What could be more romantic than playing Angry Birds on Facebook with your sweetheart or with a social network of relative strangers? The highly anticipated Facebook version of Angry Birds will officially be landing in a browser near you on Feb. 14, Valentines Day.

Rovio, the studio behind the game, has put out a trailer (above) and dropped lots of little hints that the Angry Birds on Facebook won’t be exactly like its mobile counterparts. Rovio CEO Mikael Hed said the game will have completely new aspects and a more collaborative feel. It’ll also focus more heavily on the hapless pigs.

From the trailer above it looks like the same gameplay that made Angry Birds a viral (and financial) sensation are still the focus: Flinging birds across a screen to knock out pigs and build high scores. This being Facebook, expect social posts and friend challenges to play a role, though Rovio so far has stayed mum on what those “collaborative” features will be.

It may seem like a bad idea to launch a game on Valentine’s Day, but given Angry Birds‘ success, Rovio can pretty much do what it wants. The game — and its spin-offs — have been downloaded more than 500 million times, prompting Rovio CMO Peter Vesterbacka to say the company was worth more than $1.2 billion.

Angry Birds games have been developed for nearly every major mobile platform or device but this is the first time the game will be coming to a browser and social network. It’s a move designed to get the game into more hands and more news feeds, but at some point will we just be Angry Birded out?

Is the Facebook launch a cause for celebration or just more of the same? Let us know in the comments below.

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Now that it looks like Facebook is (finally!) going to file for an IPO, plenty of potential investors want to know how they can get in on the action.

Mashable is not a financial publication, and we’re not in the business of giving stock market tips. But we can break down the IPO process — and gauge the likelihood of a regular investor getting in on the ground floor.

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Don’t Get Your Hopes Up

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We’ll cut to the chase — unless you’re a close personal friend or relative of a Facebook executive, or you manage an enormous amount of capital, you have almost no chance of getting IPO pricing on a stock like Facebook.

Why? Well, as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) points out, “the underwriters and the company that issues the shares control the IPO process.” The SEC doesn’t regulate how these primary shares are allocated.

In Facebook’s case, the Wall Street Journal reports that Morgan Stanley will likely be the lead underwriter for the IPO, with Goldman Sachs also expected to play a large role.

These investment banks are going to target large customers and institutional investors. The goal is to move shares by the millions, not the hundreds or thousands.

Even if you have an account with Morgan Stanley or Goldman, you’re probably not going to get to make any purchases as an individual — not unless you are a big-time celebrity or business mogul. (Ashton Kutcher, it’s your lucky day.) In most cases, the underwriter will call you and let you know if you can get in on the action.

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What Can Average Investors Do?

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Aside from buying pre-IPO shares on something like SecondMarket — which, again, has some basic financial requirements that will exclude most individual investors — investors interested in a Facebook IPO have a few options:

• Buy into a mutual fund that invests in IPOs. There are a few of these funds in the market, such as the Global IPO Plus Aftermarket fund from Renaissance Capital. The returns on these funds tends to be flat, however — and with a stock like Facebook, it’s unlikely that this fund will get much of the action.
• Buy on the aftermarket. This is where it can get tricky. Putting in a market order the day a stock opens can be risky. In fact, many retail investors were burned during the dotcom era for moving too fast on IPO stocks that never again exceeded their order price. Placing a limit order or stop market order can help alleviate some of the risk, but it won’t guarantee a buyer a piece of the action.
• Watch from the sidelines. Sometimes it pays to take a step back and watch the market from afar before jumping in. An IPO Facebook could be the next Google — but there’s also a chance it could also be the next Yahoo. Wait and see.

Check out the video below to learn more about the IPO.

Image courtesy of Flickr, GOIABA (Goiabarea)

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Jon Rubinstein, the former CEO of Palm and co-developer of the Apple iPod, has left Hewlett-Packard, the company confirmed to Mashable. Rubinstein came to HP after the company acquired Palm in 2012.

The departure, which had been planned for some time, is symbolic of the trajectory of webOS, the mobile OS created by Palm. Rubinstein oversaw Palm’s development of webOS after his appointment as CEO in 2007. He spent more than four years trying to push the platform forward.

