Facebook has become a central way for some of the sports world's biggest stars to share intimate looks at their lives off the playing field with fans around the world

Daily doings, thoughts on current events and peeks at family time are all highlights of this still relatively new type of fan access. And with Mother's Day just around the corner, there may be no more adorable behind-the-scenes look than seeing pro athletes with the women who made them

It's a sure bet that plenty of your favorite sports stars will use Facebook to share aww-inducing pics this Sunday. But we've got our hands on a handful of those photos early, which the players gave Facebook permission to share with us ahead of time Read more...

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Accepting mobile payments —whether by accepting credit cards in the field or by letting users pay on-site with smartphones —is a must for businesses of all types. Figuring out which mobile payment technology is right for your business can be a challenge.

Here are the pros and cons of 14 different mobile payment services to help you sort through your options for accepting mobile payments.

Square

If you're looking for a no-frills approach to mobile credit card processing, then check out Square. With no monthly fees, no contracts and no merchant accounts, Square is a good solution for those who only occasionally need mobile payment processing. Read more...

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Eminem asked and this pooch obliged. When Slim Shady tells you to "Shake That," you do it, even if you're a dog

This 2011 video of rump-shaking Harley has made the viral rounds recently after being plucked from YouTube and uploaded to Facebook. The pup has got crazy rhythm and quite the perfect booty to break it down on the dance floor (or carpeted living room)

As the immortal Chandler Bing from Friends would say, "Gloria Estefan was right. The rhythm will eventually get you." No matter your species apparently

Read more...

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I’m not sure when I first heard the term "lifecasting." It may have been in the late 90s when the TV reality show Big Brother first reached our living rooms, or it could have been much later when Sarah Austin promoted her own brand of video journalism and became famous for being famous.

Back in those days, lifecasting — the continuous live video streaming of a person’s everyday life — was an exciting novelty, an opportunity to abandon our own mundane lives and experience the thrill of being someone else

I thought of lifecasting the other day when I saw my 13-year-old daughter trading Vines with some of her friends. When Twitter first released Vine in January of this year, I didn’t think it would take too long for a generation hooked on YouTube and SnapChat to discover this almost too perfect self-broadcasting platform Read more...

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May is charging ahead at warp speed leading quickly to full-fledged summer. And as the days grow longer and the sun beats down harder, there's only one thing that you need to do — grab a scoop of your favorite ice cream flavor.

This ice cream montage from YouTuber joeyshanksfx will get you drooling in no time, with slow-motion shots of sugary, melty, creamy yumminess

We apologize in advance for all the bikini-prep diets this video will immediately detour. But live a little — we're sure waffle cones have some vitamins in them somewhere (statement not approved by the FDA) Read more...

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The next installment of the saga set in a galaxy far, far away will return to the seat of an Empire much closer to homeStar Wars Episode VII will be at least partly filmed in the United Kingdom, it was revealed Friday

Large parts of the original trilogy (shot from 1976 to 1982) was shot on soundstages near London, specifically Shepperton and Elstree. The prequel trilogy (1998 to 2005) made much less use of the venerable British studios; Lucasfilm preferred to do most of its greenscreen shooting in Australia, where costs were lower.

But the U.K.'s leading finance minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne, waged a campaign to lure Disney (Lucasfilm's new owner) back to the British Isles with some major tax incentives, according to the Daily Mail. Osborne celebrated the news in a tweet: Read more...

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Jeff Bliss is an 18-year old high school student in Duncanville, Ill. who got fed up with a teacher for what he thought was lazy, apathetic teaching. So, he gave her a piece of his mind — and touched a national nerve

A classmate taped his mini sermon on the importance of good teaching and the video went wildly viral — landing him unexpected celebrity

Here's the video that started it all:

Image courtesy of NowThis News Read more...

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Good news, Android fans: You can now install Facebook Home on your device — provided it's running Android 4.0 or higher — whether it's officially supported or not.

Facebook Home was released last month to lots of fanfare but with limited device support. A month and nearly a million downloads later, Facebook Home is available on more phones. At least, on an unofficial basis.

Users who don't have an HTC One X, HTC One, HTC First, Galaxy S III or Galaxy Note II still can't download the app from Google Play, but if you manage to sideload the app, it will work.

