By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:

Want to find a dance partner near you? Want to find a workout partner near you? Want to find a tennis partner?

A new website called CribSocial.com can help you. This Bay Area startup, which was launched in November of 2009, provides a platform where people with similar interests can connect and socialize offline through activities in their neighborhood.

While many social websites such as Facebook and MySpace are mostly viewed as indoor activities that are enjoyed alone in your house or apartment, CribSocial.com encourages offline interaction, indeed that is the entire point of the site.

It’s free service which allows people to create and participate in social activities in many different categories such as dancing, hanging out, sports, education etc. People can look for a dance partner, hiking groups or simply someone interesting to hang out with. Besides the individual activities users can also create social groups that meet regularly as well as one time special events such as a sports event or music concerts.
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By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:

While Facebook searched for ways to monetize its behemoth of a site. Other business are seeking ways to use the power of Facebook to create their own businesses

Launched on November 12, 2009, a Cape Town, South Africa startup called Personera.com is seeking to use Facebook for its own purposes.

Personera.com allows people around the world to design and order print products personalized with their Facebook content. You can use your Facebook account to sign in, customize and order your product.

Personera’s service allows people to use their Facebook accounts to log in through Facebook Connect, and make their entire social network content instantly available for product personalization. Users are able to choose a theme, automatically add their friend’s birthdays and events each day, and drag and drop their favorite photos into the monthly layout.

A high quality 12-month, 32-page printed calendar then is delivered to their mailbox. The service itself costs $24.95, but that includes shipping to anywhere in the world.
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By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:

Not all fundraising and charitable organizations are long-term ventures. Moreover, these charities have the infrastructure and capital base to last as going concerns. However, many fund-raising/charitable efforts are short-term efforts to raise money for a specific purpose. For example, raising money for individuals with cancer, raising money for accident victims, or raising money for an injured firefighter.

In these circumstances, keeping overhead down and reach donors quickly and efficiently is paramount.

A Chicago based web startup called GiveForward.org is providing an answer for these situations. Started in August of 2008, GiveForward.org provides free personal fundraising pages to individuals to raise money for friends and family members battling illnesses like cancer.

The Chicago Tribune has called GiveForward.org “The future of medical fundraising in the Internet Age.”

GiveForward.org helps individuals raise $10K, $20K and even $30K + to pay for their friends medical expenses. It gives people an easy way to help their friends and loved ones when they need it most.

By incorporating social media such as Facebook and Twitter to help empower users, GiveForward.org raises money from people all over the country for good causes. It is turning the idea that social media is frivolous on its head.

Co-founder Desiree Vargas, worked as a specialist in collegiate entrepreneurship at the Kauffman Foundation in Kansas City and as an independent consultant for Arabella Philanthropic Investment Advisors. Her passion for philanthropy and the role that young and small-scale donors can have on our communities has been a cause celebre. When not working, she spends her time inventing new recipes that don’t always work, walking her golden retriever, Ellie, and going to Zumba. Desiree likes Hangar One, cheese, and kicking Ethan’s butt in bar trivia.
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By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:

What if Google Maps were more than just a place to get directions and local information filtered by Google. What if you could go to the house you grew up in on a map, post a note in your old neighborhood and find your childhood friends?

That’s the idea behind ZoomAtlas – a map that aims to be friendlier, social, and more informative than any other map service out there. The wiki-mapping site that launched on Monday, November 16, 2009, has built a detailed, photo-realistic map of the United States, blending satellite imagery with user-edited details, lending a realistic description to specific neighborhoods or areas.

The free site combines the technology of interactive maps with the social networking of Facebook for users to post notes, stories and insights to reconnect its users with friends, family and places from their past.

Site-customization tools users can update map details including roads, railroads, waterways, sidewalks and property lines to miniscule landscaping details like grass, flowers and bricks on residences, restaurants, schools, parks, workplaces and more. Beyond updating location-specific aesthetics and details from the past, the map enables users to post information and notes for family and friends at important locations in their collective lives.
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By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:

Vacation homes seems to be the flavor du jour on the web. I recently did a story on mimbeo.com. Now there is another company who has a different spin on accessing vacation homes on the web.

SecondPorch.com is a brand new innovative, Facebook application that allows user to trade and rent vacation homes among their trusted group of friends and networks. Based in Portland Oregon and launched SecondPorch.com is the first socially enabled vacation home site available on Facebook. Its Facebook application is titled “Rent & Trade Vacation Homes”.

Vacation home rentals are a growing $50 billion industry. Currently there are 8 million second homeowners in the United States alone, of which less than 25% are used as rentals. In today’s tight economy, SecondPorch.com is offering a chance for consumers to significantly save money, as well as create a new outlet to recoup investments of owners strapped by second mortgages.

Brent Hieggelke launched SecondPorch.com not just because vacation home rentals are the fastest growing segment of the lodging industry, but also because he had a rental horror story of his own. Apparently a few years ago, Mr. Hieggelke’s father rented his vacation home through traditional means only to find that the group of 20 men hosting a bachelor party managed to cause about $4,000 worth of damage including a fireplace glass door broken, all of the pictures on the walls of historic photos had been broken, and glasses of red wine had been smashed against the walls. Mr. Hieggelke knew right then that someone needed to create a way to rent or trade vacation homes among a trusted group of friends thus Second Porch was born.
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By: Co-Editor, Bobby B:

For many people the Internet is a vast, unwieldy, intimidating organism. For other it is a vast playground with fun around every corner. For others it is merely a business. No matter where you fit on this spectrum, it is nice to learn and get feedback on various websites you might encounter.

Hiztoria.com, a Kansas City based start up launched in July of 2009, is a place for people to share and discover anything and everything about websites. Users can rate, review, share, and discuss websites both big and small. Users can earn points and level up by contributing to the site and writing reviews.

A totally revamped Hiztoria 2.0 is launching in a few short weeks. This brand new version of our Hiztoria will feature brand new designs and improved features.

As stated, Hiztoria can be used for web behemoths like Facebook and Google, to even the minutest websites in the corners of the Internet universe. Every website has an unknown counterpart or competitor, and Hiztoria plans to reveal the true gems in the ever-expanding digital world. Hiztoria users can do more than just rate, review, and talk about websites; users also even have the power to add new websites to Hiztoria.

Currently, there are over 1000 websites reviewed in the Hiztoria directory. You can sort them by name, category, most views, most fans, rating or date added. In case you are interested, Facebook.com has the most fans and Espn.com has the highest rating.
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By: The Editor

Social Networks, we love them and at times cannot stand them. We are drawn into them and find that the minutes and hours when spend on these sites seem to pass us by at the speed of light.

Well, if we are going to be on these social sites such as Twitter, Facebook or Myspace, then we might was well be rewarded for it, right??

Based in Valencia, California, Vyoom is a new Social Network with dual real-time platforms. Vyoom is a Social Network platform with many innovative social features such as a private & public stream, social channels, hotspots, friend locator and something called the RPilot.

Vyoom also has an e-commerce platform that carries actual products and a digital store. Vyoom has created their platforms to become seamless so the user experience is as if it was one platform.

Vyoom is focused on delivering real-time social communication and e-commerce to attract partnerships with brands and allowing users to make purchases at a discount and receive reward points.
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