WebOS launched in 2009 with much promise and many positive reviews but devices (such as the Palm Pre) struggled to compete in the marketplace against the iPhone and Android devices. HP, looking to craft a mobile strategy, bought Palm in 2010 and Rubinstein began revamping the platform for the new company. Rubinstein now says he planned to leave the company after the first HP webOS products came to market.

Speaking to The Verge, Rubinstein says he had planned to leave HP “sometime after” the TouchPad tablet was launched, The Verge reported. He’s now vacationing in Mexico but says he plans to return to the industry after he figures out his next move.

After acquiring Palm, HP launched its first new webOS devices, the HP TouchPad and Veer smartphone in mid 2011. The company discontinued the platform and products in August, shortly after the TouchPad’s launch. It later said it would make webOS an open-source project. HP released its timetable for doing that earlier this week.

Rubinstein also played a key role in the initial development of the iPod, recognizing early the utility of a small hard drive for portable music storage. He is said to have put together and managed the team of engineers that created the project, including Tony Fadell, the developer of the Nest thermostat. Rubinstein left Apple in 2006 and joined up with Palm the following year.

Images courtesy of Flickr, Financial Times Photos

More About: Hewlett-Packard, HP, hp touchpad, Nest, palm, Palm Pre, Veer, webOS

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You know what hurts? Being wrong, that’s what hurts. Not just a little wrong, but $85 billion wrong.

Five years ago I laughed — dare I say chortled — over the idea that Facebook was worth $15 billion. Now it’s queuing up for the biggest Initial Public Offering in tech history, at $100 billion valuation. Man, do I feel silly.

According to a report from the Wall Street Journal Friday, this long-anticipated stock moment is happening next week. Looking at Facebook’s recent moves, I can believe that: They stopped secondary trading, then went from gradually rolling out Timeline across the globe to saying “it’s coming now to everyone! You have a week!” Just prior to that, it unveiled a new collection of Timeline Apps just to show it’s serious about this whole Facebook Platform thing.

This Facebook, the one I and nearly a billion others now use, is almost unrecognizable compared to the 2007 version — a three-year-old social network that accepted a $240 million investment from Microsoft in 2007. Back then, it was really just a place to connect with old friends.

We early users shared random updates, but there was nothing about Facebook that made it a must-visit destination. Random ideas, such as giving people $1 virtual gifts, bordered on silly. The big social interactive moment revolved around actions like Poke — a far cry from the Facebook gestures unveiled last year.

Back then, I had already seen lots of social platforms come and go. Remember Second Life? It was incredibly hot. Remember MySpace? Hotter than hot. Both services still exist — in deflated, post-hype forms.

The Facebook rise, though, has been different. I wasn’t just wrong about Facebook, I deeply underestimated its founder Mark Zuckerberg. Facebook users may often complain about Facebook changes; I call it the “Who moved my furniture?” effect. But like a shark that must move to survive, Facebook’s’ steady stream of updates and innovations have not only kept it alive, but growing effortlessly. It is a global social shark, gobbling up new users wherever it swims.

Five years ago, I could never have anticipated Facebook’s growth or its transformation into platform for doing things by yourself and with friends. Facebook wants your activity (reading, watching movies, listening to music, tracking a State of the Union speech) on the network, live, when you do it, so others can engage in real time.

Users may grouse about the privacy implications of frictionless sharing, but there is a reason Zuckerberg made it this way: if it’s easy, it will be done. Saying “yes” once instead of a thousand times is the difference between walking through an open door and pushing your way through a rosebush. One is easy, painless and repeatable, the other is death by a thousand cuts.

Facebook faces hurdles, to be sure. Increased competition from Google+ and Twitter is likely forcing the IPO moment. Plus, the government and vocal minority will not stop pressing Facebook on privacy issues, and I do believe that growth in its home market has slowed a bit.

On the other hand, $10 billion — the amount Facebook will see from this IPO — is a lot of scratch. Yes, some people will get very rich, Zuckerberg in particular. But the chief Facebook Geek has said he’s not interested in the wealth, and I believe him. For Zuckerberg, winning has always been more important than money.

I expect a lot of that money to get poured back into Facebook. We’ll see new innovations and an acceleration of the Facebook-as-platform program. Acquisitions should increase, and Facebook may even expand into full-blown content creation. I can see it now: The Facebook TV network!

