Streaming video service Netflix has launched a brand new site that allows you to vote on a new set of “best of” movies and TV shows, which bears a striking resemblance to the Academy Awards/Oscars.

Continuing its tradition of uncommon categories, this new set of Netflix awards — called The Flixies — allows you to pick the best guilty pleasure, best commute shortener, best marathon TV show, best hangover cure, best bromance, best PMS Drama, and (of course) best tantrum tamer. But unlike the Oscars, categories aren’t restricted to just movies, as there are plenty of TV shows included in the mix.

This is obviously a lighthearted way of getting people to think about movies and TV shows as an emotional response to a situation, rather than which show was the best produced — something that, lets face it, most of us don’t really care about as long as we’re entertained.

Anyone can participate in voting, not just the 33 million Netflix Streaming subscribers. The results of said vote will be revealed March 11 by the company, and will include the top three video selections in each category.

Additionally, Netflix is asking people to suggest new categories, either for the service itself or perhaps even the next iteration of “The Flixies.”

Apple used the Oscars tonight to show off a sleek new iPad advertisement, this one appropriately focused on filmmaking and the movies.

Apple has a strong user base among the creative community, and the company wants to stay relevant by marketing its flagship products during major events. The tech titan has lost some of its luster as of late because investors have questioned its long-term prospects.

The ad emphasizes many of the apps (like iMovie or iTunes) that run on the iPad that could help a film junkie watch more movies or help a video creator do his or her job. The iPad is a great consumption device for videos, and if you really feel like it, you can shoot and edit movies on it as well.

Mobile titan Samsung also debuted a new ad right before the show that is also movie-themed and features director Tim Burton.

Check out the new Apple ad in the video above.

According to digital ad firm RadiumOne, Twitter and Facebook users would select Hugh Jackman as best actor for Les Mis — shockingly, not Wolverine — and Jennifer Lawrence as Best Actress for Silver Linings Playbook.

Twitter users would pick teen vamp Twilight thriller Breaking Dawn Part 2 as Best Picture, with almost 1.3 million followers, but their second place would go to Paranormal Activity 4, with less than 10 percent as many followers at 117,192. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey would slot into number three position, with 86,389 followers.

Facebook users would also pick the Twilight movie as Best Picture.

The film received a massive 38 million likes, almost five times as many as first loser — and a much better movie, if I do say so myself — The Hunger Games. And Facebook would select TED, a movie about a teddy bear that comes to life, in third place.

(Perhaps there’s a good reason why social media doesn’t pick the Oscars.)

Here’s all the data in visual form:

photo credit: Dave_B_ via photopin cc

Google‘s recent movie turn in The Internship must have put employees in a Hollywood state of mind.

With the Oscar’s around the corner — the 85th Academy Awards will air on Sunday Feb. 24 — Google has made its own predictions of the winners on a new destination website.

According to TheNextWeb, Google analysed search volume based on how many queries were run two weeks prior to the film being released, and up to three months after. It did not include sentiment — so even if you searched “Les Miserables sucks,” it wouldn’t affect the rankings.

On the new site, Google shows off all its consumer products, including its Knowledge Graph, Google Maps, YouTube, and even Google+ Hangouts.

Scroll the drop-down list to view the projected winners in the Best Director, Best Actor / Actress, Best Supporting Actor / Actress, and Best Picture categories.

Just for fun, Google also revealed the most-searched red carpet looks from 2012: no surprise, Angelina Jolie’s #planked #leg #pose made the top list (and earned its own meme).

Google hangout fans are encouraged to stream a fake acceptance speech, and there is even an interactive map to help you find out where Oscar-nominated films will be playing near you.

This isn’t the first time that the search behemoth has released a data-filled custom website to coincide with a major event: Google unveiled its “flu trends” site in the height of the sniffly season, and in the run-up to the Presidential election, it released a political channel with news and video highlights.

Do you agree or disagree with Google’s predictions predictions? 

photo credit: grebo guru via photopin cc

We’re not just using Twitter as a easy excuse to pontificate about current events. As Reuters points out, big growth in social media engagement is one of the key metrics the show’s producers will trot out when they’re selling advertisements for next year’s broadcast.

So if talk on Twitter translates to cold hard dollars, how does the Academy stack up? Social TV outfit Bluefin Labs counted 3.4 million #oscar related tweets, up three fold from the 966,000 they counted in 2011. Meryll Streep’s big win and J. Lo’s plunging neckline were the hot topics to chat about.

But while all that sounds good, it pales a little when you compare it to the Grammys, which managed to pull in 13 million tweets and an astounding 2,300 percent growth year over year. The Superbowl clocked in at around 12 million tweets, with more than 500 percent growth.

Breaking down these numbers is the bread and butter for firms like Bluefin, Trendrr, Getglue and Social Guide. How well this fledgling field works is still up for debate. But Twitter analysis did a pretty great job predicting the winners, nailing best picture, actress, and coming within a margin of error for best actor.

