While I don’t use third-party Twitter app Tweetdeck myself (I switched to Seesmic Desktop a while back), I noticed today that both Mashable and TechCrunch now have their own branded versions.

It’s basically the same Tweetdeck application but now you can have a

At 12:01 Facebook opened the flood gates on their new usernames feature.

Personally, the process went  very smoothly for me. I was able to secure my desired Facebook username with no trouble at all.

Michael Arrington’s TechCrunch has been the top tech blog for quite some time in terms of traffic. It has been discovered that Pete Cashmore’s Mashable has actually overtaken that title now.

Disney has announced it has acquired a stake in Hulu that is thought to be as high as 30% according to the folks over at Mashable. Disney has now joined NBC Universal and News Corp. in this venture.

The momentum this gives the video site is very real as it looks to jump on a position in the market that perhaps YouTube may be too late to the game on. YouTube has just started to strike deals with the major media producers and their lineup of available programs to watch is not as impressive as Hulu’s.

ith the new feature, you can supposedly compare unique visitor estimates over time for various sites, making Google trends compete with Quantcast and Compete. Despite various screenshots posted, I can’t see the unique traffic numbers for any site I try.

A bigger surprise is that you can’t see any traffic estimates – even estimates! – for Google.com.

Click the image to enlarge further.

At least when it comes to their reading comprehension.

It makes a lot of sense if you think about it. Less people will complete a doctorate as will complete a four year undergraduate degree. Less people will compete a four year degree as will graduate high school. Less education usually means less reading and less reading leads to a lower level of reading comprehension. If the words and sentences you use are too complex a number of people who might otherwise appreciate what you have to say may have trouble following how you’re saying it.