Google just launched an updated version of Google Flu Trends , a service that predicts flu trends by tracking flu related queries on the company's search engine. Until now, Google only showed aggregate data for states in the United States. Starting today, Flu Trends will show data down to the city level for 121 cities . As Google notes in today's announcement, this update was timed to coincide with the National Influenza Vaccination Week . Sponsor Google also offers Flu Trends data on a country level for Mexico , Australia, New Zealand and most of Western Europe. Data on Flu Trends is updated daily. By tracking flu-related queries, Google has already proven to be able to accurately predict the flu levels on the state and country level. It looks like Google now feels like its algorithms are accurate enough to predict influenza trends on a more granular level. Until Google is able to validate this data, however, the company is labeling the city level estimates as "experimental." Google and Google.org - Google's non-profit foundation - sponsor a number of influenza-related projects. Google, for example, now offers a vaccine-finding map and the company is working with the Public Library of Science (PLoS) to to give give scientists a place to collaborate and share research on influenza research on Google Knol . Discuss

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Google Launches Flu Trends For 121 U.S. Cities

We've been in a globe-trotting mood for the past two weeks here at the ReadWriteWeb Events Guide, adding new conferences and seminars in London and Australia. As always, you can download the entire event calendar in iCal format or import it into your Google Calendar. You can also import individual events using the link beside each entry. We publish it every weekend, as good a time as any to review your conference plans. This events guide is a weekly feature here on ReadWriteWeb. Know of an event taking place that should appear here? Let us know in the comments below or contact us . Sponsor 11 January 2010: Nashville, Tennessee Social Fresh Nashville This is the social media conference that comes to you. Social Fresh is a one-day, case-study-rich conference targeted for marketers. Social Fresh Nashville will have 30-plus speakers, including Jason Falls of Social Media Explorer, Gavin Baker of Ruby Tuesday and John Andrews of Collective Bias (formerly of Walmart). ReadWriteWeb readers get a 15% discount with the code "RWW15". 14 January 2010: Palo Alto, California The Founder Showcase The Founder Showcase , by TheFunded.com, is an open startup pitch and networking event that highlights the newest cutting-edge businesses and helps innovators gain traction among the Silicon Valley elite. On Thursday, January 14th, 10 of the most promising early-stage companies, as selected by over 13,000 registered Founders and CEOs on TheFunded.com, will present to an audience of over 300 investors, founders, and members of the press. A panel of experts will critique the pitches, and an open ballot of those in attendance will determine the Founder Showcase Winner. ReadWriteWeb readers receive a 10% discount when registering, just use discount code "RWW". 20 January 2010: London New Digital Revenue Streams Seminar Madgex and Abacus e-Media are hosting a free seminar that will offer advice and case studies from media organisations that have successfully created a direct impact on profit margins. The event is supported by the Association of Online Publishers (AOP) and Haymarket-owned Brand Republic, and will feature speakers, including David Archer, CEO of Scottish Television. The breakfast seminar takes place at the Council Chambers, Law Society, 113 Chancery Lane, London from 8.30-11 a.m. (registration and breakfast from 8.15 a.m.). To register, book here or email marleen.kinder@madgex.com . 26 January 2010: San Francisco, California Catalyst Conference Vator.tv , a leading platform for entrepreneurs and innovators to broadcast themselves, and provider of news and information through VatorNews, and Girls in Tech, a social network enterprise focused on education and empowerment of influential women in technology, are seeking five women-led startups across any stage to present at the Catalyst Conference on January 26, 2010 at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco. To be one of the five, join the Catalyst competition today and win the chance to present. 27 – 28 January 2010: Amsterdam, The Netherlands Enterprise Social 2.0: Rip or ROI? This senior executive event will bring together decision makers from the Top Fortune companies to discuss innovative strategies on how to maximise business performance through social media engagement. The event will include keynote speeches, best-practice presentations as well as interactive discussion sessions. The summit will provide excellent opportunities for you to hear international experts discuss best practices on how to drive business performance using Web 2.0 and social media. Key issues to be discussed include: How to integrate social media programs successfully into business strategies? Building business momentum, visibility and market growth through social media Measuring success and influence using metrics and analytics: what are the tools and techniques Integrating viral marketing and social media into traditional marketing mix Developing and activating audiences using social media channels such as Twitter, Facebook, blogs 1 – 5, February 2010: New York City, Berlin, London, San Francisco, Toronto, São Paulo Social Media Week The second annual Social Media Week conference will explore the profound impact that social media has on culture, business communications and society at large. The conference is designed as a series of localized events, which city partners are responsible for organizing. Programs will span a variety of formats, ranging from talks and panel discussions, to interactive workshops, seminars and networking events. Registration will open in January 2010 and the majority of events will be free thanks to the global sponsors and event partners. You can find more information at http://socialmediaweekny.com . 