Over the years, I’ve watched many companies transform when they went public. Microsoft’s IPO in the mid 1980’s not only helped create a bunch of young millionaires, it also helped turned Windows from a disappointing also-ran into the world’s dominant operating system.

In other words, all things are possible when you have money, and Facebook is going to have lots of it. And I’m willing to admit that it’s worth it.

Do you believe the social network — or any tech company — is worth $100 billion? And what should Facebook do with the money when it gets it? Ponder with us in the comments.

1. General Motors

Headquartered in Detroit, MI, GM owns Chevrolet, Buick, Cadillac and GMC.

Proceeds: $23.1 billion

Year: 2010

Image courtesy of Flickr, Crouchy69

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A familiar Seinfeld clip of “hipster doofus” Cosmo Kramer has been set to dubstep beats from electronic music producer Skrillex — continuing the [Person] Reacts to Dubstep meme bumping loud (see other videos below).

The altered footage shows Kramer driving and then entertainingly reacting to hearing dubstep. People have already watched the video more than 36,000 times on Funny or Die.

Seinfeld has fallen prey to the dubstep treatment on multiple occasions. For example, a quick YouTube search yields a dubstep-infused montage of Kramer’s entrances as well as another one of an individual walk-in.

Skrillex reactions on YouTube started popping up last year following the commercial success of his Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites and More Monsters and Sprites EPs, which helped him snag five Grammy nominations in November. His popularity spilled onto Facebook, too: Skrillex’s “Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites” song was the number six most-listened-to song on the world’s largest social network in 2011.

“2011 was also the rise of music producer Skrillex,” Facebook said in its 2011 Memology report. “Although Skrillex has been around for years, his 2011 tour, a collaboration with Korn, and record label launch prompted a 76-fold increase in the number of people mentioning him in their status updates on Facebook.”

On that note, here are Skrillex reactions from non-Kramer dudes such as babies, animals and grandparents.

Baby Reacts to Skrillex Spoof

This is a spoof of this clip.

Click here to view this gallery.

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The technology community came out in force against SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act) before those two bills were shelved last week. With them gone, we can expect tech experts and Internet users to step away from politics. The battle has been won, right? Wrong. There’s another fight heating up, and this time it’s global.

Meet the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA.

ACTA is an international treaty designed to protect intellectual property rights. The agreement was first created by the U.S. and Japan in 2006, and Australia, Canada, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore and South Korea signed on last year. Whereas SOPA and PIPA were proposed bills in the U.S. House and Senate respectively, ACTA is a plurilateral treaty between the countries that sign on to the agreement.

SEE ALSO: 22 EU Countries Ratify ACTA | ACTA ‘Is More Dangerous Than SOPA’

One of ACTA’s primary goals is the prevention of copyright theft on the Internet. The treaty operates outside already existing international bodies, such as the Union Nations (UN) or World Trade Organization (WTO). By signing on to the agreement, countries are agreeing to work with one another on issues of counterfeiting and copyright theft.

While SOPA and PIPA have been relegated to the dustbins of the U.S. Congress, ACTA is gaining life.

Thursday, the European Union (and 22 of its member states) signed on to ACTA. More EU states are expected to sign ACTA once such the treaty clears those countries’ own internal political systems.

In the U.S. ACTA is being considered an “executive agreement,” not a “treaty.” When signing a treaty, the president must get at least two-thirds of the Senate’s approval. With executive agreements, the president is allowed to bypass the Senate completely.

Some, including Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), have raised questions about that decision’s constitutionality.

“It may be possible for the U.S. to implement ACTA or any other trade agreement, once validly entered, without legislation if the agreement requires no change in U.S. law,” wrote Wyden in October of last year. “But regardless of whether the agreement requires changes in U.S. law, the executive branch lacks constitutional authority to enter a binding international agreement covering issues delegated by the Constitution to Congress’ authority, absent congressional approval.”

And once again, the tech community has been coalescing around its opposition to what it views as a threat to a free and open Internet.

Controversy began even before the treaty started gaining signatories. The treaty only gained public notoriety after Wikileaks published a leaked discussion paper. After repeated failed attempts by numerous groups to request the text of the treaty, the countries negotiating ACTA released a working draft in 2010. Many accused the ACTA negotiation process of being too shady and closed-off to the public.

