SOCIAL NETWORKS

There's no way to sugarcoat it: the U.S. housing market remains a buyer's market. That said, are there ways home sellers can better-position their home for a sale amid such intense competition? Indeed there are, and here are five.

Google has acquired Pittsburgh Pattern Recognition (Pittpatt), a company that has developed facial recognition technology, months after it backed off from rolling out a face recognition smartphone app called Google Goggles in its bid to outsmart Apple and Facebook.

Republicans and Tea Party members used the social media Twitter more than Democrats during the midterm elections last year, according to a study by the University of Michigan.

HIV-positive men who have sex with other men are at a high risk of contracting the Hepatitis C virus through sex, according to a new study of men in New York City.

Ford made waves in creating the first company Google+ page, but don't expect its Google+ page to be exactly the same as its Facebook page.

It has been just over two weeks since the Google+ social network was launched. While it is still in a beta invite-only period, Google's new social networking platform has created a buzz amassing more than 10 million users. According to recent reports, the most followed person on Google+ is none other than Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

Google+, Facebook, MySpace and everything in between.

On July 13th, dozens of arrests were made in Minsk during the latest round of silent protests against authorities in Belarus.The flash-mob-style demonstrations have already become regular events in Belarus, called by Revolution Through the Social Networks, a grass-roots movements that claims thousands of supporters nationwide.

Google will roll out a flexible tool to add more contacts on Google+ over the next few days. For users with contacts scattered across diverse email services and social networks, Google+'s new address book uploader would be the one click button to synchronize and manage all. The already existing one-click contact importer on Google+ imports contacts from Microsoft Windows Live Hotmail and also takes care of keeping the sync up to date.

Whether Facebook or Google+ will top social media hierarchy is debatable, but an Israeli company has developed an app to bridge the gap, allowing Google+ users to access their Facebook account directly on the newly launched site.

Two of the most talked-about smartphones right now apart from the iPhone5 are Samsung's Galaxy S2 and the Motorola Droid Bionic. Both Android devices from Samsung and Motorola are offering quite blazing performance at the hand of dual-core processing power. But, there still could be a thing or two that would make you choose one over the other.

The Google+ invitation button has been available for more than a day now, suggesting Google is loosening up and is more confident about expanding its social network's population.

Groupon has changed its privacy policy, and users face having personal information, including financial transaction data, collected and shared. The social daily coupon network has gone too far.

With the Google+ emergence into the market, social network rivals have another threat other than the social media giant Facebook. Google+ will be pitted against other major social networks such as MySpace, LinkedIn, and Twitter as it looks to climb its way to the top.

The announcement and limited invitation to the new Google+ social network last week not only whipped up a frenzy of anticipation, but marked the first salvo in the new battle for the social media space.

The announcement and limited invitation to the new Google+ social network last week not only whipped up a frenzy of anticipation, but marked the first salvo in the new battle for the social media space.

In order for Google+ to supplant Facebook, it will have to appeal to at least one crucial segment of the online population – college students.

With the launch of the new Google+, a lot of buzz has been created about how Google+ is innovative and at the same time it appears to be a great threat to other social networks, such as Facebook. But is it good enough to take on Facebook+Skype?

The partnership between Facebook and Skype is a natural, and it will likely change social media in a very big way -- integrating phone calls and video conferencing seamlessly into Facebook's social network.

Facebook announced the 'super awesome' news that they will be partnering with Skype with plans to offer users video chat through the social network website - is it in response to a growing threat called Google+ Hangouts?

Users have tried out the Google+ and praises have been high for the social network's latest return into the market. As the tech giant looks to continue its momentum, Facebook will look to counter Google, setting up an epic battle of social networks in the coming months. For now there are five things that users would like to see even as Google+ is diligently building its new network.