Dave Haft

There’s a lot of great content on the web, especially when it comes to travel blogs, fashion blogs and curated, crowdsourced photo collections. We dug up nine photo blogs with images that surely will inspire you to do something, whether it’s travel, think outside the box or try a pair of harem pants with a dropcrotch.

We asked some stellar photographers and curators why they shoot, what photography means to them and what makes for a moving image. Some of them use photography as an escape, like Jamie Beck, who says, “Through photography, I get to create the world I wish I lived in.” Others, like Tom Robinson use it as an honest way to document life: “I simply capture the environment I…
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More About: Documenting Your Life Series, blog, features, mashable, photography

Social media management dashboard HootSuite added three new app plugins Tuesday: storytelling curation tool Storify, note-taking platform Evernote and help desk management tool Zendesk.

App plugins allow people to send content from HootSuite such as Twitter and Facebook items to third-party applications such as Storify and Zendesk. Evernote for HootSuite comes as an app stream and plugin.

To begin using the apps, people must install them via the 8-month-old App Directory.

Here’s what each new plugin does, according to HootSuite:

Storify: “For users who want to curate social media posts into stories to publish and amplify the social media they monitor on HootSuite, the…
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More About: Social Media, Storify, evernote, hootsuite, social networking, zendesk

The Olympics officially take over the world for the next two weeks with Friday’s opening ceremony in London, and Twitter just launched its dedicated event page aimed at tracking Olympics buzz on the social network and becoming a conversation hub for fans around the world.

Produced in partnership with NBC — the Games’ official broadcaster in the United States — the page at twitter.com/#Olympics uses a combination of human curation and algorithms to collect relevant tweets from fans, media and athletes. The page can also be viewed by non-Twitter users looking to follow along.

The dedicated hub makes sense: Twitter said in a blog post Thursday that more tweets are already being se…
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More About: Sports, Twitter, olympics

1. NBC Olympic Coverage

As the official Olympics broadcast network for the U.S., NBC has been preparing for and ramping up its coverage of the games for months. Its Pinterest pins tell this year’s Olympic story in chronological order, dating back to May, when the torch was lit in Olympia, Greece.

Click here to view this gallery.

The Olympics are comprised of highly visual events. Think of the dust that settles on the floor after a gymnast chalks her hands. Or the rippling back muscles of a graceful pole vaulter. Or the swaying flag above a gold medal winner.

Already, Pinterest users are collecting and sharing powerful images of Olympic athletes and London attractions to celebrate the games. We’ve found 13 accounts and boards overflowing with everything from news coverage to party ideas, and it’s all Olympic-themed.

SEE ALSO: How to Follow the 2012 Olympics Online

What kinds of Olympic images will share best on Pinterest? On social media, in general? Where are you accessing user-curated Olympics content?

More About: Social Media, Sports, features, olympics, photography, pinterest

NBC has partnered up with Storify to place real-time streams, curated by NBC journalists, on Today.com and NBC’s 10 TV station websites.

Forty of NBC’s journalists, located in London and elsewhere, will be creating Storify feeds using data from Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites.

NBC, which has recently inked a similar deal with Facebook, is seriously ramping up its social media efforts for the upcoming Olympics. An NBC spokesperson told TechCrunch that this is the “biggest thing” NBC has ever tried with social media.

“The 2012 Olympic Games will be more social than ever, and Storify enables us to capture and report on the social stories coming out of the Games in a…
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More About: Storify, nbc

It’s no coincidence that Ford and Coca-Cola have stepped up praise of Facebook ads in recent weeks. Despite initial skepticism resulting from both the novelty of the platform and the inaccurate comparisons to Google AdWords, big-ticket advertisers are beginning to realize Facebook ads’ ability to drive sales.

But Facebook ads aren’t just good for sales. They also represent a tremendous opportunity in the field of recruitment because they can essentially target and attract candidates who are unreachable through traditional channels. If you want to know why your recruitment efforts need Facebook ads, here’s why.

1. Fish Where the Fish Are
To say that Facebook is the wor…
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More About: Facebook, contributor, facebook ads, features, job recruiting, job search series, online marketing

1. designboom

Designboom curates innovative products, architecture, art and creations from all over the world. Tap the site and its Twitter feed for mind-blowing and colorful inspiration you can apply to your own spaces.

Click here to view this gallery.

Pinterest may be the more visual platform for design inspiration, but Twitter often supplements photo appeal with design inspiration, tips and news. These blogs and personalities share interior design case studies, DIY tutorials, affordable luxury products and gardening knowledge — all via Twitter.

SEE ALSO: 10 Upcycled Gadgets for Your Home and Office

Meander through the gallery above to discover leaders in the home and garden space, who just happen to maintain valuable Twitter presences. We can’t catch them all, so please share your own design favorites in the comments below.

Thumbnail image courtesy of Flickr, ooh_food

More About: Twitter, blog, design, features, home, lifestyle

Design competition Project Runway has unveiled two new social tools in time for Thursday’s season 10 premiere on Lifetime. The features will help viewers easily interact with each other and the show’s stars.

“Real-Time Runway” (see image below) displays Twitter trending hashtags and relevant handles as well as aggregates conversations about the show in real time during and three hours before and after the show. The social tool is akin to “Tweet Tracker” for Bravo shows and “Sound Off” for The X Factor.

“Real-Time Runway,” however, allows people to filter tweets by time zones, helping viewers avoid any spoilers.

“We know how difficult it can be to avoid spoiler info in this day…
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More About: Entertainment, Social Media, TV, Twitter, fashion, lifetime, project runway, social tv

For many fans, Major League Baseball’s annual mid-summer home run derby and all-star game are enough excitement on their own. This year, however, MLB is trying to increase the fun by making them what it says are “the most social events in baseball history.”

How? A combination of in-game player tweets, curated content and social rewards for fans.

During Monday night’s home run contest, players will tweet and post to Facebook from special social media stations as well as share video and photos shot from their own smartphones. Fans who check in to the home run derby and contest using the MLB at the Ballpark mobile app will be entered for prize drawings, and MLB will feature fan tweets u…
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More About: Facebook, Twitter, sports

Tiny Wings is a fun iOS game that eschews the anger of another avian franchise for the underdog appeal of a bird that can’t fly. We especially like that it’s easy to play with just one hand (great for subway commutes).

If that wasn’t enough to get us looking forward to the next version of the game, this excellent trailer has done the trick. From the punch-card game track to the fairly game-accurate movements to the fun ending, it’s got us putting alerts in our calendar for July 12 — the date of the release.

What do you think of the Tiny Wings 2.0 trailer? Share your thoughts in the comments.

BONUS: 10 Games for iPhone You Can Play With One Hand

More About: games, iOS, iphone, Tiny Wings, videos, YouTube