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Rumor has it that Facebook is on the verge of creating a new classifieds listings, which could put it in direct competition with Craigslist.

According to The Daily's Matt Hickey, two anonymous sources within the social network revealed information on the project and said that it's likely to be finished sooner rather than later.

The service would reportedly let users create ads to show up in friends' news feeds. These would essentially offer the same sorts of things Craigslist posts do -- jobs, apartment rentals, and items for sale -- but would only target users who meet specific … Read more

Twitter is trying to suss out which of its users are male and which are female. And so far, it's gotten its prediction science down to a 90 percent accuracy rate.

But, let me back up. Why in the world would the social network want to figure out the gender of its individual users?

Why for advertising, of course.

According to Twitter, the fairer sex might like to see a promoted tweet featuring cosmetics, while men would most likely ignore such advertising. All of this apparently matters when trying to generate ad revenue and monetize the site.

Unlike some … Read more

Looking to amp up its ad revenue, LinkedIn rolls out global video advertising.

The professional networking site announced today that its self-serve platform, LinkedIn Ads, now lets advertisers use their YouTube or other videos to promote brands.

"Video ads are currently available through the LinkedIn Ads self-serve interface, our targeted advertising platform that lets large and small advertisers place text and image ads across the LinkedIn site," LinkedIn's online marketing manager, Will Hambly, wrote in a blog post today. "With LinkedIn Ads you can control your costs, pay per view or click, and stop your campaign … Read more

Facebook is upping its efforts to make money on mobile.

In early August, the company rolled out its first mobile ad units that aren't tied to a user's social connections. These ads, which Facebook called a test at the time, let an undisclosed number of third-party developers buy ads in mobile New Feeds as a way to help them drive more people to their apps. Tapping on the ad would take you to the Android or iOS App Store purchase page.

Now Facebook is opening its mobile app install ads to all developers, which should help spread apps … Read more

Apple's iPhone 5 has been available for only a few weeks, but already it's generating more Web traffic volume than the Samsung Galaxy S3.

Online advertising network Chitika today released results of a study it conducted on Web traffic volume between the iPhone 5 and the Galaxy S3. The company found that of "millions of mobile ad impressions" it recorded on the iPhone 5 and Galaxy S3, more than half -- 56 percent -- originated from Apple's handset. Samsung's smartphone nabbed 44 percent of the total impressions.

"Only 18 days since the public … Read more

Four Windows 8 television advertisements have leaked online, ahead of the operating system's launch later this month.

The advertisements, which first appeared on Israeli technology site TechIt, show off some of the main features of the operating system, but focus on the learning experience for new and existing Windows users.

A number of early adopters have complained that the new user interface is difficult to understand, too complicated or not designed with traditional desktop PCs and laptops in mind. Many reviewers and technology blogs and sites -- including CNET -- have noted that the navigation is tricky and the … Read more

The general thought in the tech world is that mobile ads are something companies should be intensively focusing on -- since it could be a good source of revenue.

But, are these ads resonating with users?

A new study shows that most smartphone owners admit to not remembering mobile ads, according to The Next Web.

In the study, which was conducted by ad solution company Azullo, 1,014 U.K. smartphone owners were asked if they could remember an advertisement they'd seen on their device in the last six months. Only 21 percent said yes.

What's more, when … Read more

Wells Fargo is the most recent mega-bank to be hit by a distributed denial-of-service attack. According to the Wall Street Journal, roughly 220 customers filed complaints of outages on its Web site today saying they had problems logging on.

"The amount of bandwidth that is flooding the websites is very large, much larger than in other attacks, and in a sense unprecedented," chief executive of private security firm CrowdStrike Dmitri Alperovitch told the Wall Street Journal.

Last week, similar attacks happened on J.P. Morgan Chase and Bank of America's Web sites. Users would try to log-on … Read more

In an attempt to find out which ads lead to purchases, Facebook is partnering with Datalogix, a company that compiles consumer purchasing data from retail stores. But the move has privacy advocates asking federal regulators to scrutinize the deal.

Marc Rotenberg, president of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, told CNET today that he will ask the Federal Trade Commission to investigate the new Facebook-Datalogix deal and determine whether the business practice complies with the terms of a recent $9.5 million agreement Facebook reached with the FTC to settle privacy complaints.

"In light of the recent consent order with … Read more