4 February 2010: San Francisco, California Vator Splash Vator.tv , a leading platform for innovators and entrepreneurs to broadcast themselves, is holding its inaugural Vator Splash event on February 4, 2010 at the Cafe du Nord in San Francisco. Catch onstage presenters: Zynga CEO Mark Pincus, Smule CEO Jeff Smith, August Capital VC Howard Hartenbaum and Google Ventures VC Bill Maris. Ten promising startups will also get to present onstage. Enter the Vator Splash competition if you want to present. ReadWriteWeb readers get a 25% discount on their tickets using the code VatorReadWriteWeb . 8 February 2010: Tampa, Florida Social Fresh Tampa This is the social media conference that comes to you. Social Fresh is a one-day, case-study-rich conference targeted for marketers. Social Fresh Tampa will have 30+ speakers, including Chris Barger of GM, Maggie Fox of Social Media Group and John Andrews of Collective Bias (formerly of Walmart). ReadWriteWeb readers get a 15% discount with the code "RWW15". 10 February 2010: New York City Online Community Unconference East The Online Community Unconference East is a gathering of online community professionals - managers, developers, business people, tool providers, investors - to discuss experience and strategies in the development and growth of online communities. As we have found with our past events, the best source of information on all of these challenges is other knowledgeable practitioners. The event runs from 8 a.m.-5 p.m. at the Digital Sandbox. 11 February 2010: New York City NYC Venture Capital and Angel Showcase FundingPost is hosting a VC showcase where 20-plus VC funds and angel groups will be exhibiting their firms during a great cocktail party setting. Each fund will have their own table setup for the sole purpose of meeting great new companies. Additionally, there will be an optional pitching workshop from 2:30 p.m. to 4:45 p.m. The cost to participate in the workshop will be $400. This workshop includes the $125 ticket to the event, and a 1/4 page listing in the Venture Guide Magazine. This event is sponsored by Credit Suisse, and takes place at One Madison Avenue, from 6-9:15 p.m. 18 February 2010: Silicon Valley, California Future of Funding Active limited partners, top rated venture capitalists, and successful entrepreneurs are invited to Silicon Valley on February 18, 2010 to discuss the Future of Funding. The venture capital bubble has burst, and change is coming. Now is the time to have a constructive dialog about the future with all of the stakeholders at the table. Don't miss the opportunity to partake in this exclusive event hosted by TheFunded . Please visit www.futureoffunding.com to see speaker and event details. ReadWriteWeb readers use the code "RWW" and get 10% off. 15 – 16 March 2010: London, England 2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum — London The 2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum takes place at the Olympia Conference Centre in London. The two-day event features four dedicated conference streams: Social Networking World Forum Enterprise social media Social TV World Forum Mobile Social Networking Forum The event features key speakers from global brands, organizations, social networking publishers and developers, pioneering social media leaders, top agencies, content producers, and more. Full workshop program within exhibition area Evening networking reception Pre-show online meeting planner for delegates Free pass for exhibition only 7 – 9 April 2010: Sydney, Australia ConnectNow ConnectNow brings together international specialists and thought leaders in social media, emerging technologies and their intersection with business. Learn how the realtime web, location based services, augmented reality, ubiquitous computing and personalised services are changing marketing and communications. Understand the importance of trust in relationship marketing and what is "social currency". For more info email info@connectnow.net.au . 11 May 2010: San Francisco, California FinovateSpring FinovateSpring 2010 will again showcase the most cutting-edge financial and banking technology innovations to Silicon Valley and the world. With Finovate's signature mix of short, fast-paced onstage demos (no slides are allowed) from handpicked companies and intimate networking time with their executives, this conference packs a ton of unique value into a single day. Come see the cutting edge of banking and financial technology and network with hundreds of the leading financial executives, venture capitalists, press, industry analysts, bloggers and fintech entrepreneurs. Early bird registration rates are available. 5 October 2010: New York City FinovateFall FinovateFall will return to Manhattan on Tuesday, October 5 to showcase dozens of the biggest and most innovative new ideas in financial and banking technology from established leaders and hot young companies. The Fall event is the original and largest Finovate and features a single day packed with our special blend of short, fast-paced onstage demos (no slides are allowed) and intimate networking time with top executives from the innovative demoing companies. FinovateFall is a unique chance to see the future of finance and banking before your competition and find the edge you need in today's market. Early bird registration rates are available. Download this entire events calendar in iCal format. Discuss

