Facebook lets photos go fullscreen, but only on Chrome, Firefox
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Facebook News
Here to help you with your Document Management Needs
Article source: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/facebook/facebook-lets-photos-go-fullscreen-but-only-on-chrome-firefox/10704
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Richard Blumenthal, Connecticut Senator, Says Facebook Passwords Should Not Be …
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Facebook News
SEATTLE — A Democratic senator from Connecticut is writing a bill that would stop the practice of employers asking job applicants for their Facebook or other social media passwords, he told The Associated Press on Thursday.
U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal said that such a practice is an “unreasonable invasion of privacy for people seeking work.”
“These practices seem to be spreading, which is why federal law ought to address them. They go beyond the borders of individual states and call for a national solution,” said Blumenthal, who first spoke to Politico on Wednesday.
The AP reported this week that some private and public agencies around the country are asking job seekers for their social media credentials. The practice has alarmed privacy advocates, but the legality of it remains murky.
Experts say the terms of service for Facebook and other sites don’t carry much weight in these cases. The Department of Justice regards it as a federal crime to enter a social networking site in violation of those terms, but the agency said during recent congressional testimony that such violations would not be prosecuted.
The practice is more prevalent among public agencies, such as police departments and 911 dispatchers.
Blumenthal said his bill will have some exceptions, such as some federal and local law enforcement agencies, or national security departments. He said it would include private companies with government contracts for highly classified work.
Lori Andrews, a law professor at IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law specializing in Internet privacy, is concerned about the pressure placed on applicants, even if they voluntarily provide access to social sites.
“Volunteering is coercion if you need a job,” Andrews said.
Blumenthal said he has heard complaints from constituents about the practice and read the AP’s news report. He said he has yet to reach out to colleagues and Senate leadership, but that he expects to have wide support for the measure.
“Privacy is not a partisan issue,” he said.
Also on HuffPost:
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Article source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/22/richard-blumenthal-facebook-passwords_n_1373945.html
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Facebook Is Said to Buy 750 IBM Patents to Boost Defenses
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Facebook News
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Facebook Said to Acquire 750 Patents From IBM as Lawsuits Mount
Facebook. Photogrpher: Frank May/DPA/Landov
Facebook. Photogrpher: Frank May/DPA/Landov
Facebook Inc. (FB) acquired 750 patents
from International Business Machines Corp. (IBM), adding intellectual
property that may help it counter allegations of patent
infringement, a person with knowledge of the transaction said.
The patents cover various technologies such as software and
networking, said the person, who asked not to be identified
because the deal hasn’t been made public. The acquisition would
swell the size of Facebook’s portfolio, which includes at least
56 issued patents and 503 filed U.S. patent applications.
Facebook, the world’s biggest social-networking service, is
bolstering its legal defenses amid a standoff with rivals that
have broader intellectual property portfolios. Yahoo! Inc. (YHOO) sued
Facebook this month, accusing it of infringing patents covering
critical website functions. Facebook may have shelled out
hundreds of millions of dollars for the IBM patents, said Erin-
Michael Gill, a managing director at MDB Capital Group LLC.
“This is a very big deal,” said Gill, who is chief
intellectual property officer at MDB, an investment bank focused
on intellectual property. While it’s not clear how strong the
patents are, “Facebook is now where it’s supposed to be.”
The Yahoo suit involves patents covering Internet privacy,
advertising and information sharing. Sunnyvale, California-based
Yahoo asked for an order barring Facebook from infringing the 10
patents. It’s seeking triple damages.
Jonathan Thaw, a spokesman for Menlo Park, California-based
Facebook, declined to comment, as did Ed Barbini, a spokesman
for IBM.
Earlier Deals
Facebook already has been acquiring patents from other
holders, including early social-networking site Friendster and
computing company Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ), according to the U.S.
Patent Trademark Office. Yahoo, Google Inc. and Microsoft
Corp. all have at least 1,000 patents, according to MDB, based
in Santa Monica, California.
