Facebook Friends

Edward Zuckerberg pulls his iPhone out of his jeans pocket and hits the familiar blue Facebook icon. He's eager to show off his latest effort to market his suburban dental practice. The man known as "Painless Dr. Z" is offering a free teeth bleaching kit to the first 10 patients who use their smartphones to tell their Facebook friends that they've stopped by his office. On the receptionist's desk, a blue sticker exhorts clients to "'Like' us on Facebook. " The effort has paid off. The dental practice has more than 1,100 fans.

Facebook has made a habit of advancing its interests at the expense of its customers, whether by weakening its privacy policy, tracking users' movements around the Web or radically reconfiguring the way information is displayed on the site's pages. So it probably shouldn't surprise anyone that while the company's initial stock offering was a boon to the company and insiders, it's been a costly disappointment for the general public. Now, some investors are accusing the company and its bankers of playing the public for suckers, sharing pessimistic revenue projections with a few insiders but not average investors.

Dear Amy: In this age of Republican vs. Democrat in almost all phases of government, the stress of relatives being of the other party and attending tea parties, disrupting town halls and marching on Washington has strained family relationships. I know we are all different and have the freedom to choose, but I feel as if these are personal attacks on me, so I have deleted all conservative friends from my Facebook account. There are a lot of people with these feelings in both parties -- any suggestions on how to deal with it?

SAN JOSE — Wondering where to go on vacation this year, and what to do? A growing number of "social travel" start-ups offer alternatives to the trusty, dusty guidebook. Sites like Twigmore and Triptrotting help you troll your social networks for friends who have friends in new places, then hit those people up for advice from a local's perspective — or arrange meet-ups when you get there. Another new site, Trippy, helps you keep track of all those interesting places you've come across on the Web while researching travel destinations.

I'm the mother of a child diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. What this often means is I feel lonely and stigmatized, and turn to the Internet in search of support. In other words, I'm just the kind of mom for whom McNeil Pediatrics, manufacturer of the popular, long-acting stimulant drug Concerta, is offering "practical, credible information" on its ADHD Moms Facebook page, launched last July.

With the rise of the Internet, people began looking for love on websites such as Match.com and EHarmony.com. With the growing popularity of social networks, they're turning to services like AreYouInterested.com. The dating application, available on Facebook and Apple Inc.'s iPhone, lets users see beyond the personal details of potential mates to their social circles, including friends and family. AreYouInterested.com is adding more than 50,000 users a day, according to parent company Snap Interactive Inc. Match.

SAN FRANCISCO - All eyes are on Facebook Inc., which is on the verge of a $100-billion initial public stock offering. But the people to watch are an elite group of former company insiders. Already loaded, or soon to be, thanks to the looming Wall Street payday, these Facebook pals are furiously building the next generation of Silicon Valley companies. And they're doing it together. Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz, the world's youngest billionaire at 27, has teamed with Facebook alumnus Justin Rosenstein on Asana, which makes online software that helps people work together more effectively.

Internet search engines have become such a helpful fixture of everyday life that it's tough to imagine life before them. They gather information at eye-blink speed, can guess a user's intent and present real-time results from Twitter and other social sites. But the experience of searching the Web remains largely solitary, or, as Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg might put it, it's not social. You can share the end result by pasting a link into an e-mail or a tweet, but there's no way to share the cool stuff you brush past in the midst of a search.

SAN JOSE — Wondering where to go on vacation this year, and what to do? A growing number of "social travel" start-ups offer alternatives to the trusty, dusty guidebook. Sites like Twigmore and Triptrotting help you troll your social networks for friends who have friends in new places, then hit those people up for advice from a local's perspective — or arrange meet-ups when you get there. Another new site, Trippy, helps you keep track of all those interesting places you've come across on the Web while researching travel destinations.

Tom Byron's restaurant, Pink Castle, is shaped like a giant nouveau castle, painted cotton candy pink and topped with blue fairy-tale turrets. The inside resembles an old-fashioned diner with comfy booths, checkered floors, balloons, video games and festive salsa music on the jukebox. Its most famous dish is a Pink Burger. Pink Castle has been such a success for Byron that he says he'd like to franchise it. On Facebook. "I think we all have harbored ideas of starting our own restaurant because it seems easy.

