The first smart move that Microsoft had made was to prominently display Tweets as results. But may be it was biting off more than it can chew. Now comes the news that first, Facebook has acquired FriendFeed for $50 million , second it has replaced Live.com its search engine with Bing. Readers remember that Microsoft has 10% share in Facebook.

Facebook is no doubt much improved and less cluttered and more efficient in its search capabilities. In the old Facebook one had to browse through various categories and there was no way to search for shared items and status updates. Now tabs have been provided on Facebook on the left side where you can simply click to find various categories. You can also seach the web and find the results displayed as a filter rather than on your own page.

Hitherto the facility of sharing your up dates was not available to others and Twitter certainly scored over Facebook where you could search for anything on the earth. Now on Facebook you can go to “Posts by Everyone” and find information the same way you do on Twitter. A message on top of the screen will update the results of your query as they appear.

Although, Facebook has made its intentions clear the problem seems to be with the users who are not prepared to part with personal information to “every one”. Facebook is trying to get over this problem by introducing new privacy options.

The rivalry will begin if Facebook succeeds in turning Twitterish.

So, it is still early hours to expect Twitter to react and know how it will fend off competition. But, will Twitter move closer to Google?

How to migrate your custom MS Office dictionary from one computer to another? This is a frequent query by several users  on “Add to Dictionary” option. This is a feature you could use always when you might want to consider moving the file into your documents and then reassigning the custom dictionary to that location thereby, making backups a lot simpler, since you wouldn’t have to dig around to find it.

Add to Dictionary option

You can accentuate your search on “Add to Dictionary” option for MS Word 2007 or other Office 2007 applications by clicking on the big Office button in the upper left-hand corner, then Word Options and then in the Proofing section you notice Custom Dictionaries.

The above action will bring up the screen where you can assign custom dictionaries, as well as see the full path to the current dictionary file. After you transfer the file from the old computer to the new one, you’ll need to use the Add button here to add the dictionary, if it’s not automatically added.

Note: Outlook 2007 requires you to open a new email before you open the Office button.

Back Up or Transfer

You can backup your dictionary file by browsing down to “Add to Dictionary” option or just enter in the following into the location bar in explorer:

%appdata%Microsoft

You’ll see one of two directories, for Office 2007 versions the path is usually located in the UProof folder, which is what you’ll want to back up and transfer to the same location on the other system. Also, you could put it somewhere else if you’d like, for instance in your Documents folder.

Note: if you open the file you should be able to see all of your custom words and avoid making edits from here if possible. You should use the Edit Word List dialog in here to make any changes, but don’t make changes to the file itself. All of those words are stored in a custom dictionary file and it is a complex process to re-enter on a new computer.

Conclusion

You must make sure you close all Office apps before copying the file in “Add to Dictionary” option to the same location on the other computer since doing so, you should be able to add the custom dictionary to the new computer, if it’s not automatically detected or you decided to put it into your documents folder.

A new kind of fraud has emerged in Face Book where rivals are employing cheap labor and software to put competitors with limited capital out of business. 
Face Book maintains a demographic profile for placement of its ads. Rivals to the people who have limited finance as capital employ cheap labor and software to click on the ads thereby making them pay more money than they would have otherwise paid.. First accounts are opened with Face Book conforming to the demographic detail that it maintains. For this purpose the software is used. Then when the concerned site is opened the software clicks conforming itself to the number of clicks that Face Book permits. The advertiser then pays for the number of clicks that the site received as charged by Face Book.
Face Book was alerted to this fraud and kept it under wraps till it could take measures to detect the fraud. One way was to connect the site another site where certain details pertaining to some sort of survey have to be filled up. Certainly the software did not have time to pause in this clicking frenzy. Another method Face Book is employing is to reimburse the credits to the advertiser when it detects the fraud.
It is one thing to generate traffic to a site to generate money. It is like the purity of gold and some amount of it is tolerated even by Google. But it is another to employ cheap labor to increase the advertising costs of rivals.

First there was criticism that Face Book was trying to emulate twitter. But the apprehensions were put to rest saying the role of Face Book and the way it is used is different from Twitter.

Then came the announcement of converting user names as URLs as part of their SOE.

Today Face Book is way ahead of Twitter and the other social Networking site My Space has some catching up to do.

