URL X-ray: With phishing, spamming and spyware all remaining concerns in the Web 2.0 world, URL X-ray is a neat little tool that allows you to combat this problem. Unless you’re sure of the source, clicking on a shortened URL in Twitter or anywhere else can be a risky activity, but by entering the shortened URL into URL X-ray, you will quickly see where the URL is about to take you. While most of the people we follow on Twitter post reliable links, this is a great tool to verify anything that looks suspicious. Your computer is protected from potential viruses, and you decrease the risk of visiting a site that may be NSFW.

Past Words of the Week
Mashup, Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Mashup: A mashup on the Web is a site or application that combines features from multiple sources to create a new service. This often involves using open APIs from different services to create an integrated solution for whatever the user is trying to accomplish on the Web. Examples of mashups range widely from metasearch engines and geolocation software to feeds and aggregators. Mashups like Ping.fm and Digsby also enhance social communication by combining several popular services into one easy-to-use application.

Past Words of the Week
Blog Talk Radio, TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Blog Talk Radio: Blog Talk Radio is a free site that allows anyone to become a talk radio host on the Internet. This is yet another way for Internet users to share their lives and express their opinions on the Web, and it’s a great way for businesses to provide their expertise in their industry. Like a podcast, this is a unique way to supplement a company blog, as it extends your brand to a different audience and can create even more interaction. Just like a real radio show, this allows for multiple participants at once, so more than one guest/listener can join the host and contribute to the conversation.

Past Words of the Week
TweetedRanks, Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

TweetedRanks: TweetedRanks is a free and easy tool that does exactly what it sounds like: it tweets the Google ranks of any site you’ve associated with your account. Updates are sent via direct message, and users can also choose to get update messages via Google’s IM client, Google Talk. On the TweetedRanks site, users set the domain(s) they would like to track along with any keywords that they want to associate with those domains. The site provides diagrams so that users can track their Google position between Twitter updates.

Past Words of the Week
Ping.fm, Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Ping.fm: Last week we talked integration in a world saturated with social media tools and networks, and Ping.fm fits right in with that theme. With Ping.fm, users can update all of their statuses at once to save time while tweeting, Facebooking, IM-ing, etc. Just one click and your global status is set. Currently Ping.fm supports almost 40 different social networks, so no matter what your network of choice happens to be, you can take full advantage of what Ping.fm has to offer.

Past Words of the Week
Digsby, Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Digsby: For the social media enthusiast who is feeling spread too thin, Digsby is the perfect tool for integration. With one free account and a quick software download, Digsby users can combine all of their IM buddies from AIM, G-chat, MSN, etc. into one buddy list; manage multiple e-mail accounts from Gmail, AOL and Yahoo! as well as POP and IMAP accounts; and integrate social networking accounts from Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and LinkedIn. From the Digsby platform, you can tweet, IM, compose and reply to e-mail, and perform just about any other function that each service offers. Users can also set a global status for their Digsby account, which will simultaneously act as a tweet, a status update for Facebook, LinkedIn, etc., and an away message for each IM account that is being used.

Past Words of the Week
Qik, Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Qik: We talked a few weeks ago about lifecasting and tools such as Ustream that allow users to stream live videos from their computers, so the next logical step would be live streaming from a phone. Qik is a mobile video platform that can stream live video to the Internet right from a cell phone. Now anywhere you go, you can share your experiences live at the click of a button with any friends or strangers that happen to be tuned in. The service can be linked into e-mail, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook, and there are already mobile apps available for Android phones.

Past Words of the Week
Posterous, Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Posterous: Posterous is a site that allows anyone to post any item of interest to the Web at any time, then provides the user with a custom URL that they may then share via their social networks. Acting as a sort of hybrid of a blog and Twitter, all a user has to do is send an e-mail with an attached photo, video, MP3, or other file, to the generic inbox. The site instantly responds to the user’s e-mail with a custom URL that will host whatever file that was sent. Similar to services like TwitPic, Posterous users’ information can be shared instantly and publicly.

Past Words of the Week
Ning, API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

Ning: Ning is a site that allows anyone to create a fully functional social network for as little as $20 per year. This is a great tool for people who share similar hobbies, interests or ideals to get together on the Web. With features such as groups, photos, chat, RSS feeds and forums, along with each member’s unique profile, a Ning network has many of the same capabilities of the social networking giants Facebook and MySpace. Ning is also a creative tool for companies to use to disseminate information and recruit new employees.

Past Words of the Week
API, Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags

API: API (application programming interface) is an interface that allows one software application to interact with another. In social media, the API is what allows sites like Twitter to be used through desktop applications such as TweetDeck or mobile applications like UberTwitter. Shared APIs also allows users’ Twitter updates to display on their Facebook page, and vice versa, and it’s how YouTube videos are able to be embedded on other sites and blogs. As long as developers can take advantage of public APIs, the number of new social media tools and apps will continue to increase, and the capabilities of the most popular networks will continue to amaze.

Past Words of the Week

Lifecasting, Crowdsourcing, Meme, Social bookmarking, Trackback, Twitter Grader, Authority, TweetBeep, Compete, Astroturfing, WEGO Health, BackTweets, PDR.net, socialmention, Twazzup, Health Exchange, Health Tweeder, DIDGET, Thoora, Google Buzz, bit.ly, E-patient, Alltop, mHealth, Augmented reality, OpenID, ROI, #hcsm, Medpedia, Almost.at, Hashtag, FollowFriday, Beta, Microblogging, Sidewiki, Meta tags