Very funny anti SOPA song.

Even Vladimir Putin isn’t immune to the power of social media. We’ve seen how social media has fueled revolutions across the Middle East in the Arab Spring, and now Russian citizens are getting into the act. An independent election observer in Russia witnessed blatant voter fraud. He captured video on his phone and then uploaded it for all to see.

Mr. Duda raced home and uploaded the clip to YouTube. Though just three minutes long, it quickly became an election-day sensation, helping fuel a major demonstration of as many as 5,000 people on Monday evening in central Moscow. They chanted “Russia without Putin!” and “Putin is a thief.” Several hundred were arrested, including two major opposition leaders.

Valentin Gorbunov, the head of the Moscow City Elections Commission, confirmed the substance of the video and announced that Russian investigators had opened a case into ballot tampering by the head at Polling Place No. 2501, where the episode occurred, Russian news agencies reported Monday.

It’s stunning to see how oppressive regimes are losing their grip on the public. The key to power is controlling information, and in the past, control of TV and newspapers was the primary tool. But it today’s bottom-up world, that control is impossible with social media and the Internet. But it’s impossible to have a modern economy without an open web, so hence the dilemma for thugs like Putin. It also presents some risks but also huge opportunities for foreign policy goals in the United States.

It’s amazing to see how political campaigns has evolved in the Internet era. We’ve seen a transformation based primarily in the areas of online fundraising and using social media to organize supporters and volunteers.

This makes it much easier for national figures to quickly ramp up campaigns. Elizabeth Warren is a great example. She has a ton of progressive support after her role in creating the Financial Consumer Protection Bureau, so when she announced her Senate campaign, she was able to immediately harness her political celebrity. She raised a ton of money online in a short period of time, mostly from small donors all around the country. The web tools for this are now very common and easy to implement. In addition to raising a ton of money, she is also organizing an army of volunteers. As a result, her opponents in the Democratic primary have dropped out.

These tools are also important for less well-known candidates. People can create local buzz, and then use the same new media tools to leverage that buzz. Things now move much faster.

That said, old-school politics are still critical, and things like appearances and shaking hands generate news stories, that then get disseminated and then motivate people to go to the candidates web site. Also, people want to show their support in many ways, so signs and stickers are still important. So campaigns still need to pay attention to things like sticker printing, but the web is also helpful here as well, as all these things can be ordered online.

It will be interesting to see what innovations are in store for 2012.

Tom Friedman is usually very good at explaining the disruptive influence of new technology and the implications for the global economy, even if he isn’t the first (or second) to notice something.

The latest phase in the I.T. revolution is being driven by the convergence of social media — Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Groupon, Zynga — with the proliferation of cheap wireless connectivity and Web-enabled smartphones and “the cloud” — those enormous server farms that hold and constantly update thousands of software applications, which are then downloaded (as if from a cloud) by users on their smartphones, making them into incredibly powerful devices that can perform myriad tasks.

The emergence of the cloud, explained Alan Cohen, a vice president of Nicira, a new networking company, “means than anyone can have the computing resources of Google and rent it by the hour.” This is speeding up everything — innovation, product cycles and competition.

The October issue of Fast Company has an article about the designer Scott Wilson, who thought of grafting the body of an iPod Nano onto colorful wristbands, turning them into watchlike devices that could wake you up and play your music. He had no money, though, to bring his concept to market, so he turned to Kickstarter, the Web-based funding platform for independent creative projects. He posted his idea on Nov. 16, 2010, reported Fast Company, and “within a month, 13,500 people from 50 countries had ponied up nearly $1 million.” Apple soon picked up the product for its stores. Said Alexis Ringwald, 28, who recently founded an education start-up, her second Silicon Valley venture: “I have many friends — they introduce themselves as ‘reformed’ Wall St. bankers and lawyers — who have abandoned conventional careers and are now launching start-ups.”

Some like Rich Kaarlgard have been describing this as the “cheap revolution” for years. Friedman is explaining the new developments in that area. We now have it all at our fingertips all the time. It’s a powerful and exciting development. Kickstarter is a great crowdsourcing example that thrives in this environment.

Friedman uses the column to contrast Wall Street and Silicon Valley. It’s a good read.

Erin Andrews has advice for celebrities who decide to use Twitter. Andrews has a huge following, and she explains how famous people need to have thick skin to handle all of the tough comments thrown their way.

“There’s so many great things you can do with Twitter: get a message out; try to help people in need. I think the biggest thing you have to know with Twitter, and anything else from a blog to a newspaper, is that you just have to have a thick skin,” she said during a media luncheon for the 25th season of GameDay in New York last week. “You just have to let it roll off. You can maybe cry about it privately with your family. Talk about it by yourself. But you just can’t respond. It’s too dangerous.”

Tweet at your own risk.

Here are some tips for creating your online dating profile. The article is aimed more towards advice for women, but men can benefit from some of the tips as well. Online dating is becoming more and more popular, so everyone should check it out if you’re looking for love or even a hookup.

Read the whole article, but here’s one of the tips:

7. Don’t Provide A Laundry List Of Things You Don’t Want

“No ultimatums,” says Davis.

Starting out with “Don’ts” and “Nevers” makes you sound negative and also tends to induce oversharing. If you say you could never be with a guy who isn’t as loyal as Lassie, odds are someone will read between the lines and figure out your last boyfriend cheated on you.

This is pretty good advice, as many profiles created by women seem to have plenty of ultimatums.

Another tip we think women should consider involves picture of their dogs. So many women seem to be obsessed with their pets, and then litter their profile with photos of the dog. Really? Unless the guy is a real dog lover, this is going to turn him off. Let him meet your pet and then see how it goes, but pictures of dogs, particularly those tiny designer dogs, are going to chase many men away.

Jeff Morgan isn’t too impressed with Shaq’s Twitter announcement that he’ll retire.

Shortly after the announcement – a 15 second video clip in which a cheery Shaquille said “I’m about to retire. Love you.” – the tech blogosphere lit up, thrilled that such a mainstream event had been announced over the web. Some said it “proves the power of Twitter.” But how? Perhaps the only thing bigger than Shaquille O’Neal’s physical form is his online presence. He has nearly 4 million followers on Twitter and 2 million Facebook fans. His real world celebrity status still exists on the internet – what is so powerful about that?

Check out the entire article. In the end, Shaq was hyping a new service called Tout which let’s you upload 15 second video clips and send them out on Twitter. It was really just a PR stunt, and in that sense it worked!

Mike Elgan calls it, along with a detailed critique that explains why this site has fallen on hard times.

This is one of the many problems cited by Elgan, and this one drove us crazy as well.

Digg was anti-blog
Digg always had an inexplicable bias against blog content. In an age when CNN and the New York Times take blogs very seriously, a site like Digg should simply allow blog posts and let the users decide if they’re “weighty” enough.

This is how Digg alienated the bloggers.

Digg is now a mess. It’s still used to try to promote content, but it’s been gamed to the point that normal people can’t submit a story with any hope of having it take off.

We’ve noticed over the past several months that Google seems to be giving even more weight to porn sites over mainstream sites when tame search terms like “Hot Babes” or “Hot Blondes” are used. Instead of featuring mainstream sites that have bikini and lingerie models like Maxim, you end up with hard core porn sites.

What’s going on here? Google has outsmarted itself, and now the search results are a complete mess.

The online dating landscape keeps evolving, and Facebook and other social media sites are often leading the way. The latest out of Facebook let’s you set up a notice system so you get notified when someone you are interested in changes their status and is no longer “taken.” This breakup notifier will likely be a very popular feature.