Facebook’s IBM deal could help assuage concerns that the
company lacks the intellectual property it needs, Gill said. The
social network filed for an initial public offering last month,
increasing investor scrutiny of the business.
Facebook, which had almost $4 billion in revenue last year,
announced earlier this month that it set up a new credit line of
$5 billion, replacing a $2.5 billion revolving line, that will
be used for working capital and other general corporate
purposes. The funds also will help Facebook cover the potential
legal costs of patent litigation with Yahoo, according to a
person familiar with the matter.
Record IPO
Facebook also had 33 corresponding patents and 149 filed
applications in foreign countries as of the end of last year,
according to the IPO filing. The company is seeking to raise $5
billion in the offering, making it the largest Internet IPO on
record.
Facebook expects more patent lawsuits in the future,
according to the filing.
“We expect the number of patent and other intellectual
property claims against us to grow,” the company said in the
Feb. 1 document, prior to Yahoo’s actions. “We may introduce
new products, including in areas where we currently do not
compete, which could increase our exposure to patent and other
intellectual property claims.”
Already, Facebook ranked No. 28 on the list of companies
most frequently targeted in patent cases last year, with 22
suits, according to LegalMetric.com. That’s more than companies
such as Cisco Systems Inc. and Yahoo.
‘Weapons in Arsenal’
“They need to have some weapons in their own arsenal,”
Thomas Scott, a lawyer at Goodwin Procter LLP in Washington,
said in an interview last week.
Acquired patents made up $51 million of Facebook’s goodwill
and intangible assets in 2011, up from $33 million in 2010,
according to Facebook.
IBM, meanwhile, has been offering portions of its patent
hoard to Internet companies. The Armonk, New York-based
computer-services giant has made a series of intellectual-
property deals with Google (GOOG) over the past year.
IBM continues to add to its patent trove, receiving 6,180
new patents last year. The company has topped the list of U.S.
patent recipients for 19 straight years.
To contact the reporter on this story:
Brian Womack in San Francisco at
bwomack1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net
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Article source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-22/facebook-is-said-to-buy-750-ibm-patents-to-boost-defenses.html
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Allen Stanford’s Twitter Complaint Fails to Win Retrial
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Twitter News
R. Allen Stanford
Aaron M. Sprecher/Bloomberg
R. Allen Stanford, accused of leading a $7 billion investment fraud scheme, at the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse in Houston, Texas, on March 6, 2012.
R. Allen Stanford, accused of leading a $7 billion investment fraud scheme, at the Bob Casey Federal Courthouse in Houston, Texas, on March 6, 2012. Photographer: Aaron M. Sprecher/Bloomberg
R. Allen Stanford, found guilty of
running a $7 billion Ponzi scheme, lost a retrial bid in which
his lawyers argued that Twitter comments by courtroom news
reporters may have influenced the jury that convicted him.
“The defendant’s motion for a new trial is denied,” U.S.
District Judge David Hittner in Houston ruled today without
elaboration in a single-sentence decision.
Stanford, 61, was found guilty on 13 of 14 criminal counts
after a six-week trial in which prosecutors convinced jurors
that he misled investors about what was being done with proceeds
of the certificates of deposit they bought from Stanford
International Bank Ltd. in Antigua.
Stanford is scheduled to be sentenced June 14. The four
wire-fraud charges and five mail-fraud charges he was convicted
of each carry a maximum punishment of 20 years in prison.
Defense lawyers, in a March 20 filing, said journalists’
real-time coverage of the trial on Twitter improperly influenced
the jurors, who had been warned to avoid other forms of media
coverage.
“This court failed to sequester the jury and permitted the
news media to occupy the courtroom during trial and permitted
the media to ‘tweet’ throughout the trial,” attorneys Ali Fazel
and Robert Scardino argued in their filing. They also said they
weren’t given enough time or money to prepare for the trial.
Frozen Assets
Stanford’s assets were frozen in February 2009 after the
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued him and the bank. A
federal judge in Dallas appointed a receiver to liquidate the
financier’s holdings to repay investors.