After Poland announced last week that it would be signing ACTA, a handful of official Polish government websites were disrupted by Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. And as happened last week in the U.S. with regards to SOPA, Polish citizens unhappy with ACTA took to the streets to protest the treaty.

According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit organization that aims to protect free speech online, “ACTA has several features that raise significant potential concerns for consumers’ privacy and civil liberties for innovation and the free flow of information on the Internet legitimate commerce and for developing countries’ ability to choose policy options that best suit their domestic priorities and level of economic development.”

What are those “several features,” exactly? First, ACTA would call for Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to provide copyright holders with information about users accused of illegally hosting protected content. Second, the treaty would set up an international body that could make amendments to the treaty. Neither the public nor domestic court systems can review that body, although representatives from relevant industries can make “consolatory inputs.”

Beyond that, the treaty’s language gets more vague. For example:

“5. Each Party shall provide adequate legal protection and effective legal remedies against the circumvention of effective technological measures that are used by authors, performers or producers of phonograms in connection with the exercise of their rights in, and that restrict acts in respect of, their works, performances, and phonograms, which are not authorized by the authors, the performers or the producers of phonograms concerned or permitted by law.”

What does “adequate legal protection and effective legal remedies” mean? That’s up to the countries that sign the treaty to decide.

Some are calling ACTA a way for copyright holders to get around the legislative process after failing to pass SOPA and PIPA:

“ACTA should not be a back door to the legislative process to enact the same requirements US citizens just overwhelmingly opposed,” says Harvey Anderson, general counsel for software company Mozilla. “We expect that the principles outlined by the White House related to combatting online piracy by foreign websites extend to any future efforts to ratify ACTA. We call on the Administration and Congress to release the full details of ACTA to ensure it won’t censor lawful activity, inhibit innovation, create new cybersecurity risks nor disrupt the underlying architecture of the Internet.”

The treaty does, however, include language designed to protect legitimate online commerce and free speech:

. . .These procedures shall be implemented in a manner that avoids the creation of barriers to legitimate activity, including electronic commerce, and, consistent with that Party’s law, preserves fundamental principles such as freedom of expression, fair process, and privacy.

If you’d like to dig into ACTA yourself, you can find the full text of the treaty here.

Do you think ACTA is a fair approach to protecting intellectual property, or are you worried about its impact on free speech and innovation on the Internet? Sound off in the comments below.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, PashaIgnatov

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With television broadcast deals that reach into the billions of dollars, the delivery of college sports as entertainment has long been huge business.

Now the Pacific-12 Conference is aiming to create what would likely be college sports’ largest and most futuristic mode of digital distribution yet — a wholly league-owned and operated platform for streaming content to tablets, smartphones, computers and smart TVs around the world.

The league believes the platform will be a key component to its future success and growth.

“We all know that TV today — from a dollars standpoint in terms of advertisers — there’s a lot of dollars there,” David Aufhauser, the conference’s new vice president and general manager of digital media, said in an interview. “But fast-forward five to 10 years down the line, and digital is going to be what holds the cards.”

The league says that in the near future it will enable consumers to watch thousands of events each year — ranging from football, to basketball, to Olympic sports, to non-athletic content — from any device anywhere on Earth.

Many leagues, teams and conferences have, predictably, increased their digital presence in recent years. But the Pac-12 appears to have ambitions beyond anything seen so far.

“We want to build something that’s not just innovative for college sports, but for how sports media and media generally is delivered overall,” Aufhauser said.

Details of the plan are still hazy, but Aufhauser’s hiring this week represents a significant step forward. He said that the league hopes to have the platform delivering at least some content by this autumn. The digital division will work in concert with the league’s television and advertising divisions, but also function as its own operation of sorts.

“We’re essentially building a startup, creating our own digital media and content company from the ground up,” Aufhauser said. “It’s a new property for college sports.”

Is the future of sports really digital? Or will consumers still default to broadcast television to watch events? Let us know in the comments.

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This post is brought to you by HubSpot, an inbound marketing software company based in Cambridge, MA, that makes a full platform of marketing software, including marketing automation tools. For more information on sponsored posts, read here.

