Facebook purchased location-based service provider Gowalla with plans to move away from displaying a time-based feed of your friends’ recent check-ins, and focus instead on creating Stories around the places you and your friends have visited.

We used Social Radar to analyze conversations around location-based services and the acquisition online.

Gowalla vs. Foursquare mentions

Gowalla, which had not been generating significant buzz this month, spiked above Foursquare mentions following the acquisition speculation last week and confirmation today.

Will the acquisition help Facebook conquer the location-based market that it failed to do with Places?

U.S. President Barack Obama teamed up with LinkedIn for a town hall about creating jobs and growing the economy, streamed live online today. The town hall was part of the President’s effort to promote the American Jobs Act, a bill he introduced earlier this month at a joint session of Congress.

We used Social Radar to analyze conversations online.

LinkedIn buzz

Buzz around LinkedIn today following President Obama’s town hall increased slightly, but LinkedIn mentions were higher in May following its IPO.

We reported last week that Facebook buzz increased significantly following its redesign and f8 conference. How does Facebook buzz compare with LinkedIn?

LinkedIn vs. Facebook buzz

Facebook mentions dwarf LinkedIn mentions online. Facebook buzz is at its highest point in the last six months by a large margin.

LinkedIn sentiment

Conversations around LinkedIn the last 30 days have been extremely positive. Today sentiment around LinkedIn is 91% positive.

Facebook sentiment

Conversations around Facebook the last 30 days have been an average of 72% positive. Today sentiment around LinkedIn is only 59% positive.

Facebook has once again redesigned the news feed and officially launched a ticker in the right-hand side of the screen displaying real-time updates. The news feed reflects the addition of the recently launched smart friend lists, the subscribe button and the relocated privacy controls on the site.

The updates precede the upcoming “major profile redesign” Facebook is expected to roll out at its f8 developer conference tomorrow.

As with most Facebook updates, many users complained. MySpace even became a trending topic on Twitter last night, comparing the new Facebook changes to the fledgling overly complicated MySpace design.

We used Social Radar to analyze conversations online.

Facebook buzz

Facebook mentions — which are typically already high compared to other topics — increased 300% overnight.

Facebook sentiment August 18 – September 19

Facebook sentiment September 20-21

Negative chatter increased 9% following the changes. The word ‘MySpace’ appears in nearly 2% of all Facebook conversations. The word ‘Facebook’ appears in nearly 60% of all MySpace conversations.

#NewFacebook sentiment

The hashtag #NewFacebook was also trending overnight and today. Nearly 80% of all mentions were negative.

Facebook vs. Twitter vs. Google+

Not to be outdone, Google+ announced several new features, such as turning Hangouts into a bona fide broadcast platform. The search giant even added search to the service, and alerted users to the new changes with a giant blue arrow on the Google.com homepage.

Twitter, which typically generates the most mentions online among the big three, fell behind to Facebook following all of the current buzz.

Will tomorrow’s f8 conference, which speculates potential partnerships with Spotify and others, increase positive buzz for Facebook?

Facebook today unveiled Facebook Messenger, an Android and iPhone app dedicated to sending messages and texts through the world’s largest social network. The mobile app is a direct result of Facebook’s acquisition of group messaging app Beluga in March. Facebook Messenger is the first mobile app developed and released outside of the official Facebook app.

We used Social Radar to analyze conversations around the new app against conversations around Google+.

Facebook Messenger vs. Google+ buzz

Google+ chatter has subsided substantially since its launch earlier this summer.

Facebook vs. Google

Facebook has consistently generated more chatter than Google over the past six months.

Which company do you think is best positioned to win the battle?

Turntable.fm, the upstart online music sharing service, received good press in June following its launch. Turntable.fm turns music into a social game by letting members set up or join rooms where they can play music for each other.

Fast Company reported this week that labels, promoters and bands such as Passion Pit are turning to Turntable.fm rather than Facebook or Twitter or even radio to announce concerts. Lady Gaga and Kanye West are listed among the company’s latest investors.

Will Turntable.fm turn into the best promotional tool for artists to interact with fans? We used Social Radar to analyze conversations online.

Turntable.fm buzz

Turntable.fm buzz spiked in June following its launch and has since subsided considerably.

Online music sharing comparison

We compared Turntable.fm to other popular music sharing and discovery services such as Blip.fm, Pandora, Rdio and Spotify. Blip.fm consistently generated the most conversations online among the five services, followed by Pandora, Spotify, Turntable.fm, and Rdio.

Has the initial excitement around Turntable.fm already worn off? Or will we see more artists use the platform to launch music, make announcements and interact with fans?

Not many words appear more often in the Social Radar database than ‘Obama.’ ‘Facebook,’ ‘Google’ and ‘Twitter’ regularly challenge ‘Obama’ for the most mentioned word online. But as of today, the word ‘debt’ has officially surpassed ‘Obama’ mentions.

