Twitter and Facebook Go (RED) for World AIDS Day

Above: Twitter's (RED) look for Dec. 1st, World AIDS Day

Above: Twitter's usual homepage, as of July 29, 2009

In support of World AIDS Day, Twitter and Facebook have gone (RED) for the day.

Facebook is running a campaign at facebook.com/joinred, where you can share the (RED) video, change your profile pic to a (RED) photo to support AIDS awareness, or shop (RED) products.

Twitter's support is much more pervasive across the site, which is respectable. They replaced their usual homepage design with (RED) galore, including a red ribbon of text that implores users to "turn Twitter (RED)". But how do we do that? Well, it says we can "follow @JoinRED to find out"! After visiting @JoinRED, I realized that there are three main ways to "turn Twitter red":

1.) Use the hashtag #red
2.) Use the hashtag #laceupsavelives
3.) Turn tweets the color red

Above: If you use the hastags #red or #laceupsavelives, or tweet the word "red" your tweets turn red

Well, well, well! Get on it tweeters!

Twitter Launches New Homepage

(Above: The NEW and IMPROVED Twitter homepage!)

(Above: The OLD and OKAY Twitter homepage!)

Twitter launched their new homepage today, which focuses on searching and Trending Topics. The search bar implores of visitors to "See what people are saying about…". Below the search bar, a cloud of the most popular topics being talked about on Twitter is featured. Oddly, there is a phrase that says "Most popular topics by the minute, day and week"... however, I'm not sure how to narrow them down by those time frames.

Yesterday, Chloe Sladden, director of media partnerships at Twitter, gave a lecture on the future of Twitter. One of the upcoming changes she mentioned was a new homepage that focuses on searching the content of the site. Well, I didn't see it coming so soon! Congrats, Twitter!