Yes, actually post – not simply comment on another user’s post or share another user’s post, but create your own post on the topic for which you searched. They say it’s all about “starting conversations,” making it so that it’s easier for users to join the discussion about certain topics in real-time.

Here’s what they had to say:

Today we’re introducing a new feature that lets you share directly from Google+ search results, and contribute to a topical Google+ stream. For example, if you search for basketball and then want to make a post about how your favorite team or player is doing, you can share right from the search results.

Just look for the sharebox after searching on Google+, and you’ll see an opportunity to “join the discussion” about whatever you’ve searched for.

When you post from the search results page, it automatically includes a link back to the original search stream. This way others can join the active conversation as it unfolds.

When you search a topic (in this case “SOPA”) within Google+, you’ll now see a new box above the activity stream. It will prompt you to “Join the discussion” about your topic. From there, you can make a post – photo, link, video, plain text, whatever.

Each post made from the search results include a link back to the activity stream on the specific topic – they’ll say “Shared from the Google+ ________ stream.” Presumably, this will prompt others to join in on the conversation about hot, trending topics.

Considering that Google is adding more Google+ content to regular Google searches in order to “personalize” these results (Search Plus Your World), is it only a matter of time before people can post to their Google+ page straight from the the main Google SERP?

While quite a few of Twitter’s current trends reflect the SOPA topic, there is one in particular dedicated to the SOPA topic, and here, you’ll find a great deal of useful information about why the web is fighting back. Another discovery is people censoring their tweets as a form of protest, like the following:

As for the general discourse, by and large, people seem to have a good grasp on the topic, although, there are some who need to read the language of the acts a little closer:

Considering the fact that Lamar Smith has stated, time and again, SOPA only targets foreign sites — and sites ending with .com, .net, and .org are exempt from SOPA’s punishing arm. With SOPA being such a hot, trending topic at the moment, don’t be that guy. Go out and actually educate yourself about what it is SOPA does and does not do (PDF).

Take advantage of the fact that Twitter is blowing up about SOPA and learn something instead of spouting off nonsensical panic tweets. Try something a little more compelling, like the following:

Take advantage of these trends and inform yourself.

The report found many interesting trends about both groups and how they embrace technology. For instance, according to the survey, 41 percent of LinkedIn members are planning to spend at least $1,000 on consumer electronics this year. The general public, however, is a little more hesitant, since 29 percent said they were planning to spend that much on consumer electronics during the year.

How much (if any) do you plan to spend on new innovations and gadgets this year? Let us know.

As far as trends go, LinkedIn members are much more tech savvy in both travel and mobile than the general U.S. public. The survey found that LinkedIn members are 53 percent more likely than the average U.S. adult to have Bluetooth in their car, and 31 percent more apt to have some form of GPS device. In addition, 51 percent of LinkedIn members are more likely to own or use a smartphone as opposed to the average adult in the U.S.

Tablet devices are consistent with this trend as well with 85 percent more prone to own or use one. Despite all the tablet devices that are available, most of the users said they were iPad users.

What’s interesting is that LinkedIn members are not just interested in gadgets for fun and games. On the contrary, 93 percent of them rely on technology for managing various aspects of their lives, compared to 89 percent of the general online population. LinkedIn members also said productivity and efficiency are the most important qualities of consumer electronics for them.

While television and newspapers influence the general online U.S. population, they are less likely to impact the shopping decisions of LinkedIn members. Instead, they seek recommendations through social networks. However, both the general public and LinkedIn members believe that companies should have a social media presence, weighing in with 75 percent and 82 percent respectively.

Even though the LinkedIn members surveyed are seemingly wealthier than the general population, with 49 percent having households of $100K or more, this report still offers insights into user trends. What’s more is it could especially help companies market their new innovations through the right channel to meet their target audience.

As of this writing, there are three Twitter trends devoted to Alabama’s BCS title-clinching win, two, however, are focusing on Jefferson’s mistakes rather than Alabama’s impressive shut out. Even the infamous LSUFreek weighs in with this appropriate mashup:

Which opens the following:

This is true, Jefferson’s Twitter account is gone. If it was up last night during the game, there’s really no telling the types of posts he had to deal with. It must have been incredibly ugly, but then again, so was his play against Bama’s defense. Speaking of, while Jordan Jefferson is getting drawn and quartered across the Internet, some folks actually remembered to give credit where it’s due, as opposed to piling on a kid who played poorly against one of the best defenses ever in college football:

That last one just about sums things up, at least from Alabama’s perspective. In case you missed it, here’s the only touchdown from last night’s game, courtesy of Trent Richardson:

eBay has issued their 3rd-annual “Top Shopped” report, where they analyze all of their sales data to come up with what pop culture forces captivated the nation throughout the year. The data was pulled from various eBay categories and solidified into a top 10 list featuring the most popular things of the year (at least in terms of $$$).