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You decide. Is this 2012 AD or is it 0008 FB — the eighth year in the Facebook era?

It’s safe to say when Facebook launched in 2004, most marketers didn’t realize social networking and social media would forever change how business is done. Don’t feel too bad if you were among them — Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg probably had no idea he was unleashing a game-changing, lead-generating marketing tool at the time, either.

Lots of marketing tools, tactics and trends began to gain traction with consumers as 2011 came to a close, and they continue to show promise for improved lead generation this year. Here’s what we think savvy inbound marketers should keep in mind as they plan, budget, analyze and adapt their lead generation and lead management strategies for 2012 (or should we say 0008?).

1. Mobile/M-commerce: Virtual Grocery Shopping in the Subway

Last summer, UK-based grocer Tesco began testing virtual grocery shopping in subways and at bus stops in Seoul, South Korea, by outfitting subway station walls and bus stop kiosks with virtual grocery shelves. Photographs emulate store shelves, and each product is highlighted with a QR code. Commuters who have downloaded Tesco’s Homeplus mobile app could point their smartphone cameras at the QR codes, pay using their smartphones, and, if they order before 1 p.m., have the groceries delivered to any address that same day. The message: Between tablets and smartphones, mobile is going to reach a tipping point. Smartphones will continue to cannibalize standalone electronic device sales — analysts predict smartphone sales will hit $200 billion in 2012, a 52% increase over 2011 as consumers tote their smartphones with them everywhere they go.

Mobile tactics figure to become substantial sources of lead generation including the aforementioned QR codes, near-field and Bluetooth communications, social check-in promotions, mobile search, mobile Web, text/SMS/MMS, email and mobile advertising.

Next Step: If you don’t yet have a mobile strategy, start planning one, then implement it. If you have a mobile strategy, hone in on what’s working and what’s not when it comes to lead generation. Jettison underperforming channels, and add one or two new ones.

2. It’s Personal — Very Personal

With the recent announcement by search giant Google to merge its public search with its Google+ social network, this trend — which began to gather steam in 2011 — will realize substantial momentum in the coming year.

What was once only the purview of monolithic merchants, like Amazon and Netflix, personalization will spread to the masses in 2012, including to HubSpot clients who will be able to take advantage of new functionality that HubSpot CEO Brian Halligan called a “personalization engine for … mere, mortal, regular companies,” allowing them to give their users a personalized website experience delivering content users’ want and enabling marketers to pick up what may be the most-targeted leads they’ve ever generated.

Personalization technologies that let users decide from whom they will and won’t receive marketing messages or which emails receive priority in their inbox and which shall languish in email purgatory took hold in 2011 will continue to evolve requiring marketers in 2012 to be exceptionally focused on segmenting their audiences and delivering the right messages to each consumer in order to grow their leads.

Next Step: Examine the tools and techniques available to help you personalize your customers’ experiences so your brand is better integrated into their lives. Give them more choices — and more informed choices — to personalize their experience with your brand. Use this personalization to drive lead gen.

3. GeoSoMo

We have no idea if GeoSoMo — geosocial mobile — will become part of the marketing lexicon in 2012 (especially since we just made up the term), but geosocial mobile services will undoubtedly see increased uptake for lead generation.

GeoSoMo began to spark interest in the 18 to 34 demographic in 2011. Geosocial services, such as Foursquare or Gowalla, which enable consumers to let people in their social networks know their whereabouts in real time — “checking in” — and comment on the venues they’re visiting will grow.

Marketers who leverage GeoSoMo to generate leads while, for example, consumers are raving about the killer apps — in this case, the appetizers at the hot club du jour — via geosocial services can still gain early adopter advantages.

Next Step: Claim your page in the geosocial services that are the most used in your area. Dip a toe into the waters with some clever promotions that get people excited, build buzz, and of course, generate leads in the process.

4. An Appetite for Apps

Mobile applications (apps) followed a common path for technological innovation: Introduction, market mania for any and all apps, and now, as the market matures in 2012 and beyond, a solid tool for consumers and thereby for inbound marketers as well.

Today’s apps must meet a higher standard before consumers download them and integrate them into their mobile digital routines. A useful tool for lead generation and building brand loyalty, apps in 2012 must provide clear benefit and functionality, must constantly evolve to keep users engaged and interested, and should have a certain cachet in terms of what you might call digital style elements, cool animations or other features that, while small, delight users.