Scardino and Fazel were appointed by the court and paid
with public funds.
“We file motions for new trials for many reasons,
including wanting to preserve the record for appellate court,”
Fazel said today in an e-mail. “The next step is sentencing.”
Laura Sweeney, a Justice Department spokeswoman, declined
to comment on today’s ruling.
The case is U.S. v. Stanford, 09-cr-00342, U.S. District
Court, Southern District of Texas (Houston).
To contact the reporters on this story:
Laurel Brubaker Calkins in Houston at
laurel@calkins.us.com;
Andrew Harris in Chicago at
aharris16@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Michael Hytha at
mhytha@bloomberg.net
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Article source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-22/allen-stanford-s-twitter-complaint-fails-to-win-retrial.html
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Etch-A-Sketch Flap: Twitter Is the New AP
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Twitter News
I always thought that Etch-a-Sketch was a great toy back in the pre-iPod era, even if I did have trouble making those squiggly lines.
But as a metaphor for a presidential candidate, not so much.
In our Daily Download debut on CNN’s Situation Room, Howard Kurtz and I talked to Wolf Blitzer about why a less-than-bright remark by a top aide to Mitt Romney went absolutely viral. (Wolf knows his stuff, he’s got more than half a million Twitter followers.)
Yes, it’s obvious that Eric Fehrnstrom blundered, but the comment got little attention after he made it on Soledad O’Brien’s morning show Wednesday. It was not until it went haywire as a Twitter trending topic — with everyone from Obama strategist Stephanie Cutter to Eva Longoria weighing in — that it became a bigger story for television, including CNN. Twitter is now our early warning system for breaking news and millions take this social media network information on faith. It’s now taken over the old media space the Associated Press has played in so successfully for decades.
In case you missed it, Fehrnstron was asked whether the primaries were pushing Romney too far to the right for the general election. His response: “Well, I think you hit a reset button for the fall campaign. Everything changes. It’s almost like an Etch-A-Sketch. You can kind of shake it up and restart all over again.”
What? Romney’s positions could be erased just by shaking up that familiar red screen? So much for winning the Illinois primary — that was so 12 hours ago.
By falling into the toy trap, Fehrnstrom was serving up fodder for the snark-driven culture that dominates Twitter. That culture often values ridicule over reason, but the story got traction because fairly or unfairly, it plays into a media narrative of Romney as a political shape-shifter. Even though the liberal group Think Progress was pushing out the CNN video, Twitter got it faster than television. Let’s face it, Twitter reflects our collective pulse, and no one needs a ticket — or a journalist’s license — to engage.
Twitter has its drawbacks — how did we all learn to become so terse? — but here’s the thing. Like a child furiously turning those white dials, you can draw your own picture.
The piece has been crossposted at: www.daily-download.com
Follow Lauren Ashburn on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/laurenashburn
Article source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lauren-ashburn/mitt-romney-etch-a-sketch_b_1373170.html
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In 6 years, Twitter becomes major social, political player
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Twitter News
Computerworld - A lot can change in six years. Just ask the folks at Twitter.
The microblogging site celebrates its sixth birthday, if you will, this week. The first tweet was sent March 21, 2006. A lot has changed since then.
Twitter now has more than 140 million active users and they’re posting more than 340 million tweets a day, according to the microblogging site. That’s more than 1 billion tweets sent every three days.
“Six years may not be very long in human terms, but it’s been quite an enormous span for the thing we know and love as Twitter,” a blog post on the site said Wednesday. “When @jack [Jack Dorsey, executive director of Twitter] first sketched out his notion in March 2006, no one could have predicted the trajectory of this new communication tool.”
Brad Shimmin, an analyst with Current Analysis, said Twitter has had a profound effect, breaking down barriers and enabling users to communicate more freely.
