They say the first bite is taken with the eye. If so, these appetizing restaurant websites succeed in whetting our appetites, inviting us to a savoury next bite. In these designs, color scheme and introductory copy show vastly different aspects of the restaurant experience. Moody warm tones create atmosphere, vibrant greens underscore freshness, and earthy colors communicate a relaxed, friendly attitude. Because customers are increasingly using mobile browsers to make decisions o..   show all text

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Of all topics, this is one of the perennials. People want more traffic, more attention, more awareness to their blog. It’s fair. We work hard on our blogs. We want more attention and traffic. If your business depends on volume, this is especially important (for instance, if you’re using ads). Getting traffic is a tricky business, and it requires a lot of experimentation. I’ll tell you what’s worked for me, so far, and I’ll tell you what you might try. Maybe others ..   show all text

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Are you addicted to Twitter? Do you have an iPad? Even if the answer to both is “no” right now, after you see Twitter for iPad, those answers are going to change — quickly. Yes, the wait is over. Launching tonight in the App Store is Twitter for iPad — the first official native iPad app from the company. We all knew it was coming (Twitter even said so a few months ago), but it has been a long wait. It was definitely worth it. Like most people, I wander into hyperbole fro..   show all text

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Mocha frappuccino and soy latte lovers rejoice: Starbucks is rolling out its Starbucks Card Mobile App for BlackBerry tomorrow, September 2. In September 2009, Starbucks introduced its Starbucks Card Mobile app for iPhone and iPod touch, enabling the owners of those devices to reload their Starbucks payment cards, monitor their rewards cards and even pay for their purchases at 16 stores in Seattle and the Silicon Valley region. In June, the coffee company extended its mobile payment system to 1..   show all text

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In the debate between the old version of Digg and the new Digg, the readers have spoken. Last week, Digg launched version 4.0 of the popular social news website. It’s been a rocky road pre-launch, so why would it be any different post-launch? Since the launch of the New Digg, which introduced the ability to follow friends, a faster architecture and personalized news, users have been in revolt, mostly over the types of stories reaching the front page. Digg has since addressed some of these..   show all text

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Microsoft has completed the development of its forthcoming Windows Phone 7. The mobile OS has reached the release to manufacturing (RTM) stage, the company announced today. All that remains now is for networks and manufacturers to work on the final integrations of WP7 so that it is prepared for its release. While an official release date has not been announced, most reports pin October as Microsoft’s target time for launch. “Windows Phone 7 is the most thoroughly tested mobile platf..   show all text

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Target will be the first retailer to sell Facebook Credits in its stores come Sunday. The Facebook Credits gift cards will be available in $15, $25 and $50 denominations at all 1,750 Target locations and at Target.com. The cards will soon make their way to two or three additional national retailers, according to USA Today. Facebook Credits is a virtual currency redeemable for primarily in-game Facebook purchases. In Farmville, for instance, gamers can use Facebook Credits as a currency, in lieu..   show all text

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    In celebrating the merits of free software and the excitement over this radical networked production method, an important truth is left unspoken. Networked collaboration shines in the low levels of network protocols, server software and memory allocation, but user interface has consistently been a point of failure. How come the networked collaboration that transformed code production and encyclopedia-writing fails to translate to graphic and interface design? The following is an ..   show all text

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Many people struggle at work because they want more authority. It turns out you can get a lot done if you just take more responsbility instead. It's often offered, rarely taken. (And you can get even more done if you give away credit, relentlessly).

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Most plants require sunlight, water and carbon dioxide to survive. We’ve found one that requires Facebook fans and wall posts. Meet Eater is a “real garden that feeds on social interaction.” It is an experiment in human interaction and design, focused on rebuilding the connection between human being and plants. Here’s how it works, according to its creator: “Meet Eater is rigged up with a system to register physical contact and social media interaction. Watering is..   show all text

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Google has quietly launched a new feature: search for blogs on any topic. The company announced the new type of search in a weekly round-up of search updates last week, and respected SEO blogger Bill Slawski argues that the launch may be related to a new Google patent. This has the potential to be a wildly useful service. How many of you have had professional or personal reasons to seek a list of the top blogs on a new topic? I know I, and many people I talk to, find themselves in such need fre..   show all text

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Digg has confirmed that it has hired Matt Williams from Amazon to replace Kevin Rose as CEO. Rose says that he will “remain actively involved in the product” but is handing over “day-to-day running of the business” to Williams. This news comes five months after Rose announced former CEO Jay Adelson would be leaving the company and about one month after the New Digg was first unveiled. At Amazon, Williams held various director-level and higher positions since 1999. Most r..   show all text

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If your Twitter page looks different, don’t freak out; Twitter is just temporarily disabling the new “Who to Follow” feature. On the Twitter Status blog, Twitter notes that it has “temporarily turned off the … feature” and that it will be “restored as soon as possible.” Twitter rolled out “Who to Follow” last month as a way to give users suggestions for other users to follow. These suggestions are based on things like, the people you..   show all text

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Digg has hired Amazon exec Matt Williams to be their new CEO, we’ve confirmed. This ends a months-long process that began with the ouster of former CEO Jay Adelson in April. Founder Kevin Rose has run the company since then. Williams has been with Amazon for more than a decade – since 1999. He is currently the GM of Consumer Payments. But he has held a variety of jobs – GM Webstore, Director Tech Alliances, Director Community & Cross-Merchandising and Director, Auctions an..   show all text