Researchers at Harvard University have gotten to the bottom of why so many people are compelled to share our every thought, movement, like and want through social networks like Twitter, Facebook, Foursquare, Instagram and Pinterest. In a series of experiments, the researchers found that the act of disclosing information about oneself activates the same sensation of pleasure in the brain that we get from eating, getting money or having sex. This may help explain recent surveys of Internet use that show that roughly 80% of posts to social media sites like Twitter and Facebook consist simply of announcements about one's own immediate experience.

The first thing people often said when I told them that I, single and 30, was moving to Los Angeles: "Aren't you worried about dating? They're even worse out there than they are here. " Implicit in this statement was a reminder that I was already too fat to captivate quality New York men. Did I really want to punish myself further by trying to find a husband in L.A.? When I hit 35, I decided it was time to venture online. On dating sites, where one can control one's image with the precision of a world-class branding firm, I could lead with "I'm not skinny.

As Facebook shoots toward a $100-billion initial public stock offering, the race is already on to find the next Facebook. And the smart money in Silicon Valley is betting one group has the inside track: Facebook's early employees. While building the world's largest social network, they built a social network of their own. Now that they have parted company with Facebook to seek their own fortunes, they have a competitive edge: each other. These ambitious young entrepreneurs call on one another for money and advice, sit on each other's boards and hook up to celebrate birthdays and weddings.

SAN FRANCISCO - All eyes are on Facebook Inc., which is on the verge of a $100-billion initial public stock offering. But the people to watch are an elite group of former company insiders. Already loaded, or soon to be, thanks to the looming Wall Street payday, these Facebook pals are furiously building the next generation of Silicon Valley companies. And they're doing it together. Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz, the world's youngest billionaire at 27, has teamed with Facebook alumnus Justin Rosenstein on Asana, which makes online software that helps people work together more effectively.

French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre famously wrote this line in his one-act play “No Exit”: “ L'enfer, c'est les autres .” ("Hell is other people. ") If he were alive today he'd probably appreciate the subversive delight people are taking in a new not so friendly Facebook plug-in that lets you add enemies, not just friends on Facebook, and “dislike” stuff with a click of a button. EnemyGraph is the brainchild of a college professor, Dean Terry, director of the new Emerging Media + Communications program in the School of Arts and Humanities at the University of Texas at Dallas.

Here's your floy-joy Friday roundup of consumer news from around the Web: -- Is a merger in American Airlines' future? With the bankrupt carrier expected to cut as many as 13,000 jobs, some in the industry say the time may be ripe for a corporate marriage . US Airways, whose management has a history of making bids for larger airlines that are in bankruptcy, confirmed that it has hired investment advisors to weigh the opportunities presented by...

Facebook friends may not be all that friendly, according to a new survey. In yet another examination of the negative social and psychological vibes generated by Facebook participation, researchers reported this week that 85% of women say they have been annoyed by their Facebook friends' postings. The survey of more than 400 women, from Eversave, a company that offers daily deals online, was conducted to examine how social networking influences consumers' reactions to daily deals.

The first thing people often said when I told them that I, single and 30, was moving to Los Angeles: "Aren't you worried about dating? They're even worse out there than they are here. " Implicit in this statement was a reminder that I was already too fat to captivate quality New York men. Did I really want to punish myself further by trying to find a husband in L.A.? When I hit 35, I decided it was time to venture online. On dating sites, where one can control one's image with the precision of a world-class branding firm, I could lead with "I'm not skinny.

Facebook, the social networking giant that connects 845 million people to one another, may be a jolly gabfest for the self-assured. But for those who suffer from low self-esteem, it appears to be a rather nasty trap, luring such people into self-disclosures that prompt many a Facebook friend to agree with their low opinion of themselves. A new study, set to be published in the journal Psychological Science, explored the dynamics of friendship on Facebook to see what benefits or pitfalls the site might offer to a population that could use the propping up of a few new friends: those who think poorly of themselves, fear judgment by others and are prone to social isolation and depression.

Five major ticket sellers — Ticketmaster, StubHub, ScoreBig, Eventbrite and TicketFly — have launched an online store on Facebook, hoping to boost sales by tapping into the social network's 800 million users. The store is part of Facebook's ambitious plan, unveiled in September, to become an entertainment hub for its users, an online touchstone for discovering new bands, watching the latest viral videos, finding local concerts and organizing friends for a night out on the town.