“Like Facebook, Twitter has thoroughly penetrated popular culture, influencing all other mediums of communication,” Shimmin said. “For me, its biggest impact has been removing the barriers that traditionally kept people and, more importantly, classes of people, apart. With Twitter, for example, everyday people can feel a sense of direct connection with their favorite celebrities, even enjoying direct communication in some cases.”
Twitter has been on quite the journey since its inception. For some time, the microblogging site was mocked as a social network where people tweeted about what they were wearing, their favorite sandwich and the fabulous new toaster they just bought.
While there’s still some of the banter, Twitter took on a whole new life and a greater importance, as its use expanded beyond social networking into politics, natural disaster response and protests.
Earlier this month, Twitter was one of the social networking sites used to amass social pressure against conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh for his controversial comments about a Georgetown University law student and her support of birth control.
Twitter also was a key player this month in driving awareness of a 30-minute video about Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony and his army. With celebrities like media mogul Oprah Winfrey and Microsoft co-founder and global philanthropist Bill Gates tweeting about the video, it amassed nearly 57 million viewings on YouTube in four days.
The change lies in how Twitter has evolved over the past few years. Twitter increasingly has been used by politicians running for office ever since the 2008 presidential campaign when then-candidate Barack Obama schooled other candidates on the benefits of social media.
Twitter also was one of the social sites that became a lifeline after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan last year. It was also a resource for those trying to find out about loved ones during massive earthquakes in Chile and Haiti in 2010. It was a key communication tool during the 2009 government crackdown in Iran, the “Arab Spring” uprising in Egypt in 2011 and the emergency landing that a U.S. Airways jet made in New York’s Hudson River in 2009.
Article source: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9225443/In_6_years_Twitter_becomes_major_social_political_player
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Renren Facebook Boost to Be Shortlived on Ad Growth, Maxim Says
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Facebook News
Chinese social-network operators
Renren Inc. (RENN) and Sina Corp. (SINA) can’t rely on Facebook Inc. (FB)’s initial
public offering to boost their shares as both face challenges
attracting advertisers, according to Maxim Group LLC.
Renren, which completed an $855 million IPO last year, and
Sina, owner of the Twitter-like Weibo site in China, jumped in
New York trading on Feb. 2, the day after the world’s most
popular social network announced plans to raise $5 billion in an
IPO this year. American depositary receipts of Beijing-based
Renren have climbed 48 percent in 2012 while Sina (SINA), based in
Shanghai, has erased 2011’s 24 percent slump to gain 36 percent.
“There could be a short-term bounce from the Facebook IPO
but it’s not sustainable,” Echo He, a New York-based analyst
who covers Chinese Internet stocks for Maxim Group, said in an
interview. “Renren has a lot of promise but online advertising
dollars are hard to make in China. Advertising in China is still
TV dominant.”
More than $68 million was spent on TV advertising in China
last year, accounting for more than 75 percent of ad spending in
traditional media, excluding online, according to CTR
Marketresearch Co. Renren, which got 42 percent of 2010 revenue
from ads, said this month the market has got off to a “slow
start” in 2012 because of China’s economic slowdown. Sina
earned 76 percent of revenue from ads last year and said in
February that ad sales this quarter will be “disappointing” as
customers cut spending.
Sell Recommendation
Maxim’s He has had a sell rating on Renren (RENN) since Feb. 3 and
on Sina (SINA) since October last year, data compiled by Bloomberg
show. Renren, which fell 1.8 percent to $5.22 by 11:05 a.m. in
New York today, will slip to $4.50 over the next 12 months,
while Sina will tumble to $51, from $70.95, He said.
China’s economy grew 8.9 percent in the last three months
of 2011, the slowest pace since the second quarter of 2009, as
Europe’s debt crisis and a lackluster recovery in the U.S.
subdued demand for exports. Premier Wen Jiabao cut China’s
economic growth goal to 7.5 percent for 2012 on March 5, down
from 8 percent over the past seven years.