While I was setting up an AT&T variant of the Samsung Galaxy S4 today, I noticed that Facebook Home finally worked on the device, albeit with a warning that I might not get "the best experience." The Galaxy S4 is supposed to get official Facebook Home support, so at first I thought this might just be a fluke. Read more...

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The first of JJ Abrams' Star Trek films was undoubtedly a hit for its action and special effects, but did the movie really do the series justice for all those Trekkies out there?

Screen Junkies sure doesn't think so. In anticipation of the May 16 release of Star Trek Into Darkness, it analyzed the first film for all its mistakes, plot holes and general weird inconsistencies, potentially proving the guy whose claim to fame was TV's Felicity shouldn't have had anything to do with this franchise

The biggest issue Screen Junkies stumbled across? Lens flares. So many lens flares. William Shatner would not approve Read more...

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We all thought it was a joke, but it wasn'tThe Onion really got hacked on Monday, and it was indeed victim of the Syrian Electronic Army (SAE), the pro-Assad group of "hacktivists" who have been hacking media companies left and right.

In an unusually serious blog post, the satirical website's tech team recounts step by step how it got hacked

Everything began in much the same way the vast majority of these hacks start: with a phishing email, an attempt to get an employee to click on a malicious link. In this case, the link appeared to lead to a Washington Post story, but it actually redirected to another web address, which directed to yet another fake site that asked for Google Apps credentials. Read more...

More about Hacking, Social Hacking, Phishing, The Onion, and Us World

With the announcement this week that a handgun made from a 3D printer fired successfully, 3D manufacturers may soon find themselves in a gray area when it comes to liability. From the looks of it, these companies aren’t ready for the new wave of customers and responsibility this might bring.

According to the BBC, designs for the Liberator plastic pistol have been downloaded more than 100,000 times already — before the U.S. government ordered that the designs be taken down for fear they may violate arms-exporting laws.

Still, the designs are out there, accessible through sites such as The Pirate Bay. “Makers,” or hobbyists, with their own 3D printers, such as the MakerBot Replicator 2 ($2,199) and 3DSystems CubeX ($2,499), are presumably still free to print it and whatever else they want Read more...

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New York City — the place where dreams come true. You party all night and everything is like one big episode of Sex and the City

Yeah, right

More like, New York City — the place where it costs upwards of $1,000 a month to rent a suspicious-smelling "studio" (read: unventilated, four-by-four, underground box) with rodent-like roommates. No one knows — or has documented — the plight of NYC real estate more so than Ryan Nethery, the creator of the Tumblr The Worst Room.

In the blog, Nethery curates the most awful living situations he stumbles across on Craigslist while scouring for "decent, affordable housing." It's a disheartening, yet very honest look into city life that only New Yorkers would really understand Read more...

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It was the lightsaber practice heard 'round the world, and one of the earliest viral videos online. It spawned a dozen parodies. But for one teenager, it meant years of hell. Now he's finally speaking out.

Ghyslain Raza, a ninth grader in Quebec, tried out some moves with a golf ball retriever in his high school's TV studio. He recorded the result. It was gawky and uncoordinated; it was, after all, just something he was trying out for a Star Wars skit at a school gala

"I was goofing around," Raza told Canada's Macleans magazine in his first and only interview, 10 years later. "Most 14-year-old boys would do something similar in that situation, maybe more gracefully." Read more...

More about Youtube, Star Wars, Lightsaber, Film, and Video

Twitter is a crowded place that can easily confuse beginner users and the less technologically savvy. Believe it or not, many prefer not to be a part of the online conversation.

You might remember fumbling with the service when first joining. While most overcome that confusion, some Twitter accounts never live to fulfill their potential. Users frustrated with the service just can't seem to figure out the point.

SEE ALSO: 100 Dead Twitter Accounts That Deserve a Second Chance

What's more perplexing is configuring your mobile device. Twitter not only sends push notifications to your phone, it can also send via SMS, among many other features. To most, the 404-04 number flashing on their phone is a no-brainer. Read more...

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It may feel like summer in many cities across the U.S. today, but a cruise through the southernmost place on Earth is never out of season.

Chill out with this beautiful timelapse footage through Antarctica's Ross Sea. Happy Friday, folks.

Homepage image courtesy of NowThisNews Read more...