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ReadWriteWeb Events Guide, 9 January 2010

When you think of services offering to get you more fans, followers, and friends on social media sites, a few of words come to mind: spammy, scammy , and sad . Purchasing fans is taking the easy way out. Instead of building up a community of followers who actually appreciate what you (or your company) has to say, you can give off the appearance of popularity with a store-bought set of fans. While no one in their right mind will come out and say that the social media "marketing" services that deliver followers and fans are worthwhile, the truth is that many people and businesses are using them anyway, even if they won't admit it. But can any of these services really be trusted? Sponsor One of the most notorious companies involved in the "fans for sale" business is USocial . Earlier this year, they were cited in an L.A. Times article regarding their service for gaming Digg , the social news website that relies on user votes to promote stories to the homepage. Stories that make it to Digg's front page end up receiving massive amounts of traffic - tens of thousands of visitors within hours. Those numbers are tempting. In fact, they're too tempting for some to resist, apparently. According to USocial's founder, organizations like a Darfur foundation, the U.S. Marines, the Mormon Church, and the Korean Department of Tourism had all signed up to used the service. In addition to gaming the social news sites, USocial also offers services for gaining more followers on Twitter, more fans on Facebook, and more recently, more views on YouTube. This latest offering flat-out guarantees your viral video's success by delivering more traffic and more views to your video pages. Does all this sound too good to be true? Well, it probably is. Only last month, Facebook sent USocial a cease-and-desist letter to the company after an investigation revealed USocial was breaking multiple laws, including illegally accessing the Facebook website and violating the Terms of Service. Among the violations, Facebook stated USocial was sending spam, using web tools to harvest pages, and getting login names and by accessing accounts that did not belong to the marketing firm. Yes, that last one sounds a lot like hacking, doesn't it? Does your business really want fans who were obtained in that way? According to Dominic Holland, founder of Viralee , a new competitor to USocial, his business offers a better way. In an article on Facebook-watching blog AllFacebook , Holland was quoted as saying "We do not take control of any users account at any time. We create a page for the user and market it within and externally to Facebook." One the surface, that sounds more on the up-and-up, but Holland, whose service sells Facebook fans at 10 cents each, won't say exactly how those fans are acquired...and the Viralee website doesn't explain either. What it does show is the company's past efforts which include fan pages for "Kisses," "Hugs," and "Pizza" as well as ongoing efforts which include various sports teams, Australia, and the charity Movember . In the comments of the AllFacebook post, Holland responds to those questioning whether these "fans" are actually from the U.S. by responding that the service can provide targeted fans. Not that it does by default, just that it can. He also defends the "pay for fans" model by explaining that once you've acquired a good number of these purchased fans, you're then exposed to the friend groups of those fans as well. It sounds like he's saying store-bought fans are just a kick-start method for generating a fan base. The initial group is there to help start the organic growth that comes from natural discovery. Still, it's hard to feel anything but skepticism for a business whose Twitter account looks like spam bot, filled with keyword-based updates like "performance based advertising," "pay per sale," and "pay per lead," instead of any actual conversation. And considering that Holland was responding on AllFacebook as Viralee's founder using Facebook Conenct, you would think he would have updated his Facebook photo to something a little more... uh ...professional. While there's nothing wrong with posting "party pics" on Facebook, if you're publicly representing a company, this is not the sort of image that engenders trust...especially if you're asking for people's money. At the end of the day, companies like Viralee and USocial keep their "marketing" techniques under wraps and undisclosed. They promise fans but not how they'll get them or whether they're legit. And that's because they're probably not. But the argument for using these services - as scammy and spammy as they seem to be - is that they let you get a head start on building your social media profile. First come the store-bought fans, then come the real ones. Or so they say. Although few are willing to go on record admitting they're involved with services like this, there's no doubt that many people and businesses are. But the question remains: does any of this really work? And even if it does, is this how you wanted to achieve success? Discuss