Next Step: Not every business needs an app, but if your business can add value to users’ lives by offering one, start exploring the process. Remember, an app is a long-term investment that requires lots of care and feeding, so don’t jump in until you fully understand what’s required. If you already have an app, come up with new ways to keep it fresh and keep the leads coming.

5. Automation Nation

A hundred years ago, marketers had just a handful of channels to reach consumers — newspapers, magazines, catalogs and outdoor signage. Today, well, you’re a marketer, you know there are dozens of channels, subchannels within those channels, and new ones being conceived almost every week. Marketing automation came of age in 2011 and, in 2012, it will become essential in generating and managing leads throughout the sales funnel.

As consumers and the technologies they use become more sophisticated, the lead-nurturing process becomes more critical, necessitating a comprehensive marketing platform to feed offers and content to prospects based on timing or actions they have taken that warrant additional contact.

Next Step: Automation for automation’s sake is worse than no automation at all. Use a comprehensive marketing automation platform with a solid marketing strategy that considers all your marketing channels for lead generation. Work on improving what happens to those leads after they come in to gain maximum effectiveness from your automation solution.

6. Information Integration

As marketers become more adept at lead generation using automation technologies, the amount of information gathered grows exponentially. The need to integrate all that customer data from inquiry to sale will be critical in 2012 and beyond.

As segmentation continues to play a bigger role in how customers are approached, the number of channels used increases, the number of messages increases, and the need to give sales and marketing a 360-degree view of all customer interactions, an integrated marketing platform becomes essential.

Next Step: There is TMI — too much information — to not have a reliable means of integrating it all. Unless your leads are connected to your nurturing programs and your nurturing programs are connected to sales and service, you are leaking valuable data. Make 2012 the year you integrate your marketing from top to bottom.

7. Social Remains Center-Stage

Social media as a lifestyle and as a marketing tool became fully actualized in 2011. Marketers no longer questioned the effectiveness and importance of using social media, such as blogging and social networks, including Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. The lead-generation challenge in 2012 will be how to remain relevant in the conversation with the customers who have accepted you into their networks. The addition of chronology into the social dialogue with features, such as Facebook Timeline, means that marketers need to work harder than ever to keep consumers engaged with timely, relevant and useful content if they want to continue to maintain mindshare and screen space.

Next Step: The social media monster is a hungry one — it almost never has enough content. Use your inbound marketing platform combined with a solid social media editorial calendar to continue to use social media to generate leads but now, in a planned, coordinated, integrated manner that maximizes your social media ROI.

With lead generation at the heart of all inbound marketing efforts, make 2012 your best year ever by being more social, more mobile, more local, more integrated, automated and personal than ever before.

(This post is brought to you by HubSpot, an inbound marketing software company based in Cambridge, MA, that makes a full platform of marketing software, including marketing automation tools. The content was written by Jeanne Hopkins, VP of Marketing at HubSpot, who co-authored Go Mobile with Jamie Turner, founder of 60 Second Marketer. Go Mobile is a step-by-step roadmap on how to get into mobile quickly and easily. For more information on sponsored posts, read here.)

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NASA announced on Friday that its Kepler telescope has discovered 11 new planetary systems that include 26 confirmed alien planets.

The new planets vary in size from one-and-a-half times the radius of Earth to bigger than Jupiter. Their orbital periods range from six to 143 days, and they all orbit closer to their stars than Venus does to our sun.

The discoveries nearly double the number of alien worlds — or “exoplanets” planets — found by Kepler outside our solar system and help astronomers better understand how planets form. However, scientists still have to determine the make-up of the planets, such as whether their surfaces are rocky or gaseous.

“Prior to the Kepler mission, we knew of perhaps 500 exoplanets across the whole sky,” Doug Hudgins, Kepler program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington, said in a statement. “Now, in just two years staring at a patch of sky not much bigger than your fist, Kepler has discovered more than 60 planets and more than 2,300 planet candidates. This tells us that our galaxy is positively loaded with planets of all sizes and orbits.”

