The Facebook App Centre is currently in beta mode but basically:

• Facebook has positioned it as a way for developers to gain more downloads and app exposure
• Apps simply need to use Facebook Connect to login to grant them a place in the FB app centre
• Paid apps will be an option but it will just be a flat fee, developers won’t be able to choose what price to charge
• Facebook will offer you analytics, mostly demographics, on the users of your App which seems to be a direct hit at Apple and their notorious closed wall around analytics of mobile apps.

You can find even more details about Facebook’s App Centre in their developer blog-post.

Will you put your app in the Facebook App Centre?

This post originally appeared on Switched on Media’s blog.

In our discussions about Pinterest, we’ve noticed a lot of people actually call the platform “Pin Interest” instead of “Pinterest”. This got us thinking about how many people globally might be making this mistake so we used the Google AdWords tool to find out! You can see in the screen grab below that 450,000 people each month are searching for “pin interest” whilst almost 7.5million people are using the correct term to find the social network.

Luckily for Pinterest, they rank 1st in the organic search results for “pin interest” so anyone who is unsure of the brand name will still find them via Google search.

What can we learn from this?

People don’t know your brand as well as you do so ask yourself:

• Do you know how people are talking about you and searching for you?
• Are you optimising search and social activity for brand keywords as well as potential misspellings?
• If you are already optimising search and social in this way, how has the optimisation influenced site traffic and conversion results?

This post originally appeared on Switched on Media’s blog.

You may have read last week and over the weekend that Pinterest has updated their terms of use and actually divided their policy into 3 sections to make it easier to digest and, ideally, more relevant: terms of use, acceptable use and privacy policy.

There are a lot of sites out there explaining how these changes will affect personal use, some of the more comprehensive articles are by The Next Web and The Blog Herald but do you understand what this means for your company’s Pinterest account and what you can do about it?

How do Pinterest’s new terms of use affect your brand’s presence on Pinterest?

One of the key changes to Pinterests’ policies is around commercial use. Pinterest explains acceptable use of the site: “personal, noncommercial use to allow you to express yourself, discuss public issues, report on issues of public concern, engage in parity and as expressly permitted by the features of the Service.”

However, Pinterest’s updated terms of service (active from 6th April) specifically state that a person may open an account on behalf of a company or organization, and Pinterest is certainly not shutting down branded, commercial pages.

So the terms of use are not 100% clear on how brands can/should be involved with Pinterest.

What can you do?

• Pinterest content should be carefully reviewed before being posted. Potentially even develop guidelines so community managers know what is acceptable and so they understand the legal implications of pinning an image that does not fall within the guidelines.
• Check copyright of all images to avoid copyright liability. Users will have to cover all costs of any legal action that involves copyright.
• If your photos have people in them, be aware of privacy rights (i.e. technically should have release forms for people who appear in the pinned photos).
• Consider how using user-generated content (UGC) may implicate your brand in potential privacy, copyright issues. At this stage, we recommend avoid posting UGC content altogether.

We’ll keep you posted on the Pinterest terms of service updates. In the meantime, shout out on Twitter (@switchedonmedia) if you have any specific questions.

Have you ever noticed how a lot of athletes are pigeon-toed? No seriously, if you really pay attention to them as they run, for many their feet don’t hit the ground straight. And yet they are faster. It makes you wonder if being pigeon-toed is an actual advantage for you, rather than just an amusing sight for everyone else.

I was so curious I actually looked it up. I mean it would be a great way for the pigeon-toed of the world to get out there and run in public more often, without feeling ridiculed for the way their feet move. Yes, admittedly there are people with this affliction that would rather play on FoxyBingo, or the latest iPhone game than go for a run along the beach, but some might be inspired to run somewhere that isn’t the gym.

It turns out that there isn’t any scientific proof that pigeon-toes make you a good athlete. Although many coaches in sports like basketball and football actually seek out pigeon-toed players. So what is going on with our feet when we run?

The average runner will land on the outside of their foot and roll towards the inside as they go. People who are pigeon-toed have less of a roll towards the inside. Due to this, their foot and ankle joint is often stiffer as it contacts the ground. It is this stiffness that gives them an advantage over other athletes, because the stiffer your foot is when in comes into contact with the ground, the less energy is absorbed by the impact.

This means that a pigeon-toed person’s foot is a bit like a bouncy ball. They bounce back off the ground without losing much energy, quickening their pace. By comparison, people who are not pigeon-toed are more like a deflated ball, with less of a spring to work from.

So tell me, are you pigeon-toed … or did you used to be? If so, what did you do to change your running style?