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When you count down the hours until a new episode of your favorite TV show airs, the last thing you want to encounter is a spoiler on social networking sites. Is there anything worse? Didn't think so.

Setting out to fix that very issue, 17-year-old Jen Lamere recently took home the top prize at the TVnext hack event in Boston (where she was the only female participating) for her Twivo app for Google Chrome. The concept is exactly how it sounds: Tivo for tweets.

Twivo puts a block on tweets with keywords relevant to any show during certain periods of time. This way, you never have to be afraid to check out Twitter while away from the TV. Read more...

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Interacting with your friends on Facebook just got a lot easier — If you’re a Bing user, that is.

Starting Friday, Bing will show comments from Facebook relevant to your search in the sidebar. From that search, you can Like a friend’s post, comment, or see the original post in its entirety on Facebook

For instance, my search for "New Kids on the Block" brought up several posts from my friends who are fans, one who was excited to hear a NKOTB song on the radio, and another who was excited to be going to an NKOTB concert this summer. So, if I happened to be looking for a friend to go to the concert with, I could potentially contact one of them. Read more...

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The Nokia Lumia 928 is officially coming to Verizon on May 16.

The phone was already leaked earlier this week, thanks to an ad in Vanity Fair, but now the release date — and carrier — is official. The Lumia 928 is the latest flagship phone in Nokia's Windows Phone 8 stable.

Nokia revealed details of the Lumia 928 on its blog Friday. Just as the Lumia 920 was exclusive to AT&T, the Lumia 928 is exclusive to Verizon.

While the design of the two phones are slightly different, the specs are remarkably similar.

The Lumia 928 features:

• A 4.5-inch display

• 8.7 megapixel PureView camera

• Wireless charging

• 1GB of RAM

• 1.5 Ghz dual-core Snapdragon processor

• 32GB of storage Read more...

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The iPhone Mashup Shoe design by Alan Nguyen of Freedom of Creation, a Dutch 3D printing house, is a pair of 3D printed platform heels with a holster on the side to hold an iPhone.

The design was commissioned by FreshFiber, the 3D-printed accessories site, and was presented at last year’s Milan Design Week.

As written on the designer’s website, the shoes allowed him to fuse art, fashion and product design with 3D printing.

Image courtesy of Alan Nguyen Read more...

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Welp, this could have gone a lot better

Stetson University brought out an insurance company executive to throw the ceremonial first pitch before a recent baseball game against Florida State. But instead of a nice nod to a corporate sponsor, what Stetson got instead was quite possibly the worst first pitch in the 100-plus-year history of baseball as a human sport.

And to make matters worse? Stetson then lost the ensuing game, 13-5. Check the pitch out for yourself above and let us know what you think in the comments

Read more...

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The middle of May marks a definitive point of change. The seasons shift; the weather warms up in some parts of the world and cools off in others. For many, the school year is coming to an end, and even more people are starting new jobs and moving to new places

For this edition of the Mashable Photo Challenge Guest Series, we want your photos that capture change

Your photos could relate to the altering weather, a new beginning in your life or even the changing landscape of a city or countryside. What are the best photos you've taken that reflect change? Follow the directions below to submit your photo, and our guest curator will select some of the most creative and compelling submissions to feature on Mashable Read more...

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On Tuesday, the CIA announced the new head of its National Clandestine Service, one of the agency's most important branches, responsible for sending spies abroad and managing its drone program. And in classic spy fashion, the announcement didn't include the agency head's name, saying the agent "remains undercover."

The statement by CIA spokesperson Jennifer Youngblood did mention that the agent had been a CIA veteran for 30 years and that he had "rich substantive and operational experiences worldwide." And even though the name of the new chief spy, as well as the name of the agent who was first picked to lead the clandestine service but was then passed over, "are widely known in the intelligence community," as the Washington Post put it, the CIA "requested that they not be identified because they are undercover." Read more...

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Someone has to open those LinkedIn emails eventually, right?

Tim Siedell's hilarious tweet is illustrated by Twaggies. Be sure to check out more great Twaggies comics on Mashable, and let us know if you've spied a funny tweet that's just begging for a visual.

Comic illustration by Twaggies. Published with permission; all rights reserved. Read more...