Now Face Book has come out with live streaming of videos in conjunction with Ustream. The facility for live streaming was tested by Face Book earlier with CNN and now with Ustream which streamed the videos of “Jonas Brothers’” concert live which was watched live by one million fans.

After the success tasted by Face Book with this event it has decided to add Ustream as a tab. There are two kinds of offers. One is for free and viewers can add this facility to chat, comment and share their posts live. But this is a limited edition offer. The second is offer that comes with a price tag for those who want to host their shows live on face book using Ustream. They can simultaneously reach out live to a large audience and the audience can also take advantage of the fact that they can interact. Similarly this offer has been open to brands that want to go live and interact with the users and simultaneously reach out to a large number of people.

This feature is no doubt a welcome change to the existing features of Face Book. But the criticism of Face Book still remains that it is turning away from the purpose it began for and is slowly becoming more commercial oriented with a Twitter inclination. May be that’s where the ad revenues lie.

All users with an email gets almost hundreds of friend requests every day from different social networking websites including, Facebook, Orkut, Myspace etc. it’s quite annoying to handle these because they cannot easily stop these mails directly.
Facebook by default sends you an email notification whenever there is any friend request or any other change in the face book applications which the user needs to disable to stay away from this spam.Facebook sends the user an email whenever someone adds them as a friend and they have to approve to add them back by logging into their account. Normally, all these email notifications are sent to them instantly whenever their friends find them on Facebook and when they add them on their network.Facebook shows all the requests in an account on the homepage where it can approve the requests and confirm them after which all the friends would be shown on the profile page which any other facebook member can find.
An email received is as follows:
Rahul has added you as a friend on Facebook. We need to confirm that you know Rahul in order for you to be friends on Facebook.
To confirm this friend request, follow the link below:
Confirm the request

The disabling of these friend requests can be done by clicking on the link which comes at the end of an email which is linked to the ‘Email Notifications’. It is notified by email whenever actions are taken on Face book involving the user.
Every Application will have its own set of email notifications. You can clik on the name that is avaialable on the right side of that appliaction to change its settings. Face book tells that even if the user turns off all notifications, they may sometimes need to email important notices about their account.
The cancellation of a “Friend Request on Face book” is discussed. If the user sends a friend request on Face book which is not yet addressed, then there is no way it can be cancelled. It automatically terminates that request after 3 months. Till then the request will be present in an account, unless the user decides to reject or accept it.This was the case with my account some time back. May be Face book should change this rule. Some times by mistake, we send the friend request to a wrong person. This feature will be very handy while committing such blunders.

Often when I talk to expats about networking on Facebook, they seem doubtful that contacts made there would help them professionally.  I might have agreed with them a few years ago, but today there is more and more evidence that this is simply not the case.

I wanted to share a story with you of one such a case.  I was chatting with a client about the success they’d been having with their blog and online networking. They mentioned that their partner (both of them expats) had actually secured an internship, which led to his current full-time job, through Facebook.

Always looking for news to inspire others to get out there and leverage the power of Facebook, I asked him if he would be willing to share his story.  And here it is…

“I had finished an internship with the United Nations (UN) World Food Programme (WFP) in September 2006 and I was looking for my big break to get back into the UN system.

I was looking for my “first job” after finishing my undergraduate degree, which is tough enough anywhere.  Living in Rome and not speaking much Italian, not being here 100% legally, and having little connections did not help me very much. Read the full story

The battle between Facebook users and the crooks and hackers just keeps rolling along. The criminals love these social networking sites because they can hijack the identity of a person known or trusted by you to attempt a fraud. The goal, as always, is to relieve you of your money or identity, or both.

The latest fraud involves the so-called Nigerian 419 scam, but with a twist. Instead of getting an email from someone in Nigeria offering you money, you receive an email from someone you know. The message says the person is stranded in Lagos, Nigeria, so please send money so he can return home.

You may be tempted to send the cash, but be careful. This is probably a fraud. Your friend’s email account may have been hijacked, and the message is being sent to all his contacts. It is very easy to fake a return address in an email.

Read the message carefully. Are there any grammar or spelling mistakes? Improper usage of slang or popular terms? Would your friend really send such a message to you? Think twice, or more, before responding.

Most social networking sites are vulnerable to this kind of attack. As I have said many times, minimize the amount of personal information you reveal in your profile. Check what your kids are revealing in their own profiles.