Strangely enough, the Top Shopped list does seem to reflect what was popular in 2011. People really do “vote” with their dollars:

1. NFL
2. Harry Potter
3. Twilight
4. Call of Duty
5. Green Bay Packers
6. iPad
7. Sade
8. Justin bieber
9. Glee
10. Charlie Sheen

eBay also dives deeper into the pop culture data with some more facts about the year-end sales figures. eBay shoppers bought 83,879 Lady Gaga-related items, as opposed to only 65,822 Katy Perry items. The Green Bay Packers had more related items sold that any other sport figure (234,089), but QB Aaron Rodgers couldn’t compete with Derek Jeter, who sold an athlete-most 131,250 related items.

“eBay sales are a direct indicator of what Americans are most fascinated by and uniquely reflects the cultural zeitgeist,” said Karen Bard Sayah, eBay Spokesperson. “From the latest video games and tech devices, to royal wedding memorabilia and ‘Winning’ t-shirts, shoppers know that whatever it is they’re coveting, they can find it on eBay.”

President Obama? No.

Huffington Post? Nope.

Google? Nay.

Lebron James? Not even close.

BBC? You’re not getting any warmer.

The most influential Tweeter, according to HP Labs, is a woman named Twiter Da Vovó, a Brazilian comedian with a penchant for lurid gestures and quite the potty mouth. Have a look for yourself (if anyone within earshot of you understands Portuguese, then consider the following video NSFW):

The calculations conducted by HP Labs looked closely and the persistence and decay of trending topics on Twitter, which they designated as having a typical lifespan of 20-40 minutes. Within those trending topics, the researchers examined which Twitter users “contribute to the collectie awareness of what is trending and at times can also affect the public agenda of the community.” Because topics cycle so quickly (honestly, 20 minutes seems like kind of a long time even for Twitterness), they did an API search every 20 minutes to gather data on trending topics and collected the data over a period of 40 days. From their data, they collected relevant info such as the author, actual text of the tweet, and the time it was posted. If you think this sounds like a ton of data, you’d be correct: in the course of their data collection, they obtained 16.32 million tweets on 3,361 topics. The entire report can be viewed below:

Trends in Social Media: Persistence and Decay

From this data, the researchers were able to glean who could be considered the most influential person on Twitter based on the ratio of retweets they received among 50 or more of the trending topics. The table below illustrates their findings:

Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you. Above CNN, NY Times, Huffington Post, Reuters, and literally every other person or organization with a Twitter account, this saucy lady from Brazil tops them all in matters of influence. If ever a model demonstrated the extreme ephemeral tendencies that online culture is prone to, this study illuminates that quite nicely.

So really, does anything mean anything at all? Perhaps not, HP Labs suggests. They make no attempt to explain why certain topics catch the widespread interest of Twitter, stating that “there is no clear picture of what causes these topics to become extremely popular, nor how some persist in the public eye longer than others.” All they’ve been able to parse from their examination of Twitter is one certainty: the one aspect that causes a topic’s popularity to decline is their novelty. In other words, once we notice something popular on Twitter, we remain transfixed on it for a brief moment until the next shiny object twinkles and grabs our attention.

Given that finding, it’s a wonder that any of us can remember anything about any Internet meme ever.

What was your favorite Internet meme of 2011? Let us know.

According to Don Caldwell of popular site Know Your Meme, the top memes of 2011 are: (Drum roll please)

1. Rebecca Black’s “Friday”

2. Planking

3. Occupy Wall Street

4. First World Problems

5. Scumbag Steve

6. X All the Y

7. Nope! Chuck Testa

8. Nyan Cat

9. ’60′s Spider-Man

10. My Little Pony

According to Caldwell, a lot of these memes became viral sensations because people could take them and put their own spin on them. He indicated that some of the others, such as Rebecca Black’s “Friday,” grew in popularity because “it’s so bad, it’s good.”