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In the last couple of hours, Facebook has been unstable for many users (including us), according to numerous tweets from those affected. In the last 15 minutes or so, Facebook seems to be completely inaccessible. While downtime happens far more rarely to Facebook than, say, Twitter, world’s largest social network has occasionally had stability issues. It’s a big deal: With 500 million active users, complaints about downtime mount up pretty quickly. We’ve contacted Facebook to ..   show all text

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With the launch of Priority Inbox, a radical new way to sort mail, Google has hugely changed the way you can process and manage email. As Gmail Product Director Keith Coleman says, “Once you go priority, you never go back.” The set-it-and-forget-it solution has actually existed in various states of completion for years, dating all the way back to pre-release versions of Gmail. The feature was picked up again 18 months ago, and today we can finally experience it for ourselves. At its..   show all text

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Today, Google will begin rolling out Priority Inbox for Gmail, a new feature for managing massive amounts of e-mail. Your inbox will never be the same again. Priority Inbox is Google’s attempt to solve the e-mail woes of Gmail power users. At its core, the feature is an algorithm; Priority Inbox uses information such as keywords, the people you e-mail the most and your e-mail habits to select the most pressing e-mails in your inbox. Those e-mails are brought to the top of your Gmail and m..   show all text

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As millions of students are trudging back to the classrooms this August, Facebook is returning to its roots: colleges and universities. Just in time for the back-to-school season, the company has partnered with social marketing firm Context Optional to build a Facebook Page of resources and information for new and returning students and their families. Students can find out about publicizing events, engaging with their larger campus community and distributing their own content on this page. And..   show all text

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Hey Foursquare junkies, here’s another merit badge to add to your digital belt: MTV has teamed up with Foursquare to award users who check in to a music venue with the 2010 MTV VMA Moonman Badge. Yeah, a rad badge is all well and good, but what’s in it for you? Well, the whole deal is also a contest, the grand prize being a trip for two to the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards on September 12. To get in the running for the prize, all you have to do is follow MTV on Foursquare, and then ch..   show all text

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This series is supported by Gist. Gist provides a full view of the contacts in your professional network by creating a rich business profile for each one that includes the most news, status updates, and work details. See how it works here. Today’s CEO is not social. So says Forrester Research’s CEO George Colony. Very few of the CEOs at top companies in the U.S. and the rest of the world have any material presence on the popular social media sites. Colony believes they should be so..   show all text

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MySpace, once Facebook’s bitter rival, is embracing the social network in a big way today with the launch of status updating syncing for Facebook. Sync for Facebook allows users to broadcast their MySpace status updates to their Facebook friends. In addition to status updates, users can share their links, photos, videos, music and even application installations from MySpace to Facebook. This is in addition to Sync for Twitter, which the company launched last year. Facebook-MySpace sync is..   show all text

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This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business. For all the praise that brand advertisers have for social media, they must be aware that it’s very much a double-edged sword. And for all the free marketing, advertising and brand promotion via Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, and other platforms used to help build an identity and relationship with your customers, it ..   show all text

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After being down for an entire week, popular random video chat service Chatroulette is back with a new version. The transition to version two wasn’t exactly graceful; Chatroulette was supposed to be down one day, but the extended downtime, during which the site was nothing more than a white page with a simple text message, saying the new version will launch “shortly,” was a sign that not everything had gone according to plan. So, what did the new (and, hopefully, improved) Cha..   show all text

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Cisco has made an offer to acquire Skype before they complete their IPO process, says one of our more reliable sources. We have not been able to confirm this rumor one way or another via other sources, which isn’t surprising. A company in lock down during the IPO process is usually even more tight lipped than normal. But if true this would be one very big acquisition. Skype insiders are hoping for an out of the gate valuation of $5 billion or so, we’ve heard. Presumably Cisco would ..   show all text

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Google is reportedly in advanced negotiations with major Hollywood movie studios to launch a streaming, pay-per-view movie rental site by the end of 2010. The site would be either part of or connected to YouTube, and Google would use its massive search and video empires to direct new users to the new service, helping it stand toe-to-toe with Apple and other competitors in the space. According to anonymous sources cited by The Financial Times, including an executive with knowledge of the deal, ..   show all text

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As per usual, there’s no legal way to stream video of the whole 2010 Emmy Awards ceremony live online, but there are a few ways you can use the web to supplement your TV viewing experience. This year the options include Facebook and Twitter-integrated, live red carpet and backstage video from Ustream as well as live blogs from Team Coco, Entertainment Weekly and others. You can also turn to the crowd for info by following Twitter updates about the ceremony, or checking Justin.tv for live ..   show all text

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Success in Silicon Valley, most would agree, is more merit driven than almost any other place in the world. It doesn’t matter how old you are, what sex you are, what politics you support or what color you are. If you idea rocks and you can execute, you can change the world and/or get really, stinking rich. For the most part I’ve sat on the sidelines over the years during the endless debates about how we need to do more to encourage more women to start companies. What I mean by &ldqu..   show all text

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