Each year, over 500 companies enter the international awards and more than 3,500 websites are submitted for judging. IMA has announced that Brightlabs has been recognised in the top 10 agencies (and the sole Australian company on the list) for consistently representing the highest standards of excellence in web design and development. Read on

Rishads reaction: We are extremely happy to have made the list and I am especially proud that an Australian company was able to make an appearance, particularly given the calibre of international firms represented. I would like to thank all our wonderful staff and clients for making this possible.

Yesterday during their Places event, Facebook showed a video highlighting the thoughts of the team of developers who actually built the functionality. It's slick as hell -- very nicely done. In fact, we weren't the only ones who initially thought that it looked like an Apple video. Read on

Jennifers reaction: This seems to be just another re-packaging of a piece of technology that's widely available on the internet, just on different platforms! Is it really necessary to try and fill the gap between our offline and our online worlds with this? I know it's the "hip" thing these days to post statuses about everything and anything, but the example about the Golden Gate bridge is ridiculous. I don't want nor need to know what every other person thought of it- the reaction is fairly standard. This is just another outlet for mundane updates, despite the subtext to this video screaming "Facebook users are cool! We don't just sit on the computer all day! We actually hang out, ZOMG, lulz!".

Come on Facebook, I don't know about other users but certainly I don't want my "friends" (including actual friends, people I met once and those randoms I accepted for the hell of it) to know where I am 24/7. If I want to go and see them for coffee, I'll organise it myself- rather than virtually "bumping into" them!

Is this just another example of Facebook providing an opportunity for our privacy to be disregarded? How many people are going to 'opt-in' for this service unintentionally- possibly putting their safety on the line?

Today (well, yesterday American time) Facebook held a press conference in which Zuckerberg and Co officially revealed what many of us have been waiting for for awhile: Facebook s official push into location based social activity, Facebook Places. You can read the live blog of the event on what was revealed and what went down on Mashable, but what I actually want to talk about is what I was surprised wasn't revealed. Read on

Brads reaction: Location based services will certainly be a mainstream part of our lives in the future. Facebook obviously has the advantage if they do it right. At the moment it looks like Facebook are going to sit back and dabble for a while and see where things go.

Mobile advertising is increasingly important, as cell phone adoption rates, especially smartphone adoption rates, soar. With a range of mobile advertising options, including SMS, WAP, mobile app display ads, search ads, rich media, video and push notifications, the landscape can be a bit complicated. After a tough 2009, advertisers are expected to increase mobile and digital marketing budgets over the next year. With this in mind, it s essential that advertisers keep up-to-date on their options in the mobile space. Read on

Brads reaction: Mobile has continued its slow crawl into the marketing mix but things seem to be accelerating now with the wider adoption of the iPhone and Android based phones. Hell I see Baby Boomers touting their iPhones on the Ferry now. Its all heads down, buds in, watching ABC News 24 via live streaming, updating Facebook or just for novelty sake, making a phone call.

Last month, I wrote a blog post about Linkedin and interviewed the very well-connected Iggy Pintado about how to get the best out of the social networking platform. This month, I want to expand on that and share with you the 15 things you should be doing with Linkedin but probably aren t. 12 of the 15 things are absolutely free. Let s start with the free stuff: Read on

Brads reaction: Excellent tips for getting more out of Linkedin. Make sure you joion the Digital Ministry Linked in group and get involved with its very active community.

TWO firms want to redefine the internet. Or so it seems, judging by the legislative framework proposal that Google and Verizon, an American telecoms operator, published on August 9th. Read on

Johns reaction: This will mean that certain vested interests get preferential data treatment. Making its harder for small start-ups. The age of the facebook from left field could be past and may be a motivating factor as it gives the established companies more time to copy model. Big business is ultimately about predictability for shareholders.

Google Wave will no longer receive the support of Google. Today on the Google blog, the following statement pretty much sums up why Wave will no longer be one of Google s supported product offerings: Wave has not seen the user adoption we would have liked. We don t plan to continue developing Wave as a standalone product, but we will maintain the site at least through the end of the year and extend the technology for use in other Google projects. The central parts of the code, as well as the protocols that have driven many of Wave s innovations, like drag-and-drop and character-by-character live typing, are already available as open source, so customers and partners can continue the innovation we began. In addition, we will work on tools so that users can easily liberate their content from Wave. Read on

Brads reaction: I think there was just too much of a disconnect between the web app and the desktop. I think if it had a desktop app it may have seen more uptake.

You notice it when you're reading email, but not so much writing it. Most email clients show just the first 50-75 characters of a message in the inbox view. Write your first line to that limit, and you'll likely get noticed. It s a tip offered up by web PR consultant Steve Rubel, who notes that an ebook author reached through his own crowded inbox and managed to get a click-through with a first line that grabbed him. Rubel dubs it tweetifying of your email s lead sentence, but it s actually about half a 140-character tweet. The idea is the same though let the character limit guide you to a punchier first impression. Read on

Brads reaction: Good idea

The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) has released preliminary results to an upcoming survey in which marketers were asked about their mobile marketing budgets for the remainder of 2010 through 2011. The results thus far indicate budgets for mobile marketing spend is set to rise 124% from 2010 to 2011, putting the total allocation to the mobile channel at roughly 4% of overall marketing budgets. Mobile as a marketing channel is up by the greatest single percentage, with events and trade shows the only other channel that s projected to see growth in budget totals, surprisingly enough. Read on

Brads reaction: Mobile is on the move....again?

UK digital champion Martha Lane Fox has announced plans to get everybody of working age in Britain online by the end of the current Parliament. Read on

Johns reaction: Nice idea but finding the cash to support the aims of Network Nation would be a challenge.