Debt mentions

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., told the Senate today that they will remain in session “continuously” every day until Congress passes legislation that prevents a default in raising the nation’s $14.3 trillion debt ceiling.

If something is not passed before the August 2 deadline for action, the federal government would, in effect, go dark. Reid warned, “Literally every function of government could cease. Social security checks, payments to our veterans.”

Last week Facebook attempted to create buzz about an upcoming announcement today, inviting people to an “awesome” event online. It didn’t take long for the news to leak that the event would focus around Facebook’s long-rumored video chat product.

Facebook unveiled today video chat powered by Skype, as well as group chat.

Facebook buzz

Overall chatter around Facebook today is about equal to its average for the month.

Facebook vs. Google buzz

Many called today’s announcement Facebook’s response to Google’s Google+ announcement last week. Overall chatter around Facebook still trails chatter around Google.

Facebook’s new Skype video chat feature continues the integration between Microsoft and Facebook, including Microsoft’s Bing search engine, which indexes Facebook’s social data. With Facebook’s entry into the video-chat market, they’ll be competing with Apple’s FaceTime, Google Talk and the new Google+ Hangouts.

Skype mentioned within 6% of current Facebook chatter

We measured the number of Skype, video chat and group chat mentions within Facebook conversations, as well as the number of “awesome announcement” mentions to determine whether the attempted hype helped create buzz. Skype is currently generating the most buzz within those topics, being mentioned in nearly 6% of all Facebook conversations online. The “awesome announcement” hype attempt did not appear to help generate significant buzz for Facebook.

What are your thoughts on the new Facebook features announced today?

Last month, we wrote a post comparing chatter for each of the major scandals in 2011 and predicted that another scandal would come along next month to capture the nation’s short attention span. Sure enough, the Casey Anthony verdict this week provided plenty of fodder online.

After less than 11 hours of deliberation, a jury Tuesday found Casey Anthony not guilty of first-degree murder and the other most serious charges against her in the 2008 death of her 2-year-old daughter.

We used Social Radar to measure conversations online comparing Casey Anthony vs. Charlie Sheen vs. Anthony Weiner vs. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Casey Anthony vs. Sheen vs. Weiner vs. Schwarzenegger chatter

Casey Anthony buzz surpassed Charlie Sheen chatter at its highest point in March to become the most talked about scandal of 2011 so far.

Casey Anthony verdict chatter

As anticipated, nearly every conversation around Casey Anthony was negative. Nearly 75% of conversations around Casey Anthony were negative.

How soon we forget

Chatter around Casey Anthony is already down 54%. Tuesday’s outrage has been replaced with tweets about Facebook’s new video chatting capabilities and other news announced today. Has social media officially shortened our collective attention span?

Last Thursday, June 30 was Mashable’s second annual Social Media Day, a day to acknowledge and celebrate the revolution of media becoming social. Mashable organized more than 600 meet-ups all over the world to celebrate the event. Mashable used Twitter handle @mashSMday to provide real-time updates and developments on the celebration and encouraged people to upload photos to Flickr, post comments on Facebook, visit their SMday.com website and tweet using the #SMDay hashtag.

We used Social Radar to analyze conversations online comparing 2011 vs. 2010 chatter.

Social Media Day chatter

Overall chatter around Social Media Day increased in 2011. The number of mentions for Social Media Day and #SMDay were higher on June 30, 2011 vs. June 30, 2010.

Social Media Day sentiment

Conversations around Social Media Day were 95% positive. Mashable appeared in 13% of all Social Media Day mentions.

Content category distribution

More than 80% of overall chatter around Social Media Day came via Twitter.

Gender distribution

Approximately 65% of Social Media Day mentions were by men and 35% by women.

Mashable buzz

Overall Mashable’s second annual Social Media Day was a success from the standpoint of generating conversations online. The event also created buzz for Mashable, which generated its highest number of mentions of the year on June 30.

How did you celebrate Social Media Day?

Google’s latest attempt at social networking was unveiled yesterday as Google+. As AdAge pointed out, Google sorted out the web and made it searchable; can it also create the connections between people that are making it social?

The major difference between Facebook and Google+ is that instead of having a massive friend list, users collect each other into groups, such as family, work and friends, called “circles.” So users can keep their weekend party photos from being seen by coworkers. And on Google+, there are no friend requests. People do not need to agree to be friends with one another and can view updates without sharing their own.

Can Google+ compete with Facebook?

Facebook vs. Google chatter

Google is currently appearing in nearly 1.25% of all conversations online. Chatter around Google is up 14% over the past month, while chatter around Facebook is down 8% overall.

Google sentiment

Conversations around Google were an average of 79% positive over the last month and are currently 81% positive.

Facebook sentiment

Conversations around Facebook were an average of 72% positive over the last month and are currently 64% positive.

Will Google finally succeed at social and give Facebook a run for its money? Or will Google+ fade into oblivion just like Google Buzz and Google Wave?