stories

Blogging hasn't become the world's second-favorite indoor activity, yet. But with so many free blogging resources available, it seems to be only a matter of time. However, time is a scarce commodity when it comes to keeping up with your blogs. Chrysanth WebStory is a free tool that can help you manage, edit, and back up your blogs and image accounts. It comes with a free online account for posting to your blogs and other sites from your PC or smartphone or other mobile device. WebStory is compatible with all major blog platforms, including Blogspot, WordPress, and LiveJournal, … Read more

Facebook is aiming to ramp up the impact of its sponsored story ads by including them in your regular news feed starting next month.

Splashing onto the social network last January, sponsored stories are ads that tout brands and businesses based on the likes of you and your friends.

Generated when a Facebook member clicks on the "like" button for a certain page, the ads display the friend's name, photo, and a tagline proclaiming that the person likes a certain advertiser.

So far, sponsored stories have been relegated to the right side of your Facebook page along … Read more

Skygrid is a fun-to-use, visually slick app for browsing through recent news from multiple sources.

Skygrid isn't tied to any particular news outlet, and you can't see much more than a short blurb and a thumbnail image for any particular story--so whether you're checking out a story from PBS NewsHour, CNET, TMZ, or WebMD, you'll have to click through to the source's Web site to read the whole story. Even so, Skygrid makes surfing the headlines fun, with a streamlined grid (of course) interface that lets you swipe through different sections and stories, with the … Read more

Google+ introduces improvements just before the holidays, text-sending teens increase their data usage by 256 percent over last year, and a federal judge rules that a lawsuit targeting Facebook's "sponsored stories" can proceed.

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded:

Facebook has landed in some legal hot water over its use of ads that snatch the names of members of the social network to promote a product or business.

In a ruling issued Friday, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, Calif., denied Facebook's request to dismiss a lawsuit over the practice of so-called sponsored stories. Such "stories," which started popping up this past January, create an ad based on the "likes" of a member's Facebook friends.

The ads typically display the friend's name, photo, and a caption asserting that the … Read more

As 2011 comes to a close, Twitter has decided to take a look back at some of the big stories that impacted tweeters around the globe in a new series, called Year In Stories.

One of the stories Twitter highlights is Shohaib Athar's sudden rise to fame. While he was sleeping in bed earlier this year, he heard a helicopter overhead, saw what was going on, and took to Twitter to tell followers what was happening. What Athar didn't know at the time was that he was live-tweeting the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound, and he … Read more

If you're a fan of Pixar's many wonderful movies--and who isn't?--you've no doubt spent years caught up in the studio's terrific storytelling. But you've probably also been glued to your seat again and again by Pixar's terrific artistry.

Now, you can dig deep into the history of that work. With the new book "The Art of Pixar," Amid Amidi takes us inside the creative process behind Pixar's long list of hit films--"Toy Story," "Finding Nemo," "Monster's Inc.," "Ratatouille," "… Read more

I'm a longtime fan of Tales2Go, the iOS app that provides unlimited children's audiobooks for a flat monthly rate.

Tales2Go - Happy Holidays bundles 20 seasonal audiobooks into one app, with no subscription required. Instead, you pay just 99 cents. That's a great deal any way you slice it, and an outright steal for parents and schoolteachers alike.

The collection includes short stories, full-length books, and even a familiar poem or two. Here's a sampling:… Read more

Buzz Lightyear is flying into high fashion, and he's taking Woody, the Aliens, and the rest of the Pixar-inspired crew with him, thanks to a new "Toy Story" fashion line from Bossini of Hong Kong.

A set of photos on Bossini's Facebook page show off the new line, which includes dresses, men's shirts, kids' costumes, and accessories.

Obviously, clothes that tap into the "Toy Story" motif are nothing new, as Disney and Pixar merchandise their movies faster than Kim Kardashian seeks out divorce lawyers. But from what I can make of Bossini's captions, it's laying out prices as high as $1,000 per three-eyed-alien tunic. … Read more