said Scotty Hendo, principal at CauseShift. “I liked how they used the telephone to capture stories directly from the teens. Plus, creating a widget helped spread the word and offer more people the chance to listen and rank contestants … [T]he campaign was a creative way to get teens to critically question what they’ve been told by their peers and adults.”

ISIS’s other project deals with an even greater social taboo. Many people experience great shame in finding out they have contracted an STD, and don’t want to admit it to their past and present partners. In an effort to stop the spread of STDs, the inSPOT network allows users to sign on to a private local community and send an anonymous e-Card to partners from a “concerned friend.”

“80% of senders choose to send their e-mails anonymously, and 80% of senders also choose to include a personal message,” said Levine. “The site has no backend database to collect information on sender e-mail addresses, recipient e-mail addresses, or personal messages. Currently, most users of inSPOT are using dynamic IP addresses which cannot be traced back to their computers or computer networks. We also use CAPTCHA to discourage spammers and bots from sending out multiple cards.”

The “Share it if You Like it” Approach

Making traditional media sharable on the web is another approach. While this strategy doesn’t break much ground in terms of social media, it hinges on creating content compelling enough that people will want to share it on their own networks using a service like AddThis or ShareThis.

Consider the original and critically acclaimed PBS TV program The Education of Shelby Knox, which discusses abstinence versus sex education in the deep South. The website assumes you will want to sound off about the show positively or negatively (and thus sex education) on your own social networks using the ShareThis service, or even go so far as to plan an event in your neighborhood.

“In terms of using a video with someone like Shelby, I do think it makes it much easier for people to discuss the issues because it’s not about ‘their kid’ — because no parent wants to believe their kid would be the one having sex in the school bathroom or whatever,” said Kivi Leroux Miller, president of Nonprofit Marketing Guide.com. “Making the conversation about Shelby and her friends allows people to share their opinions, fears, etc., while giving them some cover, since it’s not about them personally.”

Whether or not that cover translates into real social media discussion of sex education is another story. However, the site is still getting comments years after the show’s original air date.

More social media resources from Mashable:

- 3 Ways Educators Are Embracing Social Technology

- How Twitter in the Classroom is Boosting Student Engagement

- HOW TO: Prepare for Disasters Using Social Media

- How Companies Are Using Your Social Media Data

- The Science of Building Trust With Social Media

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, LaurenSimmons

Reviews: AddThis, Twitter, iStockphoto

Tags: education, facebook, List, Lists, non-profit, sex, sex ed, social good, teens, twitter

A few days ago, we spotted Twitter’s initial roll out of a geolocation feature on its Website. It appeared that Twitter was testing the feature because it quickly turned it off. Last night, the feature went back on, and Twitter co-founder and CEO Biz Stone officially announced it.

While Twitter’s geolocation feature has been live through its API since last November, this is the first time Twitter has enabled geolocation on its site. To start Tweeting with your location attached, you need to enable the feature in your Twitter Account Settings. Once you’ve opted-in, you will be able to add your location information to all your Tweets or choose to add them to individual Tweets as you compose them. You can choose to share your exact location (your coordinates) or your neighborhood or town.

Amybeth Hale is a Talent Attraction Manager with AT&T’s Interactive Staffing team. She uses social technology to help drive awareness of job opportunities as well as interact with candidates. Connect with her on Twitter at @researchgoddess.

As conference season is upon us (including SXSW, of course), I began thinking about all the things one might need to survive and stay connected with a busy schedule of travel and networking. Personally, I’m headed to San Diego to attend both SourceCon and the ERE Spring Expo.

Then I remembered that I’m the proud owner of an iPhone, and that almost everything I’ll need to make it through is easily accessible and at the tip of my fingers. Here are some of the apps which I believe will help you navigate, stay connected, and meet new friends when you attend a conference.

Accommodations

1. Priceline Hotel Negotiator

If you’re the ultimate procrastinator and you haven’t yet booked a hotel, even on arrival at the conference, the Priceline Hotel Negotiator app is for you. It pairs a great deal-finder with some comic relief in the form of William Shatner, the Priceline Negotiator. Just load up this app and shake — you’ll get a chuckle and some sweet hotel deals within a radius of your current location.

Cost: Free

Connectivity

2. Free Wifi Finder

So you’ve booked a hotel, but the room doesn’t offer complimentary WiFi (grr!). This app will use your location to find some local spots that offer free WiFi access. You can tailor your results from as near as 0.1 mile away, to as far as 40 miles. You can also filter results by categories such as libraries, cafes, airports, and hotels. You could probably couple this app with the Priceline app to make sure you don’t book a hotel room without WiFi in the first place.

