Facebook Stories: the future local social news everything

Facebook Stories launched yesterday and my reaction was a kind of "meh." But today I think I completely missed the point. In the fresh light of a new dawn, I think it's nothing less than the future of news.

Google to developers: the reason we don’t have a G+ API yet is we don’t want to screw you

Google+ would have a full read and write API today if the world’s largest search engine company knew how to release it in a way that wouldn’t screw developers. At least, that’s what Google’s senior vice president for Google+ implied …

Facebook loses 3 more executives, after stock price hits low

[Update: We've corrected our characterization of Jonathan Matus' role at the company. As a manager, he wasn't really an "executive" as some initial stories suggested he was.]

Two Facebook executives and one mobile marketing manager announced Wednesday they are leaving …

Major Facebook investor dumps nearly 2 million shares, which sink to $20, a new low

Fidelity Investments, an early and major purchaser of Facebook stock, let go of 1.9 million shares during June alone, when the social network’s value on the public market sank as low as $25 per share.

Currently, the shares sit at …

For Ernest Cline, author of Ready Player One, success is measured in DeLoreans and geeked-out fans

Ernest Cline is going where no geek has gone before with his latest book tour and contest that features a real DeLorean as the prize.

Nearly 20% of Facebook’s mobile users skip the website altogether

Facebook users are increasingly passing up the company’s ad-laden website for a mobile-only experience, according to new information disclosed by the social network today.

Nearly one in five of Facebook’s 543 million mobile monthly active users (MAUs) — 102 million …

Watch out Instapaper: Facebook is adding its own “save for later” feature

Bookmarking services like Pocket and Instapaper better watch out, because Facebook is about to step on their toes.

The social network is introducing its own answer to the services with “Save”, an update to its website and mobile apps that …

Google+ catching Facebook in brand pages but not fans … and why that’s OK with companies

Would you do it just for the ranking?

A new study of Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ tracked the ongoing evolution of brands interacting with consumers and concludes that while growing, Google+ is still definitely playing second fiddle to Facebook and …

Facebook’s new photo design brings magazine layouts and full-screen pics

Facebook is preparing to change its photo layout once again, and the new experience is as slick as thumbing through a glossy print magazine, one where you yourself in control of the layout.

In that sense, it’s a perfect fit …

Digg relaunch will draw from Realtime, a new search engine for hot links

When the social news tool Digg relaunches next week — Wednesday to be exact — it will get help from a new product called Realtime, a search engine that surfaces links being shared the most across the Web.

Realtime is …

Why Apple won’t invest in Twitter: It doesn’t have to

Apple reportedly considered making a significant investment in social media giant Twitter more than a year ago, but backed away, probably because it ultimately realized it didn’t need to make such an investment to get its way.

Details of last …

Senate amendment could finally bring Netflix into Facebook Timeline

The senate is expected to vote on an amendment next week that would allow video rental services like Netflix to take advantage of deeper integration with social networks like Facebook.

Despite being the country’s largest streaming movie service, Netflix is …

Facebook users aren’t created equal

How much is a Facebook user worth? Well, that depends on where the user is from.

(Disclosure: I have short-term options against Facebook, but I believe it’s a fantastic company in the long term.)

Based on Facebook’s second quarter earnings, …

GamesBeat weekly roundup: Gamescape 2012, a history of Batman in video games, and Donkey Kong’s failing liver

If you follow VentureBeat but don’t regularly check our GamesBeat site, here’s a list of the best games stories we ran over the last seven days that you may have missed.

Why Facebook’s stock is struggling despite phenomenal revenue growth

Investors, trusting Facebook as far as they can see it, have sent the social network’s stock tumbling down to bottom-of-the-barrel lows.

Shares were absolutely hammered in after-hours trading Thursday and again early Friday, dipping all the way down to $22.28 …

What mobile risk? Facebook says Sponsored Stories in News Feed are working

Mobile. It’s Facebook’s biggest risk as well as its greatest opportunity. The social network tried to stress the latter in its first-ever earnings call by sharing with investors and analysts that it’s now making roughly $500,000 a day from mobile …

Zuckerberg: Building a Facebook phone ‘wouldn’t make much sense for us’

Facebook building a phone “wouldn’t really make much sense for us to do,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said today during the company’s first-ever earnings conference call.

Today, the social networking behemoth posted $1.18 billion in revenue and a net loss of …

Facebook: U.S. users in the smallest regional group (not good for profits)

Facebook posted quarterly earnings today and dumped a load of data into analysts’ laps.

User numbers hit a new high, with 955 million worldwide visiting the site at least once a month. And earning are slightly above estimates, coming in …

Facebook stock hits new low of $24 after its first earnings report

Facebook's stock fell 11 percent in after hours trading this afternoon, reaching a new low of $24, after the social network reported earnings for the first time as a public company.