Profy

Yesterday the web measuring company comScore decided to publish the results of their study of the social networking field in Russia. Their research shows that Russia has the most engaged social networking audience in the world and I could not resist the temptation to share some thoughts as someone who lives and blogs on the technology from Russia.

The engagement is measured by comScore in terms of how much time people spend on social networking websites and how many pages people view on such sites and in Russia the numbers are highest with people spending 6.6 hours on social networks and viewing 1,307 pages per user per month. For comparison, in the US it's only 4.2 hours and 477 pages.

And it's not only that: 59% of all the internet users access social networks here. What's more, I myself know people who are not even internet users yet they do have accounts on social networks...

Come to think of it, it is truly fascinating how quickly one can get a respond from a huge community online - no matter what the question is. So it is no wonder that there are so many tools out there that make it possible to arrange polls around the web and embed them as widgets to your own websites, blogs or individual blog posts.

Today yet another service, ProProfs Polls, is launched that looks like a good addition to the market for a number of new interesting features it offers. I have already mentioned ProProfs here on Profy when I reviewed their tool for quizzes creation as a YouTube for quizzes...

Today Support.com, the company that specializes in remote support, has published their list of top 10 strangest things that people do with their computers that lead to pitiful consequences for their personal machines. It looks like common sense is still the only way to avoid doing things like these yourself but anyway I think it's worth taking a look at.

1.       Paying attention and doing everything that is recommended in all the pop up windows that appear when you browse the web because unfortunately too many of them prove to be dangerous as they disseminate viruses and other malware.

2.       Ignoring Windows updates...

Are you happy with your Twitter client? If so, you probably should stick to it and don't even read this post further because switching to a new application from something you are already comfortable with should take some serious advantages offered by the alternative. I would not say that OwlRead, the new Twitter client I have discovered is really stunning and a must-have for anyone who uses Twitter, but if you are not 100% happy with what you currently have, it may well be worth checking out - at least for its broad and interesting features...

The position of the Russian government has been clear for some time now: it is no good for Russian citizens to study and work using commercial Western software (developed and supplied mostly by Microsoft). Quite a number of arguments support the open-source trend, including the high prices that send many users to download pirated software and the threat of developing our advanced technologies in various scientific fields working on Windows-powered computers which does not feel particularly safe...

The Kamchatka peninsula in Russia is told to be one of the most fascinating places on Earth and those who have managed to visit the place are invariably impressed by what they see there - with the famous valley of geysers, active volcanoes and generally beautiful nature.

Unfortunately the most important problem with the peninsula is that, located in the Far East of Russia, it is too hard to get to - both for the Russian citizens and for the foreigners...

Come to think of it, microblogging is just a natural fit for all kinds of reality TV shows: after all, microblogging has a lot to do with reality TV as everyone seems to be broadcasting their lives to Twitter (and numerous other solutions available as well) as openly and willingly as those people who participate in reality shows broadcast their lives on TV to anyone who will want to watch...

This week here in Russia we have witnessed an interesting story that involves two spheres that are rarely interconnected at all -religion and social media. The thing is that one of the priests is now involved in a scandal that was caused by his numerous improper discussions in LiveJournal.

As some of you may be aware, LiveJournal is actually the most popular blogging platform in many countries of the former Soviet Union, including Ukraine where he lives. Absolutely everyone who wants to have a voice online should be there - simply because elsewhere people will hardly listen...

For quite a while now we've been talking about how powerful social media is in that it helps brands and businesses of all types and sizes to promote their goods and services doing virtually nothing but building a community (usually consisting of the beloved and valued existing users or customers) and encouraging the community to spread the word about the company...