Cost: Free

Local Stuff

3. RobotVision

Let’s say you’re in a city you’ve never visited before, and you want to find some cool stuff to check out. Sure, you could use Yelp, but where’s the augmented reality fun in that? My former co-worker Tim Sears created this app, and it’s a neat way to find anything from ATMs, to gas stations, to hospitals, to movie theaters. Better yet, you can also check out who else is tweeting around you locally, who is sharing Flickr images, and learn about local attractions via Wikipedia and Bing search functionality. Note, this app works best with the iPhone 3GS.

Cost: $0.99

4. Foursquare

Foursquare is a great way to see who else is hanging out at the same locations as you, and the gaming element of earning badges for check-ins is just plain fun. You earn points for checking in to multiple places in one day and for being adventurous and going to new places. You can see what your friends have been up to, leave tips and to-do items for other travelers, and tweet out your locations so that others know what’s going on. At any social media-minded conference, there’s sure to be a lot of location-based networking to be done through Foursquare.

Cost: Free

5. Gowalla

Gowalla is very similar to Foursquare in terms of location-based social networking, though I personally like Gowalla’s graphic layout better. Gowalla also allows the creation of user-generated “trips” that you can take, like the SEC Football Stadium Trip, or the Austin BBQ Bonanza (for those headed to SXSW). Again, you can see where your friends have been and also see who else is hanging out at your current check-in location. It’s a great way to meet and make new friends at a conference.

Cost: Free

Pics and Vids

6. TwitPic Uploader

I fully intend to take a ton of pictures at both conferences I’m attending. Though I do intend to bring a fairly nice (and very large) digital camera, there’s no greater instant gratification than snapping a photo on your iPhone and sharing it with the world. The TwitPic app lets you do this in four simple steps: Choose a picture from either your camera or a photo album; Write a comment; Log into your Twitter account, and; Send away!

Cost: Free

7. Ustream Live Broadcaster

You want to share a really fun moment from the conference, but a still photo simply won’t do it justice. Or perhaps you want to share a little taste of a presentation, or do a live interview with another attendee. This app lets you stream live video from your iPhone directly through your Ustream channel. You can set it up to automatically tweet when you are live, as well as take instant polls from viewers. It’s an easy way to share some live moments with those who could not be there.

Cost: Free

Social

8. Facebook

This one’s a no-brainer. Who doesn’t have the Facebook app on their iPhone? Use it to keep up with your friends back home and share updates about your trip. Made a new contact at the conference? Just search for them in the app and add them as a Facebook friend.

Cost: Free

9. Brizzly

I’ve only recently been introduced to Brizzly, but I really love it. For those of us who manage multiple Twitter accounts, this is a great alternative to trying to navigate the mobile version of CoTweet (which currently does not have an iPhone app). With Brizzly, you can connect to up to five Twitter accounts, as well as Facebook, and keep on top of everything. You can also save searches and upload photos. The only functionality I miss is the column layout from TweetDeck, but Brizzly certainly gets the job done.

Tip: Create your Brizzly account on a computer before you download the app, as it makes for quicker set-up on the iPhone.

Cost: Free

10. Glympse

Glympse is a really cool app that lets you share your location with others. But it’s more than just a geo-tagger — it shares your ongoing location. Basically, you can create and share your own “breadcrumb trail.” You can set it so that people will be able to access your location and follow your movements from within five minutes, and up to four hours. This is a great way to share which sessions you’re in with fellow conference-goers so they can easily find you.

Cost: Free

11. WordPress

Like a good blogger, I plan to push some content to my readers while I’m at the conferences. Now I can do that right on my iPhone. This app works with both .com and self-hosted WordPress blogs. You can moderate comments as well as add and edit your posts from this app. It’s a nice little travel tool for bloggers who may not always have access to laptops or WiFi.

Cost: Free

12. beamME pro

You want to stay connected with your fellow conference-goers, but you a) Forgot to bring enough business cards, or b) Decided to “go green” and skip the paper cards all together. BeamME lets you e-mail, text, or tweet all of your contact information to someone instantly. BeamME users can easily reciprocate and shoot their information right back. Plus, your contact info arrives in a manner which can be downloaded in a nice, tidy vCard format.

Cost: Free

Do you have any other favorite apps that would be great for conferences? Add them in the comments below!

More iPhone resources from Mashable:

- 10 Essential iPhone Apps for Runners

- 10 Best iPhone Apps for Dog Lovers

- Top 10 iPhone Apps as Judged by Mashable Readers

- 10 Fun iPhone Apps for Beer Lovers

- Mashable’s New iPhone App: Download Today!

Tags: brizzly, conferences, facebook, foursquare, gowalla, iphone, iphone apps, List, Lists, Mobile 2.0, sxsw2010, twitpic, twitter, ustream, wifi, Wordpress