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Are Store-Bought Fans Worth It?

We've discovered an adorable yet highly useful little product that could significantly ease some pain and lead to greater levels of productivity for smartphone developers. It's ridiculously simple as a concept, yet it allows for more creativity, freedom, and portability than any other tool we've seen for mobile developers, hands down. The product of a design shop and a web development lab , both based in Australia, these nifty and inexpensive toys have been popping up in offices all over Silicon Valley. Read on to learn the secret behind your favorite mobile dev's favorite Christmas present. Sponsor It's made of paper. Yes, the Notepod is the Moleskine of the digerati, an ingenious little sketchpad shaped like an iPhone. The front of each sheet features "52mm by 77mm of blank space floating in darkness," and the back of each piece is a blank grid of graph paper, perfect, as the site says, "perfect for notes or jotting down the phone number of a hot geek." Notepods each contain 100 pages, and you can snag a 3-pack for around $18USD. Shipping will take between 7 and 12 business days, unless you're lucky enough to live in Australia or New Zealand. As we all know, the best ideas often hit you at inappropriate or inconvenient times. As Inventive Labs posted, "It's incredibly fun to come up with an idea in the pub over a few beers;" however, how fun is it to decipher those indecipherable, scrawled-on and soggy cocktail napkins the next morning? Keep one in your bag, one on the nightstand - wherever inspiration strikes. It might be made of paper, but we think smartphone developers will find it a fun and simple productivity tool. Discuss

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The Ultimate Gift for the iPhone Developer in Your Life: Notepods

Smartphone users just got an early holiday treat from Google. Now, when searching for movies on their iPhones or Palm WebOS- or Android-powered devices, users can get not only theatres, showtimes, and films; they can also get trailers, ratings, and proximity-based information. This way, you can get in the car and peal out of the driveway before conducting a desktop search for movies, thus saving yourself another excruciating 5 minutes of "holiday cheer" with the family. Sponsor In a quotation-laced post on the Google Mobile blog, Google mobile UX designer Nick Fey revealed that information will be available in English only for now in the US, UK, Canada, Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand. Users of the abovementioned devices can now go to google.com in their web browsers. After searching for the term "movies," users can then tap on the "More movies" link for a panoply of new features and aggregated data. Users can then browse through film titles or nearby theatres. One of the most welcome features is the ability to play movie trailers in the mobile browser without having to navigate elsewhere. This eliminates the usual need for multiple browser tabs or frustrating cross-app navigation. Here's a spiffy demo video from our friends at Google: The new features also include ratings and categories, movie posters, and every other imaginable detail about the films listed. The information will also include upcoming showtimes for the nearest theaters, which are conveniently presented in a Google Maps interface. "We keep information on this page succinct," said Fey, "so you can quickly browse through shows and showtimes to help you decide which movie to see. If you want more details about a specific movie, just touch the poster or movie title and you'll see our new movie details page that has a synopsis of the movie, a more detailed list of showtimes, the cast and crew, and pictures." In a way, the features remind us a bit of SkinniPopcorn , a web and mobile app that integrates movie-related Twitter data, movie trailers, film reviews from the New York Times, and synopses. And that site is available on any mobile device with a web browser. Still, for the map and showtime information, Google wins this round. Discuss

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Mobile Movie Search Gets the Google Treatment