Renren reported an unaudited operating loss of $19.7
million for the fourth quarter, compared with operating income
of $2.3 million in the same period of 2010, as the company
boosted name-recognition advertising and increased the sales
force for its Nuomi e-commerce venture, according to a March 8
statement.
The site, whose name means “everyone” in Chinese and
which is targeted at the student market, is not expected to be
profitable this year, according to the average forecast of 10
analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
‘Not Apples-to-Apples’
Facebook’s success — it has 845 million members worldwide
and founder Mark Zuckerberg said in 2010 that it’s “almost a
guarantee” that it will achieve 1 billion users — has yet to
be replicated by China’s social networking sites, said Qi Guo,
an analyst at ThinkEquity LLC in San Francisco.
“Renren and Sina’s Weibo are still in the early stages of
development, so it’s not an apples-to-apples comparison with
Facebook,” said Guo, who has rated Sina a buy since October and
doesn’t cover Renren.
Sam Lawn, Renren’s investor relations director, didn’t
answer calls to his office in Beijing after hours. Sina’s
spokeswoman Cathy Peng also didn’t pick up calls in the capital.
Sina said on Feb. 28 that Weibo, which means “microblog”
in Chinese, had more than 300 million registered users. Renren’s
user base will grow to about 200 million in 2012, Chief
Executive Officer Joseph Chen said in a Feb. 14. interview.
Potential Acquisitions
Renren will post “healthy growth” this year from its
Nuomi e-commerce site, Chen said, adding that the company “will
not hesitate” to make acquisitions to gain new technology.
Renren bought online video website 56.com for $80 million last
year, and has cash holdings of about $1.2 billion.
“If the Facebook IPO is successful, the social networking
space in China will get a bounce,” Andy Yeung, a New York-based
analyst for Oppenheimer Co. said in a phone interview.
“Regardless of the Facebook IPO, Renren’s advertising revenue
will remain strong in 2012 and their online gaming business will
probably see some re-acceleration this year as well.”
Renren’s revenue from online games was $12 million in the
fourth quarter, up 39 percent from the same period of 2010, as
the company started and promoted new games, Chief Financial
Officer Huang Hui said on a March 8 earnings conference call.
Yeung rates Renren outperform, meaning he expects it to
gain more than the market, with a 12-month price target of $8.
Renren and Sina also compete with the Pengyou social
networking service operated by Tencent Holdings Ltd. (700), China’s
biggest Internet company by sales. Tencent stock traded in Hong
Kong added 3 percent to HK$223.40 today and is up 43 percent in
2012.
To contact the reporters on this story:
Leon Lazaroff in New York at
llazaroff@bloomberg.net;
Belinda Cao in New York at
lcao4@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Emma O’Brien at
eobrien6@bloomberg.net
Article source: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-03-22/renren-facebook-boost-to-be-shortlived-on-ad-growth-maxim-says
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Marine sergeant faces discharge over Facebook posts bashing Obama
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Facebook News
As his Facebook postings indicate, Marine Sgt. Gary Stein is no friend of President Obama — and that could lead to his discharge.
The nine-year veteran of the Corps is ready to fight back after the Marines declared that Stein’s online opinions violated Pentagon policy barring troops from any political activity.
Stein’s Facebook page, dubbed “Armed Forces Tea Party,” has criticized both his commander-in-chief and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.
“I’m completely shocked that this is happening,” said Stein, who is based at Camp Pendleton in California. “I’ve done nothing wrong.
“I’ve only stated what our oath states, that I will defend the Constitution and that I will not follow unlawful orders. If that’s a crime, what is America coming to?”
Stein, in one posting, said he would not follow orders from Obama to detain or disarm an American citizen if he felt their Constitutional rights were being violated.
Another Marine reported the comments, and Stein’s commander launched the probe.
“After reviewing the findings of the preliminary inquiry, the commander decided to address the allegations through administrative action,” the Marine Corps said in a statement.
Stein was yanked Wednesday from his job at a Marine recruiting post in San Diego and assigned to a desk job — with no computer access.
