Podcasting Renaissance: Is Podcasting Making a Comeback? + MORE 10/06/2012

Editor’s Note: This is the first in a 3-part “Career Checklist for Students” series by Christina Allen, Director of Product Management for Higher Education, to help students make the most of LinkedIn as they go back to school this Fall. 
In the rush of returning to school or starting a new job, it’s easy to forget how valuable your new relationships can be. The great people you meet can be a “virtual team” providing advice, insights and opportunities for your future…

Google’s Matt Cutts used Twitter this afternoon to announce that Google is launching the latest “data refresh” of its Penguin spam-fighting algorithm today and that it will affect searches across multiple languages. Including the original Penguin algorithm launch in late April,…

Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

Social commerce company ShopIgniter this week announced Igniter 4.0, a platform aimed at helping retailers promote their products with rich posts that engage users and push them down the path to conversion.
ShopIgniter CMO Kevin Tate says Igniter aims to fill the gap in the social conversion funnel between awareness/discovery and e-commerce/in-store purchases. When retailers first got on Facebook, they tried to sell too hard and turned off users. Now they know engagement is important but they sometimes end up putting Likes, comments and shares ahead of business objectives…

It’s hard to think of anyone who’s been in the public eye for as long as Clint Eastwood. 57 years after his first movie, the American icon is still looking good, strange political speeches aside. But how has he changed? We’ve pulled an image from him in every year since 1955.First, here’s a yearbook picture 1955—25-year-old Eastwood has an uncredited bit part in ‘Revenge Of The Creature’ 1956—’Star In The Dust’ See the rest of the story at Business Insider Please follow The Wire on Twitter and Facebook…

RockYou!’s Hug Me led our list of emerging Facebook applications by monthly active users this week with 41 percent gain.
We define emerging applications as those that ended with between 100,000 and 1 million MAU in the past week. This week’s top apps grew between 110,000 and 230,000 MAU, based on AppData, our data tracking service covering traffic growth for apps on Facebook.
Top Gainers This Week

Name
MAU
Gain
Gain %

1…

The Meaning of Like: How Smart Devices and Social Analytics Are Transforming Retail
This recent infographic from Symphony Teleca shares some very insightful information on the ways that consumers use devices to make purchasing decisions, and the ways that companies can measure these trends.
Going Global: Insights for International Social Media
With more companies receiving service requests from outside the continental US this article examines how best to approach a global social media strategy…

Are you thinking of starting a podcast?Do you believe podcasts are making a comeback?Do you find yourself listening to more podcasts lately?To explore why podcasting may be entering a renaissance period, I interview Mitch Joel for this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast.More About This ShowThe Social Media Marketing podcast is a show from Social Media Examiner.It’s designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing…

This week, we assembled the biggest names in business and gave them a challenge: Share something interesting with 175 million professionals.
Arianna Huffington delved into the science of sleep. Mohamed El-Erian explained why he’s still concerned about Europe. And Andrew Chen reflected on his friend, Noah Kagan, who lost out on a $100 million Facebook fortune.
The insights, part of LinkedIn’s new thought leader program, spanned across industries and veered into politics, philanthropy and even food…

IPO lawsuits to be combined and heard in NY – Dozens of lawsuits against Facebook, the NASDAQ exchange and IPO underwriters will be combined and heard by a federal judge in New York. Federal judges on Thursday ordered that the IPO-related cases be transferred to Manhattan. Some plaintiffs wanted to keep their cases in California, but Facebook requested the transfer, Reuters reports.
Facebook global communications VP to step down - Facebook Vice President of Global Communications Joe Lockhart is leaving the company after 15 months, AllThingsD reports…