Now Facebook is countersuing Yahoo, denying Yahoo’s allegations that Facebook infringed on the company’s patents — and claiming Yahoo is actually infringing on Facebook’s patents.

Facebook’s counter-claim, filed Tuesday, denies Yahoo’s statements that many of Facebook’s tools and features on the site stem from developments made by Yahoo. Facebook requests that any triable issues be taken to court.

The social network also says Yahoo is in violation of some of its patents, including patents the company holds for “generating a feed of stories personalized for members of a social network,” and “tagging digital media.”

Facebook says it plans to fight the original lawsuit.

Source: Mashable

A team of more than 20 Facebook engineers — led by a former Google programmer — is at work on a vastly improved search engine within the site, according a Businessweek report.

The idea, according to two sources, is to take better advantage of the heaps of content Facebook users create on — and off — the site every day. With people sharing status updates and supporting brand pages on the network, as well as using Facebook’s “Like” button to mark articles and videos from external sites, there is certainly a lot to take advantage of.

Mashable contacted Facebook for more information and got this response from a company spokesperson: “We don’t comment on rumors and speculation around products.”

Google has boosted its presence in the social space recently, opening the Google+ network last fall and a “Search, Plus Your World” feature to tepid response earlier this year. So it’s interesting to see Facebook potentially make a stronger move into the search world.

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Source: Mashable

A new report says Facebook has acquired 750 patents from computer-systems giant IBM. The news comes shortly afterYahoo sued Facebook for patent infringement over 10 of its software patents.

A “person with knowledge of the transaction” tipped the news, though the deal hasn’t been made public yet.

Compared to other tech companies, Facebook’s arsenal of patents is rather meager: The company has just 56 patents compared with the thousands stockpiled by the likes of Microsoft and Apple.

However, the report says, Facebook has applied to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for at least 500 more. Apparently it didn’t want to wait for those to be approved and chose to take a shortcut in stocking up its patent portfolio.

The lawsuit from Yahoo, which has recently had a wholesale change in management and is expected to announce layoffs, likely provided the motivation.

Source: Mashable

Although it is required by law for Facebook users to be at least 13 to join the network, many believe the age limit should be higher, a new study says.

According to a poll conducted among 2,000 consumers on the opinion-based community SodaHead.com, about 34% of respondents said Facebook users should be at least the age of 13 to join. However, most voters selected ages older than 13 as a minimum requirement, as 29% want ages 14 – 17 to be the earliest and 19% said the site should be limited to those over the age of 18.

Only 13% said users between the ages of 10 and 12 were acceptable for the site, followed by 5% approving of people joining between the ages of 7 and 9.

Child privacy laws necessitate Facebook’s age minimum of 13 years old.

Source: Latest News on Social Media

“Don’t judge a book by its cover?” Well according to a new study, it seems that’s exactly what social media users tend to do with Facebook pictures.

“Photos seem to be the primary way we make impressions of people on social networking sites,” said Brandon Van Der Heide, lead author of the study and assistant professor of communication at Ohio State University. “If your profile photo fits what they expect, observers may be unlikely to look very closely at the rest of your profile – they have already decided how they feel about you.”

“People will accept a positive photo of you as showing how you really are, but if the photo is odd or negative in any way, people want to find out more before forming an impression,” said Van Der Heide. “If your photo is not quite normal – either positively or negatively – people are going to pay a lot more attention to what you wrote.

Source: Mashable