The Pentagon bars military personnel in uniform from sponsoring a political club; participating in any television, radio or group discussion for or against political candidates, causes or parties; and speaking at political rallies.
According to Stein, he could face a demotion in addition to dismissal if found in violation of the Pentagon policy.
lmcshane@nydailynews.com
Article source: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/marine-sergeant-faces-discharge-facebook-posts-bashing-obama-article-1.1048907
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Forking over a Facebook password to an employer?
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Facebook News
(MIKE SEGAR – REUTERS)
Talk about Big Brother. Employers now aren’t just limiting what their workers can and can’t say about them on social media sites. Some are actually asking for their Facebook passwords.
According to a report by the Associated Press Monday, some employers are asking interviewees to cough up their passwords rather than simply glancing at the publicly available pictures on Facebook or comments on Twitter. The practice is apparently more prevalent among law enforcement agencies, which are looking for gang associations or inappropriate relationships with minors that could be problematic, though a few companies are reportedly doing so as well. Experts aren’t just questioning whether the practice is an invasion of privacy — as one commenter to an ACLU post said, “will the next step be to request a key to my house?” — but even the technical legality of it. States like Illinois and Maryland are considering legislation against it.
What baffles me about the practice is how these organizations’ leaders could possibly think this won’t come back to haunt them. For one, it sets up an incredibly imbalanced sense of trust between employers and their staff. Presumably, the interview process includes a background check, a request for references, and an interview or questionnaire about one’s background, record and experiences. To ask for a Facebook password implies the company doesn’t trust you — or its confidence in other perfectly legal, frequently used tactics for getting information about the people they hire. Even if some employers might be doing this to weed out gang sympathizers or other criminals (because of course that’s what people reveal on their Facebook page!), that ignores the very real and very damaging long-term costs to organizational culture, employee retention and managerial trust.
In addition, it makes for some pretty awkward scenarios most people would prefer to keep out of the workplace. Even if we’ve been good about keeping the photos from our sister’s bachelorette party off of Facebook, most of us probably don’t relish the thought of our future bosses flipping through photos of us in a bathing suit from a recent beach vacation. Friends who innocuously post something about a job opportunity could make it look like we’re looking for a new job. And that day we skipped out a half hour early to catch a baseball game after pulling a late night the evening before? We’d probably prefer our manager not to see pictures of us at the game.
Perhaps most unsettling is the attempt being made by some of the few employers who actually do this to say forking over a Facebook password is “voluntary.” Even if it technically is, in a job market like this one, most applicants and employees aren’t going to think they have much choice. “Volunteering is coercion if you need a job,” IIT Chicago-Kent law professor Lori Andrews told the Associated Press.
It doesn’t appear that these invasive requests are all that common, and I highly doubt they’ll become so. But any manager or leader even considering asking an employee or potential employee for their Facebook password should bear in mind what happened when statistician Justin Bassett was asked for his: He withdrew his application. If you don’t trust your employees, particularly ones in high-demand careers you could lose in an instant, they’re not going to trust you either.
More from On Leadership:
How to completely destroy an employee’s work life
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@post_lead | @jenamcgregor | @lily_cunningham
Article source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-leadership/post/forking-over-a-facebook-password-to-an-employer/2011/04/01/gIQAVZKfTS_blog.html
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On Wall Street, Keeping a Tight Rein on Twitter
March 22, 2012 by admin
Filed under Twitter News
“Next stop Dow 57,757? Don’t count on it but Tuesday’s bullish session is in the books.”
That dash of market analysis on Twitter wasn’t an impromptu thought from an investor. It was a prewritten post, taken from a library of 140-character messages that had been approved by the compliance department of Morgan Stanley and sent out by financial advisers at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney.
This is how Wall Street firms are tiptoeing into the fast-paced world of social media. Firms like Morgan Stanley 
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] must tightly monitor communications to ensure that they are in compliance with securities regulations. As a result, they generally block employees from using social media sites like Twitter or even checking personal e-mail accounts at work. Indeed, the banks underwriting the gigantic Facebook I.P.O. bar their employees from using the social networking site.
