Barry Hand

Cov­er­ing a two week roundup due to hol­i­days, so here are 5 great sto­ries plucked fresh from the dig­i­tal universe.

1. Friend-a-Gorilla

New cam­paign from the Uganda Wildlife Author­ity tap­ping into the rise of con­ser­va­tion tourism.

Gorilla tourism raised $225 mil­lion in Uganda last year, seri­ous busi­ness and this new cam­paign allows peo­ple to spon­sor a gorilla from only $1 and track them online, check it out on Friend-a-Gorilla. They’re also on twit­ter @friendagorilla and have Face­book inter­ac­tion. I like every­thing about this cam­paign, espe­cially the way it uses social media to build a relationship.

2. Google launch Fast Flip

New from the labs team at Google is Fast Flip, which lets you flip through lots of web­sites with­out vis­it­ing them. This is cool because you can basi­cally cre­ate your own mag­a­zine, one to keep on eye on. Google Fast Flip.

3. Dis­ney launch blog

For a com­pany immersed in media, Dis­ney have finally got an offi­cial blog — which sets out to pro­vide “…the lat­est, offi­cial infor­ma­tion about Dis­ney des­ti­na­tions as well as behind-the-scenes looks at what makes Dis­ney Parks the most mag­i­cal places on earth”.

From what’s already been posted up, there is a good mix of visual con­tent and inside information.

4. Google Wave Invi­ta­tions

Google Wave allows users to manip­u­late and col­lab­o­rate on con­tent at the same time, in what is the most antic­i­pated appli­ca­tion of the year. Around 100,000 Google Wave invites are due this week.

5. Changes In the Media Landscape

Nice roundup from Christian’s Dig­i­tol­ogy Blog on changes in the media land­scape with updates on Google, Face­book, Adobe and other heavy hit­ters.