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This Mother's Day, we're going to call it: Ours is a great age in which to be a mom. Yes, being a parent in the digital era means laying down rules about Snapchat and making sure your kids' online privacy is protected. But with all new technology comes a parenting tool that can improve the lives of moms and their families

We invited three digital experts who are modern-day moms for a conversation about what technologies, apps and devices are must-haves for parents

Join us for a Google+ Hangout on Friday at 3:15 p.m. ET. We'll talk about work/life balance and other ways that technology factors into modern parenting. Leave your questions in the comments section below and don't forget to tune in to the Mother's Day Hangout on Mashable or our Google+ page! Read more...

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Amazon has expanded its Cloud Drive offerings with a new photo-centric app for iPhone.

Amazon Cloud Drive Photos [iTunes link] for iPhone lets users back-up their entire iPhone photo libraries to Amazon's Cloud Drive. The app is essentially the same as the Android app released last November.

You can choose to back-up your entire camera roll to Cloud Drive or choose specific photos from different albums. There is also an autosave mode that works in a similar fashion to Dropbox's photo backup mode or the auto-upload features in Google+.

More about Amazon, Photos, Ios Apps, Amazon Cloud Drive, and Tech

John Kerry is set to make some digital diplomacy history Friday by becoming the first sitting secretary of state to take part in a Google Hangout

During the Hangout, Kerry will discuss his view of the United States' role in global affairs and take questions on American engagement with foreign countries.

Kerry will be joined at 1:30 p.m. ET by Sarah Hill, a digital storyteller for the Veterans United Network with a strong following on Google Plus; Corrie Fraiser, who leads +SocialGood, an organization that connects innovators around social good; Adolfo Garcia, a 20-year U.S. marine who's twice been deployed to Afghanistan; Emily McKhann, co-founder of mom blogger network The Motherhood; and Andrew White, president of Comptus Inc., which produces weather instruments Read more...

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In 2005, writer David Foster Wallace stood before the graduates of Kenyon College and delivered a memorable and impactful commencement address

The speech, later turned into a book titled This Is Water, has become a classic to many, up there with Steve Jobs' 2005 Stanford address. Videogram company The Glossary has revived Wallace's words with a video visualizing the concepts described by the writer, who died in 2008.

The Glossary describes the speech as "the most simple and elegant explanation of the real value of education."

Image via Keith Bedford/Getty Images Read more...

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It may seem like everyone already has all the mobile devices they need, but shipments for notebooks, tablets and smartphones reached 308.7 million in the first quarter of 2013, up more than 37% in the same quarter from the year before.

According to new data from Canalys, Android continues to dominate the mobile market, making up nearly 60% of those shipmentsApple accounted for about 19% of the share and Microsoft brought in 18%.

Tablets are the fastest growing among the three markets, climbing 106% year-over-year to 41.9 million units. Apple continues to take the lead with a 46% tablet share, but it only experienced modest annual growth (6.7%) for its smartphones. In fact, it reached the lowest level since the 2007 launch of the original iPhone. Read more...

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Borderlands 2 will have a reason to dive back into Pandora next week, as the new playable character Krieg joins the five other classes available to players.

Eight months after the release of Borderlands 2, Gearbox Software is still adding content to the cooperative loot-and-shoot title, which has sold more than 6 million units since its launch.

Krieg, the Bandit Psycho, is exactly what he sounds like: an in-your-face, melee-focused character that changes the play dynamic of the game. Gearbox Creative Director Paul Hellquist said he wanted the character to inspire fans who were still playing to change the way they think about the game. Read more...

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Camille Seaman was vacuuming her living room when the idea struck her: I should drive into the heart of a really dangerous storm.

It was during a TV show about storm-chasing, one of those behind-the-scenes mini-docs on Discovery or History, when her daughter, lounging on the couch while Seaman maneuvered the vacuum between furniture, made the playful suggestion

"She just looked up and said, 'Hey, mom, you should do that!'" Seaman told Mashable. "And I thought, 'Yeah, this actually looks pretty fun.'"

Just three days later, Seaman was in Kansas with a team of professional storm-chasers, helping to monitor, track and photograph monstrous cloud formations as they crept across the Great Plains Read more...

More about Photos, Nature, Crowdfunding, Kickstarter, and Us World