Yet for Wall Street, social media constitute a largely untapped marketing opportunity.
So a cottage industry has emerged. Adept start-ups act as guides on Wall Street’s social media adventure, providing the software that helps firms comply with regulations that date to a sleepier era of communication.
“Here they were, these organizations that had never used the social networks because they had completely locked down access,” said Chad Bockius, the chief executive of Socialware, a start-up based in Austin, Tex., that advises financial firms on social media. “This is the same thing we saw when people started to use the Internet for business purposes.”
Mr. Bockius, 35, says his company was the first to offer social media compliance products for the financial industry. Socialware sells software that can archive messages, house a library of prewritten content and allow compliance officers to oversee postings.
Guardian Life, the insurance company, has used Socialware’s software to give its sales force access to LinkedIn and Facebook. AllianceBernstein, the asset manager, relies on Socialware for its group of advisers on LinkedIn [LNKD
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].
Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, which Mr. Bockius holds up as one of his most enterprising clients, gave about 600 of its 17,800 financial advisers access to Twitter and LinkedIn last summer, and now plans to expand those ranks.
“We’re trailblazing, so to speak,” said Lauren W. Boyman, who runs social media at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney. “Even with the restrictions that we have, we’ve seen a lot of success.”
But even as firms preach the benefits of a social media presence, the reception online has tended toward the mocking.
“You’re not going to build up a real following in social media if your tweet is, ‘It’s a beautiful day at Morgan Stanley,’ ” said Joshua M. Brown, a financial adviser at Fusion Analytics Investment Partners, who runs the Reformed Broker, a popular blog. “If you’re working within the large firm framework, it probably has very little value at this stage in the game.”
Ms. Boyman said internal statistics showed that financial advisers were successfully engaging with clients over Twitter, adding that prewritten messages help streamline the process.
The costs of a mistake are high. Thomas A. Pappas, vice president for advertising regulation at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Wall Street’s self-regulator, says it is no easy task overseeing communication on sites that were intended to issue messages at a rapid-fire pace.
“It’s scary for compliance officers and firms,” Mr. Pappas said.
Last year, the regulator suspended a California-based broker, Jenny Quyen Ta, claiming that she had praised certain stocks on Twitter without telling her firm she was doing so, or revealing that she personally held stakes in some of those investments.
In January, the Securities and Exchange Commission accused Anthony Fields, an Illinois-based investment adviser, of offering to sell “fictitious” securities on LinkedIn.
Still, firms are forging ahead. Deutsche Bank has allowed Ted Tobiason, a San Francisco-based investment banker, to use Twitter. Mr. Tobiason, whose postings must be approved by the firm’s branding and compliance departments, posts about initial public offerings.
Wells Fargo, in an effort to communicate with homeowners, has put a group of mortgage consultants on Facebook. Those employees can post from a library of preapproved content, but they are also encouraged to compose their own messages and “be personal,” said Timothy J. Collins, the bank’s senior vice president for experiential marketing.
For Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, networking on social media hasn’t yet turned into a measurable stream of dollars. In the latest phase of the firm’s experiment, a group of 20 financial advisers can write their own Twitter messages. Of course, the postings must be approved by the compliance department before going online. The process can take several hours.
She didn’t write it, but Fay DeBellis, a Minneapolis-based adviser for Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, had posted “Next stop Dow 57,757?” Her version happened to be the 2,000th Twitter message by a Morgan Stanley adviser, a fact noted in a congratulatory article on the firm’s internal Web site.
Still, Ms. DeBellis, 47, says she has not won any business from Twitter. She has had more success on LinkedIn, which she said brought her about $10 million worth of business over 18 months.
Ms. DeBellis, who manages more than $100 million for clients and who says she checks Twitter “randomly,” first used her account to track the location of food trucks near her office.
“There is a learning curve,” she said. “I feel like I’m on the forefront of a new frontier.”
Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/46821123
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