David Fincher’s Facebook movie “The Social Network” headed into the 83rd Oscars ceremony tonight with eight nominations, including the Best Picture and  Best Actor awards. It walked out with only three: Best Adapted Screenplay (for Aaron Sorkin), Best Original Score (for Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross) and Best Editing (Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter).

The film faced stiff competition from the likes of “The King’s Speech”, “True Grit”, and “Black Swan.” But given that The Social Network was a critical darling, and that it also walked away with four Golden Globe awards (including Best Picture), it had a good chance at winning some major categories. (Check out my podcast review of the film with VentureBeat’s Anthony Ha.)

Here’s a rundown of The Social Network’s award nominations and wins:

• Best Picture
• Best Actor, Jesse Eisenberg
• Directing, David Fincher
• Adapted Screenplay, Aaron Sorkin (Won)
• Cinematography, Jeff Cronenworth
• Editing, Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter (Won)
  
• Original Score, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (Won)
  
• Sound Mixing

The veracity of “The Social Network” has been disputed by many, including an early Facebook employee and our own Executive Editor Owen Thomas. The film is based on Ben Mezrich’s book “The Accidental Billionaires”, which is also notorious for the liberties it takes with facts.

Both the film and book take a significant amount of accurate information from court documents, but they also fill in gaps in Facebook’s story in creative (and often inaccurate) ways. That led to decisions like the removal of significant people from Facebook’s history, including Mark Zuckerberg’s longtime girlfriend.

The Social Network was also thought to be a public relations disaster for Facebook, considering its negative portrayal of founder Mark Zuckerberg. Shortly before it was released, Zuckerberg announced his $100 million education foundation, Startup: Education, which some viewed as a way to offset the film’s bad publicity. Ultimately, the film didn’t cause much discernible public outcry, and Zuckerberg even had the good humor to join actor Jesse Eisenberg on Saturday Night Live a few weeks ago.

“The Social Network” snagged eight Oscar nominations this morning, including the coveted Best Picture Award and the Best Actor award for Jesse Eisenberg’s portrayal of Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

That the film was well-received by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences comes as no surprise — The Social Network was a critical darling, and it also walked away with four Golden Globe awards, including Best Picture. (Check out my podcast review of the film with VentureBeat’s Anthony Ha.) It was beat out in nominations by “The King’s Speech” and “True Grit”, and it was also noticeably absent from a few key categories. For one, Andrew Garfield received no Academy love for his portrayal of Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin.

In addition to Best Picture and Best Actor, director David Fincher was nominated for Best Director; screenwriter Aaron Sorkin landed a nod for Best Adapted Screenplay (the film was based on Ben Mezrich’s book “The Accidental Billionaires”); Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor and his musical collaborator Atticus Ross were nominated for Best Original Score; and Jeff Cronenweth was nominated for his gorgeous cinematography. The film also landed nominations for Film Editing and Sound Design.

When it comes to the Best Picture category, The Social Network has some major contenders to fend off, including “Black Swan”, “The King’s Speech”, and “True Grit.” Eisenberg meanwhile will be facing off against renowned actors like Javier Bardem, Colin Firth, and Jeff Bridges. Personally, I think the film has a good shot at landing the major awards — unless the Academy decides to fall back on safer choices (as it often does) like “The King’s Speech.”

Erica Albright, played by Rooney Mara, says, “You are probably going to be a very successful computer person. But you’re going to go through life thinking that girls don’t like you because you’re a nerd. And I want you to know, from the bottom of my heart, that won’t be true. It’ll be because you’re an asshole.”

But upon winning a Golden Globe for best screenplay, writer Aaron Sorkin took the stage and said, “I wanted to say to Mark Zuckerberg, if you’re watching tonight, Rooney Mara’s character makes a prediction at the beginning of the movie, she was wrong. You turned out to be a great entrepreneur, a visionary and a fantastic altruist.”

Producer Scott Rudin accepted the award for Best Picture. He said, “I want to thank everybody at Facebook; Mark Zuckerberg for his willingness to allow us to use his life and work as a metaphor through which to tell a story about communication and the way we relate to each other.” The film also won for Best Director and Best Score.

Interestingly, the rumor mill suggests that Facebook’s handlers resisted the creation of the movie, which is based on the book The Accidental Billionaires, a fictionalized account of Zuckerberg’s life by Ben Mezrich. Then, after realizing the movie couldn’t be stopped, Facebook’s founder embraced it, taking the whole company to go see it in the theaters (a number of times). He often said that the movie makers got a lot of details right, like how he owned almost every T-shirt worn by his character in the film, but noted that he didn’t create the site to get a lot of girls.

But Hollywood likes a good story and ran with the fictionalized account. Now the movie is a big contender for an Oscar. Zuckerberg has been laughing it off. Inside, it has to hurt to be depicted in such a way. But it doesn’t seem to have dented his reputation that much. Indeed, it seems only to have made him more famous.