Caldwell went on to say that most Internet memes become what they are by chance since consumers are quick to detect “forced” memes. However, there are cases, such as with the Old Spice Guy, in which the online community accepts branded marketing campaigns.

Did your favorite meme make the cut? If not, tell us what it was and why you think it should have been included.

“This year’s top cultural trends — or memes — shed light on the more light hearted things people were discussing and sharing on Facebook,” a Facebook spokesperson tells WebProNews. “For example, ‘planking,’ where you lie face down in usual locations, was one of the top memes on Facebook in 2011; ‘LMS’ or like my status and ‘TBH’ — to be honest were the new HMU. In the celebrity and music world, Megan Fox had the fastest growing Page and ‘We Found Love’ by Rihanna and Calvin Harris was the most listened to song.”

“Memology takes the pulse of this global community by comparing this year’s status updates to last year’s, unearthing the most popular topics and cultural trends – or memes – emerging on Facebook,” says Facebook’s Jonathan Chang. “Whether it’s hmu, lms or tbh, each year brings a new set of three letter acronyms that go viral.”

Here’s what the top global topics looked like in 2011:

“As well as identifying the top ten global topics on Facebook, we also dug through the data to identify the top trending cultural phenomena for the year,” says Chang.

This includes planking, the use of “lms” and “tbh”, and the rise of music producer Skrillex:

Facebook also shared the following topic lists for 2011:

US Top 10 status trends

1. lms (like my status)
2. tbh (to be honest)
3. Death of Osama bin Laden
4. Charlie Sheen
5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
6. Casey Anthony found not guilty
7. Packers win the Super Bowl
8. Hurricane Irene
9. Insidious (movie)
10. Death of Amy Winehouse

Fastest growing areas of interest on Facebook globally

Entertainment:

Actors and TV Personalities

1. Megan Fox
2. Vin Diesel
3. Adam Sandler
4. Selena Gomez
5. Will Smith
6. Taylor Lautner
7. Jackie Chan
8. Ashley Tisdale
9. DJ Pauly D
10. Kim Kardashian

Movies

1. Harry Potter
2. The Twilight Saga
3. Toy Story
4. Avatar
5. Jackass
6. Shrek
7. Saw
8. Pirates of the Caribbean
9. Fast &Furious
10. Titanic

TV Shows

1. House
2. Two and a Half Men
3. The Simpsons
4. Family Guy
5. South Park
6. Grey’s Anatomy
7. SpongeBob SquarePants
8. CSI: Miami
9. iCarly
10. The Big Bang Theory

Fictional Characters

1. Dr. House
2. Dory
3. Patrick Star
4. Mr. Bean
5. Upin & Ipin
6. Bob Esponja
7. Mario
8. Doraemon
9. Ari Gold
10. Sue Sylvester (GLEE)

Music:

Musicians

1. Rihanna
2. Bob Marley
3. Avril Lavigne
4. David Guetta
5. Enrique Iglesias
6. Usher
7. Lady Gaga
8. Metallica
9. Green Day
10. Black Eyed Peas

Most Listened To Songs

1. We Found Love – Rihanna and Calvin Harris
2. Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.) – Katy Perry
3. Sexy And I Know It – LMFAO
4. Titanium – David Guetta and Sia
5. First of the Year – Skrillex
6. Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites – Skrillex
7. Without You – David Guetta and Usher
8. Stereo Hearts – Gym Class Heroes featuring Adam Levine
9. Pumped Up Kicks – Foster the People
10. Someone Like You – Adele

Sports:

Athletes

1. Leo Messi
2. Cristiano Ronaldo
3. John Cena
4. Ricardo Kaka
5. David Beckham
6. Michael Jordan
7. Sachin Tendulkar
8. Andres Iniesta
9. Kobe Bryant
10. Cesc Fàbregas

Sports Teams

1. FC Barcelona
2. Real Madrid C.F.
3. Manchester United
4. LA Lakers
5. Chelsea Football Club
6. Liverpool FC
7. A.C. Milan
8. Arsenal
9. Galatasaray
10. Fenerbahce

News:

News Outlets

1. CNN
2. Fox News
3. NPR
4. The Onion
5. The New York Times
6. Al Jazeera Channel
7. Yahoo! News
8. The Times of India
9. BBC World News
10. PBS