SEE ALSO: View of Lightning Storms Over Africa Will Knock Your Socks Off [VIDEO]

The Kepler telescope is pointed at a location in the sky that contains 150,000 stars. It looks for potential planets by measuring the change in brightness that happens when a possible planet passes in front of a star. NASA said that each of the new confirmed planetary systems contains two to five closely spaced transiting planets.

“In tightly packed planetary systems, the gravitational pull of the planets among themselves causes one planet to accelerate and another planet to decelerate along its orbit,” NASA said. “The acceleration causes the orbital period of each planet to change.”

Kepler said it detects this effect by measuring the changes, known as Transit Timing Variations (TTVs).

The system with the most planets among these discoveries is Kepler-33, which NASA said is a star that is older and more massive than our sun. Kepler-33 hosts five planets, ranging in size from 1.5 to 5 times that of Earth and all located closer to their star than any planet is to the sun.

To see artist renderings of some of Kepler’s latest findings, check out the gallery below.

NASA Kepler Telescope

Discovered by NASA’s Kepler telescope, this rendering provides an overhead view of orbital positions of the planets in systems with multiple transiting planets.

Image courtesy of NASA.

Click here to view this gallery.

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What does where we tweet say about how we live and work? That’s one of the questions Oakland-based programmer Eric Fischer hoped to answer with his latest mapping project.

Fischer, a mapping fanatic and artist, is used to displaying vast amounts of information in visually compelling ways. In his latest project, he manages to plot out the motion of New Yorkers using public tweets on Twitter with geotags from May 2011 until January.

The project lays out around 10,000 geotagged tweets and 30,000 point-to-point trips in cities like New York City to plot the flow of people in terms of favored paths. In his map of NYC, seen above, there is a huge ink blot lining Broadway; as we’ve long suspected, it looks like the busy avenue is the backbone of the city.

Using a base map from OpenStreetMap, he drew out transit paths using Tweets. Movements are indicated on the geolocation of a Tweet, with an individual’s start point marked with one geotagged Tweet and ending with the next geotagged Tweet. This is what creates a mass of traffic routes.

“If you just draw lines from the beginning to the ending of each trip, you get a big mess, so the challenge is to come up with more plausible routes in between,” Fischer told Mashable. “That is where the 10,000 individual geotags come in, the most plausible routes are ones that pass closely through places that other people have been known to go.”

Fischer used Dijkstra’s Algorithm to calculate what exactly to map out. For those of who haven’t thought about math since high school algebra, that’s an equation that maps out the shortest path between two points on a graph. For this project, the equation pointed to the relevant paths to map out a city’s most dense corridors.

SEE ALSO: Twitter’s Top Topics and Hashstags of 2011 in Tech, Sports and Entertainment

He has also mapped out the choice transit paths in Chicago, Berkeley-Oakland, East Bay and several other cities.

Fischer has been using social media geotags to display patterns about the world’s cities for years.

In 2010, Fischer took on a huge project to map out race and ethnicity based on U.S. census data. Fischer meticulously used colored dots to represent residents in a city — a dot representing 25 residents of a certain race or ethnicity.

The map colored coded populations of people living in the city and those sprawled out in the outer boroughs. The color code stands as this “Red is White, Blue is Black, Green is Asian, Orange is Hispanic, Yellow is Other.” There are 109 maps total a part of the project published on Flickr.

“My interest in social media is as a huge source of volunteered information about where different people spend their time, the language they use in talking about those places, and the other people they communicate with,” Fischer said.
 
The Twitter social space is of special interest to Fischer because of the vast information from more than 200 million Tweeters. He has also used Flickr’s geotags to map out the world’s photographic activity by locals versus tourists. Fischer found cities like Las Vegas seem to be photographed mostly by tourists.

For the future, Fischer is looking to map out other patterns of residents in major U.S. and world cities, but will attempt to figure out how to shorten the amount of time it takes to map out 10,000 pieces of tweet-based information.

“I need to figure out how to make it faster so that it doesn’t take so long to make each one,” he said, though it’s worth noting his view of a long time is two hours for each city map.

Let us know what you think about this artful way of laying out social media-derived data in the comments.

Image courtesy of Flickr, Eric Fischer

More About: flickr, geolocation, geotagging, infographics, OpenStreetMap, Social Media, trending, Twitter

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