By Jordyn Taylor 5/31 11:35am

Servicey

Your coveted destination: Amanda Bynes's Twitter feed. Perez Hilton sympathizers need not apply.

Your Guide to Getting Retweeted by Amanda Bynes

Internet users are probably well-versed by now in the glory that is Amanda Bynes’s Twitter account. One hardly needs to spend a minute scrolling through her Twitter feed before encountering a booty call to Drake, a death threat to Perez Hilton or a topless selfie taken on a bathroom sink.

When it comes to obsessing over Ms. Bynes’ Twitter, it’s one thing to be an avid peruser, but it’s another thing entirely to earn the coveted retweet. We here at Betabeat have tried, so far to no avail. Now, for your convenience, we’ve scientifically analyzed Ms. Bynes’ Twitter feed and concisely determined what it takes to get noticed—and retweeted—by everyone’s favorite wayward celeb. Read More

By Jordan Valinsky 5/23 3:13pm

Visiting Dignitaries

Mr. Kutcher has invested in Foursquare, a check-in app; Chloe + Isabel, a social commerce jewelry company; Airbnb, a network of user-hosted accommodations; and Socialcam, a video sharing app that's a competitor to Viddy (look out, J. Biebs).

Ashton Kutcher Says He Hates Using Twitter Ever Since the Media ‘Fucked it Up’

Ashton Kutcher is totally over Twitter because we all fucking ruined it. The apparent barometer of what’s “cool” told the CTIA Conference on Thursday that his experience on the site changed for the worst since joining and that we have no one but ourselves to blame for it.

Mr. Kutcher said that the media’s oversharers wrecked the once-personal experience of publicly broadcasting your every thought to everyone with an internet connection. He added that when he first joined Twitter, it was hip and represented the democratization of media, but now that it’s gone lamestream, he’s OVER IT. Read More

By Kelly Faircloth 5/22 11:30am

Twitter Fights

Rumble!

PrivCo Responds to Criticisms of Its Tumblr Report By Slinging Twitter Insults at Fred Wilson, Everyone Else [UPDATED]

Yesterday, Crain’s reported on some eye-popping Tumblr numbers from PrivCo, suggesting VCs reaped huge rewards, including a 5,000 percent return of $253 million for Union Square Ventures, $154 million for Spark Capital, and $77 million for Spark partner Bijan Sabet.

Almost immediately, Bijan Sabet and Fred Wilson fired back, calling the report “garbage” and refuting the specifics (without coughing up what they actually made). Dan Primack (who’s tangled with PrivCo before) calls the report “a load of Yahoo.” He says USV and Spark actually put $13 million each into the company ($350,000 of it seed funding) and got around $192 million each. Not too shabby, but not the jackpot PrivCo alleges, either.

Well, this morning PrivCo responded to the critics, on Twitter, with all the rancor appropriate to the medium. Read More

By Jordan Valinsky 5/21 5:01pm

Survey Says

Psalm of Teen. (Photo: Hashgram)

Teens Are Leaving Facebook Because They’re Sick of All the Stupid Drama

Teens are flocking to Twitter, Instagram and other sites because its main rival, Facebook, is increasingly becoming DRAMA CENTRAL and they’re SICK OF IT (slams door).  A study from the Pew Research Center found that teens are seeking safe havens on other social networks because their parents are ruining the serene Facebook experience by complaining about Uncle John’s heart condition. Read More

By Jordan Valinsky 5/16 7:58am

at the movies

It would be neat to read Twitter on that. (Photo: Hashgram)

Twitter and Foursquare Attempt to Ruin Movie Going with Pre-Show Ad Partnership

The movies are no longer our one place of reprieve from social media. Twitter and Foursquare both announced partnerships yesterday with National CineMedia, a company that creates those annoying pre-show ads, to integrate the two sites into your movie viewing experience.

For the deal with Twitter, National CineMedia will pull data from the platform for the totally innovative idea of creating a weekly series that highlights tweets and trending topics related to the movies. So, get excited to read annoyed fan’s tweets about how overrated The Great Gatsby was on a 50 foot screen. Read More

By Jordan Valinsky 5/13 8:51am

Linkages

Mr. Costolo (Photo: About.me)

Booting Up: Dick Costolo Resigns as Director of Twitter U.K.

Last week, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo reportedly quit as director of the company’s U.K. arm. The news comes just days after government regulators forced TweetDeck to dissolve following accounting issues. [Sky News]

Bloomberg is apologizing to its clients after allegations that reporters snooped on client terminals to see their Seamless orders or whatever. [CNN Money]

JackThreads’ recent push into international waters, like Australia and the U.K., is doing well for the company’s bottom line as sales overseas now make up 10 percent of its business. [AllThingsD]

Facebook Home is missing features that Android users love (widgets, docks, oh my!) because all of the developers use iPhones. The lack of “droidfooding” is causing them to scramble to add those features to turn around Home’s slow downloads. [TechCrunch]

Here’s a groovy map that shows you where in the world Wikipedia is being edited right now. [Ars Technica]

Elon Musk and David Sacks have left Mark Zuckerberg’s political action group over growing concerns over the support of certain politicians. [AllThingsD]

By Jessica Roy 5/10 8:51am

Linkages

(Photo: Ynaija)

Booting Up: All the Cool Kids Aren’t Getting Twitter Verified

President Obama issued a mandate yesterday ordering government agencies to make their data “open and machine-readable.” Perhaps soon you’ll have a machine to read Betabeat for you. [Ars Technica]

The U.S. government has been buying up cyberweapons that rely on software holes in widely used programs to attack computers overseas, but that means it doesn’t want everyday consumers to know about their own computers’ vulnerabilities.  [Reuters]

The International Space Station was using Windows up until now, apparently, which seems ill-advised? They’ve finally switched to Linux. [Extreme Tech]

Oh, you got verified on Twitter? Whatever, I don’t even want to be. [The Awl]

Cybercriminals stole $45 million from ATMs across the world in a matter of hours, and their ringleader was a 20-something kid from Brooklyn. [New York Times]

Amazon is reportedly building its own smartphone and it’s going to have a 3D screen. [Wall Street Journal]