Most Shared Articles

Satellite Photos of Japan, Before and After the Quake and Tsunami (New York Times)

What teachers really want to tell parents (CNN)

No, your zodiac sign hasn’t changed (CNN)

Parents, don’t dress your girls like tramps (CNN)

(video) – Father Daughter Dance Medley (Yahoo)

At funeral, dog mourns the death of Navy SEAL killed in Afghanistan (Yahoo)

You’ll freak when you see the new Facebook (CNN)

Dog in Japan stays by the side of ailing friend in the rubble (Yahoo)

Giant crocodile captured alive in Philippines (Yahoo)

New Zodiac Sign Dates: Ophiuchus The 13th Sign? (The Huffington Post)

A couple of things that really stick out as really surprising from all of this data is that the movie Insidious made the top ten in the U.S. and that Avril Lavigne made the top 3 musicians globally. It’s not even about liking them. thought Insidious was OK, but it was more discussed on Facebook in the U.S. than the death of Steve Jobs? Really? I also find it interesting that our Super Bowl champion Green Bay Packers were so high on the global list.

Here are some other year-end reflections:

Celebrities who joined Twitter in 2011
Twitter’s top topics and hashtags of 2011
Most search in 2011 – Yahoo
Most searched/aksed in 2011 – AOL and Ask
Most searched in 2011 – Bing

Bing is the “decision engine,” and clearly people had a lot of decisions to make about Bieber and Kardashian.

“From rising stars and weddings to intense trials and natural disasters, Bing has captured history through the searches that mark the year’s most important people, places and moments in time,” a spokesperson for Bing tells WebProNews.

So here’s that list of most searched people:

1. Justin Bieber
2. Kim Kardashian
3. Jennifer Aniston
4. Lindsay Loahan
5. Jennifer Lopez
6. Britney Spears
7. Katy Perry
8. Megan Fox
9. Lady Gaga
10. Miley Cyrus

The most searched consumer electronics were:

1. Xbox and Kinect
2. Kindle
3. Playstation
4. iPhone 5
5. iPad
6. Wii
7. iPad 2
8. Nook
9. Windows Phone 7
10. Macbook Pro

No Android devices. I wonder if the results were different for Google searches.

The top three news stories were:

1. Casey Anthongy Trial
2. Osama bin Laden Death
3. Hurricane Irene

Top Celebrity Events:

1. Royal Wedding
2. Final “Harry Potter”
3. Kim Kardashian Wedding

Top Finance Quotes:

1. Real estate agents
2. Cheap
3. Coupons

Bing also shared this year-end video:

Bing looks at a few more vertical trends in this blog post.

We’re looking forward to seeing how Google’s year-end list stacks up to Bing’s, given its much larger market share, as it would represent a better picture of what people are truly searching for. I’m guessing Bieber and Kardashian are still pretty high up on the list.

The Oakland Raiders website was the first to break the news, and the team has turned their web presence into an Al Davis memorial. Considering the impact Davis had on the league, this is understandable. While he was a polarizing figure and his team hasn’t enjoyed the success it did in the 70s and 80s, Davis has been a constant with Raiders organization, not shying away from the limelight or any of the controversies his name was attached to. Here’s a look at what the Raiders did to honor their fallen owner:

Incalculable emotion over losing the man who embodied the spirit of a franchise more than any man in sports.

Al dominated it, even while his health deteriorated. That’s a symbol of incredible strength–and at the end, it resulted in incredible isolation.

In light of his passing, Twitter has responded with not one, but two trends honoring the Raiders owner, “RIP Al Davis” and “Just Win Baby.”

Here are just some of the responses:

All things considered, it’s a little surprising there weren’t more posts in the vein of Kissing Suzy Kolber’s reaction. If you’re an NFL fan, that blog should be on your reading list, provided you can handle a great deal of snark with your football news.

One has to wonder how Davis might react to the social media reaction. It’s doubtful things like Twitter and Facebook were part of his day-to-day life, although, considering the humor from the “Shit My Dad Says” Twitter account, perhaps Davis should’ve been encouraged to use it as well. The sports blogs would’ve had a field day. As it stands, one can imagine the outpouring of memories and emotions concerning Davis’ passing will be out in full force tomorrow, the first NFL Sunday since Davis’ death.

Lead image courtesy.